Should have bought stock.

Actual military members don't do manual labor in a war zone anymore unless it's in direct connection to a war fighting capability (which in the end all labors are). For instance you can still expect to see Marines filling sandbags in a guard post or securing a perimeter with concertina wire. While that kind of work still happens a lot even after all the years we've been having our little neocon world building experiment over here in the sandbox but in the big scheme of things it is also a very small piece of the pie. Marines don't burn or empty shitters, fix broken doors, run wiring, put up internal barricades, pave roads or fight lines, paint buildings, do any site beautification (yard work), dig ditches or any of that other shit much anymore. Of course it still happens but mainly at the most forward of out posts and when working around sensitive equipment (that’s where I do most of my ditch digging). This means that all the thousands of military personnel that were once tasked with doing all of the tedious shit are now occupied with complaining about being bored. Better bored than over worked is my motto.

This work still has to be done but now it's done by contractors imported to Iraq for just this purpose. Even our (low risk) internal security check points are manned by armed contractors (or mercs) by a company that raises its forces in Uganda. (I find that I very much like all the Ugandan people I've been exposed too.) Therein lies "The Thing". You see "The Thing" is that most of the contractors that do all the manual or skilled labor in Iraq are not Americans, they're mostly Asians i.e. Nepalese, Indian, Pakistani, Indonesian, Pilipino, etc. KBR is contracted to do these jobs so they go and hire a fraction of the Americans it would take to do the work and use them as supervisors and foreman for the sub-contracted Third World sub-contractors. I was talking to a man from Nepal who used to be in the Nepalese Army. A quick historical note: the Nepalese are famed soldiers. They have a reputation for being tough and tenacious; the British have fielded Gurkhas (Nepalese tribesmen) or centuries and they are even now fighting Maoist guerilla in their country. This man paid a labor agent $3,000 to get a slot to come over to Iraq and work. He was expecting to work as a security contractor but instead found that he was to be doing labor (in this case assisting an American electrician). He cannot leave until he has paid back his $3,000 and with the amount that he gets paid by his company it will take almost 3 years of work for him to pay back the fee, pay his way back home and have enough money left over to make it worth the trip (and separation from his family).