Письмо из Ирака. Настоящее.
Apr. 15th, 2004 08:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
timaПишет муж женщины, работавшей долгое время с женой моего лучшего друга.
Он (муж, который пишет) второй раз в Ираке и на этот раз будет там не менее года. Почитайте, кому это интересно. И не посылайте футбольный мяч. Я уже его послал.
hey there,
I suppose this is going to have to be my only alternative to an Easter card. Here in Tikrit, the mail was stopped from moving because of the rise in attacks on our convoys. Basically, due to the uprisings, everything has stopped moving except food, water and fuel. Of course, we did have an Easter service. A Chaplain played guitar and we prayed for our soldiers in harms way and for strength for our families back home. After services, we shook hands with each other but we said "Be safe!" not "Peace be with you." It's how we say goodbye here. Then we put our body armor and helmets back on, pick up our weapons and go back to work.
It was a good service. I hope your day was also good. Easter is a time of rejoicing for many and here, we had much to be thankful for. This week, the mortars that fell missed my buddy's HMMWV by more than 300 yards. He was driving on our FOB (Forward Observation Base) when he drove through the field of fire unharmed. Two days before that on a humanitarian mission, a young woman (soldier) in our unit was distracted by an Iraqi child covered in decoy blood. When she tried to help, someone who probably doesn't much believe in Easter launched an RPG at her HMMWV. It missed but she was hit with shrapnel. Unhurt again because she had her body armor on. A few inches higher and she'd probably be dead today. Certainly we're thankful for that day! The following day our patrol came back in after being hit by an IED attack. They timed it badly and missed killing all three and the dining facility let them in for a hot meal after meal hours for Easter... A special treat.
Like all duty days here, the duty day ended for me and I went to the makeshift recreation facility which is 20 DVD movies, some paperback books, a big screen TV with CNN, 8 phones and 20 computers for about 9,000 soldiers. That's not a complaint. It's a blessing. They're building a bigger one 1/2 mile away where we walk to to get our meals. This one, hopefully, will stay and maybe we'll get some more DVD's from bac! k home s oon if the mail starts up again. Doesn't matter, the food's good now...not like last year although most of us make the pilgrimage for food just once a day...sometimes twice but it's a long walk in the hot sun slogging 30lbs of armor and weapons to get a hot meal and a cold soda. Of course, often now they have ice cream...well sometimes...that makes it all worth it...another blessing here!
We do have to wait for a phone or an internet connection to our families a lot here when we get free time but the point is, we DO get to call home sometimes. I was here last year also. Compared to what it was like last year, we call being able to call our family a miracle rather than a blessing!
Of course, there is a downside sometimes... While waiting outside in the desert night heat, I met the soldier wounded from an IED attack two days before. He was in the turrent of what we call a "gun truck." They're sort of like the "technicals" in the movie black hawk down that we've fashioned and welded together because we're fighting against artillery shells in the road and ambushes in vehicles with canvas doors. So we cut sheet steel and sand bag the vehicle floors and put plywood sides up in the back filled with sand so that the bullets won't get through so well. I'll have to confess my sin to that today... I don't understand how "military planners" would send American Soldiers into a war with canvas clad cars or without a scope and laser sight on every weapon. Doesn't seem right but things are changing for the better. Sometimes I even believe that although I don't have a scope or a laser sight or even an issued pair of binoculars. It could be worse, last year I didn't have the plates that stop the bullets in my body armor.... this year I do. And today, I saw the first modifications coming through to give us some vehicles with bullet proof glass and doors. Now we have two safer vehicles...Another blessing.... That's a good thing because when we were filling sand bags for our trucks, we found unexploded bombs from the first gulf war that had to be detonated.... Again, no one hurt. Some say we've been lucky but I believe we're being watched over...
Concerning the soldier, a Sergeant, his face was pretty messed up and he's lost two teeth from the shrapnel. We're thankful he's still alive. So is he. He'll go back out on the roads in a few days with a purple heart and the determination not to be intimidated. He could have chosen to go home but he didn't. So will our own unit's Sergeant who still goes to the villages near Tikrit to deliver school supplies and small amounts of children's clothing, shoes and grade school math, science and english books that we get donated from wherever we can find someone that is willing to ship a bulk package here to our "kids for kids" program to help the teachers and the children of Iraq. We call it "kids for kids" because we've been asking parents, when they take their children shopping for school supplies, to pick something out for the children of Tikrit and send it with a picture of themselves smiling or with a drawing. Even old broken crayons are a gift here worth giving to a school. VFW posts send the soldiers girl scout cookies and toiletries but, to be honest, we give most of them to the people of Iraq. If you want to make a soldier happy, send him a music CD or a DVD movie. Personally, I'm looking for a soccer ball and children's story books for one little girl in a nearby town I promised I'd try to get. I don't much have time for movies...
The "peace" of Easter was not here today. Today more mortars came in again. They landed where I was working but I'd already left that area. I'm hoping the guys that live in that area are all still ok but it'll be hours before we know for sure. It's pretty much a daily attack routine. We patrol, they shoot, we seek, they hide. We return to base, pick up supplies for the people that are trying to pick up the pieces of their lives here and head back out to give them what we can.
But if I had an Easter wish, I'd wish Walmart or Staples or some sort of corporation would send a pen and paper, crayons and a reading book to every child I see on the convoy politely waiting for the chance that today, maybe, the American Soldier will give them a bow for their hair, a new pair of shoes or clothing or an American book to learn English from.
Sure, some of us are dying here every day and I've carried one of my buddies out on a litter to an ambulance not so long ago and last year, while I was in Baghdad, two guys from my old unit were killed and I saw a lot of wounded. But to see this country be free to change for the better and to restart the farms and the marketplaces makes it worth it even if we're scared sometimes by the riots for jobs.
My day's ending today with a new prayer. I'm going to back to my hootch and pray that the 20 year old soldier that had to shoot into the dirt in a crowd to back them off because she'd just had a brick bounce off her helmet won't be courts-martialed for firing her weapon without a "definite target." I spoke with her tonight. She thinks she followed her rules of engagement and the charges are going to be dropped after the investigation. I pray they will. She did her job and maybe stopped a bad situation from getting worse. I think the adults here will never forgive us for destroying their way of life...not in Tikrit. But perhaps their children will. On my last convoy, I met a young boy that wants to go to the University of Kansas! We're trying to figure out how we can make that happen. He deserves that chance.
Time's up here. Someone else needs to tell a loved one they're ok. God Bless.
If you'd like to help the children here, pass this email along. You can send bulk mail for just $3.00 (or so I hear) if you're sending a care package to Iraq. But if you are, don't send us cookies and shampoo. Send us playschool toys and bedtime storybooks and maybe toss in a pen and pad. The address is below. God Bless. And if you want to help a soldier, pass this along to a friend. If the children here learn charity from us as the victors, perhaps the true meaning of the Easter holiday..to forgive and to love.... may someday rise up here in Iraq.
"Kids for Kids"
c/o SSG Dana K. Beausoleil
167th HHC Corps Support Group
Operation Iraqi Freedom 2
FOB SPEICHER
Tikrit, Iraq
APO AE 09393
Он (муж, который пишет) второй раз в Ираке и на этот раз будет там не менее года. Почитайте, кому это интересно. И не посылайте футбольный мяч. Я уже его послал.
hey there,
I suppose this is going to have to be my only alternative to an Easter card. Here in Tikrit, the mail was stopped from moving because of the rise in attacks on our convoys. Basically, due to the uprisings, everything has stopped moving except food, water and fuel. Of course, we did have an Easter service. A Chaplain played guitar and we prayed for our soldiers in harms way and for strength for our families back home. After services, we shook hands with each other but we said "Be safe!" not "Peace be with you." It's how we say goodbye here. Then we put our body armor and helmets back on, pick up our weapons and go back to work.
It was a good service. I hope your day was also good. Easter is a time of rejoicing for many and here, we had much to be thankful for. This week, the mortars that fell missed my buddy's HMMWV by more than 300 yards. He was driving on our FOB (Forward Observation Base) when he drove through the field of fire unharmed. Two days before that on a humanitarian mission, a young woman (soldier) in our unit was distracted by an Iraqi child covered in decoy blood. When she tried to help, someone who probably doesn't much believe in Easter launched an RPG at her HMMWV. It missed but she was hit with shrapnel. Unhurt again because she had her body armor on. A few inches higher and she'd probably be dead today. Certainly we're thankful for that day! The following day our patrol came back in after being hit by an IED attack. They timed it badly and missed killing all three and the dining facility let them in for a hot meal after meal hours for Easter... A special treat.
Like all duty days here, the duty day ended for me and I went to the makeshift recreation facility which is 20 DVD movies, some paperback books, a big screen TV with CNN, 8 phones and 20 computers for about 9,000 soldiers. That's not a complaint. It's a blessing. They're building a bigger one 1/2 mile away where we walk to to get our meals. This one, hopefully, will stay and maybe we'll get some more DVD's from bac! k home s oon if the mail starts up again. Doesn't matter, the food's good now...not like last year although most of us make the pilgrimage for food just once a day...sometimes twice but it's a long walk in the hot sun slogging 30lbs of armor and weapons to get a hot meal and a cold soda. Of course, often now they have ice cream...well sometimes...that makes it all worth it...another blessing here!
We do have to wait for a phone or an internet connection to our families a lot here when we get free time but the point is, we DO get to call home sometimes. I was here last year also. Compared to what it was like last year, we call being able to call our family a miracle rather than a blessing!
Of course, there is a downside sometimes... While waiting outside in the desert night heat, I met the soldier wounded from an IED attack two days before. He was in the turrent of what we call a "gun truck." They're sort of like the "technicals" in the movie black hawk down that we've fashioned and welded together because we're fighting against artillery shells in the road and ambushes in vehicles with canvas doors. So we cut sheet steel and sand bag the vehicle floors and put plywood sides up in the back filled with sand so that the bullets won't get through so well. I'll have to confess my sin to that today... I don't understand how "military planners" would send American Soldiers into a war with canvas clad cars or without a scope and laser sight on every weapon. Doesn't seem right but things are changing for the better. Sometimes I even believe that although I don't have a scope or a laser sight or even an issued pair of binoculars. It could be worse, last year I didn't have the plates that stop the bullets in my body armor.... this year I do. And today, I saw the first modifications coming through to give us some vehicles with bullet proof glass and doors. Now we have two safer vehicles...Another blessing.... That's a good thing because when we were filling sand bags for our trucks, we found unexploded bombs from the first gulf war that had to be detonated.... Again, no one hurt. Some say we've been lucky but I believe we're being watched over...
Concerning the soldier, a Sergeant, his face was pretty messed up and he's lost two teeth from the shrapnel. We're thankful he's still alive. So is he. He'll go back out on the roads in a few days with a purple heart and the determination not to be intimidated. He could have chosen to go home but he didn't. So will our own unit's Sergeant who still goes to the villages near Tikrit to deliver school supplies and small amounts of children's clothing, shoes and grade school math, science and english books that we get donated from wherever we can find someone that is willing to ship a bulk package here to our "kids for kids" program to help the teachers and the children of Iraq. We call it "kids for kids" because we've been asking parents, when they take their children shopping for school supplies, to pick something out for the children of Tikrit and send it with a picture of themselves smiling or with a drawing. Even old broken crayons are a gift here worth giving to a school. VFW posts send the soldiers girl scout cookies and toiletries but, to be honest, we give most of them to the people of Iraq. If you want to make a soldier happy, send him a music CD or a DVD movie. Personally, I'm looking for a soccer ball and children's story books for one little girl in a nearby town I promised I'd try to get. I don't much have time for movies...
The "peace" of Easter was not here today. Today more mortars came in again. They landed where I was working but I'd already left that area. I'm hoping the guys that live in that area are all still ok but it'll be hours before we know for sure. It's pretty much a daily attack routine. We patrol, they shoot, we seek, they hide. We return to base, pick up supplies for the people that are trying to pick up the pieces of their lives here and head back out to give them what we can.
But if I had an Easter wish, I'd wish Walmart or Staples or some sort of corporation would send a pen and paper, crayons and a reading book to every child I see on the convoy politely waiting for the chance that today, maybe, the American Soldier will give them a bow for their hair, a new pair of shoes or clothing or an American book to learn English from.
Sure, some of us are dying here every day and I've carried one of my buddies out on a litter to an ambulance not so long ago and last year, while I was in Baghdad, two guys from my old unit were killed and I saw a lot of wounded. But to see this country be free to change for the better and to restart the farms and the marketplaces makes it worth it even if we're scared sometimes by the riots for jobs.
My day's ending today with a new prayer. I'm going to back to my hootch and pray that the 20 year old soldier that had to shoot into the dirt in a crowd to back them off because she'd just had a brick bounce off her helmet won't be courts-martialed for firing her weapon without a "definite target." I spoke with her tonight. She thinks she followed her rules of engagement and the charges are going to be dropped after the investigation. I pray they will. She did her job and maybe stopped a bad situation from getting worse. I think the adults here will never forgive us for destroying their way of life...not in Tikrit. But perhaps their children will. On my last convoy, I met a young boy that wants to go to the University of Kansas! We're trying to figure out how we can make that happen. He deserves that chance.
Time's up here. Someone else needs to tell a loved one they're ok. God Bless.
If you'd like to help the children here, pass this email along. You can send bulk mail for just $3.00 (or so I hear) if you're sending a care package to Iraq. But if you are, don't send us cookies and shampoo. Send us playschool toys and bedtime storybooks and maybe toss in a pen and pad. The address is below. God Bless. And if you want to help a soldier, pass this along to a friend. If the children here learn charity from us as the victors, perhaps the true meaning of the Easter holiday..to forgive and to love.... may someday rise up here in Iraq.
"Kids for Kids"
c/o SSG Dana K. Beausoleil
167th HHC Corps Support Group
Operation Iraqi Freedom 2
FOB SPEICHER
Tikrit, Iraq
APO AE 09393
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Впечатляет
Date: 2004-04-15 10:47 am (UTC)