The book opens with a squad of soldiers running a tactical control point just outside of a village called Yusufiyah. They are approached when a man Abu Muhammad had found his cousins family brutally murdered not too far off. Sgt. Tony Yribe and 3 others went to go investigate it. Although it was a terrible scene Sgt. Yribe had just assumed that it was like most other situations in Iraq in that the family was a victim of Iraqis attacking other Iraqis. The one thing that bothered him was that there was a shotgun shell and Iraqis do not normally use shotguns. From there it jumps backwards to before the deployment. It goes back to Colonel Todd Ebel taking over 2nd Brigade of the 101st Airborne Division. He was tasked with taking over …show more content…
The normal hand off that takes place in these situations was incredibly abbreviated and not what the 1-502nd had expected. Upon his arrival Cpt. Goodwin split his company into 3 jobs the FOB, JSB, and QRF. First platoon was the first platoon to go to the JSB. The living standards were sub-par even for what was expected for deployed soldiers. It was the beginning of hard times for 1st platoon. As the company began to settle into their assignment attacks on the soldiers began to happen. Kunk was bearing down hard on Goodwin telling him that he wasn’t getting the job done right constantly berating him on his performance. As they began to clear the routes in the AO the casualties starting occurring. After some time had passed all the platoons had experienced many deaths and were starting to lose a lot of their platoon leadership. The mounting pressure of combat combined with the pressure coming down from LTC Kunk communication between the company and battalion level leadership began to digress. With morale lowering with every day and casualty that went by the men began to run the tactical checkpoints that they had set up ruthlessly. They weren’t treating civilian harshly and would even harass them physically. This gave them a notorious record among the Iraqi civilians. Going into December 2005 the men had begun to relax on their own standard operating procedures along the
When the men was wounded, and showed weakness the platoon leader gave comfort while getting him the help he needed. And when he wanted to hold another soldier’s hand, no judgment was given, just a hand and consolation. A strong bond had to be there, in the jungle among the grunts to save lives and stop one another from going crazy, as they only had each other.
Control of reproductive decisions of black women is a highly prevalent a form of racial oppression in America. Due to this form of control, the meaning of reproductive liberty in America has been significantly altered. These issues are addressed in Dorothy Roberts’ Killing the Black Body. The novel demonstrates the way in which black women were consistently devalued as a tool for reproductive means, which in itself was a form of racial oppression. The novel also provides the reader with insight as to how experiences of black women since times of slavery have drastically changed the present day connotation of reproductive freedom.
Kelly Brown Douglas begins by posing a series of questions, including, “Who is the Black Christ?” and “Is the Black Christ Enough?” (6-7) For Douglas, the Black Christ, “…represents God’s urgent movement in human history to set Black captives free from the demons of White racism” (3). The question of “Who is the Black Christ?” is addressed in Chapter 3. The question of “Is the Black Christ enough?” is addressed in Chapters 4 and 5, as Douglas critically examines the relationship of the Black Christ to the Black community and ends with addressing what womanist theology is and why there is a need for it in understanding the Black Christ.
Infantry was to support ROK forces on hills 940 and 773. (Ecker, 2010) On the night of the 27th,
They found out they were going to one of the most if not the most dangerous place in Iraq South Baghdad also known as the Triangle of Death. October 2005 2nd Brigade started to arrive Kunk dispersed the Companies: Bravo-West, Charlie-South, Alpha-central, and Delta-North. Kunk assigned Bravo and Charlie who he believed to be his best companies the mission he judged to be the toughest. The relief in place and transfer of authority was quite displeasing many men said that the National Guard unit 48th were quite beaten up and done for. They claimed the men looked beat and scared letting the enemy dictate where they could and could not go and had very little intel on the AO and surrounding areas to pass along to them. As everyone started to settle in to their AO Kunk started focusing on the overall mission to fight the insurgency and support the people and train the IA. Now focusing in more on Bravo, Goodwin took over the Yusufiyah area and was very
The Story “The Black Ball” written by Ralph Ellison is about a man named John, born around the civil war that goes through difficulties and challenges in his life him being an African American. In the story, it seems like it’s just a straight forward story but if you take a real close look at it you can see that there is a message within the story. Through Metaphors and allegories and other literary terms like characterization, you can see the negative of how racism and discrimination affects people in a big way of there thinking. The theme of the story would have to do with Persistence and doing hard work through the tough times.
It wasn’t long for the company to get settled into the COP and the platoons used to the mission tempo of daily conducting mounted and dismounted presence patrols, humanitarian aid missions, and census gathering. For the first few months our AO remained very calm. There was no direct fire from the enemy, and I don’t recall there being many, if any, improvised explosive devices (IED). If the other platoons came across any, they didn’t cause any battle damage to the vehicles. As any Army
Arthur Black is a very opinionated man. In his essays about Canada, he has many short pieces about the differences between Canadians and Americans. He states how there is never anything bad said about Canada, and that Canada could even be considered a “wallflower”. In his essay Canadian Passion Not Flagging, Black talks about how the Americans wave their flag and Canadians do not. Americans have their flag everywhere; hanging inside malls, and even at the gas stations. In his essay Canada: Too Polite to Live, it says how the American Declaration of Independence demands life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Canadians have settled for peace, order, and good government. Another difference between Americans and Canadians according to
“Whenever my environment had failed to support or nourish me, I had clutched at books.” –Richard Wright, Black Boy. The author suffered and lived through an isolated society, where books were the only option for him to escape the reality of the world. Wright wrote this fictionalized book about his childhood and adulthood to portray the dark and cruel civilization and to illustrate the difficulties that blacks had, living in a world run by whites.
Arriving in October 2005, the entire campaign units were struggling throughout with being over-tasked and under-staffed, and 1st platoon was a major victim of this occurrence. Relieving the 48th Infantry Brigade, who had no relations with the locals and very little presence in the AO, they had to reestablish control of the area around FOB Yusufiyah. With terrible living conditions and little to no equipment, the platoon had to juggle improving their fighting positions while at the same time secure the JSB and the AVLB. The company TOC had no kitchen to cook food nor any running water. Soldiers would fill sand bags from sun up to sun down trying to provide themselves with some sort of cover against attacks. The PSG Miller would request supplies constantly, but it seemed a low priority of the the higher command. This was a common theme throughout the time they were in the triangle of death. It wasn't often that officers would visit the FOB or provide supplies to enhance their situation, but when they did it was not a welcomed response. Kunk would come by and tell the soldiers how undisciplined and how little work they had completed with little consideration of how hard the soldiers had been working with the limited resources.
First Platoon had many leaders brought in to try and fix the platoon. Sergeant First Class Fenlason was brought into the platoon as the new platoon sergeant on February 4th, 2006. He was not respected right away because he was one who did not have any combat experience. He was just a desk worker who got brought in to fix the platoon with a cocky attitude. From the Joes perspective he did nothing but “{sit} around smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee, and that’s it. He would do patrols once a month to go and talk to some leaders.” They hated
It was in this environment that Kunk started belittling and micromanaging his company commanders and sowed the seeds of mistrust between the different companies and the headquarters unit. In defense of Kunk, the mission he received was going to be one of the most difficult missions during the Iraq war. Upon reaching their area of operations and conducting their battle hand-off, the problems already started to arise with Bravo Company. A majority of their leadership was wounded or killed in action, creating a power vacuum and a domino effect which were exacerbated by Kunk’s actions. Instead of providing support to his wounded company, Kunk belittled them and blamed them for the hardships that had befallen their comrades further driving a wedge of mistrust between Bravo Company and the head quarter’s element. Even with frequent changes in leadership, the casualties and problems continued to rise for Bravo Company, and living conditions for the soldiers reached deplorable levels. Being short-manned stretched the already limited resources causing personnel levels to be recklessly low for the various tasks the company received. This lack of men and lack of leadership cultivated the perfect environment for heinous criminals to act on their impulses. Company commanders complained, psychiatric evaluations were completed, recommendations were made that went unheeded and problems still
Debra Dickerson, a lawyer and journalist, sets out to inform blacks that they have to give up on the past. If they do not give up on the past, there will be no future for blacks in America. She opens her book, The End of Blackness: Returning the Souls of Black Folks to Their Rightful Owners, by saying “this book will both prove and promote the idea that the concept of ‘blackness,’ as it has come to be understood, is rapidly losing its ability to describe, let alone predict or manipulate, the political and social behavior of African Americans” (p.3). My first thought after finishing this book was that she did not prove anything.
This chapter is about how Sudhir began to study the poor African Americans near the University of Chicago campus. Although the students at the University of Chicago campus were warned to stay away from certain areas around the campus, Sudhir began to venture into these neighborhoods. Hearing about and seeing the poor African American neighborhoods led him to begin his research. He was lead to the Lake Park projects in an effort to interview young black men (Venkatesh 2008:9). This is where he met J.T. a member of a local gang. Using the interview questions he had prepared for his interviews did not get him any useful information. As Sudhir was being turned away, J.T. offered that “With people
The culture of a combat unit is parallel to none. Combat units develop a cohesive bond that only life threatening event can create. The culture of the 918th was no exception. Two extremes are played out during the command of Colonel Davenport and General Savage. Colonel Davenport became so close to his men that he went to great lengths to protect them. He questioned orders that put his men in harm’s way and made excuses for poor performance. The men admired and respected him, but had a low commitment to their organization. Davenports culture was one were the men were coddled and were not held accountable. General Savage held everyone to a high standard and demanded accountability. During flight briefs he demanded reasons for poor performance. Most importantly poor performance was met with consequences.