"Typical" Iraqi House Floorplan.

**FOFEBA** · 01-23-2007

First of all, thank you to those who to the time to offer advice in regards to my last RFI.

My request is for an explaination (or links to find) the layout of a generic Iraqi "suburban" house.

Google provides some exterior imagery but the floor plan of the interior is my concern.

Any assistance would be appreciated,

Thanks.

**jcustis** · 01-23-2007

As far as "typical suburban" homes go, I can't really say that there are any. Are you talking about a moderately wealthy home, with say, two floors?

There are a couple of commonalities across the various homes I've been in, even though they may differ widely in layout:

-The main room off of the front door is usually large.
-Kitchens, side bedrooms, etc. generally have a direct line-of-sight into that initial main room.
-Depending on the purpose of the room, it may not have a door to secure it. Even if the most humble accomodations here in the U.S. most rooms have doors, so it can be odd to enter a room, and suddenly face several open and uncleared spaces. Think of the old MOUT training facilities before we got smart and realized that doors and furniture added to the realism of the training.
-There is usually a staircase that leads to the roof, or you'll find an exit on the second floor that leads to an exterior staircase, which in turn leads to the roof.
-The flooring is almost always slippery when wet, because there's no such thing as wall-to-wall carpeting except in the wealthiest of homes.
-The interiors can actually be very spartan by American standards, with few pieces of furniture.

**Tom Odom** · 01-23-2007

Out of curiosity, do Iraqi homes and apartments have the "hidden hallway" like Egyptian middle/upper class homes and apartments? The hidden hallway is used so the ladies of the house can move unseen from main entertainment areas and access those areas at will.

Best

Tom

**jcustis** · 01-23-2007

I've seen hidden hallways in a couple of the wealthier homes I've been in. For the most part, the "middle-class" homes I saw did not have them, but then again I did not get to dig into every nook and cranny. RTK may have a better perspective.

**RTK** · 01-23-2007

Originally Posted by Tom Odom

Out of curiosity, do Iraqi homes and apartments have the "hidden hallway" like Egyptian middle/upper class homes and apartments? The hidden hallway is used so the ladies of the house can move unseen from main entertainment areas and access those areas at will.

Best

Tom

jcustis is right. Among the wealthier homes, there is the "hidden hallway." Government quarters, depending on where they were build, followed a fairly standard floor plan. Ubaydi houses all looked the same as it was a government gridded community where every house had the same layout. Certain areas of Habbaniyah, particularly the government quarters area, all looked the same. Once you get away from the military installations and government owned infrastructure areas, floorplans ran the gamut.

Among periphery homes, most had a fairly standard large meeting area adjacent to the kitchen area. I did see (among some high ranking former military officers) homes with a more westernized style of architecture, with vaulted ceilings, circular staircases, and individual bedrooms. The poor guy's family typically all sleep in the same room. Those more well off have individual bedrooms. Hope this helps.

**Jimbo** · 01-23-2007

The hardest part with the houses in Iraq is getting into them. Almost all of the houses are set up to be very secure places at night(or when desired). They usually have a wall towards the street with a vehicle gate and a pedestrain gate. The gates are usually steel. It is kind of hacienda style. The exterior doors on the houses are made of steel, usually around 20 gage or better. Once you get in the house the rooms vary. The kitchen will have a small room off of it, kind of like a laundry room. The dining room will look familiar. There will be a room for entertaining (kind of like an old school parlor). The furniture in that room is usually along the exterior walls. Stairs tend to be narrow, or an open spiral stair case in nice places. Bedrooms are typical, no walk in closets, they tend to have wardrobes and such. The hard part is getting in the house.

**RTK** · 01-23-2007

Originally Posted by Jimbo

The hardest part with the houses in Iraq is getting into them.

Which is why God made shotguns, demolitions, hooligan tools, and mechanized vehicles....

**FOFEBA** · 01-24-2007

Thanks for your replies.

1. Are the bathroom / toilet inside the house or outside and is there seperate facilities for male/female ?

2. Will small arms / grenade frag penetrate interior walls ?

3. What is typical for vehicle parking once inside the outer wall ( for example uncovered parking, tin roofed shelter, or shed/garage) ?

4. Any cellars / subterrainian rooms?

5. What are typical hiding places or defenite search areas for site exploitation?

**jcustis** · 01-24-2007

Check my comments in red.

Originally Posted by FOFEBA

Thanks for your replies.

1. Are the bathroom / toilet inside the house or outside and is there seperate facilities for male/female ? I've seen both, usually depending on the level of affluence. In richer homes, you amy actually see a European-style toilet!

2. Will small arms / grenade frag penetrate interior walls ? Depends.

3. What is typical for vehicle parking once inside the outer wall ( for example uncovered parking, tin roofed shelter, or shed/garage) ? I've seen a variety, but few garages per se.

4. Any cellars / subterrainian rooms? No cellars, but crawlspaces in some cases

5. What are typical hiding places or defenite search areas for site exploitation?That's drifting into opsec. There are resources on AKO and CALL to get info on this question. For that matter, have you gone to AKO BKCS forums and asked these questions as well?

There's a lot of stuff available via your local AKO account as well.