Before missions, commanders will sometimes communicate the planned course of action using a rock drill. A rock drill normally involves a map on the ground (sometimes using what raw materials that can be gathered, sticks, rocks, sand, etc.). Recently, Captain McCreary conducted such a briefing for his fellow company commanders and Iraqi Security Force personnel at JSS Warrior--home to Captain Ralls, and some of his Alpha Company Soldiers. (CPT McCreary is holding a stick he's using to point to different points on the map laid out on the floor.)
Like this one, most of the missions recently conducted have been clearing missions. Clearing roads of IEDs and other obstacles was mentioned in a recent post below. These clearing missions include searching for weapons caches and other threats, but also include introductions and exchanges with locals to increase the sense of confidence and security. As with many of our missions, this was a joint exercise.
Iraqi Army and Police can help spot when something is out of the ordinary. Many of our Soldiers have the opportunity to work closely with Iraqi Security Forces (ISF). Some of our Soldiers, such as those at JSSs Arcala, Faraj, Lewis, and Youngblood sleep in the same compounds with ISF.
Such interaction can be stressful at first, but after a while they come to better understand one another's differences. Sometimes this is manifest as respect, other times it is mere tolerance. In either case, it's worth considering that many of these working, living, and sleeping next to our Soldiers on a daily basis may very well have been the ones shooting at them only a year ago.
The type of success most everyone wants to see in Iraq demands this level of vulnerability. We continue to pray for the stabilization of this country, the support of its leaders, and the success of this mission.
Before missions, commanders will sometimes communicate the planned course of action using a rock drill. A rock drill normally involves a map on the ground (sometimes using what raw materials that can be gathered, sticks, rocks, sand, etc.). Recently, Captain McCreary conducted such a briefing for his fellow company commanders and Iraqi Security Force personnel at JSS Warrior--home to Captain Ralls, and some of his Alpha Company Soldiers. (CPT McCreary is holding a stick he's using to point to different points on the map laid out on the floor.) 
Like this one, most of the missions recently conducted have been clearing missions. Clearing roads of IEDs and other obstacles was mentioned in a recent post below. These clearing missions include searching for weapons caches and other threats, but also include introductions and exchanges with locals to increase the sense of confidence and security. As with many of our missions, this was a joint exercise. 
Iraqi Army and Police can help spot when something is out of the ordinary. Many of our Soldiers have the opportunity to work closely with Iraqi Security Forces (ISF). Some of our Soldiers, such as those at JSSs Arcala, Faraj, Lewis, and Youngblood sleep in the same compounds with ISF. 
Such interaction can be stressful at first, but after a while they come to better understand one another's differences. Sometimes this is manifest as respect, other times it is mere tolerance. In either case, it's worth considering that many of these working, living, and sleeping next to our Soldiers on a daily basis may very well have been the ones shooting at them only a year ago. 
The type of success most everyone wants to see in Iraq demands this level of vulnerability. We continue to pray for the stabilization of this country, the support of its leaders, and the success of this mission. 
1 comment:
Every September, I recall that is more than half a century (62 years) since I landed at Nagasaki with the 2nd Marine Division in the original occupation of Japan following World War II. This time every year, I have watched and listened to the light-hearted "peaceniks" and their light-headed symbolism-without-substance of ringing bells, flying pigeons, floating candles, and sonorous chanting and I recall again that "Peace is not a cause - it is an effect."
In July, 1945, my fellow 8th RCT Marines [I was a BARman] and I returned to Saipan following the successful conclusion of the Battle of Okinawa. We were issued new equipment and replacements joined each outfit in preparation for our coming amphibious assault on the home islands of Japan.
B-29 bombing had leveled the major cities of Japan, including Kobe, Osaka, Nagoya, Yokohama, Yokosuka, and Tokyo.
We were informed we would land three Marine divisions and six Army divisions, perhaps abreast, with large reserves following us in. It was estimated that it would cost half a million casualties to subdue the Japanese homeland.
In August, the A-bomb was dropped on Hiroshima but the Japanese government refused to surrender. Three days later a second A-bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki. The Imperial Japanese government finally surrendered.
Following the 1941 sneak attack on Pearl Harbor, a Japanese admiral said, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant..." Indeed, they had. Not surprisingly, the atomic bomb was produced by a free people functioning in a free environment. Not surprisingly because the creative process is a natural human choice-making process and inventiveness occurs most readily where choice-making opportunities abound. America!
Tamper with a giant, indeed! Tyrants, beware: Free men are nature's pit bulls of Liberty! The Japanese learned the hard way what tyrants of any generation should know: Never start a war with a free people - you never know what they may invent!
As a newly assigned member of a U.S. Marine intelligence section, I had a unique opportunity to visit many major cities of Japan, including Tokyo and Hiroshima, within weeks of their destruction. For a full year I observed the beaches, weapons, and troops we would have assaulted had the A-bombs not been dropped. Yes, it would have been very destructive for all, but especially for the people of Japan.
When we landed in Japan, for what came to be the finest and most humane occupation of a defeated enemy in recorded history, it was with great appreciation, thanksgiving, and praise for the atomic bomb team, including the aircrew of the Enola Gay. A half million American homes had been spared the Gold Star flag, including, I'm sure, my own.
Whenever I hear the apologists expressing guilt and shame for A-bombing and ending the war Japan had started (they ignore the cause-effect relation between Pearl Harbor and Nagasaki), I have noted that neither the effete critics nor the puff-adder politicians are among us in the assault landing-craft or the stinking rice paddies of their suggested alternative, "conventional" warfare. Stammering reluctance is obvious and continuous, but they do love to pontificate about the Rights that others, and the Bomb, have bought and preserved for them.
The vanities of ignorance and camouflaged cowardice abound as license for the assertion of virtuous "rights" purchased by the blood of others - those others who have borne the burden and physical expense of Rights whining apologists so casually and self-righteously claim.
At best, these fakers manifest a profound and cryptic ignorance of causal relations, myopic perception, and dull I.Q. At worst, there is a word and description in The Constitution defining those who love the enemy more than they love their own countrymen and their own posterity. Every Yankee Doodle Dandy knows what that word is.
In 1945, America was the only nation in the world with the Bomb and it behaved responsibly and respectfully. It remained so until two among us betrayed it to the Kremlin. Still, this American weapon system has been the prime deterrent to earth's latest model world- tyranny: Seventy years of Soviet collectivist definition, coercion, and domination of individual human beings.
The message is this: Trust Freedom. Remember, tyrants never learn. The restriction of Freedom is the limitation of human choice, and choice is the fulcrum-point of the creative process in human affairs. As earth's choicemaker, it is our human identity on nature's beautiful blue planet and the natural premise of man's free institutions, environments, and respectful relations with one another. Made in the image of our Creator, free men choose, create, and progress - or die.
Free men should not fear the moon-god-crowd oppressor nor choose any of his ways. Recall with a confident Job and a victorious David, "Know ye not that you are in league with the stones of the field?"
Semper Fidelis
Jim Baxter
Sgt. USMC
WW II and Korean War
Job 5:23 Proverbs 3:31 I Samuel 17:40
http://www.choicemaker.net/
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