Soldier update Thread

[Beor]

Well, here it is. Valandil asked me to put up a thread on the war, so, here you go buddy . I am in Iraq right now, and if you have any questions, I will answer them if I can. If I cant, Ill give you some sort of canned "no comment", or "I can neither confirm or deny" answer. Seriously, I may not be able to tell you much, except that everything is alright, and I miss my wife and kid. I'll keep yall as informed as possible though.

[jerseydevil]

I wish you the best Beor and stay safe. Do you think the situation is really bad in Iraq? Some military personnel have stated that when they came home on leave that they could not believe how the media only reported the bad things and it made it seem much worse than it actually is. (This was before the helicopter attacks) Also - are you in Baghdad?

My brother will be heading back to Bahrain in a couple of months he said.

[Jonathan]

Hang in there - we in the West think about you guys in Iraq

So where in Iraq are you? What are your assignments?

[Dúnedain]

Originally posted by jerseydevil
I wish you the best Beor and stay safe. Do you think the situation is really bad in Iraq? Some military personnel have stated that when they came home on leave that they could not believe how the media only reported the bad things and it made it seem much worse than it actually is. (This was before the helicopter attacks) Also - are you in Baghdad?

My brother will be heading back to Bahrain in a couple of months he said.

I hear ya JD. I have a couple buddies over there and when I've told them about how biased our media has been they've been pissed. I tell them all they talk about is soldiers dying and how everything is out of control. They practically laughed at me when i said that, they were pissed that some of the things they have done weren't getting mentioned like getting the schools safe for the kids again and how Iraqis come up to them, hugging them and thanking them and asking them not to leave and stuff like that.

What has your experience been like Beor?

[Valandil]

Hey All... after Beor posted in the "Far From Home" Thread that he was in the US Infantry and in Baghdad, I asked him to give us some updates. He had trouble staying online enough to start a thread at first, but here's an excerpt from a PM he sent me that answers some of those questions:

Hey, Val, I'm having some computer problems right now, so I cant post, the dang thing keeps sending me back to the main page when I try to post a thread. I'll get it going in a while, just look for it. I am grateful that you would like to hear news, though, so here's some. Everything actually seems to be going good. Either we have an easy sector or they dont want to screw with us, because its been pretty quiet lately. We are chillin' right now, and the Internet keeps shutting down on me . Other than that, I just have been reading and relaxing until the next mission, and waiting to go home to my wife and son.

[Beor]

Yeah, that PM to Valandil still holds true. I just keep on keepin' on. I dont know how the media is handling it, but things really arent that bad here. We have had some bad things happen, and it sucks, but overall, things do seem to be improving. I thank you all for your kind words, too. We all appriciate that stuff.

[Millane]

all the best over there Beor, i guess its another life experiance and it will give you many stories to recollect to children and grandchildren in years to come, i loved my grandpas war stories.

Originally posted by jerseydevil
Some military personnel have stated that when they came home on leave that they could not believe how the media only reported the bad things and it made it seem much worse than it actually is.

the media's portrayal of Iraq is quite interesting to me, i have a family friend that was in East Timor with the peacekeeping team over there and the media here showed it as all going well and stable everywhere and then this friend phones us when he was over there and tells us how its very tense and they sleep with guns next to them in expectation of being attacked, seems like the total oppossite of what happening with respect to Iraq...

[Bombadillo]

We're proud of Beor.

I'm getting mixed messages from the media and the /whole/ truth. So there's something I'm wondering: How is the general morale over there? The soldiers must all miss their families I'm sure, but how are you guys holding up?

[Beor]

Ah, were holding up fine. Of course we do miss our loved ones, and everybody compalins sometimes, but on the whole were doing fine, as I see it.

It does get real [edited] sometimes though...

[Valandil]

Beor sent me this in a PM and OK'd me putting it here:

Yeah, Everything is going fine. Although, yesterday, something exploded and shook the ground throughout the little camp that we are at, a black plume of smoke could be seen for miles. Everything is good, though, we are capturing a lot of arms dealers and also IED makers. Morale seems to be good, so thats cool. Other than that not much is going on, you know, same ol', same ol'.

--Beor

[jerseydevil]

Beor -

Now that you are back you need to update this with new information. Maybe you want to come to entmoot though to escape Iraq a bit though - which is understandable.

Hope everything improves there.

[Beor]

Yeah, I really should, but that PM to Valandil summed it up pretty nice. I do come here to escape, I suppose, but all in all, the moot is just a good time, and one can get alot of good information and get diffenent viewpoints on things. But yeah, everything is going Okay, we (my Battalion) should be leaving here for Germany in about three months, so that is REALLY cool. Other than that, not too much has happened, of course its only ten-thirty in the morning here. We did a raid last night, no one got hurt, thats about it.

-- Beor

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Beor
Yeah, I really should, but that PM to Valandil summed it up pretty nice. I do come here to escape, I suppose, but all in all, the moot is just a good time, and one can get alot of good information and get diffenent viewpoints on things. But yeah, everything is going Okay, we (my Battalion) should be leaving here for Germany in about three months, so that is REALLY cool.

That'll be good. My brother goes on deployment soon - but he's in the Navy. he's going to be going to Djibouti. He's not looking forward to it. Then he's been in Qatar and (EDIT: phone call and forgot to finish my post)

Other than that, not too much has happened, of course its only ten-thirty in the morning here. We did a raid last night, no one got hurt, thats about it.

-- Beor

Now that we know what you look like - I'll try seeing if I can see you on the news ont eh nighttime raids and things they show on the news. Probably hard to make out - even if you are there though.

Best of luck and stay safe.

[Nurvingiel]

Our best wishes are with you Beor.

What is the biggest threat to peace, or, is everything fairly calm right now? Is there any trouble with Saddam loyalists?

[Beor]

The biggest threat to peace seems to be these guys that want to bomb everything. We are apprehending a lot of them, but they still pop up everywhere. Also, they dont just bomb us anymore, they bomb the Iraqi Police too. I dont really know exactly who they work for, they may be Saddam loyalists, but I'm sure a few of them are just radicals bent on blowing stuff up. Also, alot of them want to try to make the US look bad to the Iraqi people. The big thing right now is to keep the people feeling secure. I think we're doing a good job, no matter what the media says (which I dont really know, I really dont have time to watch the news).

[Dúnedain]

Originally posted by Beor
The biggest threat to peace seems to be these guys that want to bomb everything. We are apprehending a lot of them, but they still pop up everywhere. Also, they dont just bomb us anymore, they bomb the Iraqi Police too. I dont really know exactly who they work for, they may be Saddam loyalists, but I'm sure a few of them are just radicals bent on blowing stuff up. Also, alot of them want to try to make the US look bad to the Iraqi people. The big thing right now is to keep the people feeling secure. I think we're doing a good job, no matter what the media says (which I dont really know, I really dont have time to watch the news).

Well the media is of course blowing everything out of proportion as always. All they talk about is when someone dies or when we do something wrong. They never talk about the good things that are happening, it's so ridiculous...

[Sister Golden Hair]

Finally visited the thread Beor, so that answers my question from my PM. Stay safe.

[jerseydevil]

Originally posted by Dúnedain
Well the media is of course blowing everything out of proportion as always. All they talk about is when someone dies or when we do something wrong. They never talk about the good things that are happening, it's so ridiculous...

Well Nightline did a thing on Iraq, about whether the gloom and doom stories were correct or not and their final conclusion - that things are actually getting better.

[hectorberlioz]

hey Beor-FUBAR.

[Coney II]

Hello Beor!

Nice to see a soldier posting here!

Did you get to kill anyone?