Hello Everyone,
Things have been pretty much the same around here. We are still
training our Kandak. It is very difficult to get them prepared, as none
of them have any previous formal training. The officers are more
concerned with getting satellite TVs than training their companies. The
NCOs and soldiers are motivated and eager to train, they just don't
know anything. It is worrisome, because we are going downrange very
soon.
We will be moving to a town called Jalalabad (the coalition people all
call it J-BAD), which is due east of Kabul right on the Pakistani
border. That will be our new base station from which we will send our
patrols out. One good thing is that many of our troops come from that
area, and the civilians will be happy to see us. One bad thing is that
the Taliban is still pretty active there, and they have already killed
one of our soldiers who was home on leave. We are trying to get more
training time before we go, because they are just not ready.
I spend my days training the ANA, my nights working out and doing
paperwork. Things are real busy lately, we have so much to do to
prepare.
OK, on to the pictures. I have been making several road trips around
the Kabul area, as most of the coalition bases are spread out. The road
to Baghram (a small town due north of Kabul) is real pretty, and some
of these pictures are from that trip.
This was the king's palace years ago. It is on the south side of Kabul.
Why is it that the southern part of town is always the bad
neighborhood? During the Soviet occupation, the palace was used by
their Ministry of Defense. After the soviets left, there was a terrible
civil war, and almost all of Kabul was destroyed. This is what is
left.
Here I am standing in front of a known mine field at Baghram Air Force
Base. Mines are everywhere in this country, forcing everyone not to
stray from their well-trodden paths. Just the other day four Americans
where killed by an anti-tank mine, which was most likely planted by the
Soviets in the 1980s. In the Kabul area, mines are the greatest danger.
Outside of Kabul, there is still a lot of enemy activity, mostly by the
Taliban, but Al Qaeda is still present. I think this is why they want
to get the ANA spread out quickly to gain control of the entire
country. I think that most of you don't here about this, because the
ANA is doing most of the fighting. They have already lost more than 20
soldiers this month to fighting with the Taliban.
This is a bedouin camp we passed on the way to Baghram. Notice the
grass, it has been raining quite a bit here, more than any local can
remember.
This is one of the infamous "jingle" trucks. They are called jingle
trucks, because the owners hang jingly stuff off of them. This one is
very mildly decorated. Some are outrageous. Many are painted like
Mexican murals with many colors depicting historic or religious scenes.
The other day we saw one with huge letters saying "THE TITANIC". We got
a good laugh out of that. These trucks are all over the place, and the
drivers are nuts.
Here is a picture I took through my windshield of a line of jingle
trucks passing us. See the jingle hanging off the fender? People put
this stuff on everything, even their AK 47s. We drive around in Ford
Rangers, like the one in front of me. After that, there is just about
every type of armoured vehicle imaginable driving around here. I would
take pictures of them, but that would make them mad at me. The
canadians drive around in Grizzlys, large boat like armoured
vehicles. The French drive around in a wild looking armoured jeeps,
that look sort of like frogs interestingly enough. The Germans have an
enormous armoured vehicles, that must be 15 feet high and weigh several
tons. The Americans drive around in up-armoured HUMMVs, which look like
short brinks trucks. The Hungarians drive around in armoured Mercedes
trucks. Then there are the UN trucks, which I think are Range-Rovers.
Our fearless general has a $120,000 Ford Expedition, in which he never
leaves Camp Phoenix.
Well, the next one I send you will probably have pictures from the
J-Bad area, I hear it is really beautiful and greeny. One of my LRS
friends just got back from a mission out there, and he said it is
gorgeous. Until then, I wish you all the best.
Sonny
After thought: After I went down range, I became completely disgusted with Phoenix and Baghram. We had to go to both about once a month to draw operational funds. Both bases have Dairy Queens, Massage parlours, Burger Kings, Coffee Shops, gyms, and even concerts and dancing. While we were told there was no money for us to build defenses on our base on the Pakistan border, where we were regularly rocketed. In addition to that, the gate guards at both bases were better equiped with radios and weapons than we were. When we first went down range our best method of communication was a cell phone, we had no long range weapons, and we were driving in Ford Rangers. Once when we were ambushed, the enemy's weapons were out of our range and all we could do was run. I also had no communications to talk to aircraft directly, so we had to relay through a local Marine base. I complained to the Jack Ass staff officers at Phoenix, with their dairy queens and massages, and they refused to supply us with anything--even though they had it. They were incompetent and criminally negligent!!!! In general, National Guard Staff officers have no idea what they are doing, but they really enjoy their power. The only thing they were concerned with were uniform standards on their bases, because they had absolutely zero sense of tactics, strategy, or anything operational. I grew to despise them!!!!!