Frontline Females- Unlocking the world of Afghan women

KANDAHAR, AFGHANISTAN

01.14.2010

Story by Staff Sgt. Christine Jones  

22nd Mobile Public Affairs Detachment   

✔ ✗ Subscribe

42

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - It's a scene that has played itself out countless times across this war-torn country. A team of Soldiers passes through a doorway into a room. Women and children stare back at them. Their eyes seem to show their resignation, and perhaps, indignation, at the intrusion into their homes.

But this time it is different.

As the women and children inside the home look at these service members from different lands, they see something different looking back at them — women.

"We came along to search any females, to reassure them of coalition forces' good intentions," said Capt. Karolyn Miller, commander of headquarters and headquarters company, 97th Military Police Battalion from Fort Riley, Kan.

Miller, a Baltimore, Md. native, and her four-woman team are currently deployed to Camp Nathan Smith in Kandahar, Afghanistan.

"We've modeled ourselves after the female engagement teams the Marines have in the Helmand province," Miller said. "Women and children felt a lot more comfortable when maneuver forces were coming through if they saw females there."

Miller's female engagement team conducted its second mission Jan. 10 in Rajan Qala village during Operation Fazilat in the Arghandab river valley. They were assisting Afghan national police, U.S. and Canadian forces with a coalition effort to clear the area of improvised explosive devices and establish a presence in the community.

Canadian army Cpl. Melissa Gagnon of Thunder Bay, Ontario, worked with the team for the day.

"They actually smiled when we came in," Gagnon said. "It seems like there may not have been women here before."

Coalition forces are building bonds with the women and children in the villages because these children are the future of Afghanistan, Miller said. In many ways, she feels, Afghan parents are like parents everywhere.

"I think they want what is good for their children, too," Miller said. "We talk to them as much as we can about education, making sure their children go to school so they have opportunities other than joining up with gangs or the insurgency when they grow up."

Sitarn Shah has been an interpreter since she returned to Afghanistan from California nine months ago. A student of Islam and a practicing Muslim, it is important to her for Afghan children to know what the Koran actually says.

"The kids today said to me 'You're a Muslim why are you working with them?' I told them to go to school and learn Islam. In Islam, you're supposed to be good friends with everyone — no matter how they look, or what religion they have," Shah said.

The cultural differences between Americans and Afghans makes searching a difficult task. Male American Soldiers must be careful to respect Afghan culture. Afghan women are often only seen by family members. They don't leave their homes and must cover their faces so that no man but their husband can see them, Miller said.

As with any culture, women should always search women, said Spc. Rebecca Gutknecht, an MP with 97th MP Bn. American men would surely feel uncomfortable with another man coming into his home and searching his wife, too, the New York native said.

"It's disrespectful and rude for males to go in to search females, so most of the time they skip that. Without a female search team, the locals are more likely to hide stuff in the females' rooms where they know males aren't going to enter," Gutknecht said.

The inclusion of female engagement teams on these missions adds a new dimension, and greater access to areas of homes — and interaction with people — normally considered somewhat off-limits, it allows coalition and Afghan partners a vital tool to assist in providing security for the Afghan people.

"We're here to help them. The more information they give us, the more we can help them push the [insurgents] out of here so they can live a better life," said Spc. Sydaless Watson, a supply Soldier with 97th MP Bn. and native of Killeen, Texas.

In the future, Miller would like to take the team on a joint operation with female Afghan national police officers in Kandahar City. That way the ANP women can communicate directly with their Afghan sisters, Miller said.

At the end of the day, the female engagement teams are about more than just searching women for explosives, they're about building trust with the other half of the population.

"They can look into the face of another woman and hopefully know that everything is going to be alright ... they can trust us more than they would trust a male Soldier," Miller said.