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thedrifter
12-31-07, 07:48 AM
Stories from Iraq: Wick reporter, photographer are embedded in Iraq with Fort soldiers

By Bill Hess/Wick Communications
Published: Wednesday, December 26, 2007 11:06 AM CST
SIERRA VISTA - I've packed again.

But it's not for a vacation or even a trip with the Buena High School band to China, New York City or Washington, D.C.

It's time to go back into the sand box and provide stories to Wick Communications' newspaper readers of what soldiers from Fort Huachuca are doing in Iraq.

When you read this, photographer Suzanne Cronn and I will be in Kuwait preparing to go to Iraq. Slightly more than two years ago I was in Iraq, at a time before its first national elections, a time of hope for Iraqis, Americans and other coalition forces.

Sitting on a patio in one of the more gaudy palace complexes of Saddam Hussein, I talked with four Iraqi Christians, all of whom fled their homeland but returned to translate some Iraqi government documents for the United States.

All expressed hope the upcoming elections would be a starting path for Iraqi democracy.

By that time, the Iraqi dictator had been captured and was facing trial. None of the quartet were in the mood to grant him Christian forgiveness.

To them, he should have been immediately shot and they saw the pending trial as nothing more than an opportunity for him to verbally slap the faces of Iraqis, Americans and anyone against him.

Well, the Iraqi dictator is dead, his neck broken when the noose tightened as he dropped through a trap door in an execution room he used for many of his opponents. Unfortunately, the Iraqi government hasn't made it out of its own self-created mire of political mud.

A two-month vacation by Iraqi lawmakers this year didn't help as Americans, coalition forces and Iraqi soldiers and police - those who want a good government - bled and died on the streets of Baghdad and other villages, towns and cities in Iraq.

Ever since the United States crossed the berm from Kuwait into Iraq, soldiers from Fort Huachuca, the Signal Corps, Military Intelligence Corps, military police, medics and others have deployed to support the war on terrorism. There is one thing about American GIs: They are blunt and honest when it comes to expressing their opinions.

During my month in Iraq, with some time in Kuwait where 11th Signal Brigade soldiers trained, there was no doubt in their minds that America was going to be in Iraq for many years.

Sitting on a covered porch at Camp Anaconda, a former Iraqi Air Force base outside Balad, an NCO said he foresaw an American presence for at least 20, if not more, years. A specialist noted there is one thing about the United States, and that is it knows how to get into a country, it just doesn't know how to get out.

I reported on those sentiments, as well as another 11th soldier saying he would rather deploy again and again until Iraq was able to stand on its own than have his young son have to grow up and deploy to Iraq because his dad didn't get the job done.

That brought a retort from the specialist who told the sergeant American forces are still in South Korea and Germany.

While the young Signal Corps soldier said he understood why the United States is still in South Korea - mainly because of North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il - he could not understand why we remain in Germany now that that nation is one and communism has fallen, at least temporarily, in Europe.

I am hoping to find out what our area solders believe and what is happening in Iraq - what their eyes are seeing, what their ears are hearing and what their mouths are saying.

That will include telling about how they work and the importance of what they bring to U.S. and coalition forces.

Unlike me, whose trip in the hot summer of 2005 was only a month, and this one, also a month, will be in cooler weather, soldiers and members of the other armed services assigned to the post have been deployed numerous times, some as many as four times. And now, most deployments are for 15 months.

I'm lucky to have a photographer on this trip, the first time of my many deployments with the 11th Signal Brigade - Somalia in 1992, Afghanistan and Uzbekistan in 2002 and my previous trip to Kuwait and Iraq in 2005.

This is the first time Suzanne has been embedded with a deploying military unit.

We have worked on a number of assignments together.

Suzanne and I reported on the major accident in which a truckload of illegal immigrants crashed near the fort's East Gate, killing some of the illegals, as well as an elderly Huachuca City couple.

We have worked together on a number of stories concerning the current deployment of 40th Expeditionary Signal Battalion solders from the fort.

She wants to do a special project on military women serving in Iraq.

I want to do one on husbands and wives who are serving together.

We want to tell the readers of this newspaper about how our - and I use the word our purposefully because they are part of the Sierra Vista community - troops are doing, to include how they handle the holiday season, Christmas and New Year's.

Suzanne and I are hoping we can put a face before Wick readers of those who serve the country by leaving their loved ones, while those at home sit before a family Christmas tree on Dec. 25 or in front of the TV on Jan. 1 watching the many bowl games.

When I go out to departure ceremonies, it's easy to see unhappiness on the faces of the deploying soldiers, an expression their family members emulate.

When they come home, as some fort Signal Corps soldiers did recently, they are tired from the long flight but happy - and so are their families.

Everyone knows they have a job to do, and they are keeping faith with their families, buddies and America by upholding their oaths as soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines.

It is that dedication Suzanne and I hope to provide you the readers through words and photos.

Ellie