Funny thing about this job...

Been in a rut lately, and frankly there just hasn't been a lot to write about.

Except for this week.

Had a rock star moment this morning at the IA Brigade's targeting meeting. Targeting meetings are where we get together and talk about bad people. The IA battalion intelligence officers come, as do the IPs (when they aren't butt hurt or mired in drama of 7th grade level) and the IA Brigade Commander comes. Coalition forces also come by the truckload. We make them show slides (which they hate) and they won't talk about certain bad people who are aligned with certain groups 'because there are spies in this room' (again, more 7th grade drama). The IA generally doesn't like the meetings, but attendance and quality has improved, mostly because we willed it.

This morning, everybody showed up-- a good start. The Brigade Commander and the IP general had a meeting before the meeting-- an even better start. The real meeting started about 45 minutes late (somewhat normal). And at the end of the meeting, they announced they had agreed to exchange liaison officers to help share information.

Breakthrough. Huge. Been working on this for almost two months.

I was happy; the Coalition force Battalion Commander was happy; we were all smiles. It was a good morning. There was high fives and hot chow on the objective. I left feeling pretty good about myself.

Tonight we were supposed to have an Iraqi staff meeting; another little project of mine I have been working on is recurring meetings that are productive. I do better when the XO is here, but he is on leave this week. My team and I rolled up at 7:45pm, only to find out the meeting was cancelled. Damn. Setback.

So off I went to see the Brigade Commander to find out why. He was all upset; it seems one of his Battalion Commanders (who is not that great) had a disagreement with a local sheik, and in brief, they ended up getting the Division Commander involved, who made the incident waaaaaay more dramatic than it had to be. End result: The Division Commander locked up the sheik, and the implications are that the sheik's people will now target the IA, since the IA 'disrespected' the sheik. This goes back to the whole sheik system vs. elected governance theme throughout the blog. Even though the Brigade Commander had nothing to do with any of it, he is shamed because he couldn't handle his area. He said he would quit, he would resign, and he wanted to pack his bag and leave now, as he was "tired of being in this Division." All things said in the heat of the moment.

We (me, my Birgade Commander, his subordinate battalion commander, the Division Commander, his stooge, the Division MTT chief and a gob of interpreters) all sat in a very small room and sorted it out, along with the Coalition Battalion Commander on speakerphone. It was all way more dramatic than it needed to be, but pride was at stake. and pride is another reason why Arabs lose wars. The repercussions have yet to be felt; maybe there will be some, maybe there won't be any. Overall I found it entertaining, but then I remembered these guys will shoot at each other for pride reasons. I needed my interpreter to fill me in on the cultural pride stuff.

I have another story involving my Coalition Brigade Commander and a discussion of culture, but I'll save that one for perhaps tomorrow.

Hope you are well-- thanks for reading.

Ron