Medal of Honor

It has been a little over a week since I last posted. I have been very busy with Army stuff. Yes Army stuff…I am in Iraq you know.. Let’s see if I can bring you guys up to speed on what I have been doing…..

For two weeks I was on escort detail. The U.S. Army employs the Local Iraqi Nations here on post to help rebuild the camp; my job was to watch them. It wasn’t bad, just extremely boring. I did manage to kill some time and learned some Arabic from the translator that was with the group of Iraqi Nationals. We also had long discussions of how life was like with Saddam in power and stuff. Quite interesting.

My roommate noticed that there was a mouse running around our room the other day. We have no clue how it got there but we have been trying to kill it. He’s a fast little critter. My roommate set some traps today in attempt to catch that SOB. Hopefully we are successful. The though of having a little rodent running around my room gives me the quivers. I’ll take photos for all to see of the mouse smashed in the trap.

Oh yea, I forgot to mention. One of our very own soldiers from 3rd ID was awarded the Medal of Honor. For those of you who don’t know much about the Medal of Honor, it is the most prestigious award a soldier can receive. The last was awarded to someone over 12 years ago from that conflict we had in Somalia.(If you saw the movie Black Hawk Down, that was based on a true story) The awardee is Sergeant First Class Paul Ray Smith of B Company, 11th Engineer Battalion 3rd ID. He is credited for killing about 50 enemy soldiers from an Armored Passenger Carrier. SFC. Smith held his position just outside Saddam International Airport on a .50 Cal. Machine gun expending 3 boxes of ammunition before he was fatally wounded. In his efforts to hold off the enemy he saved about 100 of his fellow troops.

Sergeant First Class Smith is the first to be awarded the Medal of Honor during the War on Terror. With people like SFC. Smith I am proud to be apart of the 3rd Infantry Division and U.S. Army. I don’t plan on dying out here but If I do, I hope I can give my life to saving my fellow soldiers.

The son of Sergeant First Class Paul Smith, David accepted the award that his father gave his life to earn. http://www.army.mil/medalofhonor/

On a different note, the weather here is starting to get warmer by the day, highs reach about 80+. The wind is also picking up. The dust here sucks. We walk around most of the day with eye protection from the sun and also to keep the dust out of our eyes.

If you haven’t already, check out my photos on flickr http://www.flickr.com/photos/ob1