Photo By Master Sgt. Gary Witte | Spc. Eric W. Reeves, 22, of Riverton, Iowa, watches the convoy pull into the Forward...... read more read more
by Sgt. Gary A. Witte
210th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment
CAMP KOREAN VILLAGE, Iraq – Nearly 150 tractor-trailer headlights illuminate the dark, dust-filled lot as the Soldiers guide the vehicles out to the highway.
The men of C Company, 1st Battalion, 133rd Infantry Regiment have been on the road for two days, traveling nearly 400 miles across the vast Western desert to guide a convoy of supply trucks. They have already been hit by an improvised explosive device which temporarily crippled one of their Humvees.
But the hardest part of their journey comes on this third day, when everyone expects multiple explosive devices to be waiting on the roads back to Al Asad Air Base. The convoy has more than 200 miles left to go and the Soldiers have reason to expect trouble.
After all, their battalion makes this trip routinely.
Defensive driving
When Soldiers with this Iowa National Guard unit were activated in October of last year, they expected to face urban combat. Then they learned they would be patrolling a different kind of landscape.
When they arrived in Iraq in April under the 34th Infantry Division, they were placed in Humvees and armored security vehicles, guarding civilian truck convoys through Al Anbar Province and searching the roads for deadly surprises.
Sgt. Joedy J. Dennis from Alden, Iowa, who wears a tourniquet attached to the front of his body armor, leads 2nd squad, 1st platoon. He said the unit never knows what will happen out on the roadways.
"Our plan of action is always the same when we leave here, but it never ends up the same," Dennis said. "Our mission is always accomplished. We always get the trucks from point A to point B."
Their mission has continued even though constant attacks, injuries, and the worst kind of losses. Less than two weeks prior to the mission, two members of C Company were killed during a Sept. 30 small arms attack.
More recently than that, one of the other companies in the battalion was picking up a convoy at Forward Operating Base Trebil on the Jordanian Border when a car bomb killed 10 Iraqi policemen outside the gate, Soldiers said.
There are few members of C Company left who have not experienced the result of an improvised explosive device.
Spc. Matt L. Helm of Charter Oak, Iowa, has been hit four times in different vehicles, but has managed to escape injury. He described how the explosion can happen in the middle of a conversation, filling the cab with smoke and the smell of gunpowder.
"The first time you get hit, you say never again," Helm said. "Then it happens over and over again."
The Soldiers talked about their comrades who have been hurt by the devices and having seen a civilian truck driver maimed by one, yet survive. Their unit has seen an Explosive Ordinance Demolition specialist killed by a secondary device.
They said on a single day, they once found nine IEDs set along their route. Soldiers from the unit have also discovered dead bodies deliberately placed along the same route to get their attention.
"Everything is going to be different every trip," Spc. Eric W. Reeves, a gunner and driver from Riverton, Iowa, said. "You've got to keep your head on a swivel."
Slow going
When convoys leave Al Asad on this run, they typically leave with nearly 150 empty tractor-trailers, Soldiers said. These trucks, in turn, are left at the Jordanian Border and replaced by those filled with the needed supplies.
The cargo can be a variety of items, including generators, bulldozers, and concrete gravel, but the mainstay is food and fuel. The resulting convoys can stretch out to anywhere from 30 to 50 miles long, Dennis said.
Soldiers refer to the civilian truck drivers as TCNs, or Third Country Nationals. Few of the drivers spoke more than a smattering of English, causing them and the Americans to communicate through repeated phrases and gestures.
Before departure, Soldiers examine the civilians' paperwork to make sure they are who they say they are, but they also take a look at the trucks. Those in poor condition and which have obvious mechanical problems are kicked out in order to help prevent delays on the road.
The route itself ranges from simple four-lane highways through the desert to a single rural track so pitted with holes from previous IED strikes that it causes the heavily armored vehicles to bounce around like bronco rides.
Debris, including the burned-out skeletons of vehicles, litter the roadsides.
"This far into it, we have pretty good idea what the roads look like," Dennis said. "You've got to be suspicious about everything out there."
Despite the precautions, mechanical problems from the civilian vehicles often cropped up during the trip, forcing slow speeds and halts. At times, the convoy slowed to 5 to 10 mph for lengthy stretches.
Those civilians not involved in the breakdowns consistently climbed out of their cabs during nearly every stop, socializing and making tea that they kept in storage containers on the sides of their trucks.
This led to frustration among the Soldiers, who knew from their radios when the convoy should be moving. The vehicle in the rear drove up and down its part of the line, honking and the gunner telling the drivers to get back in their trucks.
The slow speeds and delays for hidden explosive devices leads to long days on the road – eight hours on a good day and up to 20 hours on a very bad day, Dennis said. Even after returning to their tented living quarters, the Soldiers can normally expect only one to two days to pass before they are back on the roadways.
Sgt. Gabriel C. Percy, a driver and gunner from Sheffield, Iowa, said the constant runs outside the wire at least make the deployment pass by faster.
"You get to go out a lot," he said. "We spent 90 percent (of our time) out here ... Almost a week goes by if you go on a four day run."
The long road home
Even with the many hazards they face, the Soldiers fight the monotony of the long drive with talk, junk food, and personal music players plugged into their vehicles' headsets – keeping the tunes at a level where they can still communicate.
Many of the gas stations the convoy passes are commonly used as a gathering place for insurgents, Soldiers said. The night before this run, an IED explosion took place near one particularly notorious station, leading to a raid and arrests.
The unit makes its own arrests when it needs to, stopping suspect vehicles and making occasional raids to catch insurgents and seize bomb-making materials. Dennis said they know when the bad guys are near, because that's when the civilians stop giving information out of fear of reprisals.
Civilian vehicles coming from the opposite direction of the convoy blink their lights to let the Soldiers know they see them, and stop when signaled to do so.
"They give us our room. Ninety-nine percent of them," Dennis said, noting Soldiers normally just have to fire a flare to get vehicles to stop when drivers don't respond immediately. "A lot of the time it's because they aren't paying attention."
On the third day of the convoy, C Company finds two explosive devices in its path. One IED is uncovered at a major intersection, but the second is found the hard way when it goes off and knocks out an Armored Support Vehicle.
The vehicle has to be towed, but no one is hurt in the incident. It is nearly dusk when the convoy pulls in to Al Asad, closing out a more than 12-hour journey. The Soldiers express relief having completed the run and look forward to having an actual shower.
They don't expect to be able to sleep in the next day, however. They will be up in the morning to start maintenance on their vehicles to prepare for the next trip.
| Date Taken: | 10.20.2006 |
| Date Posted: | 10.20.2006 11:33 |
| Story ID: | 8093 |
| Location: | CAMP KOREAN VILLAGE, IQ |
| Web Views: | 408 |
| Downloads: | 197 |
This work, Traveling Soldiers watch over convoys, by MSG Gary Witte, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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