OT: Civil Affairs Action Teams (CIVAC) * Medical Action Teams (MEDAC)

[Guest guest]

Hi y'all,

 

The below is, for most civilians, a little known but important mission

of American forces. It is not a secondary mission .. but a primary

mission for certain elements. It was common to have 15-20 CIVAC/MEDAC

Teams in the bushes during any given day in Vietnam. I have accompanied

many such teams and I always respected the dedication of the medics.

 

Are they appreciated? Generally they are .. but its difficult to cross

cultural barriers and in some cases, difficult to gain the confidence of

peoples who for generations have feared officials of any government.

 

It is, however, a welcomed approach from some other campaigns they have

witnessed prior to American teams arriving in the area .. which were

more like, " Let us win your hearts and minds or we will slaughter your

stock and burn your homes down. "

 

There is nothing political about this .. its informative .. like it or

not its reality .. and I hope it will interest some people on the list.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

 

Army Veterinarians Make a Field Call

Whirlwind Treatment of Afghan Herds Aims to Win Hearts of Rural People

 

By Pamela Constable

Washington Post Foreign Service

Sunday, March 7, 2004; Page A16

 

GOSHTA DISTRICT, Afghanistan -- The village square seemed deserted when

the U.S. military convoy arrived, except for a dog or two snoozing in

the sun. But as word started to spread, a lone boy approached on the

back of a rickety donkey. Then a girl appeared pulling a balky heifer on

a rope.

 

By noon Monday the spot was swarming with herds of sheep and goats, the

air was filled with panicked bleats and cowboy whoops, and mayhem

reigned. American and Afghan veterinarians chased runaway oxen, wrestled

recalcitrant cows and straddled goats like bicycles, expertly squirting

syringes of yellow goo into the animals' mouths and then letting them go.

 

The chief targets of the mission in this remote rural district of

Nangahar province were intestinal worms, liver flukes and especially

foot-and-mouth disease, the highly contagious virus that is the scourge

of Afghan livestock. In some areas, it is reported to kill up to 40

percent of all infant sheep, goats and cows.

 

" The Afghan herds have been devastated by years of war and drought, and

we can only treat a fraction of the animals. But if we can boost the

calf and lamb crop by 10 percent, it will have a measurable impact on

the economy and on the lives of thousands of families, " said Col. Lyle

Jackson, the chief veterinarian on the four-day mobile mission that

aimed to win Afghan hearts and minds in this agrarian region through the

treatment of hooves and muzzles.

 

The project, which took a U.S. Army civil affairs team to several

villages and nomad camps, served multiple purposes for U.S. strategy in

Afghanistan. By providing free medicines to impoverished herdsmen and

farmers, it sowed goodwill in a politically sensitive area near the

Pakistani border, which Islamic terrorists are widely believed to use as

a safe haven.

 

As the doctors squirted de-wormer and injected liver fluke vaccine,

accompanying troops also distributed leaflets in Afghan dialects that

encouraged people to support the U.S.-backed central government, brush

their teeth and wash their hands, learn English and oppose terrorism,

especially the burning of schools.

 

At one point, an American civilian who identified himself as the

regional counterterrorism director drove into the middle of a noisy and

chaotic roundup. Flanked by armed agents, he schmoozed with the district

police chief and posed for photos with a flock of goats.

 

" It's all part of the same picture. If people cooperate with us and make

their areas secure, we help them, " the man explained. It was clear that

Goshta, poor and parched but no needier than many other rural Afghan

districts, had been rewarded for promising to keep out or inform on any

American enemies.

 

The mission was fully prepared for attack, with armored Humvees leading

and following the convoy of SUVs and trucks. Before setting out each

morning from Jalalabad, the provincial capital three hours' drive to the

west, a sergeant reminded the team what to do in case of ambush. Jackson

said that on a previous mission in southern Afghanistan, an explosive

device had been detonated as his convoy passed.

 

But this time, the radio chatter from the lead Humvee warned of purely

pastoral obstacles on the dusty, jolting roads of Goshta: a camel

caravan on the right, a cargo truck stuck in the mud, a file of ducks

crossing the road.

 

At each village or camp, medical treatment for humans was offered as

well, with Army doctors setting up makeshift exam sites near the

veterinary operations and giving cursory exams to hundreds of people.

But many patients were suffering from chronic problems the doctors could

not treat, from cancer to infertility.

 

A teenaged nomad girl was carried from the hills on a donkey; she

crawled into a tent clinic on legs shriveled from polio. Dozens of

children suffered from badly stunted growth, and elders said malaria and

tuberculosis were common. An old man had an enormous tumor on his hand.

Many children had worms, and half the patients said they had never been

vaccinated.

 

While privately alarmed at much of what they saw, the American visitors

refrained from criticizing local practices, such as tattooing joints to

cure arthritis. Women surrounded by a half-dozen filthy children were

greeted with sympathetic smiles and simple questions like, " Where does

it hurt? "

 

In most cases, the doctors reached into their portable medicine chests

and handed out packets of vitamins, aspirin, allergy pills or cough

medicine. For serious illnesses they advised people to travel to the

hospital in Jalalabad, three hours away in a fast truck, though they

knew few would ever make the trip.

 

" I've been married 10 years, but I have no children, " whispered one

nomad woman, reluctantly lifting her veil so a female doctor could see her.

 

The doctor shrugged and gave her an extra-large package of vitamins.

 

Outside the tent, illiterate women compared the mysterious pills and

children fought over their brand-new toothbrushes, the first they had

ever seen.

 

" People do have unrealistic expectations when they see us, " said Col.

Dalton Diamond, the senior Army doctor on the mission. " There is only so

much we can do. With the animals, we are giving medicine. With the

people, we are mostly giving hope. "

 

Focused on the revival of herding as a mainstay of Afghanistan's

devastated rural economy, the team set out to de-worm and vaccinate as

many sheep, goats and cattle as possible. Working at a hectic pace for

four days, they ran out of medicine twice and ultimately treated more

than 10,000 quadrupeds.

 

In addition to short-term immunization, Jackson said there were two

long-range benefits to the project. First, if Afghan herds are

replenished, it may help deter families from growing opium poppies, a

major source of farm income nationwide. Last week, as the convoy wound

through Nangahar's isolated roads, it passed endless fields of green

poppy plants ripening in the sun.

 

Second, the team collected animal blood samples to be analyzed in the

United States so a more efficient vaccine can be developed to fight

Afghan strains of foot-and-mouth disease, which mutates constantly and

is considered the country's top agricultural problem.

 

In one Goshta village, a farmer shyly approached the team and said he

had a cow at home with " tabak, " as Afghans know the disease. Jackson

hopped in his SUV and drove out to investigate. As it turned out, the

cow was suffering from foot rot as a result of standing in mud and

water, but Jackson took a blood sample anyway while an Afghan vet,

Mohammed Qasim, swabbed iodine on the cow's sore feet.

 

Although their primary purpose was to treat ruminants, or grazing

livestock, the vets made a diplomatic point of trying to help all

four-legged patients the villagers brought in, including dogs with

bloody stumps for ears and donkeys with deep hip sores from carrying too

many heavy loads.

 

Here again, the Americans tried not to be openly critical of local

customs, such as burning marks on donkeys to prevent lameness, slicing

their nostrils to make them breathe more deeply, and cutting off dogs'

ears to make them fight better.

 

The trickiest animals to treat were camels, the ships of Afghan nomad

culture. As a practical matter, Jackson and other strapping male

soldiers tackled those ornery patients with plungers full of goop, while

Maj. Trudy Salerno, a petite veterinarian in the Army Reserve, helped

newborn calves find their mothers and start nursing.

 

This was also no easy task, since the nervous herds kept darting in

different directions while their owners argued over whose turn for

de-worming was next, and leathery nomad women in swirling dresses threw

rocks at the animals to keep them from mingling until each had been

medicated and sprayed with bright purple paint.

 

When the work was done, the herdsmen seemed satisfied, though some asked

whether the vaccines would damage their animals' milk.

 

Elders sipping tea in their tents expressed other concerns, saying

landowners no longer let them graze freely, and that they felt more

pressure to settle down.

 

" We don't want to bother anyone, but our life gets harder and harder, "

said Sun Dai, a nomad leader who had gathered a dozen herdsmen and their

flocks for the clinic on a barren, rocky plain. " We cannot find land and

water. The rain comes into our tents. Our children can't go to school.

 

" People want to leave this life now. "

 

But for the American visitors, camped for a few days in the Afghan

wilderness, with no sounds but tinkling goat bells and lowing animals

for miles in any direction, the harsh beauty of the surroundings seemed

like a brief and faraway dream.

 

" Yesterday we treated more than 3,000 animals and delivered a baby

camel, " Jackson said as the convoy prepared to set out at dawn one morning.

 

" This is the most exhausted I've ever been, and the most fun I've ever

had. "