SITREP 5 29 OCT 04
SITREP 5&6
GENERAL SITUATION
Little has changed in the last week. Nothing new to report on the Comprehensive Peace Agreement.
We are seeing the first of the nomads approaching our areas. There will no doubt be some issues among the nomads on the one hand
and the local communities on the other over grazing and water. Since the Janjaweed is partially composed of culturally similar groups,
there will also in all likelihood be claims that Janjaweed have come to the Nuba. While unlikely, these reports will have to be investigated
in order to “promote domestic tranquility.“
SECTOR 3 OPERATIONS
The lingering effects of the rainy season continue to make road travel difficult to impossible in many parts of our Area of Responsibility
(AOR). Another week or two of dry weather should ameliorate this situation. Also, another week or so of dry weather should take care
of the malaria problem until the next rainy season. For cultural reasons some of the National Monitors refuse to take malaria prophylaxis,
so the incidence of the disease is a problem throughout the wet time of year.
Ramadan also has an effect on operations. All our GOS Monitors are devout Muslims and fast from 0600 -1900 every day for the lunar month.
In addition to the lack of sleep incurred (since they really just have their daytime meals at night), it is dangerous to expect them to conduct
long and arduous foot patrols in temperatures that regularly reach 40 deg C without any water. (Quite hot, if you’ve forgotten your C > F
conversion formula.) · MICHAEL’S WORLD
I am struck by the effect that good police work can have on interfactional relations, and the problems that arise when anything less than
“top cop” work occurs. In the last five days I have had to deal with both.
Last Sunday I visited the villages of Agab and Rigifi to deal with complaints of GOS Police misconduct. Agab has a population divided
between GOS and SPLM supporters in a GOS controlled zone. Suffice to say that the complaint was exaggerated and at least partially
politically motivated. The meeting took me back to my childhood in Easton, CT and the town meetings at which there was more heat than
light, and more noise than thought. Rigifi has a population that is almost entirely supportive of the SPLM, and is also smack dab in the
middle of GOS controlled territory. The complaints here were totally directed against the GOS Police. Some complaints were exaggerated
and some were ancient history, but at least one was legitimate. (Fortunately the one legitimate complaint lent itself to an easy, immediate
and satisfactory resolution.) The one common denominator in both these areas was the use of unnecessarily heavy handed police tactics.
Possibly less than ideal levels of discipline in the local police forces also played a role.
Later in the week I visited the villages of Karkaria and Andulo. These villages lie along the road that connects Agab to Rigifi. Relations
in these villages among members of the two political factions and the Christian (usually SPLM) and the Muslim (frequently GOS
supporters) are harmonious and cooperative. The church and the mosque in Karkaria are about fifty meters apart, and each group
respects the other’s customs and Sabbaths. Credit for this must go in part to GOS Police SGT Mahmun Abdul Rahim, the NCOIC
of the police detachments in both villages, and his two corporals who run the detachments resident in each village. The sheiks and
community elders must also get their fair share of credit for showing what is supposed to be happening. I returned from the Agab/Rigifi visits
with an understanding of how much work remains to be done. I returned from the Karkaria/Andulo visits with a realization of how things can be.
Thus far I have refrained from comment upon the American presidential race. I beg your indulgence if I express a few opinions in this
last missive prior to the election.
At least part of the reason that we are in the position in which we find ourselves world wide, particularly vis a vis international terrorism,
is the lack of decisive action in recent years toward those whose goal is the eradication of America and, more importantly, everything for
which it stands. These are not people with whom we can reason; they must be hunted down, and killed or locked up for the rest of their lives.
Many Americans have already forgotten the implications if not the events of 9/11 Unfortunately, while Americans tend all too often to think
in terms of the latest sound byte on the news; our enemies think in terms of years, decades and centuries.
Our leader must be one who is moved by goals, not polls. He must be one who realizes that he will make mistakes, who will learn from the
mistakes and who will move on. The President operates on a fishbowl, and will always be the target of the opposition’s criticism. This
criticism will frequently be in the interest of partisan politics and not in the best interests of the nation. Unfortunately, the notion that
politics should stop at the water’s edge seems to have gone by the board. This problem is not limited to either of the major political parties,
although the levels it has reached in this campaign approach giving aid and comfort to the enemy. (But this is nothing new to Kerry…
he has been doing it for more than thirty years.) Imagine if you will Franklin Roosevelt trying to wage World War II in the
environment in which George Bush has had to try wage this World War. And make no error; this is a war for survival that can be lost
unless we can recapture some of the resolve shown by the Greatest Generation. That generation’s soldiers were no better than this one’s,
but its civilian population had a fortitude and understanding of the challenges it faced that seem to me to be eroded, if not lost.
We complain about the provisions of the Patriot Act, forgetting that every press item and every letter from the war zone was censored in
WW II. We bemoan the fact that people captured in combat zones are not released as quickly as people apprehended for crimes in the
United States and forget that Lincoln suspended Habeas Corpus (as is every President’s Constitutional right in time of war).
If George Bush has made mistakes, they were the inevitable mistakes of one who has to take decisions in a limited amount of time
with the best information available to him at that time. The reason that there are so few real leaders; executives; commanders…
whatever you wish to call those who must take difficult decisions under difficult circumstance…is that it is far easier to sit back
and second guess these decisions than it is to make them and live with the consequences. Pres. Bush has shown that he can and
will take these decisions and live with the consequences. His opponent has shown himself to be a self aggrandizing opportunist whose
entire adult life has been devoted to his own advancement. If you feel that my opinion of Kerry has been influenced by his behavior during
and after his RVN service, you are quite correct. But that does not mean that his behavior, particularly after his return, was not in fact
contemptible nor that my personal opinion of him is necessarily invalid. I hope that I have been sufficiently tactful for the sensibilities
of my liberal friends and relatives. (You probably don’t want to hear what I really think of this individual.)
I did not intend to go on at quite such length, but I was privileged to serve with real heroes. John Kerry is not fit to be mentioned
in the same sentence with them. Thank you for bearing with me.
And here I am relaxing with a few of the reasons that I am doing what I am doing now. Village of Dapkar, 23 OCT 04
SITREP 6 05 NOV 04 GENERAL SITUATION
Things continue to leave much to be desired in the Darfur area. The nomads are starting to arrive in our area in fairly large
numbers (which will increase in the weeks to come), which always causes a spot of bother for everyone. The Nuba remains relatively
calm, with a few chronic problem areas which are managed without breakdowns in the CFA.
The daytime temperatures run between 36 and 40 degrees C. I think the rains have stopped for this year, which is making vehicular
travel to many areas possible once again.
SECTOR 3 OPERATIONS
Our new Deputy Sector Commander, Frank Lyman, arrived this week, and seems quite keen. He is an Australian whose military
background includes service with Australian forces and Royal Marines (Brit). He is very operations oriented, and hopefully this
will blend well with Rainer’s administrative skills.
Ramadan will go on for another week or so. I mentioned in SITREP 5 the difficulties involved in conducting operations during
this period. Sector 3 is at a particular disadvantage in this respect, as much of our AO is in the SPLM/A controlled area.
The sites which we must inspect are up on the jebels (large hills / small mountains), and are only accessible by fairly arduous foot patrols.
The end of the rainy season has seen a marked decrease in cases of malaria.
The sector will miss its outgoing Commander who has been transferred to Sector 5 in the western Nuba. Nigel Wilson is a retired
British Lieutenant Colonel with a specops and peacekeeping background in Northern Ireland, the Balkans and various African
countries He and his abilities were greatly respected by both the Internationals and Africans with whom he dealt.
MICHAEL’S WORLD
After sending Sitrep 5 last week, I went to carry out a Military Visit (as opposed to a full fledged Military Inspection) to a
GOS battalion (Bn) HQ. My main purpose was to try to get a handle on the situation vis a vis any nomads who might be in the area.
When I queried the Deputy Commanders of the garrison about the nomad situation, the answer I received (roughly translated into
idiomatic English) was something to the effect of: “You want to find out about nomads? No problem! Let’s take a little walk.”
We walked a few hundred meters and there, adjacent to the garrison, was an encampment of approximately one thousand plus
nomads. It seems that there had been a bit of a dust up between members of this tribe and a neighboring tribe which ended up with the
beating death of a member of the other village. The GOS troops had “involuntarily” relocated the entire killer village to this location in
order to gain a few degrees of separation between them and the killee villagers (who were understandably a trifle put out by the incident).
And while this was probably the only reasonable short term solution to the prospect of escalating violence, the GOS garrison now
had +/- 1,000 hungry souls camped out next door and needing a considerable amount of humanitarian aid which the garrison was not
in a position to provide.
I think a brief sidebar concerning nomads may be in order at this time. There are two main groupings of nomads. The first is the type
which most westerners envision when they hear the term. They have no permanent dwellings anywhere, live in tents and move constantly
with their herds and flocks. They do, however, have routes and areas which remain constant during their migrations and which change
little from year to year. The other type of nomads encountered here are actually semi-nomadic. They leave their home villages for a portion
of each year to graze their livestock elsewhere, but return to their villages at the end of the rainy season. A portion of the village population
is non-migratory and looks after things on the home front while the rest of the population is gone. This practice is quite similar to the
movement of livestock to higher elevation grazing during the summer months in the American west. The return of the rovers coincides
with harvest time at the home village. The tribe we are discussing is in the latter category.
Today’s glossary items: · Sheik: a village or tribal chieftain.
Umda: an overchief (if you will) of several villages.
Emir or Ameer: the leader of a district or province.
My team and I sat down with the Sheik, Elders and officers from the garrison after a tour of the tribe’s encampment. After a suitable
amount of discussion of the entire situation, a reiteration of the limited amount that JMC could do under these circumstances (as it was a
purely civil matter and not a ceasefire violation), the sheik asked me if I would be able to go as a one time effort to open negotiations with
the other village. It was critical that the tribe be able to return to their fields in a timely manner to get their harvest in. Failure to do so would
have dire consequences for the tribe for the year to come. The request was made as the GOS personnel were not viewed as impartial,
particularly by the tribe which had had a member killed, and the JMC would be. I made it clear that if I were allowed to do this, it would only
be to open negotiations and that the two tribes would then be on their own to resolve the conflict.
I have received permission to move forward with this matter, and will revisit the village in question to assess the situation and set up a time
to meet with all parties tomorrow.
I also revisited Rigifi a few days ago. (See SITREPS 3&4). Although all is not total brotherly love just yet, the removal of the local GOS
Police Chief pending an investigation has settled. I was accompanied on this visit by Warrant Officer (W.O.) Babakia, the GOS Senior
Police Chief for the entire area. I believe that the presence of such a high ranking official lent credibility to our efforts to assist in achieving
harmony in the area. Furthermore, I do not believe that the Police Chief in question will be returned to this area. Another visit will tell more
about how well our efforts are faring.
I am going to bring W.O. Babakia to Agab, another trouble area, on Sunday. While I would love to bring Philip, the SPLM Police Chief for
the area, with us to show the local population that there is cooperation between the two police organizations, we are one vehicle down
due to mechanical problems and I do not have the space. It is also very important that the problems within the GOS Police be quickly
resolved so I need W.O. Babakia this trip.
I am going to send some attached pictures of us on operations on this document if possible (or if Gremlin XP will not allow it) on a
second
e-mail. I hope this finds all my friends outside Sudan well and prospering. I am well and happy. Take care until next week.
Group photo L>R: SPLA Nat Mon RSM Osman Eltigani, Local GOS Pol Off (name unk), MPW, James Modi (Civ Interpreter),
W.O. Babakia GOS Police
Individual photos: Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM) Osman Eltigani, SPLA, MPW (Yes, Karen I’ll put my sunscreen on next time!)