US troops in Iraq await Election Day outcome

[November 04, 2008]  MOSUL, Iraq (AP) -- U.S. soldiers in Mosul awaited the outcome of Tuesday's presidential election that will decide the future of their mission in Iraq, but most of the dining hall TV screens were tuned to sports, not politics, as they ate breakfast.

Those who voted had already mailed in their absentee ballots long ago, and soldiers at Camp Marez in the northern Iraqi city said nothing special was planned for Election Day.

"We can't stop doing what we have to do. We got to keep running," said Maj. Gary Dangerfield of Chicago, spokesman for the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment.

Sgt. James Fowler, 27, of Fresno, Calif., praised the Army for encouraging soldiers to vote and helping them with absentee ballots. He said he voted for Obama but "I am outnumbered 10-to-one, especially among officers" and senior noncommissioned officers who said they wanted John McCain to win.

"Everyone is looking forward to McCain," said Fowler, from the 94th Engineer Battalion. "But I believe it's time for change and Obama has promised that. At least he has given us a timeline" for withdrawing from Iraq.

Obama has called for bringing all combat soldiers home within 16 months. McCain, a veteran and former Vietnam War prisoner, says the current U.S. strategy in Iraq is working and has promised to pursue the war until victory.

For Iraqis, the stakes could not be higher, though many of them said they did not think U.S. policy would change dramatically no matter who wins the White House.

"We hope that the new American president will open a new page with our country which was suffering along 35 years under former regime and is still suffering a lot under the occupation," said Baghdad resident Mohammed al-Tamimi.

"We don't have freedom, we don't have independence. Our wealth is not under our control. We are not happy now," he said.

One Iraqi Christian woman who refused to give her name for security reasons told Associated Press Television in Baghdad that she was hoping McCain would win because she fears Obama would withdraw U.S. troops quickly "and make chaos in our country."

Back in Mosul, Sgt. Anthony Vess, of Bethlehem, Pa., said "a lot of people are worked up" about the election "but whoever wins I think the U.S. will be able to bounce back from all its problems."

Vess, 27, also with the 94th Engineers, said he thought a lot of younger soldiers supported Obama's Iraq policy "but we all have an obligation to our Army and our country."

"This war has taken up a chunk of my life," he said. "I consider myself a peacekeeper not a war fighter."

Sgt. 1st Class Luis Rosedo, a Puerto Rican serving with the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment, said soldiers were too busy to follow the election as closely as Americans back home.

"I'd rather be there than here on Election Day," he said. "It's more exciting than the last one. I haven't followed the campaign too closely, just watched some TV when I'm here. I've been too busy."

While Americans voted back home, Lightning Troop, 3rd Squadron, 3rd Armored Cavalry went to Badoush, a town on the northern outskirts of Mosul, to observe and help Iraqis recruit 200 new members of the National Police.

"Some soldiers are concerned about the election, but we really don't talk politics very much," said platoon leader 1st Lt. Conrad Brown, a West Point graduate from Bangor, Maine, speaking at the recruitment site where recruits were stripped, searched, given health checks and tested for literacy.

Troop commander Capt. Hunter Bowers of Hendersonville, Tenn., said he never got to vote because his absentee ballot was sent to the wrong address.

"There's some good and bad in both candidates. It's too bad they can't team up and work together," Bowers said. "Things won't change here between now and the time we go home. We'll be getting back about the time the new president is inaugurated."

Another officer, Capt. Jared Just, said that no matter who wins, "it won't really change the course of things in Iraq that much."

Minutes before the unit, in a line of Humvees, reached a checkpoint on a highway en route back to base a suicide bomber rammed his car into an Iraqi army truck.

Flames still flared from the wrecked truck and trails of blood were seen down its left front door. Iraqi police said four policemen were wounded in the blast, but the bomber was the only fatality.

[Associated Press; By DENIS D. GRAY]

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