Monday, November 12, 2012

A Letter From an American Soldier in Afghanistan

 
 
I'm not going to worry about party lines anymore. I think the phrase "the more things change the more they stay the same" applies. Domestically, individuals should take control of their own future and quit depending on a politician or some other figure to improve their situation. Foreign policy seems to be entirely run by corporations, and honestly who really matters? Like 5 countries are carrying the rest of the world.

Guess that sounds pretty negative. For now that's how I my political opinion sits. My fellow Americans want socialism. I want property and guns!

Openly gay in the military has never been a good idea. Better just not bring it up. We all make sacrifices in the military, being gay and keeping it hidden should have stayed that way.

Our mis-management of the Embassy attack in Libya has heads rolling. A General made a decision to go against orders and called up a response team was recently relieved of his position. In my opinion the top brass should all have difficulties sleeping at night knowing they allowed Americans to die while they did nothing. Of all the topics I have not cared about, this one has my attention. We deserve answers.



Enough politics. You probably wonder what I'm doing here. Right now I'm training the Afgan version of a SWAT team. There's a joint effort here with SOF members from 10 or so different countries and some contractors all working to train these guys. As of now we're supposed to be mentoring Afgans instructors who in turn run most of the training. We're under funded and under supported, on top of that this program is less than 1 year old so it's a young program. I'm happy I learned ........  Dari or Pashtu. If I spoke either of those that would be great. We have 2 interpreters assigned to my team..



Afghanistan is every bit as 3rd world as you can imagine. The smell of Kabul was horrible. I'm so happy I work in mountains away from that place. Pretty desolate here but people still function and try to find their happiness within their means. The Taliban is everywhere. There's no beating it in my opinion. The villages are too disconnected. I have heard other SOF guys tell me they have visited isolated towns and the locals really thought they were Russian. They had absolutely no clue what was happening. The government has no control due to the lack of mobility.



My focus so far is to learn the motivation of my students. Why are they here? Why do they want to be police, nonetheless why to be a SWAT police. So far their motivations are much to their own and very subjective. In Iraq the Iraqis were proud to be Iraqi and that nationalism I could identify with, understand, and use. Afgans are all over the map. My approach has been to motivate them to be SWAT commandos, to be better than the regular police, have more discipline and pride in the fact they've been chosen to be Special. We'll see how that goes. The underlying fear is that the students will turn their guns on us. Thankfully I know many truly wish the foreign militarises no ill will. So, we're likely not to be overrun but sporadic incidents have occurred often over that last 60 days. I'm sure you've heard. Luckily none have been from the SWAT police nor have they occurred at the training centers like this one. Still, I carry my pistol every where and when they have their guns with ammo I'll be on guard. But, the struggle is we have to let our guard down to get through the training.



Well, that's about it for that. My final thoughts this evening is that I have decided to try my best to get stationed stateside as soon as I can. Germany is great. But, not having the ability to see my family during a weekend or go out to shot guns is a drag. Colorado will likely be where I'll end up. Hopefully in the CIF company there. Communications?  I'd rather just shot stuff, blow up doors, and fast rope from helicopters like I did in that school I was at.

No comments: