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Life on the Iraqi front: reading lists, ideals, and plans to stay alive
The Black Lions battalion, part of the new US 'surge' force, finds a new kind of front line in Baghdad.
from the March 27, 2007 edition
Page 2 of 3
A planet away from Plentywood
Dorsey says he believes success in Iraq is still attainable if the Army is given enough time and money to regain the trust of average Iraqis and enable the country's security forces to stand on their own. He says many back home were losing the big picture by focusing on the daily violence.
"American soldiers gained their country's independence and we put an end to slavery, fascism, and dictatorships all around the globe. I do not buy into 'we can't stop this and we can't stop that,' " says Dorsey, a freckled redhead from a township in the heart of Wisconsin with barely 70 inhabitants. He joined the Army after high school because he felt college would be just too limiting and, he says, downright boring.
"The only thing that can stop us are people back home. People who decide they have had enough and it's not worth fighting anymore," he says.
Dorsey finds time to quiz his comrades on Arab phrases included in a fold-up laminated "Culture Smart Card" carried by every soldier. "Be patient; the Iraqi approach to time is slow and relaxed," reads one of the items under the Do's.
Both his father and grandfather were in the Navy and his maternal grandfather fought in Vietnam, another war that polarized the nation four decades ago.
The battalion's executive officer, Maj. Erik Overby, who is pursuing a PhD in military history, says the current surge is as significant as the US-led invasion.
"But it's not that kind of war anymore. We are not just racing to Baghdad to pull down the statute," says Major Overby, a native of Plentywood, Mt., referring to the dramatic toppling of Saddam Hussein's statute in Baghdad on April 9, 2003.
Overby, a boyish blond in his 30s, jokes about how Iraq is almost a planet away from Plentywood, where the greatest worry is annual rainfall and when to get the tractors out to plant the crops.
Sitting on a cot inside a Baghdad gym turned combat outpost, Sgt. Jamil Gutierrez, on his first tour in Iraq, says that based on his first impressions, it could take two years of working closely with Iraqi Army and police to bring about lasting and meaningful peace to Baghdad.
He says that, even then, much of the outcome will depend on the Iraqis themselves. "It's going to take their Army, their people, their police, and their culture to fix the situation," says Sergeant Gutierrez, who was born in Peru and grew up in New Jersey.
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