"It’s dusty, around 115-120 degrees, and generally not as nice as Idaho, Oregon, and Alaska. Now, of course, I’m back in Iraq, where we have all of that and bullets, too."
But he had fun on home leave in the aforementioned places, cooking, attending a wedding and doing a little target shooting. Pix and words here.
“’They (the Iraqis) have their own system and we are working within that system with Austin leveraging their experience and processes. There are things inherent in government concepts that just work,’ he said, explaining that there are models in place within the realm of civics that are essential to the running of any government."
I’m not sure I’d call Austin’s a city government that works, much less a model, considering its perpetual problems: the police periodically shooting minorities to death, the uneven, pot-holed roads that never seem to be repaired, the two months it took us to get a replacement garbage can, despite repeated pleas, and the interminable council meetings due to all the protests of this or that. Doesn’t Iraq have enough problems already?
Comments Off on Austin advises Iraq
Posted in Iraq, Texana, The War
Tagged 1st Cavalry Division, 4th Infantry Division, Austin, Iraq
Staff Sergeant Malone, of Wills Point, Texas, a small town east of Dallas, "was G.I. from a very young age. His grandmother, Monah Malone, said he talked about joining the military after watching ‘Top Gun’ as a boy. He picked a specific branch – the army – in seventh grade and followed through on his dream after finishing high school."
Almost the whole town, a place known for its wild roses, turned out for his memorial service.
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Posted in Iraq, Obituaries, The War, Troops
Tagged Iraq, Staff Sergeant Jimy Malone, Wills Point
Back in Iraq from home leave, Teflon Don counts the ways combat has changed him:
"I own the ground I walk on, and you’ll have to go through me if you want to take it. I’ve made it through nine months in what was once called the ‘triangle of death’; that area of Iraq that last year saw nearly thirty percent of those serving within it earn the Purple Heart. I’ve learned, as I think most combat soldiers do, to truly ‘not sweat the small stuff’. If a situation doesn’t threaten death or injury, I can’t trouble myself to care too much about it."
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Posted in Iraq, The War, Troops
Tagged Acute Politics, Iraq, Teflon Don
Embeded Iraq correspondent Michael Yon finds more to meet the eye than war. Birdwatching:
"We did not see the attack, but a mushroom cloud billowed in the background as I was rushing to photograph a beautiful bee-catcher. (Iraq has [a] fascinating array of birds, and when this war is over, I’m coming back with a long lens and a tripod.)"
I cringe everytime I hear about another bunch of American soldiers or Marines getting wiped out by an IED exploding near their vehicle on patrol.
"Roadside bombs in Iraq now cause over 70 percent of the U.S. casualties. Moreover, most of the bomb casualties now are combat troops…"
Why are they driving, I wonder? Have they forgotten how to walk?
Via Instapundit
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Posted in Iraq, The War, Troops
Tagged IED, infantry walking, vehicle patrols
Big Army offensives, as Robert Kaplan more or less said in his enlightening GWOT book "Imperial Grunts," are the antithesis of good counterinsurgency. So you have to wonder what’s up with "The Battle of Iraq – 2007", as Bill Roggio headlines his command-level updating post on it. Search and destroy was a big waste of time and lives in Vietnam. This one is billed as cleaning out "safe havens."
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Tagged 2007 offensive, Bill Roggio, Iraq, safe havens, search and destroy
THE TEXAS SCRIBBLER 