Camaraderie key for U S blacks fighting in Iraq

ATLANTA, Dec 26 (Reuters) When people ask Tracy Smith to describe the year she spent in Iraq with the Georgia Army National Guard, she bluntly responds, ''It sucked. ... What do you want me to say?'' The 48th Brigade lost 26 soldiers during a tour south of Baghdad that ended in May.

But Smith said the camaraderie she experienced with her unit was a high point of her life. It transcended racial barriers in a way she'd never seen before as a black American.

''You have to muster every ounce of strength you can muster for that situation. Any differences go out of the window -- white, black, male, female, Jew, Muslim,'' she told Reuters.

''You get shot at. You're in the same uniform. You're going to have to employ every ounce of that training to get back to your camp ... in one piece and not in that nasty little bag that you have in your Humvee to put body parts in.'' According to Department of Defense figures, more African American women have fought in Iraq than in any previous U S conflict, even though the proportion of blacks in the Army has been declining for a decade.

At the same time, the experience of blacks in the army is becoming less likely to be defined by race, they said.

''The combat experience and the camaraderie and the will to live takes precedence over a person's racial background,'' said David Segal, a sociology professor at the University of Maryland and an expert in military organization.

SEGREGATED UNITS During World War Two, the Army was segregated and blacks typically fought in separate units, often with inferior equipment, training and poor leadership by white officers.

As a result, many black units performed poorly, a fact blamed at the time on their race, but later shown to be a result of the institutional disadvantages they faced.

''In World War Two it (the U S Army) was a pretty horrible, racist place where African Americans were treated as animals,'' said Yvonne Latty, author of a book about black Americans in the Army.

Only one unit of black American women, the 688 Postal Battalion, was deployed to Europe, to sort and deliver mail, Segal said.

Black veterans returned to a United States that was still segregated. Having fought for a country that denied equality helped give rise to the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s.

The U S military was desegregated in 1950, four years before a landmark Supreme Court decision that provided much of the legal impetus for civil rights.

Few women fought in Korea, Vietnam or in the first Gulf War, but high black casualty rates during Vietnam led to accusations by civil rights leaders that blacks were being sacrificed by U S leaders.

DECLINING NUMBERS For years, blacks have enlisted in the military at higher rates than whites, in large part because of the educational and career opportunities it provided, Segal said.

But the Iraq war changed things. During a war, many young people start to think those opportunities are outweighed by the risk of becoming a casualty, he said.

The unpopularity of the Iraq war with blacks and the fact that few blacks voted for U S President George W Bush also helped explain the trend, he said.

John Butler, professor of management and sociology at the University of Texas, said the decline began long before the airplane attacks of September 11, 2001, and showed that black youths were increasingly coming to see the military service in the same way as whites.

Black youths were primarily motivated to join the Army by patriotism and the opportunities military service provided, said Butler, who studies military organization. Patriotism is still a factor, but he agreed that blacks and other groups are now weighing the risks of joining up.

''Black American youth, in terms of their attitude to the military, are more likely to resemble white youth because of common experience (formed at integrated high schools) and that was not true years ago,'' he said.

Since coming home, Smith, who lost the hearing in her right ear from an explosion in Iraq, said she was conflicted about the intense highs and lows of her Iraq experience.

But asked whether she'd return if asked, she said, ''You bet.'' Reuters DKA DB0851