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For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday... |
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Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? |
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Posted on 05/30/2003 3:41:46 AM PDT by tomkow6
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For the freedom you enjoyed yesterday... |
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Looking forward to tomorrow's freedom? |
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SALUTE!
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Good morning, Tonk! Good morning, Canteen Crew! Good morning, EVERYBODY! GOOD MORNING TROOPS!!
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Chicagoland Weather
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Today's FEEBLE attempt at humor: TOP TEN BUMPERSTICKERS ON THE U.S.S. ENTERPRISE
10. "Our other starship separates into 3 pieces!" 9. "One photon torpedo can ruin your whole day...think about it" 8. "HONK if you've slept with Commander Riker!" 7. "Guns don't kill people...Class 2 Phasers do!" 6. "Zero to Warp 9.7 in 13 seconds!" 5. "CAUTION...We have a trigger happy Klingon at tactical." 4. "If you can read this...don't you think you're a wee bit too close?" 3. "Have you hugged a Ferengi today?" 2. "We brake for cubes!" 1. "Wesley On Board!"
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Yo!
Randumb Thoughts from My "Voices"
There's about enough energy in two hurricanes to supply all of the energy needed by the United States for a full year. But which end of the hurricane do you plug in?
The universe always had and will have the same amount of energy. So, how much is that, and where is it when I have to get up to mow the lawn?
Bulldog Bites
Spc. John S. Wollaston
Staff Writer
When you’re a soldier and you deploy to a combat zone or an area that’s been ravaged by war, you begin to realize that Dorothy was right. There is no place like home. Things you take for granted, even simple things like toilet paper, become prized and almost sacred possessions. When mail does manage to find it’s way to our compound, things you’d hate to find in your mailbox back home like a cable bill, (and yes, I have seen more than one cable bill arrive in the month I’ve been here.) is a welcome sight because at least you’re getting some kind of mail and that beats getting none at all. But one thing that seems to resonate through every soldier is the ability to create things from nothing. Three empty Meals Ready To Eat Boxes, some tape and a little 550 cord and you’ve got a three-drawer chest to store your clothes. Two relatively clean engine oil drip pans and a little soap and you’ve got the wash and rinse cycle of a human powered washing machine. And on the matter of washing clothes, it’s safe to say that when my wife wants a new washing machine in the future, I’ll buy the nicest one I can. I’ve found a new and everlasting appreciation for them. Speaking of great creations, there’s the baby wipe. It’s not just for babies anymore. When the water is not working in our building, which is often lately, baby wipes of any shape size and scent make a great substitute shower. Not to mention they aren’t ice cold like the water in the showers when they are working. But I must note that over here, clean is a relative term. You never truly get all the dirt out from everywhere. The sand on the ground is the consistency of baby powder and gets everywhere. When the wind blows, it blows hard and kicks up sand storms to rival those I’ve seen in my native West Texas. So the battle against sand and dirt is a daily one. Right now my money is on the sand. Despite the sparse living conditions in Baghdad for the soldiers, I am amazed at the technology that is actually available. Like Internet communication. When I was in Somalia in 1993, I sent my stories out on a fax machine, through military phone lines. Usually on the third or fourth time of trying, my faxed story got back to the office. This article you’re reading now was sent via e-mail from a country that barely has the minimum necessary essentials like electricity and water operating right now. Yet we can e-mail our families and loved one almost like we’re on our own computers back home. That is simply amazing to me. And I find it funny when people, myself included, complain about the slow connection times when we log on. Who would have ever thought there would be Internet capabilities in the middle of a war zone? Ah, the marvels of technology.
Actually I must admit, the headquarters for the 3rd Brigade, 1st Armored division where I reside is fairly nice compared with where some of the soldiers have taken up occupancy here in Baghdad and other towns in Iraq. And we all agree that it’s better than the tents we were stacked in at Camp Pennsylvania while we were waiting to come north. I spent a week with the soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 41st Infantry Regiment in al-Qasim. Our building has its problems, but we’re in a palace compared to where they are located. But typical of most army soldiers I know, they are making the best of it down there and managing to find some time to laugh and smile after the un-enviable task of supporting three different divisions (the 82nd and 101st Airborne and the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized), a Military Police brigade and playing bodyguard for the commander of V Corps as he rolled from Kuwait to Baghdad. From talking to the soldiers down there, they gave the light infantry a new appreciation for the effectiveness of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. How much of that is bravado and how much is the honest truth may never be known. But I was privilege to a brief tour of the battalion’s first engagement in al-Samwah courtesy of their commander Lieutenant Colonel George Geczy. So I saw what Lt. Col. Geczy and his soldiers did to the enemy there first hand. I came away impressed.
I was also impressed with the respect that the soldiers in the battalion had for their fallen comrade, Sgt. Jacob Butler. Before I was given the living battlefield history lesson from Lt. Col. Geczy in al-Samwah, he and the scout platoon assembled on a rickety bridge over the Euphrates River. During those first engagements with the Iraqi Army, they held this bridge and 1st Bn. 41st Inf. wanted it. Out went the scout platoon to recon the bridge and assess the enemy strength. It was here that Sgt. Butler, coming to the aid of a fellow scout, after a rocket-propelled grenade hit his HUMMVEE, was killed when an RPG hit his vehicle too. They came back to the bridge, at the request of the Butler family to bury a memento box the family had assembled, at the site where Sgt. Butler died. The metal box, that had once contained a bottle of Jack Daniels (more on that in a moment), was wrapped in plastic, placed inside a .50 caliber ammunition can with holes punched in it and filled with rocks to weigh it down. Once sealed and with the battalion’s colors and the U.S. Flag waiving in a stiff breeze, Lt. Col Geczy spoke to the scouts saying, “Jake died getting us information on this bridge. Info that we used two days later to defeat the enemy. I think he would be proud.” The box was then tossed into the Euphrates where it took about 10 seconds for it to sink to the bottom. “We decided to sink it,” Lt. Col Geczy told me before the ceremony, “to prevent the locals from coming out and digging it up an hour after we roll out of here.”
Back to the box. My boss back at Ft. Riley asked me, if I would take the memento box the Butler family was putting together with me when I left for Kuwait two days later. It was an honor I couldn’t refuse. It’s amazing how many questions I got about “the box” in the time I carried it prior to delivering it to 1st Bn. 41 Inf. Upon my introduction to the 3rd Brigade Commander, Colonel Russell Gold, while waiting for our plane to refuel in Gander, Newfoundland, his first words ever to me were “Do you have the Jack Daniels Box?” I assured him that I did. The most common question was “what’s in the box?” When I informed the curious about it’s contents, those who knew about Sgt. Butler just quietly nodded their heads in understanding. There were the obvious questions like did I know that alcohol was illegal in Iraq? (Yes, I did) Could I give someone a shot of the whiskey I was carrying in my bag? (No, I would not). And had I looked to see what the family had put in there. (No I never dreamed of doing that.) I kept it guarded and protected as best I could from the elements and the curious until I met up with Sgt. Butler’s fellow scouts last week. On a personal note, I’d like to thank the Butler’s for allowing me to deliver the box to its final resting place for them. And I’d like to let them know that their son was well respected as a soldier by those in the battalion who knew him as such and is dearly missed by those who knew him as their friend.
It’s beginning to look more and more like a 1st Armored Division world here in Baghdad. 3rd Brigade was the first to complete their relief-in-place with the 3rd Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division (Mechanized) late last week. But this week the 1st AD has been given the ball and it’s theirs to run with. First order of business is to continue to clear out arms cache’s that seem to be everywhere you turn. You literally can’t spit in this city without hitting some kind of unexploded ordinance. An Explosive Ordinance Detachment went to a veterinary medicine clinic yesterday to inspect a bomb that had crashed through the roof of the clinic and was buried very deeply in the floor. The family was going about their normal business like the bomb was another piece of furniture. E.O.D. is working on how to remove it. A communications re-transmission team from the Bulldog Brigade got a scare yesterday when they discovered that they’d set up shop 100 yards from a minefield. They were unaware of it until an Iraqi approached them, said something about “boom boom” and pointed in the direction of the minefield. It seems that Saddam used the entire country as one giant arms room. There are a few remaining burned out vehicles here and there but those are being cleaned up on a daily basis. From what it looked like to me when I arrived here in Baghdad, with destroyed tanks, artillery and infantry vehicles seemingly everywhere, my impression was that if it moved, the U.S. Army killed it. Or more simply put, the bad guys never knew what hit them.
Yet, there are still dangers to the soldiers daily in Baghdad. As the brigade commander reminded me yesterday, “We’re still in a combat zone and under combat rules of engagement.” It’s just the bad guys that have changed their R.O.E. And the cast of characters is a virtual Rogue’s Gallery. You have the folks like the Fedayheen Saddam, the suicide attackers willing to blow themselves up attacking us if it gets them to Allah quicker. There’s also Para-military and other little factions just itching to try and stand toe to toe with us. The soldiers are facing threats in this country from outside forces as well. Different groups of volunteers from Saudi Arabia, Iran and Syria are sneaking arms and men into the country, determined to try and make us leave. Everyday on the streets, the patrols are encountering armed looters not afraid to shoot at a soldier. There’s the aforementioned un-exploded ordinance danger. In any given 24 hour period in Baghdad, the significant event’s board is filled with incidents of soldiers having RPG’s fired at their vehicles, sniper shots taken at guard positions or at anyone of Iraqi origin seen helping us. An explosive booby-trap under highway overpass forced a lock-down on the main route to the Baghdad Airport recently. Anyone who tells you that combat is over in Iraq is sadly mistaken. To a certain extent, it seems like the ground war was the easy part. The hard part is getting the Iraqi people to stop killing each other, form a government that represents all the people and rebuild their country and expand it’s potential. When that’s done, maybe then we can all go home. But with so many outside influences trying to determine how this country is going to emerge in the post-Saddam era, it’s going to be one of the toughest jobs we face.
And after twenty-something years of living under a Stalinist regime, it’s not going to happen overnight. Things like simply getting power back to the stoplights to help curtail accidents takes time. Automobile accidents and traffic jams that last up to an hour or more happen on a daily basis because every one wants to get through the intersection first. Having driven around Baghdad a few times already I can tell you this is a country that seems to have minimum rules on just the basics of driving to begin with and where the majority of the cars look like they finished last in the local demolition derby. So traffic lights and orderly traffic flow would go a long way to easing some of the stress.
But until basic services are restored, there is going to be tension. Until the little old lady down the street can get as much liquid propane gas as her heart desires there will be stress. Until a soldier can arrest an unruly citizen without fear of getting his clock cleaned by someone wielding an LP gas canister (like what happened the other day to a soldier from the Brigade Recon Troop) the Iraqi people and the soldiers will be wary of each other. And then there is that certain group of the population in Baghdad who are just downright mean-spirited towards anyone. They don’t discriminate between Iraqi and American in their dislike. They’re just trying to survive anyway they can and they’ll do what it takes to stop someone who’s getting in their way.
While this negative activity is not the sentiment of the majority of the people in Baghdad, the determined few that don’t like us are doing their best to keep stirring the pot. It will be quite a while before soldiers and Iraqi citizens can safely walk the streets of Baghdad.
220 posted on 05/30/2003 4:36 AM PDT by txradioguy (HOOAH! Not just a word, A way of life!)
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