photo by Katie Cole

Getting ready: Chris Martin, a Dadeville police officer and sergeant with the National Guard, does paperwork in his office Tuesday. Martin will be deployed overseas next year.

Obama: U.S. to send more troops

Locals react to President’s troop call

By Katie Cole (Contact) | Alex City Outlook

Published Tuesday, December 1, 2009

As President Barack Obama prepared to address the nation last night, local members of the military reacted to news that he planned to send an additional 30,000 troops to Afghanistan next year.

“Well, being a non-commissioned officer, I can’t really give my opinion,” said Chris Martin, a sergeant with the National Guard 214th M.P. Company who also pulls double duty as an investigator with the Dadeville Police Department and a task agent with the Tallapoosa County Narcotics Task Force.

“I’m loyal to the military and loyal to my country. If my leaders find it necessary to send me over there to keep peace or keep balance, then that’s where I’m going to go.”

Martin was already scheduled for overseas deployment with the 214th, which begins around March. He’s uncertain the company’s exact destination, but he believes it will likely be the Middle East, either Iraq or Afghanistan. The announcement to send more troops was not unexpected.

“The last time they had a troop surge in Iraq it really cut down on the violence,” Martin said. “I guess they’re going to stick with what works.”

Donald McCook, a patrolman and field training officer with the Alexander City Police Department who is also a sergeant with the National Guard 214th M.P. Company, was also not surprised.

“We need to take care of everything so that stuff doesn’t carry over here,” McCook said.

“Our main mission is to come back here and bring everybody back with us. We’re going over there to help, not hurt.”

Obama’s plan allegedly calls for troop withdrawal to begin in 2011, 19 months after they are sent, but he was not expected to give a date for the end of the war. Both men believe the U.S. will have troops in the country for a long time, although it will likely be a diminished presence.

“A perfect example: look at Bosnia,” McCook said of the country that has hosted U.S. and European peacekeeping forces since the 1990s.

The scope of the military presence depends on the degree the violence is diminished with the troop surge and how well the country becomes at policing its own citizens, the men said.

“They’re going to leave troops there as long as (they) have to,” Martin said. “I know when you go into a country the way we did and you take out the regime of power, it’s not really a short-term goal.”

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