Germantown (LSD 42) - Naval Cruise Book

Page 14 text:

,,,,.,,,1 . -,,,,.., ,,,,,,,,...,,......,........ ...Q..-..,.,,.,,.....,.. -qi--- Winning Hearts 8: Minds, Une MRE at a Time. Nlarines niay not lind Meals Ready to liat thllllfsl to he the tastiest clion' in town. hut therexs Ll young Kenyan trightl xxho's not letting go I othis shiny gilt until he finds out XK'llllliS inside. tlieloxxtl tiySgt .lohn S 1. Berret shakes hands with a new lriend he mul in hat -.-, , .......-..-fn - iw' t 'n' ' 'So a Monkey Walks into a Bar...' SSgt Shawn Demenkow trightj jokes with Kenyan Paratroopers after the Exercise Edge Mallet Opening Ceremony. tAboveJ A Navy dentist removes a rotted tooth from a Kenyan patient dur- ingahumanitarian operation. The Navy Medical!Dental team saw nearly 2.000 Kenyan patients. A Marine in a Light Ar- mored Vehicle tleftj pre- paresto returntothe ship. K We Have ESWS... They have Merit Badges? For Kenyan paratroopers tabovej rubbing sticks together to make fire is ajungle survival technique. They shared this ancient skill with 13th MEU Marines, who never quite fig- ured it out in Boy Scouts. 9

Page 13 text:

-f ..-...-f........ ..q.....v - .,.-.. W- i.. f-Q.-Y. -1, qv -- eplo ed... USS Germantown: We make things happen. Weapons recovered from Iraqi radicals by Marines from the l3thMEU. HMCCSWXSCWXFMFJ Blanca Mendez examines a Kenyan baby during Exercise Edged Mallet. 8 Germantown sailors are proud of our motto: Follow in our Footstepsf' But if you're going to take us up on the offer, you'd better be prepared to trek to the ends ofthe earth. When we got underway for our 2003-2004 Western Pacific Cruise, only three months had passed since President George W. Bush declared an end to major combat operations in Iraq. Two months before that CMarch 20031 American troops entered the middle eastern country to over- throw its tyrannical dictator, Saddam Hussein. Husseinis Baathist regime was believed to possess weapons of mass destruction and was acting in violation of various United Nations resolutions. When we got to the Arabian Sea, Saddamis regime had already been overthrown, but there was plenty of unrest left behind in Iraq for our Marines to help tackle. And while they were on the ground in Iraq looking for weapons and explo- sives left over from years of war, we were underway, in the waters off Iraqis coast, looking for smugglers trying to steal Iraqi oil, transport weapons, or traffic drugs. fTurn the page for more on our Visit Boarding Search and Seizure teanrj The pictures on these pages show some of the people our l3th MEU friends met while they were on the ground in Iraq and while they provided medical care and rnili- tary training in Kenya during an exercise in January.

Page 15 text:

--...nv--L, ---.--,-...---..... ..,,.....-.,,.... - ..-.-..., ,...- .i ....,. ,........,.-...,.--..-...,. ,p.qQ.m-:1 llt ENS Richard Ferrari Cabovel prepares to board a merchant vessel for an inspection. fRightJ Our rigid-hull inflat- able boat nears an Iraqi dhow where a merchant sailor is in need ofmedical care. 1 l O oardlflg earch XL CIZUTQ The VBSS team tabovel inspects a merchant ship offthc southern coast of lraq. tRightl VBSS team members on a brand new, state-of-the-art dhow.