NYT: Korengal Valley

Capt. Dan Kearney bows his head in frustration after the denial of his request for an air strike against men walking nearby with weapons. Above his head, the laser of an AC-130 plane tracks a potential target.

The New York Times cover story from last week's Sunday Magazine was part one of a two part series on a unit in the Korengal Valley, Afghanistan.

I came across the article last night after before going to bed after a 16-hour workday, mostly playing OpFor in wargames. During a lull in the action we had time to discuss plenty of "what if" scenarios pertaining to our deployment at some point in the undefined future. Having never served in combat I was pretty much in listening mode, taking in all I could from the combat vets contributing to the discussion. As infantry, a definite theme emerged, especially considering how successful we were at countering the U.S. Scouts whom we were "fighting" against.

On how we would have done better, in real combat, opinions ranged from suggesting we would not stack in front of windows, to, we'd just pull out and call in an air strike on the whole village.

The dialogue got more interesting as the higher ranking leaders weighed in explaining the complexity of COIN operations in the Iraqi battlespace.

I could sense the challenge the leaders faced trying to explain to door-smashing grunts (us) that even since their last deployment, things had changed (Awakening Councils, etc) and this deployment would be different for the vets. It is now a matter of kicking ass while at the same time being less obnoxious to the civilians than the enemy is, so we can maintain the trend we've seen since Gen. Petraeus's surge has turned around the war and decreased IED deaths by 80%.

This article about what is happening in Korengal valley is especially interesting after the training and discussions yesterday. I think I'll print out a copy and bring it in for our unit. Follow link for NYT's Part one: LINK Photos HERE.