95th MPs clear Iraqi highways

***image1***Sometimes the only way to find a target is to first become the target.

“Our job is to go out and get shot at. That’s how we find them,” said Spec. Marco A. Dominguez, 230th Military Police, 3rd Platoon team leader, deployed in Baghdad, Iraq.

Specialist Dominguez is a member of the “Ugly” platoon, on loan from the 554th Military Police in Stuttgart and now serving under the 230th MPs in Baghdad.

During the heavy fighting with Al-Sadr insurgents in April, the Iraqi highways were cut and re-supply operations were disrupted in several places, threatening to cut off the thousands of coalition troops operating in central and northern Iraq. Since then, the 95th Military Police Battalion’s companies, like the 230th MPs, have been performing a dangerous but very necessary mission – keeping hundreds of miles of vital highway cleared of threats.

***image2***The “Ugly” Soldiers ride in M1114 “up-armored” humvees, which are bulletproof and can survive small- and medium-sized explosions from roadside bombs. They have been doing this every day for nine months.

They patrol central Iraq’s major road networks, trying to get the insurgents and terrorists to attack them, in their heavily armed and armored vehicles, clearing a path so that the lightly armed and more vulnerable convoys can make it through later.

***image3***“If they’re shooting at us, we can handle it a lot better than a KBR (Kellogg Brown and Root) truck convoy,” said Staff Sgt. Philip J. Casiano, 230th MPs squad leader. “We try to clear a path for those guys to take, so we don’t wind up coming out later to clean up a destroyed KBR 18-wheeler.”

Specialist Dominguez recalled a day this summer when “Ugly” had been out for less than 45 minutes when the vehicle gunners spotted a hostile gunmen on a rooftop next to the road. The gunmen, with an AK-47 assault rifle, fired off a few rounds at the platoon. One of the turret gunners responded with a short burst of fire but quickly stopped after the gunmen vanished from sight, he said.

“Ugly” Soldiers said that this fire-discipline is a real concern, as they continually stop in densely populated areas of Baghdad. The platoon has heavy and effective