Our deployment is winding down. Our replacement unit will be here soon, and we are getting very busy trying to make all the necessary preparations. The missions don’t slow down just because we have to pack and ship all our gear home.
I think that our unit is tired. While many of us have grown more physically fit during our time in Baghdad, it’s my impression (and certainly for me personally) that most of us have mentally been worn down by this experience. The reasons vary, but certainly, there has been a price paid.
We’ve all sacrificed some or many things to be here. A year away from a professional career. A year away from loved ones. A year off from college. A year without alcohol, fine dining and night life. We traded those things for an aluminum sleeping box and the sound and sonic fury of explosions and the constant overflight of Blackhawk and Apache helicopters accompanied by near and far staccato sounds of small arms fire.
We’ll all be going our separate ways soon enough. Some of us are going back to civilian life for good. Some will continue down a military path. I’m waffling right now. I’m sick to death of the bureaucratic roadblocks that impeded every activity we were tasked with here in Baghdad. I spent more time fighting bureaucrats than any other single activity. The U.S. Army is top heavy with paperwork shufflers and short of the type of people who “get it done.” That’s been the single most discouraging factor of this deployment – it’s weighed more heavily on me than any of the explosions or attacks I’ve seen, heard or felt. I’ll leave here with somewhat of a sour taste in my mouth, despite my best efforts to stay positive and upbeat. As far as I am concerned, the reality is that every three steps forward we take, we also take two back.
Success or failure in Iraq won’t be determined primarily by the insurgency; rather the final outcome of this conflict will be determined by the paper pushers. The people who make the rules of engagement, the people who choose the missions and the people who report on progress or lack thereof will lose or win this thing for us.
The miliary in general must find better ways to allow information to circulate. The old chain of command structures still have some value, but they won’t help us win modern wars. A massive and rigidly structured organization with information flow that only goes up and down will always be beaten by a small, mobile organization that has no barriers to information flow.
Think about this – it takes three years to make a simple change to the officially approved chow hall menu in the Army. How can an organization that moves that slowly hope to outthink and outmaneuver its enemy? I wonder… A lot of people like to tell me I need to stop whining and just do what I’m told. They’re all part of the problem, from my persepective.
The military cannot succeed in this day and age if the people who make it go insist on adhering to that sort of stupid, mindless rigidity.