Category: Iraq

Teaching Security

I got an afternoon with the soldiers of the 94th Military Police Company today, where I got to sit down with a bunch of people from New Hampshire and talk about their work in Iraq. It included some of the most encouraging discussions of my trip thus far. The 94th MPC is training Iraqi Police, or IPs, to be good cops, and at this point they don’t even train anymore. The Iraqis now have police officers who specialize in training, officers the soldiers trust. The soldiers didn’t shy away from the challenges–many trainees aren’t committed to their training or their jobs–but they have seen growth and investment. One member of the company who is also a cop in southern New Hampshire said the officers here are starting to form the sort of tight knit bonds that connect officers everywhere. They are still forming, he said, but it has begun.

I’ve heard a lot of concern about what will happen here in 11 months, when the military is scheduled to hand Iraq back to the Iraqis, but there is hope too. That these officers are training themselves, and that the 94th MPC is there only to assist, is a reason for hope. Several soldiers told me before they came to Iraq they didn’t have much compassion for the Iraqis. As far as they understood, Iraqis were incapable of governing themselves and living peacefully together. But the experience of working in Iraq with people dedicated to the country’s future has made them reexamine that view. They now want very badly for this country to survive, not just for America’s sake but for the sake of their new friends.

It’s nice to taste that hope. It isn’t the overwhelming sentiment here, but it’s here enough that it can’t be ignored.

The Violence Continues…

Just in case anyone thought it was safe here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/19/world/middleeast/19iraq.html?_r=1&hp

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE70E0TS20110115

Three dead Americans and roughly 50 dead Iraqis in the three days since I got here. Combat operations may have ceased for U.S. soldiers, but it’s still dangerous out there, if not a war.

Update:

One more example: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/20/world/middleeast/20iraq.html?_r=1&hp

Randomness

None of these quite make a whole post alone, but together they do.
I paid $9 for internet last night so I could call my wife on Skype. It was the best connection I’ve had since I’ve been here. I gave her a tour of my CHU (containerized housing unit) and caught up with her — well worth the money spent. She said the CHU looked nicer than the hotel room we rented in Barcelona. She was right.
Last night an owl swooped in front of the car I was riding in and flew infront of us for about 15 seconds. The sergeant who was driving said it was the first time he’d seen an owl in Iraq.
A contractor in Kuwait showed me photos from when he was in the military on active duty of people blown apart by suicide bombers. He said if people saw what really went on back then they’d want all the soldiers to come home. He was heading to Afghanistan to work on deisel engines. I asked why he came back. He said he wanted to do his part to support the troops.
The C-130 had a little funnel near the rear of the plane where you can urinate. It was not set up for women.
The MRAP has eight passenger seats, four to a side, facing frontwards and backwards. That’s the “comfort” setup, but the walls of the MRAP are angled to deflect IED blasts, so your outside leg gets incredibly uncomfortable, and the four point harnesses make it hard to pivot.
A contractor who had spent time in the military told me “If you aren’t in line, get in line. If you can’t find one, start one.”
There are more contractors than military here. According to one person, it’s about 70,000 to 50,000.
The food, when its from the DFAC (dining facility) is pretty good, but I’ve only eaten one meal there. The prepackaged stuff is a little scary.
The SUV I rode in today had armor in the door — it felt like it was 50 lbs.
There were no palm trees in Kuwait, and no birds. Baghdad has lots of palm trees, and I saw a bird as soon as I walked out of the airport. Someone told me they have seen rabbits and wild dogs too, but no camels.
I’ve barely eaten over the last three days because my body has no idea what meal it should be expecting.
The contractors I met at Ali Al Salem were all Americans and former military. In Baghdad there are contractors of all nationalities.
There are lots of guns.
The Baghdad airport has these towers that track incoming mortars and shoot them out of the sky. One of the contractors told me they shoot something like 1,000 rounds a second.
The bases all still take IDF (indirect fire) but it isn’t targeted so it rarely hits anything. I have yet to hear any, but it still scares me.
It rained in Baghdad a couple days ago, and now there is mud everywhere. “It only takes a little bit,” a soldier told me.

Green Zone

I caught a ride on a Rhino this morning into the Green Zone, where soldiers from the press information office met me almost as soon as I got off. A Rhino is aptly named. I didn’t get any photos of them, but the are armored SUVs the size of dumptrucks. If Rhinos had puppies they’d be called Hummers, that’s how big they are.

It took longer to get off the Baghdad airport base than it did to drive through hostile territory, but then again once off the base the driver floored it and used a siren to clear traffic. It was still dark when we left, I was in the second of four Rhinos. They have a turret on top, and a soldier scanned the side of the road with a spotlight as we drove. Nothing happened.

The sun was rising when I got off the Rhino in the Green Zone. Again, that’s been the best indicator on this trip, because after only three hours sleep I couldn’t tell what day it was (I know it’s Tuesday morning back home, so I think it’s Tuesday afternoon here).

Two soldiers from the press center met me at the Rhino stop and brought me to the credentialing office, but it wasn’t open yet. We went and grabbed some breakfast, and I met up with some of the soldiers I’d been going back and forth over email with for the last month.

I got in to get my press pass around 9 a.m. It’s just a letter, because their card printer is broken and the new machine hasn’t arrived yet. I’ve been going everywhere with my travel orders and my passport, which always get funny looks because everyone is supposed to have an ID. I thought that was going to end today. Oh well. I haven’t been stopped yet, so I guess it isn’t something to worry about.

Then they took me to my room, another CHU. I said I was going to sleep for an hour or so, which they said was fine because they had to figure out some transportation stuff.

They woke me up at 4 p.m. I slept basically all day. And what’s more, I’m still tired. All the travel has caught up with me, I think. But I’ve got a nice place to sleep tonight, and a reasonable start time of 7 a.m. tomorrow, so hopefully I’ll catch up.

And I’ll also be getting to work. The Rhino drivers are from the 94th Military Police Company, one of the units I wanted to visit. It’s finally be time to pull out the microphone.

Much Better…

I’m sitting in my CHU (Containerized Housing Unit) about to bed down before a 4:15 a.m. meeting for my MRAP (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected) trip to the Green Zone tomorrow. Everything seems to have been sorted out. I’m not sure what went wrong, but it probably had something to do with the fact that my flight got me in on the 16th despite leaving on the morning of the 15th. I don’t know, but it’s nice to be in a heated room with some food, internet and a bed.

I have to say I’ve been impressed with the friendliness and helpfulness of every soldier and contractor I’ve come across so far. I know it shouldn’t be a surprise, but basically thus far every next step has been a mystery, and I’ve had to rely on the U.S. military 100 percent to guide me. And they’ve come through. When I don’t know something there is always someone there willing to either answer my question or direct me to someone who can. I figured in a high-stress environment where thousands of people are moving through everyday people would be less interested in helping out a total neophyte. I was wrong.

I’ve got six hours until I’ve got to catch my ride to the Rhino, as the MRAPs are called, so I’m going to crash. I got a Skype call in to my wife, saw my dog, and wolfed down a sandwich. Tomorrow I think I get to do what I came here to do.

Adrift

So I touched down in Baghdad an hour or so ago, thinking I was right on schedule to get my paperwork together and get my press ID. I called the press information center, and they thought I was flying to a different airport. I’m not exactly sure how that happened, because I was on the military plane they scheduled, but apparently that kind of mix-up happens. So now I’m sitting in an internet cafe (I can’t get the wireless on my laptop) waiting to call the press center back to see what I’m supposed to do next.

In the meantime, I have to say the C-130 I flew in on was an experience. Earplugs, bulletproof vest and helmet, lying on the seats made of one inch flat webbing. No window, no tray tables, minimal climate control. Enter through the rear bay door, and watch the landing gear go down through the little window.

I talked to another U.S. soldier who said he didn’t think there would be much of Iraq left if the U.S. leaves. That’s been the overwhelming opinion of the people I’ve talked to thus far. Not very encouraging, considering troops are scheduled to leave in one year.

OK, I’ve got to make a phone call or two to see if I’m sleeping in an airport or if I’ll find a bunk and some dinner. Wish me luck.

What To Expect?

I’m one flight away from Iraq, and I’ve still got no idea what to expect or what I’ve gotten myself into. Today’s Stars and Stripes reported an Iraqi shot and killed two soldiers in Mosul. The Iraqi brought live rounds to a security training exercise — they were all supposedly on the same side.

I sat next to a contractor on the plane from London who was former military. He’s been over here two and a half years. He’s working in Basra now, he said, where things can be quiet for a long time but then get loud real fast. Around Thanksgiving, he said, insurgents shelled the base all the time. But he doesn’t wear a bulletproof vest, he said. He’s never more than a few seconds from a bunker, which is all the time he needs.

The National Guardsmen who run the shuttle from the airport said it’s nowhere near what it was — it used to be “the Wild West with explosives,” on of them said. Now it’s much more tame, but there still might be shelling.

I’m interested to see. It’s now Operation New Dawn, supposedly no longer war. I wonder if the soldiers in FOB Kalsu (I finally learned how to pronounce it: Kal-SU) feel that way. If I have to dive into a bunker to avoid getting blown up I think I’d call that war, but who knows if I’ll have to.

I’m surrounded by soldiers who I could ask, but I’m not supposed to engage in reporting without a Public Affairs Officer accompanying me. That’s why my photos stopped at the airport. I’m not sure what’s considered snapshots and what would be considered violating the embedding agreement. I’m playing it safe — there are a lot of guns around here!

Thirty Hours Later…

…I’m in Kuwait.

I got to watch two sunrises yesterday — one in Massachusetts and one in the Middle East. From Boston to London I watched Avatar (for the first time — it’s not exactly a powerful experience on a four inch screen) and Salt, and I completely missed the day. By the time we landed in London it was 7 p.m. and completely dark.

I searched around for a power plug in Heathrow, which I found, but I nearly missed my flight because I was more worried about power than planes.

That was another six hour flight, not nearly as cush as the one from Boston. I spent it sleeping poorly and trying to watch the Town, about the place I’d left that morning.

I landed in Kuwait City at 6 a.m., 10 p.m. back home, and watched the sun rise over the haze. It wasn’t warm. I needed a sweater under my jacket as I waited for the shuttle to Ali Al Salem air base.

I missed the military check in station inside the airport, so I stood outside on the street corner where the locals said the shuttle stopped. I was out there about three hours before it arrived to pick up a half dozen soldiers and contractors on their way to the same place.

I sat next to a National Guardsman from Michigan who was part of the shuttle service. It was his first deployment, he said, but he thinks when U.S. soldiers leave the region is going to fall apart. Probably get overrun by Iran, he said. Even Kuwait would get overrun if the U.S. didn’t maintain a military presence.

We stopped at the military side of the Kuwait Airport to switch from the shuttles to a full sized bus. In the distance I could make out a huge fire, probably a half mile off or more. I asked the four men running the shuttles what it was. “Who knows,” one of them said. “Something’s always burning here.”

It was an hour ride on the bus to Ali Al Salem air base. A Chevy Suburban escorted it, and one uniformed soldier rode with us. “If we take on small arms fire I have a sidearm,” he told the nearly empty bus, “and I’ll be taking orders from my CC in the SUV.”

I do not understand all the military acronyms, but SUV I got. (Crew chief maybe — that was my guess.)

We didn’t take any small arms fire, but it was in my head the whole drive. It didn’t keep me from looking out the window, however, for almost the entire trip.

The bus was lined with dark blue curtains. I sat where they split and held them apart, watching the country slide by. Desolate. Burnt.

Trees lined the road, but otherwise is was sand to the horizon, split by fences. Plastic bags stuck in the trees and against the chain-link, like moths in a spiders web. High-tension wires crisscrossed the landscape. About halfway through the trip we passed a collection of tents, Bedouin style, on both sides of the road. Thousands of them. On one hill was a radio tower, surrounded by armaments and what looked like rocket launchers. The bus sped on.

At Ali Al Salem I checked in with the civilian authority, lined up my flight for the next morning and got a bunk in a tent with a dozen other men. No one seemed prepared for someone without a military or contractor ID, but the letters I got from USF– Iraq were good enough to clear that hurdle. I lined up my flight into Baghdad tomorrow, found my bed and flopped down. Two sunrises, eight time zones and 6,500 miles later, I was finally getting some sleep. It was one in the afternoon.