Photo By Lt. Col. Travis Dettmer | Rick Lasko, the senior agriculture advisor to 3rd Brigade Combat Team,1st Infantry...... read more read more
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KHOWST PROVINCE, Afghanistan - Not all personnel assigned to Task Force Duke are the kind whose mission is to close with and destroy the enemy. In fact, not all TF Duke personnel wear the multi-cam uniform. Some, as is the case with Rich Lasko, come to work in work clothes, their primary weapon being the knowledge of agriculture.
Lasko, the senior agriculture advisor to Task Force Duke, said goodbye today after 15 months and three task forces worth of experience here at Forward Operating Base Salerno. This was his longest deployment since Vietnam, where he spent 14 months from 1968-1969.
“I was absolutely joyful to leave Vietnam,” said Lasko, recalling the similarities to his departure back then to now. “But at the same time it was sad to know I was leaving all my buddies behind. It’s the same way today,” said the Woodbridge, Va., native.
Lasko, who served in Vietnam as a member of the 75th Ranger Regiment during his tour in Vietnam, has done something markedly different here.
Lt. Col. McCollum, executive officer for TF Duke and Columbia, S.C., native, presented Lasko with a plaque to commemorate his tour in Afghanistan.
“The counter-insurgency fight here is more than just killing the bad guys,” said McCollum. “[To win the population] it’s about clean water, full bellies and fat sheep; which has been Rick’s focus for each task force he’s been a part of here.”
The role of agricultural advisors, according to the U.S. government’s agriculture assistance strategy here, is to create short and long-term rural employment, raise family incomes, improve well being and increase food security.
One might question what we could teach an agriculture-based civilization that’s existed for thousands of years.
“For one, we’re teaching them land and water practices they haven’t been exposed to improve their natural resources, such as introducing different, rust-resistant wheat with a more abundant yield,” said Lasko, who went on to describe the “rust” as a type of fungus that quickly spreads and can decimate entire wheat crops.
“[More importantly], we are reintroducing an agricultural legacy that was lost after 30 years of decimation by the Soviets,” explained Lasko. “In a highly illiterate society where agricultural practices are mainly passed from generation to generation by spoken word, it is very understandable how their pre-Soviet agriculture prowess could be lost in a single generation,” said Lasko.
And it’s not just the growing of food that Lasko’s concerned with. Restoring their irrigation systems and reforestation are also part of the plan.
Rehabilitating the water system to pre-war effectiveness is a big part of what we do here as well, said Lasko. He went on to say there is also a long-term plan to teaching Afghans how to cultivate saplings and use them to perpetuate reforestation in places where forests were once commonplace.
That, however, will be for other agricultural advisors to tackle. For Lasko, who’s served as agriculture advisor for over 39 years in places like Russia, the Balkans, and even the Ukraine, it is back to the U.S., at least for the time being.
“It was certainly an honor to serve [most recently] with units rich in history like the Big Red One, and the 101st,” said Lasko, “[but] it was especially wonderful to serve the people of rural Afghanistan.”
Sitting down with them, learning their history, and talking with them is perhaps what I will most miss, he said.
| Date Taken: | 02.15.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 02.15.2011 13:06 |
| Story ID: | 65474 |
| Location: | KHOWST PROVINCE, AF |
| Web Views: | 207 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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