thedrifter
04-23-04, 05:32 AM
Fallujah's farms offer respite from city fighting
By: DARRIN MORTENSON - Staff Writer
FALLUJAH, Iraq ---- Just a mile from where Marines and rebels are busy killing each other in this embattled city, other American troops are getting on fine with locals, making medical house calls and sharing home-cooked meals.
Marines from Camp Pendleton's Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment are spread out around the northwest corner of Fallujah where the city's cramped urban quarters quickly melt into the marshy farmland along the banks of the Euphrates River.
While two-thirds of the company's men have been engaged in heavy fighting along the urban fringe, the other third has been stationed among the friendly farm folk who don't seem to want much to do with the anti-American cause.
"It's like another world," 1st Lt. Ross Schellhaas, Fox Company's executive officer, said Thursday after returning from a patrol to a roadblock near some fields. "We're doing more of the SASO (security and stabilization operations) stuff. It's more hearts and minds over here."
Before the Marines arrived in this rebel-infested Sunni heartland west of Baghdad in March, they had trained for several months on how to win over Iraqis to the coalition cause by politely inspecting vehicles, smiling and waving, and handing out candy to the kids ---- all the while going after the few "bad guys" they said were spoiling it for everyone else.
But within days of arriving in the region, the Marines were embroiled in a costly guerrilla war. And within weeks, they had besieged Fallujah.
Since surrounding the city on April 5, the Marines have waged a bloody fight to maintain their stranglehold on the city and isolate the insurgents inside.
For a while, it was all-out war, and every resident was a potential guerrilla.
But when most of the fighting stopped during a cease-fire ---- which has been honored enough to keep U.S. and Iraqi officials talking about a possible political solution to the standoff ---- the Marines found friends among Fallujah's farmers and other rural residents.
Among a population they say needs to be watched, but not always feared, the Marines' humanitarian training has come in handy.
"We feel pretty comfortable here," said Sgt. Cody Boswell, 25, of Salem, Ore., who led a patrol checking cars with passengers who wanted to carry food and supplies through the military cordon into the Marine-held security zone between the Euphrates, the main rail line and the city.
"Neighbors bring us food," Boswell said, waving a family across. "We help them get their animals across, carry food and fuel and stuff ---- basically help with anything we can do within our power. It's more hearts and minds here, but still you have to be on guard; you never know."
In the nearly three weeks the platoon has controlled the zone, the troops have found only one suspected insurgent: a man with a sniper rifle tucked under his car seat.
"They seem like they're another village ---- not Fallujah," Boswell said of the locals. "One man even said, 'If my son was Mujahadeen, I would turn him in myself.' I said, 'Wow! Well. O.K. then!'"
Schellhaas said the Marines have paid local farmers hundreds of dollars for damage done to their fields. And some have given residents cash for cab rides from the roadblock so that they could travel around the city to a point in the south where some residents are allowed in to check on their homes or bring food and supplies to their families still inside.
He said many who arrive at the checkpoint say they want to return to their homes to live in the city, despite the fighting.
"I feel guilty because we've had such an impact on their lives," he said. "They say they had more freedom under Saddam Hussein. I just try to tell them that when we get this whole thing straightened out, they can get back to their normal lives. But this just isn't a place you want to take your family ---- at least not yet."
After searching a dilapidated Land Cruiser taxi for guns and explosives, Lance Cpl. Carlos Martinez told a man that he and his boys could get back in the vehicle and continue down a dusty farm road along the tracks. They obeyed; the man acted a bit uptight but the boys were smiling and chatting in hushed tones as they pointed to the Marines' weapons.
Martinez said he sympathized with the people for the inconvenience the Marines' cordon has caused. Some have fields and property on both sides of the Marines' lines, and have to be searched every time they come and go.
For the most part, he said, they are understanding. A few, however, do get testy.
"Of course!" Martinez said. "I would be, too. But most of them around here are pretty nice."
With the help of "Sammy," the Marines' East African interpreter, the troops chatted and joked with locals at the roadblock Thursday.
They asked men what their families needed, explained and re-explained the reason for the cordon around Fallujah, and promised better days to come.
The troops seemed to know many of the locals personally and asked questions about family members that only a friend would know to ask.
Lance Cpl. Joseph McCarthy, 21, of Fallbrook, squatted to give candy to a cute little girl and two skinny boys. He smiled and laughed when one of the boys tried to bargain for more.
He said that having such close interaction and being able to help Iraqis was more of what he expected to be doing when he deployed to Iraq.
Like most of the men in 2/1 ---- as the battalion is known ---- McCarthy spent several months in Nasiriyah, Iraq, last year during the official war. While they were fired on occasionally by snipers, they mostly walked freely among the people and said they felt a bond of friendship by the time they left.
Out at this particularly friendly edge of Fallujah Thursday, McCarthy and his cohorts seemed like they were doing their best to build a similar legacy here, despite the violence that rages nearby.
While the other troops piled onto Humvees to move on to the next stop Thursday, and while Sammy the translator paid one of the neighbors for some bread and eggs for the troops' dinner, McCarthy helped an Iraqi boy cross the checkpoint.
With a propane tank over his shoulder and the little boy tugging at his arm, McCarthy swaggered towards the tracks.
"Hearts and minds, gents," he said out of one side of his mouth. "Hearts and minds."
http://www.nctimes.com/content/articles/2004/04/23/military/iraq/15_25_414_22_04.jpg
Marine Lance Cpl. Joseph McCarthy, 21, from Fallbrook, hands candy out to Iraqi children who approached him at a military checkpoint west of Fallujah, Iraq on Thursday.
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/04/23/military/iraq/15_25_414_22_04.txt
Ellie
By: DARRIN MORTENSON - Staff Writer
FALLUJAH, Iraq ---- Just a mile from where Marines and rebels are busy killing each other in this embattled city, other American troops are getting on fine with locals, making medical house calls and sharing home-cooked meals.
Marines from Camp Pendleton's Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment are spread out around the northwest corner of Fallujah where the city's cramped urban quarters quickly melt into the marshy farmland along the banks of the Euphrates River.
While two-thirds of the company's men have been engaged in heavy fighting along the urban fringe, the other third has been stationed among the friendly farm folk who don't seem to want much to do with the anti-American cause.
"It's like another world," 1st Lt. Ross Schellhaas, Fox Company's executive officer, said Thursday after returning from a patrol to a roadblock near some fields. "We're doing more of the SASO (security and stabilization operations) stuff. It's more hearts and minds over here."
Before the Marines arrived in this rebel-infested Sunni heartland west of Baghdad in March, they had trained for several months on how to win over Iraqis to the coalition cause by politely inspecting vehicles, smiling and waving, and handing out candy to the kids ---- all the while going after the few "bad guys" they said were spoiling it for everyone else.
But within days of arriving in the region, the Marines were embroiled in a costly guerrilla war. And within weeks, they had besieged Fallujah.
Since surrounding the city on April 5, the Marines have waged a bloody fight to maintain their stranglehold on the city and isolate the insurgents inside.
For a while, it was all-out war, and every resident was a potential guerrilla.
But when most of the fighting stopped during a cease-fire ---- which has been honored enough to keep U.S. and Iraqi officials talking about a possible political solution to the standoff ---- the Marines found friends among Fallujah's farmers and other rural residents.
Among a population they say needs to be watched, but not always feared, the Marines' humanitarian training has come in handy.
"We feel pretty comfortable here," said Sgt. Cody Boswell, 25, of Salem, Ore., who led a patrol checking cars with passengers who wanted to carry food and supplies through the military cordon into the Marine-held security zone between the Euphrates, the main rail line and the city.
"Neighbors bring us food," Boswell said, waving a family across. "We help them get their animals across, carry food and fuel and stuff ---- basically help with anything we can do within our power. It's more hearts and minds here, but still you have to be on guard; you never know."
In the nearly three weeks the platoon has controlled the zone, the troops have found only one suspected insurgent: a man with a sniper rifle tucked under his car seat.
"They seem like they're another village ---- not Fallujah," Boswell said of the locals. "One man even said, 'If my son was Mujahadeen, I would turn him in myself.' I said, 'Wow! Well. O.K. then!'"
Schellhaas said the Marines have paid local farmers hundreds of dollars for damage done to their fields. And some have given residents cash for cab rides from the roadblock so that they could travel around the city to a point in the south where some residents are allowed in to check on their homes or bring food and supplies to their families still inside.
He said many who arrive at the checkpoint say they want to return to their homes to live in the city, despite the fighting.
"I feel guilty because we've had such an impact on their lives," he said. "They say they had more freedom under Saddam Hussein. I just try to tell them that when we get this whole thing straightened out, they can get back to their normal lives. But this just isn't a place you want to take your family ---- at least not yet."
After searching a dilapidated Land Cruiser taxi for guns and explosives, Lance Cpl. Carlos Martinez told a man that he and his boys could get back in the vehicle and continue down a dusty farm road along the tracks. They obeyed; the man acted a bit uptight but the boys were smiling and chatting in hushed tones as they pointed to the Marines' weapons.
Martinez said he sympathized with the people for the inconvenience the Marines' cordon has caused. Some have fields and property on both sides of the Marines' lines, and have to be searched every time they come and go.
For the most part, he said, they are understanding. A few, however, do get testy.
"Of course!" Martinez said. "I would be, too. But most of them around here are pretty nice."
With the help of "Sammy," the Marines' East African interpreter, the troops chatted and joked with locals at the roadblock Thursday.
They asked men what their families needed, explained and re-explained the reason for the cordon around Fallujah, and promised better days to come.
The troops seemed to know many of the locals personally and asked questions about family members that only a friend would know to ask.
Lance Cpl. Joseph McCarthy, 21, of Fallbrook, squatted to give candy to a cute little girl and two skinny boys. He smiled and laughed when one of the boys tried to bargain for more.
He said that having such close interaction and being able to help Iraqis was more of what he expected to be doing when he deployed to Iraq.
Like most of the men in 2/1 ---- as the battalion is known ---- McCarthy spent several months in Nasiriyah, Iraq, last year during the official war. While they were fired on occasionally by snipers, they mostly walked freely among the people and said they felt a bond of friendship by the time they left.
Out at this particularly friendly edge of Fallujah Thursday, McCarthy and his cohorts seemed like they were doing their best to build a similar legacy here, despite the violence that rages nearby.
While the other troops piled onto Humvees to move on to the next stop Thursday, and while Sammy the translator paid one of the neighbors for some bread and eggs for the troops' dinner, McCarthy helped an Iraqi boy cross the checkpoint.
With a propane tank over his shoulder and the little boy tugging at his arm, McCarthy swaggered towards the tracks.
"Hearts and minds, gents," he said out of one side of his mouth. "Hearts and minds."
http://www.nctimes.com/content/articles/2004/04/23/military/iraq/15_25_414_22_04.jpg
Marine Lance Cpl. Joseph McCarthy, 21, from Fallbrook, hands candy out to Iraqi children who approached him at a military checkpoint west of Fallujah, Iraq on Thursday.
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2004/04/23/military/iraq/15_25_414_22_04.txt
Ellie