Wesley:
Bloomington, eh? I plan to go to IU once my tour of duty is up.
The general reaction to Saddam’s capture was one of gratitude. I had nearly a hundered Iraqi’s come up to me and personally thank me, knowning that I had no part in the actual capture. Pretty amazing. You could feel a sense of relief.
I have heard pretty much every theory of the “invasion” from the locals, but the most common one has to be the oil theory, which I can see why. A significant portion of them, as does a significant portion of the Americans, believe we came in just for the oil.
Iraqi infrastructure is well behind where it should be in this day in age. Mainly, there is no computerization whatsoever. Everything is still done on pen and paper, and you can see where that would harm things. Electricity was and still is a giant problem here in Iraq. Saddam would limit the electricity, at least here in Mosul, to 3 hours on and 8 hours off. Pretty amazing. Most neighborhoods went together and purchased a giant generator to power the 'hood. A Generator man was assigned to keep control of it 24/7, he was all powerful. There is no sanitation here either. Septic water spills into the streets, the same streets little kids play on, its horrible. I see no sense of pride in this country, no patriotism . . . It is my opinion that the emphasis of Saddam was not on the infrastructe whatsoever, but on his personal wealth (I live on a palace compound in mosul, yes, pictures available) and his military.
Alright, I know this isn’t a great thing to do, but I am reviving my thread of late. I know someone out there has to have an interesting question regarding Iraq, the Iraqi Judicial System, or something along these lines.
No questions, just a note to say thank you for your work and your sacrifices.
Do sunnis and Shiites realy not get along with each other? what about kurds with the arabs?, jews, and christians, and muslims? or the different tribes? And which if these conflicts ,if any, causes the most headaches to the coalition?
A hearty thank you, and take care, from me too. I don’t have questions at the moment. I just wish safety and peace for everyone over there.
Tijuana:
Here in Iraq, at least, the Sunnis and Shiites do not have as many problems as other places in the “Holy Land.” There have been some minor conflicts but nothing too major since we have been here.
Kurds and Arabs are a totally different story. The Kurds I have met (I have noticed that seem to be far less ignorant) do not really have problems with the Arabs. The Arabs I have met, all hate the Kurds. Pretty interesting. I’m not exactly sure where this feud began, but the Kurds do not hate the Arab people, just the Ba’athist and justifiably so.
Arabs here in Iraq tend to dislike their Christian brothers and tend to try to exclude them on everything they do. It is nowhere along the lines of the Arab - Kurd conflict. However, everyone I have met are in total agreement about hating the Jews. Not a single person I have met over here has one ounce of respect for the Jewish people or their Faith.
Perhaps the most headaches have been caused by the Tribal Conflicts. Even with coalition forces being here, there are still blood wars between the Tribes. It’s pretty bad. As a matter of fact, the group of guys that I work with, along with myself, got caught in the middle of a Tribal gun battle. Mostly the Tribal Disputes are over land and business ventures and even some over petrol. We have tried, along with the Iraqi police, to for alliances between all of the tribes. I do not think this will ever come about . . .
.I’m a Navy Journalist stationed in Naples, Italy FYI. Pleased to meetcha’ 
I’m curious, how are you connecting to the Internet?
Do you carry a weapon at all times? Flak vest + helmet?
Can you walk around on your own free will? Is their some sort of a buddy system?
Who pays the electricity bill? 
Do the Iraqi’s watch popular american movies translated into, hmm, whats the word for this…Iraqish?
Do they use the same form of toilet paper that we use?
Is their a trash collection service?
If Saddam were to magically appear in downtown central Mosul, what do you think the public reaction would be?
Are many (if any) Iraqi’s able to connect to the Internet?
Do they also tie their shoes using the bow method we use?
Are women walking around unveiled, and if so, are soldiers gawking/flirting at them? And if so, are the women gawking flirting back?
Any soldiers found wives?
Ok thats all for now
MLS and Idlewind:
Thank you very much for the support. We over here are glad to hear that people at home still think of us =)
Alterego:
Naples, eh? Bet thats a beautiful duty station =)
I am connected to the internet via an army NIPR system. Its basically just any run of the mill sat. system that connects to the main center in Landstuhl Germany.
Anytime we are outside of the wire (secured compound) we must have weapon with magazine in the well, protective body armor with SAPI inserts, and kevlar on. It really sucked during the 130 + heat of July and August . . .
There is a buddy system of sort. Really can not go into too much detail as that would be an OPSEC violation. I can say that we can not leave the gate without at least 3 vehicles and 6 people.
Right now, we pay the electricity bill. The Coalition that is. We are working on retooling the entire electrical system here in Iraq. Matter of fact, members of my Section (JAG) just worked out a deal to pipe in over 3 Megawats of power from Turkey.
As for the movies, most of them come on bootlegged on VCD format with English voices and Arabic Subtitles. I have a nice collection of “Iraqi” DVD’s that I have purchased. Such films as Matrix 3, Elf, and Once upon a time In Mexico.
Toilet Paper, this one should probably go into the Pit. Iraqi’s do not use toilet paper or any shape, form, or fashion of it. They do use their left Hand and splash water up. They swear by this method and despite my one hour class on how to use toilet paper given to my interpretor, he still swears by the “splash method.” Pretty gross if you ask me.
We, the coalition, have instituted the first trash collection agency here in Mosul. The norm before we came over was to meerly throw everything in an empty lot somewhere in your neighborhood or to meerly toss your trash into the road. This creates an unbearble spell . . .I do not know how they do it.
If Saddam were to magically appear there would be mixed outcomes. Perhaps an I love Saddam protest of roughly 500 people, like that that happened after he was caught, or a bunch of Kurds trying to kill him.
Saddam forbid the Iraqis that were not members of the Ba’ath Party to have access to the internet. The coalition here in Mosul has setup a number of Internet cafe’s of sorts for the Iraqi’s. This is one of the things they are most thankful of. Imagine not having the internet, at all . . wow.
Contrary to popular belief, they still tie thier shoes the same =).
Most of the Kurdish women up north here in Mosul do not wear veils. As time goes on, I’ve noticed more and more soldiers gawking and flirting with the locals, and yes, some of them do flirt back. We have had some get in a bit of trouble for this.
As for the wives thing, Centcom General Order Number 1 vaguely forbids this; however, Eagle Order 1 absolutley forbids this. Any violation of this would be considered a violation of Article 91, UCMJ.
Whew. . that was a lot =)
As far as duty stations go, I could pitch a well rounded argument in defense of the fact that I am the most cushioned JO3 in the Navy
I’m actually on my first (and last) tour still - my first two years were on a ship. ( I went to the Gulf [Kuwait and Bah Rain] but I didn’t have the chance to grace Iraq )
That’s all pretty much what I expected. I have heard about that no toilet paper thing but didn’t know they did it there. Eek… looks grossly at his left hand
As far as trash goes…you should see how the Italians do it. The entire city is often blanketed in smoke. Screw trash service is the motto (even though they have it); they prefer to pile it up and burn it - wherever, whenever
I’m not surprised about the flirting. Another thing i’m curious about, are any military chicks getting pregnant?
Those Internet cafe’s are awesome. It’d be pretty cool if someone came up with an online translation and we could chat with these guys.
Time for bed! Sleep tight!
I’m not an Iraqi, but there are several who have blogs.
Are women walking around unveiled, and if so, are soldiers gawking/flirting at them? And if so, are the women gawking flirting back? Any soldiers found wives?
[/quote]
Back in August, two soldiers from the Florida National Guard married Iraqi women, and got in quite a bit of
trouble for it.
I also want to first say THANK YOU for your efforts in Iraq and may God bless you and keep you safe. You and the active military are in my prayers.
I would like to also say thank you for posting! I can’t believe (even with technological advances being what they are) that I can actually talk to you in Iraq!! Amazing!! Thank you for taking time to come in here and offer your insight.
Here are some questions:
What do you eat there?
Do they have “normal” clothing stores?
What about radio and t.v.? Do people get to listen/watch American or other shows?
What kind of questions do you get from locals about America, if any?
What do the people there do for fun?
Do they seem like they are a happy people?
Is everything as brown as it looks on CNN?
(Sorry if any of this is silly…I’m suffering from the flu, so the meds make me a bit loopy! lol!)
Much love! Yogini
You mentioned the Iraqi judicial system…how does that work (or doesn’t work)? I read recently that a dozen lawyers are being sent out from the Us to try and get theb judicial system kickstarted… sounds like a massive case of understaffing. How does it work in Mosul?
I’m an intellectual property lawyer, and we were recently told that the trade mark registry in Baghdad consists of piles of disorganised paper as a consequence of looting.
Good luck over there.
alterego:
As a matter of fact, one of our females that worked with me went home pregnant. As sad as it is, there was a sharp increase in pregnancies when we were informed that we would be here for a year.
Yogini:
They eat food!! lol. Anway, the average family pretty much eats homemade bread, chicken and rice every night. It’s least expensive foodstuff here in Iraq and the average family can not afford to eat too well. I have some good photos of Iraqi food if you want some.
There are some normal clothing stores, even some main streamline stores here in Iraq. Most of them are further north in the Kurdish controlled areas. The MaziMart is just like a Wal-Mart only a bit smaller.
Saddam allowed only local TV before we came in. Anyone with a satellite was killed. Seriously, if you had a satellite you were being influenced by Western Propaganda and therefore killed. Pretty amazing. Once the coalition arrived, the locals were snatching up sats and TV’s like kids on Halloween. There are some American channels on the Sat. CNN and ABC both carry networks there.
All the locals ask us about the luxuries we have and the fact that our women are allowed to do the same things men are. They find that pretty amazing.
I just asked my interpreter what he does for fun and his reply was “Nothing . . It is boring.” There are no movie theaters, malls, or any nice parks here. There are a couple of Amusment Park like areas, but they really have nothing enjoyable to do.
Even with all the problems the people face, most of them seem to be jolly. It’s pretty amazing that their morale is as high as it is.
Yogini, you might need to get a color tv =). LOL, I would almost venture to say that everything is browner than you see. It’s pretty mundane and boring. There are some places that are green but for only a couple months of the year. I do not know how anyone can stand it. We had some books of the Smokie Mountain National park sent out here to show the Locals, and they were very impressed of the beauty of America.
The God of Muesli Bars:
As a matter of fact, you probably read the article about the people I work with. I am not a lawyer, yet, just a mere paralegal in the Army. If not, many articles like this have been written about us. We are extremely understaffed, as we currently only have three people now. We had a peak time of 10 people working here but that has dwindled down.
Basically the Iraqi judicial system was a Napoleonic confession based system. They would hold a person in jail long enough or beat them enough that he/she would confess. Then the process was pretty easy. Bribery was/is rampant here. Nearly all the judges took bribes on any case where they could. Your tribe would buy your freedom if you were arrested for a crime.
You mentioned the filing system or lack there of. Our first time we went to the main courthouse here in Mosul, files were burned and piled in every corner of every room. I do not believe they ever had positive control of any case file. It is frustrating as hell to us. We have had the need to get deeds to many properties the coalition is occupying, and this is a tedious, annoying process. . .
We have now started an electronic docketing system and put over 40 computers in the courthouses within Nineveh Province. We have also hired people to train the court administrators and clerks as well as judges and lawyers on using the computers and the docketing system.
Dryfreeze, do you ever check threads that you have previously posted in for questions?
I had a question for you in this thread.
Rather than ask it again, you can click the link and answer it if you want to.
Unbelievable. What a mess. Are the judges former Ba’athists, or are they returned exiles? I suppose even the lawyers were on the Ba’athist party list in order to get ahead.
First, I would like to thank you Dryfreeze, for doing your job over there and for posting here for all us as “home.”
You mentioned several times that you have pictures of different things. Are those on a website or do you have to email them? I would be interested in seeing them if it wouldn’t be too much trouble.
I vaguely recall an article about American female soldiers being forced to wear veils in an Arab country they were stationed in. Is that the case there? If not, are there any women who choose to wear one (if they are allowed)?
DryFreeze - thank you so much for responding. Like liirogue, I too would be interested in seeing ANY pictures you want to send! I believe my e-mail address is in my profile. Thank you again for taking time to answer my questions.
misstee:
I’m trying, out net has been down since my last post yesterday and is working incredibly slowly now. =)
The God of Muesli Bars:
Most of the Judges that were in place when we came were Ba’athist. As a general rule, you had to be a member in order to do anything with your life. We have fired 23 Judges and begun to replace them with non-party members and people that will help their country.
liirogue:
I have to email the pictures. I will get together a list of the people that want them and send a mass mail of some pretty cool ones soon. As for having to wear veils, I have not seen a female soldier wear one nor have I heard about that being enforced here. It’s a good thing becuase I know some females that had large problems with that.