Transfer of Authority (TOA)

Last Tuesday we officially took over control of MultiNational Division-North in N. Iraq in a ceremony at Speicher. The staff planned for days upon days to make sure this event was a good step forward. VIP generals from Baghdad and officials from the State Dept were in attendance as were Iraqi generals and elected officials from Salah ad Din province.

My duties, of course revolved around the media and the post-event interview with my boss. We invited western and Iraqi media from Baghdad to fly up for the event...we even arranged for a helicopter to pick them up especially. We had commitments from the New York Times, AFP, and 8 Iraqi agencies.

The day before the event, every single one of them cancelled. We had a commitment of 20 more journalists from the local provincial area, but after that letdown, I was wondering if were were going to get any media coverage at all.

On the morning of, the weather was pretty sick looking. There was a large dustcloud that had formed over most of our area, shutting down rotary wing flights for most of our guests. The CG (commanding general, my boss) made the call to delay the event 3 hours to let the weather clear. The problem was, 12 Iraqi TV , newspaper, and web journalists had descended on the base. Once they get through the security checks it it very difficult to tell someone to come back later. Fortunately we had set aside a break room for the media to chill out before the ceremony--complete with food and beverages--so they weren't too upset about the delay.

It gave me the chance to mingle and meet with them. I even recognized one of the cameramen and I struck up a conversation about how I had seen him before. It was a good chance to build relationships and to learn more about the culture. Vivian and Hayder, our interpreters, helped me with the communication.

One of the journalists who was working for Reuters was complaining about being feverish and having congestion. Not sure what to do I found a medic and we had him looked at. Turns out he had been sick and receiving medication...through an IV that was stuck in his hand for the past five days! We cleaned him up and gave him some Tylenol. Not much else we could do--but he appreciated it and he seemed to feel better. At least it didn't stop him from doing his job,napping pictures all over the place.

The ceremony went well, the after event interview went well...overall everything was fine. They had wanted to have more time with the CG, but the MNF-I commander was on hand and they had a meeting to attend.

One peculiarity: They asked if they could put their TV microphones on the podium. You have seen them before--the ones with a box around the handle with the station's logo emblazoned on it. I said, "Sure, no problem."

The podium was littered with these microphones, but none of them were plugged in! It was all about getting a camera shot of their TV station on hand for the event.

It's a concept called " wasta", or street credibility, or machismo. They just wanted to build the wasta of the organization. Interesting.

See the b-roll video we shot here:http://www.dvidshub.net/?script=video/video_show.php&id=71982

As a side note: I'm praying for my grandma's right now, especially Grandma Allen. She's pretty sick and probably in for quite a battle with the treatment and recovery phase of this. Please remember her in your prayers; for a full and quick recovery.