Category: Iraq

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Fresh Air on Counter Insurgency

I recommend a superb interview about Iraq with John Nagl, who helped write the COIN manual.  It is on Fresh Air on NPR.  This program sits on the soft left side of the radio spectrum, which is why this interview is so interesting.  The host obviously is a light-weight compared with Nagl.  You can hear in her voice and demeanor that she knows that too and is impressed with his knowledge.  She really seems to have learned something.  Her questions are sometimes leading and simplistic but his answers make it all work. 

Getting accurate news out on a venue such as Fresh Air is useful.  I suspect that many of the listeners are as badly in need of the education as the show’s host.  The popular stereotype of the Iraq conflict and the people fighting it are out of whack with reality, but too often on shows like this you hear “experts” repeating them in a self-sustaining circle.  A dose of reality will be a breath of fresh air.

Anyway, this is the link to the John Nagl Interview.     

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Practical Anthropology

Below is the Marine Band playing at the Marine Memorial in Arlington.  They play every Tuesday evening during the summer.  I went to see them last week.  The picture is not related to the rest of the post, but I thought it was a good picture. 

I minored in anthropology as an undergraduate.   I don’t think about that much anymore, but an article from AEI reminded me of the usefulness of this sort of outlook.  Anthropologists study cultures and the interrelations within and among them.  This is useful in Iraq and Afghanistan as we try to apply leverage to help those places overcome the damage of insurgencies and terrorism.   I have spoken to anthropologist studying the cultural landscape of Anbar and we are always looking for better ways to understand the people we work with.  We call it “human terrain” and knowing the human terrain is as important as understanding the physical terrain of a battle space.  It saves lives and makes us more successful. It just makes sense.

The article I linked above is about an anthropologist who was recently killed while on duty in Afghanistan.   This guy was a hero.  What surprised me was that some professional anthropologists  disagree.   Some even say it is some kind of ethical violation for anthropologists to use their skills to help with human terrain projects.   I think maybe they have been watching too much Star Trek and they think the prime directive is applicable on our planet. It is one of those examples that shows that you can get a PhD and still remain a fool.

We apply our education – history, anthropology, business etc – to do our jobs better.   It would be unethical not to do so, IMO.  That is one of the purposes of education.  I cannot believe that there is a controversy about this among some academics.   Are they trying to prove that what they teach in the ivory tower really is useless? 

The article I mentioned refers to William Francis Butler who said that a nation that insists on separating its soldiers and its scholars will likely find its fighting done by fools and its thinking by cowards.  In our modern America it looks like we have given fools some of the thinking jobs too.

Social “sciences” such as sociology, anthropology and psychology are not sciences in the precise sense of the term.  That does not mean they are not worth study.  On the contrary, the disciplines used in these fields can help channel thought and help in the art of living life.  But social scientists have no right to stand apart from their societies in a way we might tolerate in a practitioner of a hard science.  Society IS their business.

I studied history & management in school, but I didn’t leave it in the classroom.   Whenever possible, I like to test assumptions and theories in light of actual events in the real world.  Thinking improves action and action improves thinking and the test of a theory is its ability to predict outcomes in the real world. No theory accurately applies to all aspects the real world, but some are better, more predictive, than others and all can be improved in light of experience.   I think that – the real world experience – is what scares some academics.  They want to protect their theories and their phony-baloney status from the intrusion of reality.  That is why they criticize colleagues who participate in reality, no matter what rationalizations they offer.   

The best professors I recall from my studies were those who had worked in business and/or consulted extensively.  They were a lot more reasonable than those who rarely or never ventured out.   But the pure academic types often looked down on experience – silly, but true.  It evidently still applies.  Let’s hope the “purists” are not too strong.

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Welcome Back to the Fight

Barack Obama is going to visit Iraq.   This is a good thing.   He is an honest man.  After he sees for himself the progress we have made, he will have to come around to a more sensible policy on the subject.  Let the dogs of the left howl.  

We have to look to the future.   I get annoyed at all the pea-brained fools who want to relive the events of 2003.  Yes, if we had it to do all over again we would make a different set of mistakes.  I think it was a good thing to get rid of Saddam Hussein, but no matter what our opinions of the past, we live in the here and now.  We can make decisions only in the present that affect the future.  

In the here and now we have an astonishing opportunity.   The next president, Obama or McCain, will have options.  This is what the success of the surge has achieved.  American resolve and courage has given the next president a victory.  The sooner we all recognize that, the better we can build on that success.   We can now withdraw some troops; we can now get the Iraqis to pay for more of their own reconstruction; we can further humiliate Al Qaeda.   These are the things victory gives us.

We achieved this victory because of our perseverance and hard work.  Already I notice that the media is implying that the turn-around (when they even notice it) results from luck or something we could have had w/o all the hardships if only we had been nicer to some of our adversaries.   

Before a big & difficult change, people say it is impossible.  After it has happened, they claim it was inevitable. This is a perniciously silly idea.  Giving up in 2006 would have been a disaster.  If we had relied on the kindness of the Iranians, Al Qaeda or the various regional bad guys we would be bloodied all over the place.   These guys have no history of moderation or generosity.  They stop only when they hit something stronger and more determined than they are.  Americans are generous in victory.   That is what secures peace.  But you cannot be generous until you have something to be generous with.  In other words, you can give peace a chance only AFTER earning it.  

I will be watching the news very carefully.  Lord knows, it will be easy to follow Obama’s progress since he has taken all the network news anchors with him. I eagerly await his turn around in Iraq policy.   I look forward to seeing how it is done.   I expect to learn a lot re spinning.

No matter what, however, it will be a welcome development.  It is sort of like what Viktor Laszlo says to Rick Blaine in Casablanca.   “Welcome back to the fight.  This time I know our side will win.”

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The Big Idea

I found the team leader conference in Baghdad very interesting and am trying to take some inspiration from it for my remaining time in Iraq.  I was especially attracted to what General Petraeus said about the big idea and how working toward them attracts talent as people want to accomplish these sorts of goals.

Below is a “gas station” in Hadithah.  Not much to look at, but there was no fuel to buy not long ago.

It is easy to get discouraged around here if we look at the things that are still lacking.  But when I think about how much has been accomplished, the mood changes.  Places like Hadithah, which were wastelands of rubble less than a year ago, are now enjoying growing prosperity and stability, with full markets and lots of economic activity.  Our “good news story” is part of that, but only ONE part.   The Anbari people are resourceful and resilient.  They are going to make it and we can take great satisfaction that we helped.

We are beginning to notice the effects of more Iraqi government money funding projects in the cities of Western Al Anbar.  Projects are being built without our involvement.  For example, the Al Faraby Primary School in Hadithah was an ITAO project. When USACE went to do site planning they found a GOI project already in full swing.  Similarly I recently visited a youth Center in Rutbah.  CA was planning to renovate it and the ePRT was supplying some soccer field improvements.  I recently learned that our help was no longer needed as GOI was going to fund and work the project with a big budget. 

Below is Hit near the City Hall

The effects are still uneven but unmistakable and they are bringing a subtle change in attitude.  Local leaders are coming to understand that their own government, not coalition forces, is where they should look for resources.  Effecting this change in attitude has been one of our key goals, but I am not sure how much credit we can take for it happening, sort of like the rooster taking credit for the sunrise.  Certainly equally important are the fantastic oil revenues that the Iraqi government is earning as well as the perception among observant people that the U.S. Congress and the American people are less enthusiastic about continuing to push American money into a country that can well afford its own development.

Below is irrigation system near Rawah

I was a little concerned to hear that the elections may be postponed.  We hear from contacts that the people of Western Al Anbar are anxious to have their voices heard.  They learned their lesson from the foolishness of their earlier election boycott and now want more representative politicians in power throughout the area.  I am afraid that frustration will build as elections are delayed and people suspect that incumbent politicians are abetting in the delay to protect their own careers and prolong their tenure in their jobs.

 All tolled, I find many more reasons for hope than for despair.  Iraq still has a very long and steep road to travel, but it is increasingly prepared to make the journey successfully.

Above is a Marine playing golf during free time.  You take what you can.

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Hypocrisy is the Tribute Vice Pays to Virtue

Below is the flag at Mt Washington, New Hampshire

At least that is how it used to be when Matthew Arnold wrote those words more than a century ago.  I am speaking only of my own observation but I have noticed a change in society.  I can recall when people doing bad things pretended to be good because they were rightfully ashamed of their bad behavior.  Today many celebrities and athletes revel in their horrible behavior with apparent impunity.   Being bad is now cool.  It is something akin to the radical chic.  Good people feel a little shy of admitting that they are not bad and cool.  It is strange.  We have in many ways reversed the earlier formulation.

When I talk to my colleagues in Iraq, both civilians and military, it is clear to me that most people are here for good reasons.  They came to do their duty, to serve their country and to try to make the world a better place.  Of course there are also other reasons, but duty is the dominant, the predominant, motivation.  It is the sine qua non of why we are here.  My new team members feel a little reticent about admitting that.  I did too.  Why? 

The Marines really believe all that stuff they say about patriotism, duty & commitment and being around them has been both refreshing and liberating.   I think we underplay the call to duty in our lives.  Most people are looking for meaning.  True happiness comes from doing what you should do.  It need not be heroic or dangerous and it will be different for every person, but doing what YOU think you should do is what makes you happy.  That means happiness cannot be found, bought or given; it has to be earned – too bad for rich heiresses and morality-challenged sports & movie stars.  

I am going to change my introductory talk to new team members to emphasize this a little more and give them more opportunity to feel good about what they are doing.  Maybe I can use some variation of that speech John F. Kennedy gave re going to the moon, we do these things “not only because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win…”

Or is that just too un-cool for today’s ears? 

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Perceptions of Iraq

My ePRT is on the edge of the world.   I realized this as we flew low to Baghdad in the Blackwater helicopter on the way to Baghdad.   Marine Air flies higher and straighter, so I don’t see as much, but there is not much to see anyway on my usual Western Anbar travels, just shades of dusty brown.   As we flew toward Bagdad, I saw farm lands that were wider than a football field’s distance from the river.   Some of the land looked very green and rich.   How different would my impression of Iraq have been if I had been somewhere else but Western Anbar? 

I went to Baghdad for the team leader conference.   The thirty-one PRTs in Iraq represent vastly different human and natural terrains.  Each of us sees part of the situation.  It is good to try to bring us together to discuss the bigger picture.

Below is our partner helicopter. 

Iraq has improved a lot since I arrive in September of last year.  Our meeting reflected this changed situation.   Back then it was sometimes hard to see a possible solution. Today I feel reasonably sure that we will succeed in helping this country become more democratic, stable and non-threatening. 

It gets lots less green near Al Asad …

Our challenge now is how to help the Iraqis usefully spend their own resources on development projects.  We were always supposed to be working ourselves out of a job.  The preferred end state is a normal relationship between the U.S. and Iraq and we are well on the way.

… and a lot more green as you get farther from AA.

During the conference I got a couple different perspective about Iraq.   For example, Iraq had an excellent system of public health until the 1970s.   It declined in the 1980s and got worse and worse as trained professionals left the country and facilities were no maintained.   The promising news in this is that we are helping restore, not create a system.  This is true of many aspects of this place.  As one of the presenters pointed out, Iraq is not a poor country; it is a broken country that can and is being mended.   The other different perspective I got came from the simply flying over the country and talking to my colleagues.  There is more to Iraq than Western Anbar and there is a lot of potential. 

Above – animals grazing, palms growing along fields of grain.   My impression of Iraq will always be Western Al Anbar, but I have to remember that is not the whole country.

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Courageous Journalists Needed

Picture below is from the Cowboy Museum in Oklahoma City.

I stay out of specific politics on this blog, but now that both candidates have come down to nuanced but similar policies of staying in Iraq as long (or as short) as the need exists, I feel a little freer to ask what the hell is wrong with the American media?

During the bad days in Iraq, not long ago, they were writing the American obituary.  They had no trouble finding and quoting experts telling why we couldn’t win in this sort of environment.   Now they cannot seem even to notice success.  Isn’t that an extraordinary story?  In the heart of the Middle East, on a battlefield chosen by Al Qaeda as their key front for their war against civilization, in a place where they proclaimed the beginning of their new caliphate we have driven them to virtual extinction.   As they cower in their spider holes, fearing the arrival of our Marines or our Iraqi allies, their frustration is palpable.  This was supposed to be their victory, not ours.   They thought they had the weight of events on their side; they were mistaken.   Why is this not story worthy of investigation and exposition by our esteemed journalists? 

My experience with journalists informs me that many, perhaps most, work from their existing models and do not actively seek out information that disconfirms them.  They have a narrative that is generally accepted by other people in the media and that tends to constrain their perceptions.   This is not something limited to journalists, but they are particularly susceptible precisely because they think they are not.  

The narrative that their conventional wisdom accepted was that Iraq was mostly lost and that we were in a holding pattern heading for a long term failure and withdrawal. They fixed the various data points around their narrative and the stories more or less made sense back in 2006.  This narrative is now unraveling but the MSM has yet to figure out a new one to replace it.   It is not a conspiracy, but it is a syndrome, a kind of a group-think.   It will take a lot of changed facts and a couple of courageous leading journalists to break out.  We have the changed facts on the ground; what we need now is the courage.  

BTW – I was reading one couragous journalist today.   People who have been here recently know a lot more.  Stay away from those pundits and bloggers who have been to Iraq years ago … or never. 

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A Perfect Al Asad Day

I spend some considerable time complaining about the weather here in Iraq and who can blame me if you look at the pictures of the nearly opaque red air?  But Al Asad has pleasant weather much of the year.  November is very nice around here.  Winters are a bit chilly, but never cold and usually clear.   It is churlish to complain all the time.

You just have to adapt.  For example, in the summer it is much too hot for any strenuous activity during the middle of the day.   The local Iraqis are active early in the morning and in the evening.  They hunker down in the shade in the middle of the day.  This bimodal activity optimal is probably the origin of the siesta.  If you follow a similar pattern, (IF you can) you too are okay. 

I have been getting my running in before 0700.  This time of the year, it gets light around 0430 and it is very nice at 0600.   I get up in the morning and look out the door. If I can see a reasonable distance (i.e. dust is not so bad) I go out and run.   There is an interesting aspect of the dust that I only figured out (maybe) recently.   On some days the dust is not so bad at 0600, but it gets thick and unpleasant by around 0700.   Some of this has to do with the nature of wind.  The wind tends to pick up around dawn.   I suppose it is because the earth heats differentially as the sunlight hits.  The wind picks up dust and a short time later it is a mess.  

But not all the dust is natural.  Much is kicked up by our own activities.  Around 0600 the trucks & heavy vehicles start to roll in earnest; each creates a tail of dust and cumulatively there is a lot of dust.  All this dust has to go someplace and it doesn’t settle very fast.   Most of the roads are paved with white gravel and I am pretty sure our activities are the source of much of the whitish “moon dust.”  The red dust comes from farther away.   Our weather maps show massive clouds, sometimes covering almost all of Iraq.  The most recent attack of the red dust originated in the western deserts of Iraq and in Syria.  This kind of weather pattern is usually associated with a northeastern wind.  

Our local activities can create local unpleasantness, but the real dust storms are those caused by Mother Nature.  Of course it is not all Mother Nature either.  People have abused this land for >4000 years.   Much of this dirt would have been held down by the roots of plants had humans and goats not uprooted them.  I blame Dennis, our AG Advisor, for the current problem.   He has been here nine months and still not managed to cover the hills with grass and reverse the mistakes of the last four millennia.

BUT today is nice.   The air is clear and the morning was cool and pleasant.  We are supposed to have at least three days of this before the next clouds of dust obscure the horizon.   I have to get my running in while the running is good.

I made the three and a half minute trek to the highest mountain in Al Asad, an elevation of at least 30 feet,  and took the pictures.  This is as good as it gets around here. 

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M*O*A*D*S

We are experiencing the mother of all dust storms.  The dust is more red than usual.  Satellite maps indicate that the storms are starting in Syria.   I wonder if that qualifies as a Syrian incursion into Iraq.

Below is me in the dust storm.

I went out to stand in the dust as you can see in the picture (or almost not see).  You have to be in on the experience after all, the bad ones too. The dust stings your nose and eyes.   I can only imagine how it would be to be exposed to it all day w/o shelter.  It quickly dries out you mouth.   We are not suffering too much, however.  Our new headquarters is fairly well sealed since it was renovated.  This is a big change from the old building and a quantum leap from the tents.  During previous dust storms, it just rained dirt inside our building.   Today I can observe it out the window with some measure of detachment. 

Coming out of the shower this morning was interesting.  Of course, we don’t have showers or toilets (what the Marines call heads) in our cans.  I am lucky in that my can is only a short distance from the showers/heads, so I can make the trip in flip-flops and running shorts.  I don’t usually bother to dry off very much.   It is unnecessary.  Stepping out into the Anbari summer wind is (as a Marine colleague described it) like being sprayed by a giant hair dryer.  Today I had the added experience of fine red dust blowing in the wind.  I was coated like a Christmas cookie by the time I got back in.  I exaggerate only a little.

This is us coming back.  This gives you some idea of the distances involved.

On the plus side, dust storms reflect the sun’s heat, so it is a lot cooler sheltering under the dust blanket.   But it cannot be good for you.  I didn’t go running this morning.  I don’t think it is healthy to run in this pea-soup of dust.  I was thought I would be encased in concrete with cement lungs, probably in mid-stride, turned into stone sort of like after seeing the Medusa, but when I look at the dust blowing around, I understand that it would probably be the much more attractive terra cotta.   Maybe that is how those famous Han Dynasty soldiers came to be.

BTW – I submitted by essay re success in Iraq to the official State Dept blog (blogs.state.gov).  They broke it up into bite sized pieces and have not yet published the whole think, but please have a look.

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COPS

Meeting with Rutbah Police Chief

The Police Chief says that he tells everybody about his problems in hopes that the weight of his persistence will convince someone to solve them.

The Rutbah region that is his area of responsibly is vast and thinly populated.   It includes the Syrian and Jordanian border areas and the POEs at Waleed and Trabil, the village of Akashat, Nukhayb as well as the Saudi border region and POE Ar-Ar. It takes a lot of police officers, vehicles and fuel to patrol a place like this.  Unfortunately, Iraqi government resource allocation decisions are based on population w/o sufficient concern for area.

The chief says he has only 280 IP out of authorized strength of 620.  He doesn’t expect to see more any time soon. His patrol fleet consists of sixty-one pickup trucks of various sizes, Chevys and Fords.  Even when there is fuel to keep the trucks rolling, they are often inoperable.  This is a land of axel-busting roads, when you are lucky enough to find a road.  He says that he has people trained to fix the vehicles, but they lack parts and tools to do the job.  They used to have their vehicles fixed at Al Asad, but that service recently stopped.

Hammurabi

The Hammurabi Academy, located on Camp Ripper, has trained around 400 Iraqi police from Western Al Anbar since it was founded in July of last year.  Classes are small, with a student/instructor ratio of around 7/1.  Only leaders are trained.  They are supposed to go back and pass their information to the ordinary police, so it is a train the trainers proposition.  They learn a variety of tasks such as basic investigation, logistics, administration and evidence gathering techniques.   It is not exactly CSI-Iraq, but it is a start.

Colonel Stacy Clardy of RCT 2 set up the academy to produce a leadership core for the Iraqi Police (IP) of our district.  It is important to recall that back in July 2007 Al Anbar was just coming out of the terror of the insurgency and significant fighting still raged.  My first helicopter landing in Al Anbar was on a soccer field, where I was informed insurgents had rounded up and murdered the local police some months before. These kinds of things were still fresh in the memories of recruits back then.  It took courage to volunteer to be an Iraqi cop and I suppose that they must have felt a little relieved to get some training on Camp Ripper, protected by U.S Marines.   Now they talk about moving the academy off the base and that will probably happen by next year.

The Marines host the venue, provide some logistics and act as advisors.   Most of the funding comes from the government of Iraq and gradually, as equipment is replaced, the Hammurabi Academy is evolved into an almost wholly Iraqi institution.

My impression was that we had U.S. instructors teaching classes with interpreter.  I was wrong, or at least out of date.  Most instructors today are Iraqis who speak directly to the classes in Arabic.  One of the successes of the last year is precisely the development of the human capital to make this work.  Iraqi police of the past were often good at being cops in many ways, but not so good at following the rule of law & evidence.  Now they are becoming a modern police force.