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DeSales gradmy major at work in AfghanistanWalla Walla native Maj. Joel Loiacono, left, has_________ ________since February, helping to rebuild the new Afghan Army. Here, he tours an Afghan Army supply depot with an Afghan Army General.Joel Loiacono works to help form and supply an Army that will eventually serve a new Afghan elected government.ByPAULETTE CHUof the Union-BulletinU.S. Army Maj. Joel Loiacono grew up picking strawberries and sweating under the hot summer sun in the wheat and pea fields of Walla Walla. Now, he packs a 9-mm pistol and ponders the task before him: to help stabilize Afghanistan as war rumbles on in Iraq.“Nobody has lost focus on Afghanistan/' Loiacono saidin a phone call from Kabul, the Afghan capital. “That was one thing made clear to us from our higher-ups. We are all concerned about what’s going on in Iraq ... but we were specifically tq *p6n*t lose focus on what you’redoing here.*Loiacono, bom and raised in an Italian immigrant family here, belongs to the Combined Joint Task Force 180 up in Afghanistan, where 3,500 coalition forces are continuing operations. As supervisQr of the Afghan National Army Logistics Cell, Loiacono supports the new Afghan army in building itself into a lawful stabilizing force for the nation, which warlords have ruled for decades.While critics of invading Iraq say it detracts from the war against terrorism, for soldiers such as Loiacono, the war in Iraq’s immediate effect on operations has been elevated “alert” levels and ain missile strikes onHHIbases in Afghanistan.Though a senior Taliban leader recently told BBC News his force is striking to take advantage of growing anti-U.S. sentiment there, Loiacono said he still feels welcome and hasn’t seen any war protests.‘You see these sporadic attacks from time to time. The Taliban and al Qaeda are nottotally out of the country,” he Please see/WW, A3
Newspaper Details
Walla Walla Union Bulletin
Walla Walla, Washington, US
Wed, Apr 02, 2003
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USA 23 Apr 2020
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