GUESS WHO'S COMING TO DINNER - AGAIN

(WEEK OF 25-28FEBRUARY 2009)

GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER - AGAIN

We have another VIP visit, and associated dinner, this week.

AMC (my MACOM) changed leadership in November, and the new CG, a 4-star General, is coming through for a site visit and high-level meetings. She also works in time for the perfunctory meal with the staff followed by a short speech and Q&A.

It’s always fun to see a general officer, and the more stars the better so long as you’re not asked to brief them. I briefed the former CG once and it was made very clear to me beforehand that I’d better be completely squared away - I hadn’t actually needed that advice, as I’d seen him tear into some guys before. I practiced my brief for hours beforehand and it went well.

This time all I’m asked to do is eat and listen. I am among the world’s best at those two things.

The dinner is held in a room off the side of the main dining room at the DFAC, and the food is the same as it always is for these events: steak, macaroni and cheese, green beans, mashed potatoes, bread, salad.

The visiting contingent is actually quite a bit larger than usual, with the CG bringing a BG (1-star), an MG (2-star), her CSM, and an acting Assistant Secretary of the Army (a post which is normally a presidential appointment though was not in this case, thus the “acting”).

The dinner goes off without incident, and it’s interesting to hear the ASA and CG speak about their experiences in Afghanistan - what strikes them as needing work, etc. The ASA answers some logistical questions about moving equipment through Pakistan (often hairy) and there are the common and expected questions about housing - there is never enough housing.

After the Q&A, a select few of the BDE staff are presented awards for their service in country as they prepare to return home. Generally the BDE CDR will pin the medals, but they try to take advantage of the CG’s presence and she’s obviously amenable to taking part in the ceremony.

A brief statement is read with everyone standing at attention, and the CG pins a medal on the lapel of the honoree. A handshake with each of the CG and ASA complete the ceremony, and then the honored says a few words of appreciation.

The crowd dissipates fairly quickly after the awards, though the CG and ASA stick around for a few minutes to take pictures with some of the pack. I’m chatting with a colleague near the back of the room when the CG comes by to pick up her cover. She smiles at me and we shake hands.

“Thanks for your service,” she says.

“Thank YOU, ma’am.”

AMC = Army Materiel Command
MACOM = Major Command
CG = Commanding General
DFAC = Dining Facility
BG = Brigadier General
MG = Major General
CSM = Command Sergeant Major
BDE CDR = Brigade Commander

***

TRAILBLAZERS

One of the persons receiving an award for service well done, just prior to her redeployment* is my friend and colleague Dianne.

Dianne has always been one of the more squared-away persons I work with at the BDE, and iss helpful and friendly to boot. I have a chance to catch up with her after the dinner and she indicates that it is a particular honor to be presented her civilian service award by GEN Dunwoody, our CG.

The reason for this is that GEN Dunwoody, in addition to being our CG, was the first woman to reach the rank of 4-Star General (or equivalent) in any branch of the US military - an advancement rightly earned by all accounts. It was a big deal when she pinned on the 4th star last November, and it made it more of an honor to meet her, listen to her speak, and to shake her hand.

My friend Ken, a SFC, was serving at FT BELVOIR, VA, last November when she was promoted, and was asked to be a security escort during the ceremony - one of a large team. Aware of the historicity of the event, he gladly served, and also asked his wife to bring their two young daughters.

Dianne is genuinely moved by the experience, and tells me a little about her own experiences in the military. I hadn’t known that Dianne served, but not only had she been an officer, she went to West Point in 1976 as a member of the first class to admit women cadets.

We unfortunately don’t get a chance to speak at length about her experiences during that time, but I am duly impressed. It seems even more appropriate, now, that she had the opportunity to meet and be honored by another trailblazer, and put into perspective for me the strides that have been made by and for women in the military.

Not that we’re done advancing, of course.

BDE = Brigade
CG = Commanding General
SFC = Sergeant First Class

* Redeployment = going home. It sounds more like you’re deploying again, and for this reasonI have long argued for the use of “undeploying” but it hasn’t caught on.

***

HE CALLS HIMSELF “A RELIC”

Though I didn’t get a chance to speak to him (aside from a “Hi, how are you?” - “Good, sir”) the AMC CSM, CSM Mellinger, is actually the last active duty draftee in the US military.

Drafted in 1972 during the Nixon administration for service during the Vietnam War, CSM Mellinger is still serving after almost 27 years and is the highest-ranking NCO in my command.

AMC = Army Materiel Command
CSM = Command Sergeant Major
NCO = Non-Commissioned Officer

***

YOU THINK I’M SOMEONE ELSE, DON’T YOU?

I’m certain this COL has me confused with someone else.

I see him once a week at a VTC held at the BDE, and occasionally out and about the post. Every time I see him, he gets a big smile and shakes my hand, pats me on the back, and animatedly asks how I am. I respond in kind, but with a fair amount of confusion tinging the whole experience from my end.

I thought at first that he’s just a very friendly guy, and by all appearances he does seem particularly nice, especially for an O-6. But I can be sitting in a row of people, all of whom he sees as often as he sees me, and he picks me out to greet, happily.

A few months ago I had a request from home that I chased up a chain to a MAJ who stonewalled me. She was downright rude, and refused to help, which baffled me because I wasn’t asking for much. This MAJ ultimately worked for the abovementioned COL (though there are some folks in between), and I considered going over her head to him for help.

I worried about that, though, because I was afraid if I actually explained what it is I do, he’d realize I’m not whoever he thinks I am. It’s not that I wanted the attention, but I was afraid it would embarrass him, and therefore me, when it dawned on him that I hadn’t said anything earlier.

Luckily, the request was pulled back from the home office and I walked away from the problem, letting the MAJ think she won (which rankled me).

Before the 4-star dinner, I see this COL and he walks by me, smiling. I have grown a beard and probably need to trim it up; the COL actually pulls on my beard for a second and says “Gettin’ pretty scruffy!” and keeps walking.

I can only imagine he has me confused with someone else.

COL = Colonel
VTC = Video Teleconference
BDE = Brigade
O-6 = the rank of COL in Army
MAJ = Major

A DENTIST AND THE MOUNTAINS

(24FEB2009)

I have taken far too many pictures of the mountains.

I grew up on an island and perhaps over many years at and around the beach I eventually came to take them for granted. When I commuted to college I drove over one of the most picturesque bridges every single day, twice, and at some point maybe it stopped taking my breath away.

Having moved away from Rhode Island several years ago and returning maybe once a year, the majesty of the ocean has returned and I am moved by the many views my hometown has to offer – I always take some time to drive around the island, and I have my favorite spots to catch a view, to get my fill.

I have apparently not been in Afghanistan long enough to be lulled by the mountains.

Every time I walk out of my front door, my eyes turn to the mountains – is it clear today? Are they snow-capped? More or less snow than yesterday? Are there clouds lollygagging around the peaks? Is the sun almost sneaking behind them?

When I drive from one side of post to the other (almost daily, and often more than once daily), I have my camera out to catch a picture of an ascending plane against the mountains in the background or a unique view of the sun or the clouds on the mountains. I believe I’ve taken almost every picture that could be taken, but I can’t stop. The mountains still awe me.

Today I walk out of my room, see that it’s a clear day, and see that I’m not the only one who sees it. A soldier is standing up on the bunker outside my door, taking pictures of the peaks. I’ve done that.

He climbs down after a few minutes and asks me if I know what mountains these are – “The Hindu Kush”, I tell him. He tells me he’s new in country, just arrived yesterday, and that he’s blown away by the view. We chat for a few minutes; he’s a dentist and I have teeth, so that’s a subject. He’s doing a short tour – just four months. I’d be home now if that were my length of deployment.

He asks me about the post, and I feel like an old-timer, a veteran of Bagram Air Field, because I know my way around and can give directions to the 4 places anyone would ever want to go.

He thanks me for my time, and I send him on his way with “Welcome to Afghanistan.”

WASTED TIME?

(23FEB2009)

I often go to lunch late, which affords me a table to myself and time to read.

I’m reading and munching, reading and drinking today when a gaggle of soldiers sits down at the next table and begins horsing around and talking loudly. From the snippets of their conversation I hear, it’s obvious that they’re new in country.

The first thing I think is that I don’t remember what it’s like to be new in country. I’ve been here just shy of 6 months now, which is a good chunk of time – more than some deployments in their entirety.

They start talking about what they brought with them. One mentions he has a guitar that he plans to learn while he’s here, and another says he brought a harmonica. It is not, I’m sure, that they won’t be busy with their jobs here – almost everyone is – but there is always downtime, and they’re smart, I think, to make good use of it.

I always deploy with grand thoughts of what I’ll do with my spare hours – I’ll write or learn a foreign language, I’ll take classes online or workout more. I never do them, though, or at least never to the extent that I planned when I was still in the States.

It’s like being in prison, I think. If you’ve got to be there, you might as well make use of the time as best you can. I work, a lot, but I do have free time. I write this blog, though not nearly as much as I should, and I workout, though again not nearly as much as I should.

I think sometimes that I’m just doing my time, but I don’t want to just survive this (though that is the bare minimum for a successful deployment). I certainly have learned a lot, and of course I have a job I’m proud of and which is important, but there’s always something more I could be doing, something more I could take home with me.

I’m spending an awful lot of time out here in the Middle East, and am sacrificing a lot more than just time to be here. I should strive to make the most of the opportunity presented me, away from all the distractions of home.

I’m going to ask for a piano in my next care package.

UNMANNED

(21FEB2009)

Robots are cool.

While my job only tangentially and occasionally involves robots, I have always enjoyed the opportunities I’ve had to see them in action and to learn about the many new uses the US armed forces are finding for them. A good friend of mine Stateside works on robots, and I’ve been reading Wired For War about the growth of robotics in the military.

One of the contractors who falls under my lead here works with a particular UAS, but because he’s stationed at another FOB, I rarely see him or the system. By contrast, when I was in Iraq, I worked side-by-side with a young lady working with the Hunter UAS. She and I would chat about their mission, and on a few occasions she brought me to the unit.

My favorite part, by far, was hanging out in the control room while they were flying a mission. The camera mounted on the system was beaming back live video of someone they were tracking – and the person on the ground had no idea the UAS was circling above them.

I could have stayed in there for hours, it was so damn cool.

Not all robots are aerial, of course. The Johnny-5-like robots with treads are wheeled out to investigate possible explosives, disarm them, and the like. They come with a wide variety of payloads – primarily sensors and grasping arms – and I have seen their use grow during my time with the Army as well. One could do a lot worse than to steer a career toward robots of either kind – they are undoubtedly the future of the military, in ways both obvious and as yet unknowable.

Today, I took advantage of a long-standing offer of a friend to tour a UAS hangar and control center here on Bagram. I invited Izzy, knowing that he would find it of interest, and in the hopes that he’ll remember to invite me on any field trips he has access to in the future.

While there is much about the system, the unit, and their mission I can’t discuss, suffice it to say that it was as interesting as ever. There happened to be an aircraft landing while we were there, so we saw the feed from the camera: the mountains, the surrounding town, the base. The runway got closer and closer and then we walked out to see the plane land and wheel into the hangar.

On the drive back to our hooch, the conversation hits on television and I make a comment about the poor quality of the AFN channels here. Of the 8 AFN channels I get, 2 of them are in black and white, 1 has no audio, and another has the audio offset from the video enough to make it unwatchable.

Izzy looks at me skeptically. “Mine are fine,” he says. “Have you programmed your television?”

I, of course, have not programmed my television. I fell in on the room and television and (stupidly) trusted that the previous occupant would have done so.

When I get to my room, I program the television and let it automatically search for channels, rearranging all of them and correcting the problems I’d been experiencing with AFN since, oh, August.

So as the US military grows increasingly high-tech, I needlessly watched a season of football in black & white.

AFN = Armed Forces Network
UAS = Unmanned Aerial System or Unmanned Aircraft System
FOB = Forward Operating Base

OVERNIGHT SIREN

(20FEB2009)

Last night a siren went off after midnight, warning of an attack.

Most attacks are indirect fire, usually referring to mortars which the enemy likes to pop off so that they can scoot away in the hopes of avoiding return fire.

Sirens are very rare here on Bagram. They occur far less regularly than in Balad, Iraq, where we never went more than a few days without an attack, though they were almost universally ineffective.

The siren accordingly takes me by surprise, but based on the tone of it no immediate action is required other than to hunker down. Depending on the pitch (wavering or constant), duration, and any follow-up messages from the Big Voice, we may have to put on our armor and helmets, take cover in the nearest bunker (about 15 feet from my front door), and/or call our command for accountability.

I will never learn what caused this alarm, though I’m sure if I asked around someone would know. Certainly my friend Trey in the BTN could find out – he’s shown me similar intelligence reports in the past. It would also be common knowledge if an attack were ever successful – whether causing loss of life or property damage – so usually I just wait for the intel to reach me through natural channels and assume it was nothing if I hear nothing.

It may also have been a drill, though that’s less likely.

The siren going off does remind me of how close we I live to the wire. The hesco baskets and concertina wire that separate Bagram Air Field from the rest of Afghanistan is about 20 yards from my hooch.

Izzy, who lives in the other half of the building I live in, often jokes that when people from home ask him if he needs anything, he says he wants a tennis racket so that if the bad guy throws a grenade over the wire he can return it to them.

BTN = Battalion

ONE LESS THING TO LOOK FORWARD TO

(20FEB2009)

New experiences are a rare treat, and must be savored.

We live in a very confined world in theater – while I’m lucky to travel as part of my job, I will spend the large majority of my deployment on Bagram Air Field and the world defined by its borders – approximately 8 miles in circumference. There are only so many places to go on base, a limited number of new things to do or see.

I have purposely put off doing some things just so that I’d have something to look forward to later on, some new experience when the Groundhog Day syndrome acts up and I start to go a little batty.

There is apparently a Dairy Queen on post that serves burgers and other sandwiches. Izzy goes there at least once a week; his and other testimonials insist that the food is good – it is, at least, not DFAC food. I have never been.

There is also what’s called a Foo Store on post, near where the bazaar is held on Fridays; it's the inside of a container set up as a cramped store selling electronics and bootleg DVDs.

I went to the Foo Store for the first time today.

In Iraq, we had a bazaar open 4 days a week that sold little other than bootleg DVDs. They were inexpensive, and the variety of titles was impressive. The Foo Store does not match up to my experiences in Iraq, but it’s all we’ve got.

The prices are still decent, though a bit higher than in Iraq, but the variety is very limited. They, as in Iraq, tend toward selling seasons of television shows more than individual movies. The quality of all discs is questionable, as always – sometimes they work only in computers, sometimes they are dubbed in Russian, often they are shaky-cam videos taken from a theater complete with crunching popcorn and coughing audiences, and sometimes an hour into Iron Man you’ll find yourself watching an 80’s medical melodrama (as happened to Izzy).

It’s important to note, of course, that these bootlegs are illegal. Produced in China (I’m told), they are in direct violation of the FBI warning against copyright piracy that are faithfully reproduced on the bootlegs.

I buy a few movies, in the hopes that I’ll find the time to watch them, and I cross off one more thing I won’t be able to do for the first time out here.

DFAC = Dining Facility

(ANOTHER) LUNCH CONVERSATION

(19FEB2009)

The guy who scooped food on to my lunch tray today said “good luck” when he handed it to me.

I didn’t appreciate that. It’s obvious that English is not his first language, though, so I took my tray and found a seat. I bring a book with me to meals and enjoy the escape, the break, but often find myself chatting up the people around me.

My book didn’t make it out of my pocket today.

A very chatty female AF SGT sits down across from me just as I’m settling in, and she quickly starts asking me what I do. My service tag – “RDECOM” – often elicits questions, as I am likely the only person in Afghanistan with that on my chest. The active Army all have “US ARMY” tags, and the KTRs don’t wear uniforms at all, so it’s only us civilians who offer any variety in that regard.

I tell her what I do and she tells me a little about her work, and we get to talking about traveling in Afghanistan and around the world. We’d both spent some time in Croatia, though she was serving there during the war and I was there as a student some years afterward. She tells me about her time on a small base in the outback in Australia, and I regret that my job will never take me to such locations.

We talk about other bases in Afghanistan, and she shows me on her camera some pictures from her recent trip to Kabul. I’ve heard interesting things about the bases in that city, though it will be a stretch for my efforts here to ever take me there. Most of my work involves Army vehicles and equipment being used in the fight, and Kabul is primarily an HQ, where all the high-ups and muckety-mucks are.

As much as I’d love to tour the country for curiosity’s sake, it’s not at all why I’m here. While the dangers of traveling around Afghanistan are low, they’re certainly greater than staying put in Bagram, and so every trip away has to be justified – if to no one else, than to myself.

I’ll largely stick around home (where Bagram = home), but I am glad that in the course of my work I’m able to escape from time to time for a change of pace and, more importantly, to do a better job.

AF SGT = Air Force Sergeant

RDECOM = Research, Development, Engineering Command

KTR = Contractor

SLEEPING THROUGH

(17FEB2009)

Izzy and I felt like prisoners today.

We had notices stapled to our doors the last several days indicating that two crews would be coming through all of the rooms in our housing area (“Dragon Village”) today. The announcements indicated that all rooms had to be unlocked, or the locks would be cut. We are utterly at their whim.

Still reeling a little from my trip to Kandahar a few days ago, my days and nights are not entirely square. In anticipation of people needing into my room, though, I set my alarm for early, wake and put my uniform on, and then lie in bed with the lights off.

It’s always surprising to me what a person can be attuned to when one needs to be. Though exhausted and, I think, in a deep sleep at times, a knocking noise several hooches down wakes me up. I hear the crunch of the gravel as the team nears my room, and open the door before they lock.

It’s a team of KTRs who are inspecting the rooms for electrical issues. They need to access all of the outlets in my room, so I move my bed and several boxes as they climb around, one of them on a ladder as he takes apart my overhead light.

They find nothing against code, though they add a ground to my light switch, and I bid them farewell as I lie down again, still in uniform, and still on guard for the next group.

Some time later, I hear a knock on Izzy’s door and I get up, waiting for them to come around to my side of the building. After several minutes, I just walk around to Izzy’s room and he tells me they were just taking inventory of who was in each room, and he accounted for me, so we were done.

I had a few hours to kill before a meeting, so I crawl into bed and really sleep this time, getting in some good rapid eye movement and attuned only to the alarm on my watch.

I learn later that there was an enormous explosion while I slept, though we never learn if it was a controlled detonation, an attack, or something else. Izzy says it rocked our hooch, and our colleagues on the other side of post say it was even thunderous over there.

I slept through it.

KTR = Contractor

TASTES LIKE VALENTINE'S DAY

(14FEB2009)

I completely forgot it was Valentine’s Day.

Being single and in Afghanistan (though not necessarily in that order), the day doesn’t mean a lot to me, though I’d have thought I’d at least take note of it.

I don’t notice it today until I walk into the chow hall and see an improved dinner fare – ham, roast beef, a turkey carving station, and stuffing with, of course, gravy. They also have a shrimp dish which is a first – they’re the smallest shrimp I’ve ever seen, but I credit a dish considerably just for being different at this point.

The fact that it was edible only adds to its allure.

THE LONG, DRAWN-OUT PAIN OF WAITING

(12-14FEB2009)

I move into the APOD at Kandahar Thursday night.

I have all of my belongings with me; my rucksack, my body armor and helmet, and a large pelican case I’d brought with me in which I’d planned to carry the equipment we were unable to locate. I pile everything into a corner, next to a bookcase filled with romance novels and foreign fashion magazines.

We often talk about the travails of traveling in Afghanistan, and a common conclusion is that if you really want to get somewhere, you have to move into the APOD and not leave until you’re on a plane.

I really want to get back to Bagram.

The APOD consists of banks of metal airport chairs, a small kiosk that sells snacks (which is open for about 2 hours each day), and the flight desk. There is a large, flat-screen television on each side of the APOD; one showing foreign music videos, the other a British news channel (not the BBC). A screen above the flight desk shows the flights scheduled for the next 12 hours or so.

There is one flight Thursday night that quickly falls off the board: CANCELLED.

With no more flights listed, I settle into a chair, my feet up on my bags, and dig into a book. A number of people hunker down around me and it doesn’t take long to learn who’s also trying to get to Bagram.

Waiting for a flight is something of an equalizer in theater. I become friends with a SFC, a LTC, a USN CPT and her MCPO, all of whom are in the same boat as me. Throughout the night one or another of us will check the board, speak to the AF personnel running the show or otherwise gather intel and rumor, and report back to the rest of us.

The hours roll by.

We have the familiar conversations about where we’re from in the States, our family, our jobs. I learn the names of my companions’ children and when they ask me if I have kids I say “I might by the time we catch a flight out of here.”

I catch a few hours of sleep in my sleeping bag on the cold, concrete floor of the APOD. Some of my new friends curl up on the chairs. None of us sleep well.

Two posted flights for Friday morning are cancelled and we learn there’s “weather” in Bagram. A few of my fellow travelers disappear, to get sleep in a real bed, but most of us don’t want to risk missing a flight. We sit tight.

The APOD has a box of what passes for meals – plastic bags with a piece of fruit, a largely inedible egg salad or turkey sandwich, and a candy bar. The bags are all ripped open and the candy bars removed by the time I discover they’re there. I can’t stomach the sandwich.

More flights for Bagram are cancelled throughout the day.

We while the day away reading, chatting, and watching the televisions like zombies. I see countless music videos for bands I’ve never heard of, and hear the same news reports over and over and over: the plane crash in upstate NY leads most broadcasts, but the 12-year old boy who fathered a child in Britain gets much more time.

Around 2100 Friday night we make roll call for a flight to Bagram. We’re equal parts ecstatic and exhausted. I gather my belongings and join the rest of the passengers near the rear of the APOD, waiting to put my body armor on until right before we’re led out to the airplane.

We board around 2330, and take every available seat on the C-130. These flights are uncomfortable in the best of conditions, but being sardined in makes it much worse. Pallets of luggage, gear, equipment, and supplies bound for Bagram are loaded in after us; they’re rolled right up next to the seating area.

I try to ignore the mounting discomfort of not being able to move my legs as the plane takes off. We sit shoulder to shoulder, and the facing seats are so close, we have to interlock our legs and knees. The worst of it, for me, is not being able to move my feet – I hate that. The roar of the engines is thunderous even through the ear plugs we all wear. Lights are turned off on board flights in theater – for safety – and I try to sleep.

The flight is longer than usual, and we set down around 0100.

As the engines die down, a few murmured questions flitter around the cabin, I see a member of the crew make a circle in the air with one finger, and I hear the word “Kandahar” repeated in disgust and disbelief.

We turned around. We’re back in Kandahar.

Bagram was snowed in so we flew there, circled for a time in the hopes it would clear, and then returned to Kandahar. We stumble into the APOD, dejected.

Having had little more than scraps in the last 24 hours, I walk up to the Pizza Hut with a new buddy of mine, a LTC who works with my BDE CDR in Bagram. We bring our food back to the APOD and each eat a small pizza watching the news and lamenting our misfortune.

I sleep on the cold concrete again.

Battered and crestfallen, I emerge from my sleeping bag when my pizza buddy wakes me. He says we have just enough time to make it up to the Tim Horton's and back before the next showtime for a flight to Bagram. I'm not a coffee-drinker as a rule, but I gulp it down this morning and appreciate its efforts to make me feel human again.

The donut is dry. The flight is canceleld.

I stumble and mumble through the morning in a bit of a fog, but decide to escape for lunch with my USN friends traveling together, a CPT and her MCPO. It turns out the CPT is in charge of all sailors in theater – at least administratively, if not operationally (we call that ADCON and OPCON, respectively).

I don’t care for the DFACs in Kandahar. The food is just a little off, owing to the international bent of the populace at this NATO base. I get a burger, figuring they can’t do too much wrong with that (though the buns are odd), some onion rings, and a Coke.

As we’re eating and chatting, I notice the onion rings don’t taste quite right. The CPT gives me a look as she takes a bite out of one. We put them down and look at them, and I see the realization on her face just as I figure it out. They’re not onion rings. It’s calamari.

Weird.

We’re back in the APOD for about an hour after lunch when the flight desk announces a flight to Bagram. This despite no such flight being listed on the board. There’s a mad rush to get a seat but as it turns out, so many people had trusted the board and left that there are more seats than passengers.

We board within an hour and the flight is uneventful. I even have an empty seat next to me, a rare treat. I offer to take a guy’s bag from down the way, and I put it in the seat next to me, leaning on it as I doze.

When we land, I’m extra wary of getting my hopes up, and don’t trust that I’ve arrived “home” until we exit the bird and I see the familiar buildings around the airfield and the mountains in the distance. The snow piled around the runway is the reason for my delayed return.

I check in and walk down to my room, trying to decide on the way if I should shower or sleep first. I enter my room and fall asleep before making up my mind.

APOD = Arial Port of Debarkation
SFC = Sergeant First Class
LTC = Lieutenant Colonel
USN CPT = United States Navy Captain
MCPO = Master Chief Petty Officer
AF = Air Force
BDE CDR = Brigade Commander
ADCON = Administrative Control
OPCON = Operational Control
DFAC = Dining Facility
NATO = North Atlantic Treaty Organization

RETURN TO KANDAHAR

(11-12FEB2009)

This was not my favorite trip away from Bagram.

For one thing, I’d been to Kandahar before and so the novelty of visiting somewhere new wasn’t there for this trip. I get to get out of Bagram, and I’m always grateful for the change of scenery, but this trip offered little else to recommend it. I wasn’t terribly impressed with KAF the first time anyhow.

I get down to Kandahar jumping through the normal sets of hoops. There are waiting lists, plenty of

waiting, a few flights with not enough (or no) seats, wasted trips to the APOD, and hours sitting in a cramped area with other miserable travelers.

By the time I’m given a seat, I’m grateful to put on my body armor and Kevlar (helmet), get squeezed onto a C-130, and treated as cargo, so long as I’m delivered to my destination.

Rich picks me up form the APOD in KAF, but it’s too late to complete my work, so we retire to his office and living quarters. We catch up before I take a familiar spot on the air mattress we set up on the floor of his office, my feet beneath a chair, my head under his desk.

Traveling in theater always wears me out, and I sleep like a rock.

Rich doesn’t wake me in the morning, and I sleep a little late, but after a quick tooth-brushing I’m ready to get to work and hopefully get back to Bagram, which I inevitably and disturbingly refer to as ‘home’ more than once.

I’ve made this trip for the sole purpose of getting hands-on a vehicle we’ve been seeking for months. It finally turned up in Kandahar, and now I need to get to it, and remove a piece of equipment my colleagues installed on it in the autumn of 2007.

It’s raining lightly when we pull into the boneyard, a gravel lot fenced in and out of view that holds primarily battle-damaged vehicles like the one I’m looking for. They’re a familiar view for me, as my job brings me into these types of lots a fair amount, and I don’t stop to think about all of the destruction I see or what it probably meant for the people in the vehicles when it occurred.

We find the vehicle I’m looking for, an M916 line haul truck, sort of like a big rig, up against one of the fences, the engine and front tires violently absent. The driver’s side windshield is missing, too, but it looks like it was removed purposefully, probably by a unit that needed it as a replacement part for another vehicle.

Rich knows the unit who owns the truck, and he tells me nobody was hurt in the explosion. It makes sense. I’ve seen a lot worse, and the cab is untouched.

I scramble around the vehicle for a few minutes, the light rain adding up the equivalent of a heavy rain the longer I’m in it. I’m looking for a box we attached to the vehicle, but it’s not where I thought it would be. I check a few other locations. No box.

It doesn’t take long to realize that somebody’s made a mistake, and Rich soon points out that the number painted on the

bumper is not at all the number we’re looking for. We’re looking for 446. This is 447.

We look around the yard a little, but our vehicle isn’t there. It never was. We drive over to the TOC of the owning unit and ask them about the vehicle we need. We tell them what we saw in the boneyard, they make some phone calls, and then excuses.

Turns out they reported the wrong vehicle as damaged and deadlined, and they’d been reporting it that way for weeks.

The vehicle I need is still out there. Somewhere. I flew down here for no reason.

Exasperated, I ask Rich to drive me to the APOD to check on flights. It’s mid-afternoon and there’s nothing until after 1900, so we’ve got some time to kill. I let Rich get some work done; he lends me his vehicle and I drive around post aimlessly and see nothing I don’t see on every other military base.

I suggest we go to the Dutch restaurant for dinner, for a change of pace from the DFAC. Despite my offer of paying for grub, Rich gets only a coffee while I order a “meat plate” sampler, which turns out to be hit-and-miss.

Standing in line, I recognize a MAJ behind us from Bagram, and we chat for a few minutes until our food comes. We invite him to join us for dinner, he initially declines, but then changes his mind when he can’t find another seat. As it turns out, it’s his birthday and he celebrates by ordering what passes for a milkshake with his own meat plate. He is not impressed with the milkshake.

We take out time eating and talking about the States, our families, home. We go through the usual litany of questions: where from, how long, married, how many, etc etc.

As the months have gone by and I find myself in the chewy middle of my deployment, I find that I have been here longer than most people I meet, and likewise have longer yet to be here because my deployment is so darn long.

Rich drives me back to the APOD and I bring all my belongings inside, piling them in a corner next to a bookshelf of foreign fashion magazines. He asks me to call him if I don’t make it out tonight, but I tell him I’m in it for the long haul and that I’m not leaving the APOD until I get on a flight to Bagram.

While this would ultimately prove to be a winning strategy, success would not come swiftly….

KAF = Kandahar Air Field

APOD = Arial Port of Debarkation

TOC = Tactical Operations Center

DFAC = Dining Facility

MAJ = Major

MOUNTAINS AND CLOUDS

(10FEB2009)

Checking the mountains has become a force a habit.

I think we all do it, naturally. We note changes in the lines of snow, how visible they are through the clouds, the dust, or the dark. Sometimes they’re so crisp I can see the smallest crags and ridges, and if it’s clear in the late afternoon the shadows fall so starkly.

Today the clouds were bunched up against the mountains north of post, and were well-defined against the blue sky. Normally they’re just diffuse and obscuring, making today’s puffy distinctness stand out.

I’ve been here a little more than 5 months and I’m not sick of the mountains yet.

LADIES, DANCING AND OTHERWISE

(09FEB2009)

The short order line at the DFAC is serving (what passes for) Philly Cheese Steak.

It’s one of the few things they prepare passably here, and it’s my lunch. I eat about half of my meals by myself, and I’m alone for lunch today. I find an empty spot at a table and put my tray down, then grab a cup of the chocolate iced coffee – it’s delicious, and is my chief vice out here.

I chow and read, enjoying the escape from the emails and computer screen.

As I’m finishing up, a line of 5 or 6 women walk past my seat. They appear to be locals – Afghanis – with traditional coverings; not the burkas common in Kuwait, but head-scarves and flowing gowns of deep reds and browns. They’re all middle-aged, walking purposefully, even pridefully. They have purses, something I hadn’t realized was rare on post until just now, and the each have a blue security tag clipped to the front of their gowns to identify them: VIP.

I wonder who they are.

After lunch, I get with my colleague Izzy and we have one of our now-typical conversations which is mostly work-related, but invariably also about movies, family, home, food, and the weather. There is much swearing, just in the course of conversation, and though I always note it, I never stop myself from slipping into it. Izzy’s the same way.

Whereas I’m the government lead in Afghanistan for our mission, Izzy is the contractor lead, and we work hand-in-hand on any issue related to the other contractors we oversee. It’s good to have someone to bounce ideas off of, and we almost always see eye-to-eye.

We live right next door to each other and if the weather is bearable we hold our meetings standing in the gravel outside one of our rooms. Otherwise, one of us will stand just inside the doorway of the other, not wanting to invade too far into what is the other’s compact area of privacy.

Today as we stand just outside my front door, Izzy reminds me that there’s a show at the MWR tonight – a dance troupe he’d seen fliers for several days ago. I saw the same thing at the gym last night, though it wasn’t at all clear what the show is. The flier just had headshots of 5 smiling women.

We agree that we’ll be attending this show at 2000 tonight, because there are no dancing women in either of our rooms.

Just after 1730 we head up to the APOD so that I can put my name on the waiting list for a flight to Kandahar. I have a short mission down there, and would like to leave on Wednesday. They will hold your name on the stand-by list for 72 hours, so we try to plan ahead and get on the list 3 days in advance of when we want to depart.

I’ve heard some horror stories about getting back from Kandahar to Bagram recently, but am hoping they’ve corrected that, as my mission really shouldn’t take more than a few hours and I’d hate to get stuck down there where I can’t adequately do my job.

After I’m all checked in, Izzy and I head over to the DFAC where the best I can come up with for dinner is another Philly Cheese Steak sandwich. Izzy gets the breaded pork chops, which for some reason always look better to me once someone else is eating them than they do sitting in the serving tray.

We chat about the normal topics, perhaps a bit more about his 5 kids at home than usual. I tell him about the 1LT I met last week who was jumpy at dinner – a little shell-shocked; Izzy nodded along. Izzy had hunted IEDs in Iraq and had been hit a few times, and says that loud noises got him for a while, and he also didn’t like the dark for a long time after his deployment – every time he got hit with an IED was at night, he says.

Izzy tells me something I’ve heard a few times as well, that it’s difficult to turn off the ultra-awareness and suspicion that can keep you alive in a war zone. He remembers driving in the States and seeing a car come suddenly out of a side street and having the distinct and sudden thought that it was a VBIED.

Even here, where we are extremely safe (I tell my parents, over and over), Izzy is suspicious of vehicles that don’t have windows – vans or large trucks. There are a couple that park just next to our hooch (what Izzy calls “the condo”), and he always points them out to me: “I don’t like that. They could have anything in there.”

After chow, we kill a little time in our respective rooms and head up to the MWR tent a little before 2000, planning to get good seats for whatever this show might be.

We are neither of us surprised to see that the show is cancelled.

DFAC = Dining Facility
MWR = Morale, Welfare, and Recreation
APOD = Aerial Port of Debarkation
1LT = First Lieutenant
IED = Improvised Explosive Device
VBIED = Vehicle Borne Improvised Explosive Device

WELCOME BACK, EDDIE

(08FEB2009)

Our colleague Eddie had been on R&R for a few weeks.

Since he normally works in Sharana, though, his absence wasn’t obvious at all times and the weeks slipped by fairly quickly – for us, at least, and probably even more quickly for him. (It’s one of my fears that my own R&R in June will pass too quickly.)

He returned today, coming through Bagram because it’s a major port of entry/exit. He’ll catch a flight down to Sharana in the next few days.

I first see him when he visits Izzy next door, and I welcome him back.

Eddie is on a 3 to 5 year plan, with financial goals he wants to meet in that time, and I believe he intends to retire when he goes home for good – or at least have the freedom to work as and where he likes. This trip home was one of many short little jaunts he’ll make Stateside in the next few years.

I ask him if he had any particularly good meals when he was home. Food is a fairly consistent topic of conversation out here, and Izzy and I (as Alex and I before) talk about favorite meals, restaurants, and food we miss.

Eddie completely lets me down by not being forthcoming about any great grub he experienced back home.

He does relate the story of seeing his son (aged 11, I think) again. Eddie didn’t tell him he was coming, and his family was at church when he drove into town, so Eddie went straight there, sneaking in the back. Their pastor was walking along the aisle while giving his sermon and when he saw Eddie he continued on to the back and they greeted each other warmly.

Eddie said “Good to see you, pastor” which was picked up by the microphone, and when Eddie’s son heard his father’s voice he bolted out of his seat and ran to hug him.

It cannot be easy to be that age and have your father be away for as long as Eddie is planning on being away. Eddie says they spoke at length about it before he decided to come over here, and says that his son understands enough about finances to know how and why they made this decision – and what they gain by being over here.

With the economy the way it is, deployments to the Middle East are still a great way to make a lot of money. There are sacrifices to be made in doing so, of course, the separation from family being primary among them.

Eddie seems to know what he’s doing, though, and like so many others he’s here to do a job as a means to an end. It’s just a really long means is all.

R&R = Rest & Relaxation

HOOAH

(07FEB2009)

The Army phrase “Hooah” (usually pronounced “HOO-uh”) is a catch all affirmative.

Some soldiers use it more often than others. I use it very sparingly, and almost never on purpose.

I’m walking among the Battalion office containers today when I end up walking with the BTN CDR. We know each other from a number of meetings we both regularly attend, and once months ago he joined me for lunch. I wouldn’t call him a friend by any means, but he’s a good enough guy and has been helpful when I needed him to be.

He uses “Hooah” more than anyone else I regularly encounter.

He nods greeting as I fall in step with him.
Me: How are you, sir?
LTC M: Hooah.

90% of the time, that’s the exact extent and content of our interaction.

Me: You heading over to S-6?
LTC M: Hooah.
Me: Have a good day, sir.
LTC M: Hooah.

If aliens wanted to take over someone and not have to learn our language or customs, they could have much worse plans than to infest my BTN CDR and simply be able to say Hooah. I bet they could get away with it for months.

I split ways with him when we get to the S-6, which is where I check my classified email account. After he leaves I share a laugh with my buddy who works in there, as he knows exactly what I’m talking about regarding LTC M’s penchant.

I start to compare it to the word smurf, which the cartoon Smurfs use to mean any variety of things depending on context, but the word Hooah is not quite so versatile as that. Generally it just means ‘yes’ or ‘affirmative’, though I also often hear it as a means of sounding off during roll calls, or just in general agreement.

The other manner I frequently hear it is in a call-and-response during a meeting, when the person speaking wants to make sure everyone understands. One of the MAJs I work with does that a lot.

MAJ B: We’re going to go through this again, so that everyone understands the process. Hooah?
ALL: Hooah!

The other services have their own similar phrases, I believe. I know the Marines have oorah, though I’ve only heard that once out here, partly owing to the scarcity of Marines in my region and partly due, I think, to the fact that they don’t use it nearly as often.

Personally, I always feel a little weird saying Hooah. It’s more for the soldiers, I think, and I’m sensitive to the perception that I’m ‘playing soldier’ out here. I never joined the military (for many reasons), and I don’t pretend I’m a soldier now. I wear a uniform because I have to, though I am proud of it and the fact that I volunteered to be here.

The soldiers sacrifice a lot more doing what they do, and most of them put themselves in danger I’ll never experience. I went through a fairly intensive course with a number of soldiers and other civilians several years ago. We studied and worked on projects together, and we formed friendships that have lasted years. When one of the girls in my class asked if she was “allowed” to say Hooah, the soldiers laughed and told her they guessed she’d earned it.

I’ll respond to Hooah? with Hooah! and not feel bad about it.

BTN CDR = Battalion Commander
LTC = Lieutenant Colonel
MAJ = Major

KIWI MOVIE NIGHT

(06FEB2009)

I’m walking to the latrine tonight when I see that the Kiwis were watching a movie, projected onto a board they’d painted white and hung on the side of a conex just next to their quarters.

They’ve done this a couple of times, and I always enjoy seeing units doing something – anything – to relax. Before it got and stayed cold, soldiers living in huts nearby would barbecue on Saturday nights, set up a screen and play video games.

There are a few basketball courts spread around post, and a sand volleyball court next to the gym. They’d all get use when it was warmer, and I assume they will again. The cold winter is keeping everyone cooped up.

It’s cold tonight, but I think I’ve seen space heaters on the Kiwi deck, and I assume they’re in use tonight. I get closer to see if I can identify the movie, but when I hear the thick New Zealand accents of the actors, I’m convinced I’ll have no idea.

I don’t want to walk in front of their movie, so I change direction and head to the port-a-johns that are actually closet to my hooch, but in generally more disgusting condition.

EVER HEAR THE RAIN

(03FEB2009)

The rain washes against the tin roof of my hooch.

It can be soothing sometimes, and I admit I like falling to sleep in my darkened little room – closed off to the rest of Afghanistan – with the only sound being that rain. Well, the rain and the occasional jet, cargo plane, helicopter, garbage truck, practice munitions, planned detonations of enemy explosives, foreign nationals yelling unintelligibly on the telephone, and the amplified calls to prayer from the neighboring Afghani town.

But mostly I like the rain.

Tonight it’s really coming down and from inside my room, even without windows, I can tell exactly how strong it is. It seems the perfect night to just work at my computer before crawling into bed with a book, perhaps seeing what’s on television. I would also, however, like to eat dinner.

Dinner is at the DFAC, a 10 minute walk through the pouring rain and deep puddles. I consider not having dinner, though of course I have no food in my room and don’t relish going to bed hungry. Relish makes me want a hot dog, which they have at the chow hall.

Luckily, the dining hours for dinner are from 1700-2100, and within a couple of hours the rain lets up. I quickly put on my boots, knock on my neighbor’s door, and we slosh our way up to dinner and back – I end up getting a Philly Cheese Steak sandwich, one of the things the DFAC prepares reasonably well. Having never lived in Philadelphia, my standards may be too low in this regard, as they are undoubtedly too high for seafood due to my growing up in New England.

Izzy and I make it back to our rooms just minutes before it starts to pour again, having timed our dinner just about perfectly.

It is definitely something I had to get used to out here – being dependent on the meal hours and location of a DFAC for your meals. It’s hard to complain about free and abundant food, of course, but our hours don’t always match the standard 3-meal a day schedule. They try to be flexible, having a ‘midnight chow’ from 2330–0100, and that definitely helps.

Until recently, I didn’t keep any snacks in my room, but Izzy would always pick something up when we would swing by the PX, and I have taken to following his lead. A bag of chips or some crackers go a long way to cutting the edge off of waiting for the chow hall to open – or filling those long hours overnight working until 0400. They also serve as a backup for the many times I miss a meal.

The DFAC has some snacks as well, and it’s common to see soldiers filling the pockets of their uniforms with something to eat on mission, or back in their room.

I do that, too, but no matter how many breakfast bars, chili-flavored potato chips, or bags of Famous Amos cookies I have, sometimes I just want a hot dog.

Sometimes you just have to walk through the rain to get what you want.

DFAC = Dining Facility
PX = Post Exchange