A failure to communicate…

A recent posting from the [My] State Failure Blog turned me on to the work of John McHugh, a photojournalist who’s been spending a lot of time in Afghanistan.  I haven’t gone through his Guardian work yet but this video really brought me back to my time there.

One of the most fundimental challanges in being a solider in a foreign land (not to mention trying to run a successful counterinsurgency campaign) is communicating with the local population.  Even though there were way too few troops in country when I was there, there was a constant shortage of translators.  The majority of translators are locals who happened to know some english (just how much varied greatly) and were not suppossed to be privy to sensitive information.  There were also U.S. citizens, frequently immigrants from Afghanistan, who returned either to help out their new country, their old country, cash in on the $15,000 per month paycheck they were earning or some combination of all three.  Many of these people were given security clearances and therefore were able to be present during sensitive discussions, planning or negotiations.

The demand for translators with clearances (all the ones I knew of hired via private contracting companies) was huge.  So huge, in fact, that many of us had suspicions that corners were cut in the hiring and vetting of many of these interpreters (not to mention the fact that many of them had questionable language skills).

Translators present two significant problems:  errors in translation and abuse of position.

Errors in translation are similar to what you see in the video.  I can’t tell you how many times I asked a local a question, heard him give a lengthy response and then have the interpreter tell me “He says ‘Hi’.”  You then have to decide if you want to get into it with your interpreter and make him tell you everything that was said.  Even then, you can’t be sure if you’re getting the correct translation.

Abuse of position can occur with any interpreter but the most serious repercussions occur with the contracted U.S. citizens.  There were so few around, and the pay was so good that interpreters frequently spent much more time in country than soldiers.  When I got there in 2003, there were several interpreters that had been there almost continuously since the war began, and all their work was in one geographical area.  This positioned the interpreters to be a sort of court Vizier.  Many commanders relied on their interpreters to tell them who they should meet, who was friendly and who to trust.  Rumors were rife that some interpreters sold access (’Oh, you want to have a meeting with the commander?  Then you must pay me.’) and influence.

Now, that is way, WAY outside the bounds of what interpreters are suppossed to do.  They, like their name implies, are suppossed to translate.  That’s it.  Just relay what was just said in one language into another language.  Without commentary, opinion, additions or subtractions.  I have to admit, that it took me a while to learn that lesson myself but many (including many much senior to myself) never learned it.  There was a policy in place to rotate interpreters every so often just so that they couldn’t build up a network of clients and abuse their power.  I never saw such a policy enforced although I did see an attempt.  Some young officer (a captain, I believe) responsible for tracking the interpreters sent out a memo saying that all of our interpreters with security clearances would be rotated on a certain day.  Very shortly thereafter, that order was recinded because of an outcry by senior personnel about how much damage would be caused if they lost ‘their’ interpreter.  Now, if all they’re suppossed to do is translate, why do you need a specific person?  You don’t.  But if you’re using that interpreter as a crutch to tell you how to do your job you fight like hell to keep him.

My theory is that the requirements of a counterinsurgency campaign didn’t really sink in during 2003/2004 and many just didn’t know what they were supposed to do.  Who was taught how to deal with local populations?  Who even knew what our broad strategy was?  So it became easy for some to rely on a person who had been there longer and spoke the language.

I only trusted one translator when I was there and he was a local without any sort of clearance.  By the end of our tour we’d try (usually unsuccessfully) to get two interpreters to go out with us so we could have a bit of check and balance.  Competition was intense among interpreters (frequently he who was attached to the highest ranking soldier rose to prominence in their own internal pecking order) and so you could usually rely on them to stab each other in the back and tell you about screw ups.  That was usually all the incentive interpreters needed to do their job properly.

Flashback!

I was recently talking to someone about my tour in Afghanistan and how the death of my friend there affected me. As I was talking about it I got quite angry and upset. After thinking about it for a few days I figured out why…

I wanted to have a proper memorial for him and there was some discussion about dedicating part of the armory in his name as well as a few other schemes but, much to my dismay, interest waned quickly among the leadership in the unit. I lobbied as hard as I could but the best I could wrangle out of the command was a vague promise to ‘look into things’ when we got home. It seemed a bit ridiculous to me since I knew that when we got home the last thing on anyone’s mind was going to be how to memorialize him. People would be moving on, leaving the unit, new members would be coming in and everyone would be focused on getting back to civilian life. As soon as they said it I knew they were giving me the blow off. What they ended up doing was naming a conference room for him in a building in Afghanistan that has probably been torn down already and drove by the cemetery on our way home. As far as I know, that was the extent of the memorial for the first soldier of that unit to die in the line of duty since the Second World War.

I did however, make a contribution in his name at the Gettysburg Battlefield and town of Gettysburg. He was a huge Civil War buff and would always rave about the Gettysburg reenactments he took part in. I solicited everyone in the company three or four times to see in anyone wanted to contribute. To the best of my memory, four of us eventually did. I have to admit I was surprised by the lack of interest and participation from everyone. It was like they were in a whole different army then we were.

Oh, wait…it gets worse.

I was also reminded how only one person bothered to ask how I was doing after he passed away and that was a guy who had only been in our unit for a few months by that time and wasn’t much more than an acquaintance to me. No chaplain, no commander, nobody else (for whatever reason) spoke to me about him for the remaining seven months we were there.

Absolutely some of the worst senior leaders (Sergeant-Major and Field Grade officers anyway) that I’ve ever had the misfortune to serve with.  I should say that we did have some good leaders but my unit was so top heavy that any promising leader was quickly squashed.

Hmmm…I think I’m beginning to see the origins of my disillusionment with the Army now.

Fortunately, his reenactor companions did the right thing and created a great way to memorialize him.

 

Why Afghanistan hates Pakistan

Every so often I check out the search engine terms that bring people to the Travels with Shiloh information extravaganza that you see here.  The title here was one that popped up yesterday and I figured I’d write about it because:

• I don’t think I’ve spoken about it before
• I might actually have something to say about the subject (which is why I won’t be writing a post about Melanie Griffith even that that’s been bringing a lot of people to this site for some reason)

I asked a number of the people I met in Afghanistan why there was such animosity on their part towards Pakistan.  My understanding was that many Afghans fled to Pakistan during the Soviet occupation and that Pakistan provided all sorts of logistical support to the mujahideen.  So, to my superficial understanding, it seemed to me that they should be fast friends.

Not so fast…

The Afghans I spoke to had numerous grievances, including:

• The felt that the Pakistanis had a long history of interfering in Afghan affairs and had a policy of keeping the country unstable and in a state of constant conflict so that they could wield their influence there
• Afghans that fled to Pakistan were treated poorly.  Prejudice meant that it was difficult, if not impossible, for them to get jobs or housing.  They were prey to various forms of exploitation and the government didn’t do a whole lot to protect them.  I heard this many times.  I also met people who fled to Iran and they didn’t have the same sort of complaints about the Iranians.

I remember I was at some sort of meeting with local commanders/warlords and one of them got up to speak and started talking about how Afghanistan and the U.S. needed to partner against the real enemy we face:  Pakistan.    The American commander quickly brushed past that uncomfortable moment but it was clear who the Afghans wanted to spank.

So, the short answer to the question “Why don’t the Afghans like the Pakistanis?” is that the Afghans feel that Pakistan is intentionally stirring up trouble in Afghanistan and preventing it from stabilizing and becoming a real country and that Pakistan is arrogant, stuck up and generally treat Afghans like dirt.

And now you know.

Afghanistan Go Boom!!!

From August of 2003…

Yesterday we had a thunderstorm which was unusual for two reasons.  First, in the two and a half months we’ve been here it’s rained all of one time.  The prospect of water coming from the sky therefore is a big deal.  Secondly, this thunderstorm ended up not having rain.  Just thunder.  Afghanistan.  Where even the storms are dry.

One other interesting point of note about the storm will give you a glimmer of what life’s like here.  At the first few rumbles of the storm I couldn’t tell if it was, in fact, thunder or land mines detonating.  We hear mines exploding here every day.  Usually it’s part of a planned de-mining operation designed to make another small patch of land clear to farm, build or walk on.  Less frequently (but still common) the detonation is unplanned when an animal or unluckily Afghan sets one off.

After awhile you can even distinguish between different types of mine.  Anti-personnel mines (usually designed to take off a leg) make a small firecracker like pop in the distance.  Anti-tank mines, in contrast, make a really big boom.  Sometimes you can even fell the concussion of the explosion when it goes off.  The first one I heard/felt made me think we were under rocket or artillery attack but everyone I saw around (those who had been here awhile) was acting like nothing had happened so I figured everything was ok.  It’s all pretty strange but the soon all but the closest and loudest of the explosions fade into regular background noise.

One day we were out driving, following up on a report of some weapons piled up on the side of a road.  On the way we passed a small mound of freshly dug up earth which looked a lot like (what I imagine anyway)a grave.  We were in the middle of nowhere however, with no signs of nearby civilization so I knew it couldn’t be that.  In a minute we were passed it and I didn’t give the mound a second thought.

Shortly thereafter we came across a small group of nomads (called the ‘Koochi’) and began talking to them to see if they had any information about the area.  At some point we asked about the presence of land mines in the areas off the road (the roads are generally pretty safe here, especially if they’re paved).  After a brief exchange, our interpreter (known by some as ‘terps’ but for some reason the term seems to have a negative connotation flirting with it so I avoid using it) said:  “He said mines are all over here.  His uncle stepped on one today and died.  They just buried him this morning over there.”  The interpreter pointed back down the road we had just driven and I realized my first guess about the mound of earth was correct after all.

Even though we were on a well traveled road and therefore, pretty safe, everyone’s eyes dropped to the ground, looking for any sign that there might be mines under foot.  The nomads aren’t as lucky as us.  The flocks of sheep they tend have to roam and the nomads have to follow so they don’t have the luxury of being able to travel along well-worn and cleared routes.  They walk the mine-strewn fields under the protection of the Afghan trinity:  their flocks moving ahead of them to clear the way; the experience of past trips and those who’ve gone before to show what areas are ’safe’ and what areas aren’t (and a lot of that experience is learned the hard way); and finally the will of god.

People here in Afghanistan work and walk in minefields all the time.  They have to in order to live and in order to cope with the constant thought that their next step might be their last (or at least their last with that leg) they’ve given in to fatalism.  If they hit a mine, god willed it.  If they don’t, god willed that as well.  If that’s the case, a quick look around here would make you think that god’s got stock in a prosthetic limb company.  Scan just about any group of locals here and you’ll see at least one or two missing an arm, leg, hand or foot.

It’s going to be really strange to go home, look out at a field or a patch of grass and know I can walk anywhere out there without worrying or having to scan the ground trying to find footsteps to walk in.  Now when I look out at a piece of ground that isn’t definitely cleared I just think:  “There is no way I’m walking over there.”

I was talking to a friend of mine about writing this piece about land mines and we had this conversation:

Me:  ‘So anyway, I just wrote a bunch of stuff about mines.”

Friend:  ‘Really?  When I went out yesterday (’out’ is usually short for ‘outside the wire’ which is anything outside the perimeter of our base.  Some people love going outside the wire and try to every chance they get.  Others do everything they can to stay within the confines of our base.  It really comes down to a personal preference.  Getting outside the wire allows you to see and do something different than the dull routine of life here but, of course, it can involve some risk.  It just depends on how stir crazy you get staring at the same small patch of land that’s our base and how much your wanderlust acts up.  Anyway…..back to the conversation…) we went to the range and right on the other side of this hill were tons of little mines in piles.”

Me:  ‘Cool, (I’m not sure that’s the appropriate thing to say in this sort of conversation but I’m not particularly profound in spur of the moment conversations) were they anti-personnel mines?”

Friend:  “Yep, lots of little silver mines.”

Me:  “Silver?  Oh, were they egg shaped?”

Friend: “Yeah”

Me:  “OH, those are the ones that split in two and detonate when rotated a certain amount of times….(blah, blah, blah)

I put this in here not to bore you to death but because right afterwards it struck me as really odd that I could have a conversation about seeing this type of land mine versus that type in the same way I’d normally talk about seeing a movie.

It’s really a strange place here.

 Hey….there’s one in every crowd…

My last update got some of my most positive reaction I’ve ever received.  I had a number of people say some really nice things.  As usual, our First Sergeant put the article in our monthly newsletter (after some heavy editing of course - there was nothing about college students going home early).  It was really memorable though because I (indirectly at least) received my first bit of hate mail.

That’s right.  Hate mail.

This guy…let’s give him a pseudonym since I don’t like to use real names here.  Something that won’t easily identify him.  How about Captain Boozehound?  Anyway, I’m not sure what Cpt. Boozehound’s problem was but he fired off an email to our First Sergeant.  I’ll quote it in its entirety here.  Ready?  Here it goes….

     I know your’re busy, but can you take me and my family off the mailing list for this fine publication.  After reading yet another of SSG ’s last whiny piss ant articles, I almost ripped my lap top out of the wall and threw it out the window.  I also don’t want my family getting doses of this negative bullshit.  It surely does not help, both here and over there.  Thanks for you help in this matter.  I don’t think I’m alone on this thought process…

Believe me…I couldn’t make this stuff up.  The first thing that jumps out at me as I read this is that the Army must really be scraping the bottom of the barrel to fill it’s officer corps.  What exactly is the definition of ‘your’re’?  And how can I have ‘another ….last article’?  Be definition, your last article means that no more will follow it.  It’s not like I’m the Rolling Stones on one more ‘last world tour’.

I have to admit I’m not sure what ‘negative bullshit’ he was referring to but I know the positive, upbeat attitude of his email makes me want to jump up and do a jig.  Wow…who COULDN’T love a guy like this.

I just keep reminding myself that alcoholics denied their fix can get really grumpy.

Or maybe it’s the fact that this circus freak escapee knows he a fraud of a soldier that couldn’t lead his way out of a paper bag.

So, the long and short of it is because of this pinhead decided to buy ‘Hooked on Phonics’ and read my article as his graduation project my articles won’t be added to our unit newsletter.  BUT….I will not be silenced!  I will smash these chains of oppression and bring my views to the masses!  Readers of the world unite!!!

(By the way…Cpt. Boozehound, just in case you’re reading this, feel free to ask if you don’t understand anything here.  I know I write at the 5th grade level and there’s probably a lot of words here you can’t understand.  If you’d like I’ll draw pictures next time.)

Anyway….

One other interesting thing about being here is that we’re starting to see our doppelgangers around.  Now for those of you who aren’t familiar with the term, a doppelganger is sort of like an evil twin.  We’ve seen two of these so far leading me to believe that there’s a whole ‘bizarro’ unit out there made up of our opposites.  So far, no one has met their twin face to face and quite frankly I’m not sure what would happen if they did.

Would they explode in a huge explosion like when matter and anti-matter collide?  Would they have to fight to the death?  Would they merge into some strange, new life form?

So I’ve been on the lookout for my doppelganger and started to think.  What if I’M the evil twin?  What if I’M the bizarro one?  Hmmm……how would I even tell (Please…I don’t need a flood of emails confirming that, yes, indeed I am bizarre.   The question is:  Is there an even MORE bizarre one of me out there?)

Afghanistan Flashback

This post in yesterday’s news reminded me of a similar (although non-fatal) incident that I was involved with while I was in Afghanistan. I looked through my notes in the hopes of getting all the details correct but for some reason it looks like I didn’t record this particular incident in my journal. Never the less, I think it’s made a sufficiently strong impression that I can get most of the particulars right. I think it took place in September of 2003….

<begin flashback effects>

We had an MP company assigned to Bagram Air Field base operations while I was there and among their many other duties they were assigned to perform periodic patrols of the area surrounding the base. We called them ‘presence patrols‘ and they were intended to collect information, let the locals we were in the area and establish/strengthen our relations with local authorities. The MPs were a great group of people (I don’t know if it’s appropriate to give out their unit designation so I won’t here) and really gung-ho.

One morning, one of the platoon sergeants came into my office. He was one BIG dude and a police officer in the civilian world. He didn’t much care for the ‘hearts and minds’ stuff and was always looking for an opportunity to kick some ass. So when he said:

“Hey, some of my guys were out on patrol last night and they came under fire. We’re going back out there today to kick some ass and thought you might want to tag along since this is your area.”

I have to admit I was a bit dubious and thought he might just be getting a bit stir crazy. In Afghanistan at this time (at least in the Bagram area) things were very quite and there were, in fact, some rumors going around that we’d officially be going into ‘Phase 4 operations’ which essentially are post conflict, nation building sorts of things as opposed to combat operations.

Apparently, a small patrol of MPs was driving along a dirt road and out of nowhere someone opened up with heavy machine gun fire and (if I remember right) at least one explosion (grenade?) about 50-100 meters in front of the patrol. As the saying goes, discretion was the better part of valor then and, not knowing who or what they were up against, they turned around and went back to base without any damage or casualties.

I thought it might be best if I did go along just to make sure cooler heads would be around if they were needed. Besides, I was getting a bit stir crazy and needed to get outside the wire too.

So after a minimum of coordination (one of the nice things, at least from my point of view, about Afghanistan at that time was that the crushing bureaucracy hadn’t yet set in and so if you were motivated and had half a brain you could do things pretty quickly and efficiently) I hopped into an up armored HMMWV with ten or fifteen MPs loaded for bear and we were off.

As we got close to the site of the incident we say an outpost on a hill top manned by Afghan ‘police’. We dismounted from our vehicle and climbed up to meet them (careful to avoid the areas they said had land mines). The guys were very nice and told us that it was, in fact, they who opened fire the night before. Apparently this outpost had come under attack several times in the past few months so they were all a bit jumpy and that’s why they had the heavy weapons there. Once they realized it was Americans driving down the road they wanted to tell their local commander who lived in the nearby village. Since we are talking about Afghanistan, the local police didn’t have any sophisticated communications equipment like a radio, walkie-talkie, or tin cans with a string so the only way they could get the attention of their commander was to….did you guess it?…fire whatever weapons they had in the hopes that their commander would hear it and come to find out what was going on. After a stern warning to not shoot anywhere near Americans again, lest something very bad happen, we hung out for a bit.

After checking out their living conditions we felt pretty bad for these guys. They were really in the middle of nowhere, had virtually no food or water, and hadn’t been paid in months. We dropped off some food and water that we had in the vehicles and eventually moved on. After that the MPs told me that they’d stop and check in on those guys from time to time and give them what they had and we didn’t have any more incidents.

Now that was a good day…

Afghanistan War Story - monkeys, graffiti and Jimmy Buffet

This is from March of 04.  We were probably 30 days or so from finishing our 10 month tour in Afghanistan and everyone (yours truly included) was burned out.   I have to admit, I don’t  remember this part of my tour very well, I was living in some sort of zombie like  state.

17 March 04

I think my watch is broken….

Einstein theorized years ago that the closer you got to a black hole the slower time progresses.  With (hopefully) little more than a month left before we leave this giant litter box know as Afghanistan I’ve made an interesting discovery.  By some strange coincidence, it appears that our base here is located right on top of the grand-daddy of black holes.  I base this conclusion on how freakin’ long every day seems to be here.  In the mornings we look forward to lunch.  In the afternoons we look forward to dinner.  Then, we get up and do it all over again.

I’d like to at least say that we’re doing something valuable here but to be quite honest just about everyone seems burned out by this point.  Everyone’s pretty tired of hearing ‘Well, it looks like we’ll be here just a little longer.  But we’re REALLY going home after that!’ and productivity is plummeting.  I should know, I spend most of my day looking around to see if anyone is still working.  Just about the only people scurrying around are those trying to impress their boss but they don’t really count since their devoting all their energy into looking busy rather than actually being busy.

Does the Army issue you bananas too?

One of the guys in our unit just came back from a couple weeks at this little firebase that they’re constructing.  Here at Bagram, we’re the largest base in the country and conventional wisdom would have it that we have the most amenities and comfortable living standards.  So when I saw this guy I asked him if he was glad to be back.

‘No way.  Base X (that’s what I’ll call it here) was great!’

Then he told me what they’ve got there.  Locals come by the base every day to sell stuff while we haven’t had a bazaar since the middle of December.  The official reason we don’t have one is ’security concerns’.  Of course, everywhere in the country has security concerns yet we seem to be the only ones without a bazaar.  That just encourages everyone to take shopping trips to Kabul under the thinly veiled guise of some ‘operational mission’.  I’ll leave it to you.  Which seems safer, bringing locals to us, where we can search them and control what’s going on or having a couple hundred troops drive about an hour to shop in a crowded city where bombs go off like popcorn?

Yeah, seems pretty clear to me too.

Apparently Base X also has monkeys!  I don’t have all the details but apparently monkeys live nearby and they have a few on post.  I’m not even allowed a dang pet rock here and they have monkeys.

I want a monkey!   Where’s my monkey?!

Well, I don’t really want a monkey.  I settle for a dog though.  At this point even a stuffed one.

Can steroids be far behind?

On a bright note, I’ve started going back to the gym again.  Now you don’t just ‘go’ to the gym.  There’s actually quite a bit of planning required in order to make your work out experience rewarding.  First you have to pick the right time.  The gym is rather small and there’s a bazillion soldiers here just as bored as you and thinking that this is a great time to start working out so the ideal time to go is when all those bozos are doing something else.  Once you figure out the best time to go in order to get on one of the machines or get to the weights you have to be careful who is sharing the gym with you.  I’ve always worked out by myself so I’m a little picky when it comes to the conditions under which I’ll work out.

One of the most important rules is that I can’t be overwhelmed by other people’s noxious body odor while I’m working out.  It just ruins my concentration and grosses me out.  Usually it’s not too bad but when the Egyptian troops are working out at the gym I make a bee-line right for the door.  I’m not sure if these guys don’t know what deodorant is or they don’t bathe frequently or what but those guys STINK!  I can smell them from ten or more feet away and almost immediately start to turn green and scramble for the fresh air.  Now I don’t expect people to smell like the lady at the perfume counter at Macy’s while working out but how about no smell instead of ‘peel the paint off of cars’ body odor?

They do play music in the gym too but most people bring their own walkmans.  The music choices the gym people make can be a little weird sometimes.   The other day they were playing this generic techno-pop stuff that made me think I was in some trendy women’s clothing store in a mall.  The only thing missing was the disinterested seventeen year old girl chewing gum and asking if I needed any help finding anything (Not that I frequently shop in women’s clothing stores or anything.  I just know this stuff because I pass these stores.  And no, I don’t know how that skirt got in my bag and, yes, I do think it’s an incredible coincidence that it happens to be my size.  Now if you don’t mind I’ve got a story to finish.)

Did you see that Monet exhibition in stall 4?

Another good thing about the place is that we’ve got real toilets now.  There are still porta-potties around but if you’ve got that need for porcelain you can get it.  It’s still a hike from our tents and work areas and it’s more a communal thing than an individual bathroom but hey, I am not complaining.  Running water is definitely my friend.  Now that we have these bathrooms and they’re clearly marked ‘Male’ and ‘Female’ I’m interested to see how the sexes graffiti up their bathrooms differently.

The male bathrooms tend to focus mainly on bodily functions and pictures of varying quality of the human anatomy.  Now, you’d guess that there would be lots of pictures of females drawn on the ways but in fact (and a bit disturbingly), it seems that there are way too many guys drawing pictures of wieners out there.  I’m not really sure what the purpose is but it kind of creeps me out.  I’m not sure if that’s what they like to look at or they’re just drawing ‘what’s at hand’ (like other artists would paint a bowl of fruit) but it doesn’t seem right.  I can’t imagine chicks drawing pictures of naked chicks on the bathroom wall (although, that might be kind of cool) so I’m not sure what’s behind all this.  To make things more mysterious, I don’t even know how to find an answer to this burning question.  I can’t just go around and randomly ask guys:  ‘Hey, have you ever drawn a wiener in the bathroom stall?’  I’ll get punched in the face!  I’m all for progress and expanding the limits of human knowledge but I don’t want a black eye.  And who would ever admit to drawing a wiener in the bathroom (or anywhere for that matter)?  I mean, why would a guy do something like that?  What’s the motivation?  It’s not like  some art museum is going to do a ‘Wieners through the ages’ exhibit and take this knuckleheads doodles and display them.   Hmmmm….maybe someone out there knows a psychology professor or something who can enlighten me on this subject.

I can’t find any chicks who will tell me about the graffiti in the women’s latrine but I’m working on developing some spies who can give me the real poop (so to speak).  Be rest assured, gentle reader, as soon as I get the poop, I’ll pass it along to you.

Like I said we have actual running water available to us know just about whenever we want it.  It isn’t like the water that comes out of your taps in the states though.  The water we have is referred to officially as ‘gray water’.  That appealing term means that the water is disinfected (which means we won’t get some weird disease from it) but there are signs everywhere warning us that it’s not suitable to drink.  I’m not sure what could be in the water that would make it disinfected but not safe but I’m sure it can’t be good.  It’s probably loaded with some weird radioactive elements that will make me grow a third arm or something.  You can tell that no one in the army has ever taken a marketing course.  If we were in the real world, something as unappealing as ‘gray water’ would get some nifty packaging and a much better name.  Even if they still called it gray water but just did it in a different language it would sound better.  How about ‘l’eau de gris’ or ‘agua acinzentada’?  I bet you’d be willing to pay top dollar for something like that.

Just when I thought Afghanistan couldn’t surprise me any more…..

There isn’t a lot of wildlife in this part of the country.  Apparently the animals around here learned a lesson long ago that the people still haven’t picked up yet.  If you live in a mud hut and are surrounded by land mines and people trying to kill you, it might be a good idea to move to another neighborhood.

But this morning I was greeted to the sounds of migrating ducks, showing me that the animal kingdom hasn’t abandoned this country yet, even if they just use it as a pit stop.  I should clarify the whole experience however.  When I say that this happened ‘this morning’ I should say that it was dark, everyone was still sleeping but it was after midnight so, technically it was morning.  The sound wasn’t the pleasant ‘quack quack’ we hear in the states as a couple ducks swim around some pond dipping their heads in the water for a quick snack.  Instead, it was a mass quacking episode loud enough to wake me out of a sound sleep and keep me up for hours.  At one point I was tempted to take my M-16 and fire off a couple of rounds to keep them quiet.  I thought better about it though when I realized that I would have had to fire towards a bunch of tents holding special forces troops.  The last thing I needed was a bunch of trigger happy ’special operators’ thinking that my tent is the new headquarters for the Taliban.

Usually at night my sleep is interrupted courtesy of the U.S. Air Force who seem to think that the middle of the night is the ideal time to rev all the jet engines they have up to see how much noise they can make.  To be fair though the Air Force planes aren’t nearly as bad as the navy and marine planes.  I’m pretty sure that when the navy and marines order planes they include in the product specifications that the thing has to be able to blow out your eardrums from a mile away.  Of course, the navy and marines thought the Air Force had a great idea, and shortly after arriving here, starting tinkering with their engines all night too.  (Now, if you were paying attention you should have seen something strange in the last paragraph.  Yep, we actually have a contingent of navy personnel here.  If you’re still not sure why that’s weird take a look at a map of Afghanistan.  There isn’t an ocean anywhere near this country.  Not even a decent size lake.  I’m thinking this is some sort of elaborate deception plan to keep Al-Queda guessing about what’s going on.) 

On the bright side, both the birds and the planes do eventually stop making noise.  Usually right after the sun comes up and I have to start getting ready to go to work.

So, I’m listening to this cacophony of birds for a couple of hours and I finally accept the fact that I just won’t be getting any more sleep.  Fortunately, since it’s St. Patricks day we had a ‘fun run’ organized around the perimeter of the base (a little more than 6 miles).  Now, I run fairly frequently but I still have trouble putting the words ‘fun’ and ‘run’ together.  I originally had no intention of doing the run because:

1)  I had done it once already and really saw no reason to do a repeat performance.  I had, as they say, done that and gotten the T-shirt (Literally, I’ve got a T-shirt attesting to the fact that I ran in BIG, BIG circle in Afghanistan).  Once you get one of those it’s hard to recapture the high of the first time.  Kind of like heroin.

2)  The run started at 5:30 in the morning and my first response to someone who recommends getting up that early to run 6 miles is probably the same as yours would be:  ‘Are you out of your F’ing mind?!’

Since I had nothing better to do I figured that this was the cosmos’ way of telling me I should get off my tuckus and run.  Besides, maybe it’d be fun.

See what my life has come to?  The high point of my day involves getting up at five in the morning so I can run six miles.

I’m going to need lots of therapy when I get home.

Charge it!

We do have other things to look forward to while here.  There’s lunch, dinner and the PX.  The holy trinity that keeps me relatively sane and breaks up my otherwise bleak day into bite size chunks.

The PX is small but does have a constantly changing inventory.  The key to shopping there is when you see something you think you might even slightly want at some point, get it because if you wait and come back in a day or two it’ll be gone and it’ll NEVER be restocked again.  That also means that you’ve got to go and check the place out every day or two or you just KNOW that you’ll miss out of the really good stuff.  Like I said, that works well for me because it introduces some structure into my day.  So today while I was there I was perusing the CD rack and was compelled, by some unknown force, to buy a CD of Jimmy Buffet’s greatest hits.  Now, I don’t  have anything against Jimmy but the only song of his I really know is ‘Margaritaville’ which just happens to be the first song on the CD.  So I walk to the counter, like some sort of consumer zombie unable to put  the damn thing down even though I realize there’s a good chance I won’t ever get past track 1 on this thing.

I’m starting to realize that it’s just easier to accept fate, buy the dang thing and get out of there.  Otherwise, I’d just wander around the PX for 15 minutes (and it’s not that big so I would just walk in circles like a mental patient) and end up buying the thing anyway.  So, I shuffled off towards the cashier and got in line.  Since the PX is the only store we can get to there is always a line and accompanying wait.  Today it was a little longer than usual so I was preparing to settle in for a wait in one of three lines snaking towards the registers.

Then…..I hit the lottery.

A lady came up and said ‘People paying in cash go to the right.  People paying with a credit card go to the registers on the left.’  Then it was like the seas parted for Moses as everyone moved to the cash only lane and I saw a clear shot to the register.  I had the cash but one look at that line and I decided that it didn’t matter if I only had a seventy nine cent toothbrush to buy, I was putting this on plastic.  So, I zoomed up to the front of my line with a self satisfied smirk on my face and thankful that I had a good credit rating.

So, while I thought the high point of my day was going to be the run, in fact, it was getting an express pass to the front of the line at the PX so I could buy my Jimmy Buffet CD that I’m not sure if I’ll listen to.

Like I said, I’m going to need lots of therapy when I get home………

Afghanistan War Story - Kyrgyzstan edition

Here’s a story from August of 2003.  I was on my way back into Afghanistan after a week or so out of the country….

On our way back to Afghanistan, we stopped off at an air base in Kyrgyzstan (I think that’s how you spell it).  While there isn’t much to do at Bagram, it’s a thriving metropolis compared to Kyrgyzstan.

Having little else to do, I decided to get my hair cut (but not right away….I wanted to make sure I paced myself since I didn’t know how long I was going to be there and I didn’t want to do all the exciting things at one time).  Now I had heard that on this base the women who cut your hair also do this scalp massage that was supposed to feel amazing.  So, admittedly, I had some ulterior motives in going to the barber shop.  I had to see if this was an urban legend or not.

To be fair though, I also just wanted to be able to postpone having to get my hair cut at Bagram.  The people who cut your hair here are really surly types and their lack of English is matched only by their inability to actually cut hair in anything remotely resembling a style.  If you aren’t getting all the hair on your head shaved off you’re really pushing your luck.  In fact I just got my hair cut here and as soon as I sat in the chair the lady looked at me and said:  “Skinned?”

To which I replied:  “Absolutely not!”  I have no intention of going bald before I have to.  You know how the NRA’s slogan is ‘The only way you’ll take my gun is to pry it from my cold, dead hands’?  Well, I’ll have to be in the same condition before I let anyone scalp me.

Anyway, as I was walking into the barber’s tent, the atmosphere made me uneasy right away.  Foreign pop music was playing out of some tinny speakers while customers were waiting on old, second hand furniture, fidgeting with months old magazines waiting for their turn.

When one of the haircutters is ready, she comes around to the waiting area to lead the new victim to a chair.  One nice thing of note was that they had an interpreter there to explain what kind of cut the person wanted.  I’m not sure I got what I asked for but at least I felt like I had a fighting chance.  The haircut went quickly (by this point, there isn’t too much to cut) and as I was about to get up and pay, the lady looks at me and says “Wash?”  Ah….here’s my chance.  The famous ’scalp massage’!

I agree and almost immediately regret my decision.  The lady leads me into a backroom, separated from the rest of the tent by a curtain.  I’m really starting to feel like I’m getting involved in something here that I don’t want to.  The whole thing is just starting to make me feel dirty which is kind of ironic since the whole purpose is to get clean.

So….I’m lying back in this chair with my head over a sink, my body tensed to jump out of the chair and head for the hills if she asks me if I want a ‘happy ending’ to my wash.  Then she starts running water over my head and running her fingers through my hair.  Now, when I wash my hair the whole procedure (rinse, lather, wash, repeat) takes about two minutes.  The woman was rubbing my head like I was Elvis or something for what seemed to be 2 months.  Then, out comes the shampoo and you’d think my head was the size of one of the Mt. Rushmore presidents given the amount of time she took lathering it up.

The whole thing was just really freaky.  I know I should have enjoyed it but I just kept having visions of being caught by some hidden camera expose:  ‘Tonight on 60 Minutes….Soldiers engaging in shameful hair washing!”  I was really freaked out by the whole thing.  I think I’ll just wash my own hair from now on. Who knew you could feel cheap and sleazy getting your hair washed?

The Italian Connection

On Bagram there are representatives from a bunch of different countries.  Germans, Danes, Koreans, British, and (among others) Italians.  The Italians are renowned for having the best food on post but everyone can’t just walk in like our mess halls.  You either have to go to their gate and ’sign in’ (hoping that they haven’t let too many others in already in which case you’ll have come back another time) or get invited in.  Now, I’ll let you guess who gets invited to the compound but let me give you a little hint first:

There are about 7,000 men on Bagram.

And about 700 females.

Take away the married, lame and lesbians and you’ve got a very, very small pool of available women.

So needless to the say the Italians are always trolling around to bring women back to their compound for food.  It’s like a bad 50s ‘B’ movie:

“Italy needs women!”

See!  The greasy hair!
Taste!  The garlic in the pasta!
Hear!  The bad accent!
Smell!  The poor hygiene!

In all fairness I guess I have to say that I’m just jealous.  Give me another month or so of this army food and even I might put on a skirt for a good meal.

Just so long as none of them ask me to dance….

The Ramen King

Just to give you an idea of how low I’ve sunk when it comes to food I’ll tell you a little story.  When I got back last week they opened up the mess hall for lunch.  They don’t serve full meals but you can get lunch meat and Cup O’ Noodles soup.  Now, getting to eat those ramen noodles is the high point of my day.  You should know that Ramen noodles and I go way back.  When I was about 20, I was shopping and I came across these Ramen noodles and they were only .20 each.  That’s when I had a major epiphany that comes along only once or so in your life (if you’re lucky).  I figured I could eat only Ramen noodles and spend only $3 per week on food thereby allowing me to save huge amounts of cash!  It seemed like a brilliant idea at the time and I was doubly impressed with myself because I didn’t think anyone else had ever thought of it.  Now, I realize that other people probably had come up with the idea but were too embarrassed to say.  I gave it the old college try but after two weeks of eating Ramen noodles three times a day, the mere sight of those noodles would turn my stomach.  I don’t think I’ve eaten them since.

I guess either enough time’s gone by that my stomach doesn’t remember the noodles or I’m just so tired of the pre-packaged army stuff we were eating for lunch that my body picked the lesser of two evils and went with the noodles.

Afghan flashback!

This is from 30 August 2003…enjoy!

A surprising amount of the work done on Bagram is done by civilian contractors. Most of the people doing the menial labor (trash collecting, cleaning the port-a-potties, kitchen, etc.) are local nationals making (by our standards) the slave wage of about $5 per day. It should be kept in mind however that in this country that’s actually a respectable wage and competition for jobs here on base is pretty fierce. That being said, the companies that hire and pay these people are making their profits off of the fact that they can get away with treating their workers in a manner that would be illegal in most countries throughout the world. I imagine that somewhere down the road, people are going to remember how they were exploited and probably be pretty pissed. But don’t worry, I’m sure Dick Cheney will have exercised his stock options in the company by then so his retirement fund will be safe.

Many of the ‘higher end’ and sensitive positions (management, power generation, food preparation, etc.) is carried out by Americans (or people from other countries) getting paid BIG, tax free bucks for the inconvenience of working in Afghanistan.

Anyway, when any vehicles leave post, regardless of if they’re civilian or military, there are some rules that have to be followed for safety. I won’t get into the specifics but one requirement is that you have a certain number of troops with rifles with every convoy. As a result, these contractors sometimes have to canvas units on post to see if they can supply soldiers when they have business to do outside of the post. I was asked to help a group of civilians who had to go to the Kabul Airport in order to pick up some new employees arriving from the states.

I hadn’t been to Kabul before but had heard that it was definitely a sight not to be missed. Therefore, I jumped at the chance to go. Now, for the two months I had been in country by this point, the one message that had been drilled into our heads over and over again was how dangerous it was ‘outside the wire’. Reports of terrorists, weapons, and imminent attacks were so common that they were beginning to fade into regular background noise. As a result, I was ready for anything. So much so that the civilians referred to me as the ‘paranoid one’. Well, I still think that’s a hell of a lot better than the ‘dead one’.

I didn’t get to see downtown Kabul on that trip (to my disappointment) but it was still an interesting ride. Traffic laws are virtually non-existent. Since the country has been at war for almost 25 years, whoever has been in power has probably had more pressing concerns that if people should be allowed to make a right on red or not. Besides, traffic laws are kind of pointless if you don’t have anyone to enforce them and the police that are here just aren’t equipped to give out speeding tickets.

As a result, driving in Afghanistan is a Darwinian experience of survival of the fittest. Right of way is determined by:

a) The size of your vehicle

b) Your willingness to use your vehicle as a battering ram if need be

c) Your ability to communicate ‘b’ above to drivers around you

d) The amount of weaponry you and your passengers can flash when trying to ‘explain’ how other drivers should back off.

Kabul International Airport is yet another interesting experience. It’s name is far too majestic for the squat, institutional style building that bares its name. The place screams ‘third world’ with every feeble attempt to look modern and Western. The runway is strewn with wrecks of planes destroyed from years of fighting or just disuse. Obviously, Afghanistan suffers from a lack of marketing professionals. Nothing instills confidence in business travelers like seeing gutted hulks of airplanes while taking off or landing. What’s next? Featuring such hits as ‘Airport’ and ‘Alive’ as in flight movies?

Hmmmm….this country has a long way to go.

Afghanistan Flashback…boredom, killer cats and a little cheese to go with your whine…

This post was written on 2 September 03.  I’ve changed it a bit but not much.  Enjoy! 

There isn’t a great deal to do here in order to kill time.  We have a fairly well equipped gym, occasional access to computers (here, we’re more fortunate than many other soldiers.  Since we’re in a headquarters, we tend to have much greater, albeit still limited, access to email and such.  It’s not uncommon for some soldiers to wait an hour or more for an opportunity to spend 30 minutes on a computer).  Every night however, they do show a movie in one of the few buildings on the base and for a couple of hours you can sit in an air conditioned room (on some plastic lawn chairs) and munch on some free popcorn.
 
 Now, I understand we’re in a war zone and so don’t expect to see top rate, first run movies.  Some of the choices however, lead me to believe that the people in charge of the movies have been partaking in the fruits of the local horticulture.
 
 For example….
 
 For ten days in a row….TEN DAYS…..they showed nothing but westerns.  I don’t know if these guys were trying to kiss up to George ‘dubya’ in order to get a raise but I was starting to get a little torqued up.  How many guys in ten gallon hats can you watch? 
 
 Then, we got a two day reprieve and they played ‘Last of the Mohicians’ (by far, the best movie they’ve shown since we’ve been here) and ‘First Knight’.  Now?  Back to the damn westerns.  Another western and I think I’m gonna snap.
 
 One thing that is very unusual here is how quickly rumors spread here.  I thought

Ft.
Dix was bad but I think that was just an opportunity to practice for the ‘big game’ here in
Afghanistan.  For some reason, once we got here, one of the biggest pastimes around became trying to see who could dish the most dirt on everyone else (regardless of its basis in fact).  While most of this behavior is just pathetic there occasionally is some humor to it. 
 
 For example….
 
 A few months ago a rumor started among the hajji villagers that there was this strange cat-like animal that was attacking people.  The ‘pisho palang’ (it means ‘tiger-cat’ in the local lingo) was supposed to have killed a bunch of people and forced others to leave in panic.  The best part of the story is that the
US military is supposed to be behind this super-cat.  These villagers actually believed that we were inserting killer cats in order to maintain order in the countryside.  Read the story about it here, and here.

The best part of that story?  I knew some guys who were actually tasked with tracking this story down after it was written.  I think someone had the intentions of showing the locals how concerned we were and that we’d investigate this mystery but….come on….killer cats dropped from airplanes?  Oh….”They fly really low…”  

That explains it. 
  
 It just seems a little weird that in our world of bio-weapons, napalm, and smart bombs these people think we need Felix the Cat hopped up on steroids to instill fear.  If they had TVs, I’d say these people had watched one too many Oliver Stone movies or X-files episodes.
 
 Don’t assume that I’m making picking on the hajjis here.  There have been dumber rumors spread by military personnel since I’ve been here but I don’t think I’m allowed to write about them.  I think I can sum them all up by saying that even though the US government spends billions of dollars to give us the ‘best’ in high tech communications.  Internet, radio, satellite phones, etc. etc. etc.  And yet, information is basically a big game of ‘telephone’ where the story changes with each retelling.
  
 Yesterday, our unit had a meeting to discuss the overall climate here in Bagram.  A survey had been handed out a couple of weeks ago and the results were presented.  After listening to some of the comments I became convinced that at least some people have a really weak hold on reality.  Let me sum up our situation as I see it:
     1)  We’re in a war zone
     2)  The country we’re living in is hovering somewhere around the 15th century.  There is NOTHING here.  There’s nothing here as good as sliced bread because they don’t have sliced bread!
     3)  We’re in much better conditions than if we were in Iraq.
 
 These three points really lead me to take an “I’m just happy to have a cot and hot meals” approach to life.  After all, we could be in Baghdad and daily have to worry about snipers, grenades, and rockets (oh my!) while sweating in full body armor and 130 degree heat. 
 
 Seems reasonable, right?
 
 Apparently not.
 
 People wanted T.V.s.  People wanted refrigerators.  People wanted a pool!
 
 I guess people got the Club Med brochure mixed up with the “So, your going to war” government training aid.
 
 At this point I thought the command should have just told everyone to shut their yaps and do their jobs (maybe it’s just me but I’d feel a little guilty wallowing in a pool and knowing at that moment, not far away there were a bunch of guys carrying 60 lb packs through terrible terrain and heat risking their lives so I could be safe).
 
 Then I heard the kicker.
 
 The idea had been floated that people who were going to college might get to go home early so they wouldn’t miss class. 
 
 I nearly had a stroke right there.
 
 ’What’s the problem?’  I hear you ask.  ‘Give them a break.’
 
 Ah…glad you brought it up.  Here’s why I’ve got a problem….
 
 1)  They volunteered.  They took the G.I. Bill, loan repayments, etc. when the going was good.  This is the exact reason they got all that.  If they didn’t want to risk getting mobilized and miss a semester of school they should have thought of alternative funding.
 
 2)  We’re in the Army.  I’m real sorry if this war in inconvenient but in the words of General Sherman “War is hell.”  Don’t worry, we’ll also make sure none of your loved ones are rude enough to die while your at school either.  After all, the universe is here to serve you (I have to admit.  This self-absorption goes beyond even my legendary levels!)
 
 3)  Everyone is important.  Everyone has really good reasons to go home.  Some people will miss their baby’s first steps, words, etc.  Some people will miss someone’s last Christmas.  Why is someone’s college class more important than that?
 
 4)  They’ve got a job to do.  So let’s say we do send them home.  Who’s going to pick up their slack?  So not only would they get to see their families early and restart their lives but us ‘bottom feeders’ get to do all their work too!  What a deal!
 
 The self-absorbed, spoiled brats in favor of this policy say ‘Hey, you can go right back to your job.  We’d have to wait a few months before we can get back into school.  It’s not fair.’
 
 My answer is to read #1 through #4 again.  If they still don’t get it they’re probably not bright enough to do well in college anyway and might as well stay here in Afghanistan. 
 
 Since I’m not in college I’ve come up with my own reasons, which I think are just as valid, for why I should go home early.  Here they are:
 
 1)  It’s Lobsterfest time at Red Lobster.
 
 2)  My dog is having a birthday party.  I have to be the M.C.
 
 3)  A really cool episode of the Simpsons is on T.V.
 
 4)  I have season tickets to Muppets on Ice
 
 5)  My mom wrote me a note excusing me from the war
 
 6)  In enrolling in the Sally Struthers School of Lock Smithing and Home Computer Repair (letters of acceptance are available upon request).
 
 7)  I want to follow the rock band Phish around the country and smoke lots of dope.  (I could smoke the dope here but Afghanistan doesn’t have a real good live band scene).
 
 I should say that I was really mad when I wrote this.  I’ve since calmed down (it takes a little longer to do without alcohol).  whew…..
 
 Home on the Rangeski…
 
 We have about contingents from 17 countries here in Afghanistan and every one has their own uniforms, equipment, etc.  It’s kind of interesting to check out everybody’s stuff (which always seems better since its different).  One of the things that attracts the most interest is the patches worn by the soldiers of the different units and countries.  One of the countries here, Poland, has a really cool patch.  They’re an engineer unit that specializes in demining operations (clearing minefields) so there’s an exploding mine along with a buffalo.
 
 A what??
 
 Yep…a buffalo.  Even though it looks cool I do have to admit that buffalo isn’t the first thing I think of when I hear the word ‘Poland’.  As a matter of fact it’s barely the last thing I think of when I hear ‘Poland’.  I was about to chalk it up to just being Polish (and I’ll remind you, gentle reader, that I’m half Polish) when I finally decided to ask one of the guys why the hell they had a buffalo on their patch.  What did it mean? 
 
 Well….apparently there is an animal in Poland (called a ‘wisent‘ I think) that resembles a buffalo.  Who would have guessed?  It’s like the whole country of Poland has kept this animal a secret for some reason.  I checked it out on the internet and couldn’t find anything (I had the wrong name for it).  I’m guessing it really is a buffalo on the patch and this guy was just afraid of hearing more Polish jokes.
 
 Here’s an interesting tidbit for you…
 
 As you may remember from an earlier update there is a list of items we aren’t allowed to have here and designated as ‘contraband’.  Most of these items are forbidden because they ‘upset the local culture and sensibilities’.  Therefore, we’re not supposed to have things like alcohol or porn here since this is a muslim country.  No big deal right?  I mean, you really don’t want all 7,000 U.S. soldiers here drunk, horny and armed with loaded M16s. 
 
 That would be bad…..
 
 But, what doesn’t make sense is that we serve pork (which is a big Muslim no-no) almost every day here.  They sell pork rinds at the PX!  And the PX and mess halls are staffed by hajjis! 
 
 The other thing is that these rules only apply to US soldiers.  Our coalition partners can drink and watch all the porn they want.  Hey!  Isn’t that what we’re fighting for!  Our founding fathers started our great nation so that we’d have the freedom to sit on the couch like slugs, stuffing our face with fatty pork products while watching cinematic classics such as ‘Star Trek:  The next penetration’ (Note:  the title of that movie comes from a certain Star Trek geek-captain here in our unit.  The really frightening part is that he loves Star Trek so much that the regular shows are like porn to him.  He just gets WAY too excited discussing if the Romulans could beat the Klingons in a fair fight).
 
 Well….that’s it for this time.

Those damn kids! Part 1

I’m not sure how I feel about this story about kids attacking U.S. soldiers in Iraq.  On one hand it smacks a bit of exaggeration.  I’m always dubious of the media taking one or two events and describing them as part of a huge trend.  Obviously there’s no way to tell how widespread this sort of activity is from the article but it might be worth taking a closer look at it.

I don’t reject it out of hand, however.  Kids are a superb way to gather intelligence since they frequently avoid suspicion and generally U.S. troops like to interact with them (quite frankly, after a few months staring at grubby soldiers and surly looking locals carrying AK-47s you’re happy to interact with anybody outside those two groups).  I also know that child soldiers are not uncommon throughout the world and I’ve heard of at least one instance (in Columbia) where a child was used to deliver a terrorist attack (it was a bike loaded with explosives - the boy was paid five dollars to deliver the bike to someone at a local police station and then it was detonated remotely by someone watching from a distance - the kid never knew what was going on).

In Afghanistan we had a couple of similar situations.  There was one main gate that 99% of all our vehicle traffic used to leave and enter the base.  In addition to military vehicles there was also a steady stream of civilian trucks (which we called ‘jingle trucks’ because they were painted in garish colors and had tons of stuff hanging off them making them sound like huge wind chimes) that were always coming in or going out.  The front gate was always swarming with local kids who would look for handouts from the soldiers, try to sell whatever trinkets they might have or just hang around and play or watch all the activity.

At the risk of being a killjoy I recommended that we not allow kids to hover around the front gate (in fact, for some unexplicable reason, it was deicded that kids would be allowed to go past the front gate and actually onto our base).  I explained to the base commander that there were three reasons why we should keep kids away:

1. They were distracting the soldiers who were suppossed to be guarding the front gate.  The time they were playing with and talking to the guards was time the guards weren’t checking vehicles or searching locals coming on post
2. They could be a security risk.  As I mentioned above, they could be used by the Taliban or other unfriendlies to collect information on how we operated or they could smuggle stuff on or off post.
3. The kids could get hurt.  With all the trucks and equipment driving around it seemed to me only a matter of time before a kid got run over.

The commander looked at me and said:  “C’mon…kids aren’t a threat.  Nobody’s going to use them as spies.”

I was shocked to say the least that this officer (a colonel in the Army) could be this thick.  Just then his toady (our operations officer) piped in with one of his usual brilliant comments.

“Besides,”  he added “if one of the kids gets hurt or killed in an accident we just pay the parents $2,500 bucks.  No big deal.”

I looked closely at him to see if he was joking.

He wasn’t.

Yep…with crack soldiers like that in charge, how could be possibly lose the battle for their hearts and minds?