Month 11 Day 27

Notebook entry

16 reports given, met with Munir, met with executive officer, class afternoon, CJ Radin here.

Journal entry

In the morning I went to see Munir to make sure that the boys were going to come to class.  He confirmed that they were, but he had to go wake them up first.  Both Salim and Najib were sleeping. 

I talked to Qais about this and their plan now that they had three sergeants was to do exactly the same amount of work, but to always have someone sleeping.  Ummmm, no.

I come back and 1000, the time they asked to have class and they didn't show up.  Najib said

"we have too much work to do for the Corps and we can't come to class"

I said "You don't work for the Corps you work for the Brigade and the brigade commander, and the S2 officer, if he tells you that you've got class at 1000, then that's when you have class, and if you'd woken up on time this wouldn't have happened. "

Munir finally got the point and told them to go, but Najib refused. That was not going to happen, so I went to the XO and explained the situation.  I was also not about to give them the reports that they wanted for the combined briefing the next day if they didn't show up for class.  He agreed to send them to class at 1300 (their normal nap time) because they didn't show up at the right time.

1300 rolls around and I try to meet up with them again, only Salim shows up.  I go back to the XO.  He tries to round all of them up.  Munir and Qais are located. Najib is yet to be found. 

I talk to the XO. 

"I'm out of ideas" I say "I have to play this stupid game every time that new guys show up, or that the leadership leaves. I try to treat them like adults, I try to give them discipline like Marines, but they just don't seem to get it."

"How old is the Marine Corps?" He asks me

"235 years old" I tell him.

"Our military is a year old"

"Do Marines sell their uniforms?"

"No"

"Do Marines sell the fuel out of their Rangers?"

"No"

"Do Marines sell the break they are given?"

"No"

"Are Marines Criminals?"

"Not usually"

"Nearly every soldier in this brigade is a criminal, they came here because they didn't have any other option.  It will take a long time to turn them into the same type of military that you have."

Munir arrives and says "Capt Scott Shane told me I didn't have to go at 1300 I was at the mosque"

I say "sure the class isn't for you, but you need to make sure that your guys are there, you have to supervise, you're an officer"

Najib still cannot be located and Salim is ordered to unlock the container in the corner of the camp, the hot box. 

Najib is finally located he says "I was in the mosque" 

"bullshit, Munir was there and he didn't see you" the XO says.

"Go to class, then afterward he needs to come see me" the XO said.

"Is it always going to be like this rie-saib?" I asked of the XO "are you always going to have to beat the hell out of your soldiers and put them in a hot box to get them to do what you want?"

"They'll be at class tomorrow. I gaurantee it."

"Saist rei-saib, besyar tashakar" (OK, XO, thank you very much)

There is one truth here.  I have more patientience and discipline than any of these Afghans.  You don't need infinite amounts, just more than they do.  I may not get my way right away, but I will outlast all of them.  I'm like the Taliban to America.

Class went fine.  Capt CJ Radin came to work on the slides.

Month 11 Day 19

Notebook entry

13 reports given, Carambul game, class to Qais and Najib good, terrain analysis, class with Tawoos afternoon, military a combined obstacle overlay 18 month burn, Elton John Flack under uniform, general paranoid soldiers killed, Corps you're not lying.

Journal entry

My stomach has really been bothering me, and that soured most of my morning.  

I went to see the S2 and talked about the Military Decision making process.  After I spoke with him, I went to the COC.  I found the Afghans in there playing a game that resembles pool very closely called Carambool.  I took a picture.  Capt Nowak was sitting in there just watching, there was a time when he would have been pissed and stormed around, but he's just exhausted and he's given up.   I met up with Qais and Najib in the morning on terrain analysis.  I put them in competition with one another.  I had them race to find the areas on the map, and the first guy who did the correct cardinal directions got a point.  I had them into it, they were fully participating in class.  By the end Qais came up to me and told me 'you are a good teacher and I will make sure I always come to your classes from now on." I was really stoked about this, but I am trying to not get my hopes up. As I walked out of the class Capt Nowak was playing Carambool, stood up and yelled America because he had just won. 

I took the terps to chow, and they we all had fun saying what a pain-in-the-ass my guys were, how they didn't learn properly, and they were altogether too careless.  

In the afternoon the net kept cutting in and out.  I tried to make it work, but I ended up giving up and working mostly on the job and Master's degree stuff.  

I waited to teach a class to Bernie at 1530, but he didn't show.  I found him sitting outside with the General, they were about to drink tea.   The General kindly allowed him to go to class after I told the story of how he killed the most dangerous Talib in the AO a few days prior (he was a 3 in mouse). 

The class went well and Bernie was engaged. we talked about trends in the AO. 

In the evenin meeting a few interesting things came up.  First, elton John, the GSU S3, wears an flak vest under his uniform because he's afraid he'll be shot.  Second the General is using the shooting of Karzai's brother as the fodder to claim he needs a private shower, he's scared for his life.  Whatever. and 18mo old girl 'ran into' a pot of boiling oil and burned her lower extremities.  I hate these people.  the Major reported that the Corps has finally realized that we are not bullshiting them about how fucked up the ANA are, they finally realize admitted that the MoD-14 process is broken and that sending the body of a dead ANA soldier to the wrong house is sub-par performance. Finally one soldier straight up killed another soldier today in Nawa after an arguement, this could be the source of some of the paranoia. 

hhhhh

Month 11 Day 15

Notebook entry

Communications down, generals force materials.

Journal entry
I woke up at 0400 this morning with a pain in my gut that wouldn't go
away the entire day.

I tried to do my normal Friday routine but because of the new key
policy (each tent basically gets a truck and Chris had already taken
ours) I walked to and from the shower.  The new policy was induced
because one set of keys were missing for about a half a day, so in
true good knee jerk reaction Capt Nowak and Maj Davidson came up with a
policy that upended everything that we have been doing for the last
ten months and made already scarce trucks more scarce.

I talked to Suzan in the morning on the Skype/satphone simultaneously.
 This allows the connection to stay up basically no matter what.  She
is so pretty, I miss her so much.

I was going to do some work, but they decided to move the aircraft
arrival departure air control group which supplied us our fiber-optic
internet line for our government computers. They basically forgot
about us in the transition and so we didn't have internet the entire
day.

I taught a 30 minute class to the Jr. Marines on Bonds today.

I tried to go over to the RCT to do some work, but that was fruitless.
 I literally spent half and hour trying to log onto the SIPR and NIPR
and neither was working.

I came back, a failure.

I laid down after I got back because this stomach bug is really
putting me out of commission.  I slept for about an hour and a half.

The meeting was rolled back so that they could work on the internet.
Why we are having a meeting on Friday when no one spoke to their
Afghans and when no one was able to contact the outside world.   I
don't know, but these meetings are a fixture around here.

Month 11 Day 11

Notebook entry

11 reports given, Taliban patient, helicopter, nine students in class, multiplication, class with sergeants, Area of responsibility, area of interest, major Tawoos and captain CJ Radin, building quality, general signing, container.

Journal entry

In the morning the ANA tried to put our active TB patient on an ANA helo with about 25 other Afghan soldiers, no mask, no contact precations.  The docs intercepted him before he came out of the ambulance, thank God. 

I tried to go see Tawoos in the morning, but he was busy with some of the soldiers who just arrived he was giving them a 'psychological evalution'  seeing if they were nuts, if they were he was going to send them back to SBK to get processed out of the Army, the list of S2 tasks grows...He was busy with that, so I went to check up on the literacy instructors.  One of our teachers was doing a really good job, they were working on multiplication, and the students seemed to be getting it. 

After that I sat and talked to Tawoos for a while about Qais' issues, his performance, manning, the convoy the teleconferences that we were supposed to have in the afternoon.  He said that both Sgts would go to class at 1030.  I went out to prepare, but we were really down on linguists because of a couple of RSO&I courses, so the LtCol intercepted me and Naikpai and pulled us into the General's office.  He was sitting in is chair signing a stack of papers and bitching about how hard his job was.  I briefed him on his intel section.  He only half-paid attention, which I guess was good because one of the things the doctors wanted signed was in that stack of papers and they presumed that the general would get tired of signing and eventually just pen-whip it, which he did.

I taught a class to the Sgts, I told them everything that they needed to write down for their notes.  That seemed to work ok, I need to get them extra binders to put thier notes in.  They lost the old ones.

I went to lunch with the S2.  He said I would have to get extended because he didn't want me to go.  While I was flattered, I told him he'd be happy to see me go soon enough.  He denied it and said I was the assistant intel officer for the brigade. 

In the afternoon we were supposed to do two VTCs, but a generator went down which fried the SIPR and NIPR for most of the day.  Tawoos didn't show, which was good for a change.

CJ Radin came over and taught Tawoos a class instead of the VTC.  That's cool with me.

In the meeting it came up that Mustafa was complaining about the quality of the buildings that were going up.  The fucking nerve, you don't pay for them, don't plan them, don't inspect them, but complain about cracks in the concrete. Dick.  I guess the S6 got his ass in gear after he heard that Tawoos had eyes on his container, if he didn't finish it, then Tawoos would take it over. That sped things up.

At the last minute the LtCol wanted to change the route, which meant a new route study new route planning, and generally less sleep for me.  Sir, I'd be nice if you gave me a better heads-up. 

Month 11 Day 7

Notebook entry

15 reports given" stingar", cipher out cipher in and significant activity log, priority intelligence requirements, women without headscarves, used oil solution?, Spare parts solution, finance, no show.

Journal entry
I finished up my book 'the Talent Code' I wondered if maybe I was
being overly negative about this place because I had conditioned
myself to be so.  I think it is going to be important for me to show
and not tell some of the things that are going on over here.

I worked with Bernie in the morning on his PIRs.  He was very proud
that he made up three books one for Ciphers in, one for Ciphers out,
and one a Significant activity log.

One thing that came up in the translation was the translation of
MANPADs, Bashir didn't know what that was and I suggested the word
'Stingar' how I assumed the Afghans would pronounce Stinger, and I was
right, he knew exactly what that was.  Well thanks CIA in the 1980s,
not only did you beat the Soviets, you changed Dari.

We went to the combined Ops and Intel meeting.  Bernie bombed his
portion, got the 'ass wipe of the week award (a package of baby wipes)
for his performance.'  The Marines were getting all wrapped up about
him briefing his slides, and he did what they all did initially, that
is read his written report.  Maj Hesco 'Ginglied' me in the middle of
the brief.  You've got to fix this shit...Thanks, sir like you did
such an awesome job when you were working with the XO and the S1.
anyways, I think I understand why they do it.  The literacy rate is so
low, and the number of guys with eyeglasses is so low that if they
don't read everything out, then they probably rightly believe that the
audience will not get what they are sending.

There was a fair bit of Col Schmitt getting bothered by the whole
thing.  This could have been showmanship for the civilian lady from
the SecDef's advon who was in the meeting (she was in there without a
head cover by the way and none of the Afghans seems to be scandalized,
I even asked the PAO about it and he said it wasn't a big deal for a
lot of the guys who lived in Kabul).  Col Schmitt was all fired up
about the used oil, broken parts, and junk being sent he wanted a
'solution' by the end of the day.  He also made the leave flight his
'number one CCIR' for the day (apparently he was later told by General
Craparotta to shut the fuck up and stop inferring that no one gives a
shit-his words).

The SecDef's folks came over again today to walk around and
choreograph the whole route that the secdef would take.  We are
setting up some of the RSO&I training that we do and making sure that
it hums while he is here.  The stupid thing is.  That is not the point
of this level of command.  He should be here to check out the planning
abilities of the staff, but that is not going to be broached.  Capt
Arthur sagely brought up two things at dinner.  First, everyone
complains that the guys in Kabul and the states have no idea what is
going on, but then when they come to visit we put on a bullshit show
for them which gives a false impression.  Second he brought up the
issue of gear LtCol Paul Shinkman has apparently repeatedly told him that
the Col has said that if the Afghans 'can't or won't do something,
then we'll do it for them.'  He rightly brought up a the point that if
we start doing things for them that they simply won't do, then we'll
have a situation where they won't do anything (it sounds a lot like
the current situation).

I taught another class on personal finance to the junior Marines.

I was going to teach another class to Qais and Tawoos, but they didn't
show.  I didn't try to chase them down.  I'm just not going to give
them any reports or the weather until they do what is expected of
them.

The linguist tent, with a cutout so Bashir could watch TV, Naikpai on the floor, and Fareed covering his face

Month 11 Day 6

Notebook entry

Five reports given, literacy instructors, number formation, key terrain,hidden hunger economist March 25, no class with Bernie, regimental combat team here, contracting officer representative, fire extinguisher fight leave flight shut up, Tawoos slides.

Journal entry

I observed the literacy instructors in the morning.  They were teaching the
students how to say and write down big numbers.  i.e. in english
'one-million four-hundred fifty one thousand two hundred and thirty two.' is
written 1,451,232.  That was a hard for a lot of the guys.  They looked at
me in awe when I started helping some of the students write their own
numbers.  Is this fast enough?

I worked with Qais and the major on plotting key terrain throughout the AO.
I came out feeling like it was a resounding success, but in truth, I cut the
acetate with/for them, gave them all of the numbers, showed them the
symbols.  It is progress, but it is pretty heavy-handed by yours truly.

Read an interesting article in the Economist called 'Hidden Hunger' in the
Mar 25th edition.  It talks about how malnourishment in childhood can
literally reduce people's IQ.  I wonder if I am seeing the fruits of that?

In the afternoon Bernie did not want to do class, and Qais was 'wery busy,
masroof' I told them that I wouldn't give them the weather or any reports if
they didn't do class.   They didn't do class so not reports.  The RCT came
over, much to the delight of the linguists who love to make fun of Capt CJ Radin
(it means small baby in Dari).  They tried to work link analysis with
Bernie.

I did the COR training class at the RCT.  Now I can supervise government
contracts.

In the evening meeting John Soltz said he saw two of the Afghans having a
fire-extinguisher fight. Awesome.

The Gunny said one interesting thing in the meeting about Afghan
prayers.  "Anyone who has ever been on an escort mission will tell you
that these guys never pray, they only use that as an excuse when they
don't want to do something."   I think he's right.

Month 10 Day 23

Notebook Entry

Reports given, what you want versus what is possible, awards and unbiased perspective, drawdown, intelligence officer too busy to work.

Journal entry

I am writing this waiting for the METLs/Training plan review/'Call on me Thursday

I got up and did a fair bit in the morning.  I was feeling pretty good, then I ran to the gym and by the time I got there I felt like something took the wind out of my sails.  I'm just really physically tired.  I lifted weights, my muscles responded, but I was just feeling out-of-gas plain and simple.  

I got back and fought to catch up with my inbox.  I did that reasonably successfully.  

I tried to meet up with the Maj in the Morning but Salim was sick, so he said he was too busy to do anything.  

At noon time I asked if he wanted to come eat chow, this is normally a 'hell yah' but he said no, 'but you can come eat Afghan food' nan afghani boukho. I told him no thanks.  I didn't tell him that I got sick the day prior from eating the unsanitary stuff, but I really couldn't do it two days in a row.   I went to lunch with the linguists dinar complained about the food yesterday and said that they must have really been skimming a lot of money off the top if that was all they could afford for the general, it was supposed to be a feast.

In the afternoon I tried to come back and work, but I was feeling like absolute shit and I had to lay down, I missed a graduation for the drivers course, and I felt a little bad, but I was wrecked (I still am). 

I went out and taught Salim a class for an hour.  He is just starting to understand the difference between COIN and conventional war.  That's good.  He said his eyes were bloodshot and his side was hurting, his doctors told him he had to go up to Shorabak, but he wanted to hang around until Qais got back, what a good soldier. 

I met up with Tawoos thereafter, he wanted me to help him hang a map that he brought down with him.  I thought it was one big map, no it was 10 map sections.  He basically supervised as I crawled around on the ground with Naikpai and put it together.  He found a million excuses to leave the room.  Sigh

After the meeting I brought Naikpai a CD with some photos on it, he was the duty linguist and the only one in his tent.  I rolled in there and his little umpa lumpa ass is inside his sleeping bag just his face poking out watching some chick get railed from behind, he looks at me red-faced and gave his best nan-chalant thank you very much.  I'm not going to get that picture out of my head for a while. 

Month 10 Day 20

Notebook entry

Morning combined combat operations center, analysis, Salim map reading, :-), map creation, free trucks, petroleum oil and lubricants.

Journal entry

I went to the Combined COC in the morning.  I tried to describe to the S2 what we are hoping he will be able to do every morning.  That is, look at the Significant activity from the day prior and make some assessment of what they enemy are up to, planning, etc.  After I showed the s-2 he wanted me to show Salim as well.  It was a bit of a pain.  Salim has really been stepping-up of late and the same things happen to them as happen to us in the USMC.  Competence is a curse, so Salim is told that he needs to drive everyone over to the commander's conference.  Anyway.  I went back to the CCOC a second time to teach Salim the same stuff for a second time. 

In the midst of writing this.  I just caught a rat in the COC.  I put the trap out for him earlier, he has been screwing with me for the last three days.  He is 13 inches long from head to tail and 7 inches long from nose to the end of his body.  I had to smash the trap a second time because it didn't kill him right the first time.  That wasn't nice. 

Anyway,  so I taught salim that stuff and I also showed him how to pull up maps on Google maps.  If they every get the internet that could be a good resource for them since they can't give it viruses. 

The ANA brought two brand new firetrucks down yesterday Ford F-550s, with a really nice rig on the back.  I can only imagine how expensive they are.  I took a couple pictures of one of them.  The ANA had hoisted it up by the grill-guard, breaking that, and the tow truck they were using was gushing spurting hydralic fluid when they removed the wheel support.  These guys aren't new, they are from 5th kandak and have been around for a year and a half.

I gave the weather to salim, but I was so sick that I had to lay down.  When I woke up Brian was watching young frankenstein on his computer.  The only thing that struck me as odd was the way they dealt with rape, twice in the movie it was a punch-line, and the woman was totally good after the fact, smoking a cigarette with the Creature.  I don't think that would happen in modern movies, but when I think back to the Shakespearian era jokes about cutting off maiden heads, or to the decameron where the punch line of one of the stories was a guy going into another guys house and accidentally sleeping with his wife because she was in the wrong bed.  Mores have changed, I wonder where they are going?

In the meeting they talked about depending on the ANA for Petrolium, Oil and Lubricants (POL) they switched over contractors.  The old one used to fix the ANA's stuff for them, the new one is supposed to train the ANA.  Shock, the ANA supply system is not dependable and we are now looking into how we can buy oil, fuels, etc. for them with Field Ordering Officer money because it is an emergency and we are worried that they will just keep driving their trucks until the motors blow up. 

Month 10 Day 11

Notebook entry

Four reports given, homosexuals in Freidan, all the weight on the job, Salim commanders conference, bat power down, $40,000 dinars wedding, whistleblowing article Wall Street Journal, Iraq military dysfunction, trash picked up, Salim video teleconference, intelligence preparation of the battle space maps reaction, new guy assigned to intelligence, communication Shura, maintenance trailer running.

Journal entry

About ¾ of the way through Betty Friedan’s book.  It is ironic that a book which critiques societies values is still part of that society.  She has a chapter about how housewives have more gay sons that I think a lot of folks today would take major offense to.  I also wonder about the book in the Afghan context since that is so often on my mind.  She seems to put a lot of value on an occupation.  Not only am I finding little value in my work outside the home right now, but when I look around at the Afghans they certainly do not.  Dinar told me at lunch that he is going to need to spend a total of 40,000 on his wedding.  10,000 for the dowry, 10,000 of the engagement party, 10,000 for the Henna part, and another 10,000 for the wedding itself.  These guys place so much value on the home and so little value on work.  If they could they would just lay about and watch TV all day.  Friedan says that work will increase to fill the time allotted.  I don’t think that is the truth at all over here looking around at our linguists or our Afghans.  There is something different about Americans (or is it western Europeans?, or colonists?), their industriousness that is unique to our culture.  If Friedan had said America values work more than staying at home and forces women to stay home, thus devaluing their contribution, then she would have a stronger argument rather than trying to make a universalist argument.  I think these guys are a product of their culture, just as we are.  They are rational utility maximizers, but what provides that utility is different for them.  Likewise their sense of community, identity, who they consider to be ‘us’ is totally different.  Friedan’s book really brings out for me how much both values and identity vary culture to culture.

I worked with Salim in the morning on the Commander’s conference brief.  I convinced him to put in stuff about the 5Ws and manning, but he also wanted to put in random stuff like what nationality the TB were and make/model/type of vehicle.  Oh well he is still learning. The BATs system was out of commission because the power cord was broken. 

I sat in on the weekly staff meeting.  I must admit they are improving at least with their powerpoint wizardry.  They were passing some incorrect info (e.g. 100% of the VHF radios have been fielded) but it looks better. 

I went to lunch with the linguists. We talked about marriage.  Dinar about the high price of his marriage, and how he was going to tell his Father-in-law to get stuffed.  Girls over here can get married at 16.  Sammy is 22 and is going to wait until he’s about 26 to get engaged he said he can pick his own wife, but he wants his mom to pick for him.  He is a little bit of an idealist I think.  His whole service to Afghanistan thing. He is also very religious, he was talking about the Quran and how it says a man should get married when he is sexually mature and lusting after women (to which I said what, like 12 or 13), then he said only after he can also support his family.  This seems very odd because they have so many kids and don’t worry too much about human capital investment in them. Hmm.

There was a good article in the WSJ about Whistleblowing, and another about the continued dysfunction of the Iraqi military.  It makes me wonder if we are going to be in a similar place here around 2014…

I wonder if I’ve been too hard on these guys.  They have been picking up the trash around camp.  There are no more piss bottles on the ground outside of the guard towers.  I wonder if it is my negative attitude.  I also talked to Maj James Blitz and he said that the other brigades were not having the same HUMINT funding troubles.  Hmm, I want to be open to the possibility that I have just had a bad brigade, we’ll see in a couple of days. 

I did another class with Salim on IPB.  He still can’t find us on the map.  The XO came over and watched, but then slapped his leg when he couldn’t find us.  He is learning though.  It isn’t fast, but he is getting better.  Maybe it isn’t a matter of whether or not things are improving, but at what rate.  Does picking up piss bottles, and finding yourself one a map after nine months constitute a fast enough rate of change?

The Corps CoS directive came down to put more guys into intel, but rather than get unused guys like the GSU Assistant Public Affairs officer, they decided to pull the one guy from the logistics section.  This churning and eating your own is going to kill us. I am stoked about the Amer-Technique, he is smart, but we are robbing peter to pay Paul.  Is there enough human capital to go around?

Month 10 Day 7

Notebook entry

15 reports given, computer recovery morning and early afternoon, intelligence preparation of the battle space, leave flight cost, AC broken, flatscreen up on the wall, sign in roster, contractor ownership.

Journal entry

The morning was a waste.  I went to try to help salim reinstall the operating system on his computer, but GySgt Young had not prepped the comm guys properly.  They didn’t have all of the stuff they needed, so it took two hours out of my day for nothing. I had to cajole the ANA communication section into helping, get everything going only to find that the reimages were not there.  GySgt K got the stuff that he needed and updated it in the early afternoon. 

I worked with Salim on IPB again.  He is getting pretty good at remembering the three main areas, but now I am asking him for tougher smaller areas and he is having trouble.  I had him draw a map and label it as opposed to just going off of the powerpoint.  We’ll see tomorrow if that helps.  The A/C in the COC broke while I was there.  Being the resident magic-bringer I was asked to fix it.  I could not.  When I told the duty officer to talk to the GSU engineers about it he said if you tell them to fix it, it will take a week. I said ‘if you don’t tell them to fix it it will take a week from whenever you do.’ He just shrugged and said the guy might do it tomorrow.  That’s work ethic. This place is going to fall apart after we leave.

I also found out a little bit about the structure of the contracting companies. Many are nominally headed by Afghans so they can get more contracts from the government, but the board is all made up of American businessmen.  There is always a way for those who want to be entrepreneurial.

We are winning the war in the combined COC.  The Afghans now have  a big flat screen that they can write sigevents on.  Not sure how that’s better than a dry erase markers, but it sure is more expensive and complicated.  Brave New World anyone?

I found out how they cheat the sign-in roster, their signatures are basically scribbles and they basically write directly over the small marks that the S-1 puts in there to count them UA.

On the bright side.  I did some regressions on the leave flight and it looks like it actually does save the US money.  That doesn’t compare it against a more effective and consistent convoy schedule, but with what happened before.

Month 9 Day 23

Notebook Entry

Afghan national army speeding, Corps wanted me to e-mail administration, Noorudin in two months, impacted shit, 45 drivers, four trucks from fifth Kandak, Danes Garrison support unit.

Journal entry

John Hudson, Bash and Richard Sia came back at about 0100.  They said they had spoken  to a PRT rep from Ghazni who said that they spend up to $70000 to fill in shot holes from IEDs, that is a lot more expensive than merely packing them with concertina like they do down here.  I guess the Poles also have no external positions.  They all work off of big FOBs and then only during the day, no wonder stuff is all fucked up. John Hudson said yah it’s like day one every day for them.

I went over to tobston watched them unload a track-hoe that was way too heavy fr the low-boy that it was on at the Marine’s behest.

I got a nasty E-mail from the BDOC CO Maj Dylan Welch in response to an E-mail I sent the day prior.  I basically told them that if the ANA were caught speeding that they would have trouble communicating with them.  Referenced the incedent that I am about to describe with the Danes and reminded them that we force them to use our gate, and they  could always reopen their back gate, a major security concern.  I also told them that I had to tell my guys about the concept of speed.  And that they didn’t know what a speedometer was for. Maj Dylan Welch told me that this is something that the ETT could handle by talking to the ANA brass and we should teach them what a speedometer was for.  I replied that they had destroyed a million bucks worth of equipement on this trip and then blamed Ford for shoddy workmanship.  These guys literally do not know what they are doing.  Treating them like American PFCs behaving badly is not going to work out well for you.

The incedent that happened up here was relayed to me by the Danes, I guess the BDOC tore up the road to he ANA camp and didn’t bother to tell them.  One group of commandos was coming from Gereshk several km away and they were stopped.  The marines had no terps to describe the altenate route all the ANA knew was that they were being blocked.  When the Danes arrived there were 4 ANA trucks pointing their weapons at the Marines and the commandos were moving for a support by fire position.  Fucking stupid. Put yourself in their shoes.

A couple of days ago Maj James Blitz wanted me to E-mail my Afghans he didn’t know that they didn’t have E-mail he also didn’t know that we didn’t have an S1 mentor, out of touch.

A couple of days ao I translated for Capt Nowak as he bitched out Noorudin, the training NCO for being absent for 2 months. 

I guess doc checked out a guy not too long ago who had feces rammed so far up his penis that it was preventing him from urinating.  Put you can’t have anal sex in islam

We were doing the conformation brief and the 5^th kandak said they still needed 45 drivers and 4 trucks from the 5^th kandak.  The general was pissed that the mentors called him to solve the problem and not his own commander.  That’s good.

I found this, and the next little photo to be very funny.  Somebody actually printed this...

Hundreds and hundreds of trucks just sitting idle in this lot, not being used for the nation's defense

Month 9 Day 16

Notebook Entry

No fuel, tow arrangements, Romanians lead, chains, burned out clutch, snapped cable, flipped trucks, stop for water, stop Kandak to run back, flipped high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicle, Afghan national Army support, combined task force Zabul not providing support, $1 million lesson, get high while waiting.

Journal Entry

We rolled out in the morning pretty tired. We were still having mechanical difficulties with the trucks that we have. 

We moved from Camp Apache to camp Eagle. The ana did not get enough fuel over the night from the Qalat Brigade, so he had to take them back to apache to refuel.  I took some photos while we were waiting of the crazy towing arrangements that the ana were using.  My favorite was the wrecker that was lifting a dump truck, but didn’t move the boom, so it broke the window, but there were also log chains linking a couple of the vics.  The marines gave the ana a couple of mrap tow cables so that they could keep their stuff going. 

We left the gate and a while we were still in sight of the base the tow cable on one of the dump trucks pulling another dump truck snapped.  These things were rated to tow mraps which weight 24,000 lbs. the reason it snapped was th way these guys were driving, dropping the clutch slamming the breaks etc.  hell half of the dup trucks that were being towed were running because the guys liked the a/c but they were not driveable because the clutch was worn out.

The major convinced the kandak commander to send the trucks back because the marines were out of tow cables and straps, the ana had broken them all (my vic had jut linked up our second to last one) We had one left that we would need if any of our trucks broke down.  While we waited for the convoy to get going a truck pulled up on my left and stopped the whole convoy behind him.  He came up to me in the VC seat and asked if I had any water “AUW, AUW, SHUMAH MEKHAHEE AUW, BASEE SHUMA 2 KILOMETERS PESH AST WA SHUMA AUW MEKHWAHEE” [Water, Water, you want water? We passed your base 2 kilometers and you want water!!] he got the hint from my  screaming at him that I was not happy and that he shouldn’t stop the whole convoy to ask me for water when his base when we only left his base an hour ago.

We moved another 2 miles own the road and saw the wrecker/dump truck combo on their side in a ditch.  There was a fork lift out there like it was going to flip them back upright. We waited around until the kandak commander called another wrecker from the base we just left to right the two vics and tow them back.

We told the Romanians to push on, and they were nearly at the link-up point with the us army at this time.  We sped ahead and didn’t see any more crashes for a while, we did see why some of the trucks had flipped, we were doing 40 Mph on a road that could probably only handle 30Mph and the ANA were passing us.

Things were going pretty well we did a good handoff with the US army, they kept the head section going while we were still catching up with the key leadership.  It all seemed pretty good until the kandak commander told us that one of his trucks had flipped and a couple of his guys were hurt.  We stopped on the side of the road at a small compound with some kids and a Kuchi family across the street.  While we were there the marines passed out some MREs and some candy to the kids.  It was all pretty good-natured. We were far away from anything surrounded by wheat fields.  A few afghans prayed, the marines played with the kids. The doc had to open an MRE for an old man (he was probably 45) who was too weak to do it for himself.

The us army delivered the main body to the base and we asked that they come back and start policing up the wreckage from the front while we did it from the back.  They said ok they already knew of one traffic accident and were going to check it out.

They picked up a few vics and returned to base with them, needing more fuel. 

We were tired of waiting for the ana to solve their own problems so we went back to the sight of the rollover that we somehow missed probably because the guy rolled into a ravine.  The ana wrecker had managed to pull him up onto the road and put it on its wheels but that front right tire was so bent that it was untowable and the camber of the back right tire was all screwed up so it probably couldn’t have its front wheels lifted an be towed that way. The wrecker wasn’t able to lift is because the brand new truck had no hydraulic fluid.

I called into CTF Zabul for support.  They said they were in the middle of a RIP and that they didn’t have any assets to support us.  Our escorts confidently relayed the message that Lt Yunis was coming back to help with another wrecker and6 vics. Oh yay we’re saved I thought.  CTF Zabul got wind of this and didn’t want to send anything, but I told them about the $1million lesson that the ANA had from this morning and they relented.  We were waiting for a couple of hours and the major was audiby contenplatin leavin the truck an telling the battlespace owners to come back and deal with it with EOD. I linked up the guys with the wrecker with our escorts so that they could move to our position.  He tried to get the RCT involved to push from RC(SW) the problem is that CTF Zabul is an Army Brigade (therefore brigadier general) command.  What is the RCT going to do, push it to RC(SW) and then laterally to RC(S).  They wouldn’t give a shit either, they would probably just tell us to be patient . basically he was asking General Petraus to get involved and that seems a little unlikely. Oh well, he has faith in rank.

The marines I posted on the hill next to us for security smelled hash and bitched out the ana for getting high and dancing on their trucks while they should have been on post.  I told the major he told their company commander and they were reprimanded, we suggested that they may no have as many accidents if they weren’t high while driving.

Yunis showed up and to our pleasant surprise he was able to rig up the HMMWV with the help of the Marines. 

The Afghans who had learned nothing from the entire experience it seems went tearing away at high speeds. It was about as fast as we went the entire trip, 50 Mph.  we were trying to keep up because the way to Camp Hero(ana) and Lindsay (cf) was supposed to be somewhat tricky. It didn’t seem to be that way at first, but after we dropped the ana off we tried to make it over to Lindsay and went to a tiny special forces baseinstead, had to turn around and work on it again.  All in all it confirmed what we had always thought about Qandahar, what a mess.

We finally found the right spot secured billeting, downloaded some of the gear and put the trucks into maintenance.