Photo By Master Sgt. Brock Jones | A buffalo statue stands below an American flag on the stage of Joint Security Station...... read more read more
By Staff Sgt. Brock Jones
Multi-National Division - Baghdad
CAMP LIBERTY, Iraq – Soldiers can take the dirtiest and nastiest piece of real estate, and turn it into a joint security station or a combat outpost, a home away from home.
Once a run-down and junk-filled shopping center, fully equipped with unmoving escalators, Joint Security Station Adl exemplified the meaning of both dirty and nasty. That is, until the cavalry was called in. Soldiers made great strides by, Aug. 26, 2008, and continue to creat a home away from home.
Soldiers and leaders of Headquarters and Headquarters Troop, 4th "Blackjack" Squadron, 10th Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, Multi-National Division – Baghdad, attached to 2nd BCT, 101st Airborne Div., have been working double time to turn the old Adl Shopping Mall in western Baghdad, into a secure and comfortable place from which to conduct daily missions in the local Iraqi neighborhoods.
Living among the Iraqi people in small JSSs and combat outposts is one of the central principles to Gen. David Petraeus' counter insurgency operations. These forward bases put Soldiers out among the people, living and working in the very neighborhoods they have the responsibility to secure. The map of Baghdad is dotted with 51 of these small security stations and 20 outposts.
In order to more fully employ those counter insurgency principles, an advanced party of less than 20 Soldiers and their leaders from HHT, 4th Sqdn., 10th Cav., moved out to JSS Adl the first week of June to begin sprucing up the area before the arrival of the rest of HHT in later that month.
Fixing up the JSS, has been no small task and a team effort from the beginning.
"It was garbage everywhere, just like a big junkyard [when we got here]," said Spc. Aaron Rosenfeld, a Valparaiso, Ind., native, who currently serves as a recreation and utilities specialist with HHT, 4th Sqdn., 10th Cav. Regt. They found tires and trash and human waste everywhere, he said.
Cpl. Shawn Axtell, a native of Houston, who serves as a medic with HHT, 4th Sqdn., 10th Cav., said it is hard to describe the mess they found. Axtell and Rosenfeld were both part of the original group of Blackjack Soldiers to arrive at JSS Adl.
"There was trash everywhere," said Axtell. "A lot of the guys put in a lot of hard hours cleaning up trash, putting up rooms. There's still a good bit [left to do], but we're making progress."
The willing attitude of Soldiers to go above and beyond their regular duties, and their ability to work as a team, have been the keys to the success so far at JSS Adl, and the force behind the daily progress in the ongoing improvements.
"It was pretty labor intensive for quite a long time," said Spc. Guy Monighetti, a native of Suffield, Conn., who also serves as a recreation and utilities specialist with HHT. "And it's paying off, it's just a very long, painful journey. We're learning as we go."
Monighetti and Rosenfeld, both artillery forward observers who have put away their laser designators and global positioning satellite receivers for a time, are currently in charge of the monstrous job of upkeep and maintenance at JSS Adl. Both have experience working in construction before joining the Army, and that knowledge has come in handy as they fight to keep the rooms cool and the lights on. It is a huge task given the size of the building and the limited availability of resources.
"My R and U section of four guys are working hard trying to maintain the A/Cs, the light switches, the light bulbs," said 1st Sgt. Scott Greene, a native of Pocatello, Idaho, who serves as the senior enlisted leader of HHT, 4th Sqdn., 10th Cav., and the mayor of JSS Adl.. "We're going through thirty light bulbs a day due to the generator changeover and the surges. It's pretty busy."
Even though coalition forces have occupied JSS Adl in one capacity or another since the early days of the war, little effort had been taken to improve the quality of life because it was viewed as merely a transient place to live for short periods of time. The previous unit in charge of the station was a smaller group and had deemed it necessary to basically barricade themselves on the third floor, dedicating what little time and resources they had to protecting themselves.
Since Adl has become the permanent place of residence for HHT, 4th Sqdn., 10th Cav., and is scheduled to soon be home to more Soldiers from 1st Battalion, 22 Infantry Regt., 1st BCT, 4th Inf. Div., MND-B, both the leadership and Soldiers are giving extra effort to make needed improvements, from the basement to the fourth floor, to ensure the living conditions at JSS Adl are as good as they possibly can be.
"The leadership got together and we wanted to make [JSS Adl] as livable as possible so Soldiers didn't have to go back to Camp Liberty," said Green. "For the most part, when Soldiers go back [to Camp Liberty] for the day-to-day business, for their haircuts or for picking up mail, they'd rather come back, and that's what this was intended for," he said.
JSS Adl has all the amenities that larger bases have, said Green. The equipment in the gym rivals that found on larger bases. The squadron chaplain wrote a number of agencies and was given enough golf clubs to give out to the Soldiers, so they set up a make-shift indoor driving range. The mess hall, where Army cooks do all the cooking, has excellent food and service, usually no line to wait in and cold drinks available anytime.
Creating a home away from home, never an easy task, provides deployed Soldiers with a sense of security and a place to hang their helmets and body armor, a needed place of rest. JSS Adl is well on its way to becoming that home for the cavalrymen of Blackjack Squadron, a place where they can proudly hang their golden spurs and red-banded Stetson hats, a home built by their own sweat and blood and a ton of unselfish teamwork.
| Date Taken: | 09.04.2008 |
| Date Posted: | 09.04.2008 14:52 |
| Story ID: | 23205 |
| Location: | BAGHDAD, IQ |
| Web Views: | 201 |
| Downloads: | 65 |
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