Sergeant Major Michael Clemens was right in the middle of the Army transformation process when he was told his unit would be going to Iraq. His unit was converting from an Infantry unit into a Cavalry unit. He deployed to Iraq in August 2006 as first sergeant for Bravo Troop, 5th Squadron, 73rd Cavalry. His unit moved up to the Diyala Province shortly before the surge. They initially had some good joint operations with the Iraqi Army and Iraqi Police before things heated up. The first major engagement they stumbled into was when they found several large weapons caches in the town of Turki. After they moved his company out to secure it, they were heavily engaged. They spent several days actively engaging and destroying the enemy. They cleared the town and surrounding trenches of the enemy before retrograding back to the FOB to be refit.

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