Ballot Checklist: Sandbags, Plywood and Barbed Wire

The stuff of democracy arrived Friday at Iman Elhadi Girls Primary School: plywood, 2-by-4s, sandbags and lots of concertina wire.

As Sunday’s election neared, Marines trained as combat engineers were deployed throughout this violence-racked city, the capital of Al Anbar province, to erect barriers to keep insurgents from sneaking into polling places.

If the United States is engaged in nation-building, the actual construction work in this city is being done by enlisted personnel from the 2nd Combat Engineers Battalion, 2nd Marine Division, based in Camp Lejeune, N.C.

Work crews spent Friday devising ways to keep the polling places safe from attack and to channel would-be voters into orderly lines.

For the Marines, whose nearly six months of duty here has included clearing mines and booby traps during assaults on insurgent strongholds, the historic significance of this sawing and hammering at polling places was not of immediate concern.

“We’re just putting wood and metal together,” said Pfc. William Hoey-Paul, 20, of Westfield, Mass. “It’s the Iraqi people who count.”

At the polling place, which was guarded by Fox Company of the 2nd Battalion, 5th Regiment, 1st Marine Division, the arrival of the combat engineers was preceded by 7-ton trucks loaded with wood, wire, sandbags and other supplies.

Along with the last-minute construction project, election-day rules were announced Friday for residents in the area around the school that will serve as the polling place: No public use of cellular phones, no public photography, no loitering, no donkey carts.

Cellphones can be used to detonate explosives, photo-taking can intimidate voters and donkey carts are potential launching pads for rockets.

It was a long day for the Marines with the engineering battalion. As with each polling place, the school site had its own specifications and needs. While working, the Marines had to wear helmets and body armor, with M-16s at the ready in case of snipers.

“It’s just another day at the office,” said Lance Cpl. Chad Bigelow, 20, of Little Valley, N.Y.

Cpl. Peder Ell, 20, of Savage, Minn., said he has not mentioned to his parents his role in trying to prevent insurgents from disrupting the election.

“I prefer to keep them in the dark,” he said. “That way they have less to worry about.”