13MAR09
0900 HRS
Maiwand District, Afghanistan
Afghanistan is a world of contrasts. The land and the climate could have been pulled out of southern Arizona and in that way it is much like home for me (one exception is there are no cacti here, which is good because I have had bad experiences with cacti). From far enough away the homes and villages here could be mistaken for the adobe compounds in Tucson that they so closely resemble. Up close there is no mistake to be made, this little corner of the world is that land that time forgot.
Life here is different. Maybe it is not the life that is different, so much as the priorities that are applied to life. My "neighbors" are human just like you and I; they laugh, they love, they fight, and they work. They spend more time pulling water from a well than we do at the faucet, but then again we spend more time in front of a vanity mirror than they do, so I guess it all works out in the end. There is no PTA, no Boy Scouts, no soccer teams, but there is still family time and plenty of it. They work together. From dawn to dusk three generations work everyday together to keep the roof up, the animal(s) fed, and the field tended. It would be a scene from Farmtown, Anywhere, USA... if there was hope.
Afghanistan is a country of very little hope. It has been a war zone for almost three decades and it is wearing these people down. For the last seven years they have been asked to help us hunt the Taliban, before that the Taliban had them hunting each other, and before there was a Taliban this country was the last battlefield of the Cold War. And now we are here again, and I pray every day that we can bring these people back their hope.
If there were anyone in the world I could choose to bring back hope to these people it would be the men of 1st Platoon, A Company. What a great nation we must be to have created such an eclectic, caring, intelligent, and resilient group as this! They come from across the country, with different backgrounds, homes, and religions, but they came! Some joined right out of high school, some later in life, but they all came to serve. And they serve so well! There is a pride in their eyes for a job well done, a pride in the duty they fulfill. These men, these boys, can be proud of what they are doing for their country, and they know with absolute certainty that their country is proud of them. How wonderful it will be for them to have that with them wherever else they may go.
--
Robert M. Woodson
First Lieutenant, Infantry
1/A/2-2 IN "Terminators!"
R.L.T.W!
