Respect the Law and Use it

Coming in to FOB Warrior yesterday I saw a sign that said "Respect the Law and Use it", it then repeated it self in Arabic underneath. I saw the sign and thought to myself first off "that would be a real cool sign to steal" you know if it didn't mean getting out of my truck in the middle of Clemson, especially after having pissed off half the town of Kirkuk. How did I piss off half the town of Kirkuk? Well that is the story I am about to tell.
The convoy had been stopped for about an hour for a suspected improvised explosive device. I was the gun truck commander for Gun 4 at the rear of the convoy. Usually Gun 4 is pretty boring relatively few decisions to make and most of the time all you say over the radio is "Copy" or "All vehicles clear check point". Today was another matter though. A large amount of vehicles had gathered about 200 meters behind us on the road. The road was curving around and a lot of tractor trailers where parked to the side hiding the approach of any incoming vehicles towards us. Suddenly a navy blue 4 door Opel sedan came around the parked tractors, flying at us at a extremely high rate of speed. My gunner started yelling and waving his arms at the vehicle. It still didn't stop. 50 meters away. "Crack,....Crack" One warning shot, then another. The vehicle locked them up and slid to a stop. After about a minutes hesitation the vehicle turned around and sped off. About twenty minutes later the same thing happened. The vehicle looked suspiciously like the one that had taken a run at us earlier. It sure seemed liked it was testing us. Normally I won't report warning shots because you have to go through the Spanish Inquisition afterwards, but this time I decided to let the C2 know what was going on. This vehicle was acting very suspicious, much like a VBIED (Vehicle Bourn Improvised Explosive Device to you civilians) . If it did it again this guy was going to get lit up by the .50. Luckily a few minutes later EOD cleared the suspected IED that we had been stopped for and we started rolling out. This is when things started getting exciting. The convoy came up on a traffic circle. Our route of travel required us to enter in the circle at 6 o'clock and leave at 12. Well Gun 2 missed putting up the block as they entered the traffic circle so a large amount of civilian traffic was able to infiltrate to convoy. This screwed up the KBR drivers who didn't really have a idea of where they where going to begin with. So the ninth KBR fuel tanker, (oh yeah by the way the trucks we where escorting where fuel tankers full of aircraft fuel) exited the traffic circle at 3 o'clock a very bad thing to do in the middle of a extremely crowded city in the middle of the day. Gun 3 had managed to set up a block when they got to the circle so after my truck entered the circle they tried to bound up to the front of our part of the separated convoy. Hundreds of hayji vehicle are all around us, 3 is trying to get to the front literally pushing vehicles off the road to get to the front. Gun 4 is still in the back. 5 miles down the road we finally come to a stop. Gun 3 had stopped us on a frickin bridge!!! I'm on the radio cussing at gun 3 to move us. He finally pulls his head out and puts a block on west bound. I hop to the front of our element and start leading us to safety. There was so much traffic in the way. It was literally like parting the Red Sea of vehicles. I felt like frickin Moses or something. We finally got back the traffic circle and took the right turn and caught back up with the rest of the convoy. Every one else in my truck and myself where so wound up that when we finally got back on base 5 minutes later we all almost fell asleep after all the adrenaline drained away. It was pretty intense for a while. So many people glaring at you. People pointing at you, so many vehicles. Our 5 ton truck literally rammed a couple vehicles to get them out of the way, pushed them off the road. Some crazy stuff. Any way the trip back was very quiet and that is the story, mostly.
Ben
out

It's Time to Listen

This is a great article and one that I think puts our whole "world epidemic" in to perspective. If people would really just start listening (and especially respecting) other people, where they come from, and their life experience, this world just might be a better place.

Imagine an America that had been listening to the voices in the Middle East. Not interviews with military consultants on CNN, but traumatized Palestinian children, the Israeli whose family disappeared in a bomb blast, the castigated Afghan widow, the Iraqi father who cannot find or afford medicine for his daughter. What if we had been listening for years, no, let’s say decades?

Click Here for full article: http://www.odemagazine.com/article.php?aID=4141