Threats keep Hawai'i troops alert
By William Cole
Advertiser Military Writer
LSA ANACONDA, Iraq — On the first anniversary of the return of sovereignty to Iraq, Hawai'i National Guard soldiers spent the day Tuesday on heightened security, wearing body armor and helmets everywhere they went.
Photos by Richard Ambo • The Honolulu Advertiser
Security for U.S. troops remains of paramount concern as insurgents have taken to using vehicle-borne explosives and follow-up attacks to breach gates, in addition to lobbing mortars at bases such as Anaconda.
Hawai'i Guardsmen from the 227th Engineer Company wait out a mortar attack. From left: Pfc. Melvin Caraang, Spc. Lionel Quindica, Staff Sgt. Aurelio Bungcayao and Spc. Sterling Naki. Mortar attacks on LSA Anaconda, while still high, have decreased from 2004.
The Logistical Support Area, or LSA, about 50 miles north of Baghdad, is the most heavily mortared and rocketed base in the theater, and Hawai'i soldiers play a key role in its defense.
On Tuesday, a car bomb exploded at the gate of Forward Operating Base O'Ryan just a few minutes south of LSA Anaconda.
The Associated Press reported that a U.S. soldier was killed by the suicide bomber, and another soldier was being treated for wounds.
A group of Hawai'i soldiers is training counterparts with an Iraqi army battalion at FOB O'Ryan, but officials said none from Hawai'i was injured.
A year after the U.S. occupation authority turned over sovereignty to Ayad Allawi's interim government on June 28, 2004, attacks on U.S. troops remain rampant.
Some of the cyclical violence aimed at LSA Anaconda derives from hard-core insurgents pushed out of such places as Baghdad.
In some cases, it's dirt-poor farmers paid $100 to plant a roadside bomb. The wheat, watermelon and sunflower fields that surround the 15-square-mile air base also provide low-traffic areas from which insurgents can fire bombs.
The result is that at entry points such as the North gate, where more than 150 vehicles and 1,200 Iraqi workers enter the base every day, Hawai'i soldiers with the 29th Support Battalion are constantly on the alert for attacks.
More than 100 U.S. and Iraqi forces guard the entryway, one of several on base, with a gauntlet of checkpoints, armored vehicles and heavy firepower.
Iraqis entering the base are subject to pat-down searches and metal-detector checks.
U.S. base security has increased dramatically in Iraq, especially since a Christmas suicide attack on a base dining hall in Mosul that killed 22.
In March, Iraqi teens on bicycles threw a bomb onto the top of a truck entering LSA Anaconda. In that case, the driver spotted it. Some Iraqi insurgents have attempted to attach "sticky" bombs to trucks.
Insurgents not 'dumb'
A 100th Battalion, 442nd Infantry Regiment convoy got hit by a roadside bomb just outside the base.
"The anti-Iraqi forces — they aren't dumb," said 1st Sgt. Yale Alama, 43, a Wai'anae High School graduate from Kapahulu who works at the North Gate. "They observe our reactions and watch from fields with binoculars."
Faleafine
Hawai'i soldiers also range outside the base on security patrols in armored vehicles, said Capt. Joseph Burdett Jr., 38, who lives in Kailua. All of it is done in 100-plus-degree heat in body armor.
"We want to show (the insurgents) we're out here, we mean business and they aren't going to penetrate our gate — not during our watch. And we've been successful," Burdett said.
Alama, a 6-foot-3 former Wai'anae High football player, had it put in different terms from Brig. Gen. Joseph Chaves, who commands the 29th Brigade Combat Team, and 29th Support Battalion commander Lt. Col. Norman Saito.
"They said if there's a breach, you better see tank treads on your chest and not your back, because if it's on your chest you stayed (and fought), and if it's on your back, you were running away," Alama said jokingly.
Highlighting the impact of the insurgents' guerrilla-style attacks, U.S. officials recently met with insurgent leaders near Anaconda in what was characterized by the Pentagon as Shiite-facilitated efforts to reach out to disenfranchised Sunni Arabs believed to be behind many of the bombings.
As a security precaution on the June 28 sovereignty anniversary, soldiers at Anaconda were under orders to wear body armor and helmets any time they were outside.
Normally, they wear their uniform on base and carry their weapon, but only wear a helmet if they are driving.
On Sunday, six 82 mm mortar rounds fired by an insurgent known alternatively as "Six-Round Charlie," or "10-Round Charlie" — depending on how many he lobs — slammed into the base. No Hawai'i soldiers were hurt.
A lot of good people
Despite the ongoing threat, Hawai'i Guard soldiers such as Sgt. Sterling Beair, 22, a medic with C Company, 29th Support Battalion who lives in 'Aiea but was raised in 'Ewa Beach, said he believes a lot of Iraqis are good people.
Beair, who works for Clinical Laboratories of Hawaii at St. Francis West, has treated hundreds of Iraqis who show up at the North gate.
Hawai'i Guardsman 1st Sgt. Yale Alama guards the entrance gate of LSA Anaconda. The logistical support area, about 50 miles north of Baghdad, faces the heaviest mortar rounds and rocket attacks in the theater, and Hawai'i soldiers play a significant role in its defense.
"Their heart is there, but they just don't know how to go about (improving their country)," Beair said. "When I do talk to them, they do want to build their country, they do want the freedoms they would get to enjoy."
The number of mortar attacks, although still high, is down from last year at Anaconda, and Chaves, who has base defense responsibilities, wants to keep it that way.
"The mortar attack trend is going down, but the (improvised explosive device) attacks are about constant," Chaves said.
Hawai'i soldiers also man towers, and respond with mortar counter-fire when the base is attacked.
LSA Anaconda, at one time a temporary exile for one of Saddam Hussein's sons, is home to more than 20,000 service members, and is being built up as a long-term use facility.
Army Reserve soldiers with the 100th, 442nd are responsible for patrolling an area that includes 70,000 people on three sides of Anaconda, and also fire mortars against the enemy.
Capt. James Faleafine, 37, a Radford High graduate and the 29th Brigade fire support officer, takes the mortar attacks on base personally.
"I just want to kill the guy, that's all," Faleafine said. "If you shoot one, we'll shoot three to five at you, and we're more accurate."
Although U.S. forces use sophisticated surveillance and radar technology, insurgents still get away with mortar attacks that can come from two to three miles away.
Faleafine said in some weeks about 25 mortars or rockets will be fired on Anaconda. On other weeks, there are none.
Because the base is so large, with a lot of wide-open airfield, mortar strikes usually do not cause any injuries. It's also unusual for an insurgent to fire up to 10 mortars because the location can be pinpointed, mortars and artillery can be fired back at the dusty farmlands that surround the base, and a "quick reaction force" can be dispatched to the spot where the attack originated.
For the most part, life goes on uninterrupted at the base, which has a movie theater, two swimming pools and even Subway and Burger King.
Although soldiers with the 100th, 442nd have been wounded off base, and 21 Purple Hearts have been awarded or are in the process of being awarded, there have been no injuries from attacks on the base.
When an attack occurs, a siren sounds and everyone heads to a concrete building or one of many concrete tunnel-like structures spread around the base.
"It's not so bad here," said Spc. Jason Ryan from Honolulu, 30, who is also a medic. Then he caught himself, adding, "But how do you say it's not so bad when you take rockets, mortar attacks and (improvised explosive devices)?"
