Pinball

Alright so how would someone like me get a name like ‘Pinball’. It goes like this. It was a bright sunny day in the beautiful state of California. I had just dropped the girlfriend off after a weekend camping in the mountains. We had ridden out Thursday night on my bike, a big sport touring Kawasaki designed for chewing up the miles of asphalt.
We packed a weekend’s worth of gear in the luggage saddle bags, and across the back. The camp site was about ten miles up a fire road in the Big Sur area. So on my heavy street bike, at night, with a passenger and all the extra crap I pack I rode up the mountain, sticking to the smoother parts and avoiding gravel. We picked a camp site, and strung a poncho off the side of the bike to the dismounted bags to make a tent. I brewed tea over heat tabs while building the camp fire.
A wonderful evening under a field of stars, all alone until our friends would show up the next day. It has been a glorious weekend, all the more so for reaching a new level of skill in riding on dirt roads. She had to be back at work on Monday, and I had errands to run. I dropped the bags at her place to pick up later. Close to 200 pounds lighter and thinner I was cruising home in Sunday traffic. In California the practice of lane sharing is perfectly legal, as long as it is done in a ‘reasonable and prudent manner’. As traffic slowed to a crawl or stop I would slide into the space between lanes and roll on.
Something I had done thousands of times. I turn on my hazards and my annoyingly bright headlight. It had been a weekend of great fun, great friends and relaxation. By the end of the week I would be on active duty for the spin up to deployment.
WHAM! Out of the corner of my eye comes a flash of red, and the bike is shoved to the left. I slam into an SUV, then bounce right into a mini van, Attempting to correct I loose some bits on the left as I bounce off another car, and back to the right. My foot hits the last car’s bumper, pulling off the rubber strip. My handle bars twist, the controlled breaking I had been doing becomes a jerk and the front breaks lock. The bike, and I hit the pavement.
My first ‘stack’ or crash. The first time I laid the bike down in around 60 thousand miles. Because an idiot from Arizona thought he would scare me. My foot is all streaks of pain and my shoulder doesn’t want to move like I tell it to. Thus the reason the idiot walked away, oh, he also never got closer to me than lunging range.
Bike totaled, foot thrashed, and there went my active duty tour for predeployment, and the schools that would go with it.
Later, much later, after the CHP had arrived, and the firemen. I had to call someone to get the bike. When in doubt call your mom. Well that is if your mom is as cool as my mom. But I couldn’t find my phone. I convince the cop to call my mom so she can call the cousin with the truck and trailer. The officer makes the call. Rather than handing me the phone, when he dials, he waits for an answer then says, “Mrs Newport this is officer so-and-so with the California Highway patrol.” I freak out.
The protocol for calling home after an incident requiring medical attention is well established. No matter what the hour it is the same.
“Hi mom, I’m OK. I’m at Dominican ER getting some stitches and they will give me a 25% discount if I give them a credit card number right now.”
“Hi Mom, I’m OK. My friend needs to use my car to drive someone home from the hospital mind if I crash on your couch?”
“Hi Dad, tell mom I am OK. The wheel came off the car on 17 and the tow company is on the way, can I use your AAA card to get it towed to the house?”
“Hi Mom, sorry to bother you at work, I’m OK. I seem to have run into the sink in the garage, and the frig. Everything is unplugged and disconnected.”
On the back of my helmet, is a sticker, it reads in indelible ink, “IF FOUND WITHOUT RIDER PLEASE CALL (MY CELL PHONE NUMBER) IF FOUND ON RIDER PLEASE CALL (MY PARENTS NUMBER)”
If the CHP were to find me in a ditch, or smeared down the road, the number he was calling is the number they would find.
So standing on the side of the Freeway I begin to yell at the phone,” MOM I AM OK!, JUST FINE.” The officer gives me a dirty look, then goes on to explain to her that I need to talk to her.
Taking the phone I return the dirty look, looking at the gold band on his finger I say, “How would you like your wife to get a call like that.” He appears mollified.
I end up waiting two hours for the trailer (Most insurance companies won’t tow bikes. Then go to the ER. It’s a motorcycle thing.

Rule number one in any motorcycle crash is that if it hit the ground, replace it. USAA is a marvelous company. In ten days I had the check to replace my helmet, gloves and jacket. The new jacket is a FirstGear Kilimanjaro. If the army listened to motorcycle companies all soldiers would be safer and warmer. The liner is fleece, and has a wind barrier in the sleeves. The fleece and my summer gloves are the only real civilian gear I brought with me.
There are a couple of lessons to be learned from this. Shit comes at you out of the blue, weather you are riding home, or doing yet another trip from one base to another. If you stay all wound up it only means you are tired when it happens. The second is that a little bit of high speed snivel gear is always useful. Last but most important, is that if you bounce off a car just once, people will call you Pinball.
And now there is one less mystery in the world.

An Early wake up

“Sergeant Pinball,” Mighty Mouse’s quiet voice does more to pull me from my slumber than if he had knocked on the wall, his usual prelude to entering my room, “get out side to the company area, and bring your weapon.”
There are few phrases that can bring an NCO out of a deep slumber faster than those. It can mean only one thing. Some one has screwed up bad. I glance at my clock it is 0830 or as near as my clock can tell me, fluctuating power does not lend to an accurate cheap clock. For most of the army 0830 is not an early wake up, but when your day often ends as the sun comes up, and all your work is done at night this is obscenely early. Some one has truly screwed the pooch.
I slap the on button to my coffee maker, and throw my legs out of my bed. “I’m on my way” I tell him and he Di Di Mau’s out of the room. I shove my feet into my boots as I listen to him poke his head into the next room. He was carrying his weapon and mine sleeps with me so it wasn’t my truck, unless Lifeguard screwed the pooch, not likely but not beyond the realm of possibility.
I had conducted a perfect three point face plant last night when we got back. Dropping my blouse on my folding chair, and sleeping in my pants. It had been misting, so I wanted a chance to get a head start on the M240 today rather than turn it in to the arms locker I had checked it out with CPL WT. Rust on a weapon is a bad thing. I briefly consider lugging the bitch with me but a brief consultation of the Army “Worst case scenario survivors book” tells me it is a bad idea. SGT Bulldog is prying himself off the top bunk opposite me, having received the same message. SGT Grandpa the third man in my room is not here, his guys were on mission when I went to sleep. I shuffle down the hall to Doc Feelgood’s room.
Doc is up and working at his computer, as the boss medic he works more normal hours.
“Doc, can you watch my ‘240 for me?” I ask, he nods and takes it from me, placing it under his chair.
Rule one for surviving a something like this is to not drawing attention to yourself. There is nothing wrong with holding onto your crew serve, as long as it is secured. Showing up with it would definitely attract attention.
I hurry out to the platoon area a step ahead of bull dog to see a milling crowd. This is a good sign, if we were in formation it would mean that collective punishment was in store. Again mentally consulting the survival guide I implement step two.
I fade to the back of the crowd, putting one layer of soldiers between me and any open space, but keeping as far from the center of mass as possible. This is a continuation of the “DON”T STAND OUT” rule. The leadership is very agitated, SSG lifeguard has his personal weapon, so it wasn’t us. I filter past him and say as quiet as possible “Doc has the 240 for me.” He nods and then heads for SSG Moto, and waits for a clear space to whisper the same in his ear.
Moto looks up and picks me out of the crowed in a second. Being a little shorter would be nice right now. He holds up his thumb with a question on his face. I return the thumb. He goes back to what he was doing. I then slide through the crowd to where CPL WT is smoking, and tell him the same. He gives me a condescending look and says “I know.” It is to be expected of an infantryman trapped with a bunch of tankers.
Step 3 says to first endure you and your buddies are covered, then look around. Moto doesn’t look like it is us, that would mean the other squad. Keeping near the rear of the rather circular gaggle I begin listening. SGT SAFRI is explaining why his driver is running out to the vehicles to get the M4 he locked inside of it last night. This might be it. A weapon left in a vehicle, that would be enough to get us all out here.
Step 4, gather intelligence. The leadership is wound up like pack starving dogs in a slaughter house. They are not going to talk. The enlisted men, trapped at the bottom gather information out of self defense. First I find Mighty Mouse.
“Remember how we found out what was going on when we were headquarters?” I ask
He nods. “Do it now.” He smiles and begins to wander around eves dropping. When there were headquarters trucks I had three guys assigned to me. SSG Caine hated that an E5 didn’t work for an E6 and would cut me out of the information loop. So I would send Mighty Mouse and Skeletor into the back of their formation to eves drop on what they told their guys. It worked, pretty well. They just got in the habit of telling me what the learned through rumor and eves dropping.
The cold was getting to me so I went to stand in the sunlight, and lit up a Nat Sherman MCD Shipped to me by an old friend.
Step 5 don’t look guilty, be relaxed. It took two puffs before the first guy talked to me. CPL IT wanders up and begins talking. Having never smoked himself, he made himself an honorary smoker by going to the smoke pits in training. He said then it was where he found out what was going on. So true.
It would seem that SGT SAFRI’s driver leaving his M4 was not the reason for this. It had been discovered just minutes ago, when we had been called out here. The issue had been an M240 found in the motor pool.
This was so very bad, so very, very bad. It wasn’t my squad, it was the other one. The offender was already in the commanders office. SSG Caine was pulled aside by SFC Big Daddy when he came out. The data fits. Now to keep from being an accidental casualty.
There is the to be expected item by item physical inventory of all weapon systems. We move to the weapons locker, I detour and retrieve my 240 from Doc, arriving just in time to slide it into the rack when WT opens the rack. Then more standing around.
Moto has gotten a coffee cup, so I fade away long enough to get a cup for myself and SGT Sasquatch. Within an hour it is SPC Thug who gives me the first news. SSG Caine is being relived, and Dozer fills in the blanks. This was the 400 pound anvil that broke the camels back. Caine had been screwing up since we got here. He will go to head quarters, and be replaced. Ultimately he did not confirm the weapons were secured when he submitted his sensitive items report. He had abused his joes and NCOs enough that no one would stick their neck out for him.
It wouldn’t have happened to a nicer man. A few weeks later I talked to an older and wiser head about the whole situation. He had trained more than a few soldiers in his career. His last words to me on the subject bear repeating.

“ One of the problems with a lot of leaders, small and large, is that they have not enjoyed and labored with possessing power. So they misuse it. It can be narcotic and so destructive, to themselves and others. That is why the study of power is so important.”
That should be written above the doors to every NCO school in the army.

The night

We have driven the sun from the sky and roll on through the night. The trucks are far enough from any city to have left the glow of city lights far below the horizon. A stream of white lights on the empty black desert, the moon is down and only the stars and our lights show for as far as the eye can see. I am listening to Kim Harrison’s first Hollows book on tape as I alternate sitting down in the turret and standing up like my Panzer Commander genes urge me to. Our heater didn’t work when we first drew this truck, the problem is simple, the heater core had been removed or fallen out. The mechanics say it is on back order, like everything else.
The Transmission and thin dog house between the driver and TC keep Life guard and the guest driver for this mission warm. My upper torso is sniveled up, with long underwear, and my First Gear fleece, what motorcycle gear companies could teach the army about staying warm would fill volumes.
“HEY THREE, THIS IS ONE, WE NEED A SHORT HALT TO ADJUST THE HEAD LIGHTS.” The radio crackles. Sasquatch and his minions looking up in the front are asking for a piss break.
“RODGER ONE, BREAK, ALL RED ELEMENTS SHORT HALT.” SSG Moto replies.
The slinky of trucks three or four clicks long begins to compress as each vehicle pulls up to 50 meters from the one in front of it, and turns off it’s lights. In a minute or two we are in complete darkness. The night here is not the enshrouding cloak of Fantasia. It is an emptiness, a lack, there is no moisture in the air, even in the winter. While SSG Lifeguard dismounts and waters the tires I scan the horizon through the pale green of Night vision. Left and right sides clear I take a few seconds to look up.
Millions of dots of light spread from horizon to horizon. First there is Orion, then I begin try to pick out others, Ursa Major and Minor, are all I know. Back to work I scan around. Tonight we are an all green convoy. Army Heavy Equipment Transports fill the gaps between out relatively small escort vehicles.
Truck drivers hold the 88M Military Occupational Specialty (MOS) and are generally not considered the military elite. I know that we have a lot of stupid rules, but their chain of command has been smoking the crack pipe every day. They have to wear body armor to the pre-mission brief, and reflective belts while on the road. The two guys behind me are looking their tiny windows, scanning the horizon. What absolute moron orders his soldiers to wear a reflective belt in the field? I have an urge to find him and take him out with us to pull security in the empty clack knowing that he glows in the dark.
The night is cold, the weather report said in the low 30s or high 20s. It jabs at my body like a knife seeking any chink in the layers of cloth. I stare off at the stars for another few seconds before picking up my scan. It is not the perfect quiet of a desert night, the deep rumble of diesel engines provides a background noise. You never turn off your truck on the road if you can control it. With the state of our trucks it may not turn back on, or you may blow a fuse to the radio. Besides it keeps the crew warm. Back when I was a lot more junior I spent many a night cuddled up to the heat of the transmission in a hummer.
“TRUCK 3 THIS IS SASQUATCH, WE ARE REDCON 1 AND DEFCON 1”
“RODGER, ALL RED ELEMENTS CHARLIE MIKE.”
I can see the lights of the forward security element come on, then on down the road. The lights come to life, I turn off my NVGs and restart the MP3 player. A soft feminine voice is telling me a story. A woman reading to me as I roll down this blank country side. Just like my legs are warm in the truck and my torso freezes in the breeze, my mind is living in two worlds.

The Mission Pt 2: The Prep

The Mission Pt 2: The Prep

A cavalryman lived on his horse, this is where the line ‘First the horse, then the saddle then the rider’ came from. To watch a movie you would think that we spend most of our time on mission or training how to engage the enemy with direct fire. We spend most of our time getting dirty checking the vehicles. Tom Clancy has made a lot of money writing about the exiting 1% of the time. Reality is that soldiers are engaged in a constant battle against time, elements and wear and tear on vehicles. Sometimes we win.
The morning of a mission I try to sleep in, and stay up late the night before. If you roll at night the mission always stretches into the early morning, and sometimes past dawn. So I roll out of bed and hit the showers around 1030 or 11. Then go to breakfast. The only time I eat actual breakfast is when I am still up from the night before, and that is disturbingly often. Then I get into the Combat Vehicle Crewman coveralls. This has lots of zippered pockets that are both large and easy to get to. It is the exact opposite of what a fobbit likes in a uniform. It is shapeless, comfortable, practical and looks like crap.
At breakfast We eat big, shoveling calories in out mouths with reckless abandon, as we know we will miss dinner and maybe midnight chow also. Then we cram those big Beautiful Pockets with energy drink, V8 and Gatorade and waddle out the door, trying to look inconspicuous. We are supposed to get that stuff issued for missions, but it always seems to be low when we get there.
Out to the motor pool where we mount weapons, and check the trucks. Mechanics go up and down the line checking our work and fixing anything that can be in the short time allowed. Everything must be loaded, checked, tied down and arranged here. Our first couple of times we took way to long to complete this part of prep, now we are hanging out, smoking and joking for ten minutes before we have to leave to test fire the machine guns.
Out the gate to a giant test fire pit and every crew served weapon pops 10-20 rounds into the pit. The only way to make sure your weapons work with machineguns is to actually throw some lead down range. Sometimes one of the trucks will throw a stuffed animal in there as target practice.
Test fire complete we roll over for the intel brief. We have a good intel officer, he lays out all the things happening on and near our route. It takes a lot of work for him to put it together for a mere 20-30 minutes of presentation. Since we are almost early to this brief we conduct our ritual. The RipIt shot gunning. If we have a new person with us SSG Moto conducts a five minute block of instruction. First you hold the can on its side with the pop opening down. The ever present knife is used to cut a hole near the bottom the bigger the better. Then as a group we put out mouths over the cut holes, stand the cans up and pop the tops. This results in a large amount of high sugar, high caffeine content carbonated beverage being poured down your throat.
It is a great way to start the night. So far we have been at work for 4 or more hours and not left the wire. After the Intel brief the chaplain who is at every mission departure gives a little prayer for those who want it, and we go out to pick up our charges for the night. The foreign national truck drivers would make a teamster cry. They are corrupt, difficult to control and drive trucks sometimes literally held together with duct tape and bailing wire. The are also determined to make each mission and will repair, tow or jury rig any truck in the convoy that breaks down. The absolute most versatile of convoys.
We inspect the trucks going with us, then roll out the gate, our vehicles taking up places in front of, with in and in back of the convoy. It is five hours since we first showed up at the motor pool and the night is just beginning.

Bits fall off

There is an attitude I developed in riding motorcycles, ‘bits fall off’. The important thing is how you handle things falling off. I have had visors, bit of fairing, spare helmets, and even my luggage fall off on the road. Any piece of equipment subjected to long use over the road will have things break. The military takes this to an extreme. Only one of our vehicles was designed to for the role that we are using it for. The others are over weight, over age and over used, much like some of the crew members.
To compensate we take extra measures to catch problems before they start. At least an hour before each mission is spent inspecting the vehicles and our mechanics work every day to keep up with the stuff we break. Still thing stop working. Then there are things that are entirely operator error. In my case it was my big fat ass.
Rolling down our standard road, the wind chill dropping the temperature well below freezing I am huddled down in my turret behind the armored glass. Occasionally I pop up like a giant prairie dog to do a quick complete scan. I left my warmest gloves at home because I was in a bit of a hurry. My mistake that I pay for with cold hands and fingers. We had two additional passengers for this trip. I will call them Mechanic and Medic, mostly because that is what they were.
Some early excitement had us on edge a little so I was scanning back and forth using my little joy stick. Someone pops a parachute flare off in the distance. I swing the turret over to get a better view. Now my seat hangs inside the hull of the hummer. It is essentially two straps with a piece of padded wood. This was nit designed to be used on this vehicle. I spin to look over the back deck, and pop my head up. Then reach down to unfuck the cord leading to my headset.
I report the Distance, Direction and Description of what I see to SSG Lifeguard. He tries to report it up to SSG Moto. No luck, radio is not working. I try to send the report up directly, no luck. Mechanic tries, again no luck. Mighty Mouse tries, and again no luck. We now commence trouble shooting the radio, which is mounted between the front seats. Life guard and mechanic check the boxes our head set hook into. Then the setting on them. Then they go to the radio, checking to make sure its setting are right. Everything fine so far. Life guard begins to hammer away at his battle text messenger while mechanic looks for his flash light.
The vehicle has not stopped or slowed down, Might Mouse continues to roll like nothing is happening. I look down, the only problem could be is the connection between the radio and the antenna. The radio sends the signal to an amplifier and the amp sends it to the antenna mount. I look back to ensure both antennas are still there. Yep still there.
What we need to do is take the antenna wire and plug it directly to the radio. The wire is not long enough to reach the radio because it is tied up so we have less loose wire to get tangled up in. After a brief conversation we come up with a plan.
I will remind my gentle reader that all this was done on bumpy Iraqi roads, at night. I stand up on the seat, wedging myself against my hatch and my gun, while pointing over the right front side. Mechanic slides out of the seat behind the driver and all the way up to the radio. With one hand Lifeguard and I hold flash lights. Mechanic has to crawl up over the radio mount with a Gerber multi tool and snap the zip tie holding the extra wire. Then he has to pull it down and plug it into the front of the radio. Life guard then has to adjust the radio to work in the new configuration. Think of it as installing a stereo system, in the dark during a small earth quake.
Then mechanic slides back and belts in, and Lifeguard checks the radio. It works. Like I said bits fall off, the secret is not to get excited, trouble shoot the problem and fix it and Charlie Mike or Continue Mission. That three of us have been fighting military radios for years, gave us a bit of an edge.
Now I have to get the new antenna cables, and install them, because our Battalion commo hasn’t figured out how to make the time to do their own job.
The reason for the failure, my fat ass hit the connector as I swiveled to look over the back deck.
Especially in the military…. Bits Fall Off.

The Mega base

If there is one thing Iraq is not short of it is space. Vast spaces of land that the locals are more than happy to lease to us at reasonable rates. Add to that a now deceased dictator with a penchant for building airbases in the middle of nowhere and you get the super base. Located on former Iraqi Air Force bases, they don’t lack for space. You can get lost on these places. I have gotten lost on these places.
We roll on to the base and drop off our charges, fuel up and dump the body armor. Now to find food. Riding through this place I can tell we need to watch our steps. I understand, wearing a reflective belt to jog, work out. These guys are having to wear reflective belts at night, in ACUs. It is not like there is a lack of lights, you can see the glow of the base from well below the horizon, hours before you reach the gate.
The worst of it is the rules. There are rules posted everywhere, no earphones anywhere. Reflective belts required after dark. These places have police forces and people who spend their time enforcing the rules. There are even civilian contractor traffic cops with radar guns.
This I made worse by the huge number of Non-Tactical Vehicles. This is mil speak for civilian, stateside cars, that are prohibited from leaving base. The only reason for these vehicles to be here, imported at government expense, so that senior personnel don’t have to walk. The circular irony here is that I have never had a close call with a tactical vehicle. It is hard to miss the dozen plus tons of steel rolling down on top of you. I got bumped by a pickup truck backing up coming out of finance once. Then there is the PX parking lot and squealing tires. More dangerous than out on the road.
So we take off the head rags and balaclavas, and swagger into chow, sans reflective belts. The chow is good, but we don’t idle long. Back to the trucks then to transient housing.
The billets for transients here is better than my room. More room and all the heaters/AC work. I don’t even think about going shopping, shit, shower and shave, then pass out. It isn’t until the next morning when some strange NCO wakes me up that I realize that something is wrong. SGT Linebacker, and his crew are in the barracks, so it Mighty Mouse, but for some reason SSG Lifeguard is not here. I inform the strange NCO that I am not on his mission and begin to wake up.
Thirty minutes later SSG Lifeguard shows up. It would appear that there was a minor miscommunication. There are Transient Barracks numbers 1-20something, and then there are Cheeseboxes number 1-20something. Linebacker, and I had not known this. SO we simply wandered into some other unit’s barracks, and passed out. That other unit didn’t know who we were, but also simply passed out.
As we begin to roll out and head home I spot the ultimate indicator of the Super Base, a street cleaner, like a mud zamboni cleaning the streets. Is this really what we need here?
Away from the Super Base, away from the thousand and one rules and NTVs trying to kill me. Simply the road.

The road more taken

Rolling down another dark hi-way, the wind in my face. The intel brief said the temperature would be around 40. The gunners bundle up, the crews inside bring a jacket. SSG Lifeguard has complained about the heat down inside the truck before. Until the summer gets here he gets no sympathy. With Might Mouse on his four day pass we have a guest driver still, Sgt Zohan. All three of us deployed together last time. The energy level is so high you might be able to power an LED with it. This is the more dangerous route.
We get occasional small arms fire and once a week or so something blows up. Stay alert, stay alive. We scan and chat, I switch between NVGs, and the naked eye and occasionally gripe about wanting a thermal viewer. I might as well wish for a tank while I am at it, and I do. I miss my tank.
A bright flash up ahead reflects off the low thin clouds.
“You see that?” Lifeguard asks.
“Yep, looks like someone got hit, you want to ask the magic box what happened?” I ask, flipping down my NVGs and continuing the scan.
“Working on it.” He replies and begins tapping on the screen, trying to get some information from the satellite system. There is some mumbled derogatory comments from the TC seat as I scan the near and far distance. More lights fill this landscape. The NVGs reveal more but cause eye fatigue, you can only use them so long before you get a headache from focusing at different distances with each eye.
“Zohan, did you see some red stuff with the flash, kinda like tracers?” I ask.
“Yep, but nothing in the air.”
Tracers bounce, I don’t know if ball (lead) rounds bouce, but the burning marker rounds usually bounce into the stratosphere if they hit before burning out.
I keep scanning. Nothing out here but us chickens.
Life Guard gets the info. One of our sister company’s convoys was passed by a smaller faster unit, and they found the IED, no casualties.
We wait for a unit to clear the scene then move on south. Our ride along for this trip, SFC Big Daddy, pokes at SSG Moto to see if he is doing his job. Moto is always doing his job.
At the other end, as we sit and eat a midnight meal Moto, Lifeguard Zohan and I are sitting together. Normally the four of us don’t, I usually eat with the enlisted types, and the SSGs are gathered up by senior NCOs and officers. Zohan manages to switch up where he eats regularly. We get to talking. Earlier today we ran across another soldier who worked with us on the last tour. We look around and realize there are only six of us left who went with this company last time. Out of over seventy troops who went with the company last time only six are left. Seven if you include Doc Mom.
In only a few years, guys transferred, or got out, or just dropped off the face of the earth. It gave me a pause. I look at Moto, and say, “Next time you better be a platoon sergeant.” He just smiles and the conversation moves on.
My father used to teach a class to officer candidates about fear. The most important factor in controlling fear is knowledge. Knowing what to expect, or who is to your flanks, and what they are doing mitigates fear, or at least its effects.
One of the reasons they call us the Prozac squad up at battalion. Of course it might also be the easy leadership of our Squad Leader, but he might hear about it and I wouldn’t want his head to swell.

The mission Pt 1 OPORDER

The army is a giant corporation, it there are giant sections of it that do nothing but try to find new ways of doing things. Sometimes this works, most of the time it doesn’t. For instance there has never really been an improvement on the rules for Rodgers Rangers, however every Sergeant Major and Battalion Commander thinks they have found the new version to last a life time. The OPORDER or Operations Order works, as long as it is used as it is intended. SSG Moto does a great OPORDER.
Some time before a mission the entire squad gathers in a shipping container that has been converted into a briefing room. Maps under glass cover the tables and more are posted on the wall. A giant flat screen TV will show the required power point presentation to all of us. We sit at the two picnic table sized tables, the last people in have to stand in the back. First he covers generic squad business.
This is not just a opportunity for the squad leader to babble at us. We there is a lot of banter also. Myself or someone else who has recently got a package from home comes in and tosses things down the table, cookies, candies, and other stuff. It is a combination of sharing and self defense, I have to keep my weight down somehow.
After the little stuff he launches into the mission. What is going on around us, where we are going, who we are taking with us. All the details are handled here. We write down the important stuff, like time lines and changes. He does an oral quiz to make sure we were listening then briefs us what has happened in the echelons beyond reason.
This is always exciting, and makes us appreciate the fact that Moto is not a brown nosing lick spittle like some guys who have advanced as fast as he has. There was a desire for a minute by minute time line of mission prep, that included how long it took to walk to the motor pool. Then there is the additional requirements for us to complete in our copious spare time. During this the squad bonds, there is some cross talk, back talk and jokes.
The problem is that Moto is the leader of the basic maneuver element. All the work is done by squads. Platoon, company and battalion have become management. The army told them they would be maneuvering units, working outside the wire, involved in the day to day, minute to minute operations of a combat element. Instead, they see individual squads go out, sometimes for days at a time without them. They have been betrayed by their expectations. Most of our management hasn’t been here before, while junior leadership has one or more tours already under their belts. It is the way things work.
You can learn a lot from an OPORDER about how a unit is working, watch how early people show up, how they pay attention and how long they hang out after the brief.
I hang out afterward and chat with the squad, watching another unit load up their trucks. All indicators say that we have our shit wired tight, we just have to keep the bosses dick beaters out of our pudding.

My job

I love my job, I really do. I know that many milblogs talk about how the stupidity of the army, or complain about harsh living conditions, or the insanity of the army in general. I do these things also, mostly because soldiers complain and gossip. It is in the very nature of the soldier to do this. I am sure that Romans marching across Gaul had the same variety of bitches and moans as we do today. That is the subject for another blog. This is how much I love my job.
I don’t work inside the wire, this is not to say there is not work to do. I get my hands dirty going over the truck with a fine toothed comb. I have tasted CLP (Cleaning Lubricant, Preservative we clean our weapons with) while eating and scrubbing down my machine gun or rifle. My real job is outside the wire, away from all the garrison bull shit that comes with the army.
It is cold here, and will only get colder for the next few months. I hear they had snow last year. Before work I bundle up in fire resistant/fire retardant clothing, hood, gloves, and goggles. I climb up into my office, (you would call it a turret) and put on my helmet, body armor and intercom head phones. Before leaving I set both of my ammo boxes just so. Three hundred rounds linked to go in the gun, and another three hundred behind my right elbow.
Mighty Mouse takes care of the hull I take care of the turret, and over see him doing his job. We roll out and the real work begins. I scan the sides of the road for odd objects or new trash that could conceal any one of a number of explosive devices. I watch the trees, berms and houses for signs of muzzle flashes or people wanting to shoot me or mine.
There is a sense of purpose to it, a concentration of will. Every thing is important, every detail is critical. Even as we banter within the crew or over the radio with the other trucks I still scan. It is intense, it can be nerve wracking. There are times, like when a vehicle ahead or behind you takes small arms fire and you strain to spot the next shot. When the lead truck spots something suspicious and I strain to see out into the darkness for the first hint of an ambush my pulse quickens.
Don’t get me wrong, when this tour is over I will go back home as readily as the next. I will bridle under the gauze wrapped world that is the United States. I will try to escape it when ever I get a chance.
There is something about living in a world of risk. A place where you are responsible for your actions, and the safety nets are thin. I know why I feel so alive at work. I know it is dangerous, but some primal part of me just enjoys the thrill.
Then there are the guys, (actually one female is part of the squad). It is as good a group as I have ever seen. We trust each other with our lives every day we go to work. If a gunner slacks off he risks him self, his vehicle and the other trucks. Drivers battle top heavy rides, a wheel off the road could roll the vehicle over. TCs maintain contact with the rest of the vehicles. SSG Moto, has the hardest job. He has to wrangle all of us and talk to higher on two different communications systems.
It is difficult and stressful. The harder the job the greater the reward. Maybe that is the reason I love my job, it is hard, and thus rewarding.

The more things change

The more they stay the same. If a guy stays in the army long enough there are a few things he will run across, one of them Is Rudyard Kipling. Though he never served in uniform, he is proof that embedded reporters can feel see the essence of our world. Each time I read this, it gains new meanings, proof that poetry is a much about the reader as the poet or his subject.

http://www.poetryloverspage.com/poets/kipling/ballad_of_boh_da_thone.html

Please take a minute, and read the words of a great bard. He will take you from the field to the fire, and just maybe shed a little light into our world.

A dark desert hiway

Another day, another mission, different destination. As the last hints of a brilliant desert sunset fade to black. Once we get away from the base and all the bright lights, it is just us, and the civilian style trucks we are escorting. A river of red lights stretches out in front of me, and another one of white behind.
I turn my turret to block the glow from in front and behind and look off into the infinite blackness. Dim lights from a house float in the distance, with no horizon to judge by I can not tell how far. A half moon is climbing the sky, faintly red from dust in the air. Only the ocean on an overcast night is as dark and featureless as this. There is something I can do about that.
I reach up and pull the night vision goggle down over my right eye. A green world overlays itself onto the inky blackness. The house shows other lights, dim ones, probably inside, behind curtained windows. Closer there are buildings without any light. I scan to the limits of the equipment, bright light washes out any details. Stretching my neck I look up to reveal thousands of stars, more then visible with the naked eye.
I turn the turret to the left side of the vehicle, feeling the vibration of gears under my hand. A few more distant lights, and at the corner of my sector the field of glowing gems of a city. Low over the horizon Orion climbs into the sky, tonight he will hunt the moon. I complete a scan and traverse again.
With the dramatic vistas of this land it is no surprise that the Arab mind so often moves to poetry. The Koran is laid out in verse, come to think of it so is parts of the bible, if read in the original. I never have been good with other languages, other than English so I will just trust the chaplain on this one.
The temperature is dropping, the intel guys said it would drop to forty degrees. If I add in wind chill I am easily below freezing. SSG Lifeguard and SGT Zohan ask me to get them drinks from the cooler strapped to the back of the turret. It takes a little doing but I dig in for a Gatorade and a Monster respectively. My Nomex gloves get a little damp. The wind makes then extremely cold.
After I hand down the drinks I hand Life guard the gloves. He will put them on the fire wall that sits on top of the transmission. He hands up the other set, warm from the engine heat. Our heater has been broken since we showed up and the new one id on order. We think the new one will arrive around April or May, about the time the AC breaks.
Warm gloves are a thing of beauty. Keep them out of the wind until I have to traverse again. The radio is very quiet tonight, not as much banter. It is on nights like this, during a long ride up a piece of super slab that I have found my mind wandering. At times I have taken these opportunities to ‘take my soul out and examine it’. Figure out where I am in life and where I am going. Doing it at 85 or 90 mph is good for the soul, but not the best idea for the body.
A spot of introspection is an even worse idea here. My soul is fine, I will leave it to fight its own battles for a while. I lean down to light a cigarette, ( I mean I think about lighting a cigarette as there is no smoking allowed on military vehicles) and catch Lifeguard in the glow of his computer screen tapping away at the touch screen. I know how to wire that particular piece of equipment in, but have never used it up here. All my tools are much more basic.
With this I decide to check the belt of ammunition, the free movement of the gun and location of my pen flare launcher. They tend to vibrate out of whack. Always, always, always keeping up the scan.
We get to the other end and dump one convoy. Chow is closed until much later. We scarf down parts of MREs and grab another convoy heading home. Turn and burn, my favorite type of mission.
On the way south things are much the same, except that Orion has chased the moon out of the sky. We make it home, fuel the trucks down load gear and do our after checks. We finish just in time to hang out in front of the chow hall for fifteen minutes before the breakfast opens. My second breakfast since getting here, but my first sit down meal since lunch yesterday. By 0630 we are all in our racks, refilling our overdrawn sleep accounts.
Tomorrow is another mission.

odor

The sense of smell is different from the other senses. At least that is according to a barely remembered psychology class in my long ago days at junior college. The sense of smell is not processed by the analytical part of the brain but goes directly to the emotional reaction center. Flashbacks are more often caused by smells than sounds and sights, I learned that at the VA. This being the case I am seriously screwed. I live in a building with over a hundred men. They burn plastic every day here and have open gray water percolation ponds. Most of the latrines are porta johns, and maintained by spraying water inside. I will not even talk about the smells you get outside our little piece of home here at COB Allahlone.
The bad smells one can accept. Wandering through the junior enlisted section of the barracks can make a guy thankful his smokes local cigarettes that kill the olfactory organs. The bouquet of aromas from young men is… distinctive.
Then there is the other issue, the showers are a short walk away, this means that not everyone showers every day. It also means you have to transport your shower supplies to and from the shower trailer. Have you ever tried to keep your soap in one of those soap containers? They leak all over your tooth brush, and never quite dry out. It is one of those little annoying things that can drive man to distraction, like having a piece of meat stuck in your teeth and no dental floss.
There is a solution, shower gel. It comes in resealable bottles, fits nicely in the shower bag, along with flip flops an change of clothes, shaving kit and towel. It is also manufactured by the smartest marketers on earth. These people have based an entire product line on the concept that girls like it when boys don’t smell like sweaty socks. Imagine the simplicity of this! It is beautiful, and AXE and all their competitors make a fortune off selling what is essentially perfume for men. I am all for not stinking like a gym. But there are limits. The guys use ‘body spray’ like air freshener. What this means is that your nose can be assaulted by the smell of a sweat soaked uniform that has been worn for three days one second, and male perfume the next.
It is enough to drive the poor organ into fits. There is a silver lining to this. The chances of me ever having to experience the simultaneous odors of sweat, mildew, axe, and four different car or room air fresheners out side of a military barracks or a high school locker room is minimal. I have come to accept it in the military, and the only way I would go into a high school locker room is at gunpoint. So I hope the issue to be moot.
As for that wonderful shock to the senses of a port-a-john? I was a bachelor for way to long for that to effect me.

In the Groove

Things have been going well, the squad is getting in the grove. It feels good. When a unit syncs up and starts clicking you can feel it. There is a feeling in the air. Our first few trips were a little clunky. Every thing that could go wrong did go wrong. Nothing anyone could be blamed for, but just pesky bad luck. This resulted in long trips, over 24 hours long from weapons draw to weapons turn in. We hit our stride.

Early up and out to the truck. The constant light rains makes re-wiring the commo a little interesting. Not to speak ill of the last unit, but who wires a data cable under the hood of a hummer? Data cables do not respond well to being repeatedly beaten by the vibrating hood.
Mighty Mouse and I spend the morning running wires and connecting power lines. Only one blown fuse and two minor shocks later the magic box works again. Then it is time to grab our gear and throw it on the truck. The rest of the squad begins to trickle out in twos and threes. No orders are needed, each crew draws weapons and goes to the motor pool.
The mechanics are waiting, weapons are mounted, and any problems that come up are fixed. The weather has cleared up, leaving us with clear skies and a sticky mud that makes you taller by clinging to the bottom of your boots in layers an inch thick.
Vehicles are prepped and we roll to meet the convoy. Gunners disdain to use the doors on most vehicles, climbing up the back or over the hood to ensconce themselves in the turret. As we wait they sit on the roof, feet on the hood to joke, smoke and drink their pre mission energy drink. For however long we are on the road the gunner is the only man who will have an unrestricted 360 degree view. He is also the most exposed, sitting up on top of the truck. No armor is perfect, and the certain knowledge that anyone shooting at us will be responded to in kind is a whole additional layer of protection.
We sit through the brief, the last few hours, days and months on the route we will take. It is mercifully short this time. The chaplain comes in and gives us a few words. PFC Wookie and I exchange glances over bowed heads as the two non-Christians. Whatever gets the boys through. Leaving the brief I reach up and slap my tattoo hard, enough to sting. My own form of prayer.
Then we head to the class 1 connex where all the Gatorade, snacks and most importantly Rip Its are stored and collect the critical consumables. There is a shortage of energy drinks, and much grumbeling about that. The rest of the company has been a bit too efficient in their pillaging of the supplies. Out on the trucks we cross level. Those with extra toss drinks and snacks between crews. Body armor is donned in the ominous sound of attaching Velcro. You put on armor to go out of the wire. Soon we will be rolling.
SSG Moto comes up on the net, “ALL RED ELEMENTS THIS IS RED TRUCK THREE REPORT REDCON STATUS.”
The replies are come quickly.
“TRUCK ONE, RED CON ONE DEFCON ONE AND READY.”
“TRUCK TWO, RED CON ONE.”
“TRUCK FOUR, RED CON ONE.”
“TRUCK FIVE, RED CON ONE.”
“TANK SIX, RED CON ONE”, Sgt Dragon has not quite recovered from loosing his panzer, and still in a bit of denial.
“TRUCK SEVEN, RIP IT!” SGT Bulldog is a recent convert to the alertness through energy drink school of thought.

The lead trucks pull out then the convoy starts moving, gun trucks intermixing at assigned intervals. The first and last trucks call in at the entry control point, and we are out on the road.
This is freedom. SSG Moto is the absolute boss of the unit. No one higher to stress him out, and we just do our job. We roll through little towns with the occasional groups of small children standing by the side of the road. I keep a bag of Jolly Ranchers next to the gun. Every once in a while I throw a couple to the kids. Every soldier has a story of these road side beggars warning of bombs in the road up ahead. Sometimes you toss a bottle of water, or Gatorade. These towns are run down ramshackle arrangements. They look more like single rows of storage lockers than stores. Piles of tires and garbage are every where.
It is still better than it was. Gasoline sellers operate all over the place, and there is fresh fruit displayed during the day. At night they are like a ghost town. It used to always be like a ghost town. Ask any soldier running these roads if things are better now.
It is a short trip, to a little base just outside a town that used to be synonymous with EFP, now is simply has less comforts than the mega bases where I live.
We drop the convoy and park in the waiting area for them to do their business. The crews dismount, gunners climbing out of the turret and laying their body armor on the roof. Friendly insults and banter fill the air as we wander to where SSG Moto is waiting, sitting on the hood of his truck with his cap on back wards.
I pull out my latest acquisition from Amzaon.com, a dogs chew toy in the form of a 21” long rubber chicken. From my pocket comes a roll of 550 cord, that magical string that, along with duct tape keeps the army rolling. Some experience with knot tying creates a noose, that is placed over the chickens neck. Choking it. When pulled it emits a little squeak.
Much fun as squad members come by to choke my chicken.
Relaxed bullshitting, as the sun goes down, a crescent moon with Venus between its horns sits low on the horizon, in a dimming orange and red sky.

Food and shopping complete we are back on the road, it is full dark now. At first I think my night vision goggles are messing up. Then I realize it is a mist. A heavy ground fog is closing on the convoy. The convoy is wrapped in a thick blanket, obscuring all but the vehicles on either side. We slow to a crawl, creeping along the road. Our banks of bright lights create a white bubble in front of each truck. I switch vision systems between the naked eye, a white tac light and IR spot light with night vision. I can only see about fifteen meters into the gloom to either side. Sometimes not even that.
We strain to see the flash of gunfire or the incoming ball of green or red light from a tracer round. Typically only one in four bullets fired is a tracer. Each glowing light indicates four invisible brother reaching out for you. I drink Rip Its and triple shot coffees to stay alert. My eyes burn from the strain of focusing on the NVG over one eye and using the Mark I eyeball with the other.
The convoy creeps on.
If the enemy is active in this soup, they could walk along the convoy from truck to truck and we would never know until we were at touching range. The lead truck crawls forward. Eyes straining for any hint of an IED. Dectection range is zero. Only GPS can tell us we haven’t missed the turn to the base. Iraqi Police, Iraqi Army and Sons of Iraq checkpoints spring out of the mist with no warning. A few men huddled around a fire for warmth mark each one. A year or two ago they would have gone home, now they stay at their posts.
The GPS guides us to the turn off. The first truck drops chem. In a half full water bottle to make it distinctive from the twenty other markers on the road I add another one just for good measure, arcing it through the night to make sure I get the next trucks attention.
Into the wire we come, still crawling so as not to startle or run over the gate gaurds. One truck stops to count the trucks coming in. On the way to the fuel point we get the word. Everyone made it.
Once inside the wire, radio chatter picks up, people crack jokes, or hurl friendly insults. Truck seven answering each call with the cry of “Rip It!” He only went through four or five on this one.
We drop our gear, pull maintenance (even in pea soup you take care of the horse then the saddle then the rider) and head back to the barracks.
Just another day at the office.

Happy Groundhogs Day

There is a sameness to every day here, a routine that defies the days of the week. The concept of weekends and holidays is lost in the next mission date, or whatever work detail you have been assigned. Every fifteen days there is payday, but other than that, days, weeks and months begin to blur. This tour I actually knew that Thanksgiving was coming the day before. Last time I showed up at the chow hall for breakfast, and was pissed it wasn’t open, even after someone explained to me that it was Thanksgiving.
This year brings back memories of that year, 2004. I went to work, and missed lunch. My boss then LT Bean Counter (who is now a captain, and then as now one of the best combat leaders and levelheaded men I know) insisted our combat patrol coming off duty brought something for his RTO. It was luke warm, and bore only a passing resemblance to the extravaganza my mother puts on for such days.
This year was much the same. Despite the order put out by Sergeant Major Big Poppa, we had a full day. First was a ‘patch ceremony’ Where we were awarded our combat patches. Last time I checked you didn’t need one when you were in a combat zone. I put mine on when I went home last time. That resulted in missing breakfast, as we are all on a vampire schedule. Then we all went to the motor pool from 1030 to 1600, to verify the serial numbers we had already verified twice. No sane NCO signs for a piece of equipment without checking the serial numbers, well not more than once.
We had to move all the trucks from one line to a second line, verify the serial numbers, then move them back. Only the insertion of ludicrous levels of command interference made a 30 minute job, last six hours. The army is like that.
SSG Lifeguard took a hit and let Mighty Mouse and I slip off for a 20 minute meal. On holidays like this it is tradition that the big meal is served by the command staff. It is somewhat satisfying to have a full bird colonel had you your ham. Some other troops snuck in, I think, but it was a chew now taste late meal. The commander was sitting down and eating when I showed up and still there when I left. ‘nuff said.
So rather than ‘Happy Thanksgiving’ we greeted each other today with ‘Happy Groundhogs day!”. We managed to make dinner, leftovers from lunch, and Lifeguard, Nord, PFC Chulpa, CPL ESPN, and SPC Great and I all toasted with sparkling grape juice.
A soldier could feel self pity. But I remember a letter I got on December 23rd 2004. An old soldier remembering laying in a puddle on an ambush patrol in Viet-Nam. A string tied between him and the other troops so they could signal without making any noise. The rain rolling off their helmets and soaking their clothes, as they watched an empty trail, waiting for an enemy to walk into their kill zone. No one died that day which made it a good Christmas and every one since has given him cause to be grateful, knowing that there are soldiers spending their holidays in much worse conditions.
As I walked out of the massive DFAC, I sent a silent thanks to all the guys who didn’t or won’t have a second rate dinner. The war goes on regardless of weekends or holidays, and this only makes the next one that much better.
Groundhogs day is the same as the last, it hasn’t gotten any better, but also it hasn’t got worse, and that in and of itself is something to give thanks for.

BTW: I understand I have a fan who is not a old friend or blood relation. Thank your great and terrible daughter for me.

Privacy

The most valued thing in this war is privacy. The first casualty of a war zone is privacy. It could be worse we could be cramming 8 men into 6 man tents. Sgt Grandpa, and SGT Bulldog have the misfortune to be crammed into a space smaller than my old bedroom with me. The lower enlisted sleep four to a room in even less space. The drive for privacy quickly pushes soldiers to hang ponchos or poncho liners from bunks, and build rough wooden shelters from plywood and 2x4s.
We seek some measure of personal space, even if it is the area of a single mattress only notionally shielded from prying eyes. Laptop computers and headphones are a common courtesy so everyone doesn’t have to listen to your movie, or music. We live, work, eat and sleep together. The same faces day in and day out. There is bound to be friction. A little privacy is the lube that makes the machine work.
As I write this Bulldog is talking to his girl on VOIP while SGT G3 watches a rebroadcast of a football game. G3 is in the next room, separated from our room by 7’ high office walls, as the bunk beds are 5 feet high Bulldog and G3 effectively sleep next to each other separated by a half inch board. They both ignore the interference. Tolerance is another lube to keep the machine moving.
There is only one light switch for two rooms and five sergeants, when someone wants light or darkness they sing out and if there are no objections I hit the switch over my bed. Accommodation makes things work.
Shortly after we got here a error in the housing arrangements over in the lower enlisted quarters caused CPL ESPN to be kicked up to NCO quarters. Our room was selected. Instead we took a dead end hallway with just enough room for a bunk bed and room to get in and out of it and walled it off. ESPN is the only person under the rank of Sergeant First Class to have his own room and privacy. Innovation is the hallmark of the American soldier.
As I take wander talk to PFC Mighty Mouse I see ESPN hanging out with his old roommates and playing Xbox. He doesn’t spend much time in his private room.
Gandpa, Bulldog, G3 and Doc (the last man in our area) talk, share snacks and get a chance to bitch to our peers about ours seniors and subordinates. If I take a wander out to the back porch SFC Big Daddy is hanging out there shooting the shit with his platoon members. Up on the roof there are always guys hanging out, smoking and joking, and it is rare that anyone goes to chow or the PX alone. We are social animals made all the more so by our isolation form the country an environment that we grew up in.
Isolation is the grit that makes the machine break, more surely than enemy fire.

SSG Lifeguard just poked his head in to see if I want to go to midnight chow. See what I mean?

The Food

The food.

I sit staring at a plate containing something that might be beef stroganoff. Meat over noodles would be more accurate. Just days ago I sat at one of the finest restaurants in Chicago. Now I am wearing a two day old uniform, and my rifle. Days ago I was wearing a suit, dressed to the nines, down to my shoes. My companion wore her strapless dress (don’t ask me to describe it I can identify tanks, not women’s clothing). The line was long today, about 15 minutes. Reservations for Alinea should be made one or more months ahead. My concierge at the Wyndham works miracles.
On a good note this pile of calories cost only my signature on a sign in roster. Alinea cost more than a valve job and a new rear tire on the Kawasaki. It was worth it.
We live our lives in such an ordinary way, we experience ordinary things. We commute to work, for me just a shuffle down stairs. We see the same so often, I like to step out of the ordinary. Sometimes that extra ordinary experience involves a luke war cup of coffee in a tin cup heated over a fuel tab. Watching the sun rise or fall over a remote landscape. It can take your breath away. There have been moments spent in line at the tank range, resting against the front slope and watching tracers play down range, giving color to the inky blackness of night while the steel releases the heat of the day against your back.
My favorite are hours spent playing with gravity as I swoop up and down the mountains. The sound of the engine screaming at me from between my knees. These are experiences of the sight and feel. Dinner was one of taste and smell. It is fortunate both of these has have been dulled by years of smoking. I might have died of sensory overload.
In any profession there are professionals, experts and artists. After the first course I desperately tried to come up with a comparison. My mind went home to motorcycles. I was in the professional space of the Valentino Rossi of cooking. A man who has passed out of mere mortal status to become an Icon. Each of the courses are a visual work of art. The man at the next table takes a picture with a professional camera before eating each of his 14 courses. This is the short meal. A mixture of flavors and smells does not so much assault my senses as infiltrate past my tongue and into the brain to overload.
Fish eggs from some special pond in the last corner of the virgin wilderness of North America, wines from some guy in Italy who only has 25 acres and sells it only to the poshest of posh. I thought I had seen it all half way through the meal. My mind was reeling from course to course. Then they brought out the beef I know what the effects of cryogenic gasses looks like. It is distinctive. That was a piece of beef that had been dipped in a gas cold enough to be liquid.
I thought I was out of my depth when there was no sign other than a valet out front when we gratefully jumped from the cab driven like I used to drive in Iraq. When there is liquid nitrogen involved in keeping raw meat from cooking at room temperature all bets are off. The staff had skill and professionalism of an SF team, and I do not use the comparison lightly.
A three hour meal, of the highest quality and artistic style available anywhere. I beautiful experience to store for when times are not so wonderful, but not something to contemplate in an army chow hall while gazing at beef over noodles. I reach for the salt and open my latest book about long rides. It is simply a matter of self defense.

Freedom pt 3

Who knew so much could happen during a four day pass? As I am borrowing a sport coat from the hotel and getting dressed for the previously mentioned glorious dinner a drunken voice barks out from down the hall. “Sergeant Pinball you look dope!” I flinch It would appear that SGT Nord and crew to include PV2 SPQR have found me. I thought I had left them at the Holiday Inn… no such luck.
As we part from my path to high society and fine dinning, we now take up the narrative of the other members of the company. SSGs Moto and Caine in their best siamese twin impersonation have picked up their significant others and headed for Chi-town. SGT Dragon, after brutalizing a room of enlisted men (mess with the well yoked SGT Nord at your own risk) has headed home to fiancé and children. SPC Bongo is most likely fully inside the nearest bottle, at least he is a happy drunk. The only report we get about the Brothers SSG is when SGT Nighthawk, fully three sheets to the wind and listing thirty degrees sees them at the top of the Sears Tower, the shuffle their SOs off as quickly as possible.
The Nord crew with their underage drivers (If there is one injustice in the US it is that you can be a soldier at 18 but can’t drink until 21. If you can do the deed you should be able to numb the pain.) hit every mixed age drinking establishment they can.
I have seen the video, I have some of the pictures, I still am amazed at the events that unfolded in a room at the wyndham. About the time I was contemplating the benefits of liquid nitrogen and Japanese beef the party got really started.
I can only confirm that the main even involved two exotic dancers, lets be honest here strippers, a large volume of alcohol, PV2 SPQR, and a facsimile of male genitalia mounted on a plug-into-the-wall power drill. At least he was wearing his army approved eye protection. That would be the other extreme of making memories. It is also a good way to get $400 dollar cleaning charge on your room. All things considered my evening was less expensive.
The last day of the pass I packed up rather early and headed back to base. PFC Tooth, hung over and passed out beside I managed to forget the whole toll road thing. I wonder if they will bill the rental car company for the tolls? Once I am in the company area, my bags dropped and a short nap taken I am asked to sign in.
Not just ‘no’ but ‘HELL NO!’ I explain to 1SG Goggles that I was born, and I was around yesterday but I was not born yesterday.
He is understanding, CSM Santa Gives me grief, I smile, execute a ‘Yes Sergeant Major’ and exit the building. My pass lasts until 2359 on the last day of the pass. As long as I am present and ready for duty at first formation I am clear until midnight. Before they realize that I am gone I am down sitting down behind a pint of Samuel Adams at the on post bar, still in civilian clothes.
SFC Redneck and SFC Lightfighter are there. I vow to hide behind their 14 pay grades if questioned. The scouts sit down moments later. Pitchers are bought and pizza eaten. I get to meat Lightfighter’s wife, a wonderful woman who had a few choice words to say about Family Readiness Group. SGT Trackstar and SFC Caine and wife join us later.
I drink like it is my last beer for a year… because it is. PFC Why, looking all civilian and crap dances it up on the dance floor. While I meet Doc Mom’s husband. Sending your wife off with a hundred and fifty men has got to be a challenge.
At 2300 I stagger to the bus. At 2315 I stagger off the bus, smelling like a brewery and able to walk a straight line with a little help and a lot of luck. I pull myself together and march up the steps of the CP. My signature looks like my normal scribble. I try not to burp in the 1sg’s face, turn around and walk out.
Exiting the CP the First Sergeant reminds me that all contraband must be disposed of prior to midnight. Just a friendly reminder.
The disposal committee is waiting for me at the door. I have two small bottles and a wine sized bottle of local beer. CPL Methuselah, SGT Dragon, and others gather around and help me out. With the world spinning around my head I execute a perfect face plant into my rack and promptly pass out. A good way to end a pass.

Kuwait

Kuwait

The term Fobbit was invented for soldiers working here. There really isn’t a safer place you could be. None of the risks of stateside life and none of the risks of a war zone. How can you prepare people for combat operations when there is a 24 hr Starbucks and Baskin Robbins?
The place is unreal, transients, (units stopping here before going north) live in giant tents. Less than a ten minute walk there are all the conveniences of home. Taco Bell, KFC, Panda express and more proclaim their presence on brightly colored, back lit signs mounted on drab double wide trailers. Most of the troops wander around in a jet lag induced fog. The closer to leaving the more alert they appear, not through a sense of anticipation, but more because they are adapting to the environment.
This is the face of the long war, the small war, the people war. Those of us that enlisted when there was still a threat of red hordes pouring through the Fulda Gap are off balance. War was supposed to be a return to the primitive. You existed in a primal state, eating, sleeping, fighting and dying on your vehicle or with your squad. All the training advertised that kind of war. The kind of war that has not been here since 2003.
The wild west has also departed for parts unknown. We have brought the railroad. Within a year or two of the invasion we drove around like we owned the place. The hiways, byways and back roads all belonged to us. When you came back all they cared about was how many new bullets you needed. Before Strykers and up-armor, when a nice ride had a roof. We rode with our feet hanging out of the truck and our gunners standing behind a hillbilly weapons mount.
Now they question how much ammo we should take for the Mk 19 the Iraqi Army and Police can stop us. Maybe this is all an improvement, the Iraqi government should be in charge. I just don’t trust them. I don’t trust their work ethic. Number one indicator for an IED is that the guys at the check point have gone home.
A thousand questions flood my brain about the upcoming year, none of them have an answer other than wait and see.
In the meantime I will sit by the stage where they have Karaoke night and local bands play. The desert sun washing out my computer screen while I wait for Baskin Robins to open up. Closer to 16 than 31 flavors, but considering where I am, pretty impressive.
In a few days I go back to the war, a nine month ride full of boredom and terror. I look on the bright side, I could be stationed here. I would probably go more crazy than I already am.

A Jump to the Right

A Jump to the Right

A dear friend of mine whom I will call Traveler spends most of her professional life going through airports. How different the process of traveling with the army her life is. Airports are wonders of efficiency you walk in the door at SFO, and if like her you know what you are doing, you walk out the door at PDX just a few hours later. The Army can make brushing your teeth difficult. In our little jump over the pond and into the kitty litter box it would be hard to make it more complex.
We start the day of, final packing, the last laundry carted to the washers and back to be stuffed into already over full bags. It doesn’t take James bond to figure out that the unit is leaving, the dozens bottles of laundry soap left in Laundromat. Soldiers are chucking the bits and pieces they don’t need, makes it easy for me. I don’t need to buy more soap.
We stack the bags at 1830 and the wait begins. Some time later we load all the bags onto a truck, a pretty good work out all things considered. I call the parents, and chat after arranging to have the phone shut off on the first. Then call my sister to chat it up. More waiting, until the buses arrive. They are school busses to old to be used for schools anymore. Each soldier has his carry on, we sit two to a seat, time to make your buddy smile. The buses get fuel and drive around on post without apparent direction.
The poor bus driver is subjected to the 1st platoon standard entertainment. On other rides, with other platoons the guys will sit and listen to their media players. We entertain ourselves by singing. Between 10 and 20 voices sing everything from rap to 80’s hits even some Motown. The one or two odd balls who know that key are not for opening locks or can carry a tune in a sack are drowned out by the rest.
The driver fails to comment, clearly a wise man. SFC Big Daddy and 2LT Corn Fed know all the words to ‘I Like Big Butts’ considering that they are only slightly less pale than I am it is mildly disturbing. SPC Stonewall next to me has never heard of Johnny Cash, His only excuse is that he is black, I don’t buy it.
At the airfield we have to go through the TSA search. No lighters, knives, or bottles of liquid. Never mind that every passenger is in uniform, we are taking off from a military airfield and carrying our M4s, SAWs and bayonets, that little pocket folding knife is prohibited. It has been said before: “The Army could screw up a wet dream.” I know, it has screwed up mine.
Even the pornography check is pointless as most troops have personal computers. (What do YOU think the internet is for?)
Then we wait some more. Another call to the sister and parents. We continue to wait. The plane boards at 0230, I haven’t slept since 0600. We cram ourselves into seats designed for normal passengers with weapons and outsized carry-on’s. They want the weapons on the floor, taking up my valuable leg room. Mine goes muzzle down by the window.
Time begins to blur, helped with Doans back pills and Tylenol PM. I wak up as we land in pouring rain. We all get off the plane as it fuels. Then back on for the next hop. Again I pass out before the lights of the USA fade below us. We are racing into the sun, shades down to watch the in flight movie. The tape is damaged though only a half dozen of us notice, being the only ones awake.
I fade in and out of consciousness. Time zones and travel have made the time irrelevant. At the next airport they still speak English… sorta. We pile out and head to the smoking area. There is internet for those who can find it. We pile back onto the plane blurry eyed some of us simply following the uniform in front of us. Wedged into the seat again I take my secret weapon and pass out as the green fields are obscured by the clouds. SGT Dozer has been a good traveling companion. He keeps his short legs in front of him as I stretch into the empty seat between us. SGT Nord, our orgional third moved forward to more space as soon as we got altitude the first time.
Back in the galley three soldiers have taken off the ACU top and brew coffee wearing Omni Air International aprons over their T-shirts and ACU pants. I snap a picture and stumble back into my seat.
Kuwait is just like we left it, you could go twenty miles and not be able to tell the last thousand years has passed, or be in a major commercial center. This may be the safest place on earth for soldiers. The Kuwaitis are very effective at keeping the war at arms length while making billions off it. I pity the terrorist who would risk his organizations funding by launching an attack here.
Another ride in the dawns light to the Gateway camp. Sit in a briefing no one listens to except the locations of DFACs and the PX. We unload the truck of our bags and into the tent. Over 60 soldiers in one long have pipe tent. The smell will eventually get bad. For now most pass out. I sign out with the boss, grab CPL Methuselah and go on a pinball bounce. Maybe I will be able to stay awake long enough get my body into the new pattern of day and night. To help myself out I try a new delicacy, the Red Bull Icee.
I call the parents and discover my time calculations were off, it is 4am at home. I look for an internet connection. No luck to find one without a two hour wait. Then head back, the Red Bull wears off and I crash like a DC-10 without engines. Morpheus awaits, sanity may return with sleep, or is that just a pipe dream?

Freedom Pt 2

I find the bar without difficulty. The third bumper and I hear my score going up. Inside PFC Thug, Doc Mom, some of the scouts, and more were already working on their boozing. I sit down, and a beer appears in front of me. The night begins to blur, I know that SPC Bongo and the other Silent Killer show up, Nord and his crew, SGT Trackstar and his car of guys. Soon there are tables full of drinking troops. A few are still in uniform, these are the ones flying out late tonight or early in the morning.

If I continue the roll down to Chicago I need to stay sober, less than one drink an hour. SPC Bongo wants to hit a strip bar, not surprisingly the scouts have a list of important questions. Where is it, how far, what is the cover, drink minimum, cost of a lap dance? Questions answered we begin to gather up the troops.

I do a head count, and realize that we are staying here tonight. I skip off from the strip club and get two rooms at the Holiday Inn. Whatever happens I will not be sleeping in the rental tonight. I pawn off the other room to SPQR and Heart Disease. Free from any real responsibility I go on the bar bounce. Yes we are supposed to travel in pairs. I set out to see what this college town has in the way of local bars.

I pop my head into the Animal House, crowd was a little old for me, the one with a nautical theme was a little stuffy, I would have done gone to “Then Library: an interesting place to drink” but they were closed. I end up in a little place called “Johns” About my speed, cheap drinks, and a dart machine. I prefer the metal pointed darts, but anything will do in a pinch. Another OIF vet in the bar and I start talking, then we team up to play, two girls.

Drinks are rolling, I stick with Jack and Coke, the official drink of OIF II and III. The stories roll, and then someone starts buying shots. Patron goes down so smooth. The games keep rolling, the booze is flowing, I seem to be able to hit my target often enough not to get too embarrassed.

At some point a glass is broken and I find out that it is no big deal, as the other team in a three way game of cricket is the manager. He buys a round for his clumsiness. By midnight I am listing at 15 degress and three sheets to the wind.

It is my sister’s birthday so I give her a call. Okay not the best of ideas, but she not only understands, but seems happy her little brother is having a fine time. I run across Nord and crew returning from the strip club, as it turns out the mission was a failure, and finish the night with a beer bought for me at Hooters again. Then I go and crash out in my wonderful hotel room.

For the first time in two months I sleep without the noise of snoring in the room (yes I snore but I never hear it). I am in a state of blissful silence. Five floors below all hell is breaking loose.

It would seem that crowding at least six troops have crowded into my other room. SGT Dragon showed up, killing time until his flight leaves. While SPQR and Wookie float around in the indoor pool (I wonder if they found a hairball in the filter the next day) the three suitcases of beer begin to disappear. Not fast enough for Dragon, even without his ever present partner SGT Nighthawk he is the life of the party. His favorite game seems to have been “Beer Grenade”.

Through speed, aggression and violence of action he manages to route at least two to the rental car, and leaves the rest of the crew bruised on the floor. When I show up to check up on them the next morning, it looks like and smells like a frat house on New Years Day. I require they leave beer, a tip and a note for the maid and hope that my credit card won’t be billed for water (I mean beer) damage.

Enough of this small time stuff, my pass is well and truly started. It is 250 miles to Chicago, I have a full tank of gas, a carton of cigarettes, it is quite bright and I left my sunglasses in the barracks. I hit it.

An hour later I want to strangle Tooth. He has bought the cheapest ear phones in the PX and is playing his music at full blast. I crank the stereo louder to block out the noise. Five hours to his hotel, the musical clinking of beer and wine come from the back at every bump and toll booth. WTF toll booths on interstates!?!?! We get to the Holiday Inn in Chicago. They didn’t have reservations, so in my last effort as an NCO I put the rooms on my card for the first night. Tooth is checked in, the rest of the guys will show up as hangovers and other perils of traveling in groups allow.

I make a point of not telling anyone my destination, as the car warms up I turn off the cell phone and remove the name tapes from my back pack and computer bag. SGT Pinball has left the building. Mr Pinball a civilian replaces him. For just a little over 72 hours I will live life to the fullest, then back to the army.

Crew

The crew

The end is near and most of us are happy for it. Our time in beautiful CONUS (CONtinental United States) will be over soon, by the time this is posted there is a good chance I will be over the pond. It is time to go, the training was useful, it was needed. Now it is over. No more First Army trainers, no more boxes to check and sheets to sign.

I sit on the porch stoop smoking a cigarette and watching the tendrils disperses into the evening air. SPC Bongo is next to me. He has been back from his last tour less than 6 months. We are just done.

I look over at him and ask, “You ready for this?”

He gives me that silly grin and laughs, “Sarge, I was ready when we showed up.”

It is so true. When I came back from the last trip half the troops got out as soon as they could. Another quarter spread to the four winds, some beyond the reach of a combat deployment in recruiting command or the Air Force. The rest are still here. There is something addicting about the army. Something that we get here, that we don’t get anywhere else.

Part of it is family, a second family that is. Looking down the barracks I can tell you the about each guys marriage, how his home life is going, and so much more. You don’t get this kind of social situation anywhere else. They try to capture it on film or in books and it all falls short of the mark. These are the men that I will trust with my life a network of mutual dependence.

Then there is the destination. This will be an opportunity. A place to test yourself, where nothing matters, but what you do, and how well you do it. This will not be the wild west of OIF II and III, the rules are more strict, the enemy (according to reports) is less bold. Still the challenge is there.

I have always said that the army sponsoring a NASCAR was a bad idea. They need to sponsor AMA or Moto GP motorcycle racing. The drive is the same, to push your self and your body faster or further than the other guy. There is an acceptance of risk, an understanding that gain comes only with risk.

Riders come in two types, those that have perfected self deception, (these do not usually last past their first good crash) and those that accept the price for what they do. I think I am in the second group, but I could be deceiving myself. I have seen the risk that Iraq shows. The risk is worth the reward. It really was last time. Back then we had few armored vehicles and most didn’t have doors or roofs. Just three to five guys, hanging out the doors or standing behind a piece of metal pipe welded to the floor with a machine gun on top.

Now there are gun shields and MRAPS, ASVs and nothing unarmored rolls out the gate. Most gunners don’t even stick their heads out of the hatch. The mission is more dangerous, but the risk to me is lower. Just like heading out on a cool summer morning to ride HWY 9, just because the road is dry, and the tires are freshly scrubbed in doesn’t mean you relax. Ease into it, and feel where your skill is today. I wonder what my real skill level is, how much has the training refreshed and improved?

SPC Bongo and I know what is there, the good, the bad and the ugly, yet we still go. Is it any wonder that humans still war? With an inexhaustible supply of young and in my case not-so-young men looking for a chance to step beyond the bubble wrap protectiveness of our society, and a limited supply of motorcycles?

Something drives us to risk, to push to take the long dark journey. This is mine. If the urge hits me again, I should have the means to just get on the bike and ride. You don’t have to go through 120 days of train up to ride to Panama.

Freedom

The long awaited time had come. The company stood in formation, eagerly awaiting the magic words while SFC Big Daddy administered the safety brief. We have all heard it before and I let it wash over me like music before bed time. Don’t drink and drive (duh!). Don’t drink to excess (not bloody likely). Do not engage in risky sexual behavior (this earns a chuckle from the crowd). The drone goes on. Then the magic word comes… “DISMISSED”

I think I made it to the car before my hat reached the ground. If either way it would have gone to the judges. The pinball has been launched into the game. Like a shot I gather my two passengers and head off into the sunset. Surprisingly since my ultimate destination is Chi-town to the east I must first go west. PFC Airborne is meeting his fiancé at the airport, I suspect that he will not see the light of day for the next four days. PFC Tooth will rally up with the other single troops for a weekend of traditional stress reduction in Chi-town, but needs a ride that far.

We hit the first bumper without a hitch. Airborne does a perfect PLF out of the vehicle at the airport. With a few phone calls we discover the rest of the boys are nearby at the mall getting rid of army gray for the varied colors of civilian clothes. Under the gentle management of SGT Nord. I Macys into the rental car GPS and away we go. We are less than a mile out we realize that something is wrong.

The dot on the Hertz ‘Never Lost’ does not correspond to a physical building. Indeed it tells us we have arrived while on a freeway in the middle of a swamp. I look around for land marks, no luck. We begin a search pattern and call the guys already there, again no luck.

I begin to bitch at “That gods damned piece of proprietary shit!”

Ranting and raving as the rain pours down I try other mall type stores. All show up at the same location, the middle of a swamp. Stupid thing probably hasn’t been updated in years.

PFC Tooth manages to convince me to ask for directions. It would appear we are two miles off target. I hope that the army isn’t buying the same technology. It probably is. We pull into Macy’s in a minor rain squall, pop out and head for the doors. Now we have to find one of the half dozen or so troops in the mall. Well it isn’t easy.

PV2 SPQR (yes he used to be a PFC, but it would be wrong of me to explain the details) spots us at the center of the mall. All I need is a sweat shirt or a flannel or something. Tooth didn’t bring any civilian clothes so he needs a whole outfit. I dive into the store recommended by SPQR.

Ten minutes later I am standing in the greatest of ironies. A zippered hoody with the words “Holister, SoCal” emblazoned on the front. Never mind that I have traveled 1800 miles to get a shirt from the town just down the road from my house. Or that the only way Holister is southern California is if you don’t own a map and don’t know anyone with a map. Not only that it cost $60 which is more than I would pay for any everyday article of clothing.

Never mind I am warm, and that is what counts. We gather up, rather SGT Nord herds the cats into a smallish gaggle. PFC Wookie, PFC Chin, PFC Heart Disease, PFC and a passel of others make a group decision… We are off to Hooters. I make a call to them on the way to the car, this time never lost can find the address, although it can’t find them through the directory. Piece of shit.

Two bumpers down still rolling and bouncing I head for the next stop. A place based around the fact that men spend money on hot girls in tight clothes. The perfect honey trap for this crew.

To be continued.

Gunnery

Gunnery

The apex of the training year for mechanized units is gunnery. I understand the active duty tankers take most of a month to complete this task, reserve units take a two week annual training period from drawing tanks to turning in the last cleaned weapon. I thought that was a little stressful, then we did wheeled gunnery here. Is having a wrong opinion wrong? I hope not.

SFC Big daddy is the HMFIC (Head Mother Frakker In Charge) by virtue of his training as a Master Gunner. My self and 12 others would be the VCEs (Vehicle Crew Evaluators) going down with crews, grading them and then explaining the grade, then jumping in with the next crew and doing it all again. We found out we were going to the evaluator class the night before the class started. Of 13 evaluators, 11 failed the first test, and thus it began.
We would have to go and retest while range, that needed 12 VCEs ran with 2. Big Daddy was unhappy with us, to put it mildly. The crews are stressed because this is their big test, and the rest of the company feels the stress and reacts to it.
To put it mildly the first couple of hours on the range were…. Stressful (I said that already didn’t I?). In true military fashion the master gunner vents on his evaluators, the VCEs vent on the crews, who then vent back at each other. This lasts for about 2 hours. Then we get the magic. The immensity of the task overcomes the individuals. Like some giant group think the tension begins to drop. Soldiers help their buddies, and the range begins to click a machine gun. Truck heads down range, the next one is pulled up to the ready line. A truck returns, and we shoot the next one down.
I wander past the iconic image of gunnery, not tracers arcing down range, or the boom of cannon fire. Three soldiers, vehicle commander, gunner and driver passed out asleep in a neat line. I step back to take a picture and notice the all over crews eat, bullshit or pass out together. Maybe it was the crews going down range that managed to calm us down. You never know.
The VCEs will shoot and grade, no rest for the wicked. The engagements begin to blur, only the notes on the score card to tell you what happened this time and what was on the last crew. Unlike tanks where you sit in the tower and listen to the fire commands and time the crew we have to ride down behind the gunner.
Ever tried to stand up in the back of a vehicle, a stop watch in one hand, pen in the other, holding down a score sheet while tracking targets, and grading fire commands? Not easy. Then there are our generally young drivers. They drive with the aggression of the young and the skill of the same. CPL Calm got thrown into the back hard enough to leave bruises , twice. I got a full can of .50 ammo thrown at me like a medicine ball. I collapse back into the clam shell, toss the ammo off to the side, and ride the sudden stop back up to my place behind the gunner, hit the stop watch and recover the grade sheet. I get bruises on both sides and a sore back for the rest of the event. Bull riders eat your heart out.
I as the day goes on, I am walking to my next truck and hear the evaluator briefing the crew.
“Slow is smooth, smooth is fast. If you throw the VCE out of the vehicle or make him swallow his dip it is an automatic zero.”
SGT Adams deals with it another way. I am leaning against the shack as he ‘counsels his driver. “If you don’t slow down I am putting a steaming cup of coffee on the dash in front of you.” It takes his driver PFC SPQR a second before he realizes the repercussions of a jack rabbit start and steaming hot coffee. “Rodger Sergeant” He says.
The day moves on, crews go to sleep after their day run, waiting for darkness. The range crew keeps rocking. A weapons guard is kept employed almost full time keeping the two pots of coffee brewing. The temperature drops and still vehicles head down range. With the back hatch open the heaters are fighting a hopless battle against the cold.
We bundle up and keep going. Midnight comes and goes without us noticing, as crews keep going down range. At night the tracers tell the whole story. As gunners get better they all go the same place instead of spraying all over the place. Targets get hit, engagements get shorter.
At some point I begin to notice less hang dog expressions from returning crews. More After Action Reviews include “Great engagement, I can’t really say anything more.”
SFC Caine keeps the crews rolling SFC Big Daddy fixes guns and helps crews and evaluators. The temperature drops into the low forties and a mist comes over the range. We are in constant motion, but the speed has dropped as we dip deeper into our reserves. If you see a guy dragging ass too much you take his next crew and tell him to get an hour or two of sleep.
Help your buddy, cover down, make things work. The boxes of empty brass and links grows behind the ammo point. Crates stacked upon crates of the debris of gunnery.
At 4am the range shuts down. We will start up again in the morning, rather later in the morning. Most of the crews go on the first bus, then the range crew. Two hours of sleep and we start up again. Remember to eat and drink water. I dip into my emergency energy drink supply and share it around as needed.
My crew, SSG Lifeguard and PFC Mighty Mouse take on the lions share of setting up our vehicle to shoot. Down we go, and then I am back to grading. No cause to complain, eleven of us are in the same boat. Sleep is for the weak. You can sleep when you are dead.
Events truly blur, I don’t even remember my own qualification, but apparently I did well. Over 30 crews in less than three days. Not bad, not bad at all.
Gunnery is over and our trip over the pond comes near. With a solid eight hours of sleep behind me, I look back and feel pride and confidence. One of my last AARs sticks in my mind. I look into the faces of a crew that was shaky at the beginning and say, “You guys really cowboy’d up. I look forward to rolling down the road with you watching my back.” That really says it all.