Dealing with terps, the unoffical *true* version

"Every rotation does it."

"No one will ever know."

If you are working with an interpreter, and they utter either of these phrases, go ahead and punch them right in the mouth. More Soldiers have gotten into trouble listening to there terps than I care to count.

Before I get into this, I do need to make a distinction between military linguists, who are Soldiers who happen to speak a foreign language, contract interpreters, who, by and large, are native speakers of another language, and have somehow immigrated to the US, and local linguists who are, well, local nationals who speak enough english to get a job with US forces. My focus here is not military linguist - they are Soldiers and should be treated as such. I was lucky enough to work with one in Iraq and he was a tremendous asset. The picture at the top is of he and I at rest after a long week.

So back to the quotes above, I have heard both of these from terps in the past, and it is usually at the begining of the rotation. My experience has been that the suggestion they are making, is not for the benefit of my team. While it might be something we would enjoy (oh like, "we can cross the border and go party in Zagreb!" or "I used to sneak women on base for the last rotation all the time"), the motivation is usually something to do with the terp himself.

Fortunately, I don't have any good stories about guys sleeping with female terps, we were smart enough not to hire any and avoided that nonsense. But I suppose you could google all the pics Joe has posted on the internet. [;)

Sergeant Grumpy's Rules for dealing with Terps

You are in charge, not the Terp
I have been in a situation where a terp, who in fairness had been at the base we were working at a long time, said during a meeting when told to translate something, "No, we aren't going to do that, I won't translate it." Eventually, like a precocious puppy who nips all the time and doesn't get disciplined and eventually bites, terps start to think they know more than Soldiers they work for. This happens because people fail to manage terps like they do their subordinates. If this is happening, stop and re-set expectations with your terp, and make it damn clear. If the terp can't adapt, get rid of him if you can. The terp in this story ended up being sent packing after one month.

You must communicate with your terp
While terps are tools, they are not screwdrivers. You won't get the best results by just throwing them into a meeting at the last minute without warning. While OPSEC concerns must be respected, take the time to pre-brief him or her on what general topics you plan on covering, if there are any specialized vocabulary you intend to use, say you are going to discuss issues related to a water treatment plant, the terp might need to do a little research. And take this time to remind the terp, you work for me, translate just what I say, try to use my tone of voice, etc.

Then do a quick debrief while you review your notes, this is a chance for you to give immediate feedback to the terp to reinforce positive performance and demand improvement in weak areas. It also is a chance to ask for their help if there are areas in your notes that are lacking, or if something was said you didn't understand, but didn't want to break the flow.

You will check your terp
My experience tells me terps will get lazy in their use of language, and some have personal hang ups over using profanity, etc. You need to take the time to learn a few words so you can test your terp. If you find he hasn't used the word you are expecting, this has to be addressed immediately after the meeting. The easiest of course are to use the profanity which always seems to be the easiest to pick up. Another good tactic is to bring in a linguist who the term doesn't know speaks, of course this only works once, but puts him on notice.

You will treat your your terps like they are sources
Because guess what, they are. You terps will likely have many, many side conversations with all the important local nationals you visit with. And they will also talk to all the other terps on base, who are also talking to people all over town. Get it? Now, the other rules above will require you to take a tough line with your terp from time to time, but if you handle that professionally, and take the time and effort to actually build a relationship with them, you will gain access to a ton of information. Don't like your terp? Too damn bad, I'm not asking you to become domestic parnters, I am saying the terp better think you two have a good relationship. And never ever forget that the terps gossip and talk shit about each other and Soldiers on base, don't give him anything to say about you other than "he's a hard ass sometimes, but he's fair."

Corrallary: Do not treat your military linguists like terps.
They are god-damn Soldiers, not terps, so treat them like the rest of your Soldiers. Nuff said.

Justice for Bosnia?

After years on the run, the former leader of the Bosnian Serbs, Radovan Karadzic, was captured in Serbia last week. This man played a big role in stoking the fires of hatred and genocide in Bosnia Herzegovina. While all sides in this terrible three way civil war descended into the depths of human cruelty, Karadzic's forces led the way and were responsible for some of the most gruesome acts of inhumanity since WWII, and rival the behaviour of Al Qaeda in Iraq. This includes the round up and murder of 8,000 men and boys in Srebrenica in July 1995, and the vicious shelling campaign against Sarajevo (66 people were killed and 200 wounded in just one day, documented here.)

It is particularly gratifying for me to see this bastard caught - catching him was one of our major "projects" in Bosnia, as "D" also discusses. Of course we did not, but we had several interesting meetings with people close to him. And being based out of Tuzla for part of my tour, I also heard many stories of terror and loss from the Muslims who lived in that area. The Serbs were not just fighting a war, they were terrorizing and brutalizing everyone in their path.

So we worked hard, but never caught him, always like a ghost he was, a rumor of his presence, but NATO was never fast enough. And then of course there must have been the obvious support from his former inner circle, and the rumors of the French leaking warnings to him and his crony in death, Radko Mladic. But the most likely was always the most obvious - he was said to be hiding in Serbia where he enjoyed support of the security services, and there were no foreign troops.

So what? Well there are several lessons that should be drawn from Bosnia. Of course, one of the lessons of Bosnia is that the U.N. is incompetent at stopping violence of any sort - it was only the threat of use of American force (by Bill Clinton) that stopped the fighting Bosnia and the actual use of force against Serbia that stopped the attacks in Kosovo. One of the bitter ironies of the war is that Srebrenica was "protected" by the U.N. as a "Safe Zone", thereby making it an UN Safe Zone. Truly, unsafe. The U.N. forces protected the civilians by standing by as the city was overrun, and helping organizing the bus loading. U.N. troops also played a vital role as human shields to protect against NATO (meaning American) air raids against Serb positions.

I am not saying the U.N. is useless mind you, the U.N. has successfully played an important role once fighting has been stopped but hopes that the U.N. could stop the genocide in say, Darfur, are misplaced. Sometimes the use of force is the only answer, and the U.N. is not the instrument for that. The Bosnian Serbs and the Darfur government both illustrate the fact that brutal regimes pay no heed to Western sit-ins, protests, lectures, boycotts, etc. While it may be hard to accept for some people who lived under the Western security blanket, some people cannot be reasoned with, some cultures only respect strength and force. It is not what we desire for the world, but it is still the world we live in.

Another lesson, which was reinforced for me during my tour in New Orleans, is that civilization is a thin veneer, and people are still a short step from a uncontrollable mob. Yugolsavia was, after-all, a model of Socialist success, an example held up by people like Ted Kennedy, John Kerry, and other Communist apologizers. Bosnia especially was the most ethically integrated part of Yugoslavia, with many intermarriages and multi-ethnic communities. New Orleans may well have been less ethnically integrated than Yugoslavia, but the rampant looting in an American city illustrates that even here, you must be prepared to defend your person and your property.

For those interested in learning more, here are a few recommendations that can help you understand. I also highly recommend the BBC website on Bosnia and it's personalities.