Notes From Across The Pond

Jeremy Riegel
HHC 173d STB
JBAD PRT
APO, AE 09354
September 8, 2007

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Afghanistan Update
Saturday, September 8, 2007 1:11pm EDT

Okay, I know I am severely overdue for an update. Sorry it has taken me so long, but life has been incredibly busy here. My Soldiers continue to do great things for the Afghan people, and I’m very thankful for all their hard work.

We have made significant progress in the short time we’ve been here in Afghanistan. I am going into my fifth month this trip, my twenty- sixth month total in this country since 2003. My first trip we did what needed to be done. My second trip we were training the Afghans on what needed to be done. This trip I am starting to see the Afghans do for themselves. Yes, we still play a vital role in training Afghans, but I regularly see the progress we’re making.

Our main effort in Nangarhar Province is the Afghan National Police, or ANP. The Area of Operations (AO) I am responsible for is the northern half of Nangarhar Province, which has six districts (think counties) and seven precincts in the city of Jalalabad. Most of the ANP have graduated from an ISAF-ran Police Academy, but that teaches only the basics in about six weeks, and does not produce a fully capable policeman by graduation. It’s a great start and a solid foundation, but is just the start of training, much like our basic training.

My job is to partner with the ANP in my AO to conduct joint operations and provide additional training to the ANP to build their capacity to function without coalition support. Now that we are well into the execution of our training plans, we are seeing significant progress. We have expanded our training from one ANP station to multiple station training. The way we do this is by conducting training at one ANP station, and identifying an ANP soldier who picks up the training well, and is able to retain a good deal of the material. We then use him as an assistant instructor the next time we go to that station, as a refresher for him. Next, we take that ANP soldier to another ANP station and use him as the lead instructor, with my soldiers as assistant instructors. Since we must teach the class through an interpreter, the classes go much quicker when presented in their native tongue.

When we first arrived in Afghanistan this trip, ANP flat out refused to cross district boundaries, even if the ANP in the next district we being attacked. Now, largely due to the partnering we are doing for training, all of our districts readily support each other in times of need.

Last week, we conducted our first ANP Combat Life Saver (CLS) course. During the medical training we’ve been doing at the district centers, we identified a trainable ANP Soldier who did well with the medical tasks. We invited eight of those Soldiers to our base for a full day class on CLS skills. After classroom instruction, practical exercises, and a formal testing phase, all eight Soldiers graduated our training. They were given graduation certificates (certificates are held in high regard by Afghans), a CLS bag with basic first aid supplies, and pronounced the ‘Platoon Medic’ for their district.

We have also started many projects to make the daily lives of Afghans better. We have put up several privacy walls at clinics that treat females. Solar powered streetlights are being installed in Jalalabad to light several busy streets. We have partnered with several clinics to provide supplies to, and visited many schools where we’ve handed out donated school supplies, toys, and candy. I’ve also initiated a large project where I hope to do some sort of improvement of every mosque in Jalalabad, over a hundred total. Whether we paint the mosque, repair the roof, improve their latrines/foot washing stations, build shoe racks, or donate prayer rugs, we will attempt to touch each and every mosque in the city. One of the biggest information operations (IO) tactics the Taliban uses is to say Americans and Coalition Forces are here to defile Islam and that we hate Afghans because they are Muslim. We know this is nowhere near the truth, but everyday Afghans may not know better. By partnering with the city’s Mullahs and conducting mosque improvements, we are efficiently undermining the Taliban’s main IO theme, as well as helping thousands of Afghans. (Note, it is not US Soldiers physically conducting the improvements, but we evaluate the mosques with the city engineers and hire Afghan contractors, approved by the mullahs, to perform the labor.)

As we move into Ramadan (Islam’s Holy Month) we are able to reflect on some significant accomplishments during our short time here. But we still have a lot of work ahead of us. My Soldiers work hard in the blazing Afghan heat (still over 110 degrees almost daily, with high humidity), but they see that they are making a difference. There have been a few IEDs in my AO, but we still have not been shot at or received rocket/mortar fire, and that is largely due to the positive relationships my soldiers have build with the communities we work in.

While we have not suffered any losses yet, the 173d ABCT has not been as fortunate as my company. We have lost several Sky Soldiers, to include a friend, Major Tom Bostick. While their loss is painful, their sacrifice certainly was not in vein. As George Patton said “It is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.” Tom was also on his third deployment here, and his leadership no doubt saved the lives of many men the night he was killed.

For those of you who have sent boxes of toys, beanie babies, pencils, and school supplies, thank you. I have received dozens of boxes and will continue to pass them on to the Afghan kids. As schools open up this month after a summer break, I will be able to distribute more of those items and send more pictures of us handing out the donations. We have plenty of storage space, so after my room fills up I can have the boxes stored in our shipping containers. If you are part of a group or church that wants to organize a collection to ship over here, I will make sure you get pictures of us handing out your donations. If you need ideas of what to collect, please let me know and I’ll pass on what we are short on at that time. Beanie Babies, McDonald’s Happy Meal toys, pens, and pencils are always needed (and cheaper to ship!), and hard candy is never unpopular with the kids.

As always, I thank you all for your support. Without your thoughts and prayers, we could not complete this vital mission.

Jeremy Riegel
HHC 173d STB
JBAD PRT
APO, AE 09354

One of the schools we are helping. They teach 3,000 students in seven classrooms! This was a summer school class learning English, which we gladly helped teach for an hour. One student asked us to write "bridge" on the chalkboard, then asked us why do we put the D in the word if we weren't going to pronounce it? I never thought of that, but it was the first of many good questions from the group.