Chuck YarboroughIRAQ DIARY 02/09/04Basra, Iraq - At 11:25 a.m. Sunday, the two-vehicle convoy passed a heavy concrete divider that had a single sentence spray-painted on it: WE LOAV U.S. ARMEY. We were in Iraq, right where Saddam Hussein had filled a ditch with crude oil and set it on fire during his ignominious retreat from Kuwait in the first Gulf War. Until you see it, you can't really believe Iraq. It's a dirty, nasty countryside that looks like the tide just went out on the River Styx. The road along the border is lined with bedraggled children, most shoeless and all filthy, pointing at their mouths, begging for scraps, money or anything else they can get. And if you don't give it to them, they might steal it. As we waited in one of the many stops it took to finally cross the border, I watched one child try in vain to steal a chain securing one of the Baghdad-bound prefab trailers that serve as living quarters for coalition workers. Each time we ground to a stop - as we did often - our South African personal security detachment (PSD, as it's called here), went on high alert.[/i] Conrad Blything drove our heavily armored Toyota Land Cruiser and Braan Protorius - Pottie to his colleagues and charges - rode shotgun. Or more accurately, rode AK-47. Task Force Shield commander Col. Tom O'Donnell, fresh off 10 days in the United States briefing National Security Adviser Condoleeza Rice's deputy on the progress of providing security for the Iraqi oil pipeline, and I rode in the back seat. O'Donnell, who'd been chatty as we made the two-hour trip from Kuwait City to the border, grew silent and placed his 45-caliber Colt on the seat between us. He and I were in desert camouflage uniforms, Kevlar helmets and flak jackets. Conrad and Pottie sported black flak jackets, complete with steel armor. Trailing us in an unarmored Jeep were the rest of the Erinys Co. [/i][A Johannesburg-based security company - miko] team assigned to protect O'Donnell.[/i] Both vehicles were purposely heavy with road grime from a trip Saturday from Baghdad to Kuwait City to pick us up. Bright, shiny cars are a signal that a naive potential victim is in the area. Easy pickings. We drove to Basra, in the heart of the Romailah oil fields, the richest in Iraq, where crude oil often bubbles in the desert like smelly ponds of ooze, and toured the grounds of the biggest refinery in the country. At each gate, dozens of armed guards waved, smiled and checked under our Land Cruiser for explosives. Welcome to Iraq.
Originally posted by Martlet What's this "we" business?
Originally posted by miko2d Pei: I imagine there are a lot of people in Iraq needing that kind of protection right now. True - according to Washington Post (Feb 18), U.S. and coalition military cannot provide adequate protection for foreign contractors and iraqi colaborationists, so dozens of private security companies and thousands of private armed guards are working there. But I did not think US troops needed that kind of protection. miko
Originally posted by miko2d I can imagine the conversation.President Bush: Tommy, we need you to set up security for the oil pipeline in Iraq. Report to Condi on your progress.Col. Tom O'Donnell: Iraq! Oh Sh#t! That place is denagerous!President Bush: Don't worry. We will give you protection.Col. Tom O'Donnell: OK. But don't give me those sh#tty american troopers. I need people who know how to ride patrol in hostile territory.President Bush: Of course not! You get south africans with real AK-47s.... miko
