Stryker Brigade News

Counter Balance

Dec-30-2003 » Filed Under: Iraq News

The article we decided to post yesterday regarding Samarra was one man's portrayal of life in Iraq right now. Eric Schmitt with the NYT has a great article in today's paper which offers a different perspective. Without help from organizations like the U.N., U.S. soldiers are being asked to wear many different hats, and doing the job exceptionally. Excerpt:

When First Lt. Ryan Peay reported for duty here in mid-October, his assignment was to call in 105-millimeter artillery strikes on the opposing forces' positions. With major combat in Iraq long over, that job lasted about two days.

Instead, Lieutenant Peay, 24, was thrown into the breach as his battalion's civil affairs officer, responsible for hiring the unit's 20 Iraqi interpreters, employing hundreds of Iraqi guards and setting priorities for $1.5 million in requests from local leaders for new wells, schools, hospitals and Internet cafes...

With civilian aid experts still in short supply or scared off by the security threats, the story of Lieutenant Peay and others like him is told hundreds, if not thousands, of times over as the American military continues to shoulder the biggest effort to help a nation restore its civilian society since the end of World War II...

"It's the smile-and-wave campaign," said Maj. Shawn Phillips, 35, of Flemington, N.J., the operations officer for Second Battalion. "You have one hand on your machine gun and the other waving at kids, handing out soccer balls."