NAWILIWILI — For Harold Vidinha of Koloa, the decision to return to a war zone as a civilian security man was a no-brainer. Even when his former U.S. Army Ranger sergeant major invited him to a company reunion and he
NAWILIWILI — For Harold Vidinha of Koloa, the decision to return to a war zone as a civilian security man was a no-brainer.
Even when his former U.S. Army Ranger sergeant major invited him to a company reunion and he found out the reunion location was Iraq, he said “sure.”
“I had no second thoughts about going when I got the call,” said Vidinha, who was working for the federal Transportation Security Administration at Lihu‘e Airport when he got the call.
He plans to work in Iraq for three or four years, and during that time make enough money to buy a home and retire comfortably back here on Kaua‘i, where he was born and raised.
“You cannot make a living in Hawai‘i, can’t buy anything,” on wages offered for the kinds of work he can do, said Vidinha, 52, when asked why at his age he would consider going to work in a war zone.
In Iraq, though, he makes $140,000 a year, with benefits that include paid vacation.
Of course, there are some down sides. People may try to kill him on a daily basis.
As a personal security guard for civilian engineers charged with rebuilding roads, communications and utilities systems in Iraq, he has been across Iraq, and to Jordan, Syria and Kuwait in the several months since he accepted a job from representatives of civilian contractor DynCorp.
He has been shot at a few times, and has lost three of his Iraqi “shooters,” or armed Iraqi security personnel charged with securing the safety of an engineer Vidinha is also assigned to guard.
In a four-car convoy traveling at speeds between 80 mph and 100 mph, the rule is, “nobody’s supposed to pass me,” Vidinha said.
Vidinha drives a vehicle that includes an interpreter riding shotgun, the engineer between them, and one car ahead and two behind, all containing shooters.
Going at those speeds, the only people who would try to pass are those seeking to harm his highly trained engineer.
During one such trip, a speeding car tried to get to Vidinha’s, and ended up shooting up the rear of one of the trailing vehicles. Shooters in that car rammed the other vehicle, forcing it off the road.
Three Iraqi shooters died.
“All they’re doing is killing their own people,” he said of Saddam Hussein loyalists used to living the high life when the dictator was in power but who now find themselves with nothing to do.
So, they disrupt or attempt to disrupt activities of people like the engineers trying to give civilian Iraqis something many of them have never had in their lives — electricity, telephones, and other things most of the rest of the world take for granted, he said.
Vidinha is in charge of a corps of 12 Iraqi shooters, who once they get to know and trust you, “they’ll give up their life for you,” he said.
“I’m really glad I went to see for myself. People were really treated brutally by him (Hussein),” said Vidinha, a 22-year military veteran.
He said most Iraqis support the United States, President Bush and the British who are working to rebuild the country.
Vidinha doesn’t have much contact with uniformed Americans in Iraq, who operate under “different rules of engagement” than the civilian security personnel.
“Our job is not to stand and fight, but to run so we can run another day.”
It’s a job he could easily make a second career out of, especially since the task of establishing or restoring infrastructure in Iraq will “take years and years.”
He guesses it could take 20 years to complete.
But he won’t stay that long. “It depends on what I can buy here,” he said while enjoying the company of friends and family at the jetty area of Nawiliwili Harbor Wednesday.
With an average home on Kaua‘i now selling for around $350,000, he figures in three or four years of work in Iraq he’ll be able to buy a home and retire comfortably here.
During the rest of his professional career in Iraq, he knows he’ll be a moving target. But his military training has prepared him well for his current assignment.
“There’s always fear, and you learn to control it. I feel very confident, but there’s always that watch, that fear.”
There are many civilian jobs in Iraq, but Vidinha won’t advise friends or family members here to apply for positions similar to what he’s doing. “I don’t want to be responsible for them,” because he’d spend his time worrying about their safety, which in his business can be a deadly thing to do.
He offers up e-mail addresses for those wishing to apply for or inquire about lower-paying jobs, offering between $60,000 and $80,000 a year, for a wide variety of positions in more secure areas of the country where firearms aren’t required.
Vidinha is single, and has a daughter, Amy Vidinha, a son, Kevin Vidinha, and grandson Kaui, who turned 6 yesterday, Thursday, March 4.
As he sits on the jetty breakwater talking story, he is relaxed, in blue-jean shorts, a tank top, visor and sunglasses, not at all looking like someone trained to be able to kill or incapacitate someone at the blink of an eye.
He likes being home.
“It’s nice to be able to sleep without your weapon at your side,” he said during his brief Kaua‘i visit prompted by the death of his former mother-in-law in one of the Wailua traffic accidents last month.
He goes back to Iraq Sunday and, “sha ala,” or “God willing,” he’ll return for a few weeks of rest and relaxation in July.
Associate Editor Paul C. Curtis may be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 224) or mailto:pcurtis@pulitzer.net.
