Word: battalion
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...regime. It attracts applicants from all over the world including China and the U.S., and has stiffened the sinews of the heads of state of eight countries plus a clutch of royals, including the British princes William and Harry. "When I was in Sierra Leone meeting a Kenyan battalion, it was exactly like being back at Sandhurst," says Major General Andy Salmon, former commandant general of the Royal Marines, the last British commander of British coalition forces in southeastern Iraq and now head of force readiness at NATO's Supreme HQ Allied Powers Europe...
...School Ellis began his efforts to open Pir Mohammed in late January. To get permission to reopen the school, he needed the approval of three separate command structures - his battalion superiors, the Canadians who ran Task Force Kandahar and their NATO superiors at Regional Command-South, the NATO regional command for southern Afghanistan. He also needed the approval of the local, district and regional Afghan government authorities. That part wasn't too bad. Ellis was a gung-ho briefer. On Saturday, April 3, I watched him describe the school operation to a group of Canadian generals. "That...
...hours before the operation was to launch, the 1/12 battalion planning staff scotched it. "They said we hadn't done sufficient planning for the bomb clearance," Ellis says, "and I suppose they were right. The trouble is, there are only two American bomb-clearing units for all of Kandahar province. I managed to find a Canadian team." The operation was rescheduled for April 4, when the Canadians would be available...
That night, Ellis learned that his superiors had, once again, briefed their superiors at RC-South about the Pir Mohammed School operation. "They want to sleep on it at RC-South," Ellis said, rolling his eyes. "And battalion said they don't want me calling up, trying to convince them." (See TIME's audio slide show "The War in Afghanistan Up Close...
...next afternoon, Ellis received word from battalion: there would be another delay, ostensibly of five days, but Ellis knew it would be longer than that. The Canadian bomb-disposal unit couldn't wait around. It had to go on to other projects. "This is becoming a joke," said one of the troopers who escorted me out of Combat Outpost Senjaray the following day. "It ain't gonna happen...