In winter snows, soldiers work to warm relations

[NJmaverick]

KHANJANKHEL, Afghanistan — Spring has come early to Wardak province, in the form of unseasonably warm weather and an early awakening of the Taliban from its annual hibernation.

And U.S. soldiers are preparing for what local residents are warning could be the bloodiest fighting season yet.

Soldiers from the 173rd Airborne Brigade’s Company B, 1st Battalion, 503rd Infantry Regiment stationed at Combat Outpost Nerkh haven’t fired a shot in their nearly 3-month-old mission. Instead, they have been trying to make inroads with traditionally hostile villagers to the west of their small, tented compound, itself just west of the provincial capital, Maidan Shahr. The 173rd’s predecessors set up a patrol base last summer in this collection of mud-brick buildings bisected by a bustling bazaar. It was under attack for all 12 of the days it was open and the Army scrapped the project.

The 173rd soldiers conducted an air assault Wednesday, hunting Taliban members who had reportedly threatened and roughed up villagers and kidnapped two recruits for a local U.S.-backed militia in Khanjankhel. The soldiers ended up conducting an impromptu meeting with village elders.

http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=68338