Free Republic

PATROL BASE YATES — As part of their commitment to keeping insurgents away, members of the Sons of Iraq built a checkpoint on a narrow stretch of road through Fuhail Mujeer Village, 25 kilometers southwest of Baghdad, April 25. As recently as December, Rakkasan Soldiers of 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault), established a presence in the area, which was previously an insurgent safe haven. Now Soldiers from 2nd Platoon, Company C, 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, assigned to their battalion’s Company D, are living at the newly built Patrol Base Yates and working with the SoI...

A Sons of Iraq member waits as his application is scanned during an Iraqi Security Forces screening in Muellha, Iraq, April 7. Applicants took a literacy test to determine if they were eligible to join the ISF. Army Photo by Spc. Amanda McBride, 4th BCT Public Affairs. FORWARD OPERATING BASE KALSU — Sons of Iraq eager to join the Iraqi Security Forces participated in an initial screening in Muellha, Iraq.Iraqi Security Forces, Coalition forces and local leadership held the screening, designed to gauge which SoI members are eligible to continue forward with the transition process into the ISF.“We were doing...