We’ve started establishing a rhythm here. When lucky, we have up to two days warning about future patrols; this gives me time to plan the missions and figure out exactly what I want to do in my sector. Additionally, we’ve started picking up a workable system inside the platoon: SSG Lark keeps the platoon straight, I keep the sector straight. An ideal scenario for me is I come from a brief, tell him I need five trucks by 0900 and one squad of dismounts, he makes it happen, and I take over on the patrol. It works.
Activity yesterday was pretty substantial. We had three IEDs, one VBIED (car bomb), and some small arms fire in the city. None directed against Coalition Forces, but the National Police had a bad time yesterday. I was rolling out the wire just as it happened. This meant that I was tasked and retasked to go play pick-up-sticks all over the city. When something exploded, I had to stop my regularly-scheduled mission and go run over and assess the damage. The car bomb was pretty vicious. We found a second car, heavily damaged from shrapnel, a good three hundred meters away on the road. The driver had been badly wounded and the car had just kept on rolling down the road until the tires finally gave out and it slowed to a halt.
Over the past few days, Blue Platoon has been running around the neighborhoods conducting more SWEAT-MS assessments (Security-Water-Electricity-Academics-Trash-Medical-Sewage). We’re basically glorified utility patrollers with guns on these operations. The electrical situation here is the real problem; most households receive 1-4 hours of power for every 24 hour period. Everybody complains about electricity first. They don’t even complain about anything else, usually, as if to emphasize how bad the situation is.
MOSUL 30JAN09
A little break in journal contact, there. Sorry. I had to stop in mid-entry and go out to watch a tower move from one traffic circle to another; exciting stuff, I promise. At least it helped us build a little “wasta,” which is apparently the term here for the reputation of a relationship. If you promise something and then deliver on time, you build wasta. If you fail to deliver, you lose wasta. I guess it isn’t too different from gaining or losing face. The commander of my partnered battalion was very appreciative of our efforts; the fact that we also drove like madmen around the city for the past three days delivering truckloads of barbed wire to polling sites hasn’t hurt us, either. It was like Iraqi Christmas. We would drive up in our big tan sleds and dump spools of jagged metal on their doorsteps, and the National Police practically cried with joy. They have an unhealthy obsession with barbed wire, I suspect. They went pretty nuts out there. After doing a pretty good job of fortifying the polling sites with the wire, they took the extra and started hitting targets of opportunity. They put wire on top of barriers, wire on top of sandbags, wire on top of wire, wire surrounding cars, wire on the outside of walls, wire on the inside of walls, wire on the walls—all with this maniacal grin of utter and perverse glee. They are happy tonight.
Probably not, really. We’re all a little on edge. Tomorrow is Election Day, and we’ve been prepping for this operation for the past three weeks. We’ve reconnoitered the polling sites, prepped the security, established a permanent presence, re-prepped the security, established a no-vehicle curfew for the city, placed panels on the rooftops for the helicopters and drones to identify, and then prepped the security a little more. But tomorrow we see what our efforts are worth. I expect and predict some serious violence in a few target neighborhoods where dominant ethnic groups are going to try to influence the election by intimidating/slaughtering their political/ethnic enemies en route to the polls. Then again, maybe everything will go smoothly. As my translator Sam (the nickname is goes by in the platoon) taught me: insh’allah, la hatha she bacher. May it be the Will of God that nothing happens tomorrow. If it does, though, Blue is ready. We’ve prepped for this for weeks. Let’s see how our plan stacks up with theirs.
I suppose I should probably introduce Sam at this point. Sam is my translator, an Iraqi university student in his senior year majoring in nursing. He’s a nice, quiet guy who has only one problem: he doesn’t speak English. I don’t know how nobody noticed this during the interview process. But here he is, and learning quickly—and here I am, learning Arabic quickly. So I guess it works out for both of us. If he was a perfect translator I would have a much harder time forcing myself to learn the words and phrases in Arabic. He’s generally hilarious, as are our attempts to come to a mutual understanding of whatever someone said to us. “Fire station no move through traffic the system.” (I cock my head slightly to the side, raising one eyebrow in consternation. This is the first step in the little dance we have choreographed.) “He say, fire station in traffic the system no go.” (At this point I give my first attempt to translate. This is dangerous, as he will agree with my translation if it sounds even remotely like what he meant to say. This can cause some misunderstandings among the finer details of the conversation.) “The fire station is in the traffic circle?” Good start, I think. “No, the fire station no go through the traffic… the circle traffic… traffic circle the system.” (This leads to my second attempt at translation, which is usually right… not because I actually got it right, I suspect, but because I was close enough or Sam considered it a hopeless case.) “The fire truck can’t get through the traffic circle?” “Yes! Yes. No go fire station through traffic the system circle.”
I think you get the idea. He’s a great guy, and he has a good temperament and patience for our patrols. He comes out every time I do, which is to say every patrol. He goes without complaint. My men don’t go without complaint, so that’s a point for Sam. Last night on a dismount patrol Sam stayed up and kept moving beside me even after a few hours. Some of the men were starting to drag behind. Point for Sam. When the bullets started whizzing around last night, Sam even tried to grab me and push us both into an alley. I had to extract myself with a little urgency, explaining that my job was to run towards the gunfire, but it was perfectly all right if he decided not to join. I didn’t think we would be exchanging pleasantries with the bullets.
Unfortunately, last night revealed itself to be a terrible accident. Fortunately there were no casualties on either side, thank God (al hamd’allah—see how we learn?). We had fired upon a National Police vehicle in the dead of night. He had approached from the rear of our patrol, without sirens, flashers, or other identifying police markers, and my rear fire team initiated their Escalation of Force procedures. They shouted at him to stop, showed their weapons, and then flashed the vehicle with their tac lights and lasers. The vehicle stopped. A moment later the lights came back on, the engine gunned, and the truck sped forward. My rear fire team repeated procedure (very quickly, as they were already too close for comfort) and then popped off a warning shot. The truck sped up—probably out of panic—and my rear team fired a couple of controlled pairs into the hood. He stopped then. I ran to the perimeter and screamed at him to open the doors and get out of the vehicle immediately or be fired upon, at which point he identified himself as a (terrified) lieutenant of the National Police. He had come up to visit a neighboring checkpoint. We then learned something that I imagine should have been rectified a long time ago: their near recognition signal, the method by which they pass through friendly lines and identify themselves as friendly and find the friendly forces around them, is to flash lights at each other. Our Escalation of Force (EOF) doctrine is to shine lights at the target. So in the light conversation that occurred last night, one party said STOP and the other party heard COME ON IN, BUDDY. How we haven’t solved this would have boggled my mind before, but now that I understand how the Iraqi Army and National Police plan operations and signals I’m not surprised at all. Maybe this incident will force a solution. Meanwhile, I made a point of checking up on him today and discreetly having Sam inquire as to the cost of fixing the truck. Yes, it wasn’t our fault—we followed doctrine to the letter—but it would demonstrate an act of good faith with our allies.
So, to tally, I’ve now experienced Blue on Red (enemy contact), Blue on Blue (friendly fire), and Blue on Green (allied friendly fire). Now all I need to get the whole spectrum covered is a contractor to pop a few shots at me. That’ll bring us a Blue on Gold. At which point I might as well come home, because what else is there to see? Blue Platoon has now been shot at by every possible group!
Anyway, it’s past midnight and I have about four hours of sleep to get before the operation tomorrow. Wish us luck. Tomorrow will be a bit crazy, I suspect, but I know we’re ready. I’ll update as soon as possible with the results of our operations tomorrow.
