The Turkish Dogan Bey power ship sits moored in the southern port of Umm Qasr. The ship provides enough power to run a small Iraqi city. Currently, it feeds into the main Iraqi power grid. Photo by Sgt. Francis Horton

The government of Iraq has been concentrating on providing basic necessities to its people while striving to maintain order and security.

Electricity has been an issue Iraqis are concerned about. In the southern city of Basra and throughout Iraq demonstrations have been held demanding more reliable power.

In response, steps are in place to help ease the power problems.

In the southern port of Umm Qasr, the hub of imports and exports for the country, a large ship sits moored to the docks. It is adorned with Turkish and Iraqi flags painted on the side, and large transformers cover the majority of the deck.

“It’s like an on-land power facility,” said Coast Guard Lt. j.g. Frank Bullock, a logistic coordinator with the Joint Interagency Task Force. Reciprocating generators on the deck of the ship use a refined fuel provided by the Iraqi Department of Energy. The electricity is run to the Iraqi power grid. This ship alone has the ability to power Umm Qasr with some left over, he said.

“So far, we have had no security incidents,” said the plant manager and ship captain, Mutlu Cevlik, a Turkish sailor from Istanbul. A five-year contract has been signed with the Iraqi Department of Energy for the ship to provide power, he said. A second ship has also been dispatched from Turkey.

Security cameras and local guards have been hired to help secure the ship, Cevlik said. Around 70 people from Umm Qasr keep the ship safe 24 hours a day. Onboard, Turkish workers keep the generators maintained and running.

Turkish workers run fuel hoses across the deck of the Dogan Bey power ship to keep the generators filled and pumping to capacity. Photo by Sgt. Francis Horton

“Sandstorms are the biggest problem,” Cevlik said. The generators operate as close to full capacity as possible, but during periods of high wind, sand and dirt get caught in the filters causing overheating and automatic shutdowns.

Cevlick is confident issues like these will be easy to get around. The next step is to hire a security officer to help bring the ship up to international safety standards.

“We want to make this environment better,” Cevlick said.

DVIDS
Story by Sgt. Francis Horton

When the city of Basra was particular unstable between 2006 and 2008, the port of Umm Qasr was left to tread water as a contributor to Iraq’s economic development.

Now, however, through the collaboration of the Joint Interagency Task Force Iraq and Iraqi partners, the port is positioned to navigate over its next developmental hurdle.

Today, port operations are more secure than they were just two years ago when Shiite extremists controlled much of the area. Quelled by Iraqi forces, the city of Basra is now peaceful. The task force, which includes the departments of Defense and Homeland Security, is charged with aiding in Iraq’s reconstruction. Part of that collaboration includes devising a plan to make Umm Qasr more attractive to potential international trade partners.

Steadiness in a city that could be Iraq’s primary economic generator is a major priority of Multi-National Force – Iraq.

U.S. Army Gen. Raymond Odierno, commander of Multi-National Force – Iraq, arrived Nov. 21 to speak with task force officials about progress at Umm Qasr and its efforts to meet mandates under the International Ship and Port Facility Code – a certification that more countries are obtaining to gain a larger slice of the global maritime marketplace.

A tool of the International Maritime Organization, the code is a comprehensive set of measures to enhance the security of ships and port facilities, developed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks.

In the last few months, ships from such countries as North Korea, Jordan, Panama and Sierra Leone have arrived at Umm Qasr carrying wheat, cars and building materials. Built in 1958, Umm Qasr is designed to handle agricultural and manufactured goods and is Iraq’s only deep-water commercial port.

Odierno understands that implementing the certification for Umm Qasr is important to drawing more international trade prospects because the code is becoming the accepted standard in international shipping operations. The challenge is getting Iraqi stakeholders to embrace the concept as well.

“If they become more efficient, they have an incredible opportunity,” Odierno said of the port authority and its role in Iraq’s economic future.

Maj. Mark Reiswig, a civilian military transportation officer for the 34th Infantry Division, helps address port and security issues for task force’s Port Advisory Coordination Element. While Umm Qasr has made strides to bring the port nearer compliance, the bigger test is convincing Iraqi stakeholders that privatizing one of the state’s most significant state-owned assets will be key.

“The concept that you can come over as a company and make money is pretty foreign to them,” said Reiswig, of Rockville, Md. “Iraq will look like Kuwait and Bahrain, once they start to make [progress].”

The certification process is about eight months from being completed. Because an international port is only as safe as the incoming vessel’s last port of call and the cargo’s last inspection, it is essential that Iraq ensure measures are sufficient to fend-off threats and protection breaches, said Maitham Najim, Umm Qasr’s head of port security.

The task for “gave me a lot of direction, also a check list that helps,” Najim said.
The check list is long, but getting shorter.

Task force and port officials are working to improve various port security features, including better ways of controlling port access, screening and inspecting cargo, installing additional security equipment, upgrading customs processes and introducing automation.

Capital for the upgrades is being provided by a $370 million loan from Japan. At the port site, trucks move containers to one yard daily where they are off -loaded and moved to another yard to be used again. Before, containers were stacked in one location and left.

It’s getting better as far as efficiency, said U.S. Coast Guard Cmdr. Joseph LoSciuto, PACE officer in charge, but there’s room for improvement across the whole port operation.

“Right now, it takes 10 days to process cargo once it comes in,” he said. “With the changes we want to implement, we can cut that down to five days.”

Under an agreement between the Syrian and Iraqi transport ministries, the first rail trip from the western Syrian seaport of Tartous to Umm Qasr took place earlier this year. According to Reiswig, having a working railway that connects to Basra’s port is an integral part of the transportation equation.

Advisors are pursuing a reduction of the number of port employees from 4,800 to 900, Luscioto said. That’s because the state-owned port, a major employer, has a long-standing tradition of patronage.

Convincing their Iraqi counterparts that trimming employee rolls is beneficial to the port’s overall efficiency will be a difficult, but essential for the port’s future.

There are no simple solutions, LoSciuto acknowledged, in convincing some Iraqi officials that the move to privatization is a move toward a stronger future in Iraq.

“This is important, but we can’t do it unless they want to do it,” Odierno said.

DVIDS
By Army Master Sgt. David Bennett

The United States Army Corps of Engineers has been involved in Iraq since the beginning. The Corps of Engineers is a civilian tasking commanded by Army officers.

The mission of the Corps in the United States has been seen in such projects as waterway dredging, dam building and levee construction. The Corps is also heavily involved with the construction of military infrastructure such as found on bases.

The Corps of Engineers operates in Iraq as the Gulf Region Division. Within the division are three regions, North, South and Central. Today’s Bloggers’ Roundtable allowed us to interview two women working in the GRD, Col Margaret Burcham, commander of the Gulf Region North district and Joanne Milo, deputy district engineer for the Gulf Region South district.

Col Burcham is a West Point graduate, from the third class to admit women into the Military Academy. She is married and has a son. This is her second deployment to Iraq.

In Gulf Region-North, her command has 81 civilian employees, 25% +/- are female. There are 46 Iraqis at GR-N, 2 women, 1 is an architect. There are 36 military, 2 are women.

Unlike the MNF forces, the Corps is working with both the Iraqi national and provincial governments and with the Kurdish Regional Government. Burcham just returned from the opening of a newly built correctional facility in the KRG area. The Corps has also been involved in building a slaughterhouse in a community in the mountains.

Col Burcham told us that the Kurds were great hosts.

In Irbil, the Corps and the Iraqis recently opened a new police academy.

In Tikrit, working with regional education officials, and with Tikrit University officials, the Corps is developing a vocational training program. The Colonel said that this project was a challenge because it was unlike any of the usual types of work done by the Corps.

Burcham pointed out that there is little manufacturing done in Iraq and a great deal has to be imported such as electrical infrastructure parts. Asphalt supplies can be an issue, and the Iraqi ministry involved controls its production.

This is Joanne Milo’s second deployment as well. She is an Illinois native and has one son.

In Gulf Region-South, there are about 97 civilian employees and about 30% are female. They are located at a US Air Force base which is located next to an Iraqi military base.

Joanne Milo was eager to discuss the work being done in GR-S. One of the most recent projects is work for the Iraqi Navy at the port of Umm Qasr, where a pier and other facilities are being planned.

Her region has seen the increased use of concrete batch plants, making that construction supply more available.

Milo pointed to the construction of a bee farm, as well as a meat market and a fish market as examples of unusual projects her region had undertaken.

She was especially proud of the Basra Childrens’ Hospital project, a $155 million construction and equipping project that began with the Corps but is increasingly under Iraqi control. This is an oncology hospital and will be state-of-the-art, including having a linear accelerator. Spain is providing $22 million for the hospital through the U.N. Development Program and Project Hope is providing over $20 million.

Ms. Milo remarked on the progress made by the Iraqis in taking charge of the various programs and projects. Under the former regime, the people in the south were not allowed to think for themselves.

Both women were asked about their experience in the Corps with any sort of discrimination or prejudice against their sex.

Col Burcham told us that the only time she felt anything like that was at West Point, as the military adjusted to women in the academy. She was quite firm that her opportunities in the Corps and the Army had been all she could have wanted.

Milow was equally effusive in her praise of the Corps of Engineers wen it came to equal treatment for women. She has been offered a promotion, in fact, after her current assignment in Iraq concludes.

The Army Corps of Engineers in Iraq works closely with the combat engineers. They may work on projects together, train together and support each other with equipment and personnel on occasion. The missions are different, but the same pool of Army officers command both types of engineering units.

It was nice to be able to interview an engineer graduate from West Point. The Military Academy was originally an engineering school and it was good to see that the tradition is being maintained despite the French and business Management majors who also graduate.

Iraq is now open for international business, thanks to the valiant efforts of a Turkish wreck salvage expert and his Iraqi team of divers who have cleared the port of Umm Qasr of over 33 wrecks.

Mr Kahraman Sadikoglu, who runs an international shipping business and wreck salvage operation, has been in Iraq ever since 2003, clearing the Iraqi port of the many wrecks that litter the jetties. No stranger to Iraq, Mr Sadikoglu was kidnapped and held to ransom by insurgents in 2005 but survived the ordeal and came back to Umm Qasr to help the people of Iraq. The port had been closed for sometime due to the proximity of the wrecks to the loading/unloading jetties that allow the ships to dock and disgorge their precious cargoes.

Thanks to his efforts and those of the coalition forces who have secured the port, 24 jetties are now open for use. The 34th lift that took place at Jetty 9 was that of an Iraqi mine laying boat that was bombed by an RAF Tornado in the early part of Operation Telic 1. A further 10 ships a month would be able to use Jetty 9 now that the wreck had been removed, adding considerable shipping capacity to the port.

Mr Sadikoglu said, “The port is moving and there is life there. From 2003 to 2006 there was very little security but when we came back in early 2008 it hadn’t changed. When the army troops moved here in August of 2008, suddenly it was like the light being turned on and off, the system here is completely changed, the port is 100% secure! There has been a big change in the last 3-4 months. Four months ago they did something here and now it’s secure”

The mine layer’s location made dredging the port very difficult; over 2 million cubic metres of silt requires removal from the port annually. It was also lying on the knuckle of the turn into the port making larger vessel’s navigation of the channel cumbersome.

The port is now thriving with over 300 shipping containers (30,000 tonnes of goods) being offloaded daily, that flow into Iraq and the wider Middle East. The port also supports over 48,000 people in the local area who depend on its commerce for their living. Over 70% of Iraq’s bulk food (rice, sugar, wheat etc) is imported through Umm Qasr, making it strategically vital for the Iraqi people.

Currently, B Squadron of the Queen’s Royal Hussars and 2 companies of the Iraqi commandos are based at Umm Qasr, providing security for the port. The Navy Transition Team consisting of Royal Navy and U.S. Navy personnel are also based in South Port helping to train the Iraqi navy.

DVIDS

Security progress in Basra is “overwhelming” and Iraq’s second-largest city could be “another Dubai in the coming decade,” the commander of Multi-National Division – Southeast said June 14, referring to the bustling international business hub.

British Army Maj. Gen. Barney White-Spunner told Pentagon reporters via teleconference from Baghdad that Operation Charge of the Knights – ordered by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki in March – has “well and truly” turned the tide in the city.

Before the operation, militias controlled large parts of the city. Militia leaders, many under control of Iran, intimidated the populace and turned the city into a crime empire.

Basra is key to Iraq’s success, with oil fields, the port of Umm Qasr and the international airport being economic engines for the region, White-Spunner said.

Since Operation Charge of the Knights began, Iraqi Security Forces have reasserted their authority over the city. “We now find people free to go about their daily business without fear of intimidation,” he said.

Daily life in Basra is much like any other Middle Eastern city, the general said.

An air of normalcy has returned, and the Iraqi government has managed the humanitarian situation with only minimal coalition support, the British general said.

“The curfew’s been lifted, and water and fresh food are obviously in plentiful supply,” he said. “At the same time, Operation Charge of the Knights allowed the Iraqi government to arrest hundreds of criminals and violent extremists who’d taken advantage of the situation.”

But more significantly to Coalition forces and the Iraqi government, the operation showed the militias had little support in Basra.

“Once the leadership fled, the ordinary rank-and-file militia … very soon returned to normal life, which supports our contention that they weren’t committed terrorists or committed militiamen,” White-Spunner said. “They were poor Shiias who didn’t have opportunities for jobs or whatever and have been perverted by the militias.”

Iraqi troops led the operation with advice from embedded military training teams and coalition logistics support.

Continuing the security gains is important to the city’s future. The Iraqis are putting in place a counterterrorist structure so “when those violent extremist elements do try to come back – and some inevitably will – then they’re ready for them,” he said. “There was a slogan scrawled on a bridge in Amarah by one of these fleeing violent extremists. It said, ‘We’ll be back.’ And underneath that, an Iraqi soldier had scribbled, ‘And we’ll be waiting for you.’”

MNF-I
By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service