Dazed and Confused

Some of the funniest quotes from my soldiers thus far have come as we near the end of an all night mission--heads are bobbing, speach is slurred, reports are fuzzy and vague, an altogether regretable state of affairs for a platoon in the throes of combat but one which is inevitable given the schedule of patrols we keep. As an introduction to these quotes I will simply state you are peering out from your vehicle into the town/highway/house/back of your eyelids you are currently overwatching when you turn to say something to a fellow soldier in the vehicle. Sure enough, that soldier is "blindly contemplating", sound asleep. "Hey, John Doe! Wake up!" And much like a dog ate my homework, a classic excuse is immediately offered up. The highlights:

1) "I don't know, sergeant, I just closed my eyes to blink and they wouldn't open."

2) "I'm awake but my neck is tired!"

3) "I'm just trying to...fix...something....down here....Okay, finished, I'm good."

4) "I was just resting my eyes for a little bit, figured I could listen for awhile, I'll go back to looking now."

5) "#$%& we've been out here a long time, Sir!!"

These responses usually have the effect of setting off the rest of the truck in an uproar which if nothing else serves to wake us up for awhile longer. Night after night we are encountered with the biggest enemy in an at most semi-kinetic fight, complacency. Let the enemy see where exactly your soft underbelly is and prepare to get tickled on it. So we wake up, slap ourselves to rush some blood to our face, and focus in on whatever it is we happen to be overwatching.

The latest update I can give you is with the Sadr uprising in Basrah, Najaf, and Sadr City we had some minor unrest in our own town among his supporters which has caused us to again amp up our efforts in a preemptive measure to keep the lid on the situation. At least it seems to be working. Now the latest is Sadr has called off his supporters and is currently kicking back in Iran getting an earful for stirring up the Americans and possibly delaying what otherwise seemed to be the inevitable drawback and transition to financial support that will come post-election '08. I think the larger question in all this is what happens when we leave? Who's going to put the lid on a largely popular fanatic when the police force consists of at least a large contingent of supporters at worst and sympathizers at best? Who is their unifying figure the country will rally around, someone who rises above the religious and ideological squabbles and bloodbaths and unites the tribes and sects and provinces under an Iraqi banner. At some point for them to be a successful democracy there has to emerge at least a nationalist impulse among the people which shuns entangling alliances with Iran and Syria and compels men to work for the greater good of the whole. Right now their interests go as far as our checkbook leads them and when the pen that signs the checks runs out of ink I will be very interested to see who they turn to for sustenance--the government or their religious leaders?