Shadow’s taxicab reports-Ice mortars, IED’s and dreams of guerrillas.

The road brings me to another actor in George Bush’s Middle East drama. A man I learned through our conversation was actually a member of the National Guard who just came off an 18 month tour. I’m sure I audibly gasped when he told me this and I expressed that I had no idea they were deploying the Guard for that long. I inquired as to what theatre he had been in and he replied that he was in both. Literally he told me he got done in Iraq for 9 months and got shipped right to Afghanistan. It was my understanding it was his entire unit that was deployed this way.

With a little leading he was very open about some of his experiences and in particular we talked at length about the differences between the two wars that I’ve discussed with many soldiers and some of the tactics the enemy employs. Despite rosy rhetoric from people like Donald Renfield I don’t think I’ve had one soldier tell me any of the people they’re fighting are pushovers. They all definitely have a healthy fear and respect for the cunningness of these fighters due mostly to the friends they’ve seen mangled and killed by them. The gentleman I was talking to this night used a phrase that I’ve heard many soldiers use and I think it’s mostly a defense mechanism either for them or for those like me that would be the recipient of horrors should I delve into the story.

He said, “It’s not that bad”.

It’s rare of me to let my passions get the better of me when I’m doing these little fishing expeditions for war stories but I couldn’t help myself and I blurted out, “Not that bad! My god man you guys are getting shot at and bombed! Back here is ‘not that bad’ what you guys go through is inconceivable to me. I hear a lot from you guys, particularly the differences between the two theatres, that the Taliban will give a more stand up fight and that in Iraq it’s a lot more guerrilla warfare.”

He replied that there were both in each case but in Iraq the insurgents are particularly crafty with some of their attacks. One example he cited was the reason they are able to do so many mortar attacks on our forces and our bases without us being able to find the attackers is they use mortars packed in ice. I don’t recall the exact mechanics of it but in a nutshell the insurgents set a mortar up undercover of night somehow packed in ice so the shell will trigger after a few hours when the ice melts enough for the mortar to drop and engage the firing mechanism. Needless to say when our forces scramble a patrol to attack the source of the mortars the human targets are long gone.

He said the insurgents are adapting their IED’s quite well to our vehicles armor which is supposed to be nearly impenetrable. He claimed that they’ve designed a new bomb that somehow pops up next to a vehicle as it’s going by and will somehow slap a metal plate against the vehicle that will stick to the armor. The explosive then goes off behind the metal plate and the force blows shrapnel right through the armor filling the interior with hot flying metal.

Despite the obvious savagery of these conflicts I’ve heard many soldiers, this Guardsman included, lament the rules of engagement they have to operate under. He made a couple chilling comments. One that even if his superior officer told him not to shoot someone, if he personally “knew” the person in question was a terrorist he would blow him away. The other was that he believed that the military still wasn’t adequately trained how to fight a guerrilla war.

“If we could fight a guerrilla war we’d kick some serious ass. We don’t hide in buildings and shoot out windows like they do, we attack from out in the open and assault the buildings they’re in.” I got the sense he wasn’t overly impressed with how the campaigns were going over all. Add another to that list. Always tip your cabbie.
Shadow out

Wow.

It's definitely time to go!

n/t

I have to admit, when I lived over that way, I saw some crazy contraptions that were cobbled together with bubble gum and baling wire, hugely unsafe, some of them, but they WORKED. Everything from vehicles to oddball Rube Goldberg-esque contraptions to do all sorts of things. In Saddam days, the bravest of the brave would make satellite dishes out of soup cans, and sneak them up on the roof in the dark of night.

The culture greatly respects 'engineers' and you see a high proportion of degrees in engineering coming out of their universities (Arafat had a civil engineering degree, so did Osama, for that matter, as does Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the current PM of Iran). No doubt a lot of these unemployed engineers are putting their unused degrees to work....

Hey first report after a long bout of writer's block. Show me some love DU! Working on another one right now. B-)

Welcome back, shadow.

:hi:

<http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x2461214>

Sinking fast

n/t

I'm not going to give the traditional glad-handing and everything like that. I will say this: if you can find the time, you should write down these stories and sell them as a book. HBO has made a series out of "taxicab confessions" that aren't half as interesting or significant as the things you've shared with us.