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In an effort to get the word out as soon as possible, I am giving a big H/T to my fellow Afghan Lessons Learned milblogger, WOTN for the tip on this and I hope he does not mind I am repeating his blog here on Bouhammer. Please take a moment and join me in voting for FingerTipNews.
The Military, amongst others, have often complained of media bias. In fact, the MSM slant is a large part of why the War On Terror News main site was created. In follow-up to that, a close associate of mine, said to me: “If you think the media is so unfair, why don’t you start your own?” The “you” of that included others that didn’t participate, but the speaker of it has been less than happy with the amount of time it takes for such endeavors.
FingerTip found a different way to do similar things. An 11 year Air Force Veteran, FingerTipNews (fingertipnews.blogspot.com/)has been so successful that a spinoff @AllMilitaryNews was created. In the latter endeavor, many milbloggers and Supporters of Our Troops have benefitted by an aggregate of the many sites tweets being put in one spot, in one timeline
But FingerTip was also the leading source covering the Iran Election aftermath.
With all of that going for such an awesome tweeter, one would expect widespread support for someone going up against an MSM Giant that epitomizes the complaint such as CNN. But such is not the case and this is an area that the #SOT community can tip the balance. Voting in the Motorola Mashable Open Web Awards is running at a breakneck speed of about 60 votes a day. Recent sampling shows that about 1/3 of those are voting for FingerTip and another 1/3 for CNN.
As such, it’s possible that one big push could put FingerTip over the top, but the daily dedication of those that Support Our Troops would certainly bring greater awareness to the effort. Seems like a no-brainer to me. If you’re a part of SOT, particularly if you have benefitted from FingerTip or AllMilitary News, you should be voting every chance you can. That means daily, Chicago Style!
And while you’re there, don’t forget to vote for @ThankASoldier in Best Non-Profit Use of Social Media.
U.S. Army Spc. David Harris (left) and Staff Sgt. Nash Stratton, both with Charlie Company, 4th Battalion, 23rd Infantry Regiment, 5th Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division, arrive at Combat Outpost Sangar, Zabul, Afghanistan, on Nov. 17, 2009. Harris and Stratton are deployed to Afghanistan to conduct counterinsurgency operations. DoD photo by Tech. Sgt. Efren Lopez, U.S. Air Force.
I have said those worlds on this blog more times than I can remember. Anyone that I know who has been to both has said the same exact thing and told me I was dead on with that statement. Now it seems yet another soldier with experience in both reinforces the idea yet again.
“Before deploying here we were given training on language, culture, everything. I thought that since I was an Iraq combat veteran, I didn’t need any of that stuff. I was wrong. Both countries may be Muslim but this is a totally different place,” says Sgt. Michael McCann, returning from a patrol in the east-central province of Logar.
Another example is the terrain:
Soldiers and officers involved in combat operations all cite the more punishing geography and climate, those focused on development the bare-bones infrastructure, and intelligence specialists the even greater difficulties in identifying the insurgents as among the many sharp contrasts between Afghanistan and Iraq.
“The sheer terrain of Afghanistan is much more challenging: the mountains, the altitudes, severity of weather, the distances. That wears on an army,” says Maj. Joseph Matthews, a battalion operations officer in the 10th Mountain Division. “You can flood Baghdad with soldiers but if you want to flood the mountains you are going to need huge numbers and logistics.”
I know I have been somewhat absent here on Bouhammer.com the last few days. It has been a crazy last few days around the house and I just can never seem to find the time to write. There is no shortage of things to write about and I plan to catch up on some of those this weekend. I want to talk about the Obama decision (now that it appears to be happening), Eikenberry’s hypocritical mouth flapping, why I can see why Glenn Beck says the things he does, some cool things that the guys at Vision Strike Wear continue to do, and of course, many other things about Afghanistan.
For now though I would just like to wish all my readers and their families a Happy Thanksgiving. As the day winds to a close, I hope it was a day that was filled with reunion, good times, lots of great food, and a day of smiles and laughter. If your family member is deployed on this day, I hope you had a chance to talk with them. For those overseas I can tell you for the most part it was probably just one more day deployed like any other day, except with some better food for a change. For those in the States missing a deployed one, there were probably a few extra prayers said before dinner.
In my household, we said prayers for all of you, the deployed and the ones left behind.
KABUL — The Afghan government is raising police salaries by as much as two-thirds, with the U.S. and others footing the bill, in an effort to rein in corruption and boost recruitment.
The central government will increase Afghan National Police monthly pay in volatile provinces to $240 from $180, and in nonvolatile provinces to $200 from $120, Interior Ministry spokesman Zamarai Bashari said. He said the U.S. has pledged to pay for the wage increase for the first year, and other donor countries will contribute in subsequent years.
The move is part of an effort to bolster Afghan security forces in the face of a growing insurgency. As the Obama administration has considered options for a new Afghan war strategy, U.S. officials have recently focused attention on an option combining bringing in added forces for both combat and training.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown said this week he is “optimistic” that NATO countries are set to increase the number of troops that they contribute to the war.
A competent, professional police force will be essential for an eventual handover of responsibilities by the U.S.-led Western troops deployed here. President Hamid Karzai said in his inauguration address this month that he wants Afghan forces to take the lead within five years.
After observing approximately 15-20 bad guys cross the Afghan-Pakistan border in the same spot for two nights in a row, I decided to take a squad of Afghan National Army (ANA) soldiers, my Embedded Tactical Trainer (ETT) NCO, and myself to set up an overnight ambush along their avenue of approach.  Now for all of you Monday morning quarterbacks who are already saying to yourself why didn’t you set up an ambush after the first night or use mortars, artillery, or even call in air assets to eliminate this threat. Well, those are courses of action that were discussed but other priorities limited our manpower for maneuver capabilities, air coverage wasn’t available at the time, and we could only get a few mortar rounds off before the enemy would scurry back across the border into Pakistan and then our hands were tied with the rules of engagement.ÂÂ
As soon as darkness arrived, my squad of 12 ANA soldiers and I moved out towards the pre-determined ambush site. Not even 10 minutes into our movement, I received a radio call from one of the observation posts (OPs) that there were 15 bad guys crossing the border at the same location as the previous two nights. I then received a radio call from the 10th MTN commander at FOB Tillman wanting my element to take up a defensive position and hold because he had air assets (two F-16s) moving to our area of operations. When told of the estimated time of arrival (ETA) for the air was going to be approximately 20 minutes, I requested to continue my movement as I could have my element into an ambush position in approximately 15 minutes. Unfortunately, I was denied this request and found myself internally battling the adrenaline rush excitement of instinctively charging forward to inflict casualties upon enemy forces versus keeping a cool demeanor, follow orders, and reminding myself of the big picture and the many moving parts that are currently involved. In combat this moment is called having tactical patience.  Its a delicate balance of knowing when to put the hammer down and when to ease up and let the situation develop (something I’m sure General Custer could’ve used a little bit more of). ÂÂ
After the 20 minutes had passed for the arrival of our close air support I received another radio call informing me that the 2 F-16s were diverted to another location that was in a more dire situation at that moment but we should have 2 Apache helicopters on station within 10 minutes. I requested again to maneuver my small element toward the enemy to set up the ambush as they were now approximately 1200 meters from my current position. Again, I was denied and at this point I’m starting to feel like the kid who gets picked last for dodge ball. I also have to explain the denied request to the ANA soldiers, who are starting to act like a cranky 7 year old kid jacked up on Mountain Dew, is being forced to stand outside Disney World and is told that he can’t go play. Now this is a prime example of the cultural differences between US soldiers and Afghan soldiers. In this situation US soldiers might grumble a little but will drive on with little explanation on why. The ANA soldiers react much differently as most are unable to keep their emotions in check. I informed the ANA that I was very disappointed in their ability to maintain their military bearing and they can/need to do better because we still have bad guys out there in front of us. I was basically using the same tactics on them as I would a middle-school classroom full of ADD/ADHD students.ÂÂ
Shortly after getting the kids, I mean, the ANA settled down the Apaches did come on station. The Apache pilots dropped down to my radio frequency to confirm my location and the bad guys location. After having them positively identify my location (my NCO partner and I were wearing infra-red strobes that are only visible with night vision devices), the Apaches began their gun runs and quickly neutralized the majority of the bad guys. Unfortunately, five were able to run back across the Pakistan border to play another day. Just another chapter of the cat and mouse game played out along the Afghan-Pakistan border.
In a rare fatal incident, two American troops have drowned in Afghanistan, while trying to recover equipment from a northwestern river, security officials say. The soldiers died on Wednesday, while trawling in the Badghis province’s Bala-Murghab River for lost supply packages, the area’s Deputy Police Chief Mohammed Jabbar told a Press TV correspondent. The supplies were lost as a US aircraft was dropping caissons and food parcels on the troops’ base.
It is such a waste and so sad that these two brave Sergeants had to die this way. It either goes to show how important those supplies were that one of them risked his life to retrieve them from a fast-moving river or that he was that dedicated to being a soldier and making sure no supplies were lost. It does show that one soldier cared so much about his “battle-buddy” that he ignored the risks and jumped in after his buddy to save him, but lost his own life.
It is stories like this that make me want to work harder at what I do, as I work with the folks that have influence in the technologies into making sure that supply drops are more accurate and don’t end up in a tragedy like this. I feel for the families of these brave and courageous young men.
