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WANT TO REALLY SUPPORT OUR TROOPS IN IRAQ? |
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Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler
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Friday, 01 June 2007 |
Everyone
says they "support our troops" fighting in Iraq. Liberals just pretend they do - while conservatives are sincere
but may not know how to for real.
So let me
introduce you to Major Eric England, an Air Force intelligence officer who has
been deployed in Saudi Arabia (where he was on 9/11), Bosnia, Colombia,
Afghanistan, and in Iraq for eight months of combat duty.
Maj.
England is developing a very interesting way for regular folks to give soldiers
in Iraq what they actually need. He
calls it Online Troop Sponsorship Registries. Here's how it works.
He has developed a network of contacts among Marine and Army
units on the front lines in Iraq. These
are the guys who are out there directly in contact with the Iraqi people whom
they are trying to protect from the Jihadis.
The units tell Maj. England what they most need for their mission, or
for local Iraqis who want to help them.
Then Maj. England places these requests on his Troop
Sponsorship Registry so that regular Americans can donate money or materiel,
which he then delivers to the units in Iraq.
You may not be surprised to learn the #1 request is for $20
bills. Units need cash to reward
helpful locals because locals know where insurgents make bombs and plan
sectarian attacks. There is an existing
small rewards program now, where the troops pass out coupons which helpful
locals can redeem for cash
(and divulge their info) at the nearest military base.
This
requires the local Iraqis to risk their lives being seen by Jihadis going to
the base. Far better for units to pass
out the cash and get intel right on the spot.
But much
more is needed than cash. Ordinary
tools (hammers, saws, etc.) are a big hit.
Small power generators even bigger.
Medical supplies the biggest.
The US
Army's "Black Lions" Battalion of the 28th Infantry Regiment told
Maj. England that nothing would more help them win local Iraqis over than
medical supplies. With $10,000 in
donations from hundreds of Americans, Maj. England was able to deliver one
dozen industrial-sized medical first aid kits to the Black Lions.
The men of
the regiment say it is helping them enormously with the local Iraqis, and have
no doubt it has already saved a number of American soldiers' lives.
The first
step in really supporting our soldiers is to understand they believe in what
they are doing. Hundreds of thousands
of the finest young Americans our country possesses have served in Iraq or are
there right now. All but the tiniest
fraction not only believe in the morality of this war but that it can be won.
Not only
that, there is growing evidence that it is being won, particularly with
the Sunnis. The deadliest part of Iraq
used to be Anbar Province. Now an
alliance of tribal chiefs has pretty much shut down Al Qaeda and the Sunni
insurgency in Anbar.
At this
moment, the deadliest place is Diyala Province, where so many Jihadis fled from
Baghdad after the Petraeus surge.
Again, an alliance of almost one hundred Diyala tribes has formed, and
the violence there is being shut down.
The
improvement is so dramatic that even the New York Times is reporting the
possibility of a wholesale Sunni cease-fire.
As for the
Shias, perhaps you noticed that after Mookie (Moqtada al-Sadr) made an appearance
last week calling for an end to American "occupation," we went after his
militia straight up and killed several of his main commanders. Mookie quickly went back to ground.
This war
has not been won. There are still vast
problems. But it is being won. Our soldiers on the ground see it with their
own eyes.
One good
way to directly help them is through Maj. England's Troop Sponsorship
Registry. To do so, you can contact him
at
This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it
.
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