Tweet
War: Canadian-style
Part 5 of a special report by Mitch Potter and Rick Madonik
Mar. 12, 2006. 06:57 AM
Father and sons
The pups of Alpha Company call him "Pops," or sometimes "The Old Man." To glimpse at his grey whiskers, it is easy to imagine Cpl. Erik Hjalmarson is a lifer with decades in the Forces.
Not so. Though Hjalmarson turns 55 this month, he didn't join the army until age 49, making him an extraordinarily mature recruit to Canada's front-line combat forces.
What drove the Duncan, B.C., native to call the Canadian Forces Recruitment Centre six years ago? In part, Hjalmarson explains, it was his last chance to share in a family heritage that dates back to World War I.
"There was no joining after age 50, so it was then or never and I just thought, `What the heck, let's see what they say,' " he says.
Hjalmarson had already put in decades of hard slogging in the heavy industries, from sawmills to cement plants to coal and copper mines throughout British Columbia, earning his papers as a millwright and machinist along the way. He describes a life of honest labour without shortcuts, each stint brought to an abrupt end as mines played out and companies went under.
"I've had some pretty nasty jobs but I've never been afraid of hard work. The worst I can remember was running jackhammer. You drag a 90-pound machine up the rock face and when you get it going it shakes the crap out of you," he says.
"But what we're doing here is probably the most demanding of all. Climbing out over these mountains through extremely rugged terrain, nobody gets to soak in a tub or have a beer when it's over.
"All you can do is recoup for a day, prep your kit, clean your weapons, and out you go again, rain or shine."
Hjalmarson has another overriding interest for being in these hills: It helps him keep tabs on his oldest son, also named Eric, 25, who is deployed at the main Canadian base at Kandahar Airfield, working with Bravo Company. Father and son have been in the same battalion for the past six years.
"I think I worry about him more than he worries about me, but that is what a parent does. It just goes to show how our family is steeped in military tradition. My dad was with the Royal Canadian Engineers in World War II, landing at Juno Beach and fighting right through to Germany," he says.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
`The biggest satisfaction is watching these young guys become men of substance'
Cpl. Erik Hjalmarson
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"And my grandfather served with 49th Battalion, the South Saskatchewan Regiment, in World War I.
"I've grown up with the stories. To me, it relates to a tradition of what Canadians used to call `citizen soldiers' — volunteers who joined up to fight. Canada always had an army that could make do with what they were given."
Hjalmarson brings a unique sensibility to Alpha Company's 1st Platoon, equal parts den mother and father of invention. A restless soul, he is always dreaming up improvements to make life more bearable in the stress-filled environment at the unit's temporary home in the hills north of Kandahar.
He is also one of 1st Platoon's unabashed keepers all things Red Devil — stickers, banners, patches and stencils — that cumulatively galvanize the esprit de corps for which Alpha Company is known.
This is not a politically correct undertaking: Army command does not always look fondly on the cultivation of the Red Devil nickname. But out here on the front, no such rules apply, and within a day of deployment the spray cans come out. Forward Operating Base Gombad is now the Red Devil Inn.
There are stuffed mascots at the inn, including a Wile E. Coyote with four tours of duty under his belt and a Kermit the Frog with two. Hjalmarson, who is fond of woodworking, filled in a few spare hours whittling wooden assault rifles for each.
One day he was spotted building a kite from scratch. When asked the purpose, he deadpanned, "Now when I tell one of these guys `Go fly a kite,' I can give them the means to do it."
He is a big part of the glue that holds together 1st Platoon, but don't tell him that. "Glue? That's what they make out of old horses."
Hjalmarson expected to retire at age 55 when he joined, but the military has since extended the age of mandatory retirement to 60. He is on his third tour, having served in Bosnia and Kabul.
"I don't know if I'll be climbing these mountains at 60, but they've got a few jobs left at battalion for old broken soldiers," he says.
As long as the Canadian Forces will have him, Hjalmarson says he is ready to serve.
"I think the biggest satisfaction is watching these young guys become men of substance. We get people from all walks of life coming in, boys from the farms and cities and fishing villages. A lot of them already know what is it to work hard and some of them have to learn it the hard way.
"What we end up with is a fighting army. Not just a peacekeeping army, but a peacemaking army. Sad to say, most Canadians don't know about it. But it's here. We're here. And we're getting the job done."
True confessions
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Around the campfire, the unshaven truth will come out. Between missions, the knee-high mud hearth at the centre of the Red Devil Inn is the place to be for those not collapsed on their army cots.
The open-air courtyard firepit is equal parts dining hall for the constant consumption of MREs and an open stage for flattop guitar and off-colour jokes. It is also a place for war stories — ever hear the one about the snoozing Canadian sentry who almost shot the Bosnian bread man? — and sometimes, even, a place for true confessions.
Encrusted river-soaked socks sometimes lay drying on the firepit's edge, set there by soldiers determined to sap all available energy from the glowing embers. The firewood is imported, for there is nothing to burn in this part of Afghanistan save for twigs, and the 1st Platoon appears maliciously determined to burn every scrap in the house before they are relieved by 2nd Platoon. Such are the ways of inter-company rivalry.
It emerges by firelight that the Red Devils resent that, somehow, in the minds of so many Canadians, they don't really exist. A crack combat unit, they feel, has no place in the eyes of what many perceive as anti-military Middle Canada. Like their grandfathers, they trained to fight. But somehow in the 50 years between then and now, these shadow warriors lost their hold on the country. Or Canada simply let go.
Do not make the mistake of viewing them as a single, monochromatic entity. Though they do their jobs bonded as one, 1st Platoon is a unit rich with NCOs of experience and nuance. There are men here who can quote you the finer points of leftist author Noam Chomsky, others who will shrewdly dissect the lesser points of polemicist filmmaker Michael Moore, gesticulating with tattooed arms for emphasis.
As embedded journalists, we are a practical liability, strategically useless occupants of two seats in the LAV that would otherwise go to soldiers capable of warcraft when the going gets pear-shaped.
But as the days and nights melt away, the initially sullen tolerance of such intrusion evaporates, and 1st Platoon begins to show itself for the unit it really is. They accept. They warm. They welcome.
Nowhere was that connection more evident than with Lieut. Greene, the CIMIC rep, who over the course of leaders' engagements in seven villages transformed from journalist-babysitter to respected peer.
On a journey to the north by LAV, Greene began inviting the Star to take advantage of the unit's Pashtun translator, effectively joining in the shura meetings with village elders to ask questions of our own.
By sheer happenstance, one such village was in the midst of a wedding ceremony when the Canadian convoy arrived. The women of the hamlet wore no burkas but instead were adorned with richly coloured gowns previously unseen by Canadian eyes in these parts. They dashed for cover when the Western soldiers emerged from their LAVs. The village elders gladly delayed the nuptials for a 15-minute chat, quickly revealing themselves eager to establish schools for both sexes. It was the first village to make such a declaration in our travels.
Other destinations proved substantially more hostile, such as the village of Tanachuy (pronounced "Tan-gee"), where, when Capt. Schamuhn made inquiries about two militants the Canadians were particularly interested in locating, a cluster of black-turbaned, scowling men erupted in furtive whispers among themselves. A nerve was struck, but when asked directly whether they were aware of the suspects, they denied any knowledge.
Still, even at tense Tanachuy, the Canadian mission to get to know the locals paid dividends. A literate villager, rare in these parts, presented to Greene a notebook he had made for his son — a handwritten cross-cultural dictionary providing the same words in English and Pashtun.
Yes, the man told Greene, he would like to be a teacher. And if a school could be built, he would happily share his knowledge with the village children. Perhaps one day, the man said, his son could even become a doctor. "We have no medicine in Tanachuy. But we need a doctor for the elderly. My son could be that man."
For Greene, the work in the villages was proceeding slower than he had hoped. During his final night at the campfire, he spoke candidly about where the mission was headed, wondering aloud whether a more effective way to reach out to the local Afghans was possible.
"Some days it feels like we're getting somewhere. Some days it feels like I'm spinning my wheels," he said.
"Maybe what we need to do is have Afghans up front, instead of people like me. I would like to get some of these interpreters to Ottawa, get them some training to improve their English, get them fired up about what a fully developed nation is like. And then get them back here to work on persuading these villagers where their future lies," he said.
"What we're doing is good. But imagine having actual Pashtuns doing this job. Then they could reason with themselves."
Part 5 of a special report by Mitch Potter and Rick Madonik
Mar. 12, 2006. 06:57 AM
Father and sons
The pups of Alpha Company call him "Pops," or sometimes "The Old Man." To glimpse at his grey whiskers, it is easy to imagine Cpl. Erik Hjalmarson is a lifer with decades in the Forces.
Not so. Though Hjalmarson turns 55 this month, he didn't join the army until age 49, making him an extraordinarily mature recruit to Canada's front-line combat forces.
What drove the Duncan, B.C., native to call the Canadian Forces Recruitment Centre six years ago? In part, Hjalmarson explains, it was his last chance to share in a family heritage that dates back to World War I.
"There was no joining after age 50, so it was then or never and I just thought, `What the heck, let's see what they say,' " he says.
Hjalmarson had already put in decades of hard slogging in the heavy industries, from sawmills to cement plants to coal and copper mines throughout British Columbia, earning his papers as a millwright and machinist along the way. He describes a life of honest labour without shortcuts, each stint brought to an abrupt end as mines played out and companies went under.
"I've had some pretty nasty jobs but I've never been afraid of hard work. The worst I can remember was running jackhammer. You drag a 90-pound machine up the rock face and when you get it going it shakes the crap out of you," he says.
"But what we're doing here is probably the most demanding of all. Climbing out over these mountains through extremely rugged terrain, nobody gets to soak in a tub or have a beer when it's over.
"All you can do is recoup for a day, prep your kit, clean your weapons, and out you go again, rain or shine."
Hjalmarson has another overriding interest for being in these hills: It helps him keep tabs on his oldest son, also named Eric, 25, who is deployed at the main Canadian base at Kandahar Airfield, working with Bravo Company. Father and son have been in the same battalion for the past six years.
"I think I worry about him more than he worries about me, but that is what a parent does. It just goes to show how our family is steeped in military tradition. My dad was with the Royal Canadian Engineers in World War II, landing at Juno Beach and fighting right through to Germany," he says.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
`The biggest satisfaction is watching these young guys become men of substance'
Cpl. Erik Hjalmarson
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"And my grandfather served with 49th Battalion, the South Saskatchewan Regiment, in World War I.
"I've grown up with the stories. To me, it relates to a tradition of what Canadians used to call `citizen soldiers' — volunteers who joined up to fight. Canada always had an army that could make do with what they were given."
Hjalmarson brings a unique sensibility to Alpha Company's 1st Platoon, equal parts den mother and father of invention. A restless soul, he is always dreaming up improvements to make life more bearable in the stress-filled environment at the unit's temporary home in the hills north of Kandahar.
He is also one of 1st Platoon's unabashed keepers all things Red Devil — stickers, banners, patches and stencils — that cumulatively galvanize the esprit de corps for which Alpha Company is known.
This is not a politically correct undertaking: Army command does not always look fondly on the cultivation of the Red Devil nickname. But out here on the front, no such rules apply, and within a day of deployment the spray cans come out. Forward Operating Base Gombad is now the Red Devil Inn.
There are stuffed mascots at the inn, including a Wile E. Coyote with four tours of duty under his belt and a Kermit the Frog with two. Hjalmarson, who is fond of woodworking, filled in a few spare hours whittling wooden assault rifles for each.
One day he was spotted building a kite from scratch. When asked the purpose, he deadpanned, "Now when I tell one of these guys `Go fly a kite,' I can give them the means to do it."
He is a big part of the glue that holds together 1st Platoon, but don't tell him that. "Glue? That's what they make out of old horses."
Hjalmarson expected to retire at age 55 when he joined, but the military has since extended the age of mandatory retirement to 60. He is on his third tour, having served in Bosnia and Kabul.
"I don't know if I'll be climbing these mountains at 60, but they've got a few jobs left at battalion for old broken soldiers," he says.
As long as the Canadian Forces will have him, Hjalmarson says he is ready to serve.
"I think the biggest satisfaction is watching these young guys become men of substance. We get people from all walks of life coming in, boys from the farms and cities and fishing villages. A lot of them already know what is it to work hard and some of them have to learn it the hard way.
"What we end up with is a fighting army. Not just a peacekeeping army, but a peacemaking army. Sad to say, most Canadians don't know about it. But it's here. We're here. And we're getting the job done."
True confessions
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Around the campfire, the unshaven truth will come out. Between missions, the knee-high mud hearth at the centre of the Red Devil Inn is the place to be for those not collapsed on their army cots.
The open-air courtyard firepit is equal parts dining hall for the constant consumption of MREs and an open stage for flattop guitar and off-colour jokes. It is also a place for war stories — ever hear the one about the snoozing Canadian sentry who almost shot the Bosnian bread man? — and sometimes, even, a place for true confessions.
Encrusted river-soaked socks sometimes lay drying on the firepit's edge, set there by soldiers determined to sap all available energy from the glowing embers. The firewood is imported, for there is nothing to burn in this part of Afghanistan save for twigs, and the 1st Platoon appears maliciously determined to burn every scrap in the house before they are relieved by 2nd Platoon. Such are the ways of inter-company rivalry.
It emerges by firelight that the Red Devils resent that, somehow, in the minds of so many Canadians, they don't really exist. A crack combat unit, they feel, has no place in the eyes of what many perceive as anti-military Middle Canada. Like their grandfathers, they trained to fight. But somehow in the 50 years between then and now, these shadow warriors lost their hold on the country. Or Canada simply let go.
Do not make the mistake of viewing them as a single, monochromatic entity. Though they do their jobs bonded as one, 1st Platoon is a unit rich with NCOs of experience and nuance. There are men here who can quote you the finer points of leftist author Noam Chomsky, others who will shrewdly dissect the lesser points of polemicist filmmaker Michael Moore, gesticulating with tattooed arms for emphasis.
As embedded journalists, we are a practical liability, strategically useless occupants of two seats in the LAV that would otherwise go to soldiers capable of warcraft when the going gets pear-shaped.
But as the days and nights melt away, the initially sullen tolerance of such intrusion evaporates, and 1st Platoon begins to show itself for the unit it really is. They accept. They warm. They welcome.
Nowhere was that connection more evident than with Lieut. Greene, the CIMIC rep, who over the course of leaders' engagements in seven villages transformed from journalist-babysitter to respected peer.
On a journey to the north by LAV, Greene began inviting the Star to take advantage of the unit's Pashtun translator, effectively joining in the shura meetings with village elders to ask questions of our own.
By sheer happenstance, one such village was in the midst of a wedding ceremony when the Canadian convoy arrived. The women of the hamlet wore no burkas but instead were adorned with richly coloured gowns previously unseen by Canadian eyes in these parts. They dashed for cover when the Western soldiers emerged from their LAVs. The village elders gladly delayed the nuptials for a 15-minute chat, quickly revealing themselves eager to establish schools for both sexes. It was the first village to make such a declaration in our travels.
Other destinations proved substantially more hostile, such as the village of Tanachuy (pronounced "Tan-gee"), where, when Capt. Schamuhn made inquiries about two militants the Canadians were particularly interested in locating, a cluster of black-turbaned, scowling men erupted in furtive whispers among themselves. A nerve was struck, but when asked directly whether they were aware of the suspects, they denied any knowledge.
Still, even at tense Tanachuy, the Canadian mission to get to know the locals paid dividends. A literate villager, rare in these parts, presented to Greene a notebook he had made for his son — a handwritten cross-cultural dictionary providing the same words in English and Pashtun.
Yes, the man told Greene, he would like to be a teacher. And if a school could be built, he would happily share his knowledge with the village children. Perhaps one day, the man said, his son could even become a doctor. "We have no medicine in Tanachuy. But we need a doctor for the elderly. My son could be that man."
For Greene, the work in the villages was proceeding slower than he had hoped. During his final night at the campfire, he spoke candidly about where the mission was headed, wondering aloud whether a more effective way to reach out to the local Afghans was possible.
"Some days it feels like we're getting somewhere. Some days it feels like I'm spinning my wheels," he said.
"Maybe what we need to do is have Afghans up front, instead of people like me. I would like to get some of these interpreters to Ottawa, get them some training to improve their English, get them fired up about what a fully developed nation is like. And then get them back here to work on persuading these villagers where their future lies," he said.
"What we're doing is good. But imagine having actual Pashtuns doing this job. Then they could reason with themselves."
Comment