Thursday, March 26, 2009

Border Region

Dan Rather has a weekly program on HDNet. Unfortunately, at the HD.net web site they only post a 38 second teaser of the hour long show. If you cannot watch it on your TV, they want you to buy a DVD of the show.


However, that takes nothing away from Dan Rather's presentation. I mention this because I think that this is extraordinary reporting. This is far more graphic than anything on the local news.


This week's show has a report from Quetta, Pakistan and from the Korengal Valley, Kunar Province, Afghanistan.


The video of fire base Restrepol in the Korengal Valley of the platoon high in the mountains, at the 6000' level, reminds me of Viet Nam. Whether one is in a remote mountain outpost or up to your neck in water in a canal with leeches on your legs and abdomen waiting to ambush a barge carrying a regional chief, the extreme similarity is that in both places one is very uncomfortable.


This show brings home the gritty reality that the vast majority of Americans have never experienced. The privations, primitive living conditions and adaptabilty of the U.S. fighting man never cease to amaze me.

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