31 July

An old mud building where some of the guards sleep




A network switching box for a multimillion dollar Afghan MOD Network inside the Mud Hut...that is planning at its finest



Old picture of a nearby village


They have been working hard. Note the transition from mud to bricks and the tower in the middle. This is the common style for a home in the area and most of AF. It is probably an entire family (grandparents, parents, kids and more) in the walled off compound.

Nearby hydro-electric damn

Russians left in a hurry and left a bunch of junk

Sweet jeep thing that we are going to try to rescue next trip to Kabul

I am taking orders if anyone is interested let me know your size and preferred color. I can get a great deal if I order in bulk. Note: they have purple and gold

High rise living. This is in Bagram. These are CONNEX boxes like you see on 18wheelers going down the interstate. We use these for everything over here.

What a week! Started the week with a run to KABUL for various reasons. Finished a book titled Inside Al Qaeda: Global Network of Terror and started another on what “The West” must do to fight off religious extremists that will stop at nothing to destroy our way of life. I have started making election security preparations. With that said, my leave has changed to early Sept, vice the second half of August due to the elections. The initial scheduling of my leave during the elections was an oversight on my part. Some of you have expressed concern for my mental well-being in response to some of my writing. I am fine. I have been doing a lot of reading about politics and other current events, and much of it has been eye opening. I am not talking about rumor mill “Where was Obama born?” stuff or anything of that nature. I am talking about possibly more disturbing things:

1. Did you know that very few, if any, of our congressmen actually read bills before they vote on them one way or another? What do we pay these people for? Is that representative of your way of doing things? We have to stop electing career politicians.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/postpartisan/2009/07/read_before_you_vote.html

2. I mentioned last week terrorist training worldwide and even in the U.S….just this week, a few family members were arrested in VA for just that.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534983,00.html

3. Some congressmen are so out of touch with reality they don’t know the details of some of the most basic laws in the U.S. (ie. Drinking age and smoking age). Once again, how can we entrust the responsibility of making and enforcing laws to an elitist few who don’t care to learn about what laws they are making or the people they affect?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xxLNKnLaDG8

http://www.foxnews.com/video2/video08.html?maven_referralObject=7618751&maven_referralPlaylistId=&sRevUrl=http://www.foxnews.com/

(same guy this guy is unbeleiveable and par for the course as far as our "representatives" go, as far as I am concerned)

My world is not all doom and gloom. I enjoy myself day to day here in this wild country. A little biblical lesson: Many of you may have wondered like I have, “What is wrong with these people?” “Something just ain’t right.” I will let you know that it is written that these people shall not “be right.” Genesis Chapter 16 is God talking to Abraham’s mistress, Hagar. She had just run away from Sarah and Abraham after Abraham got her pregnant…long story short, God tells her to cheer up, “you’re with child…your having a boy…Ishmael…He shall be a wild man. His hand shall be against every man and every man’s hand against him.”

Some translations even say Ishmael’s people will be a “Wild ass people.” The Arabs are decedents of Ishmael. Afghans will tell you that they are not Arabs…surprise guys, you come from Arabs.

As far as still coming home in December, that is up in the air, too. The Navy will try to use guys like me that are already trained and over here to fill some positions for a few months to take us out to our original dates…going with the flow as usual.

Thank you all for your prayers and support. Have a good weekend. God Bless.

BMP

24 July

Osama's Tea House. He supposedly lived in this building on our base and planned 9/11 from here. I don't know if I posted a previous pic of another building and claimed the same thing, but now people are saying that this is the one.


Sleeping on the roof.



This is serious


What happens when 3 dudes work on the same row of blocks at once


Killing machine


Tropical living at one of the guard towers


Room with a view


Ditch Swimmers at it a again


I am sure these two are liscensed to drive on the highway


Tower overlooking HWY

The mobbing from 2 Weeks ago

More Mobbing Pics- note the boy third from the right giving the little girl an elbow to the face

This week was “normal.” Normal, meaning that I didn’t travel out of the area and don’t really have anything exciting to report. No new revelations or discoveries come to mind.

This week, there was a team of U.S. soldiers here to evaluate the progress of our ANA counterparts. They look at their ability to do their jobs and the degree to which they can do them without the help of the U.S. They are graded on a scale from 1 to 4. A 4 means the ANA guy is just a puppet and does only what the Americans tell him and unable to do anything on his own. A 1 means the team only relies on the Americans for some small things and could probably function OK on its own. This same team was here in early May, shortly after I arrived in country. My counterpart pretty much got 3s across the board on the first evaluation due to the fact that he was not here for most of the evaluation and his subordinates didn’t have a clue how things are run and the fact that some things were pretty jacked up. We will get the outbrief on Saturday, and it looks like he will get 1s in most areas and maybe some 2s. It has been a long, trying 2 months since the last evaluation, but we have covered a lot of ground. It is good to see some of the long term projects come to fruition. I enjoy the short term projects like construction or repairs of a security gate or check point, but to see the long term effects is really gratifying.
In other news, there is an AP story out there about an attack in my neighborhood. The long and the short of it is the enemy will continue to attack in an attempt to disrupt the peace and the elections. The country’s 2nd democratic presidential elections are approaching. The very right to vote and the fact that the government will be able to pull off such a “western” evolution enrages the enemy. They will do anything to destabilize the area in an attempt to illegitimize the AF govt and security forces. The people in this country are simple minded. Whoever can provide them security has their support. If the enemy can convince the population that the good guys cannot help, the population will side with the enemy. The truth of the matter is that they cannot and will not overpower us, but will be a thorn in the side trying. It is a waiting game. They have nothing but time, but we keep giving ourselves time tables and ultimatums. We have to stay here and keep doing good things. We have to stop doing stupid things that alienate the population and continue to train the AF forces and police to handle business themselves. I came here thinking that if enough people try hard enough, my kids won’t have to come here. After seeing, hearing, and reading some different things, my time table was a few decades off. Our forces are conducting advising operations in the Philippines today; we first had advisors in the PI in 1898. Look no further than today's headlines on foxnews.com for our allies reluctance to commit for the long haul. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,534667,00.html?test=latestnews The last lines are: Australia, with about 1,550 troops in Afghanistan, lost its 11th soldier last week. Air Chief Marshall Angus Houston said Tuesday that a multilateral withdrawal would lead to civil war with "a very strong possibility the Taliban would prevail."

The hatred for the West that is bred in extremist Islamic schools across the world is hardly imaginable. It is going on in AF, Pakistan, Iran, Indonesia, Malaysia, the PI, Canada, Somalia, England, and of course, the U.S. There are more countries represented by jihadists than by the “Coalition of the Willing.” There are cells everywhere. Sometimes, a wife may not even know what her husband is up to. These guys are surprisingly organized, as well. They are financial wizards and frugal spenders. They are secretive and patient. It seems the most secretive people in America consider a secret kept if they speak on a condition of anonymity, and the powers at be want to bring soldiers home to appease the voters. I will conclude by saying we must continue to send men and women in uniform to far off lands to find and root these people out because terrorism and war are games in which you never want to have the home field advantage.
Have a safe weekend, and God Bless.

BMP

17 July

I promise all I was pointing at this kid was my camera. You'd think I had my pistol in one hand and the camera in the other.




A "shower." The security guards provide some insight to "Afghan" thinking. They have rooms with electricity with nearby running water, but choose to sleep out near their posts so they don't have to walk so far to get to work. The result is this is their shower. One guy climbs the ladder and dumps a bucket on the guy showering.




Notice the bag on the goats nipples. They do this so the baby goats don't take the milk so they can have it themselves.


He missed his turn. This is what created the traffic jam below.

I haven't asked, but I was stuck in traffic at this time. They probably would have been able to tell me "there is traffic."

Changing a tire.

Haji does surf...donkey surfing


This is what happens if there is a wreck or a traffic slow down...they all bunch up. So, what happens if there is a wreck that blocks both lanes, everyone on both sides of the wreck does this. So, now you have to clear the wreck and get all the idiots out of the road before you can let a either side go.



Caught my eye--they had to know they were going to run out of room

Hunch Back of Kabul and an overcrowded bus with people on top in one frame...great success

Old russian Armored Personnel carrier

Sweet Jingle-bling


An impressive gut. We think he is pregnant



These are our fearless fire fighters for the ANA. We are working on them being able to run drills without "pre-alerting" the drill. For those of you non-nuclear types, this means you can know that a drill is coming, but you should go about your business like you don't know it is coming. The first drill we ran, these clowns were dressed and ready on the water truck 30min before the "drill" was supposed to start. Our goal for the second drill was no "pre-alertment." Just before the second drill, I went to deliver some sandbags to the firefighters and this is what I found. They were slightly embarrassed, but were quick to pose when I broke out the camera.




"Dead guy" for drill. He was laying next to the "suicide bomb" (a burning blanket). When the fire fighters showed up, they sprayed the fire extinguishers everywhere, including all over this poor guy. He didn't flinch. He played a great dead guy.





Another new friend and true business man


Well, after making my blog entry last Jummah (corrected from previous spellings), I relaxed for a few hours and then went to the bazaar. This is our primary interaction with the local kids. I usually load up my pockets with candy or pens and hand it out along the way. Friday, I filled an entire cargo pocket with over 50 pens/pencils/markers and wrapped some shoes my mom sent me in a piece of material. I thought it would be a big hit…and it was. They were so happy to see me that they mobbed me. Ripping things out of my hands, fighting each other for shoes. You had one kid with a flip flop and another with the other one…each telling me that they only got one. It came down to an Afghan security guard back handing a few of them and open hand smacking a few others for them to get off of me. I only had to back hand one of them because he ran up and grabbed me after I had had enough and decided that this was a bad idea. I gave the guard that helped me what was left in my pockets and a pair of crocs for his kid and got the hell out of there. This is not the first instance of these little bandits not appreciating our kindness and being patient. A few weeks ago, in the bazaar, a boy that works at one of the shops had just accepted my payment for several things and was thanking me for the business when I offered him some candy. My hands were full, so I handed him the bag and said take one or two. He reached in and was gone with several fists full before I knew what happened. I told him, “Nay, nay, nay” as I pulled the bag away, but he continued to grab and looked in my eyes as he made away with my candy. I told him to enjoy the candy b/c he was never going to see a single penny from me and anyone of my friends if I could help it. I don’t know if he thought I was joking b/c every time I go, he says, “My friend, my friend, come to my shop, I have no business.” I tell him that is good, I like watching thieves fail. I usually holler something over my shoulder as I walk pass about how he shouldn’t have taken the candy or that I hope he enjoyed the candy.

Today, I was confronted by a mob of dirty Afgan kids all yelling “Mista, chocolate…” As I got closer and passed through them, I could see that they each had a mouth full of chocolate. It is cute and fun to give them things sometimes, but it is setting up this country for failure just like welfare did for ours.

Cultural Note: many of you are hunters or are married to one and have seen your food go from hoof to pot…maybe by way of the freezer. All of us have bought meat from a butcher or the grocery and never paid much mind to what that animal looked like or how long ago it was killed. I am not going vegi on you, this is just a lead-in to something I saw a few weeks ago. I have been unsuccessful at capturing it on film, but some of the butchers sell meat on the side of the road from stands we would associate with a booth at a flea market or a beer stand at a fair. Now picture it 140F out and there is a huge cow’s back leg hanging from the corner off the lean-to roof. They sometimes use the cow’s hide to keep the flies off, but I rarely see this measure taken. I don’t know what happens to the rest of the cow, but I only see one back leg hanging there…(I am sure the rest is refrigerated). Well, we were on our way to drop someone off at the airfield at 330am when we passed one of the stands and saw a huge cow standing next to it...a few of us joked about how that cow was hanging out in a bad neighborhood for beef. Ten minutes later when we passed back by on our way home, the cow was dead. Three hours later, I passed again and just one leg was left hanging by a hook. BY 2pm that day, there was no more cow. It was interesting to watch this over the course of the day.

I had a great week. My mentee and his security force have showed great improvement in their ability to plan and execute exercises and drills. They are really starting to understand the importance of some of the many things that I have been trying to drill into their heads for the past 3months.

An Army colonel asked me how things were going the other day, and I told him how frustrated I get sometimes. He reminded me to exercise “Expectation Management.” I realized instantly how important those two words are. I was briefly reminded of the instance many years ago when my mom told me (one of many times): “I guess I expected more from you, I am disappointed.” I replied, “Well mom, if you don’t expect much, it makes it harder to be disappointed.” I was probably back handed shortly thereafter. I now know that to expect the world is to pave the way for disappointment, but to expect nothing is a disservice to yourself and others. It is all about managing your expectations and making expectation adjustments over time. When I got here, I wanted to help so bad and had high expectations. My expectations clouded my reality and led to me doing too much work for the Afghans, furthering their dependence on us. I quickly grew tired of doing it for them and started getting angry when they wouldn’t do it themselves. I don’t know what I expected of them after studying the history of the United States and knowing that if you do something for someone else that they should be doing themselves, the end result is they will let you and they won’t know how to do it eventually. I have now shifted, along with all of my fellow Americans here to a “I’ll watch, you do it" mentality. One guy that I work with was too busy to visit the clinic where he mentors the doctor and his staff due to our schedule. When he finally got over there, he found the clinic cleaner, more organized, and the senior medic had made a training plan and was training his junior personnel. I don’t have clear explanation for this, draw from it what you will.

God Bless, have a good weekend.

BMP

10 July - Granny B: WARNING SNAKE PHOTOS

Another beautiful truck.


"Wrench" telling these guys they are wrong



They watch and think, "Man, we gotta do this again."

2 Weeks behind, why wouldn't you wash a car on the job site

It is the small things...people are not held to a standard...

...ever.

Snake from last Friday

Happy Cobra Killer

After the rocks, before the pool stick

This is my office hallway, my feet must have been just outside the photo

Long hard week.

Saturday, the 4th, I went on 3 convoys to the airfield down the road...it is a short ride, but the whole commotion of gearing up and gearing down takes a while. The first one was at 330 a.m. to take some guys to catch a plane, went again at 9am to drop off a truck, and back at 1pm to pick up the truck and get mail. Well how nice for them, no work on that base for 4th of July, so no mail for us. We did have a BBQ dinner on the 4th on the back patio of the dining facility. They decorate the dining facility for different holidays, so it was nice. It doesn't come close to being at home or at the real "Personville" for the 4th. One guy told me a story of him calling his brother on the 4th, and the brother answers the phone by popping open a beer and describing the BBQ...the guy just hung up...saying, "I don't be needn' to hear about all that bull sh-- right now."

His facial expressions make the story...he is a cross between Dave Chapelle and Mike Rivaut (Major and Dad only will get this reference).

One of the major security projects I have been working on opened up Saturday. It is a new gate. Well that threw their whole world for spin. It was like teaching them how to do their jobs all over again. My temper grew very short and eventually pretty much was lost Wednesday morning. I was explaining to one group via my interpreter how they were not doing their jobs correctly when one of them interrupted me and started telling his side of the story...on a calm day I simply ask them to remind me of our current situation: "Were you invited to my country to help me sort this crap out, or am I here to help you?" Usually that gets them on the right track. However, Wednesday, I yelled at him in English (not sure what I was hoping to accomplish) to shut up, I told him I didn't care about his story, or why he thought doing it my way was not important. I realized I needed to walk away, and did so. Apparently, as I walked away, the Security Co. Commander, my mentee, proceeded to beat the snot out of this kid. I didn't see it, but another American and terp saw the whole thing.

My whole team is growing tired. We are in a situation in which we want to do everything we can to help the ANA and Afghanistan, but we tend to have a 1yr sprint mentality. The fact of the matter is, you can't sprint for a year and these folks are here for life, so they are in no hurry to help themselves...why would they be, the silly Americans are willing to do almost everything for us. They have great pride in themselves as individuals, but not in the sense you 'd think. For instance, if I walk up to a job site that is all jacked up and want to correct it and show them the right way to do something, they will let me do the whole thing...not the stand and watch and look concerned kind of let someone else do the work, but more the find a shady spot to squat down and just let that dude do my business type of laziness. Pray for my team, our patience and our stamina.

The contractors cut corners in the construction of buildings because for the most part they can get away with it. We have an incredible Warrant Officer (Wrench) who rides them hard. I have seen them tear up slabs he didn't like, tear down walls that were a little off, etc. He tells them "This is wrong, stop now and go back to step X." They will sometimes continue in defiance, and he just says..."Ok, I'll make you tear it out tomorrow." These idiots continue to test him, and he continues to make them go 1 step back 2 steps fwd day after day. The reason they are willing to spend the extra time and money on double work is that they average about 150% profit on each contract. So they try to cut corners to make more money, if they get caught and have to do double work, they just accept defeat and move on because they know they get away with enough.

On a different note, my leave dates are relatively set for the second half of August for 2 weeks, and I am set to be back in the states for good around the beginning of December.

Murl and I are in the process of deciding on our next duty station, so keep that in your prayers as well.

Have a great weekend. God bless.

BMP

03 July

SORRY, NO PICS. I had plenty of them, but my computer decided to delete them. It told me there was a problem with the folder and asked if I wanted it to fix it...sure, why not? My computer's idea of fixing a problem apparently is akin to that of the mafia.


Happy 4th everyone! This week has really flown by. I went on convoys several days, so that makes things go by pretty fast. Our boss returned from leave, so we had to go back to Bagram to pick him up along with some more supplies. I was back on the FOB for one day, and then back on the road. Thursday, I went up to some really small FOBs to deliver them some new vehicles. It was my first time to travel in this area of the country. We drove along a river valley just miles from the Pakistan border. The terrain is absolutely beautiful. As usual, we passed village after village with kids lining the streets waving and gesturing for water/food or just giving a thumbs up. We got a few other gestures, but those are few and far between.

I did get to witness the ANA do some very interesting things, as usual. On the way home from Kabul, an 18-wheeler in our convoy “broke down.” I use quotes, b/c his break down spot was located in a picturesque valley with a small stand that sold drinks and fruit…oh, how convenient it was prayer time, too. Heck, while we are stuck here, let’s take some pictures with our RPGs in front of the river to send back to mom and dad. All the while, the silly Americans will believe that this truck is broken, but we are fixing it and will be done any moment now.

I’ll get back to the prayer/faith subject in a minute.

The whole purpose of us going to Kabul besides picking up the boss and supplies was to pick up some up armored Hummers for the ANA. Yes, the ANA is now starting to be outfitted with the same equipment as the U.S….well kind of the same. We have M1151 and they are getting M1152 (yes, theirs are newer and more powerful). So our convoy up there was about 13 vics, a mix of U.S. and ANA. Now on the way back it is over 25 with the new ANA Hummers and the 18wheelers pulling the new U.S. trucks for the guys at the smaller FOBS. Keep in mind, the ANA is used to driving FORD Ranger pickup trucks…now we are giving them something the width of one and a half Suburbans that weighs 14000 pounds.

Before we even left to return to JBAD, an ANA Hummer ran into the Ranger parked behind my vic…chaos ensued. ANA officers appeared from everywhere yelling and screaming at the Hummer. One opened the door and proceeded to beat the driver about the head and face until his hand apparently hurt. So, you are thinking did we train these people to use this new equipment?…Yes, supposedly.

As the sun set on us in a winding valley, I see that the ANA Hummer a few vics in front of me doesn’t have its lights on. I know what is about to happen and what already has. This guy doesn’t know how to turn the lights on, and he is going to break it trying. There is a safety mechanism that prevents you from accidentally turning on the lights in case you are trying to be “dark.” So, as the sun goes down, I am hoping that I am wrong and he is going to sort it out…NOT. Now, what is happening is the 18wheeler behind the dark Hummer notices the problem and does the neighborly deed of lighting his path by driving in the left hand lane next to him on a two lane mountain side road with a sheer drop to a river going about 40mph. I am not believing this. I call up to my boss and recommend we stop to stop the madness and prevent the imminent crash. So we stop, and yes, he did break the light switch. During the stop, a medic was requested due to a cranial laceration…yes, this injury occurred while we were stopped. The best I can guess is someone got lippy and someone got an AK-47 butt stroke to the skull.

A few other “ANA NEW TOY-isms”:
1. The turret (gunner’s area on top) is usually (always /100% of the time/everyday) reserved for one man, in body armor with a heavy weapon…what did the ANA think was a good idea? Two or three guys with no body armor and no weapon (how would you fit a weapon and two friends?). They thought they were in a victory parade or something…hair and beard blowing in the wind taking close up pics of each other.

2. The turret (see above description) is a “keep hands and arms and most other body parts inside type of space”…not anymore. Some American gunners will rest an arm or hand on the top of the turret…ANA rests arms inside the turret. I saw one guy sitting outside the turret on the passenger side of the roof with his feet dangling in front of the passenger windshield on the hood…THE ENTIRE TRIP HOME.

The ANA guys we rolled with Thursday were more professional. Didn’t see any crazy things today except the areas we drove through had a lot more naked Afghan toddlers running around…just an observation.

As far as religion/faith go, Afghanistan is 99.9% Muslim/Islamic. A person is a Muslim. The religion is Islam. Rules, teachings…etc are Islamic. The official name of the country is the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (IRoA). From what I can tell, you are either a good Muslim or a bad Muslim. I am not 100% sure of the wickets one must meet to be on either side of the argument. A good Muslim prays 5 times/day (usually in a mosque) and believes that if anything happens, it is the will of God. A bad Muslim may or may not pray 5 times, uses the will of God as an excuse for laziness, and will talk of drinking and his girlfriend in Kabul. As far as the whole will of God concept, or “Enshalla,” it is quite frustrating. We try to get them to clean their facilities to prevent illness, we get, “Dirt/filth doesn’t cause illness, God does.” I try to get certain security measures implemented, and get told, “If it is God’s will, we will be attacked.” I cannot tell them that God doesn’t help those who don’t help themselves, b/c then I will be punished under the Uniform Code of Military Justice for proselytizing (preaching to people).

Afghans believe that the prayer in the mosque counts for more points: I was walking with my terp a while back, and call to prayer came over the loudspeaker at the mosque. I asked if he was going to go, and he said that he was with me, so he would go later. I said thanks and asked if he prayed in his room or just anywhere, or did he only pray in the mosque. He explained that he could pray anywhere, but prayer with the congregation was better. His exact words were, “So, today…I lose.”

Prayer call is 5 times per day. The first starts at about 3:30 am and they have a few more throughout the day and then another around sunset. The first time I heard it, I was sleeping in a tent my first night in country and nearly jumped out of my skin thinking it was the “Allah Akbar” (God is great…now I am going to kill you) vice the “Allah Akbar” (God is great…wake up and come to Mosque). The call to prayer is sang/chanted over loudspeakers situated on top of the mosques. There are mosques everywhere, so when call goes down, you may hear 3 or 4 separate sets of speakers “Alllllllllllllllllaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah Akkkkkkkkkkkbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrr….” I just grin and say yep, sure is. Many of them carry beads around very similar to a rosary (without that whole cross thing) and say prayers for the different beads. I asked once what they say or how the beads work and was told, "you just say 'Allah Akbar...Allah Akbar'" Not very creative in their prayers.

One thing I have come to terms with is SAFETY doesn’t exist in this culture…back to the Enshalla attitude. They don’t tell one another to “Be safe” before a mission, it is God be with you. Americans should probably be telling each other “God be with you” a little more often, but we need to be safe too my people.

I hope this cultural lesson answered some of the questions I have been getting about their religious habits.

Until next week, GOD BE WITH YOU and be careful. Have a safe 4th.

BMP

NOTE:
(It is Thurs night. I write this every Thurs night and then load it on Fri morning. I was sitting here proof reading when I hear, “Hey, DOG (Dog is a 300# redneck from Arkansas that works for KBR on the FOB) what kind of snake is this?” I had to hear it twice before it clicked…must be an inside snake…not good. I ran out of my office to a COBRA between me and the door. I grabbed a pool stick from the rec room and broke it on my first swing. His head is up now hissing and I got people throwing rocks from the other direction at the snake and me and yelling at me to keep him inside. What kind of sense does that make…keep the damn snake inside? I chased the snake outside to the stone throwers. There were no less than 10 people in a semicircle tossing baseball size rocks at this snake. They got one good hit and I finished him with the pool stick piece in my hand….not cool man, not cool.)