PERSONAL INVESTMENT

I will be heading home soon so I probably won't post again for some time. Thanks to all who have supported me through your encouraging words and prayers. A big thanks to everyone who donated to our humanitarian efforts.

If you would like further information on our ongoing Afghanistan humanitarian efforts, please contact me directly. My email address is located under "My Profile" to the right.

A whole new group of soldiers has arrived to take our place. Please don't forget about them or their families. Those soldiers will be here for at least twelve months, and with the recent extension, many will be gone for fifteen months.

FIFTEEN MONTHS.

Think about what that means. Kids will spend over a year without a parent. Some kids will have both parents deployed. Spouses will be without their husband or wife. Many marriages won't survive. One thing is certain. Lives will be changed forever.

Could you handle it? Could your spouse? How would you feel if it was your child, your father, mother, brother or sister? We've even got grandparents serving here.

I can tell you how you'd feel. You'd be worried. You'd take an interest in the people and the politics. You'd count the days until your loved one could come home. You'd voice your opinion.

You'd get involved.

That's the problem as I see it today. Many of us don't know anyone who is deployed. We're not personally invested in the outcome.

Don't just say that you "Support the Troops." What does that really mean? Does it mean thinking about what the troops believe? What they're going through? What their families must endure? Does it mean taking some kind of action in order to influence the outcome?

Or does it mean what the t.v. or talk radio tells you?

I think it means more than sending a card, a care package or placing a yellow ribbon magnet on your bumper. It means getting involved. It means participating in the American political process. It means pushing outside the boundaries of the world that you have created for yourself.

Consider it your duty to follow what is happening and to form your own opinion. That's the least you can do.

But if you really want to support the troops, you must find a way to become personally invested.

PR: wait... I: wait... L: wait... LD: wait... I: wait... wait... Rank: wait... Traffic: wait... Price: wait... C: wait...

AFGHAN SCHOOL CHILDREN

During a recent village recon I had the chance to see an elementary school and visit with the kids.

Like all kids, they were a bit shy. I guess I would be too if a couple of fully armed soldiers walked into my classroom. That can't be helped because we're required to stay in our body armor.

Despite our appearance, the kids opened up to us really fast and were glad to see us. A great icebreaker is to show the kids digital pictures of themselves. They've probably never seen pictures of themselves so they're fascinated by the camera.

Notice anything? All boys. I really couldn't get a straight answer as to whether the girls attend school or not. I know that this school is so small that the kids have to attend in shifts; some in the morning and then a new group in the afternoon.

Overcrowding is a common problem. The typical Afghan family has between five and ten children. It's also hard to get the teachers paid sometimes. This school house is in the middle of nowhere and is not easily accessible, which exacerbates those problems.

Anyway, it was fun visiting these kids and hopefully we will be back soon to deliver more help to them.

A BIG STEP FORWARD

(CNN) -- Top Taliban leader Mullah Dadullah Lang has been killed in a military operation in southern Afghanistan, NATO's International Security Assistance Forces said Sunday, confirming earlier reports by the Afghan government.

A NATO statement said Dadullah had "left his sanctuary in southern Afghanistan where he was killed in a U.S.-led coalition operation supported by NATO."

The operation was made possible "by the Afghan National Security Forces and the Afghan people," the statement said.

The elusive commander was in charge of day-to-day military operations for the Taliban and, according to ISAF, his death has struck a "serious blow" to the resurgent Taliban in the region.

According to Afghan government spokesman Khaleeq Ahmad, Dadullah was tracked down Friday by a joint Afghan army-police operation backed by NATO air support in southern Helmand Province.

Ahmad said Dadullah, who he described as the "killer of killers," was located through intelligence reports and by following leads closely.

"We had some reports that there were some major figures in the area of the operation," Ahmad told CNN Sunday. "We were going for some significant figures who were hiding in Helmand province."

Ahmad said the announcement was made Sunday because that was when the government's intelligence service confirmed the body was Dadullah.

The one-legged Dadullah figured prominently for the Taliban in media interviews.

In April, he told al-Jazeera that Osama bin Laden helped plan a deadly suicide car bombing outside Bagram Air Base targeting a "very important American official," apparently referring to Vice President Dick Cheney. (Full story)

Referring to bin Laden, Dadullah told the network, "Praise be to God he is still alive, and we have information about him and praise be to God he orchestrates plans in both Iraq and Afghanistan."

On March 1, Dadullah said his forces were poised for a spring offensive against NATO-led coalition troops in Afghanistan, and that he was maintaining a regular line of communication with bin Laden. Dadullah spoke in an interview obtained by Britain's Channel Four.

Journalist Tom Coghlan told CNN on Sunday from Kabul that he had witnessed a shift in NATO battle tactics.

NATO has been moving away from killing large numbers of low-level fighters to targeting Taliban figureheads in an "aim to decapitate the leadership," Coghlan said.

And Dadullah's death is "perhaps the biggest military loss" the Taliban has had since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion.

In December, the U.S. military said another top Taliban military commander was killed in an airstrike close to the border with Pakistan.

Mullah Akhtar Mohammad Osmani, described as a close associate of Osama bin Laden and Taliban leader Mullah Omar, was killed by a U.S. airstrike while traveling by vehicle in a deserted area in the southern province of Helmand, the U.S. military said.

I FRATELLI DI ITALIA

The title of this post means "My Italian Brothers." Yesterday marked my last visit to Camp Invicta, the Italian FOB, and the last time that I will see my friends Giuseppe and Erman in Afghanistan. I say "in Afghanistan" because my wife and I plan to travel to Italy later this year. I hope to see them again then.

I can't say enough about Guiseppe and Erman. They kept me sane by feeding me great Italian food and through their friendship. Visiting with them was a welcome break from Camp Alamo and it gave me something to look forward to each week.

To my Italian friends, "Mille grazie."

OPERATION BACKPACK

We are currently in the process of filling over 2000 backpacks and duffel bags to give to the Afghan school kids. This is proving to be one of our biggest logistical challenges.

This must be done during our "down" time, and there isn't much of that. Each backpack or duffel must be unwrapped from its packaging, unzipped and then put through an assembly line of packers. Here you see backpacks waiting to be stripped of their internal packaging, which consists of a lot of useless cardboard and plastic.

Each packer has an assigned task. One person is in charge of pens and pencils, another handles crayons, another handles notebook paper, and so on. Then a person has to zip up the backpack or duffel and place it back into a box for shipment. As you can see, this is a very labor intensive process.

Two days of work and we've only been able to stuff about 800. Here you see the stuffed backpacks that have been "re-boxed." These are now ready to be delivered.

See all of those boxes in the back? Those are the duffel bags that we haven't even unpacked yet.

This is going to take a while.

Soviet K-9 Dog Kennels

Soviet Combat Engineers used dogs to sniff for land mines during their war in Afghanistan. German shepherds were the breed of choice.
These pictures show the remains of a Soviet K-9 dog barracks. They were built using the same mud construction that the Afghans use for their homes.

You can still see the small kennels used to house each dog. It's amazing that the mud construction has lasted this long.

The Afghans tried a number of ways to baffle the Soviet Union's dogs, like wrapping the mines in cellophane or sprinkling them with motor oil. Neither method was very successful.

Dogs are still used today to help locate the thousands of land mines left in this country.

AWARDS CEREMONY

Today the Training Assistance Group held an awards ceremony for many of its departing members.

It is nice to be recognized for a job well done, but people don't do things here for medals.

I personally did not set out on this tour to chase medals either. We only wear them on our class "A" uniforms, and being in the National Guard, I have only donned mine a few times. However, now that this deployment is almost over, it does feel good to know that people think you did a good job.

I received the Meritorious Service Medal and the Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal. We will all receive several other medals for participating in this tour.

Colonel Lyman said today, and I agree, that the Volunteer Service Medal is the most meaningful. I'm very proud of the humanitarian work we've done here.

FULTON COUNTY DAILY REPORT ARTICLE

Wednesday, May 9, 2007
Atlanta JAG carries out aid mission for Afghan refugee village
By Meredith Hobbs, Staff Reporter

On Friday, U.S. soldiers distributed two 7-ton trucks’ worth of clothes, shoes and supplies to a refugee village near Kabul Military Training Center in Afghanistan. Atlanta solo plaintiffs’ attorney Scott Delius, serving in Afghanistan as an Army National Guard JAG since November 2006, organized the relief effort.

SCOTT D. DELIUS is ordinarily a solo plaintiffs’ attorney in Atlanta but has been serving in Afghanistan as an Army National Guard member since November 2006. He is stationed at the country’s largest military training base as a judge advocate general helping to train the Afghan National Army.

In late February, appalled and frustrated by the desperate poverty he’d seen in a refugee village near his base at the Kabul Military Training Center, he organized a clothing drive for the villagers.

The response was enthusiastic and generous. Within a few weeks, Delius had received more than 200 boxes of clothes, shoes and supplies at Camp Alamo, the American base at KMTC—all labeled and sorted by size and gender.

The contributions from colleagues and friends in Atlanta, Tennessee, New York and elsewhere were enough to fill a 7-ton truck. Boxes collected by Camp Alamo’s commander, Col. Jim Lyman, filled another 7-ton truck.

On Friday more than 50 soldiers at Delius’ base volunteered to help him transport the donations to a nearby village and distribute them to the Afghans. Since Friday is a Muslim holiday, it is the soldiers’ day off at the base.

Delius wrote on the blog that he’s keeping of his tour, Afghanistan JAG, that it took him about two weeks to plan the trip. He checked out the village three times, then planned the route and organized the personnel before Friday’s expedition off the base.

Crowd control was the soldiers’ biggest task; the villagers jockeyed for better spots in line for the clothing and shoes. Delius writes that there were no women or girls in the line because the men and boys kept pushing them aside—so the soldiers moved the girls to the front of the line, where they received all the clothes they could carry.

“We were able to put shoes, pants, shirts and jackets on over 500 people and size them correctly. That is a massive undertaking,” he said on his blog, where he also has posted pictures of the humanitarian mission. Delius, who was promoted to captain in April, is due to return to Atlanta later this month. He and his colleagues and family are working with a humanitarian organization to keep the aid effort going after his return and send shoes and clothes to Afghans in other villages.

HUMANITARIAN MISSION PICTURES

More pictures from yesterday's successful mission to deliver clothes to a needy village.

We completely filled two of them with boxes of clothes, from top to bottom.

The rest of the photographer's pictures tell their own story about the impact that we made yesterday. Enjoy.

HUMANITARIAN MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

Today we packed two 7 ton trucks filled from floor to ceiling with boxes of clothes and took them to a village outside Kabul for distribution. One truck was filled entirely of clothes that I collected from around the U.S. The other one was filled with boxes collected by the Alamo commander, COL Lyman.

It's hard to describe the size of the interior of a 7 ton truck, and we had two of them filled with large boxes. This was the largest distribution of clothes that I have ever seen. We were able to put shoes, pants, shirts and jackets on over 500 people and size them correctly. That is a massive undertaking.

I was the convoy commander for this mission. It took about two weeks to plan. I reconned the village three times, planned the route and organized the personnel. However, it's a lot more detailed than that and there were many people that volunteered their time. I don't want to give the impression that I did it all myself.

As a matter of fact, this mission would not have been possible were it not for the generosity of my family and friends back home who collected, packed and organized the boxes of clothes for shipment. The clothes were sent to us pre-sorted and labeled. That meant we only had to unpack the boxes and set up stations for the clothes.

This is a "must" for anyone organizing this type of endeavor. Make sure the boxes are pre-sorted and labeled before they are shipped out.

Of course, this mission would not have been possible without the 50+ volunteers who selflessly helped today. This picture shows the line of American and British soldiers formed to unload the goods. It's the largest turnout I've ever seen. Remember, this is everyone's "off" day. They are donating their personal time to do this.

Here we are setting up the stations. Shoes on the left, coats in the back, shirts on the right, etc.

Baby clothes being unpacked.

Look at all the shoes. Someone even donated football cleats.

Here the villagers are lining up. Crowd control became the biggest task. This is where I spent most of the day, helping to placate the villagers and assure them that there was plenty for everyone. They understandably jockeyed and tried to push to the front of the line because they're desperate.

Note the sign outside the school where we distributed the goods. It was built by the French.

As most of you know by now, females are treated quite poorly in Afghanistan. You will notice that there are no women in line. Young girls showed up, but they had to fend for themselves. Unfortunately, they couldn't do much. The men and boys kept pushing them aside.

Well, we fixed that problem. We moved the girls to the front of the line! You'll be happy to know that the girls got all the clothes that they could carry.

The inside of the courtyard as we're distributing goods. We had a controlled entry point, which was key. A soldier escorted each person through every station to make sure they got a fair amount of clothes that fit them.

The kids are fascinated by the digital pictures of themselves.

Some of the bags were bigger than the kids trying to carry them.

We took good care of over 500 people today, sizing them all up with shoes, pants, shirts and coats to fit. It was great.

This is the last humanitarian mission that I will lead and organize. All of the clothes that I have collected have now been distributed. I will also be coming home soon.

Mobilizing and getting to Afghanistan has been difficult. But these missions have made it all worthwhile.

THE RUSSIAN CAVE

There is a huge cave not far from our FOB. It was used by the Russians during their war here in Afghanistan to hide tanks. Hence, it is called the "Russian Cave." Yes, I know, it would be more accurate to call it the "Soviet Cave" but most people are not as picky as I am about historical facts.

Unfortunately the cave was locked today. Why does a cave need a lock? I don't know, but this thing is truly massive and supposedly goes back quite far into the mountain.

Me in front of the locked cave.

It's interesting to be this close to a piece of history, to imagine the USSR soldiers laboring to construct this tunnel and driving their tanks in and out. I wonder what they thought, what they felt about being here and what ultimately happened to them.

You can almost feel the presence of all the people who have struggled here in the past. It's like they're silently watching you.

The Afghans call these spirits "ghents." They firmly believe that they are all around us.

Sometimes I think they're right.