Summer heat and hot insurgents...

As the summer goes on, the heat seems to go up. As the heat goes up, so does the insurgent activity. Rather strange...we want to work less as it gets hotter, these guys seem to want to do more. That or they're just more pissed off than normal due to the unbearable heat. We're starting to reach into the 120's on a daily basis now. As we move into August...that'll start reaching the 130's. I can't begin to explain how hot that is.

My main area of operations is right next to the National Police station. This happens to be a high profile target for insurgents...more so of late. That being the case, it means we're having plenty of shooting to run to. Most of the time, they've already scared the bad guys off. Others, we show up, fire a couple bursts and the bad guys run off. It's impossible to pursue them due to barriers on the neighborhoods, and if your gunner doesn't hit with the first burst, the fight's usually over. So we end up with several short, high intensity engagements a week of late. It gets frustrating to say the least.

Add in the frustration of lying locals. Their constant complaint is of the National Police check point randomly firing into their neighborhood. The NPs don't randomly shoot...they might get a bit excessive when they do shoot, but it's usually not random. So we keep asking the locals...who's shooting from their neighborhood. Of course, everyone's innocent, knows nothing or sees nothing. Do we have proof they shoot? Yeah...while moving to the latest engagement at the checkpoint, two rounds hit in front of my truck. Only place they could have come from was in the neighborhood. Unless the NPs have magical bullets that go over walls and through houses to seek out humvees.

Our NPs did lose someone recently. They were obviously upset, but it hit my guys as well. It was one of the NPs that we interacted with quite a bit, had traded items with and even given a CIB (which is a high honor for an infantryman...but for them, more so to get it from us). I was more upset that my platoon wasn't out at the time to help them out, especially after hearing how the unit on the ground did next to nothing as far as returning fire or helping the NPs with casualties.

Lastly, but definitely not least, my CO found an EFP recently. Everyone made it out ok, the truck was done, though. They had one minor that will be return to duty soon and another that's already back on missions. EFPs are one of the few things we're actually scared of here. Old technology, but tough to do technology. They're generally imported from Iran in some shape or form. Thankfully this one was aimed a little off. The EFP was followed by small arms fire, which made for quite a bit of fun on our part. Not sure the insurgents enjoyed it...but we dropped nearly 10,000 rounds, 3 AT-4s, and then had a pair of Bradleys join in with their main gun. The target house basically disappeared. Can't say we got confirmed kills..but per normal for us, the bad guys learned they really don't want to mess with our trucks. Most convoys will drive through, shoot a few rounds and get out of the area...not us. We fire them up and maneuver if can...

About all for now. Another days ends for me here as I write this. Another day closer to going home. The rest of the heat to contend with before the home stretch of holidays draws us closer to Carson.