Week
Thirty-Three
Seeing my wife and
daughter blowing me kisses made me depressed and I had to turn away. I was returning from a brief two week
vacation with them. The line to board
the airplane back to
My second
separation from my family will be shorter, only four to five months. I’ve endured eight so far.
As I stood in
line, an unsurprising, yet new perspective on the Iraqi people came to
mind. I hadn’t really given it much
thought before, the Iraqis have always touted
themselves as very “family oriented”.
Musing however, over my separation from my own family; my wife in
particular, reflected to me a significant difference in the two cultures.
It occurred to me,
that although every one of the two or three dozen Iraqi men I now know and
associate with, are always showing off or talking about their families, it’s just
the kids that they are speaking of.
The wives are
never mentioned.
It’s almost as if
they regard their wives as appliances, eagerly sought after, prized for a short
time after purchase, and then resigned to the kitchen where they can
religiously and inconspicuously perform their duties. Never to be mentioned again.
American culture
may have at one point been similar, but since my parents
generation, woman were becoming more dominant forces in the household if not
true companions.
I was about to
miss my own true companion. My wife is
the person that I do things with. Even
if I don’t mention her, or if during my recounting of a story from the past six
years she wasn’t the focus, she was still present.
The woman of this country seem to have no presence. They are portrayed as inconsequential by the
men. A few have obtained leadership
positions and voice their opinions to any within range, but are still dismissed
quickly by most men.
It’s sad
really. Nuff
said.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
While I was away,
my battalion suffered its own sadness and sense of loss. Three men are now dead and one more may die
shortly. Another four are seriously
damaged and will never be the same.
Three events over
24 hours made the changes.
Depending upon who
you ask, the force of the explosion varied from 600lbs to 1000lbs, but the
results were indisputable. The tank
carrying First Sergeant Gifford and his crew was hit so hard by the IED, that
the 30 ton turret broke free of the eighty bolts that hold in to the base, and
launched into the air.
The funeral
service was being held when I arrived.
I knew the First
Sergeant (Gifford); the other two I didn’t know as well.
Most of our battalion
knew all three.
Now everyone seems
to be moping around. It’s a tough loss,
but we’ll get through it.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Without
exaggeration, I tell you, that every night I sit on the balcony of my tower and
smoke a cigar. Every night I hear gun
fire around the corner of my tower to my right.
It comes from an Iraqi police compound that routinely shoots at cars
that pass too close. Sometimes they
wound and/or kill the occupants. It
continues throughout the night and makes me wonder if they place any value at
all on human life.
Since I have
returned from break, gunfire has begun in another direction. I am now hearing small-arms fire directly in
front of me, outside the wall on the opposite side of our compound.
This gunfire is
different however. It is multiple shots
from more than one weapon. It’s more
like a barrage than a single engagement.
And some nights there is return gunfire as if two groups are attacking
each other. It sounds like a real war
among soldiers, not just police and civilians.
I am not
privileged to any specific information.
The area is patrolled by a different unit and they don’t share the
details with us. It still worries me
however, because it is new and unexplained.
The overall
violence seems to have also picked up. More car bombs, more suicide bombers, and more terrorists groups
taking credit. I don’t know what
CNN is saying, but anyway you look at it, it’s bad.
The other day, two
groups of Iraqi soldiers turned on one-another.
It was something akin to a Mexican stand-off.
Are these people
going to start warring among themselves?
Let’s hope not. It’s bad enough
having the individual suicide bombers blowing themselves up in the name of some
religious undertaking. If a civil war
breaks out because of political differences, everything we have worked for will
be destroyed.
I’ll try to keep
you posted.