Manny DeLaRosa Update
Sergeant First Class Manny DeLaRosa
US Army Reserves
From Bangor MI
1993 Graduate of Bangor High School
-
2010 - Currently deployed to Afghanistan, Zabul Province,
Shinkay District.
-
2007-2008 - Deployed in as a Civil Affairs Team Sergeant to
North Babil Iraq.
-
2001 - Deployed as a Military Police under Operation Noble
Eagle.
The Van Buren
County Sheriffs Office would to recognize Manuel DeLaRosa
for his service to our country.
During his a 12 year employment with the Sheriff's
Office, Manny held many positions in the Corrections Division and was
Supervisor of the Jail Drain Crew until his recent deployment to
Afghanistan. Not only has Manuel been a valued employee, but has
dedicated his time for our nation’s freedom. He has been deployed three
times since joining the Army Reserve. In the last 6 years, he was
deployed twice to Iraq and is presently in Afghanistan. Manny continues to
help in these countries by working with troops from other nations and the
military police in Iraq and Afghanistan.
We don’t expect Manuel’s return back to the states and
return to work for another year. We look forward to his return to
Corrections where he will resume his last assignment with the Drain
Crew.
Below are photos and emails from Manny
while deployed.
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to send Manny an email.
Sent: Monday, September 06, 2010 9:06 AM
To: Mark Zirkle
Subject: Army
Just checking
in with you guys. I'm doing alright. Still training up in Atterbury. I'm adding a few pics so you guys can see what I'm up
to.
How is everything at the jail?
Manny
Sent:
Monday, September 20, 2010 11:03 PM
To: Mark Zirkle
Subject: picWe had a day
off and we were allowed to go to the Purdue vs Ball State
game. I was hanging
out with the Tippecanoe County Sheriff guys on the sidelines.
Manny
Sent: Saturday, October 30, 2010 2:32 PM
To: Mark Zirkle
Subject: Re: Afghanistan
It's me again. Everything is going well so far. Looks like I
will be here in Qalat for a couple weeks. So I guess that means I
can get a little comfortable. So far it's been "somewhat" calm
here. We just gotta stay on our toes. Any bad decisions and you
can find yourself in a bad situation quick. Luckily I have some
pretty good guys on my team. We've been staying busy for the most
part. We are still learning the area which is the most important
thing right now.
Last thing you wanna do is go out into the villages and open
terrain without intel. Gotta know what your dealing with first
right.
I'm attaching a couple pics.
How's everyone doing back at the station? Hope everyone is doing
well.
Manny
Sent: Saturday, December 04, 2010 10:34 PM
To: Mark Zirkle
Subject: update
How is everybody doing? Thought I'd stop by and say
hello. I have finally moved (again), hopefully for the
last time. I am in the Shinkay District, which is Southeast
of Qalat city. If you look on a map, I am in the Southeast
corner of Afghanistan. Close to the Pakistan border.
There are three of us on this base that are doing Civil
Affairs work. I'm currently working close with the
Afghanistan Army Commander (in this area) and the Afghan
Police Chief. With the police, we are helping them
re-furbish the District Center (kinda like a county
building). This is where the weekly meetings occur (kinda
like a commissioners meeting). All the elders show up and
represent their areas within the District (Towns, villages).
We show up and listen to their concerns and issues. Our
goal is to get the Government of Afghanistan to give more
assistance to this area. What the government doesn't do,
we try to do. Only if necessary.
I'm currently working on
putting projects together that will help them repair their Carezzes (underground waterways). These run water from the
mountains and into their lands. This waters their crops
and keeps their wells from drying out. They were damaged
during the Pakistan rains.
I'm adding some pics to this message.
There is so much more I want to tell you guys but I'm not
allowed to. At least over internet. I suppose I can tell
ya when I get home.
Hope your all doing well.
Manny
Pic 1 : Holding a formation of the Afghan Police. We
wanted to see how many they actually had on duty.
Pic 2 : Walking through the mountains looking for Carezzes
Pic 3 : Watching some kids cruise through the mountains on
their Donkeys
Monday,
December 13, 2010 9:11 AM
To: Mark Zirkle
Subject: Re: News from home.
I was
thinking while I was out on my mission today. Instead of
having my emails cut and pasted on there, I'll send you a page
or two of what I'm doing here. So that way, it is a bit more
clear. The emails on there seem to be a bit confusing if
someone is reading it and is not familiar with the military.
Thanks,
Manny
Pic: Handing out coats for children. Helping them prepare for
the winter
I am part of the Provincial Reconstruction Team “ZABUL”,
assigned to a Detachment which works in the Shinkay District.
There are Three Civil Affairs Soldiers assigned to this area.
PRT Zabul's
Mission:
Conduct civil-military operations in Zabul Province to extend
the reach and legitimacy of the Government of Afghanistan by:
1. Promoting
good governance and justice
2. Facilitating reconstruction, development and economic
growth by developing projects on the leading edge of the
Afghan National Development Strategy
3. Supporting and enabling an effective Afghan security
apparatus
4. Coordinating Consequence Management Operations with the
Government of Afghanistan, Afghan National Security Forces and
the International Security Assistance Force.
Currently, the Shinkay Detachment Team is working on
Irrigation issues with the District. Due to the Pakistan
floods, much of their irrigation lines were destroyed or
damaged to a certain extent. Our goal is to get them
operational before the spring.
We are also working with the Afghan National Police. We
are supporting them and helping them establish a good
relationship with the local populace.
Everything we do is a joint effort with the Afghan
National Army. They are very well trained and organized. They
have been a big help to us when it comes to understanding and
working in this area.
December 16, 2010
I am totally lost.
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Feb 2, 2011
By Karen Parrish
American Forces Press Service
Photo credit
Air Force photo Staff Sgt. Brian Ferguson
Sgt. 1st Class Manuel
Delarosa, Provincial Reconstruction Team Zabul, Shinkai
Detachment, finds a pair of shoes for a young girl while helping
Afghan National Security Forces distribute winter supplies in
Safidar village, Afghanistan, Feb. 1.
General: Afghanistan planning yields
steady progress
WASHINGTON, Feb. 1, 2011 -- U.S. and coalition troops have spent 18
months carrying out the first comprehensive campaign plan linking their
efforts with those of their Afghan counterparts, a senior U.S. commander
said today.
"Last year saw the implementation of a plan that
demanded focus and synchronization," Lt. Gen. David M. Rodriguez,
commander of the International Security Assistance Force Joint Command,
told Pentagon reporters in a video teleconference. "And we all saw that
where we do that, we make steady progress."
The plan was based on a strategy of "synchronizing
efforts in time and space," Rodriguez said. ISAF and the three Afghan
security ministries -- interior, defense, and national security -- put
the plan together and carried it out, he added.
The plan focused effort "where it was most important:
population centers, commerce routes and areas of economic potential,"
Rodriguez said.
The first foray employing the plan was a coordinated
civil-military effort into the central Helmand River valley. That
initial trial of the strategy yielded some lessons learned, Rodriguez
noted.
The first lesson, he explained, is that security gains
happen faster than increases in government capacity, so several lessons
involved more planning for government activities to follow future
security gains. Other lessons involved improving the "complementary
effects" of conventional and special operations forces, while "the
minister of interior learned some lessons on recruiting and training
police forces, which were much more effective in the follow-on
operations," Rodriguez said.
"And we all learned that building local political
bodies that represent the people is an iterative process," he added. "If
more and more people are mobilized, the representative councils become
more representative and more effective."
The lessons learned in Helmand informed operations in
and around Kandahar City over the summer and fall of 2010, the general
said, noting that Arghandab, a district just outside Kandahar City, had
been a Taliban stronghold where people could not move around without
fear.
"In that 18-month period, the district governor was
killed, the district police chief was maimed, and there were no
government officials or police present any place but the district
center, which some of the Afghans described as a combat outpost," he
said.
The ISAF-Afghan combined approach to establishing
security and fostering local government growth effected a
transformation, Rodriguez said.
"I was there two weeks ago, and there were 16
government employees working with a new district governor," he said.
"There's a new police chief who has a police force that's out and about.
And the people on a Friday afternoon, Afghan family time, were out
picnicking in the Arghandab River Valley -- a significant change from 18
months ago."
The partnered forces made similar, but smaller gains,
in Kabul province's capital and in Afghanistan's east, north and west,
Rodriquez said.
Extending security and fostering Afghan forces' ability
to lead operations, while expanding the government's ability to serve
its people at the same time, are essential to the goal of transitioning
security responsibility to Afghanistan lead by the end of 2014,
Rodriguez said.
"So we're going to stick with the current approach," he
said.
This year, the updated plan focuses on expanding
security to more population centers and important roads, while building
slow but steady progress in the north and west, the general said. The
planning effort now involves U.S. and United Kingdom embassies and
additional civilian Afghan ministries, Rodriguez explained.
The Afghan independent director of local governance and
the minister of rural rehabilitation and development helped to develop
the current plan, Rodriguez said, and their participation is "altogether
helping to bring better coordinated effects to a common plan."
Also important this year, he said, is building the
Afghan forces' durability and sustainability.
"We put a tremendous effort last year to get the
infantry forces fielded to increase the number of [Afghan] boots on the
ground," Rodriquez said. "And this year [we] will focus on logistics,
the other enablers, [and] the engineers, to support the long-term
sustainability of the Afghan army."
While 70,000 new Afghan soldiers and police were
trained over the past 18 months, efforts continue to build literacy and
leadership capability in those forces, he said.
Afghan forces already have established a stronger
presence in places like the Helmand River Valley, where ISAF-to-Afghan
troop ratios have shifted from 1-to-5 18 months ago to 1-to-1 today, the
general said, while ratios are now 1-to-1.2 in areas around Kandahar
City.
"The Afghan national security forces are increasing
significantly in the important places," Rodriguez said, adding that the
challenge is to help the Afghans as they increasingly take the lead to
make the progress durable.
The plan also must address building Afghanistan's civil
service work force, Rodriguez said.
"In the last 18 months, there's been a significant
effort to train civil servants by [the U.S. Agency for International
Development] and the U.S. embassy," Rodriguez explained. "So rather than
have just one or two people in the district government trying to do
something, they now have 10, 15, in some cases more, to try to build
that stability."
As security improves and the Afghan population's
confidence grows, "more of them will come out to serve," Rodriguez said.
"And that's what has to occur over time, so that they can maintain the
hold to properly build this long-term stability that they desire.
"We'll continue to support the building of the local
governance that serves the people," he continued. "I'm confident that
we're helping to set the conditions for the people to participate more
fully in building a better future for themselves."
Rodriguez said the real question in preparing to draw
down the number of ISAF troops in Afghanistan is whether Afghan forces
can provide security in their country without the assistance of
coalition forces.
"Can they do it with less of us?" the general posited
to reporters. "Can they provide that security for the Afghan people so
that they can go about their daily business? And is there sufficient
governance out there that doesn't negatively impact on security?"
Those factors will determine when and where ISAF can
reduce its troop presence, he said, and such progress already has
happened in some places. Helmand province's Now Zad district had an ISAF
presence last year of two Marine battalions, Rodriguez noted. "Now," he
added, "there's a company-plus."
The Afghan army and the Afghan police, augmented by
that bolstered Marine company and "a few enablers," Rodriguez said, now
can provide the same level of security that just over a year ago
required two Marine battalions.
The Afghan government is now building its processes to
initiate the transition process, the general said.
"It's going to be another month or two until all that
gets worked out so that we can officially start moving along the
transition process," he said.
When the ISAF troop reduction does get under way,
Rodriguez said, some combat troops may be shifted to a training role,
and those troops who will remain in Afghanistan longest will be those
who can augment the Afghans' efforts to build their own capacity.
"The things that require a longer time to develop are
the command and control that the headquarters provides, the integration
of a significant level of intelligence, access to joint effects -- air
being the most important one, but some artillery -- and then logistics
and medevac," he said. "Those things take a longer time to build than an
infantry company. So as we look over time, [those are] the ones that
will be there longer, relative to all the combat troops."
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