From a Special Ops Soldier, Part II

Editor’s Note: Mindful of the time it took American occupation forces to begin to straighten out Germany and Japan (civilians starved to death in the winter of 1946 in Berlin and the Marshall Plan wasn’t operative until ’48), we have been reluctant to criticize post-war Iraq. Also, we aren’t there and are skeptical of the media that is there, so we haven’t said much about the day-to-day operations. Receiving this via a JINSA Flag & General Officers Trip participant who vouches for its authenticity, we thought we would show you what real soldiers think.

Editor’s Note: Mindful of the time it took American occupation forces to begin to straighten out Germany and Japan (civilians starved to death in the winter of 1946 in Berlin and the Marshall Plan wasn’t operative until ’48), we have been reluctant to criticize post-war Iraq. Also, we aren’t there and are skeptical of the media that is there, so we haven’t said much about the day-to-day operations. Receiving this via a JINSA Flag & General Officers Trip participant who vouches for its authenticity, we thought we would show you what real soldiers think. (We excerpted from a longer letter and cleaned up the language a little bit.) It reinforces our basic belief that what we are doing in Iraq is the beginning of a better life for the people there, and that our soldiers are a terrific advertisement for America. The following is Part 2 of the letter. For Part 1, see JINSA Report #343.

Some Iraqis don’t like us, but the vast majority does, and more and more they see the GIs don’t start anything, are by-and-large friendly, and very compassionate.

The civilians who have figured it out faster than anyone are the teenagers. They watch the GIs and try to talk to them and ask questions about America and now wear wrap-around sunglasses, GAP T-shirts, Dockers (or even better, Levis with the red tags) and Nikes (or Egyptian knock-offs, but with the “swoosh”) and love to listen to Armed Forces Network when the GIs play their radios. They participate less and less in the demonstrations and help keep us informed when a wannabe bad-a** shows up in the neighborhood.

The younger kids are going back to school again and they get a hot meal. I watched a bunch of kids playing baseball in one playground, under the supervision of a couple of GIs from Oklahoma. They weren’t very good but were having fun, probably more than most Little Leaguers.

The place is still a mess but most of it has been for years. The hospitals are open and are in the process of being brought into the 21st Century. Safe water is more available. Electricity has been restored to pre-war levels but saboteurs keep cutting the lines. And the old Ba’ath big shots are upset because they can’t get fuel for their private generators. One actually complained to General M, who told him it was a rough world.

Our search and destroy missions are largely at night, free of reporters and generally terrifying to those brave warriors of Allah. The only thing that frightens them more is the word “Gitmo”. The line is out that Guantanamo Bay is not a Caribbean vacation and they usually start squealing when an interrogator mentions it. No wonder the Red Cross, the National Council of Churches and the French keep protesting about the place. It has proven to be very effective in keeping several hundred fanatical psychopaths in check.

Our first objective is to get the die-hards off the street (or make them too scared to come out in them) and destroy their caches of weapons (we have collected more than 227,000 AK-47s and that is only the tip of the iceberg; Curly bought nearly a million of them from our pal Putin), then cut off their money supply, mostly from Syria and Lebanon. We must continue to get public services up and running: water, sewage and garbage service; electricity; public transportation; oil fields and refineries; and get to a dinar that won’t halve in value every month.

It’s going to be a long haul (it took 10-15 years in Japan and West Germany) but if we don’t stick with it, nobody else will, and we’ll have some other loony running the place again. Nothing more satisfying than working with the BEST damn soldiers in the world, flushing real human p**p down the drain and giving some folks a chance at trying freedom for a change. They may learn to like it and then my great-great-grandson won’t have to worry about some maniac trying to destroy the planet.

God Bless America.