Ladies and gents,

I hope everyone is doing well. I know how excited you are to have two
spammings from me in one sitting, but try to contain yourself. I wrote
the one about being shot at and since it was a stream of conscious I
decided to leave it untouched. So even though you are reading them at
the same time there is a temporal separation between when I wrote
them. In fact, today 5 Sep 09, is the half way point… give or take a
few days.

Since the election day we’ve gotten contact again. The good news: no
Marines or civilians were hurt, and the better news: we killed 2
Talibs, one instantly and the other died en route to their hospital.
We found out from the locals after the fact. (and yes the Taliban have
field hospitals in a wonderful slice of heaven know as Marjah. Wait a
few months and it will be all over the news. Think Fallujah part III).
Killing these guys plays a large part in dismantling the air of
invincibility the Taliban have constructed in the eyes of the people.
Don’t worry I fully realize that this war will not be won by killing
every single Talib, counter insurgency’s don’t work like. That doesn’t
mean that their deaths are not a good thing. These men are terrible
people. They desire to keep an entire country trapped in the Stone Age
with draconian rules regarding freedom, women, education, and
religion. They are stuck in the wrong century. This is the primary
reason that I know they will lose. Time marches forward and progress
is an unstoppable wave. As schools get built and the education of
A-Stan improves the Taliban will be washed away like so much flotsam.
Time and perseverance will be our best ally in this struggle against
these medieval minded men.

As much as I praise and exalt San Diego and southern California as the
best place to live (that’s actually a fact not an opinion, I proved it
once in a lab with very expensive equipment so don’t argue with me), I
am a mic New Yorker at heart, and oh gawd the worst type; one from
Lawn-guy-land. It was my upbringing in New York that forged me into
the cynical and sarcastic person that you have all grown to tolerate.
So as much as I love San Diego, there is a special place in my heart
for New York. There’s no place like it and if you think otherwise you
had better just fuhgedaboutit. That being said, it feels right for me
to be here.

As I sat at my computer drafting the patrol schedule for this week I
made it to Friday, and then the date slapped me in the face. September
11th 2009. I was instantly brought back to that day 8 years ago.
Huddled around a monitor in the computer lab watching helplessly as
the twin towers, the centerpiece of the New York City skyline,
exploded in hellacious fireballs then crumbled to dust. The fear, the
panic, the wanting everything to go back to how it was just a few
hours before all came back to me. I remember during the days that
followed we had our local congressman come talk to us, I suppose in an
effort to reassure us, to tell us everything would be alright and that
we would find those responsible and make them pay. In that meeting
with the congressman “News 12”, the local news channel of long island,
had found their way to our little meeting. Being the overachieving AP
student that I was I raised the parallels between LBJ and GWB.
Invoking the Tonkin Gulf resolution I asked if we gave the president a
blank check wouldn’t we risk throwing ourselves into another long
protracted war, like we had so many years ago? My teacher was so
proud. The congressman was not. Clearly this was not the place to be
asking questions with substance so I was fed some marshmallows to keep
me from piping up again. News 12 found me afterwards and asked me some
follow up questions. That’s when I remember voicing some concern about
my plans to join the military after school and how this might affect
my life in some way. After the cameras were off I explained that I
wanted to be an officer so I still had college to go to, I was assured
by the anchorwoman that I had nothing to worry about then. That was at
least 4 years down the road. I was given the same assurance from a
cook at the local restaurant where I worked. “You got nothing to worry
about Pat, we’ll have this thing wrapped up in no time.” That was 8
years ago. As I said earlier, it feels right for me to be here. Gone
are the feelings of concern or trepidation. Replaced instead with a
resolve, with a desire to finally make it so no one will ever want to
do those heinous acts again. Why shouldn’t it be a New Yorker who
helps do it? They stabbed at us from the darkness and retreated into
the shadows of the mountains and valleys of Afghanistan. Almost a
decade later we have not relented. They picked a fight that they never
should have. This isn’t entirely about retribution, it’s also about
salvation. We are not here to kill every person who has ever burned an
American flag or cheered and applauded on that fateful day back in
September 2001. No, we are here to work with the Afghan people to
rebuild their country. We are here to make a country that will foster
tolerance and education, and that will discourage hate mongering. A
tall order, no doubt, but an entirely necessary one. If you think
otherwise, well, you had better just fuhgedaboutit.

Don’t worry folks; the rest of the e-mail is much lighter.

Ramadan is in full swing, so the locals are tired and a little bit
crankier than usual. This might have something to do with not eating
or drinking from sun up to sun down in the ridiculous heat and
humidity of this place. I don’t know though, I’m just spitballing
here. Our ANP partners don’t eat or drink and they still go on patrol.
Let’s just say they aren’t the most attentive members of the patrol. I
don’t like Ramadan for the simple reason that I don’t get to eat and
drink chi with anyone during the day, instead I just sit down and talk
to them. I can’t wait for it to be over, then I can go back to
freeloading off the elders of A-Stan.

We do need to get these people TV’s or a movie theater of some form. I
say this because apparently we are still the most interesting thing
these people have ever seen. We’ve been walking around and talking to
these people for 67 straight days it’s not like it’s a surprise
anymore. We will go on a patrol through a village and take a short
security halt for whatever reason. Immediately children and grown men
will squat next to us. On an aside, everyone over here squats. I guess
the concept of chairs never occurred to them. They would make awesome
catchers in baseball, I swear they can assume that stance for an
indefinite amount of time. Anyway, they squat next to you and stare.
We once paused for a few hours during the heat of the day and the same
grown man stared at me for 2 straight hours. Didn’t even say anything,
just stared. I get it, we look different, but it’s not even like we
were doing anything exciting we were literally just sitting there. I
just imagine what’s going through their heads is something like this,
“any minute now something’s gonna happen, riiiight…. now! wait… ok…
riiiight… now! Alright, alright, this time it’s going to happen…
right… now!”

I blame their lack of movies and TV shows. Jerry Bruckheimer and James
Cameron have dulled our senses so much that if aliens landed in our
backyards we would be pretty freaked out at first, but invariably
we’re start comparing them to whatever movie/TV aliens they resemble
most to us. “Dude, he totally looks like the ones from The X-Files.”
“Are you crazy? They are defiantly more like the Independence Day
aliens””Both of you guys are way off! Haven’t either of you seen V?”
(yeah, that was a “V” reference, let’s see how many of you remember
that little gem). Since these people have never had the good fortune
of seeing Hollywood’s best their imagination is a little dimmer than
ours. If you’re not really tan with a beard and wearing a wizard’s
robe, you’re out of this world.

It’s good to see the weather changing. Like everything in A-Stan it’s
abrupt and extreme. We were used to 120-140 degree days with high
humidity, and then on September 3rd it dropped to 57 at night. There’s
now a breeze during the day that seemingly blows the humidity away and
keeps it bearable throughout the day. When you return from a 6 hour
patrol it no longer looks like you jumped in a river just from your
sweat. Pretty soon though it will be legitimately cold and the needle
will enter the red on the misery scale. Yes, there is a misery scale,
but it’s all very complicated with science and numbers. I won’t bore
you with the explanation; suffice it to say the red is a very unhappy
place. For anyone who’s been to Quantico, think FEX 3 defense with
snow and a dickhead AI.

Alrighty guys, I’m going to get back to fighting terrorists and
playing solitaire. Stay safe and drink a coke zero for me.

Wishing you were here… not really, I wouldn’t wish that on anyone,

Pat

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1st LT O'Shea, Patrick