Declaring defeat

I can't just let this go by so I'm reverting to politics for a post. Hey, it's my blog.

I watched Obama's speech at West Point last night. What I saw was the president declaring defeat. We are going to send 30k more troops starting in 2010, and then we are starting to pull out in 2011. WTF?

So the message is: you've got a year to win it, then we're going home. He said we would take into account conditions on the ground, well if so, why put a date on it? What I think this really does is give Obama cover for quitting. I think he would have us leave now if he could. What he can do now is say "I gave the military everything they wanted, but they failed. So we're pulling our troops out." He saves face, the military gets the blame.

Everyone will take that date into account. When an Afghan considers joining the Afghan army, he has to consider that the Americans have already said they are leaving in less than two years. And how realistic is it that the Afghans will be ready to fight the Taliban on their own? Pakistan will take that date into account when they are deciding how to deal with Al Qaeda in their country.

The absolute best we can hope for at this point is that the bad guys will just lie low for a year and wait for us to leave before they rush back in to take over. Why fight when you just have to wait less than two years and your enemy will leave?
But we know they will fight. Soldiers and Marines will die and it will be for nothing because we've already decided when the war ends.

They can put any spin on the decision that they want, and I'm sure they will over the next few days. What I'd like to know is what I'm supposed to say to one of my Soldiers when they stand if front of me and ask: "What's the point?" (Actually that's the question I'd like to get an answer to myself.) This makes my job a lot harder.

Quitting is quitting, it doesn't matter how long you hang on for if you are just going to quit. If you're going to quit, quit early.

I've got to stop talking to people

I'm an impatient bastard. I know this about myself. And it's getting worse. This is pretty common for me around deployments. It's happened pretty much every time I've gone on a hardship tour or on a war deployment.

I get irritated easily, especially by people who are not deploying. That mostly means civilians. Sorry. It's not the civilians fault, I know that and I try very hard not to let people know that I'm irritated. But I know sometimes it comes across.

I've talked to my wife and she says she sometimes feels the same way. (She's also a Soldier for those tuning in late.) My son has also said the same thing. So I guess it's not that uncommon.

I suppose I'm posting this as a way of saying, if you know someone who is deploying soon, cut them some slack. You may think they are mad at you, and they may just be on edge.

More tips for care packages

Okay, I've been thinking about this. There are a couple of other things to keep in mind when sending care packages to troops overseas.

One is "Know your troop." That is, what I need overseas is different from what my son needs. I'm a support troop, he's a combat troop. I'm a senior NCO, he's a private.
Mainly this means I have more access to a PX (store), I am pretty much staying in one spot most of the time and I have money to buy what I need. At least more so than a young private.

So if you know a kid over there who is a combat troop on a small Combat Outpost (COP) like my son, send him or her anything and everything. The things on the list in my last post are all good. But if you are sending things to a support Soldier on a big Forward Operating Base (FOB), keep in mind we probably don't need baby wipes and ibuprofen. Our PX will have all that stuff. I should modify this a little, location trumps job type. If your troop is a REMF, but stationed on a COP, send the baby wipes. Of course, you should listen to your troop and send them whatever they ask for no matter where they are.

Something else to keep in mind, eliminate packaging and ziploc everything. This is especially important for a grunt like my son who is living out of his rucksack. Ziploc type bags are extremely useful. You can keep little stuff organized and dry, and you can see through the bag so you don't have to open everything up to find what you are looking for.
Eliminating packaging means less garbage your troop has to deal with, and makes the package you are sending lighter and cheaper to mail.

Last, if you want to hear from your troop, include some self addressed envelopes or postcards in your care package. You don't need to put stamps on them, letters and postcards are free from combat zones for the troops. You might even put a couple of sheets of paper in each envelope, especially for the grunts. When I was a Cav Scout I could never keep letter writing paper clean and dry, it always ended up getting thrown out.

PS, I think I need to add this. Don't send your troop contraband items. You may think it's cute to include a couple little airline style bottles of booze, but you can get your troop in a lot of trouble. I don't think I need to say it, but don't send drugs either.

Sending your kid to war is harder than I thought

This staying behind thing sucks. I never realized it was so hard to be the one staying home where it's safe. I've always been the one leaving.

I went to the PX today and picked up some things for Aaron's first care package. He lost his watch so I got to shop for a new one for him. Being a watch nut, that was fun for me. In this case I found him a cheap Casio digital, just in case he loses this one too.

Some of the other things I picked up:
Anti-bacterial wipes
Eye glass cleaning wipes
Single load packs of laundry detergent
Q-tips (for ear and weapon cleaning)
Ibuprofen
Moleskin (for blisters)
Self heating hand and foot warmers
Book of crosswords
Couple of decks of cards
A set of dice
Vitamins
Batteries (AA)
Protein bars
Sunflower seeds
Ziploc baggies
A magazine and a paperback book

(If you know anyone over there, all this stuff is nice to get.)

Since Aaron's birthday is coming up, I got a big Hanna Montana gift bag in which to put all this stuff. Not because he likes Hanna Montana, but just for laughs. Imagine a Marine infantryman in combat opening up his care package and everything is in a little girls gift bag.
Well, maybe it's funnier in my head, but I'm sending it anyway.

Then on the way home a song on the radio hit me funny and I had to pull over because of the tears. I'm not the crying type, but there it is.

Aaron flies tonight

My little boy gets on a plane tonight and flies to Afghanistan.

Danner Combat Hiker

Come to find out the mountaineering boots the Army is issuing is the Danner Combat Hiker. Looks like this:

Casio Pathfinder

I really prefer mechanical watches (you can click the "watch" label at the bottom of this post to see some of my previous watch posts.) But I recently had to take my Omega in because it stopped. Mechanical watches are, relatively speaking, fragile. What makes them fascinating to me, the working of tiny gears and springs, is also their weak point when it comes to toughness.

So I decided to get a Casio Pathfinder. This is a digital multifunction watch. I'm replacing the Suunto Vector I've had for five or six years.

The Vector is a great watch, but it's beat up and it's huge. I can't wear it, I just hang it from my web gear. Casio came out with a couple of new models of its Pathfinder line that are smaller in size and more wearable. The reason these are so big is that they are combine time and an altimeter, barometer and compass, called an ABC watch.

With these watches you have to pick your priorities. If you want the best ABC functions, you go with a Suunto, a Highgear or, suprisingly, the Timex WS4. But for me the ABC functions are secondary.
My priorities are:
Chronograph (stopwatch) functions, for crossfit and running.
Multiple time zones, since I'm going to be far, far away.
Day of the week display. I can never keep track of the day of the week in the field.
Alarms, for wake ups, meetings, etc...

Now since I'm not a big fan of digital watches, I want to get as much bang for my buck as possible. That's why I like the ABC watches. They have all the functions mentioned, plus more!

The altimeter function isn't huge for me. These are not all that accurate, although some are really pretty good, based on the reviews I've gone through. More important to me is the barometer. This shows the trend of barometric pressure over a period of time. If the trend is rising, good weather is coming. If the trend is falling, bad weather is coming. I made a habit of checking my Vector before bed and again in the moring to have an idea of what weather to expect.

Then the compass. Why not? Useful to orient a map, decide which direction to angle a shade tarp (the south side.)

So which watch to choose? Only one choice really. The Casio Pathfinder (PAW 1300) has the right combination of features, in the right priority for me. The stopwatch is easy to use, it displays a second timezone with one button push, has 5 alarms, has the barometric pressure trend line, and the day of the week. It also is made to stand up to abuse.

To top it off, it's solar powered. More specifically, it has a battery that is charged by light. So no worries about changing batteries in Afghanistan. (Though to be fair, many of these watches have batteries that are easy to change. You open them up with a quarter.)

This Pathfinder also syncs with atomic clocks regularly, if you are in range. I don't expect to be in range, but I'm not too worried about the time getting out of sync.

Here's a pic.

Boots!

So a little update on how the shopping is going for the deployment.

So I got the duffel bags, and some small stuff sacks to organize my gear in. Life should be a bit easier back in the tent now.

The next issue was boots. I want my boots to disappear as soon as I put them on, I don't want to think about them again. Luckily there are a lot of options now. I managed to find two very comfortable summer boots, although I had to compromise a little. These boots wear like tennis shoes, but they are a bit hot. I mean they don't breathe as well as the old fashioned "jungle boot" style desert boots we were issued in the past, or even the new issue boots. But the comfort factor makes it worth it.
Here are pics. Bates M-9:




Blackhawk Warrior Wear:

Then, since Afghanistan is not Iraq, I decided some new waterproof boots would be a good idea. I settled on Danner TFX boots. These come with or without Gore-Tex and the GTX ones come with or without insulation.

I went with the GTX but without insulation. My feet get hot when I'm working even when it's cold. These are super lightweight and comfortable, right from the start.

The other reason I went without the insulation is we are supposed to get issued a pair of "mountaineering" boots. Which I believe are Bates Tora Bora boots, or something very similar. They look like this:
They are insulated, so that's covered.

This gives me two good pair of summer boots and two waterproof winter boots. That ought to cover it.

Got the North Face bag

Two of them actually. I found a closeout on last year's bags, so I picked up two of the XL size bags in black for $50 each. Then I found a sale on the medium size bags at REI, and picked up a red one.

Life is good.

Gear time

This blog is going to get into gear because I like gear.

So I've been looking at duffle bags. I have several green army duffles of course. The army has been using it for about 60 years, I think. It's evolved a little, but basically it's a canvas tube with shoulder straps. Looks like this one here:

The basic problem with the Army duffle bag is that it is top-loading. Whatever goes in first is buried until you empty the thing out. I am hoping to do better for this deployment.

I started looking around online and I found this bag that the Army is issuing to some units.

It's okay, I hope we get them. But I'd like to have a bag that isn't digital camouflage. I found a really nice, tough duffle bag from North Face.
The standard Army issue duffle bag is 5200 cu in. The wheeled deployment bag is 7000 cu in and the North Face bag is 9000 cu in. Either way, I've got more room than the standard bag, and I've got the U-shaped zipper that will allow access to all parts of the bag when it's packed.

If I have to choose between the two, I'll get the North Face bag. It has shoulder straps that can be taken off and compression straps that allow it to be cinched down to a smaller size if it's not completely full. It's made of a water resistant fabric and it won't scream "MILITARY" at the airport if I use it later for travel. It comes in red, which is always a good thing. I want the red, but I'll have to think about whether I should get it in black to take on a military deployment.

Best case, we get issued the wheeled bag and I buy the North Face bag. I'd be happy to leave all the old green duffle bags behind this time around.

Getting deployed again

It's on! Not going to give a lot of detail here, of course. But I think I'll use this blog to talk about deployment issues and how the training is going and, well, whatever else comes up.

For now I'll just say, we're going next year, probably to Afghanistan. That's not giving too much away.

Hmmm

Might have to start blogging again.