Troops mop up and rebuild after the war

By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer

KIRKUK AIR BASE, Iraq — Sgt. Dennis Moore, sitting on a bench outside a building on this old Iraqi air base, looks like the weight of the world is on his shoulders.

Pvt. Jared Baxter of Farmington, N.M., stands guard at a house in Kirkuk being searched by troops from Company C, 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment, and the 173rd Airborne Brigade. During the Iraqi occupation, Hawai'i soldiers are going after insurgents and helping with reconstruction. Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser

His desert camouflage uniform has a slept-in look, his knee-

pads dangle at his ankles and, right at the moment, he's tired.

The morning before, the Schofield Barracks soldier had gone out for seven hours to reconnoiter a spot for a target range. From 6:30 p.m. until about 1 a.m. he had a mission related to finding "Rocket Man," an insurgent who has made a name for himself firing rockets at the base.

Five hours later, the team leader from the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry ("Gimlets"), was out in the city again — this time on a neighborhood "cordon and search."

A year after the United States launched the first strikes in Operation Iraqi Freedom on March 19, 2003, the job for soldiers like Moore — who was here then, too — is different, but often no easier.

The 23-year-old parachuted into H-1 Airport west of Baghdad on March 29 with the 3rd Ranger Battalion out of Fort Benning, Ga.

"It seems a lot more peaceful," Moore said as he prepared to head out on yet another mission. "It feels like not all of them (Iraqis) want to get you. A lot actually like what you are doing here."

As the nation reflects on the war, the anniversary is not something that soldiers on the ground are dwelling on particularly.

"We don't focus too much on what's going on with news of the war," said Spc. Kalani Ng, a 23-year-old medic from Kane'ohe who's with 1-21. "It's more what we're going to do this year and what we're going to do with the extra money we get when we get back home."

About 3,500 Schofield soldiers with the 2nd Brigade Combat Team arrived in Iraq last month for a yearlong mission. In addition to rooting out insurgents, the soldiers are helping to rebuild Iraq's infrastructure, from schools to police and the Iraqi Civil Defense Corps, a form of National Guard.

Sgt. Dennis Moore Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser

"First, I can tell you that among the society now, you see democratic conduct spreading among the minds of the people and they are going to learn, day after day, better," said Yassin Osman Aziz, 51, an interpreter for U.S. forces and a former teacher who grew up in Kirkuk.

"Before, in Saddam's time, we have only two newspapers," Aziz said — and those were run by the Baath Party "just to praise Saddam."

"If you go down in the city now, you see more than 100 newspapers and magazines. This means everyone can express their ideas."

In Saddam's time, teachers were paid 4,000 dinars a month — about $3, Aziz said. Now they receive about $320.

"So this payment is very, very good for now," Aziz said. "Because of the war, the living standard was very bad. Now I see, day after day, it will be better."

At a public forum at the Pentagon on Friday, U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld noted the signing of an Iraqi interim constitution guaranteeing freedom of religion and expression; the right to assemble and to organize political parties; the right to demonstrate; the right to vote.

"One year ago, none of those protections could have been imagined by the Iraqi people," Rumsfeld said. "Today they're real. It's an historic moment in history, one that shows the power of freedom."

Spc. Robert Hall, 25, who's with the 1st Battalion, 27th Infantry Regiment ("Wolfhounds"), based southwest of Kirkuk, also served in Iraq at the start of the war and is back.

Hall, who is from Benicia, Calif., was part of a platoon of Schofield soldiers parceled out to different units as casualty replacements.

Flying into Iraq by Chinook helicopter, he linked up on March 26 with the 2nd Battalion, 502nd Parachute Infantry Regiment, at a soap factory near Mosul in the north.

"Every time we came to a city, we were the first to engage," said Hall, who described firefights as "controlled chaos."

"Pretty much everything you do in training is the way it was," he said. "You don't realize until you are sitting at home watching it on TV — and it's like, damn, I was getting shot at, I could be dead."

Hall said living conditions for soldiers have taken a 180-degree change for the better.

"We pretty much did everything first," he said. "There were no conexes (trailers to live in), no PXs. It was MREs (pre-packaged meals) and water."

Hall, who was in theater about four months the first time around, said it's hard to believe that the war started a year ago.

"I'm glad to see we're doing good things now and they (Iraqis) are accepting us a little bit more than last year," he said. "But we still have a long way to go."

He faults the news media for focusing on the negative, and not enough on the positive.

"They don't see us giving out the food or building schools. I have yet to see a school opening on CNN or a town getting a phone connection. All you see is: 'Another five soldiers died.' ... "

Moore, the 1-21 sergeant, went to Afghanistan with the 3rd Ranger Battalion in June 2002 and conducted about 75 combat patrols in 90 days out of Asadabad in the northeast along the Pakistan border.

He got married in December and three months later parachuted into Iraq from a C-17 — an entry he doesn't entirely recall because he hit his head hard on the landing and received a concussion.

"I was basically walking around talking, but I don't remember it," he said. "The next morning, I woke up (in the tactical operations center) and then linked back up with my platoon."

Moore's unit watched for fighters trying to flee to Syria. Three of the soldiers were killed in a suicide bombing when a pregnant women jumped out of a car and blew it up, he said.

He arranged a permanent change of station to Hawai'i, thinking "I would never get deployed again because Hawai'i doesn't get deployed."

Since serving in Vietnam, the 25th Division had remained a bulwark against possible North Korean aggression.

Moore said his wife hates it that he has been deployed to combat zones so often.

"In the past three years, I haven't spent a birthday with my wife, I'm always gone," he said. "(But) it's my job. I have to do what I have to do."

The 3rd Platoon team leader was able to pass on to his soldiers some of the experience he gained from being in Iraq before.

Moore said U.S. forces "are doing a lot of good things — like getting a police force in to try and stop some of the crime that's going on."

"We're on the right track. What we're doing is going to help, but, in my opinion, it's going to take a lot longer than they think," he said. "For the next 10 years, we're going to be either here or in Afghanistan trying to fight the war on terrorism."