Part 1: From executive suite to Baghdad’s slums

‘We should have been past this’
Humanitarian aid wasn’t the primary focus for the U.S. Army’s civil affairs units in Iraq in 2006. The main emphasis was on helping the locals with issues of governance and economic development — getting institutions, infrastructure, utilities and places of employment going again.

That kind of work could be maddeningly slow-going, though. Deierlein’s unit often encountered inertia in dealings with both local Iraqi officials and U.S. military bosses.

At least some of that sluggishness, especially on the Iraqi side, was rooted in fear. Progress achieved with the help of U.S.-led forces invariably drew the attention of insurgents. When the Army took on the task of hiring Iraqis to work as garbage collectors to clear Baghdad streets choked with trash, the effort stalled again and again. The reason: Garbage collectors, with their slow-moving trucks and predictable routes, were easy targets for snipers.

Other undertakings — even simple ones — often became mired in bureaucracy. Deierlein would try to get something done, such as obtain blankets for homeless refugees, only to be stymied by a barrage of paperwork.

“I found plenty of people who wanted me to fill out a spreadsheet, form or report and no one that could tell me what they actually did with that form or who it actually went to,” he wrote in one of his e-mail updates. “I filled them all out — still waiting.”

Delays like these drove Deierlein crazy. Accustomed to the frenetic pace of his life in Manhattan, he wanted to make things happen — fast. 

The charity work in the poorest sections of East Baghdad turned out to be something he and his fellow soldiers could accomplish together. The work became therapeutic.

“Honestly, we all felt that we should have been way past this,” said Maj. Phil McIntire, 43, commander of Deierlein’s company in the 414^th Civil Affairs Battalion. “When war first breaks out, you do these basic humanitarian things. We thought we should be restoring governance and economic development at this point. … But because the military was having such a hard time providing real direction for what they wanted to do, we thought we’ll at least do this if nothing else. …

“And the people who got the help were very, very grateful. A lot of these people have nothing.”

The call-up
Yes, I guess it has gotten so bad they are calling up 38-year-old, beer-bellied has-beens.
— Excerpt from an e-mail message Tom Deierlein sent out to his staff in New York on Oct. 14, 2005

Deierlein’s improbable journey to the slums of Baghdad began in October 2005, when he returned to his Upper East Side apartment after a business trip to Puerto Rico to find an official-looking envelope containing a Western Union Mailgram from the Army.

“A lot of stuff I received from the military I never even opened,” he recalled. “But this just looked different. I opened it and it said, ‘You must report or a warrant will be put out for your arrest.’”

Deierlein was stunned. He was sure it had to be a mistake. A 1989 West Point graduate with two master’s degrees, he had left military life behind more than a decade earlier.

He called a lawyer, who assured him he could successfully fight this, and he called the Army to protest the orders.

“I’m an old man,” he told the voice on the other end of the line. “I’ve been out of the military for 12 years now. How could it be that I’m being called up?”

“All I know is that you have to report to Fort Jackson for a few weeks, and probably Fort Bragg after that,” the voice replied.

“What if I decide not to go?”

“A warrant will be put out for your arrest.”

After confirming his Social Security number, Deierlein realized the Army didn’t have the wrong guy. He was being called up because his name had remained on the Individual Ready Reserve roll ever since he had left the Army in 1993. Unlike part-time soldiers in the National Guard or Army Reserve, most Individual Ready Reservists do not receive ongoing training, and they rarely get called back to military life.

Authorization from Rumsfeld
But facing a need for soldiers on the ground in Iraq — particularly for officers such as Deierlein — the Army received authorization from then-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to call Individual Ready Reservists back to active duty.

Deierlein felt certain that the specter of jail time was just a threat. But a thought began to gnaw at him: What if he got dishonorably discharged for failing to report? The idea troubled him deeply. He was a graduate of West Point, after all. And he had endured grueling training to become an Airborne Ranger, an elite Army soldier capable of jumping out of airplanes and operating under extreme stress, including sleep and food deprivation. Could he stomach the disgrace of a dishonorable discharge?

He also recalled that as a young man at West Point he had pledged to give a lifetime of service to the nation. That phrase “lifetime of service” kept knocking around in his head.

If his country really needed him now, could he say no? By refusing to go, would the promise he made years earlier be empty, meaningless?

He discussed the matter with the people he trusted most. His parents, opponents of the war in Iraq, begged him not to go. His fiancée, Hiwot Taddesse, who had served in the Navy for four years after graduating from high school, understood the pressure he was feeling to step up. “What are you going to tell your grandkids?” she asked him. “That you got called up and didn’t go?”

MORE FROM CHARITY BEGINS AT WAR

Charity Begins at War Section Front

Part 1: From executive suite to Baghdad Journal: Called back to active duty — ‘No joke’ Day 2: Minimal training for a huge task Journal: Readying for ‘very dangerous job’ Part 3: Venturing ‘outside the wire’ Journal: ‘ThunderCat6’ arrives in Baghdad Part 4: It all comes back to garbage Journal: Goodbye Baghdad; hello bed rest Part 5: Charitable spirit survives Journal: A new foundation Charity Begins at War Section Front   Add Charity Begins at War headlines to your news reader: