Hearts and Minds.

I haven’t updated in a while, but I’ve been doing plenty of things over here in Afghanistan. While everyone is finally settling in and doing their day-to-day jobs, I sit here planning my platoon’s next days’ patrols. I love it. I don’t have some boring ass job like tower guard or dining facility officer. I actually get to do something and make a difference. Don’t get me wrong; those special occupations are necessary, just not my cup of tea. I think being around the guys and working with them, and molding them into better people is becoming my daily satisfaction. They’re molding me into a better person, and I have already learned so much in one month of my deployment. You never really understand the military saying of “when in charge, be in charge” until it’s actually forced upon you. There have been many situations in my “learning to be an officer”-career where I have taken charge, but it was only for a certain period of time… like an evaluation period. But here, I could care less if I was being evaluated or not. I’m having a great time running the missions I want to run with my platoon. I have great NCOs who support my plan and give me advice on what to do. Even though the unit at the higher levels might not be the best, I think my platoon holds a higher prestige than most.

Anyway, enough rambling. Went on a few more patrols trying to see how the people of the different villages here in Afghanistan live. Who they associate themselves with, how they run their everyday life. You would think they would be tired of Soldiers walking through their neighborhoods and trying to see what’s up. That was my initial feeling. But honestly, the villages we went to actually support the troops, and want us to come through their villages and say hello. I sat down with one of the elders in the villages, he offered me Chai and nuts and raisins. We spoke through my interpreter and found out a lot about what they need, want, etc. Before, I was so “why are we doing this” type of thing about trying to win the hearts and minds of the populace. But it is true. The overall goal to make Afghanistan better will not work if the general populace hates us. They will just turn against us and not cooperate. This in turn will degrade us from finally turning complete power to the Afghan government. It’s a lot of politics as well, but as long as I’m content with what I’m doing, that’s all that matters. Give me a task and purpose, and I’ll tell my guys the same.

In any case, I hope everyone back home is doing well. I miss everyone and I miss knowing what everyone is up to. At least you guys can sort of see what I’m up to.

Time to hit that gym up.

DEUCES.