Col. Chet Wernicki, second from right, and his colleagues provide humanitarian services in Iraq. (Courtesy of National Iraqi Assistance Center)
Serving as a lifeline in war-torn Iraq
BY ARNOLD ABRAMS STAFF WRITER
June 5, 2005
The two young boys had terrible medical problems.
They urgently needed heart surgery, which requires skilled surgeons with modern technology in a sterile hospital setting. But such things are not available in Baghdad, where they live.
So their sorrowful families watched in despair and frustration as both boys -- Fadi, 3, and Sajab, 9 -- began turning blue because of inadequate blood circulation in their small bodies. They were dying and there seemingly was nothing to do.
Until Col. Chet Wernicki stepped in.
He arranged to have them bused last month to Amman in neighboring Jordan, where doctors donated their services, a hospital charged minimal fees and several wealthy Iraqi businessmen handled the bills.
"They are recovering at home now," Wernicki, 52, said about the kids, whose treatment required months of planning and bargaining. "And my people couldn't be happier. Not much publicity comes from these cases, which is understandable because there's so much violence and tragedy in Iraq, but this is what we do."
What Wernicki and his 45-member Army civil affairs unit do is wage peace in a war-torn country.
All the unit members are reservists, attached to the 353rd Civil Affairs Command on Staten Island. Since being deployed in September, they have run the National Iraqi Assistance Center in the capital, where foreign charitable private and public organizations work with local leaders to provide a wide range of humanitarian assistance for about 5,000 clients per month.
The center offers medical care, clothing, school materials, prosthetics and compensation for war damage or injuries. It also locates jobs, educates people about human rights and establishes safe houses for battered women and children.
"These are not blood-and-guts issues," said Wernicki, a Commack resident who is an executive with the New York City Transit Authority. "But the war here will not be won if we cannot solve such problems."
Although helping the two boys involved high drama, the colonel, who is the center's director, said most projects are more mundane.
"The key element is assistance," said Wernicki, a Queens native who was a supply officer on active duty for seven years before leaving the Army and joining the reserves in 1986. "We try to meet the needs, wants and desires of the Iraqi people."
Such work can be as frustrating as it is fulfilling, Wernicki said, because it involves much planning, finagling and worry.
Those who know Wernicki say he can deal with the difficulties. "He is as caring and giving as he is dedicated," said his wife, Barbara Wernicki, an administrative worker at LaGuardia Airport. "He is perfectly suited for the job."
But not everything gets done, Wernicki admitted.
"There are plenty of foul-ups on all sides every day," said Lt. Col. William Woods, 48, a Manhattan resident who is Wernicki's deputy. "But when things work out, we get a wonderful feeling."
"These kids have nothing when compared with most American children," he explained. "So when we can give them anything -- even something as simple as candy -- it makes my day."
Typical of the many problems his unit handles, Woods noted, is the plight of about 200 Iraqi citizens who, because of the damage or danger produced by war and insurgency, live in what once was Iraq's national theater.
"It's a very delicate situation," Woods said. "These people are squatters living on government property. They have no right to be there. We're trying to work with various ministries -- including police, health and displacement -- and it's far from settled."
As, Wernicki readily concedes, is the question of whether Iraq can be transformed into a democratic society.
Many of the difficulties were summed up by what happened to a safe house for battered wives and their children that the Americans established in the Green Zone, a heavily fortified Baghdad area that houses top U.S. and Iraqi officials.
"It took a long time to set it up and get the proper people into it," he said. "Then an Iraqi minister learned about it, maneuvered to take it over, threw out the women and children and now uses it as his home." That development, Wernicki said, represents much of what the U.S. is trying to change in Iraq. "We see this as corruption and want it eliminated," he explained. "But for most of the world -- and certainly here -- it simply is how things are."
The colonel decided not to name the minister.
"That would be foolish," he explained. "This guy could close my operation down."
Iraqi army officers stand next to captured men suspected of being militants in Baghdad Saturday June 4, 2005. Iraqi Army's al-Muhtana brigade arrested 19 suspected militants in raids in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib and Sabi al-Bour neighborhoods. (AP Photo/Mohammed Uraibi)
Marines Find Weapons, Huge Bunker in Iraq
By SAMEER N. YACOUB Associated Press Writer
June 4, 2005, 10:28 PM EDT
LATIFIYAH, Iraq -- Hundreds of Iraqi and U.S. troops searched fields and farms Saturday for insurgents and their hideouts in an area south of Baghdad known for attacks, and the Marines said they discovered 50 weapons and ammunition caches and a huge underground bunker west of the capital fitted out with air conditioning, a kitchen and showers.
The joint U.S.-Iraqi force operating in Latifiyah to the south was backed by American air power and said it had rounded up at least 108 Iraqis, mainly Sunnis, suspected of involvement in the brutal insurgent campaign to topple the Shiite-led government.
To the west of the capital, the 2nd Marine division said its forces had discovered 50 weapons and ammunitions caches over the past four days in restive Anbar province. The military said the find included a recently used "insurgent lair" in a massive underground bunker complex that included air-conditioned living quarters and high tech military equipment, including night vision goggles.
That bunker was found cut from a rock quarry in Karmah, 50 miles west of Baghdad. The Marines said the facility was 170 yards wide and 275 yards long.
In its rooms were "four fully furnished living spaces, a kitchen with fresh food, two shower facilities and a working air conditioner. Other rooms within the complex were filled with weapons and ammunition," the announcement said.
The weapons included "numerous types of machine guns, ordnance, including mortars, rockets and artillery rounds, black uniforms, ski masks, compasses, log books, night vision goggles, and fully charged cell phones."
In Latifiyah, 20 miles south of Baghdad, Iraqi and American forces launched a raid as part of Operation Lightning, a week-old assault aimed at rooting out insurgents conducting raids on the capital and sapping militant strength nationwide. While Iraqi forces were in the forefront of Saturday's sweep though the semi-rural region, it was clear the U.S. military was still the driving force.
About two hours into the operation, for example, American forces voiced concern that an area covered in tall grass had not been searched. An Iraqi commander said he was reluctant to send his troops into the field for fear of an insurgent attack.
"This is a dangerous area. We need helicopters and the American army," Iraqi Brig. Gen. Najim al-Ekabi said.
The American soldiers, who had spent months training Iraqi soldiers, tried to persuade al-Ekabi to send his troops, saying it was likely that weapons were hidden in the fields and alongside an irrigation canal.
Army Capt. Jason Blindauer of the 2nd Brigade, 10th Mountain Division told al-Ekabi the force had orders to search the area. "No one is going to do it better than your group," Blindauer said.
Al-Ekabi asked for a private meeting with the Americans and departed shortly afterward in a large convoy, ostensibly to conduct the search.
Maj. Ronny Echelberger later went into the area with American forces and searched a few homes, saying was not been sure the Iraqi search had been sufficiently thorough.
The Iraqi army's reliance on U.S. troops was evident in other ways. Echelberger had to show an Iraqi brigade commander his location on a map shortly before Iraqi troops launched the operation, and a few minutes later Iraqi soldiers fired hundreds of rounds when they mistakenly thought they saw an insurgent.
"These guys are doing baptism by fire. It takes time," Blindauer said.
Operation Lightning is being watched closely as a bellwether of when Iraqis can take control of their own security, a key to the U.S. exit strategy more than two years after Saddam Hussein's ouster.
Interior Minister Bayan Jabr has said at least 700 suspected insurgents have been rounded up in the sweep, which has also killed at least 28 militants. U.S. Lt. Col. Michael Infanti said at least 221 people had been detained since last Wednesday by forces carrying out a sweep of Baghdad's southern districts. It was unclear if that number was in addition to the 700 given by Jabr.
Also Saturday, a suicide car bomber blew himself up at an Iraqi police checkpoint on a main road connecting northern Mosul with the nearby city of Tal Afar, killing two officers and wounding four. Four others were hurt in a roadside bombing as they went to help their fallen colleagues, Mosul police Lt. Zaid Ahmed Shakir said.
An Iraqi believed to be a terror leader in the north was captured by U.S. and Iraqi forces in Mosul, 225 miles north of Baghdad. He was identified as Mullah Mahdi and was caught along with his brother, three other Iraqis and a non-Iraqi Arab, Iraqi army Maj. Gen. Khalil Ahmed al-Obeidi said.
Mahdi was affiliated with the Ansar al-Sunnah Army, one of Iraq's most feared terror groups, and had links to the Syrian intelligence service, al-Obeidi said without elaborating. Iraqi and U.S. officials have accused Syria of facilitating the insurgency by allowing foreign fighters to cross its borders, but Damascus denies the allegation.
On Sunday, a representative of Australia's top Islamic cleric said the cleric had met with Douglas Wood, an Australian being held hostage by Iraqi militants.
Sheik Taj El Din al-Hilaly is in Baghdad seeking the release of 63-year-old Wood, a California-based Australian engineer who was abducted in late April. The group that kidnapped him released a DVD on May 1 showing him pleading for Australia to withdraw it 1,400 troops from Iraq.
The Australian government has refused.
Ikebal Patel, from Australia's Federation of Islamic Councils, told television's Seven Network he had spoken to Al-Hilaly in Iraq on Thursday.
"He said to me: `I've seen him eye to eye,' those were the words he used, eye to eye, it was Douglas," Patel said.
He said Al-Hilaly reported that Wood had received the heart medication he needed and was holding up well.