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The Difficulty of Delivering Aid in War Zones
(Newsweek) John Spencer - I watched the aerial footage of the disaster surrounding the Israel Defense Forces attempt to deliver aid to northern Gaza last Thursday in horror. It brought back memories of my own experiences trying to deliver humanitarian aid during combat in war-torn cities. As a platoon leader in northern Iraq in 2003, I was tasked to use my infantry platoon to distribute water with a giant water truck to a crowded slum in Kirkuk. A crowd began to surround us and soon turned into a mob. Thoughts ran through my mind of a suicide bomber or a weapon firing from the crowd. They crowded the security trucks screaming and making the soldiers extremely nervous. It rapidly became uncontrollable and I gave the order to pack up and withdraw. A few weeks later, we were tasked to deliver trucks of cooking gas into another area of Kirkuk. As we drove to the distribution site, civilian pickup trucks packed with men started to drive next to and even into the gas truck. Men from the pickups tried to jump onto the gas trucks. We had to abort the operation, and I told my convoy to return to base. In 2009 as a company commander in Baghdad, I was tasked to deliver water and MREs (meals-ready-to eat), the same ones that were air-dropped by the U.S. this week in Gaza, to an impoverished neighborhood. Within minutes, a crowd formed and turned into a mob. My soldiers were being engulfed. I immediately ordered a withdrawal. Soldiers always have the right of self-defense. In Gaza, where heavy fighting continues, threats can be snipers or rocket-propelled grenades. We know Hamas operatives, dressed in civilian clothes, have been walking up to armored vehicles to place magnet bombs and fire into the crowd during aid distribution. The writer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Modern War Institute (MWI) at West Point, served for 25 years as an infantry soldier, including two combat tours in Iraq.