Fort Irwin company to bridge language and cultural gaps in war

FORT IRWIN • “Bottom line, sir,” one solider said. “The Army could not complete its mission without 09 Limas.”

The room full of soldiers cheered. They agreed. The soldiers are the 51st Translator and Interpreter Company; 09 Lima is their code name.
The language company was activated at Fort Irwin on Oct. 23. At only 44 soldiers now, the Army plans to grow the company to 158 soldiers who will accompany commanders in Iraq and Afghanistan. The soldiers of the 51st are native speakers of Arabic, Pushtu, Kurdish, Farsi and potentially 10 other languages and dialects targeted by the Army, said Lt. Col. Andrew Cooper.

Many of the soldiers were not born in the United States but rather grew up in Iraq and Afghanistan, where they still have family. Because of the sensitive nature of their job and out of fear for their families’ lives, the soldiers asked not to be identified.

The idea of trained translators or interpreters in the Army is not new, but the idea behind the 51st is. The company is the only one active in the Army. Once the company is filled out and trained, soldiers from the 51st will deploy with combat teams to Iraq and Afghanistan and work with the top level commanders there to not only bridge the language barrier but also the culture gap. Already, some soldiers have been deployed with great success.

“Knowing how to speak a language is one thing, but understanding what is going on is another,” Cooper said.

The company’s 1st Sgt. Thomas Gustason said the soldiers of the 51st can detect anomalies in behavior that could signal danger or explain situations that the soldiers do not understand. In one situation, U.S. troops were uneasy about the amount of activity surrounding a funeral in Iraq. Thinking there were weapons transactions occurring, the unit was about to raid the funeral when a soldier, from Iraq and familiar with Iraqi customs, informed the U.S. soldiers that there was a festival going on. They did not raid.

Lt. Lory Jarvina is the company’s executive officer. She spent 15 months learning Arabic as an Army linguist at the Defense Language Institute. She said the knowledge trained linguists bring to the field and those of the 51st soldiers are worlds apart. Jarvina knows Arabic but did not pretend to know Arabic culture.

“A student can be an expert in language,” she said. “But culture. That is a whole different world.”

Knowing the Iraqi or Afghani culture has saved American soldiers in the past. During a conversation between a U.S. commander and an Iraqi, the Iraqi smiled and told his aides to feed the commander some parsley. Literally, a harmless gesture to give the commander a snack. However, the translator, who was a native born Iraqi, knew that feeding someone parsley was slang for giving them poison. It was a death threat against the commander.

“We can change the face of the United States Army,” one soldier said. “We can save lives.”

A majority of soldiers were recruited, Cooper said, based on past work as translators or contractors. In the past, civilians often worked with Army units to help them navigate the cultural differences. Starting with 51st, the job of translator and Interpreter and cultural watchdog will be that of a soldier. Cooper said it erases the obvious difference between the soldier and the translator. Gustason said it creates more trust among the unit.

Stories of the 51st

Although only barely two weeks old, the soldiers of the 51st Translator Interpreter Company are full of stories. Many of the soldiers worked as contract translators in Iraq and Afghanistan during the war. Others have already been deployed as 09 Limas to the war zones.

MOSQUE AMBUSH • A soldier from Afghanistan said he and another translator saved about 50 or 60 American troops one day. A small town had invited an American commander and troops to a ceremony at a mosque. The translators thought it was strange that a top town official was not at the ceremony. He said that by Afghan custom, the official should have been there. The translators did some snooping and found several explosives disguised as rocks. It was an ambush.

BACKSEAT DRIVING • An Arabic-speaking translator was asked to accompany a high level convoy of vehicles in Iraq. She wanted to ride in a lead vehicle so she could watch out for anything suspicious, but the commanders said no. En route, a vehicle in front of the translator was hit by an IED. One soldier was injured. The translator had seen a sign, written in Arabic, warning Iraqi vehicles to stay off the booby-trapped road. Because the translator was not in a lead vehicle, she could not warn the convoy in time. She said she always rode up front after that.

FIVE WORDS • A soldier that spoke Arabic worked with a U.S. commander in Iraq as a translator. He and other translators would teach the commander five Arabic words a day, and the commander was good at retaining them. Before long, the soldier said, the commander was introducing himself in Arabic, carrying on small conversations and reading signs. The soldier said that was a big accomplishment.