How receptive was the population to learning from the U.S. military?
I set up the Kirkuk Business Center to function like a not-for-profit, even though it got its funding from the U.S. and the coalition. I wanted people to feel as comfortable as possible going there. At first, a lot of them were very sensitive and untrusting. Some of our local staff members had to quit after they were threatened because they were working for us. But really, I found that people are the same everywhere. Everybody wants the opportunity to feed their family, rise up to a higher status in the world, and make a difference. What was the security situation like? Kirkuk is safe compared to Baghdad and Central Iraq, but needless to say, there were things blowing up every day. On a bad day, there’d be one or two car bombs. On a good day, we’d only have IADS [integrated air defense systems] and rockets or mortars. I lived in a secure compound with Kurdish guards and I went to work at a Kirkuk government compound that was inside a secure area. The tough part was making the seven-min
