My past, our future, and the Shadow Mayor.

     In the time since my last blog post, I've turned 27, my third birthday celebrated on a deployment, along with my 23rd, and 25th; have continued to partake in a weekly tradition for Friday nights around Camp Vance, and found out some great news about my future.  In local news and weather, the air temperature recently has significantly dropped-we're in the mid-20s at night and the upper 30s during the day-I think it might almost be time to unpack some of my still stuffed-in-a-hurry seabags from NIACT/Fort Jackson to find my Army issued winter jacket-the kind that comes issued new in the manufactures packaging already smelling foul, one of those where the quality assurance tag should read, "Vomited in by Number 7 ."
     Having served greater than 30-consecutive days boots-on-ground in Afghanistan, I'm now legally entitled to government recognition and future benefits as a veteran of Operation Enduring Freedom.  Though I'm already a documented Iraq Campaign veteran, this increases (doubles) the potential for future benefits later in life, both from the Veteran's Administration-but also less well known things like scholarship funds for my future children, etc.  I have also been awarded the Afghan Campaign Medal (with campaign star),  and NATO Service Medal for participation in the ISAF mission. 


     Great news came late last week in email.  One of the biggest benefits of volunteering to come out to Afghanistan was that I'd be granted what the Navy calls "one-on-one" detailing-where I'd get to communicate in person my desires for my follow on post-deployment assignment and get preferential consideration in the assignment process, rather than being thrown in to the pot with the masses of junior officers scheduled to rotate from their current duty station during the same fiscal quarter.  Duty assignments, as it turns out, are as much a money thing for the Navy as a man-power concern.  The reported cost to the government for moving an officer with dependents is around $10,000 per move, so the Navy's Bureau of Personnel can only release new orders in bulk as the earmarked funds become available, parcelled out by quarterly budgeting.  Therefore, unless granted one-on-one status, I'd be competing against 25% (one fiscal quarter's worth) of all other Surface Warfare qualified LT's rotating to a shore duty.
     Amanda and I drafted a grand strategy awhile back, a sort of contract to each other-listing three potential courses of action for our future goals including: work, education, location and timing, and even signed our names to it to make it official.  The ideal course of action, we agreed, would be to leave Virginia Beach and move on to a better location during my shore tour.  Annapolis, we also agreed-would be a great duty station; she could be close to family-I could get back into sailing and could teach at my Alma mater and share some accrued wisdom/hard lessons learned/war stories with some aspiring Midshipmen as well as both of us could attend school; Amanda for her RN license, and a Master's degree for me. 
     Last week, I submitted my shore tour request through one-on-one detailing, and just a few days later, I received the response: Selected as Naval Leadership Instructor, department of Professional Development, US Naval Academy, report date on or about July 1, 2012.  So that's that.  Annapolis bound!  Party on, Wayne; Party on, Garth.

     Rapidly becoming a weekly tradition at Camp Vance, Bagram, Friday nights are the Camp's cigar night.  Really, quite a nice social break from the break-neck pace of work, it's affords a chance to relax around a roaring fire, fueled by stacked wooden forklift pallets.  Weekly, the same familiar faces are always there-nearly forty or fifty folks of all different ranks and services-and our numbers are growing each week, socializing without regard to rank.  It's too dark to really see rank insignia, and it doesn't really matter out there.  It has a 'Cheers' type atmosphere; everybody knows you're name, and they're always glad you came.  I've got a humidor here that gets some pretty good use as the H. Upmann Petit Corona cigar (JFK's, a former fellow Navy patrol boat officer; PT 109), brand and size of choice) makes for a great gift in return for professional favors rendered and in recognition of a job well done, as well as being stocked with the Montecristo #3, my personal favorite.  This weekly event, not officially sanctioned by the command, is hosted by a character known as the 'Camp Vance Shadow Mayor,' in sarcastic homage to the Camp's Mayor (the Army's term for the ground support battalion's officer-in-charge of sanitation and public works) and 'Shadow'-a term always used in intelligence briefings to describe the Taliban's non-recognized parallel government establishment in each region, as in, "The Shadow Governor of Such and Such Provence."  I'm not a fan of the Taliban by any means... but I am a fan of my Friday night cigar.  Long live the Shadow Mayor of Camp Vance.

Insurgents, Insults, Idolatry.

I do realize it's been some time since my last post; there are mainly two reasons: some days are too busy to commit the time to write, other days are so slow I figure no one would want to read about what I'm doing in the first place.  In the time since my last post, I've gotten a permanent place to live, moved into my new office, been attacked three separate times by Taliban mortars and rockets, oddly enough, even right now-while I write this, the indirect fire alarm just sounded telling us to put on our Kevlar vests and helmets in anticipation of another night time raid.  I've also started doing work in earnest for my new bosses and have already butted heads with the immovable object: Army culture.

My living quarters, my CHU (Containerized Housing Unit, pronounced as 'Choo'), is literally just that-an electrified, corrugated steel shipping container, prefabricated with an artificial wood floor, a hand made wooden door on hinges, and a small air conditioner.  I share this space with two others; an Army Second Lieutenant and an Afghan translator with an obviously anglicized name, "Sam."  The Army officer works the night shift in the personnel office, so I generally never see him-the Afghan and I share the same schedule.  Our small space is subdivided with plywood walls, actually affording some semblance of a private space.  This space, though small-is still luxurious and vast compared to the small coffin and blue curtain combination I was afforded living on a very small Navy ship on prior deployments.  I'm happy and appreciative for the space I do have.   The greater base outside the walls of our monastic camp is rather chaotic, dirty, and bleak, and there are few reasons to venture beyond our own camp's walls.  I've been forced to work outside the camp just enough to understand the jokes on the unofficial humor site for Bagram Airbase: http://www.ilovebagram.com .  Check out the site from time to time, it updates daily with reader submitted posts about life here.

I've developed somewhat of a daily routine; the work schedule is predictable mostly, with the occasional very late night or very early morning, but its nothing that I can't handle.  I'm assigned to the headquarters staff for the Special Operations Task Force; my boss, essentially the Executive Officer is a SEAL Commander (Navy) and the big boss is an Army Special Forces Colonel, a la "Apocalypse Now" (replace Mekong River delta for Hindu Kush mountains).  It's a rather interesting community of Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines and even a few Afghans that live and work on the camp, supposedly a "Joint" command, but Joint, as my boss explained to me, is really just a nice way of saying "Army led."

Some of the things I've been trying to learn are the nuances of the Army culture here; some are standard practice Army, some are unique to the Special Forces community. I haven't been around long enough to know which is which and which customs are neither, just the habit of a bunch of dudes sitting around in Afghanistan that over time became the new standard.  The Army's customary etiquette is truly different from the Navy's, as both services have clearly developed individually in parallel vacuums.  The Army's reverence for certain positional authority rather than based on rank is totally contrary to the way the [surface] Navy does business. 
The Navy for example considers the Executive Officer (the second highest ranking officer at a command) as truly the second in command; here at least, it seems as if the Command Sergeant Major (CSM), the senior most enlisted man, is the second in command, and all must pay deference to him save the unit commander himself.  The Navy certainly respects the wisdom and judgement of the CSM's equivalent, the Navy's Command Master Chief (CMC), but in the end, the Commanding Officer might as well be God and its just understood and unquestioned that the Executive Officer is his prophet.  There are no other intermediaries and idolatry of other ranks is strictly forbidden. Things are different here; all difference of course in the nuances, but the nuances in life often are where the rubber meets the roadkill.


I've had the opportunity to get to know many Army officers that work here-within about two minutes of introduction, they all want to immediately point out to me the differences between our two services.  Each will inevitably say-as if somewhere in their Oath of Office, they raised their right hand and vowed, when meeting a Naval Officer, to robotically spew forth a tired reiteration of, "The Navy cares more about things and equipment and the Army cares more about its people," as they simultaneously strike a triumphant Washington-crossing-the-Delaware pose, look around over their shoulders and anticipate an eavesdropping peer to second their droning with a jovial toast, "Here here!"

I often stop and wonder why they all seem to think this, considering most know almost nothing about what I do in my real job, when I'm not filling a billet here the Army has either decided it can't do or won't do, as well as why they say this, and further more, are they actually fundamentally correct in the verbal spar? 

I have most certainly decided they are wrong-and not just out of simple parochial loyalty to my Naval Service.  Our machines work because our sailors work to make them go.  No sailor will do his job correctly if he's not having his basic needs met.  I'm not Superman, most days I don't bring my red cape aboard the ship with me, and I don't intend to climb the pulpit steps and preach a lesson on Maslow's Hierarchy Theory of Leadership-but it should suffice to say engines simply don't get repaired, courses don't got plotted on charts, and guns don't get cleaned if a sailor comes to work every day from a home where he can't pay his credit card bill to afford diapers for his child, his wife is cheating on him with his brother, he's got a court date for his second DUI in two weeks, or the filling fell out of molar while he was chewing on a pen during a meeting. 

A ship cannot sail itself, nor has any sailor that's ever been in my charge been neglected of my attention and care, in all matters of personal life: family planning, drug & alcohol counseling, financial planning, college education, career advancement, etc.  The list goes on.  I've been the one who brought my sailors a Thanksgiving turkey to feed his family, and I've been the first one to visit in the hospital when their children were born; I've been sitting side-by-side across from the loan officer at the bank, I've been to court houses, jail houses, MADD meetings, mortgage closings and doctors appointments.  But still as the record tells, supposedly only in the Army can an officer care about his enlisted man.

Not all is lost; the days do seem to go by quickly here, once a firm routine is established, I think now its mostly its a matter of keeping my head down; perhaps the rockets, mortars, insults, and time will simply fly right by.

Bagram bound.

After about four days of theater in-processing in Kuwait, I was loaded onto a bus and driven to a very large joint Army-Air Force logistics base quite literally in the middle of nowhere, sandwiched between the vast sand dunes and a herd of wild camels.  The practice of good Operational Security (OPSEC) does not allow me to name the exact base or location, but needless to say, the base was crowded and dirty.  Trash tumbleweeds bounced end over end down the alleys and sheets of sand were drifting across the broken slabs of packed crushed stones and mortar that made up the few marked roads on the base.  People were hustling in all different directions carrying bags and body armor; some were headed to or from Iraq, others to Afghanistan, and others still to parts of Europe or on to the United States.  Flights from this airport are all military transport and cargo craft.  

There were probably more civilian contractors waiting for flights than military personnel; most of these are easily identifiable by the same ridiculous de facto uniform: tan, suede desert combat boots, rip-stop tan cargo pants, a dark polo shirt with all the buttons undone, and a company id badge swinging from there neck on a lanyard.  Additionally, almost all of them have a goatee and black polarized Oakley sunglasses.  If you can imagine a whole drone army made of carbon-copy replicons of this purely stereotypical, but also true-to-life, very accurate phenotype; that’s what’s running around in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan, each making well north of $200k a year, fighting America’s wars on behalf of the US taxpayer’s wallet.  This is most likely why America is broke; but I digress…

The base in Kuwait was sprawling with military passengers and cargo traveling every which way.  Flights more often than not run late, or sometimes, not at all.  Flights are cancelled, re-routed, reprioritized or simply delayed for no other reason than the local national driving the bus to and from the tarmac to the terminal wants to stop and smoke a cigarette half way down the aircraft taxi-ramp.  As many travelers are denied their assumed seat on any number of flights, there are literally people who live in tents at the airport waiting, upwards of a week, for a flight with an available seat to take them to their next stop.  To accommodate these stranded travelers, a shanty town of hundreds of tents was erected by the Army; upwards of twelve strangers to a tent, underneath the parachute-cord braces that barely hold down the raggedy, wind torn, sand  and dust covered shelters.  I stood in awe watching one groan under the strain of a gust of wind.  In the back of my mind, I think I was secretly hoping for that Mary Poppins moment when the ground stakes would break off and the whole thing would be swept away to some magical Arab land of Oz.

My flight was cancelled.  I was facing the horror of being stuck in that place for an undermined amount of time, possibly sitting in this traveler’s purgatory/refugee camp for a few days.  As I was both cursing the Air Force and simultaneously trying to convince myself that spending a week there would only make a more resilient person in the long run, thankfully a new flight was added in the late evening and my name was on the flight manifest. 

Mashed into the body of a military cargo plane, lost in an amoeba of sand and mud colored uniforms, only broken by the occasional unbuttoned polo shirt clad contractor, we made the three and a half hour flight from the Kuwaiti desert to Bagram, Afghanistan.  The flight, as the crow flies, should only be a little over an hour, but Iran sits dead square in the flight path, and as they do not allow overflight of US military aircraft, the flight had to take a rather lengthy, circuitous route to its destination.  The wheels touched down to a hazy, cloudy night in the very early morning hours.  After getting my bags off a pallet in the receiving passenger terminal, my command sponsor met me and took me back to my quarters on a small, rather secluded part of the base.  Still partially on east coast time, partially on Kuwaiti time and in a strange new place, I found it nearly impossible for the remainder of that night-as well as the next day, and still the day following to fall asleep and stay there.  As it was still very dark in the mountains (Bagram sits in a small mountain valley in the Hindu Kush mountains in Parwan Provence, northeast Afghanistan at about six-thousand foot altitude, surrounded by snowcapped, towering mountains soaring to over twenty thousand feet),  I could see almost nothing-but hear and smell almost everything in a twisted, compensatory quid-pro-quo.  Strange screams of darkened combat aircraft taking off into the night from the flight line, smells of evergreen trees artfully blended with the waft of fermenting garbage, and the sounds of large diesel trucks crunching over loose gravel made the first nights long and the daylight hours longer still-trying to absorb all the instructions of my new bosses and learn enough of my job to stand on my own feet before my sponsor leaves for home and, all with a mild case of altitude sickness and sleep-deprived bloodshot eyes.

Thoughts on Kuwait.

Having arrived early yesterday morning in Kuwait, following a flight from Columbia, and a stop-over in Fort Drum, NY and Germany, I've got a little down time to reflect.  We flew on a chartered 767 full of military personnel; our NIACT class side by side with a group from the Army's 10th Mountain Division and two military working dogs (MWDs).  The two dogs, young German Shepards, sat with their handlers in the cabin and behaved themselves well.  With everyone on board carrying knives and firearms, it was a good thing we didn't require a TSA screening.  We boarded the plane by rank (lowest first, boarding to the rear); the Lieutenants, Lieutenant Commaders and I wound up somewhere in what would be considered business class seating.  After the decent through the clouds, I peered out the window and saw a familiar sight: the clusters of flickering orange lights from the oil well flare-off towers from the off shore rigs in the Persian Gulf.  I've seen these many times, both from the water and from the air.  I had a bit of a flashback-for a minute I could have sworn I rewound the clock to May when I flew that same route home from Bahrain; not a particularly great flight-I was emotionally exhausted then from the deployment and worried about my career and the hurdles that lay ahead.  This time was different; I was surrounded by folks who were looking to me for guidance; this was my fifth deployment and the Persian Gulf and Kuwait have almost become my second home, having spent half of the last almost five years patrolling its waters and kicking rocks down its dusty harbor town streets. 

As the plane dropped lower still, I could see the Kuwait City lights and shore line; the buildings and street lights outlinend with glowing halos from the dust and sand suspended in the air, typical of the Gulf this time of year.  The plane landed, we debarked, and were quickly whisked away from the plane to a secure military part of the airport waiting for transportation to our forward staging area.  The desert palm trees swayed in the breeze and the air was heavy with the omnipresent dust.  I could taste the dust again, with its gritty texture between the teeth, the sting in the eyes, and the earthy smell of potting soil-I really haven't been away from here long enough to forget it.

We drove about two hours from Kuwait City to a forwarwd staging base.  This base is built on the location of a very large Desert Storm tank battle, infact one of the largest tank battles since WWII.  This has historically been the place that all new arrivals in theater headed to or coming from Iraq have transfered through-and its really only transients.  No one is really stationed here with the exception of the support staff (mostly National Guard) who run the physical duties of maintaining a base (power, water, security, logistics) and those who are tasked with processing and organizing those groups coming through.  Here we live in large tents, about 150-ft long by 25-ft wide, about fifty bunks to a tent and packed full of people and gear.  The tents resemble large greenhouses with an arched roofs.  The Navy portion of the base is far from the center and all it's locations of note and nightime hotspots: the base exchange, post office, dining facility, USO tent, and ATT&T calling center and internet tent.  We shower in a trailer (until the water allotment for the morning runs out and the storage tank empties) and the toilets are in upscale porta-poties (pastic walled stand-alone units, but with a porcelean urinal, and flushing toilet).  We share the base with those soliders on their way home from Iraq; many of them infact, soldiers who deployed in May thinking they'd be in Iraq until at least June of 2012, but as of a few weeks ago, most would be home for Thanksgiving and all would be home for Christmas.  Maybe now the Army can do it's own job now and not rely on Navy personnel to do the work they either can't or choose not to. 

We'll be here for a few more days taking care of administrative processing and acclimation to the timezone and weather.  Our schedule is intentionally left empty to allow for sitting around and catching up on sleep.  We average about one mandatory event a day; usually a briefing or some other task-but mostly we sit around and wait, passing the time until we can call home (eight hour time zone different to EST) or until the next meal.

A note on OPSEC.

Having arrived safely in Kuwait and immediately sent north to a forward base as a staging area for processing and further transportation eastward, I wanted to take a brief pause and talk about OPSEC (Operational Security).  In the next few days, I'll be traveling by a few different methods and will not be able to comment on the specifics due to requirements to protect those who are traveling with me and those who will follow the same route in the future.  For this reason, photographs may be non-specific and posts, email, and even the odd phone call might seem very vague.  For those back home, please do not discuss the specific details with others, especially by email or phone.  Loose lips sink ships; loose tweets sink fleets.  Thanks for understanding-I'll post when and what I can.

Until we meet once more here's wishing you a happy voyage home.

NIACT Class 12-001's last weekend in South Carolina passed without incident. Saturday morning's training was cold and slightly disorganized, getting off to a late start. We discussed more tactics, including advanced personnel searches and detainee procedures. After planning the details for our Final Battle Problem exercise, I spent the remainder of the day in downtown Columbia, enjoying some of the local cuisine and entertainment provided by the Halloween costume wearing students of the University of South Carolina on their way out to the bars.

Our final Battle Problem, the convoy exercise, wasn't nearly as exciting as I hoped it would be. As lead vehicle commander for a column of four HMMWVs and two MRAPs, my crew was able to spot each ambush and simulated IED along the 7-mile exercise route, but our driver was one of the instructors who dutifully stuck to the exercise script, so even if we spotted the threats, he'd still ignore the order to stop the truck, inevitably rolling into the hazard for the sake of accomplishing the pre-determined training plan. The day was a long one-my spine felt throughly compressed under the weight of my body armor after spending hours and hours standing around inside a simulated FOB (Forward Operating Base) waiting for the convoy exercise to actually begin. Just as abruptly as it started, the exercise was over.

The following day was spent drifting in and out of sleep through some over-preached and dumbed down legal briefs by an Army JAG. His brief was nearly pointless. Rather giving the latest updates on Rules of Engagement (ROE) or Escalation of [Lethal] Force (EOF), we received nearly three hours of instruction on the UCMJ's rules for searches of US servicemember's personal property and how it relates to the Fourth Amendment. I'm still curious as to whether or not he knew that we were headed to Afghanistan the following week or if he just assumed we were staying at Fort Jackson for the long haul. The rest of the day was dedicated to the through cleaning of personal weapons, the M4's and M9's we've been training with and lugging around in the rain and sand for these last few weeks. Not a single speck of carbon residue from cordite gunpowder, not a grain of sand, nor a single drop of moisture or oil could remain inside the nooks and crannies of the weapons before inspection by the Drill Sergeants. CLP (Cleaner, Lubricant and Protectant) is the standard military issue solvent used to clean and preserve small arms; I learned the smell of it almost ten years ago during Plebe Summer at the Academy and I haven't forgotten it since. CLP is a lightly viscous, light weight machinery grade oil that is slightly yellow in color and has a petroleum odor like that of zippo lighter fluid. For normal operation of a weapon, a light coat should be applied to every moving part, but for inspection, it simply wouldn't do: I put down the CLP and wiped down the inside and outside of my rifle with Windex. Though the rifle looked spotless, without any lubricant, it would make a nice mantle decoration, but fail miserably as a weapon. As soon as I passed inspection (after the third go-around with Staff Sergeant Byford), it immediately was brushed down with CLP again. Inspection passed, check-in-the-box. Move on with life.

Just like that, Navy Individual Augmentee Combat Training was done. No fanfare, speeches, ceremonies, or anything else to mark the occasion. We've been left to ourselves for an evening off and a day of rest to take care of any loose ends before our flight out. I took care of a few financial matters, finished packing my bags, got a hair cut and enjoyed an Arturo Fuente cigar with a classmate of mine followed by a quick phone call home to Amanda.

My class will depart the country shortly and will be split up in the next few days to travel to various part of the Middle East and perform in a wide array of missions. The barracks are now lined with the tell-tale olive drab sea-bags and desert colored uniform items.


"...Anchors aweigh my boys, anchors aweigh, farewell to college joys, we sail at break of day. Through our last night ashore, drink to the foam; until we meet once more here's wishing you a happy voyage home..."

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

News from Kabul.

As Bravo Company waited in full gear in the darkness and cold of pre-dawn Saturday morning to board busses to Fort Jackson's main training sites, we hadn't yet heard the news. Our lesson for the day was to continue with our convoy training in preparation for our final event: the Convoy Battle Scenario. In this scenario, each platoon of about 30 sailors is required to plan, organize, and conduct a convoy of six vehicles through about a seven mile course rife with ambush points, IEDs, and land obstacles and mock villages, police stations, and a hospital. The mission will be to bring a diplomat to meet with a village elder and provide security once arrived. At the conclusion of the meeting, the convoy will depart and return the same route. There will be upwards of twenty actors playing locals is full dress; explosions will be simulated by smoke, blank rounds will simulate live, but the rest is real. Real doors will be kicked in, real buildings and cars will be searched, and real people will be treated during medivac situations. I was named as the assistant convoy commander, so I will be busy in the next upcoming days planning and briefing.

Just as we were making our initial preparations, a real convoy in Kabul, Afghanistan was attacked by a VBIED, killing seventeen, including about ten US servicemen. The convoy was traveling to complete an ISAF (International Security and Assistance Force Afghanistan) mission on behalf of NATO. Many of the members of Bravo platoon are headed to Camp Edgers to work that very same mission just a few weeks from now. It is unknown if and how many Navy personnel were involved-but if there were-it is likely they would have attended the same NICAT class in Fort Jackson before deploying. Because it was the weekend; most headed separate ways and only a murmur of discussion was held amongst the students.

We've been taught many of the current tactics of IED use, but they are still deadly and still continue to be a threat. Practicing the final convoy exercise begins to get you hyper-aware of the possibility that every pieces of garbage by the side of the road, every sign post, every unusual rock or pothole could potentially conceal a deadly bomb. If you stopped at each bend in the road or each telephone pole to call EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) teams, the mission you were sent to do never would be completed. Trust in other members of your team to watch out for the things you don't see, trust in the equipment you ride in and wear to protect you, and trust in your training to spot danger from a safe distance are all you have to rely on-even then, bad things still happen.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Convoy.

Following our rifle qualifications, the last graded hurdle between our NIACT class graduating and marksmanship remediation-or worse, being rolled back to repeat the class again until standards can be met; we've now moved headlong into the more distinctive nuances of Afghan military operations and our likely missions, rather than the more general curriculum all students here must take. Our company of 70 sailors is mostly headed to Afghanistan; some were going to Iraq initially, but within the last week, many have gotten word their orders have been shifted, canceled, or re-assigned with the deadline for the drawdown of US forces. The requirements driving the orders to send sailors through this program are anywhere from 6-12 months old, so funding and necessity may have shifted since. The other company in our class is made up of those headed for Individual Augmentee assignments to places like Qatar, Kuwait, Germany, Tampa (yes, Tampa, Florida-home of MacDill Air Force Base and US Central Command, known warmly as "Tampastan").

We've been discussing basics of convoy operations; everything from mission planning, equipment, tactics, threats, and emergency procedures like medevacs, ambushes, and IEDs. We've been introduced on the up-armored humvee as well as the newer MRAP (mine resistant, ambush protected) vehicles and the pros and cons of each vehicle.

Yesterday, after some time on the rifle range, we stopped by the mobile IED exhibit trailers they have at Fort Jackson provided by the Joint IED Defeat Organization (JIEDDO), an inter-service task force chartered to lessen IED damages from attacks in Iraq and Afghanistan. The trailers had displays of examples of different types of IED components, and the three most common suicide explosive vest examples-even a complete mock up of what one would expect to see in the kitchen, living room and workshop of a bomb maker in Iraq/Afghanistan to help visually identify what the tools of the trade of the home-made explosives maker are: pressure cookers, gloves, chemicals, timers, wires, saws, mixers, etc.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Range days.

These last few days, we've spent some serious time on the range. Completing our pistol qualifications on Saturday, we've moved very quickly on to the M-4 rifle qualifications. For those unfamiliar with the weapon, its a smaller, more compact version of the venerable M-16, which has been in service with the US military since about 1964. The M-4 shares about 80% of the parts with the M-16, with the exception of a small collapsable butt stock and a shorter barrel, designed to lighten the weight and allow for close quarters, urban combat. The first step was to complete grouping and zeroing with live ammunition, a procedure where the sights are adjusted on each rifle, customized for the eye-sight plane and body characteristics of the individual shooter. The next step was to spend some time in the dark scenario based video trainers, simulating a checkpoint on a busy road in an Iraqi village where decisions had to be made to shoot at all, and if so, when and whom to shoot in an escalation of force scenario. This morning, we spent from sunrise until about noon on the LOMAH (Location of Miss and Hit) range, an outdoor facility with pop-up targets at 75m, 125m, and 300m ranges-about the maximum effective range with the M4 and non-telescopic iron sights. This range is pictured above. The LOMAH system works using a type of high frequency sonar that will give instant feedback via a computer LCD screen at the shooter's position on where specifically the round impacted the target; or if a miss-how far and in which direction. This was also the first time we've shot our rifles in full body armor and it certainly makes a difference; being able to hold the rifle steady and get in proper shooting position is restricted by the heavy armor and limited range of motion. As you can see from the picture, the 300m targets are nearly impossible to see laying down in the prone position, and a hit on a dark target silhouette in the shadows of a sand berm might as well be pure luck. Our full rifle qualification course will be completed in the next day or two.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Rollover, Rollover, Rollover.

This morning, Bravo platoon mustered in our full gear and took a bus trip to the training centers on the far side of the post. At one station, we practiced on a computerized simulator correct point of aim and sight picture for our upcoming Army rifle qualification. The Engagement Skills Trainer (EST) can be configured to run a few different programs, but our class ran through the basics of grouping and zeroing an M4 rifle under the close supervision of the drill sergeants and civilian contractor running the simulator. The range is a projected display screen and the facility is equipped with M4s rigged to a laser system in the muzzle, with accelerometers, pressure sensors, and a pneumatic hose hooked to a compressor to create a recoil and cycle the action just as the weapon would fire on the real range. Speakers simulate the sound of gunfire. Using a computer system to analyze 3-axis motion of the rifle as well as trigger pressure and muzzle point-of-aim, the instructor can review, replay, and correct a shooter's form.


Following the EST, we made our way over to the tactical vehicle roll-over simulator. Yesterday, we had a period of instruction in the classroom about the reasons for and the dangers of a HMMWV and Mine Resistant Ambush Protected (MRAP) roll-over. These are both top heavy vehicles that have caused many injuries and deaths due to roll-overs. There is a particular danger of trapping and drowning the occupants when operating near water, so special precautions must be made if the potential for roll and immersion exists. I found it difficult to get out during the exercise, but was able to; some were not able to make it out without assistance. The cab of a HMMWV is crammed full of armor, radios, weapons, ammunition, and supplies, and wearing body armory and helmets on top of it makes it even tighter. If you can imagine what it looks like to flip a turtle on its back and watch it try and flip itself right side up: that's about how it felt. Making it tougher still was the disorientation of having to release yourself from your seat and seat belt, and having to come crashing down onto your head onto what used to be the roof of the cab but has now become the floor-then trying to find the door lock release handles and open the door.






The simulator was the body of a HMMWV cab, and was able to spin 360-degrees. We were rolled 90-degrees to one side, 90-degrees to the other before finally flipping and going for the live drill.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Corporate Culture.

Yesterday, we were issued our weapons and a piece of Army corporate culture very different from the Navy's, for me: a very new M4 carbine and a very old, beat up M9 pistol. I will be returning the M4 to the armory at Camp McCrady at the end of the training, but I will be carrying my M9 with me every day until I am I ready to return home. Now that we've got weapons; we're required to carry them everywhere with the exception of PT and the bathroom; during those times, they've got to be locked up next to our rack and someone else, our "Battle Buddy," is required to watch them at all times. We carry them to class in the morning, we carry them to formation, we carry them to meals, and we carry them to get a haircut or pick something up at small convenience store on base. We load, unload, clear and sling these weapons no less than twenty times a day. I'm familiar with the weapons already and I've already qualified as a Navy expert marksman on each, so I'm not particularly concerned with managing them.


The Army has a bit of a different philosophy on weapons than the Navy. In the Navy, we're taught that weapons are very dangerous and only specific people are allowed to carry, maintain, or use weapons, and even then, only for a very specific reason. The average sailor never gets to put his hands on a weapon other than standing watch, and even then, it never gets un-holstered other than to turn it back into the armory. The Army believes that weapons aren't a burden, nor something to cause fear to the user. Just as a professional carpenter wouldn't leave his hammer locked in his toolbox all day and have to request permission from three people to use it, sign it out, and then have to write a written report about each nail driven with it before signing it back in; the Army allows its personnel to be comfortable and familiar with their personal weapons, and all are not only welcome, but encouraged, and even required to carry while living in a forward operating base. This is a culture change I'm going to get used to as a former Navy weapons and ordnance officer.



This afternoon, we were broken into separate groups for cultural awareness classes for the first time, while there were many in the Afghan class, so far I haven't met anyone else headed to Bagram with me and the Joint Special Operations Task Force (JSOTF). Most seem to be headed to Kabul's International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) headquarters to work with the NATO mission. Today has been our first official introduction to the weapons culture of the Army and the Pashtunwali code of Afghanis.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Ripcords.

After some downtime to figure out the basics of Maslow's Hierarchy of needs , answering the eternal questions of survival such as, "Where do I sleep, eat, use the bathroom, and put all this stuff in my seabag," we've now made it through the very basics-including how to dress ourselves in Army uniforms. They've broken our training class of about 150 sailors into two separate companies, each with three platoons; doing the math would mean each platoon is about 25 sailors strong. After the Navy staff meet-and-greet yesterday, today we were introduced to our Army staff, all drill instructors, but now reservists. Between all of the Army staff, they have a tremendous amount of relevant combat experience as well as a good sense of humor, which makes them a truly valuable resource for us to learn from their example. After breakfast this morning, we took a fifteen minute bus trip down the road from Camp McCrady to the main area of the military reservation. There, we were issued another two bags worth of gear, another 70 pounds. Some of this gear we won't use while we're here-like our rucksacks, sleeping bags, etc; other stuff, like our newly issued body armor, the IOTV (Improved Outer Tactical Vest), and our ACHs (Advanced Combat Helmet). These two items came with an instruction book, as some assembly was required.

Returning to Camp McCrady, around 1400, we continued for another two hours with instruction on how to actually assemble the body armor. The version we have is the latest and greatest, designed in response to some recent vehicle accidents in Iraq and Afghanistan where humvees have rolled over in drainage ditches or near reservoirs and the occupants have drowned because they were trapped in their vests and the seatbelts. Our version has an emergency egress strap about three inches down from the neck where a firm pull rips a wire out and magically, the vest falls off you into no less than seven distinct pieces, with armor plates and all dropping off. This is quite an impressive piece of gear, with obviously a clear objective goal and reason for its creation. The assembly part becomes interesting, as the first thing we did in the class was pull the rip cord, and then spending two hours to learn how to successfully put it back together. I hope I never need to use that rip cord because: 1). It means my vehicle has flipped over in water and is sinking quickly. 2). There isn't a chance in hell I'll be able to successfully put it all back together again when safe on dry land.

Location:Camp McCrady, Fort Jackson, SC

Deployment is Underway: Shift Colors.

If you follow Amanda's blog ( www.mrsterranaut.blogspot.com ), you already know these last few days have been particularly eventful. Friday was my last day at NMPS; really just for check out, transportation brief, and uniform issue. I was issued about 60 pounds of winter and summer Army uniforms, all crammed into a seabag. This essentially filled the bag and didn't leave much space, not enough for my gas mask, not enough for my overflowing medical records; swollen due to the quantity of dental x-rays (see previous post, "Sorry Sir, we don't see that in your records"). Realizing I was also required to bring three sets of the Navy's issue physical training (PT) uniform, which no one really wears in the Navy, with the exception of the chief select's conducting fundraiser car washes, as well as shoes, toiletries, my iPad, underwear, and a few nice to have personal items, such as a travel humidor for Montecristo cigars left in my humidor at home, or my Savinelli briar pipe. It lead to a a few tough decisions; packing for 8 months of a great unknown with only the items I could fit into a pocket of a backpack. Once I finally get to where I'm going, I can always mail stuff to myself further down the road, but for now, I'm living off what I can carry on my back.


One of the events Friday I wasn't looking forward to was my appointment with the local Nissan dealership to turn my leased car in. The car was my Ensign-mobile, my Nogaro red, two seat 350z convertible that I got in San Diego in the spring of 2008 after completing my first deployment aboard USS PORT ROYAL. It was a great car for a single man in his early 20's living by the beach in San Diego, it was the car Amanda and I drove cross country in when we moved to Virginia Beach when we first started living together, it was the car that represented to me what a single, young officer should be able to enjoy; but those days and that car belong to a different man, in a different place, with a time stamp and a passed expiration. Sliding the keys across the desk at the dealership was tough. Watching them take my license plate off and hand it back to me was tougher still. Watching the lot attendant drive away in my car and park it in the dirt and gravel lot behind the building with ugly, rusted old cars was even tougher. There were some tears.

The lease was due to run out while I'm away on deployment, and I won't be renewing it, or purchasing. While I loved that car, it simply won't work for the winters on the east coast, nor is it a practical car for a family. The money I save on the car payments, if all goes to plan, will be used for the down payment on a new BMW 335d, purchased through the factory's military sales program-which will build the car to specification and ship to the US, saving the buyer about 15-20% off the MSRP. Hopefully there will be a shiny new car waiting for me in the driveway when I get home.


After the dealership, neither Amanda or I felt like cooking. We went out to a local BBQ restaurant where I won a hot-wings challenge at a year prior. The owner told me they were out of habanero peppers, so there wasn't going to be a repeat attempt, but the restaurant provided a welcome distraction for Amanda and I none-the-less, even if only for an hour. The family counseling folks who give the required pre-deployment briefs refer to a common experience they call, 'The Wall.' For those who haven't experienced a long period of separation from loved ones, 'The Wall' describes the emotional barrier people will create leading up to the departure as a self-defense. A couple will have an increasingly hard time communicating, lesson physical contact, often avoid eye contact, and this phenomena will escalate until the departure, making the last week or so unbearably tense. The reason behind this behavior, so they say, is as a way to brace oneself for the shock of a major loss, and to pre-cognitively self induce the separation, so that at least, in a way, you have some sort of control over the situation. There comes a point leading up to the day you've been dreading most where you can't wait for the actual moment to come, just to get it over with. When separation anxiety comes, most people respond with some sort of compulsive behavior. Some people drink a lot, others bury themselves for hours a day in a hobby, some people, like me, spend money. I can always tell outwardly when its weighing on my mind, because I tend to spend money very freely: weekend trips, dinners out, new camera equipment for myself, buying lots of gifts for my wife. I think its because I feel guilty about leaving her. After dinner, for the rest of the night, I really began to pack in earnest, making trips back and forth from one room to another gathering belongings to be assembled for cramming into my backpack. With each trip passing the living room and Amanda, I could feel the wall between she and I getting bigger. I already felt bad I couldn't spend my last hours home with her, rather than packing, but then I also couldn't make eye contact with her for fear of seeing her tears, nor could I speak to ask her how she was for fear of what the truth might sound like. The night was spent silently packing by myself. Finally finishing around 0230 Saturday morning, I crept into bed. I laid there for two hours, without a chance of falling asleep, and then rose from my own bed one last time. I don't know if Amanda was asleep, or if she simply was silent too. The wall was there, and it was stronger than I'd ever felt before. As this is my first deployment married, this is probably going to be the new normal.


Saturday morning, I packed my issued gear seabag in Amanda's car, and put on my backpack, made one last trip around the house to make sure I hadn't forgotten anything and then said my goodbye to Amanda. We've always agreed to say our goodbyes at home, in private, rather than the drawn out public display some sailors will do. These are the types that bring their whole family, including their crying children, making it awkward for all around them. Amanda placed my wedding band on my finger and slipped my dog tags over my head. I gave Amanda the Troll Bead charm bracelet I had begun for her the previous week.

The trip to Norfolk was quick, no cars were on the road that early and we arrived way too fast. Their were still puddles on the ground from rain the night before and the puddles reflected the yellow light of the industrial sulfur gas street lamps. With a quick kiss, we separated; Amanda drove off into the still early morning darkness and I was left at the front of the NMPS building with bags in hand. As I was one of the first there, I witnessed the rest of the group arrive in much the same fashion, though some brought their families with them into the building. Inside the building: a very short accountability muster and a send off-prayer from the command chaplain asking God for protection for warriors and their families. Just as the sun was rising, we boarded the busses for the Navy Individual Augmentee Combat Training (NIACT) in Fort Jackson, SC, passing through rows of staff members from the USO, elderly veterans from the local American Legion post shaking our hands and two large, bearded, leather clad bikers from the Patriot Guard Riders Motorcycle Club, adorned with many ribbons and pins from the Vietnam era. The two busses departed to crying wives, children, saluting old veterans and drove through an arch created by two waving American flags held by the Patriot Guard Riders on either side of the street approaching the gate. It was actually a pleasant and quite moving send-off. I especially appreciated it following the indignant homecoming in May from my last deployment to the Persian Gulf. It felt fitting and appropriate without any excess. As soon as the busses left, while it still sad to be leaving home, I fell asleep-something I haven't been able to do in a long while. Leaving is tough, perhaps only matched by the stress of re-adjusting and coming home; but it also has a silver lining of a much needed catharsis, the culmination of a lot of building stress. The deployment counter has started, every day passed is a day closer to home, now is the time to focus on work and relax my mind, now is the time to laugh again with Amanda, even if only through email and phone calls. This deployment is now underway: Shift Colors.

Location:Virginia Beach, Norfolk VA - Fort Jackson, SC

A question of religion.

With our last day at NMPS tomorrow, and the prospect of splitting up to travel to different training sites all over the country before deploying to different conflicts and locations around the world, the last of the medical checks were conducted today, including the now famous ANAM cognitive test; a battery of computerized reaction and mental-spacial processing tests to establish a baseline to compare against results following potential traumatic brain injury after exposure to an IED or other pressure/concussive event.


Yesterday, we were given new sets of dog tags, stamped from aluminum blanks with data collected at the start of the week. My tags came back with my religion printed across the bottom. This isn't my first deployment to a Muslim country, rather, it's my fifth, but I've never had an issue pair of tags before where I've actually been required to wear the dog tags daily. I haven't practiced my religion in almost fourteen years, and I don't think it's appropriate that I be potentially singled out, tortured, and possibly killed by Islamic terrorists in the name of clerical accuracy on a small tag on a necklace.

After receiving those original tags, I brought them back to the NMPS staffer who dropped them on my desk and requested a new set be printed. This is what I'll be wearing for the next year. May the force be with with me.

Location:Norfolk, VA, USA

"Sorry Sir, we don't see that in your records...."

Today was day 2 of 4 of administrative preparations at the Naval Mobilization Processing Site (NMPS) in Norfolk. The focus of today was mostly medical check-ups. I took the time to get my records screened and most of the lab work and immunizations updated prior to arriving at NMPS, but of course, just an in every other Navy command, the records never seem to transfer correctly. Every Naval medical or dental clinic I've ever been ordered to go for treatment or for periodic exams always say they can't find the previous records, but then assure me that they've now, "...Gone to a computerized system, so the records will be there, right after they re-do all the work previously done." I swear, I've had more blood draws for HIV screening, more Yellow Fever shots, and at least twice as many Anthrax shots than I'm supposed to have. Throw that on top of the seemingly insatiable requirement for skin PPD-tuberculin tests and the hundreds of dental x-rays to check up on bite-wings, and I'm likely to be one of the most medicated, most periodontally studied people you've ever met. Also, rest assured, none of my seemingly weekly HIV or PPD tests have ever come back positive-but they continue to do the tests and then lose the record. They say they're going to start me on anti-malarial medication tomorrow; when combined with my most recent Typhoid and Yellow Fever immunizations, I should be all set to travel back in time to 1900's Panama and dig the canal... or deploy to Afghanistan, whichever comes first.






Spending hours and hours on line waiting for people to review my records, re-do medical tests and immunizations I've already recently had, and of course, surely they will lose the new records right before I transfer.

Location:Norfolk, VA, USA

Check-in: Mobilization and Processing

I spent this morning at the Naval Mobilization and Processing Site (NMPS), co-located with ECRC in Norfolk. Our group, made of about 120 personnel, will only spend the next four days or so together before going our separate ways to different training locations throughout the country. The purpose of this center is to review the medical and administrative readiness paperwork for sailors about to deploy in IA or GSA roles. The sailors are quite a professionally diverse group. Rank wise, they range from very junior enlisted Petty Officers to senior Commanders and Captains. Just by estimates from a class-welcoming show-of-hands poll, I'd say about a third are reservists called up for active duty. As Lieutenants in the Navy tend to stick together (partly out of a similar cohort attraction, partly for defense in numbers against more senior officers), I sat in a row in the briefing room with about eight other active Lieutenants. There was one other Surface Warfare Officer, three helicopter pilots, one Medical Corps Officer, two Supply Officers, and one Submariner. Not all were headed to Afghanistan; some were headed to Iraq, others to Dijibouti, and others still to places like Bahrain, Qatar, Germany, Ecuador, and yes-even being deployed to places as familiar as Tampa, Florida. Why people 'deploying' to Tampa are required to put on Army uniforms and get trained on how to kick down doors and take detainees, I haven't figured out yet. NMPS is really just the clearing house for IA sailors passing through and returning home, I won't really know until Saturday who will be coming down to Ft. Jackson for training for deployment to Afghanistan with me.

The day was filled with briefs on legal readiness (wills and powers of attorney), transportation and travel claims, standing orders and business rules while at NMPS, contact information for next of kin, and the uniform fittings. Aside from the estimated 110 pounds of gear and weapons I'll be issued in Ft. Jackson, I'll be issued 32 pounds of new uniform items while still at NMPS in Norfolk-which allows me only 8 pounds of personal items not issued to take with me. The staff recommended having Amanda mail the rest of my stuff to me in Afghanistan once I get there. I'm being outfitted in the Army's newest uniforms the FRACU (Fire Retardant Army Combat Uniform). The thought process behind issuing Army uniforms is for the sake of friendly force identification and to not stand out to enemy forces looking to take a cheap shot at something different; that its better to be a zebra in a herd of other zebras when there are lions around. They'll have my embroidered name tags and all my issued uniforms ready to go by the end of the week. At least I get a new pair of comfortable desert boots out of this deal.

Location:Norfolk, Virginia

Night Before Reporting to ECRC

Columbus Day

Tomorrow I report to the Expeditionary Combat Readiness Center (ECRC) in Norfolk. I never want to make big plans my last days home or my first days after returning. Really, sleeping late, and having few time commitments are my preferred wishes. Today, Amanda and I spent the afternoon locally, visiting the recently refurbished Virginia Aquarium-only about a ten minute drive away. We concluded the day with sushi at our local restaurant (she and I had sushi on our first date, back in Annapolis, a few years back and have managed to always have sushi before being apart for a long while, and as a first meal when reuniting). We also stopped by one of the local jewelry stores and got Amanda a new silver chain for her Troll Bead charm bracelet collection. Her last bracelet is nearly full, and that bracelet had an ocean theme, but now she's got a 'deployment' bracelet started, with relevant beads to this deployment. Her first three beads: Stars and Stripes, a Silver Archer, and a green and gold bead, for my new uniform colors for the next eight months. I plan to fill it with more beads as gifts during the duration of the deployment as I pass each major milestone on the way from start to finish. When her new bracelet is full, it will be time for me to come home.





A very early start is expected tomorrow, I haven't an idea where the building is I'm supposed to report, or how bad the traffic will be getting to the base. If I'm due to report no later than 0730, I've got to be out the door and on the road by 0515.

Location:Virginia Beach, USA

TerraNaut: Voyage of a Land Sailor

Friends, family, and well-wishers, welcome to my blog! In just a few short days, I'll be starting an adventure like I've never had before. I'm headed for Afghanistan, with orders in hand to report as Protocol Officer to the Commander of the Joint Special Operations Task Force. This is a unique type of a assignment that requires special training. I'll be working with the U.S. Army, referred to by the Navy as an "Individual Augmentee" (IA). The particular type of IA assignment I'll be participating is further classified as a Global War on Terrorism Support Assignment (GSA). Suffering a loss of words to further explain this these types of orders, I borrow from Wikipedia:

"...An Individual Augmentee is a United States military member assigned to a unit in a TAD/TDY status. Individual Augmentees can be used to fill shortages or can be used when an individual with specialized knowledge or skill sets is required. As a result, Individual Augmentees can include members from an entirely different branch of service. The system has been used extensively in the current Iraq/Afghan War, though with some criticism. Currently, there are approximately 12,000 Navy and Air Force personnel filling Army jobs in the United States, Iraq, Afghanistan, Cuba and the Horn of Africa at any one time..."


I detached from my last command, based out of Little Creek, Virginia Beach, VA about a week ago after two long years and two deployments to the Persian Gulf. Since then, I've spent some time cleaning up around the house, doing some landscaping and gardening, re-writing my Will and Powers of Attorney, talking to moving companies for price quotes for an eventual move to my next assignment, completing medical requirements for all my immunizations and of course, spending time with my wife, Amanda. All of my pre-requisites are complete; every box is checked off on my check-list and on paper, I'm ready to go. That doesn't mean mentally it makes it any easier to leave. With only a day left before reporting to the Navy's Mobilization and Processing Center (NMPS) in Norfolk, reality creeps in and I'm starting to feel a bit anxious for the first day.

Location:Virginia Beach, United States