Henry's Web Log

General Petraeus succinctly captured the progress and challenges of the US military surge in Iraq, and afterwards, in his remarks published in the December 2008 edition of ARMY magazine (I get the news a little late here!). I found particular relevance in his observation:

"Security is necessary, but [it is] not sufficient. Certainly it is the bedrock, it's the foundation for everything else," he said. "When there are 55 dead bodies every 24 hours in Baghdad, you're not going to get legislation. You're not going to see markets open. You're not going to see kids going to school. Everything stops except for survival."
"You have to achieve that security, but . . . then it must be capitalized on," he added. "As you achieve a little bit more security, you begin a spiral upward instead of a spiral downward, where all of a sudden now you can ... get a market open, and then the people might provide you a little bit better intelligence, which means more effective raids and targeted operations, which means more bad guys off the streets, which means more local support, which means now you can get some Iraqi forces back on the streets. And you keep spiraling upward in a series of reinforcing activities, each of which capitalizes on the other."

Certainly it’s a good thing that we didn’t suddenly pull out of Iraq in the midst of gaining momentum, the upward spiral! And we do have some hard deadlines we’re meeting in accordance with the Iraqi legislation and at the request of our Iraqi partners, including a requirement to have combat troops out of the cities by the end of June.

The amazing part to me, though, is that the US Military, trained in the management of violence, is making a real difference in the economic stability of this country. In 2003, the objection was that “we’re not really trained to be economic development agents, we’re trained to kill” but the answer really is, “Who else is capable of pulling this off?”

You need a huge force to squash the violence, but do so in partnership with the host nation, and phase your own withdrawal so that more and more, it is the host nation that is taking care of itself.

“But we’re Americans! We want a quick fix! Isn’t there a pill we can take? Can’t we just get out of there?”

Well, no. We can’t. We’re Americans, and we’re trained to do the right thing.

I’ve been asked by family and new soldiers headed here what a typical day on the COB is like for me, or for troops in general. During the winter, when I was meeting convoys, there really was no typical day! Every day was different depending on what was due in, and I could be grabbing a nap between 10pm and 1am to get ready for a 2am arrival; or I could be in the office most of the day with reports and email. I usually mixed up my day, though, to keep it interesting and blood flowing beyond my posterior- I’d go check construction progress on our fuel farm (and take pictures, make corrections, etc), or head over to the container storage yard to check security. I was often escorting Iraqi truck convoys into the COB and mispronouncing Iraqi phrases!


My new work is a sustainment brigade representative (liaison officer, LNO) to the Division Headquarters, and that’s considerably more routine. I’m in the G4 office, which oversees all supplies, equipment, transportation, fuel, water, and property accountability in the Division. I say, routine, but of course it's a lot of problem solving, and every day is different. Perhaps the best way to charactarize is that every day used to be insanely chaotic, now it's just chaotic. I’m definitely up earlier, though, starting around 0500 or 0530. One big driver for me being up early is that Mr. Sun starts his day off about 0500 here, and that’s going to get worse before it gets better!
Breakfast opens at 0530, so having a custom-made omelet is my new favorite way to start the day. By 0630, I’m in the office getting set up for the first meeting. Usually it’s an update briefing via video teleconference. Next, there’s a daily G4 “huddle” where we go quickly through all the outstanding issues. From there, a bit of time to work the issues and take care of business. Lunch comes along as my first chance to see what the day has turned out to be: Hot? Dusty? Thunderstorms? Then it’s back in the climate-controlled HQ for an afternoon meeting or two, more email, and reports.

One of the other soldiers in the G4 is also a blogger! Take a look at the adventures of SGM Dave Crotteau . He had a heck of a time getting flights in April, but finally made it. His April posts also include good descriptions of the environment here, and he concurs that being here is absolutely the right thing to do! Interestingly, his daughter, Jacki, is about to deploy over here as well!

Several times a week we have a Brigade Battle Update Analysis where the LNOs always have a slide about recent activities, presented to the Brigade commander and attended (online) by every section in the brigade (about 120 slides! Break for dinner, then back to work, until 8 or 10pm, depending on how things are going. During the huge build-up, we were often at work until 11 or later…but things are much better now. Plus, there's two of us now. Maj Jim Reis is a huge help. In fact, it’s not unusual now to hit a lull between meetings and have time to go to the gym or the Internet café. That makes a world of difference in my morale!

Below is a photo of my workspace. I've "marked my territory" within the sea of cubicles with a partriotic banner made by the great Cub Scouts of Pack 145 .

One of the many amazing things accomplished here in Basra is that in the midst of transitioning from UK to US, and growing the COB, and consolidating Multinational Division-Central and MultiNational Division-Southeast into MultiNational Division-South, and moving the 10th MTN division here, and bringing in a new force of soldiers to mentor and work with our Iraqi partners, that we’ve also taken on a whole new face to contracting.

You’ve probably heard about the use of contractors here, from KBR to Blackwater and many others. As Basra transitioned March 31st, though, we implemented a contracting practice that puts Iraqi-based businesses out front. “Iraqi-First” gives preference to our host nation, not only helping them develop business and service skills, but keeping the contracting money in Iraq. This initiative has not been painless, as several winners had not previously held a contract with us before. They had to quickly spin up a new workforce, tools, security processing, and their own support structure, such as parts-ordering for air conditioners and electric generators.

The result, though, is pretty amazing! We are witnessing a fantastic transformation that is yet another step towards Iraq being self-reliant and economically stable.

Ethan made a video for the annual Reflections contest in his school. He loves stop-action Lego and building it into a film. He and Eric both have several videos in my YouTube profile, “CustomWebProgrammer.” This year’s theme was simply “WOW.” So Ethan got busy and put together a 40-second clip with a clever message. He submitted it last Fall, and just this week, heard from our District-level announcements that his film took the top prize in Intermediate-level schools across the Commonwealth of Virginia! His film is now competing at the national level. And Eric? He has been selected the Student of the Month for April at Christiansburg Middle School. Lisa and I are extremely proud of both boys.

Remember the Quantum Leap series? It was a Belisarius TV show that had a great run of several seasons. The intro started off:

Theorizing that one could time travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Sam Beckett stepped into the Quantum Leap accelerator and vanished .... He woke to find himself trapped in the past, facing mirror images that were not his own and driven by an unknown force to change history for the better. His only guide on this journey is Al, an observer from his own time, who appears in the form of a hologram that only Sam can see and hear. And so Dr. Beckett finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong and hoping each time that his next leap will be the leap home.

Lisa writes that she often get emails and packages where she exclaims - much like Sam - "Oh, boy." She felt that way recently after hearing another request to volunteer as the lead for an upcoming project, sandwiched between two other major events. She says it got her rewriting her own Quantum Leap voice-over (courtesy of Lisa):

Theorizing that one could be a single-parent during a military member’s deployment, Lisa Bass stepped into the Deployment Accelerator and went astray .... She woke to find herself trapped in a world that doesn’t understand the reservist’s life, facing problems that never materialized before, and driven by an unknown force that challenges every ounce of her sanity. Her only companions on this journey are Eric and Ethan, kids with their own unique coping skills, who appear in different forms of cooperation and moods that only Lisa can guess. And so Lisa Bass finds herself leaping from day to day, striving to put right anything that goes wrong and hoping each time that her next leap will be into the arms of her military spouse when he comes home.