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Critical Meetings About Meetings

Friday, January 22, 2010

Well let me see…. The laundry guys were all happy to see that I had returned to the Sand Box. Thanks guys. They memorize your name and remember it forever. Very strange. A little creepy.

Anyway, let’s talk about what’s popular over here now. Meetings seem to be very popular. Lots and lots of meetings. Meetings to talk about meetings. Meetings to set up other meetings. It’s easy to forget that it’s a war zone, except for the fact that everybody is wearing some sort of camouflage. Which is interesting since each branch of the service is here, and we’ve all decided to wear different camouflaged uniforms. It’s like an Army Surplus Store fashion show.

Modern Warfare 2, the Playstation/Xbox game, is popular of course. Bickering among us is also a popular pastime. Especially for those of us who know that we’re always right. Of course everybody here believes that they’re right, so the bickering continues unabated. Food …. The same. Let me see…. It seems that really nothing has changed since I left in the middle of November. Almost like I never left. Yes, that’s a bit disturbing.

Of course just like last year, if I am not temporarily gainfully employed, I shall be here to watch The Super Bowl. And the best part about The Super Bowl is the commercials, which are not shown over here. In their place are Armed Forces Network commercials about brushing teeth, changing socks, and other really good information targeting those of you who grew up in the Appalachian region. Still, the information redundancy is a bit trying.

Among some of the things forgotten that are quickly remembered upon return? The 200 yard sprint to the bathrooms and shower trailers. Or how pale you get when you never see the sun. Or a $3.50 haircut.

I really have nothing to complain about. This place now has all the comforts of home. Which for me is disturbing, but not worth complaining about.

This is the worst time of the year though. I’m not into basketball, Nascar, or hockey, and there’s only a couple of weeks of football left. Hopefully baseball spring training will hurry up and get here. At least we can start watching and see who will pop positive for steroids this year. In my very humble opinion, I wish they would all do steroids. Who wouldn’t like to see a 105 mph Fastball or a 500 foot towering home run?

Blog drift. Sorry. Anyway, that’s all I got tonight.

Peace – J

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Civilization of the War Zone

Thursday, January 14, 2010

Well, it’s the same as it ever was in appearance and activity outside the wire. Inside, we’ve gone from living in a bombed-out hangar, to living in a ten-man tent with 15 pilots, to living in “pods”. We’ve gone from digging our own bathroom, to Porta-Johns, to shower tents, to Cadillac showers with running-water, sinks, and porcelain.

I’ve seen the transition from flip-flop shower shoes (the accepted norm in 2003) to the current accepted norm, CROCs. We’ve gone from MREs to chow-halls, dirt to sidewalks, and from eating whatever you could scrounge to the “Hand-washing Police”. Now we have 24-hour laundry service and people walking around in ironed and starched uniforms. There’s cable-TV, wireless Internet, and cell-phones.

I remember when it was one SAT-phone call a month for 10 minutes – if you were lucky. Now we have guys calling their wives everyday; video conferencing and online chatting with them. The care packages crack me up. At the beginning of the war, you couldn’t get crap. Now we get so much stuff we send it to food kitchens back home in the States.

I saw a weird thing today at the shower. One of the Air Force guys literally has a tackle box for a shave kit. Something like the kind that you would use for keeping household cleaning supplies. But he had an assortment of loofahs, wash-buffs, and body wash products; literally a freaking men’s aisle of stuff from a local Walgreens. He actually had a PVC expandable rod that he put at the base of the shower. I had to ask (I didn’t want to ask), “WTF is that for?” “Oh!”, he said, “That’s to keep the shower curtain from blowing in.” Tomorrow he may have a Sherpa carrying crap for him. Nothing surprises me now.

It’s just freaking crazy. This war has officially been civilized. I think it’s either time to go home, or I need to jump theaters in order to feel normal again. To get back to MRE’s, wearing the same dirty flight suit for a week, and washing it in a bucket.

I don’t get it. I was in the party that just wanted to win the war and get the hell out of this third-world. Now it seems that people are trying to make it like home. Bizarre.

Peace – J

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Sixth Tour Update

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

T_1786_for-FraserFraser has finished his sixth project overseas and is back in the United States. He had some technical administrative issues which restricted his ability to post more regularly. Under the site’s standard terms of engagement, he probably won’t post again until his seventh re-deployment sometime after the beginning of the year.

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Same As It Ever Was

Wednesday, October 28, 2009

French Soldier drawn by the BritishAll right, apparently most stuff never changes. The Uniform Police are still alive and well. Their ranks are usually made up of unemployed senior NCO’s that have never been here before. But hey, if they weren’t here, what would we have to complain about?

Everyday and twice on Sunday I’d prefer to take the rag-tag uniformed guys into combat over the shiny, pressed, and polished guys looking for a parade. The famous quote in my community is: “I went to war and garrison broke out”. (Attributed to the Red Dragon.)

One of the common offenses is “Wrong Uniform”. Well, we have every flavor of military here, not to mention civilian contractors. And if you can keep track of who is who, and what uniform regulation they’re breaking, then you have entirely too much time on your hands.

I wonder how much money the military could save by getting together and just having one uniform with different nametags to show what branch you’re from. I mean, we’re all working together. We’re all fighting the same war for the same country. But maybe I’m short-sighted and missing something. There must be a whole uniform manufacturing industry that has grown up with this war. It might crumble if we all had the same uniform. How could we risk that in the time of an economic stimulus package?

Peace – J

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R2D2 Tales

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

UH-60 RobotWell, it’s pretty bad when you see your job being replace by robots. The pilot is rapidly becoming obsolete. It’s a new era. The Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) and Unmanned Piloted Systems (UPS). New acronyms are coming out daily. They have fixed wing platforms (Predators, Global Hawk), and now rotor wing models (Fire Scouts). They come in all shapes and sizes, from Ravens that are hand launch-able to the big Global Hawks, which are as big as regular aircraft.

Little known factoid, the Air Force produced more UAV pilots (oxymoron) last year than they produced real pilots. It’s the wave of the future. Some of these vehicles can stay airborne for more than 24 hrs. They switch out operators to cover that long of a stretch. To add insult to injury – waiting for a UAV to take off…. it just kind’ a slaps you in your face.

Some are remotely piloted from all the way back in the states. The thing that really gets you – not that we do this for medals – but some of these guys are getting Air Medals from the comfort of a lazy boy / air-conditioned office virtual cockpit “back in the rear with the gear”. Not getting mortared and really no fear of getting shot down, killed, or taken as a POW. If they have a bad day, they go home, kiss the wife and have a cold beer. If real pilots have a bad day, they start doing their evasion plan and trying not to get caught by the bad guys. On a real bad day they don’t come home at all.

But I guess that is the whole premise – eliminate that weakness (the pilot) in the system. No longer vulnerable- willing to take greater risk with drones than live pilots. Right now the results are great, and we work hand in hand together. But we also may be working our way right out of job. Ain’t science great? I’m just hanging out here waiting for my robot to come replace me.

Peace – J

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This Is Familiar

Thursday, October 15, 2009

algiersWhat’s up? Same shit, different deployment here. Nothing really to write about. The beer was good in Germany. Kinda pissed the Germans off by asking for American beer. But I think they’re all still pissed off about WW II. Spent the night there, then did the jumpseat back into theater. One of the pilots was a furloughed American pilot, the other was a FEDEX pilot. Good guys.

Kinda sad to see that not much has really changed around here. I see the same people I saw the last couple of tours from the other branches that we work with. Some things that have changed…. Well, there’s a couple new sidewalks. I guess nobody believes we will all be out of here before Christmas next year. But hey, the President did get the Noble Peace Prize.

AFN (Armed Forces Network) is still the same crap. The DVD collection has gotten a lot bigger. The laundry guys crack me up here. TCNs (third country national) from the Philippines. They remember everyone, and ask; “How was your trip home?’ As they put it: “Mr. Fraser, how long you stay?” Twenty years from now, after they write their memoirs, we’ll find out that they were all intel officers.

But hey it’s College Football season. So at least we have something to fight about around here. You forget how much fun you can have watching football with no beer, no tailgate, and the games that start at 1 am Zulu. But at least its football, with no commercials, just mind washing Public Service interruptions about how to defeat the Swine Flu, or to remind you that bushing and flossing your teeth will prevent tooth decay. Thanks for the info.

Back to living life through emails and 1 second delayed phone calls. Over. As always, a great group in the squadron to spend the days flying with and BS-ing about everything. A couple of new guys have shown up, and the pecking order starts all over again.

Peace – J

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WTF, Where’s Fraser?

Friday, May 22, 2009

HSC-84 RED WOLVES do some training at Sunrise Mountain, NV.Look at that, almost 3 months without a post. How are we going to get a movie contract with such intermittent attention? Some high school students from Las Vegas found Fraser flying out in the Nevada desert. I thought it was just a gambling party. Apparently he’s training for his 6th tour. See if you can spot him.

Just in case you were wondering, it’s a contractual issue that allows him to refuse to write when he’s in the USA. So from my side, as the editor, I hear, “Oh yea, I’ll write.” But obviously, I’m doing this writing.

Many thanks to Nellis Spotters for allowing us to use their superb high quality images and video.

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Monkey-maze

Friday, March 6, 2009

Dagger LoadWell a crap load of new guys showed up. It’s funny. Some of them are first timers, most not. They are already counting backward and planning their escapes. Which is funny because you never leave here early. In fact, you never even leave on time. The one constant you can find on the deployment is that you will not get out of here on time. It’s the basic thought to build on.

First, people never get here on time because of military airlift limitations. So because the replacements aren’t here on time, you can’t get out of here on time. Second, even when you do get the handshake and the wave goodbye, that doesn’t mean you will get out of here. Because military airlift is either late if your lucky, or canceled if your unlucky.

So the veterans of this monkey-maze never plan on leaving on time. In fact, you can usually plan on leaving at least 60 days past the time you were supposed to leave. If you get out earlier then that, then it’s a pleasant surprise.

Gotta cut it short. Will write later. But never count on anything.

- Peace J

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Band of Brothers

Monday, February 23, 2009

sunsetI just starting watching the “Band of Brothers” series for the third time, and I’ve come up with the following conclusion: I have never been in a war. WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam – those were true wars. The generation of WWII is truly a great generation that we can still talk to. They bonded together after the attack in Pearl Harbor. They dropped everything to support the war effort. The magnitude of casualties and wounded that they suffered and yet continued to push on, has me awe struck. These were true Civilian Soldiers from all walks of life, with one thing in common – they were all Americans.

We have casualties in the wars we’re fighting today. The loss of any serviceman or servicewoman is tragic. But during those earlier wars there were fathers, sons, and brothers from the same families that paid the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom. My sense is that America no longer has the stomach for war. For a time we bonded together as Americans after the 911 attack, with a surge of Americans crowding the military recruiting stations. But memories seem short. The primary driving force for young Americans into today’s military recruiting stations is the poor economy.

This war has now surpassed the length of World War II. President Obama says we will be largely withdrawn by mid-2010. It seems that we look at this war as more of daily nuisance and drain on our economy, and don’t really feel involved with it. If we were to ask our population to bear arms in a war that mirrors WW II – I think we would fall far short. The generation of World War II was not asking what the country could do for them, but what they could do for their country. In my eyes, Americans have grown soft and self-centered with our own individual quest for the American Dream. The race to keep up with the Jones’s; who are now living in a house 4 months behind on mortgage, that they could never afford, even when they did have jobs, have maxed out credit cards, and who just got their new cars repossessed.

It seems that our government has also become soft and self-centered. We have droves of career politicians and lobbyists. This is not what our forefathers intended. We need to limit the terms that politicians serve and the financially corrupting influence of special interest lobbyists.

Lets see…… something that people are probably not interested in are my suggestions to solve America’s problems: term limits, flat tax, reinstate the draft, tackle the illegal immigration problem, hold our politicians responsible for their votes and actions while in office, require voting, get rid of Social Security (start your own savings plan and get rid of the social security tax), stop bailing these CEO’s and companies that have wasted billions of their own dollars and now want to waste billions of the tax payers money, highlight the pork in bills being passed in Congress, stop being politically-correct and tell the Americans the truth, stop paying deadbeats on unemployment, stop socially passing kids through our schools (“America needs Ditch Diggers too!”, to quote from my Dad), start being personally responsible for your choices, and start taking ownership of this country instead of sitting back on cruise control.

The Generation from World War II should be disgusted with the heirs of their sacrifice. Band of Brothers. If you haven’t watched it, you might not understand.

Peace- j

[J – For some added perspective, read this letter from Pfc K. Vonnegut Jr., U.S. Army, dated May 29,1945. It is a reprint from a posthumous publication of the author’s writings.

Referencing America problems: transition mechanisms, unforeseen costs, unintended consequences, and social and economic instability are the devilish details of great national experiments. - ed]

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Happy Valentine’s Day

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Happy Valentine’s Day. And Happy President’s Day. They both look the same from this side of the pond. Being here for 4 months, working every day, no days off, the days of the week just blend together. It doesn’t really matter. Back home, looking forward to the weekend, maybe beers on Friday night, sleep in on Saturday, maybe a Sunday brunch, then golf. Yeah. We don’t have that feeling.

Fraser's helo at sunriseBut there is a payoff when we get back to the United States. For missing 32 days of weekends, plus at least 6 days of holidays, we will receive exactly 4 days off when we return. Even if you return on a Friday, then you get that Saturday and Sunday, which everybody gets off anyway, and then it’s Monday and Tuesday off. So 4 free leave days off to make up for the 38 missed days off. If you do the upper level math, that’s 9.5 missed days off for each 1 day off received. So somehow in the bigger picture that’s supposed to all work out.

We have a pilot rotation coming up. Now those are fun to watch. First, it’s good to see a new guy, talk, and find out what the hell is going on back in the otherworld. Second, its fun to watch the guy who is going be replaced. His days all of a sudden turn into 48 hr days that can’t go by quickly enough. Planning for the great escape begins, looking up departure flights, and studying exactly when and where landfall can be made in the States. All the gear gets packed up days too early, and any extra crap gets sent back in the mail so it won’t have to be lugged on a flight. You practically have to put an ankle bracelet on them with a LoJack© tracking system to make sure they don’t jump the fence before the new guy is actually here and has had his 48 hours of time zone adjustment.

A fun thing to do is to start rumors like the inbound replacement got hung up in Europe and missed his flight, or got sick and is pushed back by a week or two. It’s sadistically funny, except when it turns out to be true, then it’s just sadistically tragic. People always write and ask when we’re going to get home? Honestly, there’s no way to answer, and we really don’t know until we actually touch down back in the United States.

Hellfire LoadThe food here has really gone to crap. Convoy delays. First we’ll have plenty of cereal, but no milk. Then we’ll have milk but no cereal. The Arba’een pilgrimage to Karbal for the Shiite Muslim population has literally closed down MSR (Military Supply Routes). 10 million people walk, drive, or whatever from all ends of Muslim civilization to end up in Karbala. Our role in paying homage to this celebration is that our menu looks exactly the same as it did the day before, except with just a little bit less. This whole food experience has coincided with the new Obama Administration, and we are investigating the coincidence.

We’ve also been watching the meltdown of the economy back home, and have dutifully been burning candles for the banking executives that might be salary capped at only $500,000 a year, and who might have to fly commercial to the Super Bowl or to Vegas for their conventions. It really breaks us up.

A PVT patrolling the hostile streets here is being paid $1,399.50 per month. And an executive sitting on a private jet, whisking off to luxury destinations is complaining about only getting half a million a year, after being at the helm of a company that he drove into the ground, and then has gone to Capital Hill to beg for taxpayer’s money. You never really hear the Private bitching. He just shoulders his M-16, grabs an MRE and goes on patrol without a thought of what evil awaits him in the dark or how small his bank account is. I wonder how much we would have to pay a bank executive to patrol city streets in the middle of a combat zone?

Peace – J

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