KUWAIT 24DEC08
Christmas Eve in Kuwait. I’ve finally found some time to sit down and write my third entry here. Over the past few days we’ve been awake practically around the clock; we finished a daylong range on 21DEC and then proceeded to spend the whole night installing reactive armor on the Bradley Fighting Vehicles. After two hours of sleep we went out for another day long range, and after that I was informed that I would be the Officer In Charge (OIC) of the range the following morning (a full eight hours in the future), so the rest of my night was spent scurrying around from one place to another finding us the vehicles, ammo, and range equipment we would need to conduct the training. We woke up early (another two hours) and started working on the Bradleys; they had been transported to us by ship, and apparently a few of them had developed some mechanical problems in transit. So we pushed through those issues in time to get to the range and we fired until range control told us to stop around nightfall. Busy days. The Commander, Executive Officer (XO), Company Intel Officer (COIST), and a few other key leaders from headquarters have pushed ahead to Mosul to prepare for the main body’s arrival. So now it’s just the lieutenants and our NCOs running the show. First order of business was to catch up on lost sleep.
Bradley Reactive Armor is quite a concept. We’ve added large (heavy) panels of C4 to the sides of all the vehicles, which at first sounds like a terrible idea. I was uncomfortable with the fact that I spend so much of my time in a little metal cocoon surrounded by ammunition even before we decided to further surround THAT with explosives. But the reactive armor is directional—and fortunately, directed away from us. The idea is that a rocket will encounter equal and opposing force from the contact detonation of the C4, and thus cancel all of its effects. A nice idea. Unfortunately, the rocket has to hit at the right angle, in the right armored spot, and we have to hope that the ensuing blast won’t inadvertently set fire to the neighboring panels of C4. It detonates by a combination of heat and pressure, so the fire alone won’t send it exploding in every direction, but it is quite flammable and could conceivably light us all up. We’d probably be quite safe (though warm) on the inside, but the result would be the Hell Bradley, a flaming ball of death careening through the streets of Mosul. Definitely a sight to behold. So, until the damned stuff ends up saving my life or one of my men’s lives, all I think of the reactive armor is that it is heavy, bulky, and overburdens the suspension.
This is a problem the German Army of World War Two would be able to converse about at length, so it’s nothing new. We design a vehicle for certain tasks, but as the missions and the threats change, we throw additional equipment on to negate the new risks. More armor, more weapons, more communications arrays, more everything. But the underlying chassis remains the same. So now the vehicle has to carry 40 tons when it was designed for 36, basically. This leads to mechanical problems and forces us to drive at less than peak efficiency. So far the problems are minimal, but the history of the Koenigstiger Panzer shows where this eventually leads. Or, more recently, the 1114 HMMV (the real Hummer, for those of you driving the oversized gas guzzlers at home). When we started upping the armor on those, throwing heavy armored doors and building up the turrets, we basically shot the suspension all to hell. This is one of the reasons we’re shifting to the newer 1151 model—and ultimately shifting from the HMMV model altogether. A good vehicle at its core, but with all the additional equipment, too prone to rollovers and mechanical flubs.
The men are in good spirits for Christmas. In the spirit of things, one of the men (SPC Ladies’ Man, as we’ll call him for reasons which should be obvious) has done me the great honor of asking me to preside over his reenlistment ceremony—but I have to dress up as Santa Clause. He’s still trying to get a suit by tomorrow. I’ll provide the update on how successful this was in the next entry. We’ve planned minimal training for tomorrow, so after a few hours of medical work, the men should be free to hit the Moral, Welfare, and Recreation (MWR) tent and play some cards or pool. If they’re really brave they might even try to tackle the lines for the phones… provided they even work.
I may have spoken too soon about the progress of my team leaders. For a minute there I considered us to have the best leadership in the company, and for my hubris the company 1st Sergeant swapped one of my best riflemen for an aging specialist in 2nd Platoon, with instructions that he be given a team leader position. He is new, he is untrained in the job, and thus far he has been demonstrating no serious desire to change this. We put him in the squad with SGT Skizz in the hopes that he’ll be able to light a fire under him. Should his performance not improve within the next two weeks, we’ll be forced to fire him. Out of a cannon. Into the sun. So all eyes in my headquarters are on SPC Pappy. Maybe he’ll surprise us.
On that note, I don’t think I’ve introduced the cast of characters in my little headquarters yet. We’ve got an ensemble that would make Shakespeare green with envy. At the head is my Platoon Sergeant, my partner in crime and mentor. We’ll call him SSG Lark here, as his real name is another songbird and he prefers being Airborne. He came from Fort Benning where he was a black hat in Airborne School (one of the trainers). Funnily enough, we’d actually briefly met before he came to my platoon. He was one of the instructors in my Airborne School company. His wife worked with a good friend and fellow lieutenant’s wife back in Georgia. The old timers always tell me how small the Army world really is, but I hadn’t expected to start running into old faces so soon. Anyway, SSG Lark is 30 and has a dozen years of Army experience. He’s generally quiet and reserved, but is quick to anger and righteous indignation. This is good for discipline in the platoon, as it is neither my job nor my personality to drive people by screaming. He’s happy to do all of that for me. He has been blessed with very high expectations, and maybe cursed with the fact that he does not always react well to the inevitable let down when these expectations are not met, but all in all he has been an outstanding addition to Blue Platoon. He is also OCD, which is another excellent trait in a Platoon Sergeant but not so desirable in a roommate. Well, at least he’ll be able to escape the aura of “filth” that surrounds me when we get our own rooms in Iraq. I’ve never seen so many ulcers formed because my shoes were not perfectly aligned—or maybe my weapon strayed a few inches into his territory when I set it down—or perhaps my rucksack is lilting slightly to the left. He organizes and trains with the same attention that he cuts his sausage patties in the morning; namely, with great focus and meticulous planning. This has provided the platoon with the stability and order it so sorely needed before.
My vehicular expert and leader is SSG Regulator. I’ve chosen this name not only because of his clear desire to keep things clean and orderly but also because of his seemingly limitless memory of Army Regulations. This guy uses regs as a weapon. Doesn’t think it’s a good idea? Well, he can find a reg that tells you not to do it. And given the prolific nature of Army publishing, there’s one for just about everything. My God, we even tell you how far you need to have port-a-johns away from the tents. And he knows exactly what that distance is, in every form of measurement ever devised by man. This can sometimes result in great tedium, but generally this means that there is no better man in the platoon—and possibly the whole company—to keep your vehicles in order. I can always trust that they’ll be ready to roll out with SSG Regulator. I haven’t had the opportunity to roll out of the wire with him yet, so I don’t know how he handles in the field, but inside the base he is the very definition of “By the Book.”
My first dismount squad leader is SSG Chase—actually his first name, which he would prefer you used when addressing him. Smooth, laid back, easy humor… not your first image of a thundering infantry squad leader, but he gets the job done. He has high expectations of his men, if not always of himself, and his meteoric rise through the ranks is a testament to his ability to get the job done. It won’t always be pretty. In fact, I don’t think it has ever been pretty. But it gets done. Otherwise, and with the exception of his close friends, he keeps himself quiet and reserved. He works just fine with me because he’s open to new ideas and is amenable to getting things done in whatever way works. This, needless to say, causes a slight amount of friction with SSG Regulator.
My second dismount squad leader is SSG Crunchberry. I’m not sure what the story really is behind this name, but from time to time he insists on being referred to as Petty Officer ----, of the HMS Crunchberry. Eccentric? Definitely. He also used to be my platoon sergeant before SSG Lark arrived. He is certainly capable, and eight days out of ten is an invaluable asset to the platoon. The other two days he’s generally inebriated and hostile. This has obviously improved since we got to Kuwait and the well dried up, as it were. But there were definitely a few touchy days of withdrawal we all had to contend with. He much prefers leading a squad to managing a platoon, as it spares him from the politics and administrative ulcers at my level. And he is very good at getting the men trained. When he gets it in his mind to teach the men a new skill, they WILL learn it. It’s just a lot less painful if they do. His life ambition is to leave the Army after this tour and open a cantina on a beach somewhere in Mexico; barring this, he will take his savings and tour the world as a high-class hobo, befriending bums along the way while he writes the memoirs of his travels; or, he’ll stay in Iraq after the reconstruction since it provides him the opportunity to pursue a career in midget farming. That’s right, midgets. As in “little people.” He wants to raise them. Strange? I prefer the term “delightfully eccentric.”
Those four make up my little inner circle. Obviously my first point of contact is SSG Lark, who’ll accomplish whatever I need done with little fuss and careful planning. He’s also there to whisper into my ear whenever I need to get more involved, get less involved, completely disinvolve myself, or totally take over something. This is necessary for me. Most of my officer training was conducted and overseen by NCOs, so I tend to focus too much on what NCOs focus on. Officers need to have eyes only for the bigger picture. SSG Lark does not appreciate it when I poke my nose into the inner workings of the platoon, and we’re still trying to work out some kind of code so he can covertly inform me that I’ve encroached on his territory. Nevertheless, I spend a decent amount of time with SSGs Regulator, Chase, and Crunchberry; first so that I can get firsthand reports about the men, second so that I can directly express my expectations or plans, and third because otherwise my world would be very, very small. I’m not really suppose to interact with the men at an individual level, since my NCOs—and the Army, really—want to maintain some kind of buffer between the links in the chain of command. As my dad would say, shaking his head about his same observations in the Navy in Vietnam, there is “no playing with the enlisted men.” So, to keep myself from going crazy, I have my little circle. And sometimes my brother lieutenants, but more often than not they’re all embroiled in their own platoon problems.
And that, in brief, is the higher leadership of Blue Platoon. We’re all gathered around the tent cleaning our equipment and dreaming of sugarplums right now. For the first time in my life I won’t be celebrating Christmas with my family. Additionally, because of the No Fly Zone and our anti-aircraft platforms, Santa won’t be landing here tonight. So I celebrated by buying myself a new map pouch and a large Spiced Chai Latte (that’s right… this is not your granddaddy’s war). Around midnight I’ll push out to the phones and try to call my wife and family. For now, though, I’d better sign out. SSG Crunchberry is brandishing a shotgun and yelling eccentricities (less delightful when the man is armed, I’ve observed). So, Merry Christmas to all of you. May your celebrations be full of cheer, may your loved ones be close beside you, and if you have a chance spare a prayer of good fortune for the boys in Blue.
