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Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:35:59 +0300
Subject: Greetings from
Hello everyone. Hope this email finds you all well. We finally have an extended amount of down time (2 days) so I thought I’d write you all and say hi.
Things here are going pretty well. The intense heat has finally hit and is here to stay, at least for the next month or so. The past few days the temps have reached into the 130s so we try to stay inside as much as possible during the day. We really can’t complain too much though, it’s actually been a pretty mild summer, for
The team is doing pretty well. We’ve started sending people home on their 2 week R&R which seams to make the time go by even faster. We actually track things by the 3 weeks that a person is gone and every time one comes back and another leaves it’s almost another month down. We try to stay as busy as possible in what little down time we have. If we’re not out on a mission or working with the Iraqis, we’re usually doing maintenance on our trucks or planning for the following day’s activities. We try to get at least half a day of every week but of course it can’t always happen. I’ve been taking it kind of easy the past week since I separated my shoulder back on the first and been told to rest it for 2 weeks.
Things with the Iraqi National Police are going as good as can be expected. We work with them almost daily and have managed to get a pretty good relationship with them. The job of advising them is defiantly a very unique one and probably a job that nothing else can compare to. If you had told me 10 years ago when I first joined the Army that in 2008 I would be a Captain working with and mentoring the Iraqi Security Forces to secure and defend their own country I would have called you nuts. But here we are doing just that, and learning a lot in the process.
Working with them can be very frustrating at times, but very rewarding at others. Even in the short amount of time that we’ve been here we have seen, and helped in, our battalion making great strives to being self sufficient and able to operate independently without Coalition support. When we got here the battalion was barely able to maintain the status quo, basically manning several checkpoints throughout their area of operations. And even that was not done very well; many of the checkpoints were abandoned during heavy fighting in the weeks before we arrived. Now, they not only man those checkpoints 24/7 but they are able to plan and execute missions completely on their own. Just today we returned from a level mission that was completely planned, briefed and executed by the Iraqis. Seeing over 400 shurta (National Police Officers), from 5 different battalions, all come together and execute the mission was quite a site to see. Even our battalion on their own is making tremendous gains. It seems like every day we are hearing about another cache or high value target (a known terrorist being searched for) that the have captured and taken off the streets.
The gains we’re seeing aren’t just with the National Police. The area that we are operating in is making huge progress to returning to normal. In the past 4 months over 1,000 families have returned and moved back into their homes. Some of these families left shortly after the 2003 invasion but most of them left when the sectarian violence started. Seeing them move back to their homes is huge and one of the most important, and rewarding, things we have seen happen. We also get to watch, literally as we drive through the area, the constant area beautification that is going on. Many of the main roads are being repaved and getting decorative medians and sidewalks put in. This is a great thing to see happen since up until recently most of the roads were in disrepair with tons of trash and what not all over the place. We also like to see it because it makes it harder for the insurgents to emplace and hide IEDs, which of course makes it a lot safer for all of us.
The security situation here has gotten so much better that it’s like night and day from just 12 months ago. While there are still attacks on both Coalition and Iraqi forces, the number, frequency and severity of them have dropped dramatically. In the area we operate in, both the number of attacks and the number of casualties have almost bottomed out. In any given week we can count the number of attacks against Coalition on one hand, if there are any at all. This trend is mirrored is almost every other region of the country and some have been able to report a month or more between attacks. Al-Anbar province in the western part of the country use to be one of the most dangerous areas for US troops. But now it is one of the safest and most secure. A little over a month ago they reported the first attack, against any one, in almost 6 months.
Much of this progress can be attributed to the Iraqis themselves. Not only are the Security Forces defeating the insurgents but so is the population as a whole. The civilian population is tired of 5 years of fighting and wants to return to peaceful living. Everyday, more and more people come in to volunteer for the Army or Police forces, or they come in to volunteer information that is helping us win against the insurgents. While they do want us to leave, they don’t want us to leave before the insurgents are defeated and the Iraqi Security Forces can maintain the peace. And thanks to them we’re even closer to being at that point then we ever have been in the past.
Well I think I’ve rambled on for long enough. Got some work to do anyway. Hope everyone is doing well and I miss you all. Hope to hear from you all soon, and looking forward to getting back and seeing everyone in person. Stay safe.
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