LES key to 3rd Brigade’s success in Iraq

Staff Sgt. David B. Bouchat/296th Brigade Support Battalion

DIYALA PROVINCE, Iraq — I am running a course known as the Logistics Training and Advisory Team. The purpose of this course is to train the Iraqi Army’s wheeled vehicle operators and mechanics on “by-the-book” maintenance procedures and troubleshooting.

Our vision is to train enough Iraqi soldiers and leaders so that the Iraqi Army will be able to eventually run this program under our guidance. The language and cultural skills that I learned in the Language Enabled Soldier program allow me to build trust at an accelerated pace.

When we took over this course, in August, not a single Iraqi fighter wanted to volunteer to return to our camp as an instructor. Since then, we have had four returning instructors. In our last class, we had to turn away volunteers, because six out of 10 wanted to come back to instruct.

I attribute this success to my team’s heightened cultural sensitivities and language ability. Myself and Spc. Joseph McDonald are instructors in this course, and we are both LES graduates. Without our LES training, the vision of “training-the-trainer” would have been a less-attainable goal for our organization.

McDonald, the distinguished cultural graduate from class 01 of LES, summed up our experiences.

“The Arabic language foundation that I received from the LES program has helped me build a strong and friendly relationship with the Iraqi soldiers whom I train,” he said. “The ability to communicate with the soldiers directly, without an interpreter, allows us a more personal connection.”

This isn’t the sort of interaction Iraqi soldiers expect.

“I always enjoy the amazed looks and whispered talks when I speak Arabic for the first time,” McDonald said. “This is soon followed by rapid-fire dialect, before they realize that my Arabic is only ‘shway, shway.’

“Still, they give me credit for what I do know, and I can tell they appreciate the effort,” McDonald said. “Our maintenance course often turns into a language course as we point out different parts and tools by exchanging the Arabic and English names for them.”

I have also had the opportunity to speak to some of our infantry-based LES counterparts. Sergeant Anthony Yount and Spc. Thomas Jowers told me their Arabic skills are steadily improving. While on patrols, they are able to speak effectively with the Iraqi soldiers and police with whom they work.

The ability to communicate in Arabic multiplies their units’ effectiveness by allowing patrol leaders to use interpreters while the LES Soldiers operate independently.

From my perspective, the LES course has been invaluable in improving the 3rd Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division’s success in the Diyala Provence.