Sitrep From Afghan

[Gunner 0313]

By Marine Corps Lance Cpl. James W. Clark
Special to American Forces Press Service

HELMAND PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Jan. 19, 2010 - Two men donned flak jackets and Kevlar helmets here Jan. 15 -- one set coyote brown, the other forest green, each with an emblem of their nation.

Stepping out of their tent and walking with their squad leaders in step, Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Galen P. Hafner, a platoon sergeant with Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, and Staff Sgt.. Gulwazir Harin, an Afghan National Army platoon sergeant attached to Alpha Company, prepared to set out on a patrol.

Throughout the battalion and within each infantry company, Marines and Afghan soldiers train, live and are preparing to fight alongside one another.

Until two weeks ago, none of these men had ever met. As U.S. Marines and sailors stand on Afghan soil half-a-world from home, Afghan soldiers stand a few steps away in equally unfamiliar territory -- many of them hail from northern Afghanistan.

Afghan interpreters work to translate Dari, Pashtu and English, bringing new meaning to Afghanistan's moniker as the melting pot of the Middle East, a title derived from its ethnic diversity.

The two platoon sergeants for 3rd Platoon traveled dramatically different paths to reach the road they patrol today. Hafner grew up in Bushnell, Ill. Searching for direction after high school, he found it in the Marine Corps, enlisting 11 years ago, when he was 19.

"I screwed off a bit in high school and didn't have a lot going for me," Hafner admitted. He comes from a family of servicemembers. His father was a sailor, and his grandfather and uncle were both Marines.

"I knew I was going to enlist," he said. "I just had to decide what service." Hafner said he spoke with recruiters from different services before deciding that the Marine Corps would take him where he wanted to go.

"My mom, right off the bat, was very proud," he said, "[and] maybe a little frightened that I wanted to go into the infantry, but very proud of my service. My dad was nervous, mainly because he knew how crazy Marines could be, and would throw away the recruitment flyers and brochures that were sent to the house."

On the other side of the world, Gulwazir found himself drawn into service as well, albeit for different reasons.

Growing up as a refugee in Pakistan, Gulwazir described his time there as one of tribulation and adversity before he made his way to Afghanistan to fill the rising need for soldiers, saying that he "had to come."

"A lot of people decided to join, many of them refugees, or poor farmers," said Gulwazir, who enlisted six years ago, when he was 16. "I want to do well for my country and for my [army]."

As he works with his soldiers, instructing them in a clipped tone and the creases across his brow tightened, Gulwazir seems less like a young 20 year old and much more like the seasoned veteran he is. He described the death of his platoon commander, who had served as a role model when he first enlisted, as one of the greatest tragedies of his life, even greater than the time he spent as a refugee in Pakistan.

However, for all the hardship he'd faced, Gulwazir breaks a smile as he talks about home, his wife and the infant son he has yet to meet.

"I love her very much," said Gulwazir, who has been with his wife for just over a year after their arranged marriage. "I knew her before, and liked her, but [i] am falling in love and missing her now."

Also separated from his family and children, Hafner met his wife while stationed in Naples, Italy, with Marine security forces. He has been married for six year.

Hafner, who has a 5-year-old son and a 19-month-old daughter, reflected on the challenges military life can have on a family.

"Through training and work-ups and deployment, you miss a lot of family stuff," he said. "On the last deployment, the poor conditions and minimal communication made it difficult. We've been fortunate enough to work through it." Hafner's daughter was born while he was deployed last year in Garmsir, Afghanistan. "Hopefully, I can be home for her next birthday," he said.

Although they come from different backgrounds and can't hold a conversation without a third party to interpret, the men share poignant similarities. Each is far from home. Each has a family waiting anxiously for their return. Each has come willingly and with a sense of purpose.

"I'm interested in seeing how [the integration] goes," said Hafner, who alongside Gulwazir, will lead the Marines and Afghan soldiers in the months to come. "We're part of their group, and they are part of ours."

(Marine Corps Lance Cpl. James W. Clark serves with the 1st Marine Division's Regimental Combat Team 7.)

[Gunner 0313]

Marines Draw Out Taliban in Helmand Province

By Marine Corps Lance Cpl. James W. Clark
Special to American Forces Press Service

HELMAND PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Jan. 22, 2010 – Stepping gingerly over rocks and uneven ground, Marines from Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 6th Marine Regiment, and the Afghan National Army soldiers attached to them, patrolled to the north of Observation Post Huskars here Jan. 18.

The patrol stalked through a small, barren crop, just large enough to sustain the inhabitants of a nearby compound, which now lay abandoned. As the column made its way past homes and farms, there was a rising sense that something was amiss; there wasn't a villager in sight.

Passing through a small archway in a mud wall and out across an open plateau, the Marines' suspicions were realized as several flat and hollow cracks rang out. Dust kicked up around ankles, and clumps of dirt flew from the walls as bullets struck all around the patrol. Sprinting to get behind cover to return fire, the Marines had achieved their objective. They had located the Taliban.

For the next five hours, Marines and Afghan soldiers traded fire with insurgents. The sun had set by the time the patrol withdrew, and they had uncovered a cache of about 1,300 pounds of ammonium nitrate, which is a prime ingredient in homemade explosives and against Afghan law to own. One suspect was detained, several insurgents were wounded or killed, and there were no Afghan army or Marine casualties.

"The original goal of the patrol was to do [census operations] and see who was living in the buildings," explained Marine Corps 1st Lt. Shaun Miller, the company’s executive officer. "We wanted to get the lay of the land and interact with local leaders and elders."

Although the initial plan was to interact with villagers in the north, each time the Marines pushed beyond the walls of Observation Post Huskars, they took fire from insurgents.

"Every time we've gone out on patrol we've gotten into firefights," said Miller, who paused for a moment to speak over a radio to a Marine on patrol who had reported seeing a rocket-propelled grenade gunner. "We've been here for five days and have launched over 20 patrols, and as soon as we go more than one mile outside of the wire, we encounter heavy enemy resistance. It's like [the Taliban] are drawn to us."

The increase in patrols and subsequent engagements with insurgents serves to buffer friendly villages to the south of Observation Post Huskars from the Taliban north of the Marines' position.

"To the north, the majority of the compounds are abandoned and are being used by insurgents," explained Miller. "However, in the south, villagers have asked for our help, [and have] even led us to where improvised explosive devices were planted so that we could destroy them."

As the light began to fade and the Marines switched to night vision, infrequent tracer rounds and pop shots would clip and skim over the compound where the patrol had taken refuge. Meanwhile, they waited for explosive ordinance disposal Marines to arrive and destroy the homemade explosive ingredients found earlier in the day.

With the events of the day behind them and the bomb ingredients destroyed, the patrol set off toward its camp to catch a few hours of rest before going out again the following morning.

(Marine Corps Lance Cpl. James W. Clark serves with the 1st Marine Division’s Regimental Combat Team 7 public affairs office.)

[Gunner 0313]

Lucky day for our guys. No let me rephrase that a, blessed day for our guys. Article is from reporters that have been with us for a few days. Hope all is well and miss you guys.

1stSgt P. T. Davis
Weapons Company, 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines
Regimental Combat Team 7
Nawa District, Helmand Province, Afghanistan

Foot on Bomb, Marine Defies a Taliban Trap

More Photos >
By C. J. CHIVERS

Published: January 23, 2010

SHOSHARAK, Afghanistan — If luck is the battlefield’s final arbiter — the wild card that can trump fitness, training, teamwork, equipment, character and skill — then Lance Cpl. Ryan T. Mathison experienced its purest and most welcome form.


A foot patrol in Shosharak came close to disaster. More Photos »
On a Marine foot patrol here through the predawn chill of Friday morning, he stepped on a pressure-plate rigged to roughly 25 pounds of explosives. The device, enough to destroy a pickup truck or tear apart several men, was buried beneath him in the dusty soil.

It did not explode.

Lance Corporal Mathison’s weight triggered the detonation of one of the booby trap’s two blasting caps. But upon giving an audible pop and tossing small stones into the air, the device failed to ignite its fuller charge — a powerful mix of Eastern Bloc mortar rounds and homemade explosives spiked with motorcycle parts, rusty spark plugs and jagged chunks of steel.

Lance Corporal Mathison and several Marines near him were spared. So began a brief journey through the Taliban’s shifting tactics and the vagaries of war, where an experience at the edge of death became instead an affirmation of friendship, and in which a veteran Marine reluctantly assumed for a morning one of the infantry’s most coveted roles: that of the charmed man.

“Damn Matty, man,” said Cpl. Joshua D. Villegas, the patrol’s radio operator, allowing his eyes to roam over the intact Marine after the patrol had backed away from the dud. “Lucky son of a b----.”

Homemade bombs, which the military calls improvised explosive devices, or I.E.D.’s, have become the insurgents’ killing tool of choice in the Afghan war, a complement to the Taliban’s assault rifles, machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades. They serve as a battlefield leveler for elusive fighters who are wary of meeting Western forces head-on.

As their use has multiplied several-fold in the past two years, bomb-disposal specialists and American officers say, the Taliban’s bomb-making cells have sharpened their skills, moving away from smaller bombs in cooking pots to larger bombs encased in multigallon plastic water jugs, cooking-oil containers or ice coolers.

The bombs typically contain a slurry of fertilizer mixed with aluminum-based paint, and are triggered either via switches tripped by their victims or by a militant who detonates the weapon remotely when a victim moves near. Sometimes the insurgents use military-grade explosives from unexploded ordnance or conventional land mines.

No matter their determination or rising level of experience, those who manufacture or place the bombs still make mistakes, as evidenced by events on Friday morning on ground that the Marines call Cemetery Hill.
A foot patrol from Charlie Company, First Battalion, Third Marines left Patrol Base Brannon, a remote outpost in Helmand Province, at about 4:30 a.m., two hours ahead of the sun. The Marines said they were headed to a knoll to settle into an observation post beside a cemetery and watch over a road dubbed Blue Moon.

The cemetery, contained by mud walls and shaded by three tall trees, overlooks part of the small village of Shosharak, including a house from which the Taliban have often fired on Marine patrols. A Marine was killed here last year. It is bitterly contested ground.

The Marines reached the wall. About a half-hour before sunrise, Lance Cpl. Dario P. Quirumbay, 20, the assistant patrol leader, called softly to Lance Corporal Mathison, 21. He wanted to give him a thermal sight to scan the surrounding terrain.

Lance Corporal Mathison moved toward his friend. When he was a few feet away, the weight of his footfall depressed something hidden in the dirt. There was a muffled pop, a sound resembling a man stomping on a bottle. A small explosion — like that of firecracker — lifted his boot. Rocks peppered the two Marines.
“Don’t move!” Lance Corporal Quirumbay said.

Wary of stepping on another bomb, the patrol sat still until light glowed in the eastern horizon, when other Marines unfolded a metal detector and swept around their friend. The detector emitted a loud whine, signaling that a large bomb remained in the soil.

The Marines radioed for a team that specializes in dismantling explosives and backed off the knoll.

[FistFu68]

God has a nicname it's LUCK

[Gunner 0313]

The kid was one lucky SOB.

[Leighms]

I am wondering if I may ask you a question if I can, if you have a moment to answer?

[Gunner 0313]

Saturday, February 20, 2010

MARJA, AFGHANISTAN -- They had slogged through knee-deep mud carrying 100 pounds of gear, fingers glued to the triggers of their M-4 carbines, all the while on the lookout for insurgents. Now, after five near-sleepless nights, trying to avoid hypothermia in freezing temperatures, the grunts of the 1st Battalion of the 6th Marine Regiment finally had a moment to relax.

As the sun set Thursday evening over the rubbled market where they set up camp, four of them sat around an overturned blue bucket and began playing cards. A few cracked open dog-eared paperbacks. Some heated their rations-in-a-bag, savoring their first warm dinner in days. Many doffed their helmets and armored vests.
Then -- before the game was over, the chapters finished, the meals cooked -- the war roared back at them.
The staccato crack of incoming rounds echoed across the market. In an instant, the Marines grabbed their vests and guns. The 50-caliber gunner on the roof thumped back return fire, as did several Marines with clattering, belt-fed machine guns. High-explosive mortar rounds, intended to suppress the insurgent fire, whooshed overhead.
And so went another night in the battle of Marja.

The fight to pacify this Taliban stronghold in Helmand province is grim and grueling. For all the talk of a modern war -- of Predator drones and satellite-guided bombs and mine-resistant vehicles -- most Marines in this operation have been fighting the old-fashioned way: on foot, with rifle. They hump their kit on their backs, bed down under the stars in abandoned compounds and defecate in plastic bags.

"This isn't all that different from the way our fathers and grandfathers fought," said Cpl. Blake Burkhart, 22, of Oviedo, Fla.

The battlefield privation here is unlike much of the combat in Iraq, which often involved day trips from large, well-appointed forward operating bases. Even when Marines there had to rough it, during the first and second campaigns for Fallujah, they didn't have to walk as far and they remained closer to logistics vehicles.

In Marja, U.S. military commanders figured, the best way to throw the insurgents off-balance and avoid the hundreds of homemade bombs buried in the roads was to airdrop almost 1,000 Marines and Afghan soldiers. That provided an element of surprise when the operation commenced, and it allowed the forces to punch into the heart of Marja. But it also meant they would have to tough it out.

Because they had to stuff their packs with food, water and ammunition, sleeping bags and tents were left behind. That seemed fine, because summer temperatures in southern Afghanistan often reach 140 degrees. But at this time of year, the mercury can dip -- and it did during the first days of the mission, to freezing temperatures at night.
Huddled under thin plastic camouflage poncho liners, the Marines lucky enough to get a few hours of sleep in between shifts of guard duty huddled close together, sometimes spooning one another, to keep warm.

It didn't always work. In those first days, more Marines were evacuated for hypothermia than for gunshot wounds. One grunt in the battalion's Alpha Company proudly displays the frostbitten tip of his middle finger as his battlefield injury.

In the mornings and evenings, the Marines huddle around small fires they build, fueled by stalks of dried poppy, the principal cash crop in Marja. But in some platoon bases, nighttime fires have been banned because they make it too easy for Taliban snipers to aim.

The snipers have become the principal concern for the troops here, not the seemingly pervasive roadside bombs, in part because there is less driving than in other missions. More Marines have died from gunshot wounds than blasts in the first days of the operation.

As a consequence, body armor and helmets are a must-wear, except when in a patrol base with thick brick walls. Even then, mortar rounds and rocket-propelled grenades are a constant threat.
Marines who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan call the Marja operation more intense than anything else they've encountered, save for the battles in Fallujah.

"This place is crazy," said one sergeant as he ran to respond to the attack on Thursday evening. "It's more intense than anything you could have imagined."

The intensity is sharpened by the lack of any relaxation. It's all combat, all the time.
The laptops and DVD players that some Marines brought are packed in duffel bags and footlockers, which will be delivered at some point. Could be days. Could be weeks.

There is technology out here, but it is all in the service of war. Each company has a few laptops connected to high-powered satellite antennas, which commanders use to view live, streaming footage from unmanned aircraft flying overhead. It allows a bird's-eye glimpse of the battlefield in a way their infantry units could only dream of a few years back.

But for the average grunts, all they have is what they could carry. And those who borrowed a book from the chapel library at the base before they were dropped into Marja -- well, nobody has really had time to read.
Same for showering. That is, if there were showers or places to bathe. "Hygiening" in the morning means a quick scrubbing with a baby wipe. Full ablutions are weeks away. In the meantime, everyone smells equally rank.

The lack of hot water hasn't kept the Marines from shaving. The Corps' style -- high-and-tight haircuts and cleanshaven faces -- is enforced out here, no matter how rough the conditions.

The one edict most openly flouted is with regards to the possession of pets. Every patrol base, no matter how small, seems to have attracted at least one stray dog in search of food, water or just companionship. The outpost that was attacked has a tiny puppy, dubbed Furball, who is fed a generous daily allotment of packaged tuna and chicken found in some ration bags. The rations, which are called MREs -- for Meals Ready to Eat -- are pretty much all anyone has to eat, other than the last bits of Corn Nuts or beef jerky squirreled away in a rucksack. The choices range from a boneless pork rib to a beef enchilada to vegetable lasagna. Regular meals, which require a base with a kitchen, a dining hall and contract labor, may never come to Marja. The Marines here have been told to get used to meals in a bag for months.

None of this seems to bother anyone out here. There's a bit of harrumphing here and there -- the lack of hot coffee and the shortage of cigarettes prompt regular complaints -- but all say this is why they got into the Corps.

After Thursday's attack, which lasted 90 minutes before a volley of mortar shells and rockets presumably wiped out the insurgents who had been shooting, the Marines returned to their designated corners of the base in the darkness. Dinner was cold, and the cards were scattered. But nobody cared. All they wanted to do was talk about the fighting, and the one Marine who had been wounded by a Taliban sniper.
"This is better than 'Call of Duty,' " said Lance Cpl. Paul Stephens, 20, of Corona, Calif., referring to a series of shoot-'em-up video games.

"This is what it's all about," Cpl. Mina Mechreki added. "We didn't join the Corps to sit around. This is what we came out here to do."

[FistFu68]

I'm going out too take care of Bizz,but after reading this I'm gonna Be Walking Tall I LOVE these Young Bastards GodBless them All Yut Yut Semper Fi OORAH

[Gunner 0313]

Officials Note Operation Moshtarak Progress

American Forces Press Service

KABUL, Feb. 23, 2010 – Signs of steady progress in development and governance are evident in the central part of Afghanistan’s Helmand province, International Security Assistance Force Joint Command officials said today.
In a daily update on Operation Moshtarak, which began in the region Feb. 13, officials said bridges, roads and culverts are being repaired, bazaars are re-opening and attracting customers, and a variety of initiatives are being planned or implemented.

Officials said six projects are ongoing, and 18 are planned in northern Nad-e Ali under the Afghanistan Vouchers for Increased Production in Agriculture Plus program. Meanwhile, educators and school officials are discussing a training program that will promote reading, writing and arithmetic skills among young people who are addicted to drugs or have previous affiliations with the insurgency, officials added.

Afghan and combined forces continue to encounter “small, but determined pockets of resistance,” often from bunkers or other fortified positions, officials said. Though roadside bombs remain the greatest threat to security forces, they added, the combined force continues to make headway in clearing operations to enable improved governance and development.

New patrol bases are being established as Afghan forces assert greater authority in Marja and Nad-e Ali. A new patrol base is operational at 5 Ways Junction and a new police base is being built in southeast Marja, officials said.

Clearing operations are on track and enabling greater freedom of movement for civilians and security forces alike, officials said. Task Force Helmand's engineers continue to upgrade roads in their area of operations, enabling more effective delivery of stabilization supplies.

(From an International Security Assistance Force Joint Command news release.)

[Gunner 0313]

By MICHAEL M. PHILLIPS and ALAN CULLISON

MARJAH, Afghanistan—The Taliban grenade that whizzed overhead was John Kael Weston's first indication that
this town might not be ready for an influx of diplomats, agriculturalists and economic-development specialists.
The U.S. State Department official visited Marjah on Friday to see whether the week-old allied military offensive had made enough progress to allow the U.S.-led coalition and the Afghan government to launch their main mission: Reintroducing Afghan civilian rule to a town that has been under Taliban control for years.

2:15
Thousands of Afghan and foreign troops continue to battle Taliban fighters around Marjah, but many Afghans remain skeptical about the success of the operation. Video courtesy of Agence France-Presse.
Instead, Mr. Weston found the battle still under way and the town so devastated by years of war and neglect that it was hard to imagine scores of civilians setting up shop there very soon.
"I don't think we're there yet," he told Sgt. Rian Madden, an infantryman grimy from a week of firefights.
"I think that's a pretty fair assessment," the sergeant responded blandly.
Afghan and North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces continued to push through the Taliban stronghold of Marjah Friday, and were encountering "determined pockets of resistance" in northern and eastern parts of the city, the NATO coalition said.
View Full Image

Six coalition soldiers were killed Thursday and one on Friday in relation to the operation, bringing the total to 12 casualties since the beginning of the Marjah operation. NATO said four of the casualties resulted from small-arms fire and three from improvised explosive devices, or IEDS.
In Marjah, the coalition plans to spend tens of millions of dollars to repair battle damage, provide quick jobs and reverse years of government and Taliban neglect. The Afghan government has an official, Haji Zahir, waiting in the wings to take up the post as town administrator. But he hasn't visited yet.
Coalition officials such as Mr. Weston, the State Department liaison to the Marine task force leading the offensive, had envisioned Mr. Zahir going to work in what were once the government offices in Marjah. But they turned out to be little more than a clump of ruins where the locals held a weekly outdoor market before the fighting began.
Nearby is a former school, now in ruins and occupied by Marines who have built sandbag barricades to absorb regular Taliban attacks.
Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, commander of the Marine task force, came away from Friday's visit persuaded that it would be at least another week before the civilian surge could match the military surge in Marjah.
"Is there a good part of town?" he asked with dismay as he came upon the old government center.

[Gunner 0313]

By Laura King

February 20, 2010

Reporting from Kabul, Afghanistan - Following the deadliest day yet for coalition forces seeking to drive the Taliban from the town of Marja in southern Afghanistan, another Western service member was killed Friday by small-arms fire, military officials said.

Surprisingly accurate Taliban snipers, together with intricate webs of roadside bombs, slowed the progress of the offensive as it neared the end of its first week. Commanders say key goals are being met, but they acknowledge that clearing operations around the town probably will take about a month.

A Western military statement said "determined pockets of resistance" in Marja persisted Friday in the form of sometimes- intense firefights and ambushes. The nationality of the latest fatality was not immediately disclosed, but the circumstances were described as a "small-arms fire attack."

U.S. Marines seized a strongly defended compound south of Marja that appeared to have been a Taliban headquarters, the Associated Press reported. They found photos of fighters posing with their weapons, dozens of Taliban- issued ID cards and graduation diplomas from a training camp in Pakistan.

A day earlier, six service members with NATO's International Security Assistance Force were killed by explosions and small-arms fire. That doubled the coalition toll to date in the operation, which, including Friday's death, now stands at 12 Western troops and one Afghan soldier killed in action.

About 120 insurgents have been killed, Afghan officials estimate.

Though the U.S. Marines spearheading the attack in Helmand province are far better trained and armed, the insurgents have had some success with classic guerrilla tactics.

Taliban sharpshooters had long had a reputation for being anything but. However, coalition field officers say they have been encountering snipers considerably more skilled -- in part, perhaps, because the insurgents had many months to prepare for this battle.

The Marines heavily publicized plans to seize Marja, in hopes that less committed insurgents would leave and civilians in the area would be spared an even bigger battle.

As it is, the offensive is the largest since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion that drove the Taliban from power.

The Western assault began Feb. 13 with troops being airlifted over Taliban front lines and miles of minefields and dropped in the town center. That tactic was repeated on a much smaller scale Friday, when elite Marine reconnaissance squads were airdropped into areas where snipers were known to be operating, the Associated Press reported.

At the outset of the assault, the Marines' commander, Brig. Gen. Larry Nicholson, had expressed optimism that key sites could be secured by nightfall of the first day. That goal has largely been achieved, said British Maj. Gen. Nick Carter, who is the top regional commander, but it took nearly a full week of fighting.

Carter, speaking Thursday by videolink, told reporters at the Pentagon that the "end of the beginning" was at hand in Marja, but that it probably would take several more weeks to fully secure the town. At this point, coalition troops -- U.S., British and Afghan -- control major roadways and bazaars, and Afghan police have begun arriving to help with the transition from warfare back to some semblance of normal life for residents.

Coalition officials hope that attention can be shifted soon to governance-building. As soon as Marja is deemed secure enough, a newly appointed deputy district governor will be brought in to begin overseeing the restoration of public services. During the time that the town has been a Taliban stronghold, schools closed and government authority vanished.

Elsewhere in Nad Ali district, where Marja is located, the military said "stabilization projects" such as repairing canals and opening schools had begun.

Military officials have also been attending shuras, traditional gatherings of tribal leaders.

[Gunner 0313]

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, March 1, 2010 – Combined Afghan-international operations in Afghanistan have killed several insurgents in recent days and led to drug and weapons confiscations, military officials reported.
A combined patrol operating in the Koti village of Kapisa province Feb. 27 used intelligence information to conduct an operation against an insurgent leader responsible for supplying weapons and equipment used in attacks against Afghan forces and members of the International Security Assistance Force.

During the operation, several armed men were observed near the compound. When the men displayed hostile intent, the patrol took defensive measures, killing several of the men.

Throughout the operation, Afghan National Police protected two women and two children in an adjacent compound. No civilians were injured.

Also on Feb. 27, a combined force operating in the Spin Boldak district of Kandahar province discovered a large amount of drugs. Led by Afghan National Police, the patrol discovered about 1,700 pounds of hashish on the trailer of a broken tractor. The drugs were confiscated and moved to a nearby police compound.

In another operation, Afghan forces turned a large weapons cache over to an ISAF explosive ordnance disposal team in the Bala Boluk district of Farah province yesterday. The cache consisted of three rockets, three mortar rounds, 30 hand grenades, 24 rocket-propelled grenade warheads, more than 700 large-caliber machine gun rounds, a pistol and a radio.

Another combined force captured two militants in a compound while pursuing a Taliban commander in Kandahar city last night. The force also found assault rifles, pistols, grenades and 200 blank identification cards.

A combined patrol destroyed four 107 mm rockets found in the Gelan district of Ghazni province yesterday.

No shots were fired and no Afghan civilians were harmed during the operations.

On Feb. 24, Afghan National Police, assisted by international forces, recovered two weapons caches after insurgents attacked a police checkpoint in Daykundi province. The caches, discovered in two locations, were found after insurgents engaged a checkpoint with machine-gun fire. The police returned fire and cleared a compound from which insurgents were seen firing.

The police discovered two assault rifles, two machine guns, a shotgun and about 5,000 rounds of ammunition. After searching the immediate area, the police also found 1,100 pounds of ammonium nitrate fertilizer, which the Afghan government banned in January because it can be used to make explosives. The ammonium nitrate was destroyed on site with no injury to civilians or damage to property.

(Compiled from International Security Assistance Force Joint Command news releases.)



Well, this will cement Hanson's reputation as a crazy Far Right guy. How dare he mention killing the enemy as a way to victory? That's not what we're about, we are for peace, waddling little puppies, little girls with flower baskets, warm chocolate chip cookies, yadda-yadda-yadda. Such harsh realities are offensive and it's just so rude to bring them up!

Of course, some of us will just nod our heads and say "Damn right, wipe out enough of those who fight you, wipe out their replacements, and then the replacements after that, and at some point the flow of replacements will slow down, become a trickle, and sputter out. And then we can all go home."

Yeah, primitive thinking for sure. Oh well...

S/F

Del

[ggyoung]

2 Utah Marines killed. On Monday 2008 graduate Carlos Aragon was killed when he stepped on a presure-activated homemade explosive whyle on a foot patrol in Helmand province in southren Afghanistan. Two days later, 2007 graduate Nigel Olson, a fellow member of the Utah-based Charlie Company of the 4th Light Admored Reconnaissance Battalion, was killed in the samevolatile region. They both graduated from Mountain View High School in Orem, Utah. S/F my Brothers and RRIP.

[ggyoung]

This was just on the news that another Utah Marine was wounded in Afghanistan. He was from the same Mountain View High School as 2 other Marines who were killed last week. All 3 were Charilie Company, 4th Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion out of Tooele, Utah. This same company had several killed in Iroq.

[dizark]

Semper Fi 1/3... We will be there to take over soon (3/3)