Chris' Deployment Journal

Erin Byerly from Boulder Colo. asks (sorry, just had to write it like that, as if it were a letter to Zoom or some other kid’s program): "I assume you get time off--is it regularly scheduled days off? What do you do with your time off? Get to travel about any or are you restricted to your base?"

We do NOT get any regularly scheduled days off just some days end up being sort of off (but never really, there is always at least some little detail to pull, a machine gun to clean, and at least other piddly stuff). It’s tough because you can run for a couple of days straight and the day that looks like it might be off, suddenly some report of bad guys comes in and you’re back in the body armor, running for the Humvees, and spending sometimes an entire night out cruising around.

Here’s an example: we work on a nine day schedule (and we usually don’t even realize what day of the week it is, except when all the Mormon guys suddenly leave for a while we know it’s Sunday). Our week is broken up into three days of guard duty, three days of day patrols and ‘logistic package’ (runs to the big air base to get breakfast or dinner, fuel, drop off our trash, etc.), and three days of QRF (Quick Reaction Force – just generally waiting around, being ‘ready’ in case anything happens), which also includes night missions.

The other day (it turned out to be Easter actually, but who here knew?) we had a patrol scheduled but another squad was short a few guys so me and SPC Smith had to go with them on an earlier dismounted (walking) patrol to the market and up to the Citadel, a 5,000 year old sort of castle which was mostly destroyed by Saddam and is also the home of Daniel’s tomb. (This patrol was the one we had the Statesman reporters with us and was featured in their online photos.) So Smith and I walk around with all our gear for three hours, return to base, grab a sandwich, hop into Humvees, go out on our regular mission for a few hours, come back, take a nap, settle in for the night and get ready for bed when we were called out again.

The regular QRF had already been called out so we were all that was left and had to go. That ended up being several hours of patrolling a neighborhood, doing a ‘cordon and knock’ (setting a perimeter around the neighborhood and knocking on doors to ask people for info) looking for two trucks that might have shot a few mortar rounds at the KRAB (Kirkuk Regional Air Base – I apparently can say the name of where we are now, since it’s all over the Idaho Statesman). We got back here about 0200. Our squad then went to bed for a nap, getting back up at 0430 because we were scheduled to have the morning logpac run to get breakfast. During that run to the KRAB, we missed a State Dept person that we were supposed to escort and so had to then run back to the KRAB to get them. Best still, we were scheduled for ANOTHER patrol just an hour after we got back.

Luckily, the higher ups realized we were just toast and sent another squad. Then a big vehicle-born IED went off less than a kilometer from here and they now needed more bodies so a few of our guys had the displeasure of having to roll out with them, yet AGAIN (luckily I was… ah… ‘indisposed’ in the latrine when all this came down). Sound like fun? Of course not, but that’s an extreme example and certainly not our average days. On the plus side, the past few days have had very little missions, and we’ve spent the time finishing up the climbing wall, adding holds for new routes, and climbing, while I’ve also been able to catch-up on some emailing.

And we do not get to leave the base, other than for patrols and other missions. In that sense, this place can sort of feel like a prison, concrete walls, barbed wire, exercise ‘yard’ and all. But we’re much luckier than the majority of the people stationed here. These people are what we generally call POG’s (Person Other than Grunt – essentially anyone who serves in a non-combat arms role or support mission here) and they are everyone from chow hall guys to people who work in the headquarters doing reports all day, finance or legal people, etc. They are all stationed at the KRAB and about 80% of them NEVER leave that base. They’re going to spend a year here and will never see anything of this country other than that one US base. Safe as that might be, that just – in my mind – would totally suck. And we do occasionally fantasize about taking a few Humvees out into the hills, splitting the group into to, and having one group pull security while the other goes climbing. Ah, if only…

Posted by: Unknown / 11:45 AM