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Here's some feedback from an army combat engr currently inIraq . Quote :
Its been 2 months since I sat down and wrote a long letter . A lot
hashappened . In early July, our company was tasked with facilitating
the payment of former members of the Iraqi Army . They gave us location
and they gave us the people with the money and we made it happen . It
was a company mission that lasted about four weeks. My platoon was
tasked with night securit on site to guard the money. My guys said there
were firefights (Iraqi vs Iraqi ) every night out there . That mission
didn't involve  much on mypart , aside from ensuring the  guard force
was prepared ad properly rested . It was a nice break from the usual
running around town . The night that Uday and Qusay were killed was a
pretty exciting evening . All of a suuden , at 10:30 PM , gunfire
erupted all over the city . My whole platoon and I hopped up onthe roof
of our Bldg with our rifles and watched the night sky , tracer fire
coming up 360 degrees around us in the distance . AT first we thought it
wassome kind of coordinated attack , but we figured after about five
minutes of (fire? ed. ) it ws just celebratory fire . Apparently falling
bullets killed a lot of Iraqi that night . Once the pay mission ended ,
we  received a new Battalion CO . He brought to the table a whole new
cocept for Combat Engineers in a peacekeeping role . Since early Aug , I
have been Project Manager ( pretty close to my major in college )> I am
working with an Infantry Task Force inteir sector . We work with local
Iraqi Neighborhood Advisory Counsels ( NACs ), which were set up in each
neighborhood by the Army to let people ge a first taste of demoracy .
The NACs vote on , prioritize . and submit to us schools , public
utilities , parks , infrastructure , and , generally , messes that need
serious repairs, renovations , and clean up . Of the 20 schools they've
asked us to fix ,most were built in the 30s and 40s , and hav'nt seen
any major repairs since .We are using confiscated Ba'ath Party funds to
pay civilian contractors to come inand renovate these schools completely
. Right now , I have  10 schools lined up waiting for funding approval ,
allof which went through a bidding process with three local contractors
. I work with an Iraqi namedJassim who's a mechanical . Real nice guy .
He and I spend our days driving around town together in my HMMWV . He
assesses the scope of work amd writes the tender for each project ,
solicits bids forom local contractors , then I handle the bidding
process , the paper work , the funding requests through the Rmy and
management of the project . Together , he and I will QC th construction
and ensure that the work done is quality . Money is no object . Saddam's
paying for all of it this . These schools are going to be done right
.Its pretty amazing what we are about to do . We just had the first two
projects approved tonight (26 Aug ) . Once the contracts are signed ,
construction will begin .Both projects are worth about 45000 eavh . The
most expensive one I have lined up is 118000 , which had to be broken
dwn into multiple , smaller projects in order to get the funding
approved . I work about 19 hours a day doing this stuff , but it's a
worthwhile mission .During the day I drive around tesector with Jassim
and soldiers from my platoon as a security element , looking at schools
, sewage stations , parks andeven broken traffic lghts .There's a lot of
broke stuff , let me tell you . And just for the record , none of my
projects involve any war damage , aside from the schoolthat the
republican guard decided to live in , fight from , and trash before
ditching their iniforms and running away . We didn't break one tenth of
this stuff . This is how Iraqi lived under Saddam . What's realy blowen
my mind is the reality of the NGO's that are working here . Ihave
personally een the work of three of them , and I have to say that these
groups are nothing but self-serving , inefficient , crooked
organizations. When you drop money in a UNICEF jar at a McDonalds
somewhere , you think your'e helping someone , right ? Not really . I've
seen first hand the work that UNICEF ( UN Childrens group , the one that
used to con us into collecting for them at Hallween when we were kids )
, IRD ( International Reconstruction andDevelopment ) and UNDP (another
useless UN organization ) have done here . UNDP andUNCEF have succeeded
in causing serious problems withthe sewage system here because they
quick fixed a major pmping station rather than paid for a quality job.
I've driven out to this same neighborhood every week for a month
now because a lack of sewage erupts every other day from this station
that UNDP said they "fixed" 2 months ago . Another experience witha
crooked NGO  is the group IRD > They've been going around to schools
offering to paint and spackle and change light bulbs . Five of the
schools I've beenworking onwere IRD schools that the NACs wante us to do
. The NACs want nothing to do withthese "himanitarian " organizations .
They say they're crooks and wont have their names associated with te
work that these people want to "do" . These aid organizations just want
to do the minimum , and then boast about how much they have done ( and
then ask for more donations ) . It seem like their mission is more to
sustain their ownnexistence and pay their overhead , rather thanactully
help peolpe in a real , long term way . Believe it or not< despite the
constant negativity I knowis being spewed fromthe media ,the Amy is
doing really great humanitarian things out here , and very slowly
conditions are starting to improve . MY task force is planning a toy
drive for the five ophanages in our sector for around Christmas time (
or for those Politically Correct out there , as a late Ramadan
gift-giving event ) . A Captan from my Task Force Staff walked through
one of these orphanages this week and said it brok his heart > One of
the little kids he talked to had nothing to play with but a pile of old
soda cans that he would use like building blocks. If anyone wants to
contibute < please send me toys or whateve and I'll make sure they get
to these orphanges by winter time . I,m looking forward to getting this
construction started next week . By late Oct every school in my sector
should be cmpletely renovated , or 85 o/o there . One thing I don't
understand is all the confusion about this UN bombng ? Why is everyone
so surprised ? The UN did all it could tokeep Saddam in power .If I wre
a UNofficial , I'd stay as far away frm Baghdad as posible . I'm not
sure what kind of crediblity these people think they have in this part
of the world . but it isn,t much . Jassim even asked me rhetorically why
they were evn in Iraq at all ? Iraqi 's have satellite TV now . They
know hown hard the UN tried to prevent this war from happening . This
week I even went out to a hotel that UN officials were staying in since
vacating their former residence . The needed an engineer estimateon
securit and barricade construction . American soldiers were standing
guard outside the hotel . One euro-looking UN guy gave me adirty look
when i walked into the hotel lobby . I guess they got  better service at
hotela when Saddam was around .This past month was reall amazing . My
unit is helping these people far more than I ever thought a combat
engineer battalion could . As much as I miss Germany and home anddecent
weather and decent food , I'm pretty motivated about our job out here .
We have 8 months to go, and there's a lot of stuff to fix . That's all
i've got . I'm taking a lot of pictures and trying to document thia as
much as possible . Looking to making this a   picture
slide show when I get home > I havn't written a letter in almost 2 wks ,
and I definitely have a lot of thankyous towrite. I'll be in touch soon
though , I promise . Scott UNQUOTE . Sent by Bob Dalrympe .