‘Money is a munition’

[unhappycamper]

Life in Baghdad
Much time devoted to finding weapons caches.


‘Money is a munition’
By Andrew Scutro - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday May 31, 2008 7:28:51 EDT

COMBAT OUTPOST MEADE, Iraq — The first thing they pulled out of the ground was the mud-caked barrel of a heavy machine gun.

Examining it, Capt. Jim Trask calls back to headquarters.

“We’ve got something here. It looks like a barrel to something,” he says into his radio. “It’s shiny.”

Half an hour earlier, Trask — commander of Comanche Troop, 3rd Squadron, 1st Cavalry Regiment — sat with community leaders in Tameem, a garbage-littered settlement five minutes from southeastern Baghdad across the Diyala River.

The meetings are what platoon leaders and higher do during the day, every day, in Iraq. They sip sweet tea, smoke, eat roasted chicken, and negotiate on how much the new playground will cost and who will get the contract.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/05/army_iraq_local_053108w/