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Chickens fly the coop, and U.S. troops move in

Mar-22-2008 » Filed Under: 2/25 SBCT

By James Warden, Stars and Stripes

TARMIYAH, IRAQ — Most soldiers call this growing patrol base simply “The Chicken Coop.”

That’s not just colorful military lingo. About a week ago, the base was exactly that. Soldiers from 1st Battalion, 14th Infantry Regiment arrived here to find feathers, feeding troughs and other chicken waste.

Rough as The Chicken Coop is, it’s an important part of the battalion’s expansion into the rural areas northeast of Taji, said 1st Lt. Calvin Kline, the battalion’s information and operations officer. This area is a longtime refuge for insurgents “dubbed the arms room of al-Qaida.” Prior units saw fierce fighting here. The insurgents even managed to shoot down an Apache helicopter in 2005.

The fighting and roadside bombs were so bad that the area’s main east-west road was mostly off-limits to coalition forces. Just as bad, attackers were chasing “Sons of Iraq” guards from their stations, putting a dent in American security initiatives.

Sgt. Erik Helms, a 1-14 Stryker commander, was stationed south of Taji in 2005. The road’s reputation made it tense the couple of times he had to drive it during that deployment. It had gaping holes, including one large enough to hide a coffin, that made perfect places to hide the roadside bombs Americans feared so much.[...]


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