The Weekend Before Crhistmas in Baltimore

OK, a few mundane weekend things . . . .

I hung out in Baltimore this past weekend, pretty nice weekend with TONS OF SNOW. 20 inches or so.

Friday night we went down to Fells Point and had supper at Brick Oven Pizza (BOP), good pizza, best pizza I have had in Baltimore to date. I think that of the three big named places for pizza in Baltimore I would have to rank them Brick Oven Pizza, Iggies and Matthews. Matthews is the crowd favorite, but I don't know why. BOP had a great crust and a good selection of toppings. Iggies had good toppings, but I was not a fan of their crust - - it was very thin. Matthews, the one that has the most press, was kind of disappointing, weird crust, plain toppings, just not that spectacular. None of them could beat the original Valentinoes, though.

After pizza, we went to a local Christmas attraction: 34th Street. Folks on the block went close to the Griswold level to decorate their houses. There were some pretty standard decorations (Pictures in the normal picture place) to some very Baltimore-unique stuff. Old Bay seasoning, crabs, National Bohemian beer cans (Natty Bo?) and some other kitschy stuff were predominant throughout the street. The highlight was an open house where a guy had some of his metal art work out. I am not a fan of eclectic art, so I was mostly in the "Hmmmm, Nice?" mode. You be the judge, and let me know what you think. Sparkplugs, really? Um, ok, if you say it is art, it is art.

I probably should have left that night, everyone was talking about how much snow was going to fall in B'more that night, I didn't believe it. Of course, we got about a foot of snow that night, and another 8 inches that day. Way too much for this Carolina loving man. I took a couple of pictures of my car under the snow, very tragic. We did some driving around on Saturday (had to find coffee, no electricity in the house or in the local 7-11, tragedy), but, quit after we realized that there were way too many crazy folks, and way too much snow. Luckily, the power went out too, so it was just a great weekend. We played a little bit of Scrabble and just hung out, basically, not that much else we could do. The power came back on about 6 pm. We ended up the night by watching the latest Harry Potter movie. Not sure what the folks were thinking when they made that movie, but it was very confusing to me. I had even read the book, and had problems following the movie, and I thought some of the actors were just going through the motions.

I came back Sunday morning, and hung out on the bay, so, good weekend.

Why is Myron undressing in the snow?

So, why IS Myron getting naked? Who is Myron . . . . .

We had the third hike with complete strangers brought together by the internet, it was pretty good, but VERY cold. Friday, the temp was just below 32 degrees, but there was a 30 mph wind hawking through the valley as we were hiking. It warmed up to a balmy 33 degrees on Saturday, and the wind disappeared. All in all, a good hike. We went from just north of the Pennsylvania border south to Washington Monument State Park. Some of the terrain was challenging, there were some good ups, and fierce downs, it was definitely AT hiking, there were a lot of rocks, some very pretty streams, good views of the valley and snow. Andrew (from my first MD section hike) and his climbing buddy Myron (pictured above) joined me for the hike.

We started off by shuttling cars around, so we had a car at either end of the section. This almost caused a Strategic Hiking Error (SHE) on my part: We left the parking lot on the north end, hiked about a mile when I realized that I had left the keys to my truck in Andrew's car. Luckily, I recovered and went back to the car and got the keys. That would have been really bad. After the key recovery, we hiked about 7.5 miles into MD and stayed at the Raven Rock Shelter, older shelter, but big enough for me to hang my hammock inside the shelter. Now, this would normally be poor hiker etiquette, but I waited until about 7:30 PM to hang the hammock, so there was really no chance that another hiker would come through, especially with the temperature dropping down. Who, in their right mind would be hiking on that weekend? Even in the shelter, it was kind of a cold night, I had another SHE: I left the end baffles on my hammock quilt open, so it wasn't as effective as I really needed it to be. I realized this about midnight, got up and made the correction, snug as a bug in a rug after that.

Saturday we started off about 7:45 and hiked pretty steadily throughout the day. The highlight of the day was Myron crossing our second stream of the day . . . .

Myron's Demise:

Stream crossing on the AT can be kind of iffy, especially on Saturday, cold weather + water + rocks = some icy rocks. On this stream crossing, Andrew went first, found a pretty good path, pointed out a very icy rock for the next guy to avoid and waited on dry ground. Myron made it to the second rock, but hesitated on rock #3, there was a bit of ice and he probably should have gone on to rock number 4. He hesitated slightly, which is BAD when crossing streams - - -you lose your momentum. Then, he went into a climber's pose, tried to get a third point of contact on the rocks, then went in. If it wouldn't have been 32 degrees or so, it would have been kind of funny to watch, and after it was all over, we all did get a chuckle, but, Myron took a spill off or rock #3. For the record, Andrew laughed first, I had two thoughts: 1. Damn, I bet that is cold. 2. "I wish I had a camera . . . . " (a quote from the Peony Park accountant-hag, Smokey). I couldn't get my camera out quick enough, so I went across to stream to see if I could help out. Myron quickly changed into dry clothes and we kept on hiking.

Myron's final resting place, just in front of the tree.

The rest of the hike was pretty tame as far as the AT goes, some ups, some downs, and some very urban hiking areas, good hike. We ended up at the Washington Monument, which as per AT tradition was at the top of a hill. Myron was a good sport about it, and admitted he would probably hike again, but would really rather wait til it warmed up a little bit. I agree with him, I think our next hike will be Marchish.

The Magic of the Internet

I am very new to the Maryland area, some things are kind of interesting to me. One of them is the magic of the internet. So far, I have found a running group, a local hiking group and a group of folks that are interested in enabling my Appalachian Trail hiking habit. All of these folks, prior to me meeting them were perfect strangers, but we did some initial introductions on the internet, and then took off on some runs and hikes. So far, no axe wielding maniacs on any hikes.

In addition to the hike on the Appalachian Trail (Harper's Ferry to South Mountain State Park in Maryland - - home of the original monument to George Washington), I hiked with a group of folks in Gunpowder Falls State Park, just outside of Baltimore. Pretty good hike, I put some pictures in the normal area to the right, about 3 hours of walking, talking, looking, picture taking, generally enjoying nature. This was the day after the first snow storm here, so there is a lot of brilliant white stuff on the ground, but it was not too cold or anything. By the time we got done it was kind of melting, but it was a good day for a hike.

What has been going on?

Not much. I am settling in to a work rhythm, but that may be disrupted by the Army. I am currently at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, but may be moving down to DC in a few weeks, once the Army lets me know.

I have gotten back into a couple of things that I was into before the Iraqi adventure: Running and hiking. I talked a little bit about running the Army Ten Miler in my last post, cool race, I haven't planned on my next one, though.

I have done two more section hikes on the Appalachian Trail, bringing my section total to just under 625 miles, which sounds good, but there are 2178 miles on the trail. My first section hike was from Elk's Grove, VA (just south of MT Rodgers) to Damascus, VA, about 24 miles or so. The section was mostly downhill, but had some serious ups as well. (Pictures posted on the right, if the link works) I was hiking with Charles and Deaton W., one of the scoutmasters I worked with in NC and his son. We met in Damascus Friday night, had some pizza for supper and then headed up to Elks Garden to camp overnight. When we got there, a local scout troop was camping there (all very young scouts, maybe 12 years old), we teased Deaton that he was that small at one time. Now he is a strapping 6'4 or 5", once he fills out he could be trouble on the trail. It was his idea to go hiking, which was pretty cool to hear coming from a 16 year old. Saturday was great weather, shorts and short sleeve shirt all around, like all hikes on the AT it started off going up hill until we hit the top of White Top Mountain and Buzzards Rock. We ran into the Scout troop up there, once again, Deaton denied ever being that small. We had some pretty good downs after that, and the day finished with a solid 4 miles of ups, which made it kind of unpleasant, but a fine welcome back to the AT.

Once we got to Saunders Mountain Shelter we ran into some thru and long-term section hikers, Spoonful (hiking from Harpers Ferry to Springer), Calamity (finishing off her through hike from Maine to Springer). They were hiking together in a sort, they would end up at the same place every night, she would start about an hour earlier than him and finish off a couple of hours after him. The third hiker, Mark, was getting off the trail in Damascus. Calamity was 64 years old, retired from up in NY and just decided to hike. Spoonful was much younger, probably 30 ish, and was taking a life-break - - - sometimes when life starts to move to fast for you, and you aren't really that happy with what you are doing you take a life-break and escape. He chose to escape on the AT. We had supper with the group, talked a bit about the trail then everyone went their own way to go to bed. I was hanging in my hammock, snug as a bug in a rug. Charles and Deaton were tenting it and the other three folks shared the shelter.

Family note: Faye, not sure if you remember this or not, but the other half of the "Best Ever Gift from Faye" was a beeswax chapstick along with the Northface gloves, I found that in the bottom of one of my backpack pockets and used it happily.

The second day of the hike was down into Damascus, mostly downhill, depending on how fast you go, it is normally worse going downhill on your body. Going up a hill makes you feel bad for a moment, but you get over it once you get to the top of the hill, downhill makes your thighs hurt all day long. I didn't really feel it until the drive home the next day, but I did feel it. If anyone ever goes to Damascus, there is a cool little coffee shop there, me and Charles partook of some coffee there. All in all a good hike and a fierce welcome back from the AT. Charles and I plotted to get our third amigo and his son (Bill and John O.) out in JAN 2010, I think we will be successful.

My second hike was not as difficult, I ran into a guy in my running club that expressed an interest in hiking and camping, so we planned a shorter hike here in MD. I wanted to keep it short just in case he wasn't really into the trail, it wouldn't be too far to have to listen to him complain about the trail. There is about 40 miles of the AT in MD, we decided to hike about half of it. We started off at the MD Washington Monument (the first monument to George Washington, and one that he actually visited) and hiked south towards Harper's Ferry, WVA. The hike was through some of the area that the Second Battle of Antietam took place (a rare, pre-Grant Union victory), so there were Civil War markers to look at throughout the hike. I will post some pictures in the normal picture posting area.

The terrain up here was pretty easy, we started off with a 4 mile stint up from the monument to Rocky Run Shelter. I have to say, that was the nicest shelter I have seen on the trail so far, but we camped behind it. We joined an unknown hiker that was taking an extended life-break: He did a north to south thru hike (Springer MTN, GA to Katadhin MTN, Maine) and then decided to turn around and do it the other way, kind of a Forrest Gump sort of thing: Just kept hiking and then I stopped. The second day was a very fast 13 or so miles, the terrain is very mild here in MD, which was appreciated after the previous week. We are not sure what time we started, but we finished off about 1100. I was supposed to bring the watch, but left it in the apartment, so we just winged it SAT morning.

I think the next hike will be in JAN with Charles, Bill, Deaton and John; after that, I will knock out the other section in MD. Once I am done with MD, I will probably work to finish off VA over the spring and summer and knock out that last section in NC (Franklin, NC to Fontana Dam).

Whew, what a month

Well, I am officially back from Iraq, I accomplished one of my re-deployment goals - - run the Army Ten Miler, more on that later. Before that:

We redeployed from Iraq, and out-processed FT Riley. I can honestly say that I hope to never go there again now that we are done. All of the events were well run, there were a lot of people to out-process, so it took a little while, which was expected. Along the way though, we were once again treated pretty un-professionally by the unit responsible for organizing the event. I can understand a little confusion, but confusion plus goofy ideas, well that is just plain silly. To be fair, some of our TT brethren did some just plain stupid stuff, for which that individual should have been called out, but the unit that was organizing the outprocessing defaulted to the ancient army principle of mass punishment. Sigh. Oh well, done with that chapter of my life.

After leaving FT Riley in my rear view mirror, I went up to KC to see my little sister and her crew. I went for a good run there on the high school track (sweet track, btw), my last bit of hard intervals. After the run, me and Julie went out for pizza (naturally, my new favorite food). And watched Sydney's volleyball team play. Lot of giggling going on out there, but it did look like they were having some fun, so I think the giggling is excused.

After KC, I went up to the homeland and hung out at Melissa's house. That Friday night I watched probably the best high school football game I have seen, Millard South Patriots (Christian S. plays for the Patriots, so we had to go) took on the team from Elkhorn. Early on, it looked like South in a runaway, but Elkhorn came storming back, and took the lead. Millard South came back and tied it up, with a little bit of time to go. Elkhorn was driving for the winning score, when they lined up for a field goal. Number 4, the MVP for that game, from Millard South came through the line, blocked the field goal, picked up the ball and stormed to his end zone for the game winning TD. WILD is an understatment. I haven't got an update on Millard South, but they looked pretty tuff after that game. Christian S. had a pretty fair game, he is an offensive/defensive lineman, and still a junior. Pretty good year for Christian - - - he also earned his Eagle Scout badge which is pretty cool, and quite the accomplishment. I knocked out my last long run on the Twin Creek Trail there in Bellevue, and had a nice visit with the rest of the family.

After that, I headed east on I-80 (for those of you driving from Omaha to Aberdeen, take 70, no tolls) to Aberdeen. I spent a few days finding a new house for me, Sam and Cheney, and found a nice one.

http://mrislistings.mris.com/Matrix/Public/Portal.aspx?ID=33207520175

3441 Tewkesbury was the choice, I am hoping the elephant stays in the room. I will need to figure out a fence for Sam and Cheney, but that will be pretty easy. I also checked out my new digs at Aberdeen Proving Grounds - - first impression: VERY SMALL. I found a gym there and asked "where are the other gyms?" (NOTE: there are 20 gyms on FT Bragg, so plenty of selection). The guy working there said "this is the only one . . . . ", bad sign. I also did some running around on the post, there aren't any rolling hills (like the sisters) on APG, so I will have to find some places to run off post that have hills. I didn't check out where I will be working, but I can do that later on.

This past weekend I went down to DC for the Army Ten Miler, my favorite race. I stayed at JFord's Foggy Bottom mansion, but he wasn't there so we couldn't exchange running stories and such. His roommate, Derek B. was there, so I hung out with him some. Unfortunately, Derek is a michigan fan, so I had to listen to some michigan propoganda and a few complaints. For those of you that don't follow football, Nebraska won the 1997 National Championship, some folks in michigan believe that they should share the championship, but there really is no evidence of that outside of the ann arbor, michigan. Defeating michigan in the 2005 Alamo Bowl was the high mark of the bill callahan regime in Nebraska, so there is further evidence of Husker domination. While there I went with the michigan fans to watch the michigan vs. michigan state game, good game, unfortunately the wolverines lost in OT (sorry SFC T).

On to the Army Ten Miler - - a pretty good run on a beautiful, fall day in DC. I was hoping to hit somewhere in the high 60s for the run, but was not too sure about my condition and I had a couple of nagging injuries (sucks getting old). Once the race started I kept a pretty good pace and just enjoyed the run. Pleasantly, I hit right at 68:06, which, although not a record for me, was a pretty good day considering I spent the last year trying to train up for it in Iraq. For those runners in Iraq and Afghanistan, I am sorry you missed it, but I was thinking of you while I was running. I really like this race, it is kind of a homecoming for military folks and I am always pleasantly suprised by who I meet up there. Sure enough, while I was getting on the subway to go to the race, there was Bill R. one of my former team leaders and a company commander while I was a battalion XO in 1/3d SFG. We caught up with each other then got lost in the crowd. I also saw Joe C., a fellow USASOC salt mine worker, he is now developing optics and lasers for the Army, so I will probably run into him again. Pretty good day all in all.

Waiting on a Plane - What do you do when you have nothing to do?

We have been hanging around FOB Stryker for a week or so, waiting on our plane. Because nobody can really estimate when a team will show up, the transportation planners take the worst case sort of scenario. Our replacement team showed up 3 days early, so we had about 8 days left after we transitioned with them. For us, we spent all of that time at FOB Stryker.

What do you do when you have nothing to do?

Typical day:

Get up about 6, go for a nice run before it gets too hot. Running here is MUCH better than running at COP Cashe South, which was MUCHMUCH better than running at COP Cashe North. On North, there was a .22 mile route (actually 2 routes, you could run one way around, or the other way around); on South, there was a 1.25 mile route, pretty good, but there were some areas that had deep gravel, and there were some turns that had to be made, so you lost a little momentum and time on the gravel and turns. Here at Stryker, there is a nice route that is a basic rectangle, the long sides are a mile long, the short sides are about .5 miles long, no deep gravel, some good asphalt to run on, and a few patches of gravel road, and only a few twists and turns. I have run much better this week.

I am still trying to maintain my Army Ten Miler training plan, but I don't have the speed to keep up with it right now. I figure if I would have been back at Bragg, I would have, but not here. At South there were too many turns and other things to do a good interval, but, that is life. I figure I will hit somewhere between 68 and 70 minutes during the race, probably not my best time, but I have been in Iraq for a year (that is what I keep telling myself so I don't get frustrated when I miss a training time). My best time at the ATM was a 63:15, I consistently hit in the 63s for the race. 2008 I hit a 65, but I was training more for the Marine Corps Marathon than the ATM. This week will be not so good for training, I am going to miss my long run, but will probably make it up next week once we are back in the US.

After the run, go eat a leisurely breakfast, normally I can stretch that out to at least one full segment of ESPN Sports Center. Normal breakfast is a huge Army omelet (all vegetables on the inside though), some french toast if they have it and some oatmeal. Not too bad.

After breakfast, head over to the computer lab to surf for a while, check out football stuff, and generally do not much. After about an hour on the computer, I head over to the barracks to do not much again. Me and Doc do the daily crossword puzzle, he is a little faster than me, but I know a few of the not so well known words. We tried a NY Times Sunday puzzle, well beyond our crossword capability. I guess you have to live in NY to be able to figure those out.

About 1330, head over to the chow hall for a ham sandwich. Two slices of ham, two slices of provolone cheese, lots of tomatoes, black olives and mustard. I normally heat that up on a panini grill until the cheese melts. Don't know why, but the ham tastes goooooood.

Post lunch, browse the PX, see if there is a magazine that I haven't seen before and look at the same stuff I have been looking at for a year. If the timing is right, I can catch a bus over to FOB Liberty (FOBs Liberty, Victory and Stryker are all on the same compound around the airport) and check out the PX over there. Better selection, but basically the same stuff I haven't bought for a year.

After a little PX action, head back to the barracks to do some more of not much, then head to the gym for an afternoon work out. After the work out, hit the chow hall again for some supper. On friday's I let myself get some ice cream at supper, kind of my New Year's resolution - - no sweets except on fridays (and if someone has a birthday, or if there is a celebration for some reason). I have been ok on maintaining that for the past few months. The only violations have been when we went to FOB Hammer or Loyalty for a conference or log run, then I had ice cream in the chow hall.

Once we are done with dinner, normally I would watch a dvd or read some then drift off to bed. Not a lot of excitement, but, who really needs that?

Mission Pretty Much Done

OK, the replacement team is here and we have transferred authority to them. One last task to be done, signing the property book, which will take place on Wednesday, after that, it is all over but the waiting.

8 folks flew to Baghdad last night, the remaining three will join them on Wednesday when we go up to do the paperwork.

I am spending the time researching fantasy football statistics and plotting the downfall of Wade.

We fly out of Baghdad to Kuwait on the 10th, and out of Kuwait to Kansas on the 12th. We should hit the ground on the 13th of SEP.

I will probably have a few more posts, probably to sum up the mission and put it in perspective.

Small Victory

Yesterday, COL Alaa, the Brigade Deputy Commander, had a meeting with all of the Sons of Iraq (SOI) leaders in the area. The meeting was to go over the Government of Iraq (GOI) SOI Transition Plan. From earlier posts you might recall these were the mostly Sunni fighters and tribe leaders that decided to stop fighting the GOI and US Forces and start helping out against the insurgents in Iraq. Pretty big step for them, turning against other Sunni and Shia tribes in the area and trying to do good instead of evil. The US recognized them and started to pay the heck out of the, last November or so the GOI took over the payment of the SOI and earlier this spring the GOI started to talk about transitioning the SOI into normal government work.

The SOI leaders were very upset, they were pretty sure that now that security was pretty good the US and GOI would just forget about them and let them fend for themselves in the job world and against the insurgents that were still out there. The GOI developed a transition plan, basically absorbing the SOI leaders into the government leadership and the SOI members into government ministry jobs. Yesterday, COL Alaa read off the first 622 SOI members in the area that will be transitioned and where they would be working. The SOI leaders, who were initially very skeptical about the program, were giggling like school girls because they were so happy. The transition will take several months, but this is a good start.

Funny part of the meeting: As the list was being read off, one of the names that was read off was recognized by a couple of the leaders - - - they thought it was pretty funny that he was going to the Ministry of Education because the dude can't read, right or do any sort of educational thing. "What will XXXXX do at the Ministry of Education?" "umm, security?"

The rest of the meeting was pretty standard for an Iraqi meeting led by COL Alaa - - - talk a lot, say the same thing over and over again, talk some more, say the same thing again, until everyone is bludgeoned into submission. The meeting could have been done in about 10 minutes, but COL Alaa went over everything several times, and then went over them again. Nobody can say the man ain't thorough. He also read off all 622 names, I didn't think he would, but he did. I chew a lot of gum to keep from falling asleep.

Other than that, it has been a very quiet 3 weeks in the area. There were a few IEDs and EFPs (0 casualties, MRAPs and Up Armored HMMWVs work) on our side of the river early in JUL, but nothing since. There were also some rockets that were allegedly fired at our COP, but they weren't aimed very well and missed by literally a mile or so.

Other notes:

Our replacements will be here Monday, ten days after that we will be standing at the airport with our thumbs out for a ride.

My running has been pretty consistent. I was able to maintain my desired race pace for 4 miles last week, I was supposed to do 1 x 2 mile interval and 3 x 1 mile intervals, but I felt so good after the first 2 mile interval that I extended it a mile. In the words of Indiana Jones' faithful assistant in the "Temple of Doom" Shortround: " Big Mistake". I was able to eak out 1 of the 1 x mile intervals, but was dead after that. Overall, good week of running. This week's speed workout (the hardest day of the week) is 4 x 1 mile intervals at faster than race pace. I will do 4 x 1 mile intervals.

Fantasy Football: The much anticipated Fantasy Football kit has come out, I have developed a few rosters, I am pretty set on the players I want but I want to watch the rest of pre-season before I make my final selections. This year's strategy: Beat Wade.

Hmm, not much to talk about

26 days and counting here . . . . that is the amount of time we should have left in Iraq. Our replacements are currently in Kuwait, going through much of the same training that we went through a year ago. I hope they have a better experience. After Kuwait they head off to Taji, Iraq for a little more frustration. They have been in good contact with us and we have let them know about their future job, the 3-1 Federal Police (formerly known as the National Police).

Our partner unit has changed again, the fine folks from TF 1-82 Field Artillery (the Dragons) have moved on to a different location and 5-73 Airborne Cavalry (Recon) has assumed responsibility for the area. Good thing is that 5-73 has been working in the area out in the northern part of 3-1 FPs operational area. They are very familiar with BG Emad and the rest of the Brigade, so it was a pretty smooth transition.

We have cut way back on our missions, the Federal Police in this area are pretty much on it and have a pretty good plan of action, so we aren't needed as much as we were several months ago.

Other news:

Fantasy football season is upon us again. I know that Wade will remind me that he has beaten me more than I have beaten him, so here goes another year. Normally, after I finish off really bad, I have a pretty good year. We'll see.

Running news: This was a low mileage week. I think I have made some other workout adjustments (cutting out some gym work) and I am had one of those really good runs that made me think I am hitting a good stride. Next week will be a harder week, so I am thinking that the good run times will carry over. I have also altered my route to avoid a lot of the graveled areas (better footing) and most of the smaller, sharper turn areas so I am moving a little faster than before.

Hmmm, what has been going on . . .

Well, in the area, a whole lot, for the team, not too much.

Since 30 JUN 09 (Sovereignty Day) the National Police have been on the ball. They are really taking charge of the area and keeping pretty good order. There has been one significant activity - - one of the big Sunni bosses was assassinated, pretty tragic: he was one of the leaders that convinced the Sunni population to stop fighting everyone and settle down in this area. He was blown up in his car, Mafia Style, the other guy in the car only got a few scratches. I was pretty worried when I heard about it because the folks that everyone suspected have been on the warrant request list for 3 months.

Somehow all of the planets and stars aligned and one of the new judges issued 14 warrants for arrest in less than 4 days. So far, 9 arrests have been made, so the National Police are looking pretty good in the eyes of the population. After the arrests, BG E was pretty much giggling the whole day he was so happy. There are 5 more folks to arrest, he thinks they will have them here shortly. I think they got this security stuff down.

Because the National Police are on it, the team doesn't have a whole lot to do, but I guess that is a small sacrifice for good security in this corner of Iraq.

Other news:

About 40 days til we start heading towards Kuwait, I do hope it is easier to leave than it was to get here.

I am on week 7 of my Army Ten Miler Training Plan, I am able to keep pace on most of the runs, but I have to break the long tempo runs down to one mile chunks and do them as interval runs. I thought I had a pretty good base laid down, but I am not able to sustain speed for over a mile. I am sure it will all work out.

Slow down

30 JUN 09 = Iraqi Sovereignty Day, that is the day the brakes got slammed on and we moved into slow down operations. For us (folks outside of the big cities) there hasn't been a whole lot of impact, we just have to make sure that all of our operations and patrols are combined with the Federal Police (the organization formerly known as National Police, I don't know why the name changed). For about the past month that is the way the US Forces have been working in our corner of Iraq, there were very few US only operations and now there are none.

For the folks in the big cities, that means a lot of sitting around. I have heard stories of some units not going out the gate at all because their Iraqi partner units have said " . . . don't worry, we have it under control, if we need you, we will call you . . . ". BG E is a huge fan of partnership so I doubt he will ever say that. He has pretty much been directing operations in his OE for the past couple of months, so not a big change for the US Forces in this area.

The two weeks prior to 30 JUN were some of the worst ones that I had seen as far as targeting US Forces in Baghdad. There were several attacks that prompted us to decide not to bother going to the city for anything. Across the river in our area there have been a few attacks but the insurgents over here are not too good at the attacks. Their best effort so far has been lobbing 4 rockets in the general direction of COP Cashe South, but the berms around here are so high and the COP is so small that it is very hard to hit unless you are right outside the wall. Since 30 JUN the US Forces in the big cities have been keeping a low profile and there have been no attacks on US Forces.

There has been a few good sized attacks on the local population, but nothing too spectacular yet. It is hard to stop these sorts of attacks, you really have to go after the networks that are supporting and executing the attacks. In order to do that you have to have a warrant which is another whole story in itself.

The biggest thing we have going on is some training for the Federal Police out at FOB Hammer and getting ready for a big religious pilgrimage. For the most part, pilgrims will be passing through this area into the big city, not stopping here.

So, to keep busy, I read a lot, surf the net, work out and watch a little TV. I lucked out and got an entry number to the Army Ten Miler (my favorite race) so I have started a 16 week train up for the race (currently on week 5).

Not a whole lot else to report, but that is a good thing. Reconciliations are still going on, but to be honest, once you see one, you have pretty much seen them all. The SOI transition to regular government employees has not started yet, so no issues there and the next election cycle isn't until JAN 10, I will be watching that on CNN.

56 days until no Kevlar (helmets, body armor) is required.

Sovereignty Day

Two days ago was Sovereignty Day, a new national holiday as declared by the Prime Minister. This was the day that US forces ceased combat operations in the big cities. Big day for the Iraqi Security Forces, I hope things work out for them, there are still some major problems that have to be worked out: Shia factions in the parliment, Sunni unrest because they are being ignored by the Shia dominated government and the Kurdish problem. So, as they say here: Im Shah Allah (if god wants it to happen, it will).

The declaration sparked off a huge celebration, which the National Police wanted to get in on, so they decorated their HMMWVs and pickups with ribbons and flowers and cruised around the city. A couple of days earlier, BG E's oldest son (Emir) came to visit and hung around the headquarters for a while. While he is here, Emir gets away with murder because none of the soldiers want to say NO to the general's son. Kind of funny, we walked outside and saw Emir driving around the compound in the forklift (Emir is 12), when the general saw that he got mad at the soldiers that were supposed to be watching him, but, what could they do?

Anyway, big day for the National Police, Emir, COL A, the general and me commemorated the day with a picture in the general's office:

Operation Big Arrow

Recently the high command in Baghdad ordered some pretty curious missions, a lot of searches on the fringe of the city, and we are definately on the fringe. The brick factory search was the first in our area, Operation Big Arrow was the second one. Basically, the high command put a big arrow on the map and said" . . . . we think you should search, umm, around here . . . . ". BG E being a good soldier said yes and came up with a plan that kind of made sense. See graphics below:

I say kind of, because he, I and all of the other commanders pretty much knew that there wasn't too much in that area, except for a lot of empty desert, but search it we did. When I suggested that he search the smaller villages in the area and call it a day, he said no, the high command wants that area searched and that is what we are going to do. I asked him what he thought he would find in the area, he had a pretty good answer: The area is a fault line between several Sunni villages on one side and several Shia villages on the other, so there may be a few caches there. If you remember back to OCT/NOV 08 the NP found a HUGE cache of home made explosives and C-4 (military version of plastic explosives) in a cemetary, well the cemetary was about in the middle of the search area. So, search it we did.

The cemetary at Um Al Bid:

Being total pro's, the brigade staff put together a pretty good operations order, that covered most of the details, including how to logistically support the operation. The logistics portion of the order was towards the end of the order, so we had to sit through a lot of arabic and translation. During a long meeting we will rotate interpreters through the duty, so you get some really good interpretation and some not so good. By the time the logistics got briefed, we were on our third interpreter, Shadow, who is ok, but misses some words. So, you will hear (arabic, sounding a lot like Charlie Brown adults): WawaaaaawaaWa . . wa wawawaaaaWa . . waaaawaaaWa. . . . wawawawawaawaa WaWaaaaawa wa . . followed by Shadow trying hard: Ok, he said this will be a long operation, ahhhh, I missed that part, the soldiers should bring some water and something else and the soldiers should bring cookies . . . .

BG E in charge, checking the map:

When we all heard bring cookies, we all snapped out of the daze and looked at each other to confirm that we had heard "they should bring cookies". Kind of funny thing to hear, but it made us all giggle on the inside. True to the order, all the soldiers deployed with a little packet of cookies for snacks.

National Police moving out:

The mission went off without a hitch, except for our MRAP's AC did it's disappearing act, AGAIN, so, 11 hours in a steel sauna. About halfway through the mission, BG E called a pause and issued a FRAGO: Just check the two small villages in the remaining area and we will call it a day. The cows were deemed "safe and clear" so, no further searches of cows necessary.

The End of the Earth

Things in the suburbs of Bagdhad are going just fine, there hasn't been a Significant Activity for over a month, so I think the National Police are all over it. Currently, the Iraqi High Command is directing several operations in areas on the borders of their area, not sure why, but I am happy that they are planning and directing operations. 3-1 had one of the missions and executed it as well as any mission I have seen them do.

BG E giving last minute guidance to his company commanders:

The mission was 2 days ago, in an area called the Brick Factory, the main brick factory for Bagdhad. There is a town there, about 50,000 people and a huge brick factory. I call the area the end of the earth - - it is on the far western edge of our OE, and the road actually ends shortly after you turn into the brick factory. It is pretty much the post apocolyptic vision - - - dark, dank, very polluted, raunchy area to live in. There are 400 brick ovens, fueled by crude oil, the exhaust is pumped straight out of the ovens. The EPA would go nuts in the joint. There is a permanent cloud of crud that hovers over the area, the day we went this was compounded by a major sand storm, so crud + fine sand + no breeze = 3 years taken off of the team's life expectancy.

The stacks of bricks with dirt on top are actually houses. 2 or 3 families live in there, the funny thing is, even though it is a crummy area, most of the houses have a satellite TV dish on top of them. I guess they watch pirated soccer games and soap operas from Turkey, as well as: Oprah (BG E's favorite show), The Doctors (a close second), Knight Rider (the orginal series) and the Dukes of Hazard.

Anyway, you get the idea. On an earlier mission in the area, we ran into a suicidal donkey. The donkey would walk down the road, cutting in front of each of our vehicles, stand there for a few seconds, look right up at the driver and give the "just run me over, please, put me out of my misery" look. When the donkey realized he wasn't going to get run over, he would go to the next vehicle. Kind of funny, but also pathetic. The donkeys have to pull huge carts of bricks from the ovens to the loading dock, and raw bricks to the ovens, so, not a really good job for a donkey. There isn't a whole lot of automation, most of the work is done by people and donkeys. I guess this is good because if the factory was automated, then all of those people and donkeys would be out of a job. I am pretty sure the donkeys wouldn't mind, but the people would head straight towards the insurgency recruiting office.

I think if I am reincarnated I want to be a horse in Kentucky or a dog in Germany. That would be the best life, definately not a donkey in Iraq or Haiti. If I had to be a donkey, I think I would want to be a donkey in Indiana, maybe in Western North Carolina.

Other notes:

I started my Army Ten Miler training plan this week, I am already two runs behind, todays tempo run kicked my ass, I couldn't keep the target pace for three miles. I am sure the runs will improve.

We had a Law/Judicial Conference at one of the big FOBs, we got there about 9:15, right before the chow hall closed for breakfast. Smelling French Toast, me and 6.5 headed straight to it, after we made sure our NP buddies were chai'd up and settled in. I had a big stack of French Toast, 6.5 go an Army omlette. Not sure if any of the readers have had an Army omlette, but they are pretty good, but they are only available at the bigger chow halls - - our tiny chow hall here does not offer them for breakfast, nor do they offer French Toast - - the fluffy kind that is made with Texas Toast sized bread, so it was a pretty big deal.

80 days to Kuwait, and no Kevlar.

Weak, winy post

OK, it is officially summertime here, 110 at least in the shade today and the wind was like a blast furnace. Perfect time for a road trip, especially if the air conditioner in your MRAP (55,000 lbs. of steel, hermitically sealed with a huge, sun magnifying, bullet-proof windshield) has started to laugh at you and the heat. The AC in our steel monster works sometimes (especially when the Socrates has it at the mechanics) and quits most of the time (especially when you are 5 minutes into a 1 hour and 30 minute trip). There are very few places that we have to go that are close, so driving these days kind of sucks the life out of you.

MRAPs are pretty good vehicles, in previous posts I have commented on how they do what they were designed to do, but their AC is definately a lowest bidder product. Today was a perfect example, we were driving to FOB Hammer with the National Police to drop them off for some training. FOB Hammer is truly in the middle of nowhere, the road to it is paved, kind of, but has these huge pot holes all along it, so you can't get over 20 miles an hour. We left at 7 AM, got there about 9 ish, before it got too hot (it was only about 90). The AC was just fine. We ended up hanging out there for 5 or 6 hours, opening ceremony, tour of the training base with the General, conference with one of the coalition force battalion commanders (who I went to Infantry Officer's Basic Course 21 years ago, and was stationed with at FT Ord, CA for a few years - - - small Army World), lunch at the big FOB (no ice cream for me, I just wasn't in the mood), some shopping at the PX (even if it is the same stuff you have seen for 9 months the pure joy of being able to shop trumps the selection, and some of the magazines were new) and one of our other MRAPs was in maintenance for 4 hours for - - take a guess - - a broken AC.

All the while we were sitting around the FOB, Socrates had the AC turned on and it was keeping the insides of the vehicle mostly cool. Once we got geared up and headed down the road, I felt the hot blast of air that means the AC just quit. So, 1 hour and some change worth of driving, heading due west, right into the setting sun, 110 ish degree air circulating inside our vehicle. I hit the ice water hard (we keep a cooler of water on ice for such an occasion, cold water beats warm water ten times out of ten over here) and just let the sweat pour on down.

While you are rolling outside the wire you wear: your Advanced Combat Helmet (good piece of gear, much more comfortable than the two previous versions I have experienced) which manages to keep all of the heat from escaping your head; radio headphones, rubberish pieces over both ears (nothing worse than ear sweat, especially when you can't do anything about it); ballistic glasses, which keep the heat right over your eyes; fireproof ACUs (if they are designed to keep fire out, do you think they are going to let the heat escape from the inside?); 35 pounds of assorted Kevlar plates and pads, nylon webbing, and other heat retaining materiel and your boots, weapon and fireproof gloves (see fireproof ACUs for my comments on that). Anything you touch is HOT because of the sun and lack of AC.

If I were back at Bragg or Riley when this happened, I would just roll down the window, but that is discouraged and well, impossible. The windows on the MRAP are more chunks of ballistic glass. Sigh, you just have to sit there and sweat.

Anyway, we made it back to COP Cashe South with no additional discomfort. It is funny when it is 110 degrees outside, you open the door and it feels like cool air is rushing inside the vehicle. Weird.

I am sure that the veterans of the WW II North Africa campaign that read my post will have absolutely no sympathy for me, they not only did not have AC in their Sherman tanks, they also rarely got cold water and most definately didn't have Baskin Robbins Jamoca Almond Fudge ice cream. So, I will keep my complaining to a minimum.

87 days til no Kevlar is required. Sorry about the wining.

Quick Update

SPC Higgins, one of the paratroopers that was wounded last tuesday, is out and about. I saw him at a conference this morning. I talked to him for just a few seconds, but I let him know that I was very happy to see him and he said he was very happy to be seen.

LTC Shinners, another paratrooper that was wounded, is doing well I hear. He is still here in country, recovering from his wounds.

Tuff week

Rest In Peace SGT Duffy, when you get to Fiddler's Green stop off and have a few with your airborne buddies and watch a few Husker games as well.

Bragg soldier killed in Iraq (From the Fayetteville Observer Times)

A soldier with the 82nd Airborne Division was killed and four others injured Tuesday in Iraq after a road-side bomb exploded near their Humvee, authorities said.

Sgt. Justin J. Duffy, 31, of Cozad, Neb., died from injuries received from the blast.

Four other soldiers — Lt. Col. Michael Shinners, Spc. Ryan Higgins, Pfc. Adam Rosenbaum and Pfc. Alan Davidson — were injured but are currently in stable condition. The soldiers were on patrol in Baghdad at the time of the explosion. They are each members of the 3rd Brigade Special Troops Battalion, 3rd BCT of the 82nd Airborne Division.

A memorial service for Duffy is scheduled Sunday in Iraq.

A graduate of the University of Nebraska at Kearney, Duffy joined the Army in June 2007 and became a truck commander with the 82nd Airborne Division in July 2008.

“Sgt. Justin Duffy was an exceptional NCO and a leader of the highest caliber. He served as an Infantryman with distinction and honor in combat, sacrificing his life for our nation,” said Lt. Col. Kenneth Rector, commander, 3rd Brigade Special Troops Battalion, 3rd BCT, 82nd Airborne Division. “Our condolences go out to his family and friends as we all mourn his loss.”

The youngest of three children, Duffy is survived by his parents, Joseph M. and Janet L. Duffy, of Cozad, Neb., and two sisters.

His parents remembered him as the model son.

“We knew from when Justin was a little boy that he would succeed. His desire to serve his country and be a paratrooper is what made him exemplary,” Joseph and Janet Duffy said in a statement. “We supported him and prayed for him every day. Words cannot express how proud we are of him, and he will always be our hero.”

Duffy's awards and decorations include the Bronze Star Medal, the Purple Heart, the Army Commendation Medal, the Good Conduct Medal, the National Defense Service Medal, the Iraq Campaign Medal, the Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, the Army Service Ribbon, the Overseas Service Ribbon, the Combat Infantryman Badge and the Parachutist Badge.

I didn't have the chance to meet SGT Duffy, he was on my Brigade Commander's Personal Security Detachment so I saw him around a few times, I did talk to SPC Higgins a few times, he had the additional duty of taking pictures at events so he had to lug around a camera with the rest of his kit, so we talked camera stuff while waiting around. LTC Shinners is the Deputy Commander of the BDE that I am attached to so I talked with him a few times. They were on the way to pick up the Brigade Commander at a lunch we were all to attend, so it was quite a shock to hear about.

Not much else to say about this week.

OK, The Internet is back . . .

A brief moment in history:

Al Gore came by this morning and installed the internet here again, good guy. He gave us a quick rundown on global warming, beings how this is Iraq and it is over 100 degrees by 8 am we really didn't need that sort of briefing, but we listened patiently.

Ok, not really true, but we did fire the first guy that was setting up the civilian internet service here on COP Cashe South and the new guys seems to be more customer oriented.

The last few weeks have been mostly un-eventful (mostly harmless for you Douglas Adams fans . . .), there have been no IEDs, EFPs or rocket attacks. Just the normal patrolling, searching, meetings, talking to's and leader engagements.

BG E has been keeping busy with checking up on his operations and meeting sheiks. I am getting schooled on what a sheik really is . . . Apparently, there are fake sheiks running around. We had a meeting with one of the two big sheiks in our area, the sheik of the Al Dafey tribe. This is a Shia tribe, pretty big, lots of people, and the sheik of the tribe is pretty ticked off that a lot of "fake sheiks" are running around acting like they are in charge. Apparently, during the hard times, all of the big sheiks ran off to other countries, and now they are starting to come back. The big sheiks are trying to re-assert their power and take control of the population away from the fake sheiks. Here is what I have learned:

In order to be a sheik, you have to:

1. Have a historical lineage of sheiks.

2. Have at least 2,000 people under your care/control.

3. Be recognized by the other sheiks in the region.

We have two real sheiks, according to the rules. Sheik Sammi and Sheik Hatif. Sheik Hatif is the one that is getting upset the most, because the fake sheiks have taken control of the tribal support council. He feels that only true sheiks should be sitting on that council. Unfortunately, the Prime Minister has signed a letter appointing the fake sheiks (Sheik Q from earlier posts, is a fake sheik) to the council, so there isn't a legal leg for the old sheiks to stand on right now.

I just shake (no pun intended) my head and wonder how this country will progress past all of this. Now, you have the central government (which isn't really helping the people out here), the local government (which also isn't helping the people out very much), the fake sheiks on the tribal support council (not helping much) and now the "real" sheiks trying to grab some sort of power. To me it looks like a bunch of kids arguing over who is going to play, instead of adults sitting down and trying to work out the huge problems the area has. The only folks I can see that are trying to help folks out are the ISF (Iraqi Security Forces) and the US Forces. Sigh.

Soccer Tournament update:

We went to Shaab Stadium last weekend for the tournament, the first game was pretty close for a little while, but the other team got worn down in the second half and couldn't match the 3-1 NP team's speed, we ended up winning 3-1, but should probably have won 6 or 7-1, we missed 3 penalty kicks and hit the cross bars twice. That victory put us in the finals.

For the finals, BG Emad said he was a little concerned, the team we were playing was an Iraqi Police Patrol (kind of like traffic cops) unit and they, umm, had some players that might not have been in the unit. Of course, we had some players that technically were not in our unit so we didn't complain too much. It was a pretty close game, but their ringers were a little bit better than our ringers, and they won 2-0.

A couple of soccer tournament notes:

There was one female that played on our combined team, Specialist E from Naples, Florida. She was quite the hit with all of the players, they were fascinated that a female would step onto the field and play with them. On day two of the tournament, a radio reporter asked to interview here and let us know that she was the first female EVER to play soccer in Sha'ab Stadium. The stadium has been around since 1966, and she was the first. Kind of cool. She said all of the right things during her interview (no, I didn't know that I was the first . . . This is a great honor . . . I hope that other women are able to play . . . ) I got some photos of her playing, but everytime I tried to get shot of her on the sidelines she was smoking a cigarette, I didn't think that would be very inspirational. I will find some other photos from folks with better cameras and try to post those. There is really no way to verify that she was the first, but it is pretty cool to think about it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Shaab_Stadium

Sha'ab stadium was kind of cool, but it was your basic all concrete stadium. I thought it was going to be hot as all get out, but most of the stands were in the shade so that helped out a lot. There was also a press box in there, with Uday Hussein's original couch in it. I took a seat in it just for history's sake and so I can ask folks at some social event whether or not they have sat in any of Uday Hussein's furniture.

For both soccer games we took two busloads of local hooligans and National Police shurta to the stadium, they were the only fans in the joint and were very vocal. The crew included a three or four piece band, any song they played was good enough to get up and dance for. They did get kind of quiet towards the end of the second game, though.

The stadium was a multipurpose stadium, it has an olympic sized track around the soccer field, which was pretty cool.Alls I could think about was spinning some quarter mile intervals during the game, but I didn't have my running shoes or fast shorts (for those of you that followed my Boston Marathon blog last year - - - I didn't bring the fastest shorts EVER here, but I did bring the pair that I ran the Boston Marathon in last year, they are pretty fast, just not the fastest shorts EVER).

Speaking of running, I hit the 30 mile a week mark last week. I had a couple of nice 7 milers, 5 miles worth of interval work and an 11 miler on Sunday. I have decided to violate one of the rules - - I run with my Zune MP3 player. That probably sets a pretty poor example, but to be honest, most of the time that I run, I am the only person out there running, and there is no traffic to speak of so, I just take the chance. With the civilian internet being back up I can download Car Talk and This American Life, two of my favorite radio shows. Those make the runs go a lot better.

I downloaded a training plan for the Army Ten Miler, which is 4 OCT 09. I probably won't be able to get to DC for the race, but who knows. If I do get a number in the deployed soldiers lottery, am able to get to the east coast by that weekend and find myself in DC, I want to be ready to run my favorite race.

Soccer Game and Achmed

What would a war be without a, without a, without a soccer game? Our higher headquarters, one of the brigades from FT Bragg, decided that it would be a great idea to have a soccer tournament with all of the Iraqi units teams playing, along with a few token US soldiers. Iraqis are pretty good at soccer, US guys are kind of good at soccer, so it was an OK idea . . . There are 8 Iraqi units in our area so the brigade set up a pretty simple single elimination tournament. We had to travel down south to play an Iraqi Army unit. I have seen home field advantages before (penn state vs. Nebraska, that penn state receiver was waaaaay out of bounds in 1982, but the home refs made sure he was in; and who can forget the florida state robbery in the 1993 Orange Bowl? Two Husker TDs called back, unsportsmanlike conduct when the fsu fans stormed the field with 15 seconds left?), but Iraqis take the the home field cake.


First half, 1-1 tie, pretty even match, our boys are more talented, but the Iraqi Army team has a lot of speed. First 3 mintues of the second half, the National Police score two quick goals, seems like the game is over. 30 minutes go by, the Iraqi Army gets a break and scores one, 3-2, no problems, only a few minutes left (the halfs were 30 minutes long), just lay back on defense and play keep away. 25 minutes later, the ref gives two of our players red cards for asking him how much time is left, so we are down to 9 players. 20 minutes later after it is obvious the Iraqi Army team isn't going to score, the ref finally blows the whistle and ends the game, a victory for the National Police.


Turns out the Iraqi Army unit had threatened the ref with arrest, unless they won. Kind of funny. Interesting story, one of the players that got a red card on our team was an American, he became an instant hero to the National Police. After the ref carded him, he went off the field, as soon as the ref turned his back, he went back on the field and played a few more minutes until the ref saw him, and chased him off the field with the his red card waving. Everytime I see him I call him Two Cards.


Achmed: BG Emad's father suprised him last week and brought his youngest son down from the big city to visit dad at work, it was pretty cool meeting three generations of the general.



All's Achmed (4 years old) wanted to do was drive one of our MRAPs:





Other notes:


Not sure if anyone reads the comments, but my brother-in-law, Wade, has decided to start the taunting early. He has thrown down the gauntlet on fantasy football this coming year, even trying to give me advice (?): Matthew Stafford. Yeah, right, rookie quarterback, Detroit Lions. Almost as good as drafting a kicker that didn't make a team . . . . Starting my research now.


Ice Cream:


One of the huge injustices of this mission is that the smaller bases, where most of the soldiers that get out and do stuff live, have small chow halls, with not the best amenities. While the big bases (FOBs) have palatial chow halls with great extras. One of the best extras is Baskin Robbins Ice Cream (chocolate, vanilla, cookies and cream, jamoca almond fudge, strawberry and pralines and cream). I have mentioned this before, Superman's favorite flavor is Jamoca Almond Fudge, prior to this month, I didn't partake of the delight. For some reason lately, I have started to have a hankering for ice cream, so I have broken down.

Today, we had a meeting at FOB Loyalty with one of the National Police about the SOI, one of the parts of the meeting was lunch. COL A, the acting commander while BG E is on leave, bugged me for two days about the meeting, lunch and ice cream. He didn't really care about the meeting (an SOI transition briefing) but he did care about the ice cream. He asked me three times before the meeting whether or not we would get ice cream with lunch. When the meeting went past 2 PM, he got worried because the chow hall closes at 2 PM, so he asked me a few more times. The meeting ended, he practically sprinted to the chow hall, ate lunch then started to talk about the ice cream. It was funny to watch. He ended up asking for vanilla, kind of cute. When I came back to the table with a scoop of vanilla and a scoop of jamoca almond fudge he was mad that I didn't tell him he could have two flavors, not sure if we are going to win this war with only one scoop of ice cream.

Quick Post

The civilian internet is back up, I will post some pictures and knock out an update later on this afternoon.

We have a Sons of Iraq meeting in the big city today, should be a hoot. The SOI program as we know it is supposed to be transitioning away, with the SOI being absorbed into several Iraqi government ministries. I think this will be a big deal and hope it is done right. If not, there will be about 2000 or so unemployed, former insurgents that are ticked off at the Iraqi government roaming around our sector. Hmmmm.

Blogger's Blues

For some reason I haven't really felt like blogging, maybe hitting month number 9 of a 12 month deployment has kind of brought a melancholy or writer's (blogger's?) slump. There were a couple of positive things: We have our redeployment timeline: Our replacement team shows up mid-August, we go back to Kuwait at the end of August and back in Kansas sometime in September. Our replacement team has also contacted us, which means they are starting to suffer through the training in Kansas, and they are sending one of their team members here this week.

And a couple of negative things:

The past couple of weeks were mostly quiet until a couple of days ago: There were a few rockets launched at COP Cashe and there was an IED yesterday. Only one vehicle was damaged in the IED attack (mine resistant vehicles do their job) and thankfully there were no casualties involved in either attack. The rocket launching was kind of strange - - basically they lean a rocket up on a rail, point it in the general direction of the target and let it fly. Kind of like trying to hit a bulls-eye target with a bottle rocket launched from a coke bottle. Not a whole lot of accuracy. None of the rockets came close to hitting anything, but it is a tactic we haven't seen in our area for over a year.

Prior to this week the National Police made some pretty high level arrests that seemed to take the wind out of the insurgents cells, but then these two events mark an upswing in attacks in our area. We will see how the next few weeks go.

Couple of other notes:

The National Police received the first of their Up Armored HMMWVs last month. BG E had a short ceremony where each of the HMMWVs were dabbed with sheep's blood for luck (unless you happen to be the sheep that gave up the blood). They have been cruising around in bright blue and white HMMWVs now for about a week. This makes me pretty happy - - BG E is in a safer vehicle and doesn't stand out nearly as much as he did when he was cruising around in his armored Toyota Land Cruiser.

Survivor, the best non-football show EVER, is wrapping up it's 18th season (they run two series a year, so really they are in their 9th year, but who is counting?). Tragically, the finale will be in a couple of weeks and that will leave me with absolutely nothing on TV to look forward to. Sigh. If anyone is watching, my money is on JT, most folks like him. Stephan is a good guy, but doesn't have the crowd behind him.

There will be a definite TV draught until pre-season football starts to warm up again along with Fantasy Football . . . . I can't remember where I stand vs. Wade, but he beat me last season which means I need to clean his clock again this year. Going to be tough to do, though. I am deployed and only have limited exposure to football (starting excuses early is always a good strategy). I am going to try to recruit a few team members this year, we'll see how that goes.

Another wild week . . .

OK, wild week. Things all over the country are heating up, good thing about it is I don't think the violence is swaying anyone towards the insurgent's cause. Most of the violence is killing civilians, which is not a good way to convince a population you are right. There have been some pretty spectacular (in a bad way) suicide vest bombings, I have no idea who would strap a suicide vest on and blow themselves up, or how you go about recruiting someone to do that, but wow. In our area . . .

There were 6 IEDs found (mostly by the Sons Of Iraq and National Police) in the southern boundary region of our AO, and another 2 found on two of our major roads. All but one of them were found before they detonated (the one that detonated blew up after a National Police patrol went past it, no injuries), but still, that makes getting in the vehicle to go on missions just a little more thought provoking. Not sure if you remember this from the blog, but our southern boundary is shared with a less than stellar Iraqi Army unit, they haven't really done a lot to help out the situation. They made a few arrests, which didn't work out well for the CPT that made the arrests (he was killed in an ambush that made it clear that the folks that got arrested had friends that didn't like him being arrested).

On top of all of the IEDs, folks in some of the smaller villages are taking pot shots at the National Police, which drives BG E crazy. In response to all of the shenanigans going on down on the southern boundary, he extended his boundary so he could go into the area that a lot of insurgents were able to operate in. His theory was that the insurgents were coming from the zone to our south, emplacing the IEDs in our area then going back to the southern area where he couldn't chase them. So he extended the boundary and started doing missions in that area.

Once he started doing missions down there, IEDs started re-appearing on our major highways, so he probably poked the hornets nest, which is just fine with him. He is very anxious to chase folks down and make arrests. His biggest frustration is that the legal system is holding him back - - he can't get warrants very quickly (still waiting on warrants that he requested at the beginning of April). Without a warrant, he can't make an arrest that will stick. Very frustrating.

We went with him when he monitors the operations, he is pretty cool about how he monitors the missions. Most generals (even US commanders) want to be right there, kind of micromanaging an operation, he hangs back with his commo officer and NCO, monitoring three motorolas and two cell phones, map in hand. It is very enlightening to watch, him allowing his subordinates to manage the battle and he just waits to help them out if necessary.

He has another one of his units clearing the businesses on the side of the two major highways that had IEDs on them. It was kind of cool this morning when we were driving out we saw some of the National Police soldiers picking up trash from the sides of the road and the median - - insurgents will use garbage to hide their IEDs because trash is everywhere and most folks just don't notice it anymore.

All of the pressure is starting to work, there was a big arrest last night. The guy picked up was a major IED distributor and had a lot of connections. We will see if other folks shake out from this arrest.

I was out on a mission yesterday and today we had a small humanitarian assistance mission with the National Police, basically we hung around while they passed out boxes of Red Crescent (Arab version of the Red Cross) supplies to needy families. I took a few pictures, that was about it. The guys didn't really want to go - - I think they were looking at a day off and reminding me that two suicide vests had been used in other humanitarian assistance missions, the National Police had it under control and it was an easy mission. Monday's are traditionally our days with no missions scheduled.

Other news:

The team has found out that our replacements are on the way, they should be getting here sometime in August, we should be leaving here in the first couple of weeks of September, and should be back in the US shortly after that. It is a long way off, but it is something to look forward to.

Ruff Week in a Little Corner of Iraq

This past week should have been a very happy week in the 3-1 National Police area of operations - - they received their first 75 Up Armored HMMWVs, which is quite an honor for a non-Iraqi Army unit - - but there were some very sad events that took place in the AO that made it a sad week instead.

The first event was the death of LTC Mohammed on friday. He died in a traffic accident (more on that later) on his way to pick up his unit's HMMVs. He was a true hero of the regiment, in 2006 he was wounded in action, shot three times by the insurgents. He spent the next two years in the hospital and recovering from the wounds. He returned to the brigade about 5 months ago and immediately started working hard. He was a very strong officer that had a great rapport with his soldiers and other Iraqi officers. I enjoyed working with him, no matter what he was doing if I saw him he broke into a huge smile and came over to shake my hand. He also spoke a little English, which was cool. Needless to say, BG Emad was crushed that day. The NP's evacuated LTC Mohammed to the BDE HQs, he was still alive, BG E saw him and said take him straight to the hospital. He died of his wounds at the hospital. 4 other soldiers were wounded in the accident.

The truck he was driving in was a Chevy Silverado, the Iraqi's love the Silverados - - big V-8s so they move out. LTC Mohammed's driver was driving too fast, hit a pot hole, lost control and the truck flipped over. LTC Mohammed was not wearing a seatbelt, and was thrown from the vehicle. Very sad day, and a loss for Iraq.

The second event happened on Saturday night. An IED exploded in Center City, killing two kids and wounding two others. A kid had found an IED (probably some Un-exploded ordnance left over from the hard times) and was carrying it to town to show his friends or sell it in the market. When he pulled it out of the bag to show his friends, he dropped it and it exploded, killing him. Iraq is a tough place to live sometimes. Another sad day for Iraq.

The bad thing about the whole situation was that at the same time the IED exploded, our Explosives Ordnance Disposal team was blowing up some other things that were found or turned in, so there was a series of explosions at the same time as when the IED exploded in Center City. One of the local leaders (not the best leader and definitely not interested keeping public order) ran straight to the TV and radio stations and claimed that Center City (a Shia city) was under attack from a smaller Sunni town, stirring the sectarian violence pot a little bit. He also claimed that there were 10 people killed and hundreds wounded. He did this without permission or making sure he had all of the correct facts. Unfortunately, this story got picked up by several news agencies and now Center City is famous for the wrong reason. There was even a story in Stars and Stripes about the attack, the story used the leaders account as a reference, so even our friendly press got it wrong.

Needless to say, that leader has been talked to by most everyone that is doing the right thing in the area. BG Emad called him out and let him know how much damage he had done, Sheik Q dressed him down in front of several other sheiks, so the guy either got the message or is too stubborn to admit he was wrong.

The final thing that happened was a comic sort of tragedy. We asked BG Emad to record some radio announcements, asking kids not to pick up Un-exploded ordnance and if they do find something, they should report it to the National Police. He of course agreed to do it and we made an appointment at the local radio station (a US friendly radio station, pretty much because we give them money for generator fuel and bought all of the radio equipment). We arrived at the appointed time, and were ticked off right off the bat. You can always tell if something isn't going to happen in Iraq if nobody is around. The radio station was deserted. We made some phone calls, got the manager there 30 minutes late. He went into the Iraqi song and dance, Iraqi's really hate saying they can't do something - - there was no fuel for the generator (not true), we can't start the first generator, the generator mechanic is on his way to start the second generator . . . blah, blah, blah. After about 30 more minutes of beating around the bush it turns out that an employee of the radio station had stolen all of the gear and they couldn't put BG E on the air. I have no idea why they couldn't say that on the phone, but it was very frustrating.

I was pretty frustrated, we bought the equipment, paid for the fuel to run the radio station and someone stole the show, literally. BG E, being the total pro that he is asked to not be frustrated, these things happen in Iraq.

That sums a bad week, and the enemy didn't do a darned thing.

Kids, if you are out there, wear your seatbelts, drive at a reasonable speed and don't play with UXO.

Wild Week in Iraq

Last week was kind of a wild week here in Iraq, but quiet in our corner of the country. This past week (4-9 APR 09) was the anniversary of the US invasion of Sadr City, the anniversary of the death of the elder Sadr and the anniversary of the capture of Saddam Hussein. All of the car bombs that you saw going off are the way one segment of the Iraqi society has decided to commemorate those events. Nothing has happened in our little corner of Iraq, knock on wood.

There was a smaller bomb that went off south of us in another unit's sector, but nothing here yet. The area to the south of us has been a problem area: The Iraqi unit there isn't very good, the commander is very old school - - weak figurehead, doesn't engage local leaders and has no respect for the SOI and sheiks, exact opposite of BG Emad. The terrain is also as close to a forest as you are going to find in Iraq, mostly date farms, with very close trees and not a lot of roads. Insurgents can slip between the two unit's areas, cause problems in one area then just fade back into another area. We have started to work closer with the US unit that is down there, and trying to drag the Iraqi unit into some agreements on how to operate and sharing information and intelligence. We are also trying to get a combined operation or two with the Iraqi units to make it harder for the insurgents to operate.

BG Emad went on Jazza (vacation, he takes about 5 days a month), he went on Jazza the day that all of the wildness started - - 6 car bombs in Bagdhad. On that same day a National Police general was assassinated in Bagdhad which caused some concern until we knew it wasn't him. He told me that when he goes home he hangs around the house, doesn't go outside of his yard and mostly does gardening. I tease him about the Lion of the Mada'in gardening, he just chuckled. He will be back on Saturday.

While he is gone, his deputy will be running the show. Good guy, but he likes to taaaaallllllllkkkkkkkk. BG E is very cut and dry, COL A drags things out. The team hates going to meetings when COL A is running them, I have to drag them into the meetings. COL A can take a 30 minute meeting and make it last 2 or 3 hours. Very difficult to maintain focus.

There was supposed to be a million-man march (sponsored by Al-Sadr) in Bagdhad today, but it rained all morning and I don't think that Iraqis want to come out in the rain and march. CNN said they had "tens of thousands" which to me means about 16,000 people or so. I don't think that the folks around here really have the heart for that sort of stuff anymore. LATER NOTE: There were about 7,000 folks at the march, so not a real strong showing.

NCAA Tournament update: Smooth (SFC T) won the tournament, he had it locked up pretty early, and barring any upsets he was locked in on the prize.

Internet Connection Challenges

My civilian internet access got cut off, the contract wasn't renewed so they are trying to find a new contractor to set it up, so my blog has not been updated. The only good way to update the blog is to check into the Morale, Welfare and Recreation internet cafe and update the blog, so I write something, e-mail it to someone or myself then cut and paste. I also can't put anymore pictures in the blog until there is a new civilian internet provider. Sigh, sorry. War is hell sometimes.

Not sure if you are reading about this but the SOI members have not been paid for this month by the government of Iraq so they are getting a little out of hand. There was an SOI unit up in Bagdhad that was disbanded and arrested after they resisted their leader being arrested. In this area there have been some signs of unrest - - - some sniping at a National Police checkpoint and another IED was emplaced and went off (no casualties, but very unsettling) on one of the routes that we travel on sometimes. The IED was on a route that has had 6 IEDs emplaced on it, very close to where one of the earlier IEDs was emplaced, so there is a lot of suspicion, especially with the SOI that are supposed to be watching that area. BG Emad was furious and embarrassed, he was relieved that nobody was hurt. He offered to buy the US another HMMWV to replace the one that was destroyed by the IED.

I have no idea what the government of Iraq is thinking sometimes. There still are some sectarian/tribal shenanigans going on within the government. The ministry of interior (runs the National Police, Iraqi Police and all other internal security units) is Shia. The ministry of Defense (Iraqi Army) is Sunni for the most part, the department of Displace Civilians and Reconciliation is Sunni. There has been a lot of infighting between those organizations about the SOI. The Iraqi Army wants to disband them because they are mostly the folks they were fighting with during the bad years, the National Police wants to keep them around because they know that if you stop paying all these guys things will go wrong. Very frustrating to watch, there is so much potential here - - lots of money, water, agriculture and a population that wants to move on. The SOI pay was held up this month because the organizations couldn't agree who should pay them. One of the organizations wanted to take over paying them from the Department of Displaced Civilians and Reconciliation (DDR) (one of the Prime Minister's personal offices), there was a lot of arguing over who would pay them, in the end, they will get paid by the DDR, just 3 weeks late.

NOTE: This previous section was written a couple of days ago, yesterday (Sunday) the SOI money came through so there are a lot of happy former militia members out there. I will let you know about this month - - payday is supposed to be in two weeks . . . .

In other notes, the Humanitarian Assistance supplies that we coordinated for, took the NP up to Bagdhad to get and helped them load up were delivered to Salmon Shtup Village. We didn't go with them because we wanted to make sure it was a NP show and they got all of the credit. It was kind of funny, when we went over the pictures of the distribution from the NP there was some other US unit in some of the pictures. We are trying to find out who those guys are and ask them what the heck they were doing up there in the middle of nowhere with our unit distributing our supplies.

NOTE: We figured out who the glory-hounds were - - - a National Guard MP unit. We see them on a regular basis, they work with the Iraqi police in the area and come to some of our meetings, I am going to bust out the LT that runs the platoon and see what he was thinking.

The National Police finished off their volleyball tournament yesterday, the good guys came home with a close victory. BG Emad's Personal Security Detail team won the tournament, I took some good pics and will post them when I get a chance. The level of play was pretty good, I was impressed with both teams. The second place team was from the Narhwan (Northern City) Iraqi Police Station, they had two players that were very good, lot of good setting and spiking going on. I am glad the Personal Security Detail team won, those are the guys that surround BG Emad and run his security when we are out walking around.

Salmon Shtup Village Round Two

Today we took COL Diyah from the 3-1 NP up to Bagdhad to pick up the first round of Humanitarian Assistance for Salmon Shtup village. All in all we loaded up 4 pallets of water, 6 pallets of wood, 3 big boxes of cement and 2 pallets of cinder block.

It was kind of a long day, as good as the US Army is about communication, it is hard to link up with another unit that isn't in your area of operations. We had to find the one Staff Sargeant on FOB Striker (huge place) that had the keys to the storage vans where the Humanitarian Assistance was kept. It took us about 2 hours to find the guy and get all of the pieces together - - keys, forklifts, forklift operators, another forklift with a different kind of fork, yet another forklift because the first one broke, etc. - -but it all worked out in the end.

The fine soldiers of the 639th CSSC (Combat Service and Support Company, I think) from the Montana National Guard out of Kalispell, Montana helped us out a lot. Not only did they load up the goods for us, they also spotted the Iraqi shurta lunch and as much gatorade as they could all stuff in their trucks.

Salmon Shtup Village

One of BG E's projects is Salmon Shtup village. This is a small area northwest of Northern City, pretty much in the middle of nowhere. The village was destroyed during the bad times, it was right on a Shia/Sunni fault line in the north of our sector, and all of the families in the village were chased away. All of the Northern City sheiks think this is a very important area, BG E does as well, we aren't quite sure why, but if they think it is important, we will help out as much as we can.
About 4 months ago, Sheik K started to ask BG E to provide security for the displaced families as they came back to the area, BG E agreed, and made sure Sheik K understood he would only provide security if the families came back and started to rebuild the village. For the next 2-3 months there was a lot of going back and forth between the Northern Sheiks and the Tribal Reconciliation Council (the senior sheiks, both Sunni and Shia, that have been appointed by the Prime Minister to work out issues between Sunni and Shia tribes before they get to the point where they need the government to intercede). While I was on leave 42 families were convinced to move back to the town, BG E put a platoon of National Policemen up there to secure them and now folks are trying to work with the government to get basic services to the village. Pretty standard requirements: Water and electricity. The fields around the village are all green, and there are date palms there so there is something going good, but to be honest, not much for the folks to do up there outside of try to scrape together a village.

Couple of successes: The Red Cross dropped off 43 water tanks (one per family) this week and Sheik K sends a water truck up there every couple of days. BG E visited the village on monday, we went along and BG E will present the village requirements to the Mayor's executive council. The Beladia Mayor (a Beladia is roughly the equivalent of county; a Nahia is a larger city within a Beladia) may be able to do something, I will keep you posted.

Some of the pictures of the village are posted to the web page.

ID Card Victory

Today was a banner day, the forces of US Army bureacratic evil were defeated on the modern corporate battlefield. Today, BG E received his International Zone (Green Zone), Iraqi-wide identification card. This card allows BG E to go into the Green Zone (part of Iraq, btw) without a US escort, kind of funny, but that is the nature of security. The team that worked with 3-1 NP let his ID card expire about 3 months before they left, as we drove away after dropping them off my counterpart said, " . . . oh, yeah, you guys need to get BG E a new ID card."

Because the card had expired, BG E had to go through the whole process, which meant SWATT had to go through the whole process. Once we found the ID card office, we (6.5 and I) had to sit through a 4 hour presentation on how to fill out the proper forms, and where those forms would go. We were also briefed on the operating hours of the ID card office: 0930-1130 in the morning, closed 1130-1330 (for lunch), 1330-1630 in the afternoon, Monday through Thursday. After doing some quick math, the pack of folks in the office worked 6 hours a day, 4 days a week. Now, we thought that maybe those were only the hours they were open to the public and the other 30 or so business hours in the week they folks were busy processing paperwork, making ID cards, returning phone calls, answering emails and dutifully pursuing their mission of ensuring the right Iraqis had ID cards. After a few phone calls, we found out that, nope, they only worked 24 hours a week, and would not consider working a minute past any of their posted hours. Some folks fight wars in different ways, apparently these folks only fight paperwork 24 hours a week.

Anyway, there are three steps to the process: Initial forms, security screening and biometric processing and picking up the card. OK, four steps. Two of those steps, security screening and picking up the card, BG E had to be present, so we had to drive from the country to the big city. For the security screening, we got held up by normal Bagdhad traffic and almost didn't make it there before 1130, as 6.5 and BG E walked up to the office, the ID card folks were closing up shop for lunch at 1120 or so. Luckily, the officer in charge of the ID card office was there and was receptive to how difficult it is to make appointments in a city with little traffic control and a lot of traffic.

We finally got all of the steps completed, now BG E can attend meetings in the Green Zone and on other bases controlled by the US without an escort. Big Victory.

NCAA Update: Round two had some pretty profound impact on the pool. I am still in third place, but it is much closer. 6.5 has moved into 1st place, tied with Smooth. Superman has faded back to 4th place. There are some major differences in our Sweet 16 picks, so things will get clearer in the pool. 6.5 is banking on Duke making it to the final game, I think that is a stretch after watching Duke break my heart over the past 3 years. I picked Syracuse over oklahoma and am sticking with unc making it to the final game against Louisville.