Iraq Security Developments

Iraq Security Developments
Reuters
August 2, 2007

BAGHDAD - Seven mortar rounds landed in the grounds of the Iraqi Islamic Party headquarters in Baghdad's Yarmouk district, killing three people and wounding five, police said.

Iraq Security Developments

Iraq Security Developments
IraqSlogger
August 1, 2007

BAGHDAD – Gunmen killed two civilians in a drive-by shooting in west Baghdad’s Yarmouk district on Wednesday, police said.

Photos: Census Mission in Yarmouk

Census Mission in Yarmouk
Digital Video and Imagery Distribution System
Photography by: Spc. Elisha Dawkins

census mission in yarmouk

Includes:

Sgt Karl Davis
Cpl Johnathan Dekock
Staff Sgt Michael Sangaland
Pfc Michael Ashford
Sgt 1st Class George Havel
Spc John Hatson

Sight Unseen: Artillery Soldiers Search for Elusive Enemy

Sight Unseen: Artillery Soldiers Search for Elusive Enemy
Digital Video and Imagery Distribution
Story by Spc. Leith Edgar
Posted on 07.30.2007

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Over six months into his deployment, artilleryman Pfc. Brandon Tripp has yet to move his howitzer, let alone fire it. His M-4 rifle, on the other hand, has not received a day off since its owner set foot in Baghdad.

On patrol in the western section of the capital, Tripp stops to speak with residents, play with children and look for anything to indicate signs of the elusive enemy. The out of sight antagonist hides within a few million citizens in an urban jungle making capture more difficult than finding the proverbial needle.

Tripp, a 26-year old native of Jackson, Ohio, is not alone. Soldiers working throughout Baghdad to improve security face an enemy who does not fall under a flag, wear a uniform or fight under an organized command structure.

This morning, Tripp’s eyes are on the watch for any sign of danger as he walks down the streets of Hateen, a neighborhood within Baghdad’s Mansour District, with his unit, 4th Platoon, Battery A, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment. The mission is to search the homes of residents with the assistance of troops from the 6th Iraqi Army Division, said the battery’s commander, Capt. Brian McCall.

By the end of the operation, the Soldiers had searched approximately eight blocks of the neighborhood and confiscated a few contraband weapons. Simply removing a few rifles and hand guns off the streets did not necessarily make the mission a success. But the time the Soldiers used to talk with residents about helping them expel the enemy in hiding was, said McCall, a native of Junction City, Kan.

“By getting out and talking with the local populace, we’ve been able to build a good rapport and as a result they’ve passed us tips, which have helped us find IED’s and guys who are causing trouble,” McCall said. “A lot of times people are nervous talking to us on the street. So, we’ll quietly hand them a card in a handshake. It doesn’t look like they’re being complicit but they’re encouraged to call.”

McCall said his phone rings off the hook thanks to tip cards and the signs attached to the battery’s Humvees, which advertise an email address and phone number for information.

To improve the chances of residents making a call or sending an email, the troops frequently hit the sweltering streets.

Operating in Hateen for more than seven months, Tripp takes every opportunity on patrol to make small talk with residents, he said.

“A lot of people in the neighborhood remember our names,” he said. “I think that helps.”

Yet, no matter how much Soldiers like Tripp think they know the people; they are never really certain who is truly a friend or foe. The unauthorized weapons the Soldier’s routinely confiscate could be for defending the home or killing Soldiers.

“We talk to them once a week and then all of a sudden, we go in on a raid, and find 10 AK(-47)s in their house,” Tripp said, explaining that many Iraqis feel the need to stockpile weapons for protection. “You just don’t know who to trust.”

Under such conditions cultivating trust is an uphill battle. But fortunately many of Hateen’s educated residents understand violence is not the way ahead for Iraq, McCall explained.

However, there are groups opposed to progress in Hateen. Cells of al-Qaida in Iraq and Jaish Al Mahdi, commonly referred to as JAM, a militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada Al Sadr, operate in Hateen, he said.

As Tripp and his fellow artillery Soldiers were patrolling the streets of Hateen, Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno, the commander of Multi-National Corps-Baghdad, recently told reporters Iraqi and coalition forces are making progress against insurgents and extremists in Baghdad.

“The surge of coalition forces had an impact in denying sanctuary to al-Qaida in Iraq and Shia extremists,” Odierno said.

According to McCall, Hateen is one of those sanctuaries.

The neighborhood is very affluent, composed primarily of educated Sunni residents and professionals such as engineers, doctors and schoolteachers. But it also houses financiers and planners, who masquerade as professionals, but are essentially the brains behind many operations against the government of Iraq and coalition forces, McCall said.

“They’re very quiet and they don’t do very many things in their own backyard per se. We have not found any large caches in our area. Nor has any intelligence led us to believe there are large groups of fighters (in Hateen),” McCall said. “It makes it a lot harder to find (them) because they are smart and can cover their tracks.”

In addition to the insurgent and extremist cells bent on destabilizing Hateen, Tripp and his unit are also combating sectarian violence.

A dispute between two families in the neighborhood has caused sectarian strife. Violence between the families has escalated to reprisal killings, bombings and collateral damage, McCall said.

“They’ve started to fight amongst each other,” he said. “While it may not be al-Qaida or JAM, it’s still violent action in our neighborhood that’s causing problems. So we’re trying to bring the killers to justice.”

In addition to policing the neighborhood, artillerymen like Tripp, are asked to work toward the reconstruction of Hateen’s essential services, including the restoration of electricity, sewage and trash pickup, McCall said.

“We’re artillerymen, so we’re used to firing howitzers.” McCall said. “But our howitzers haven’t moved out of the motor pool the whole time we’ve been here.”

photo by Spc. Leith Edgar

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides
Dagger Brigade Combat Team Official Site
Week: July 23 - July 29
Slides: 32, 33

CPT Wojcik Visits LTC Gadson while on leave

SFC Fuentes on Environmental Morale Leave

Photos: New friends in western Baghdad

Photos: New friends in western Baghdad
BlackAnthem Military News
Digital Video and Imagery Distribution System
By Spc. L.B. Edgar, 7th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment
Jul 29, 2007

making new friends

Sgt. Danil Ramirez, a Miami native and a team leader with 4th Platoon, Battery A, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, visits children in Western Baghdad, Iraq, July 26. Ramirez and other Soldiers were part of a joint operation with Iraqi security forces to disrupt insurgent activities in the area by searching residents homes for contraband.

Strife and Ice, Staples of Life, Overlap in Iraq

Strife and Ice, Staples of Life, Overlap in Iraq
NY Times
July 28, 2007

BAGHDAD, July 27 — Each day before the midsummer sun rises high enough to bake blood on concrete, Baghdad’s underclass lines up outside Dickensian ice factories.

With electricity reaching most homes for just a couple of hours each day, the poor hand over soiled brown dinars for what has become a symbol of Iraq’s steady descent into a more primitive era and its broken covenant with leaders, domestic and foreign.

In a capital that was once the seat of the Islamic Caliphate and a center of Arab worldliness, ice is now a currency of last resort for the poor, subject to sectarian horrors and gangland rules.

In Shiite-majority Topchi, ice makers say that Moktada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army issued a diktat on the first day of summer ordering vendors to set a price ceiling of 4,000 dinars ($3) per 55-pound block of ice, 30 percent less than they charge in areas outside Mahdi Army control.

Everyone complied, delivering an instant subsidy to the veiled women and poor laborers who are the radical Shiite cleric’s natural constituency. The same price is enforced in his other power bases, like Sadr City.

Some suppliers are horrified. “They are trying to improve their image, and gain favor,” a merchant grumbled, as a sickle-wielding colleague chopped the hollow crystalline blocks in half for black-robed women to cram into shopping bags. “But it won’t do much good, we all know what the Mahdi Army are.”

Wearied by four years of chaos, others support the move to reimpose order, any order.

“There is nothing better than law and order,” said Omar Suleiman, another factory manager. “In the days of Saddam Hussein, the government used to control the price of ice. Now there is no control, except where the militias are doing it.”

Shiites are not alone in manipulating supply to suit their own sectarian agendas.

At one plant, situated under a highway overpass in Topchi, all four delivery drivers quit last year after warnings that sectarian gangs would kill them if they continued to drive across the invisible but all-too-real lines dividing Baghdad’s Sunni and Shiite neighborhoods.

Customers in one suburb cautioned them that takfiris — fanatical Sunni extremists — had decreed their frozen product un-Islamic.

“In Ghazaliya, it is forbidden to sell ice because the takfiris said, ‘The Prophet Muhammad had no ice in his time,’ ” said Khatan Kareem, a manager at the factory where the drivers worked, shaking his head at the absurdity.

Many of Baghdad’s ice plants are museum pieces. In one, the industrial compressor was manufactured in India in 1960. Another’s was built by L. Sterne & Co. in Glasgow more than half a century ago.

Hussam Muhammad, whose family owns the equipment in the business where Mr. Kareem works, never imagined that the dilapidated factory, built in 1952 when Iraq was still a monarchy, would survive into the post-Saddam Hussein era.

“In 2003, I thought the ice business would be finished because everyone would have electricity and refrigerators once the Americans arrived,” Mr. Muhammad said as he scuttled from fan belt to ice-blistered piping trying to keep the plant limping along. “The fish sellers and meat stores who used to buy from us are gone, closed because of the security situation. Now it is the poor people who come because they don’t have money to pay for generators to keep their food and drinks cold.”

Baghdad’s sectarian compartmentalization of ice is as rigid for customers as for deliverymen.

Such is the fear of the gunmen that at the factory under the overpass, only the immediate neighbors can safely reach its grimy doors.

“People used to come here from Sunni areas, Taji, Amiriya and Jamiya to buy ice because they had no ice factories in their areas,” Mr. Kareem said. “But the Sunnis cannot reach this area now, and I am the same. I am Shia, and I cannot go to Yarmouk.”

The thought is particularly rankling to Mr. Kareem because until three months ago he lived in Yarmouk, a Sunni neighborhood, and enjoyed a secure government job, until an Iraqi Army raid uncovered a Shiite icon on his wall.

“They beat me up, burnt my house and forced me out of the area,” he said, squatting amid the nauseating smell of ammonium that permeates all ice factories. “I now live in my relatives’ kitchen. And I work here.”

His depression reflects the frustration of the Iraqi middle class, which prided itself on being one of the most educated in the Arab world, but now sees itself falling further behind its regional rivals and back onto the technology of its grandfathers.

In wealthier districts consumer goods are stacked high on shelves, for the “haves” who can afford to buy black-market electricity from private generator owners.

But millions of “have-nots” cannot afford this luxury, and many of those generator owners have now been killed or driven away by militias intent on securing their lucrative assets.

Ice, ostensibly the least political of commodities, requires only water, electricity and a few chemicals.

But in Baghdad’s current state of polarized violence, no business is an island. Raw materials must pass the checkpoints and gunmen, with their arbitrary rules and instant punishments, as must customers, suppliers, staff and the finished product.

The ice factories — cash cows in the peak summer season — have not escaped the gunmen’s notice.

In the Sunni enclave of Adhamiya, newly walled off from its Shiite neighbors to halt cross-community slaughter, Taha Khaleel complained that his drivers and mechanics were at the mercy of the Shiite-dominated Iraqi Army checkpoint that controls the gate.

“It depends on their mood,” he said. “This causes problems for us in the continuity of fuel supplies. The drivers are more reluctant to come to us now because of that, and because of the insults they face.”

A kidnapped factory owner in Taji was released only after he surrendered his car. At the Qutub Ice Factory in Baghdad, the owner has already fled Iraq after receiving a death threat, and employees say most of its middle-class customers have also gone.

Not so fortunate are the poor buyers in a street market the Salaam neighborhood, where wooden ice shacks have sprung up in recent months, despite the adjacent sewage and piles of rotting garbage.

Alarmed by tales of disease, many buyers now drop sterilization pills into the frozen blocks. If they are lucky, the stores will have ice from Sulaimaniya or Erbil, Kurdish cities where it is made from clean mountain water. If unlucky, the impure Baghdad product, with its distinctive yellow sheen.

“I never used to buy ice in Saddam’s regime, because I could use my refrigerator. But nowadays I have to because there is no electricity, and we need cold water,” said Muhammad Abbadi, 52, the owner of a clothing store. “Ice is the only source, even if it is dirty. Both my girls fell sick with typhoid two weeks ago.”

Reporting was contributed by Khalid W. Hassan, Ahmad Fadam, Wisam A. Habeeb, Karim Hilmi and Mudhafer Al-Husaini. Mr. Hassan was killed July 13.

Photos: Artilleryman Patrols Mansour

Photos: Artilleryman Patrols Mansour
Digital Video and Imaging Distribution System
Photographer: Spc. Leith Edgar
July 27, 2007

artilleryman patrols mansour

Pfc. Brandon Tripp, 26, a native of Jackson, Ohio, and an artilleryman with 4th Platoon, Battery A, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, pulls security in front of an up-armored Humvee of Iraqi army soldiers in Hateen, a neighborhood in Baghdad’s Mansour District, Iraq, on July 26. The joint operation between coalition forces and Iraqi security forces disrupted insurgent activities in the area through a cordon and search of residents’ homes.

Photos: Protecting, Patrolling Mansour

Photos: Protecting, Patrolling Mansour
Digital Video and Imaging Distribution System
Photographer: Spc. Leith Edgar
July 27, 2007

patroling, protecting mansour

Sgt. Danil Ramirez, a Miami native, and a team leader with 4th Platoon, Battery A, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division, pulls security in Hateen, a neighborhood in Baghdad's Mansour District on July 26. The joint operation between coalition forces and Iraqi security forces disrupted insurgent activities in the area through a cordon and search of residents' homes.

Hot in Tehran: Iran's global-warming agenda

Hot in Tehran: Iran's global-warming agenda
National Review Online
CBS News
Daveed Gartenstein-Ross
July 27, 2007

Daveed was embedded with the 2-32 for a few days back in June.

Excerpt:

Iran’s most obvious maneuverings have been in Iraq, where it has long aided insurgent factions. During a recent trip to Baghdad, where I was embedded as a reporter, I found that virtually every American soldier feared the explosively formed projectile (EFP). This kind of bomb has been described as uniquely dangerous because “when it detonates, the concave end blows outward and melts into a bullet-shaped fragment that slices through armor and flesh.” Captain Greg Hirschey of the Army’s 717th Explosive Ordnance Disposal Company told Wired of an incident where an EFP went through a Humvee, taking off both of the driver’s legs and also an arm. Lieutenant Patrick Henson of the 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery told me that he saw video in which an EFP went straight through a heavily armored Humvee and left an impact on the curb on the other side of the road. (Several Army sources corroborated his account.) Iran has been providing Shia insurgents with these deadly weapons. In 2005, Time reported that Iranian operative Abu Mustafa al-Sheibani, who headed an insurgent network created by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, introduced EFPs to Iraq. In February of this year, the American military stated that EFPs had killed “170 American and coalition troops in Iraq,” and the numbers have continued to rise since then.

Are These Your Soldiers Too?

Are These Your Soldiers Too?
Daggers Edge Magazine
By 1st Sgt. Robert Cook
July 26, 2007

So there I was, no kidding, right in the middle of Baghdad when I began to ponder, what is it that I can say or write about for our newsletter that has not already been mentioned? What was out there or what has happened that I can highlight and still bring credit to our hard working Soldiers? As I began to drive on with my daily workload of paperwork, I came across the Battalion Commander's "Command Philosophy". What stuck out the most to me were the three words that drive him daily and how he expects the Soldiers to internalize these same three words. The three words are: competence, confidence, and courage. I thought to myself for a moment and realized, our Soldiers are already living by and using these three words.

I believe our Soldiers are very competent. When we first learned of our mission prior to going to the National Training Center (NTC), I had a lot of doubts. Here we were, a new unit still training within our own field of expertise and we were going to have to switch our focus to becoming infantrymen. This required a lot of man hours and a lot of training and retraining, not to mention working closer to our infantry counterparts to acquire information on tactics not common to us. There were quite a few reasons to be doubtful and it had been clearly stated numerous times as we took on this mission.

As we began to go through the training at NTC, the worries lessened just a bit. It seemed as if the training we did prior to departing Fort Riley had paid off some. I mean, we still had areas we needed to work on, but we were able to see how quickly our Soldiers had adapted. Now, as they patrol the streets of Baghdad, they appear to be no different than the infantrymen who once trained us. Sometimes, and even quite often, they seem to do it better than the infantrymen we see out in Baghdad and on FOB Liberty. Our guys and gals are becoming more and more skillful by the day and are truly a force to be reckoned with, when and if encountered.

The word courage in the dictionary is defined as the "mental or moral strength to venture, preserve, and withstand danger, fear, or difficulty." This definition could not even begin to describe what our Soldiers display each and everyday. In fact, I will tell you what courage is. Courage is going across the seas to face an enemy who has no face, an enemy who can be anywhere at all times. Who faces such a thing on a daily basis? Your Soldiers do. Courage is going into a foreign city to bring peace to its residents. Courage is working in a place, day in and day out, where you encounter different cultures, languages, and people; people displaying the mixed emotions of relief and anger that you are in their city. Daily we send our Soldiers out to gain the respect and trust of people they do not even know in the hope that we will gain an ally or a friend who can help us defeat our enemies. Could you do a thing of this magnitude? Your Soldiers do.

Courage is moving from a semi-secure place into a dangerous city full of Improvised Explosive Devices (IED), machine gun fire, rocket explosions, blocked streets, and harsh temperatures well above 110�. Who in their right mind willingly faces such dangers? Your Soldiers do. So, if you were to look at the dictionary definition of the word courage, I will bet it is incomplete because the true definition of courage includes the American Soldier.

Finally, if there is one thing our Soldiers have plenty of, it is confidence. They believe that they are bringing about a change in the area we secure, and why not when they see new shops opening and people openly cooperating with us? They watch the black marketers flee the area when their vehicles turn the corner. They hear the residents tell story after story about improved safety, they see more children outside without fear of violence, and they see more families moving home for the first time in months or years.

As our Soldiers ride through the city, they see the trash being picked-up, fences being repaired, and sewage waste and sewage systems being cleaned-up and redone. All of this is a result of their efforts to establish a safe and secure environment. So ask yourself, why not be confident in our mission or our accomplishments? I think that you would be and you would show it with as much pride as our Soldiers do. They are not the only ones who feel this way - leaders at every echelon of command talk about the work that our Soldiers do every single day.

The only thing extra I can say of our Soldiers is that they are relentless because they know if they do not do this mission, no one will. We are a field artillery battalion with less than half as many Soldiers as an Infantry Battalion, and yet, we make it happen. It has not been easy and there has been sacrifice. Our young guys and gals are drained, but they know they will be replenished. They are worn by exhaustion and fatigue, but they know that they will be re-energized when their mission is done. They fight complacency, shaking it off and returning to the basics to stay focused and vigilant. Our Soldiers endure all of this not for recognition or glory, or even some promised fortune or fame; they do it out of pure dedication to duty and the simple fact that staying loyal and committed to this fight may, one day, free this country from the tyranny of violence it has endured for over 35 years. They do it because they are American Soldiers, joined with others fighting for a cause, but most importantly, they do it because they are PROUD AMERICANS!

Security Developments In Iraq

Iraq Slogger
Security developments in Iraq
Tuesday, July 24, 2007:

BAGHDAD - Two Iraqi soldiers were wounded in a roadside bomb explosion at Qahtan Square in the Yarmouk district of western Baghdad on Tuesday morning, police said, according to Reuters.

Roundup of Daily Violence

Roundup of Daily Violence
McClatchy Newspapers
Mohammed al Dulaimy
July 24, 2007

Around 9 a.m. A road side bomb targeted an Iraqi army convoy in Qahtan square near Al Yarmouk hospital. 2 soldiers were injured and one military vehicle was damaged.

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides
Dagger Brigade Combat Team Official Site
Week: July 16- July 22
Slides: 24, 25, 26

Awards Ceremony

LTC Lawson
SGT Smith
SPC Voight
awards given: CAB, PH, ARCOM

A Little Proud American

1LT Nick, Emily, Olivia Bell, and family

Combined Security Forces Help Daklea Health Clinic

CPT Jayson Morgan
PV2 Steve Robbins

Changes

Changes
2BCT Newsletter : The Dagger's Edge
By Sgt. 1st Class Daniel McKim
July 12, 2007

Waking up at 3 o’clock in the morning to head out to my truck and go hunting holds a different meaning here in Iraq than it does in the States. For one, my typical packing list of a shotgun, reflective safety vest, and a thermos of coffee does not help much with the conditions here. Instead of ducks, I now hunt terrorists, and as I get in my truck, I bring my rifle, tactical vest, and a block of ice that will eventually melt into the cold water I will drink while on patrol. It is funny that all of us think about what we would rather be doing; for some of us, it is drinking a beer with family members at a summer barbecue, or taking a swim with the kids at the beach. Despite the separation from our friends and family, the memories we create here are still significant. Time in Iraq moves slowly, and free time is a rare and precious commodity, but the constant support that the men show each other creates a home away from home. The men that I work with on a daily basis are at the forefront of all my thoughts here; their safety, health and welfare are my greatest concerns. But like me, I know they fight everyday to create a small world in their minds where they are ‘not a Soldier.’ This is not to say that they do not love Soldiering, it simply means that their families, friends, and stateside ways of life are among their fondest memories. Following each mission, as I walk back from the command tent, I pass through the Soldiers’ tent make sure the guys are doing well.

On any given day, I can find Pvt. Andrew Walker trying to master the latest riffs on his Guitar Hero game or Sgt. Jason Billings on his way out to call his wife. Staff Sgt. Jeremiah Brennan manages to squeeze in an afternoon nap, while Spc. Jonathon Larson continues to pursue his correspondence courses online. One fact stands out, these men, like all Soldiers deployed around the globe, have managed to forget about those long missions and the inherent dangers of being deployed, and have created a piece of home in Iraq. Even I have occasionally cracked open a book to escape the intensity that surrounds us.

But what of the families we left behind? I know that regardless of our mission, the people we left behind are still anxiously awaiting our return. Our biggest fears are the natural changes that occur during deployments. Yes, we will be gone for over a year, and yes we will adapt according to our new environment, but just as the part of our minds which remains fixated on memories of home, so too do our memories of those we left at home stay the same. That being said, we imagine that people are still the same… But we know that is not the case.

All of us have and will continue to change during such a long time away from our loved ones. I recall my last tour in Iraq when we received a redeployment briefing from the chaplain at the tiny FOB on the border of Iran that had become my home. It was time to begin to let the thoughts of combat seep to the back of my mind, and time to start focusing on redeploying and reuniting with family and friends. The changes that we underwent from being gone for so long framed every experience in a different light. As I begin to think of what the chaplain said, I realize that we have not had much contact with our families, and the simple sensors of our minds are disjointed as a result of being members of an all-male unit. Some of us surely will say a few more curse words than we did in the past, and some table manners have certainly fallen by the wayside. But these small changes can only be expected when you live, work, sleep and eat next to each other day-in and day-out in such close quarters.

Thinking back to the chaplain's words of wisdom, I am reminded that our parents, wives, children and friends will also change in many ways. Wives may undertake new careers or find new hobbies to pass the time. Children may become accustomed to different treatment from one parent when the other is deployed, and may even get away with things that Dad would not have allowed. Friends normally do a great job of staying in touch, but some have surely gotten married and started families of their own.

We are closing in on the five month mark of our deployment, and the R&R program is in full swing - roughly two soldiers per platoon (10 soldiers from the Battery) are home at any given time, visiting family and friends while getting some well-earned rest. Some plan on getting married, while others will hold their newborns for the first time. No matter what their plans, it is good to see Soldiers get this time off. The excitement they show upon their return and the stories that they bring back with them help pass the time on long patrols and never-ending guard shifts at Joint Security Station Torch.

During this deployment, each person will discover something about themselves that they did not know prior to arriving in Iraq. Some will find newfound strengths to bring home with them, while others may find weaknesses to correct while we are abroad. Some Soldiers will sustain their discipline and make the most of their time here; others may be able to embrace the many changes on home front because war has taught them to be adaptable in nature.

Iraq is an ever-changing, fast-paced world unlike anything else we will ever experience. As the war here continually changes, so too does every other part of our lives, and a phrase keeps coming to mind that I heard growing up..."Sometimes change is good, even if it’s bad."

Photos from journalist Nikola Solic

Photojournalist Nikola Solic has been embedded with one of the B-Battery platoons, and many of his pictures have been picked up by Reuter's, Yahoo News, and the NY Times.



All of Nikola's pictures can be found here



As I do a better job of picking out the relevant ones, I'll add to the list below:

Lt. Henson pouring out black-market gasoline





.

NY Times Photo-Op

New York Times
BUSH TO DECLARE PROGRESS IN IRAQ ON SOME FRONTS
July 12, 2007, Thursday



taken by Nikola Solic, photojournalist embedded with one of the B Battery Platoons; appeared in print on pg A-11.

Lt Patrick Henson is in the center; the first American soldier to the right of the Iraqi police officer.

unfortunately, I don't think I have the full text copied, but the story really wasn't about the 2-32.

Two-day clearing operation in Mansour nets cache, community support

Two-day clearing operation in Mansour nets cache, community support
Official Website of Multi-National Force - Iraq
BlackAnthem Military News
by: Multi-National Division - Baghdad POA Press Releases
July 8, 2007

BAGHDAD — Multi-National Division-Baghdad Soldiers, in conjunction with the Iraqi Army, conducted a two-day clearing operation in western Baghdad last week.

Task Force Patriot, the 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment, partnered with the 2nd “Falcon” Battalion, 5th Brigade, 6th Iraqi Infantry Division for the two-day operation, known as Operation Patriot Strike. The combined force cleared parts of the two neighborhoods of Hateen and Yarmouk in the Mansour District.

This was the first battalion-wide operation for the Patriots since Operation Arrowhead Strike IX in April and the first combined battalion-level effort for the Patriot and Falcon battalions. More than 100 Iraqi troops participated in the clearing operation.

The Patriot and Falcon leadership planned the operation together to combat violence in the area. Due to several improvised explosive devices, which either detonated or were found in the neighborhood, Coalition Forces and Iraqi leaders believed there to be an IED cell operating in west Yarmouk. They designed Patriot Strike to capture the members of this IED cell and clear the area of any weapon caches.

While Soldiers found no members of an IED cell, American and Iraqi troops did discover one cache of weapons and contraband. Additionally, the combined forces confiscated more than a dozen other illegally-owned weapons, mainly AK-47 assault rifless and pistols, and are confident that they have cleared the area of all illegal material.

Initially worried that the early morning hours of the operation would upset local residents, Patriot Soldiers instead found that the residents were receptive and opened their homes, eager to cooperate.

“The people seemed happy to let us search their houses. They fully cooperated with us as a way to prove that they are on our side,” said Sgt. 1st Class Rickie Jackson, a St. Louis native and platoon sergeant for Battery A, 2-32nd FA. Jackson added that the locals gave his platoon several tips about insurgents possibly operating in the area.

“This was an absolutely tremendous performance by our Soldiers and the soldiers of the Falcon Battalion,” said Lt. Col. Mike Lawson, commander of Task Force Patriot. “In just two days and despite the sweltering heat, our combined forces cleared over 500 homes. This will go a long way toward convincing the people of Hateen and Yarmouk that we’re here for their safety.”

Photos by 1st Lt. Ryan Stidum and 1st Lt. Matthew Offiler, 2nd Battalion, 32nd Field Artillery Regiment

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides

Dagger Brigade Weekly Slides
Dagger Brigade Combat Team Official Site
Week: July 2 - July 8
Slides: 40, 41

Deployment Relationship Workshop

CH Parson
SSG Brickner
PFC St. John
SGT Cope
SGT Carroll

NCO Induction Ceremony

SGT Goodwin
SSG Woode
CSM Champagne
CSM Huffin

The Patriot Call: Iraq Edition, Vol 1, Issue 6

The Patriot Call: Iraq Edition
Volume 1, Issue 6
July 6, 2007

Includes:

'Command Philosophy': by LTC michael J Lawson

'Our Newest NCOs': by CSM William R Huffin

'Free Thinking': by CH Troy Parson

'Changes': by SFC Daniel MoKim

'A Day in the Life of a Platoon Sergeant': by SFC Timothy Brown

'A Day in the Life of a Liaison Officer': by SFC Matthew Franklin

'My First Time in Iraq': by SFC Samuel Popple