I think, both are hurdles that someone like me have to clear. It’s almost as if I say, “Okay, enough. Now, let me put those aside and figure out what works. What’s the reality on the ground? How do we reach out to people on another side?”

Anyway, keep writing. I’m reading and learning.

Also, I really like the idea of aid worker combined with security contractor. How many contracts do guys do out there, where they protect some FOB and they never get outside the wire to mix it up with the locals? Most security contracts involve being isolated at camps, with very little interaction with non-security type locals. I see this in Iraq, and I am sure Afghanistan is the same within the contracting community. Yeah, convoys and PSD stuff is cool, but the kind of work you guys are doing is hands on/working with the locals/making a difference/while having the ability to protect self and others. To have the freedom to move around, and really connect with folks is pretty damn cool if you ask me.
S/F -matt

You make a very good point too concerning the possibility of driving the price of food up in areas where civ/mil teams are housed. I don’t think that would be a problem because (as I envision these teams) you would have a compound housing 40 or so individuals in various district administrative centers. There would never be the concentration of internationals which could easily drive the food market up.

The problems normally encountered with quality control, storage and food preparation would not surface in this type of set up. Although local villagers would be hired the kitchen should be run by a Nepalese or Filipino cook who would have to be supervised by the corpsman (medic in Army terms.) The Navy has directives which provide specifics on how to prepare fresh vegetables and fruits in third world countries which use “night soil” for fertilization.

I have been here four years and have eaten local food in every corner of this country and have never been sick. I know a few people who have gotten very ill but it has never happened to me. If the bad guys are going to try and slip poison into the chow of internationals they would do it when they are hosting them at a jirga – this is an old trick in central Asia and one of the reasons why potential antagonists always eat out of the same communal bowl.

We need to take some risks if we want to make progress – deploying troops in the exact manner our doctrine recommends can be done safely and cheaply. You just have to be smart about it and the one thing our military has is a surplus of very smart people.

If anyone at State had the sense God gave a rabbit, they would be trying to get you to run stuff like this all over the country. Sadly, gerbils appear to be the order of the day. Good news for you; bad news for Afghanistan.

I wanted to challenge you on the point of eating local food. I think it’s a good idea, but can you address the following concerns?

Lets forget the fact that there are some really big, really influential companies that have tied up huge contracts for the supplies. Besides that, how would you be able to assure availability of raw materials, quality control and potential for the militants to poison the food?

Also, a big problem is that when you suddenly have 43,000 more people to feed the cost of food goes up because the local farmers/producers can charge a premium due to the demand. This wouldn’t really effect the coalition forces, but could do a lot of damage to the buying power of the locals. This problem was evident a year or two ago when the price of flour and rice went up due to foreign market demands. Growers were trekking over to Pakistan to sell their goods for more money and it was causing food shortages in Afghanistan.

Cheers!
Russ