Week Eight

My perspective of the Iraqi people, although still positive, has been waffling over the past few weeks. I have seen a number of things that distress me.

You know…we like to think that societies, no matter what their origin, have the same basic motivations and desires. If a particular group of people are lacking in technology or governmental structure, we attribute this to oppression, lack of resources, or lack of opportunity. It’s assumed, that given equal chances, all societies would end up roughly the same.

I am noticing significant character differences in the Iraqi people, that I cannot explain (or excuse) just because they were ruled by an evil dictator for the past few decades. There seems to be a few rudimentary differences in the way these people envision (and interact) with the world around them.

It’s my hope that enough years of freedom and education will weed out some or all of these detrimental traits that are currently present in this society.

The most significant and distressing of which, is their complete disregard for trash and filth. Some of the more educated and affluent seem to have acceptable levels of hygiene, but many have no qualms with living in sewage.

They throw their trash on the street. They urinate and defecate close to (or in) their own living spaces. They pile up debris and let the flies swarm around, without giving a single thought to burning it.

My own dog wouldn’t crap in the same area that she sleeps, but these people will.

My specific case-in-point is a trip I made to the 303^rd Iraqi Army headquarters. This is one of the first battalions for the new Iraqi Army. They are being created entirely by the Iraqi government. They will have some training assistance from US forces, but for the most part are on their own.

These men (approx. 400) have been housed (by their own, new government) in an old aircraft hanger. The hanger sits on an abandoned airfield. When they moved into the area there were no facilities for waste disposal (human or otherwise) available. They had plenty of tarmac to separate where they live from where they shit, but somehow this idea didn’t come across to them.

At first, they tried to use the clogged toilets in the hanger. 400 men to 3 crappers…a good ratio. That lasted 24 hours.

Then they walked outside and around to the back of the hanger to take a dump. That lasted until the first rainfall (about 3 days more). Then they just started crapping inside, against the wall. Eventually the rain came down the inside wall and washed their own feces in to the main hanger area. Now they are just walking around in it. They added to the filth by throwing their uneaten food-stuffs onto the floor as well. Their empty soda-cans, each with a drop or two of sugary fluid remaining, completed the invitation for a fly festival.

Have you ever seen a swarm of flies so thick that you couldn’t see through it? I wouldn’t be surprised if there were more than a million flies swarming around INSIDE this hanger. Outside is safe. When you look into the hanger you see the fly covered faces of hundreds of men looking back at you. They are at the point now that the flies land on their face two or three at a time and they don’t even bother to shoo them away.

What kind of person would tolerate this?

They do complain. They talk like they see a problem with these conditions (that they made), but their solution is to ask us to fix it. They are taking no ownership or responsibility for the situation that they created. Every time we go by, they ask us, “When are you going to come clean our hanger and build us bathrooms?”

Look guys…We’re NOT.

At some point, human waste disposal becomes a primal instinct. My dog at least attempts to kick some dirt over her own doo-doo.

Bury it, Burn it, Send it to Iran, I don’t care which, just do something with the damn stuff and show me that you have some dignity. You’ve got 400 men for crying out loud…You’d think they’ve never heard of the term: “Shovel”

This “What have you done for me lately” attitude has got to stop.

Some people say, “We’ll we got them into this mess, now we have to help them.”

According to my new Iraqi friends, this same type of behavior went on under Saddam as well. He apparently had to yell at his own people to keep their (and his) living areas clean. Now that Saddam left, things have gotten worse, despite the fact that they now have the freedom to make it better.

Even the local laborers who come onto our FOB each day, are a hygienic nightmare. We give them trash cans, latrines, and hand washing stations and they still get caught defecating up against our barracks and littering. I have yet to see more than one or two actually wash his hands before entering our dining hall.

Now, I know that European and Early American history has its share of filth and resulting plague, but education overcame that. This isn’t Iran. Many of these people are educated, yet still draw lines in the sand far short of where I would place “civilized culture”.

I’ll remain hopeful however. We were all there at one point.

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Other aspects of my distress stem from, their (the Iraqis) lack of faith in their own health care system. These people have doctors. Some of them are quite good. They have medical schools, residencies, and access to modern equipment and medications. But many locals still refuse to use them. Worse, their own medical system repeatedly dumps, traffics, or re-directs existing patients to our hospitals under false pretenses, simply because they don’t want to deal with them.

An instance was with a young Iraqi soldier who had been shot, off-duty, in his own neighborhood. Many soldiers and policemen fear for their lives because they joined law-enforcement. Sometimes they wear black ski masks while at work, just so they are not recognized by members of their community.

One such soldier was recognized by a extremist who lived in his village. This extremist was very upset that the soldier had joined the Iraqi Army, and shot him in the gut a couple of times. The soldier did not die. Actually his wounds were rather superficial and he had an excellent prognosis. He was initially treated in a local hospital and was doing well. When the hospital got word however, that there might be another attack on his life, they immediately made up a story about how severe his condition was and that he needed immediate transfer to a US hospital in the Green Zone.

Like an idiot, I fell for the story and actually assisted in orchestrating the transfer. I even provided this help, without evaluating the patient myself. I just assumed that the doctor who was reporting to me, was sincere and professional.

Hogwash…

I ended up inconveniencing many of my own US colleagues over this soldier and I fear I burned a few bridges in doing so. The man was stable and there was no reason that the local hospital couldn’t have continued to manage him. They just didn’t want to be burdened with security for this guy, and thought that they’d just pawn him off on us.

That would never have happened in the US. First, it’s illegal. Second, if a patient’s life is in jeopardy from attack, the hospital would simply make arrangements with local authorities for a guard.

Shoot, my wife has a fantastic story about a prisoner she cared for, that had four US Marshals surrounding him at all times!

And I got caught up in this nonsense…

As my friend Lizzie (from Austria) used to say, “Pisses me so off”.

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While I’m venting…enter our humanitarian missions.

Now, I really like these, and I hope that they continue. No matter how great a government or society one lives in, there will always be poor who, for whatever reason, are limited in healthcare access. I like helping these people. But now I am worried, some of these people are beginning to think that the US is their access to health care. They seem to have forgotten that they have their own doctors.

There was a 4 month old that my PA encountered while he was on one such mission. This child had untreated hydrocephalus (water on the brain). Left untreated, it will eventually cause irreversible brain damage and possibly death. In the US, the treatment has become simple. It is almost a bread-n-butter procedure for most neurosurgeons. It’s called a shunt.

Since the invasion, the US has had a “Golden Child” program. This program allowed for special pediatric cases to be sent to the states for procedures and treatments that they could not get locally. It was nice, because it drew good press and made everyone happy.

Well, it drew good press until one of the little tykes died. Then it became a blemish on the face of US good-will. Now the program has been dismantled until further notice.

It seems that a child with visceral-leishminiasis died, while awaiting the proper paperwork to fly to the US. Paperwork!! A child died because of red-tape. Finger-pointing went everywhere! And one of these stone-casters talked to the press. Now no one wants to deal with “Golden Children” or any other golden anything.

I don’t blame them.

I would love to see something done for this child, but I fear we will not be able to accomplish it. We are trying however. The company commander of HHC has his heart in the right place and he is making valiant efforts to stay on top of the situation and see that this girl gets medical treatment. We’ll see how it goes.

Why this whole thing has bearing on the Iraqi people, is what bothers me.

They have NEUROSURGEONS!

Why doesn’t the damn Ministry of Health have a friggen Golden Child program? Please tell me that they are working on it.

According to my good Iraqi friend Adel, even Saddam, had a Golden Child program. Insincere as it may have been, if Saddam had found out about such children, he would immediately order his doctors to take care of them. Yes, admittedly, the press would then be forced to show the public how benevolent he was and broadcast the case everywhere, but at least there was a program. Now what happened to it?

Let’s hope that gets there too.

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While we’re hoping…How about the firemen.

In America, firemen have got to be the quintessential poster children for “ship-shape”. I mean everything is clean and polished and tidy and orderly and ready-to-serve.

America has always been proud of their fire-fighters, and after 911, firemen as a whole, are probably one of the most respected professions out their.

One would be appalled if they saw a fire truck in disarray.

Not in Iraq.

We (meaning the 4-64) gave this local fire-department money for trucks and equipment. They have brand-new engines and a budget to maintain them. Today, we went to the station to deliver a $50,000 generator (that I could have bought at HomeDepot for $1000). While we were there, I looked at some of their equipment and was embarrassed, even insulted. How dare they be so sloppy with this stuff. Parts of their new engines were already broken. Handles had been broken off pipe valves. The hoses were heaped on top of each other. Nozzles were torn off or missing altogether. Embarrassing…

Even if they didn’t have the resources to order brand new handles, how hard would it have been to weld one of them back together and make it last a little longer? In the US, just about any redneck would have found a way to jury-rig something to make the system work. These people do have duct-tape…We bought them some of that too.

I want to see these people take a little ownership. Take a little responsibility for the freedom that we just handed them.

Maybe that’s the difference…Maybe that’s truly it. America is made up of a people who fight for freedom. A hard won freedom is worth continuing to work for. These people just got it as a Christmas gift, and I’m not certain they know what to do with it yet.

Yes, many Middle Eastern people come to America each day, along with Indians, Orientals, Europeans, Africans, South Americans, and other. They endure great hardships and leave many relatives behind. But they get here and they don’t take their new found freedom for granted. Most immigrants it seems, accomplish great things, or at least try.

I hate to say it, but perhaps America shouldn’t just hand people their freedom…or at least know when to stop giving handouts after we’ve gotten it for them.

The individual Iraqis that I have met here are becoming close friends on mine. Just seeing them each day and interacting with them, reminds me of the good things that have come from all of this, and part of me is happy that I am here. (Other than missing my wife and daughter severely)

But man…Some of this is really frustrating…

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