3rd Infantry Division Operations - Fort Stewart - U.S. Army

26 3rd Infantry Division Operations
promised a punishing summer. Dust choked electronic equipment
and wind storms cut visibility. The desert had a furnace
hot feel. The little rain that came quickly turned roads to a
soupy muck. Conditions were miserable but troops soldiered
on. With the help of the Air Force’s 557th Expeditionary Red
Horse Battalion construction engineers, the base camp was
transformed into a fully functional operating base named for its
hearty occupants, "Forward Operating Base Hammer."
Sledgehammer adopted the tactic of positioning Soldiers in
the communities so that they could protect the population. Logic
followed that if the people felt secure, infrastructure would
be repaired and the economy would improve. The conditions
would be set and essential services, government, law and order,
would be restored.
Commanders partnered with the Iraqi National Police leaders
in the area. East of Baghdad, the 1st and 3rd National Police
Brigade showed promise as a viable Iraqi led security force.
It was woefully undermanned, poorly equipped, and barely
trained. Still, the need for security was paramount and true
security meant participation by Iraqi forces. Foot patrols in
Salman Pak were combined with members of 1-15 Infantry and
the Iraqi National Police. Success followed with the discovery
of caches containing artillery rounds and other seeds used by insurgents
to grow misery for the community. For the time being,
the Sledgehammer brigade held positions at a patrol base called
Assassin, a Joint Security Station in Salman Pak, and three
Combat Outposts: Cashe, Cahill, Cleary and FOB Hammer.
Life at one of these forward bases was tough at first. Like
FOB Hammer, outposts required substantial work. COP Cleary
had been a government building and was adjacent to a rundown
greenhouse. Cashe was located in Tuwaitha, south of Jisr Diyala.
Cahill, the smallest of the three, had been a hunting club