When I was in the military we had a lot of assets that allowed us an advantage over those that we were fighting against. We had some of the most reliable and high tech weapons with the most state of the art optics. I carried an M4 rifle that had a thermal heat sight on it that cost $250,000. Needless to say I had it screwed on and tied to my rifle as tight as I could possibly get it. We had access to artillery and bombs that were so sophisticated they could level one specific building and leave the surrounding buildings untouched. We had helicopters that could fire guided missiles at people or targets that they couldn’t even see. Despite all of that the greatest asset that we had was people, more specifically our interpreters.

Over the course of fifteen months we used a handful of interpreters, but eventually settled on one that we then kept with us for the duration of our deployment and we couldn’t have possibly found a better man for the job. They weren’t all like him though. Before Frank we had a few interpreters that were pretty shady, and some were even ‘fired’ for suspected ties to the very people we were fighting against. But for the most part they were honest people doing their own part to make their country a better place to live. Most of them were taking a far greater risk than we were by doing the job they chose to do. Of course we could be killed just the same as them, but after our tour we got to come home, they had to stay there where they would live under the constant threat of being discovered as an interpreter and subject to some pretty horrendous outcomes should the wrong people find out what they did. This was illustrated to me when our interpreter’s brother was murdered during our deployment for being the relative of someone helping the American’s.

I found out that most of the individuals who chose to be interpreters were doing so with the hopes of one day being able to leave the country and become American citizens. Something that I believe a lot interpreters were told could happen more quickly for signing up for that particular job. When we were getting ready to leave Iraq and come home I gathered up all of the junk that I had acquired and couldn’t take home with me and gave to our interpreter so that he could sell it and put the money in his savings to help pay the fees of becoming an American citizen because it’s my understanding that it’s not a cheap process. I certainly wouldn’t have done this for most interpreters but ours proved himself ten times over as a man who deserved it. Had I had the ability to help him out even more I wouldn’t have hesitated to do so because I felt like it was the right thing to do, and for the incredible things he did for us, that was the least I could do to try to help him.

I bring this up because of two stories I recently read. The first is of a state Senator who has made a public spectacle of helping people adopt children from poverty stricken countries. The second story was from the Army Times newspaper and talked about how the government is seemingly reneging on its promise to help interpreters get their American citizenship after their contracts as interpreters had expired. It’s certainly a good thing to help less fortunate people if you have the ability to do so, but it’s also a despicable thing to ignore those who have risked their lives on the promise of getting help in leaving a place we’ve invaded and will very likely see those individuals killed once we leave.