Truck drivers find Iraq comfortable, rewarding

[Barrett808]

LYONS - When he signed on for a one-year tour of duty as a truck driver in Iraq, Dean Battershell was looking at the paycheck.

He thought he might be living with heat, scorpions, and sleeping in a tent with a dirt floor. But that hasn't been the case.

Besides the money being "good," Battershell said he's sold on the job, and making plans for extending his time. He has been in Iraq four months. He came home for a visit recently.

...

While "things happen," Battershell said, he's not afraid.

"We get hit every once in a while, but it's a rarity anymore, not an everyday occurrence," he said. "I go outside the wire not expecting any problems."

(more)

http://www.kansas.com//mld/kansas/news/state/11926646.htm

[thebigidea]

1. well, at least somebody is having a grand old time

and at our expense, too! Yay!

[alcuno]

2. Knock on wood, Dean!

They're still looking for the guy from Indiana.

[Missy M]

3. To bad the Iraqi's don't live as good as he does over there...

what a bunch of propoganda. I wonder if he is being paid extra for his rave reviews.

[The Night Owl]

5. Gosh, I wonder if the typical Iraqi driver...

Gosh, I wonder if the typical Iraqi driver has a heavily armed convoy surrounding his vehicle at all times.

[Missy M]

7. Yes, it seems like the typical Iraqi driver...

is being blown to pieces all the time.

[The Night Owl]

4. So, when AP says that truck drivers find Iraq comfortable...

So, when AP says that truck drivers find Iraq comfortable, what it really means is that the two truck drivers it spoke to found Iraq comfortable. No surveys of anyone else... Dean Battershell and Randy Lines speak for everyone.

[dArKeR]

16. I'm emailing this DU URL to AP. I hope you all do too!

[e-mail], [e-mail], [e-mail]


Subject: Truck drivers find Iraq comfortable, rewarding

Learn a little about what the honest Americans think about your story!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=edit&forum=102&topic_id=1560209&mesg_id=1560406

http://www.kansas.com//mld/kansas/news/state/11926646.htm

[The Night Owl]

22. Fix your link!

The DU link you provided is broken.

[dArKeR]

27. I'm emailing this DU URL to AP. I hope you all do too! - FIXED

[e-mail], [e-mail], [e-mail]


Subject: Truck drivers find Iraq comfortable, rewarding

Learn a little about what the honest Americans think about your story!

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x1560209#1560406

http://www.kansas.com//mld/kansas/news/state/11926646.htm

Thanks! I really blew it on this one! Sorry! I'll have to resend it to them again.

[NNN0LHI]

6. Come on in, the waters fine. Just like Club-Med n/t

[obxhead]

8. wonder where he's "driving"

[AndyTiedye]

18. He's "Driving" the Personnel Recruiting Desk for Halliburton

I'm sure they have lots of openings.

I suppose those trucks are air-conditioned, so they're nice and comfortable,
until they run over an "Improvised Explosive Device", then they get real uncomfortable real fast.

[cynatnite]

9. These drivers make good money

It's anywhere from 100k-200k a year.

Hubby was offered a job and he turned them down flat.

[SaveAmerica]

11. It's blood money, I know you were proud of your husband.

[Miss Chybil]

10. Sorry, I'd rather have my head than money and I'm sure an Iraqi would

rather have the job - at a tenth the pay.

(Edited for spelling.)

[vogonjiltz]

12. Hah, we would pay iraqis 1/100th of that.

[Miss Chybil]

14. You're right. I can't figure out why the Iraqis won't throw us any

flowers, though. Can you?

:sarcasm:

[The_Casual_Observer]

13. Psyops piece. This story contradicts every story coming out of the place

and it was placed at a time when things are going further to shit.

[The Night Owl]

15. Exactly. Check it out... 7 Iraqi truckers killed just a week ago...

http://www.grandforks.com/mld/grandforks/news/world/11837731.htm

At least seven killed in Iraq truck convoy

Associated Press


BAGHDAD, Iraq - A convoy of trucks believed to be carrying supplies to a U.S. military base west of Baghdad was ambushed Tuesday, and reporters who arrived after the attack said they saw the bodies of at least seven people.

...

But Dean Battershell and Randy Lines feel safe and comfortable, so everything must be OK!

[Barrett808]

20. Recent incidents -- 92 Turkish drivers killed

From a quick search of Iraq Front News:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IraqFrontNews

Foreign-run convoy ambushed in Iraq
10 Jun 2005
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L10271314.htm

A foreign-run convoy of civilian trucks was ambushed west of Baghdad this week and several of those working on it may be dead, the British-based security company that supervised it said on Friday. Reuters Television footage from near the town of Habbaniya, between Falluja and Ramadi, showed several burnt out trucks as well as documents apparently issued in Turkey. Video distributed in the Sunni rebel stronghold of Ramadi showed the same site, apparently at an earlier time with the trucks still burning and at least seven dead men slumped in an irrigation ditch. Among personal documents displayed was an identity card issued by Hart, a British-based security company. Hart said on its Web site a convoy of trucks escorted by Hart security vehicles was ambushed near Habbaniya on Tuesday. A spokesman for the company said the fate of those on the convoy was still unclear but that U.S. forces had recovered "a number of bodies" which had yet to be identified. ...

---

Another Turkish truck driver killed in Iraq
Fri, 10 Jun 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.dunyagazetesi.com.tr/news_display.asp?upsale_id=222437&dept_id=87

Yusuf Akar (49), a Turkish truck driver in a convoy carrying goods for US troops in Iraq, was killed yesterday morning in Ramadi during an attack on the convoy by insurgents.

---

Turkish Truck Driver Killed in North of Baghdad Sun, 01 May 2005 00:00:00 GMT http://www.zaman.com/?bl=hotnews&alt=&trh=20050501&hn=19029

A Turkish truck driver was reported killed in an attack the other morning in the north Baghdad in Iraq. An Iraqi police official said that armed people fired at the Turkish driver in Mekhul region in the neighborhood of Beyci 200 km outside of Baghdad.

---

Another Turkish driver killed in Iraq
Thu, 21 Apr 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.dunyagazetesi.com.tr/news_display.asp?upsale_id=216524&dept_id=87

A Turkish truck driver was reportedly killed near Baghdad yesterday when a roadside bomb exploded. The identity of the victim was not announced by Iraqi officials...the number of Turkish truck drivers murdered in Iraq rose to 92.

---

Bombs kill six in northern Iraq
Fri, 15 Apr 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/?id=13242

Three Iraqi soldiers were killed at dawn on Friday when their vehicle hit a roadside bomb in Balad. Thursday night, two Iraqi policemen were killed near Tuz. And in Al-Dujail, a foreign truck driver was also killed by a roadside bomb overnight.

---

Another Turkish truck driver killed in Iraq
Sat, 16 Apr 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.turks.us/article.php?story=20050416064337534

A Turkish truck driver has been killed following a bomb explosion in Iraq, early Saturday morning. The bomb went off in the Eyci vicinty, 200 kilometers north of Baghdad, security officials said.

---

Death toll of Turkish truck drives in Iraq reaches
90
Tue, 12 Apr 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.dunyagazetesi.com.tr/news_display.asp?upsale_id=215344&dept_id=87

Attacks on Turkish truck drivers in Iraq, which to date have taken some 90 lives, are ongoing.

---

Turkish Driver Killed in Northern Iraq
Sun, 20 Mar 2005 00:00:00 GMT
http://www.zaman.com/?bl=hotnews&alt=&trh=20050320&hn=17647

A Turkish truck driver has been shot dead in Northern Iraq. Iraqi police official Hasan Salih declared that unidentified persons attacked a convoy protected by the US 9 km north of Beyci at 11.00
local time and killed a Turkish driver.

[The Night Owl]

21. Of course, the AP piece...

Of course, the author of the piece about Dean Battershell and Randy Lines doesn't present any statistical information about the safety of truckers in Iraq in an article that is supposed to be about the safety of truckers in Iraq. The opinions of two truckers, who are probably Red Staters, is apparently the only information AP wants to give us about the state of trucking in Iraq. That alone speaks volumes about the situation in Iraq.

[Barrett808]

32. And the bias of AP. n/t

[Zan_of_Texas]

25. I personally listened to a truck driver who was there.

He was hired by Halliburton to go to Iraq. He's been back about a year, so admittedly things may be different now.

But, when he went over, the training was almost completely nonexistent. He drove with someone for ONE DAY, then the next day, he was the one "teaching" the next person.

The maps were lines drawn in the sand.

They sent out the trucks on Good Friday, after there was a huge amount of hubbub that the Iraqis were especially incensed by whatever was going on at the time, and vowed to kill every American who went out that day. Of the trucks sent out, a sizeable portion were shot at or blown up that day.

The story he told, of trucks racing through trying to pick up other wounded truck drivers in the convoy, were hairraising and disturbing.

He was injured. After he returned to the US for medical treatment, Halliburton contacted him ONCE. He had to institute legal proceedings to get proper medical care.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

17. heck yeah they are making $8 ,000 to $20,000 a month! that's "rewarding"

From an Amy Goodman interview with PRATAP CHATTERJEE Managing Director of Corpwatch.org recently returned from Iraq. His latest articles cover the prison prisoner abuse scandal at Abu Ghraib and the role of private contractors.


You have to understand Amy that a lot of these systems of private contracting were set up I believe in good faith, to save the taxpayer money 12 years ago, but they have been abused. Dick Cheney started setting up private contracting when he was the head of the pentagon in 1991 and 1902. He basically led us to believe, and I -- I don't know that he necessarily believed otherwise, but these private contractors would come in emergency situations, rather than having soldiers, you know, on tap all year that we were paying salaries to, and so interrogators would be brought in for a couple of weeks or truck drivers who we brought in for a couple of weeks. This would save us money, because the civilian truck drivers are paid $8,000 a month. Now, that seems like an awful lot of money for somebody with no skills, but theoretically saving paying a soldier $30,000 per year. Hover, when the system is used to employ these people $8,000 a month all year round it's a significant financial loss to the military and to the taxpayers. The system is upside-down, even in terms of cost savings.

[ElectroPrincess]

19. Great Fun! Right on until the time you're killed ... GAME-OVER man ...

And no options for "reset."

Would be hell spending the rest of your Civie Truck Driving tour DEAD! Aye? :P

[0rganism]

23. Great News! Now the warmongers have NO EXCUSE

Those of you carrying the enlistment forms around to shut up the chickenhawks should print out a dozen copies of this article too. If you run into someone using the "I'm too fat/out-of-shape/busy/hedonistic to join up" excuse, just hand them this article and a KBR job application. With any luck, the entire lot of them will be off to Iraq within a fortnight.

[Crunchy Frog]

24. And if he gets blown up, I'm sure his family

will get a nice little settlement. For a look at how these contractors are doing over there, check out this page from icasualties.

http://icasualties.org/oif/Civ.aspx

Looks like an aweful lot of truck drivers aren't making it, and that's only a partial list of ones that have actually been reported.

[daleo]

26. What a load of propaganda

It must be bad, to have this tripe being planted.

[Vladimir]

28. War profiteers always find war rewarding n/t

[Junkdrawer]

29. Oh Oh Stewardess...I Speak New Speak....

What they mean is: Drivers are getting blown up left and right and it's near impossible to sucker drivers into the job of trucking the oil they can't pipeline out because the resistance keeps blowing up the fucking pipelines....

[Cocoa]

30. Brought to you by the Iraq Tourism Board

be sure to check out Bush Square! see my sig line.

[borlis]

31. Where else could a regular guy have bodyguards

like celebrities? I'll bet he feels pretty damn special.