Officer Lehneman served in Iraq

By NATHAN LAMB | Milton Independent Staff Writer
miltonreporter@yahoo.com

Milton Police Officer Jack Lehneman poses with a group of Iraqi school kids during his deployment for Operation Iraqi Freedom during 2005.

Patrolling the neighborhood, responding to emergencies, and keeping the peace.

Those are all mainstays of Jack Lehneman’s job as patrol officer with the Milton Police Department, but it also sounds a lot like his duties in Iraq with the Army National Guard from January to November of 2005.

Having served as an armored platoon leader in Operation Iraqi Freedom with the 1st Division of the172nd Armor battalion, Lehneman confirmed that point, but said similarities were limited past that.

“I think the only comparison was patrolling and being in a vehicle,” he said. “The type of operations we did over there were much different than things we do here.”

While overseas, Lehneman was in charge of 19 men in four Humvees, which were attached to an engineer battalion for much of his tour. Operating out of the then “very hot” Anbar province in western Iraq, typical duties included escorting specialists who disarm roadside bombs or IEDs (Improvised Explosive Devices).

Since those specialists were the single largest obstacle to successful IED attacks, response teams were often targeted with secondary small arms, explosive, or mortar attacks, said Lehneman. In practice, the team often knew they were walking into dangerous situations, but Lehneman said it was something they got used to.

“It’s like we were expecting to get hit anytime we went out; that was a reality,” he said. “In the beginning it was scary as hell, by the end it was almost normal, you just expected it.”

Other duties included raids to round-up weapons and explosives, and providing security on convoys. Lehneman said they regularly found people with residue of explosives on their hands or illegal weapons, and reported seeing their handiwork in the field on more than one occasion.

“Every day was kind of a crapshoot,” he said. “On our convoys we were hit probably 14 to 15 times by IEDs…by the grace of God we were able to avoid losing anyone in my platoon.”

In that respect, Lehneman acknowledged there was some comparison with the unpredictability of police work. It’s common for police to get a suspicious activity call or citizen dispute call that turns out to be more serious. Lehneman said he doesn’t consider any call or traffic stop to be routine, and said that same mindset came into play when responding to calls overseas.

“In my opinion, you have to be thinking about the many different variables you could run into,” he said. “If you’re not doing that, you’re not preparing yourself for what you could be facing when you get there.”

However, Lehneman said it wasn’t all bad news in Iraq. He reported numerous positive interactions with the local population. His opinion was that the majority of soldiers believe in the mission of establishing democracy in Iraq and behaved accordingly.

“My basic directive was that we were guests there…we would told to operate as we would if were an occupying force in our own neighborhoods,” he said. “I think the level of respect we got from the locals reflected how we operated as a group.”

Another similarity with police work was the close bonds that form between the unit; he listed the platoon’s safety as a primary concern during operations and saw them become like a family during the year.

That probably made his recent Guard promotion to Captain somewhat bittersweet: If deployed again. Lehneman will be assigned to a planning and operations role with the battalion staff, where he’ll coordinate operations from the battalion HQ.

Lehneman considers the question of future deployment in terms of “when” instead of “if," but remains committed to the mission nonetheless.

“Building this country didn’t happen overnight,” he continued. “I don’t know why people think we can help another country build its constitution overnight.”

Lehneman said it really was “apples and oranges” to compare policing to soldiering but he would term his current occupation as the best of both worlds. Helping others is a major component of both, he added. He even thought of taking more onto his plate, but that idea did not pass muster on his personal home front.

“I thought about joining Milton Rescue, but my wife said ‘no, you’re busy enough,” he said, with a smile.