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Member |
Not an appropriate place to put this out...remember, this is a public site, and Haji & all his buddies troll here too. Get a FM from someone in S-3, or web search it on E-pubs...there's plenty of info to be found. You (and all your guys) should know that stuff forwards and backwards before you leave anyway, so get to studyin'. |
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Basic Training |
I watched this in awe!! WHat our guys are going through for our country is unbelievable! My thoughts and prayers are with you Bad VooDoo and all the rest of OUR men and women!!
 P.S. Are there any women in the Bad VooDoo |
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Member |
No girls.
The guys are from the 1/184 which is Air Assault Infantry. They are from my neck of the woods (NorCal). I almost joined the 184th when I left my old Infantry unit several years ago, but went to the Army Aviation world instead. The 184th actually took over our "armory" (old as hell WW-2 era barracks building with a weapons safe in the basement) at Camp Parks when we stood down our Battalion. They are over there backfilling slots with the 1/160th which is a Light Inf. unit. This is an all male occupation...no women...although many women are working in roles that directly support the guys. The 184th is a very squared away Guard unit...big time...look them up on Google. They are known as the Night Stalkers (completely separate from the 160th Spec. Ops. Aviation Regiment who also go by that name), and they are a very high speed group of guys. Not your typical weekend warrior. When I was talking to them at the closing time of our Battalion, they were quick to point out that if you expect to be a weekend warrior, and only PT and train on your "drill weekend", then you are not what they are looking for. At a time when most CA Guard units were having a hard time making recruiting mission (late 1990's), they were quick to let it be known that they can (and would) pick and choose who they would allow to serve there. Some of my platoon mates went to the 184th, and most of the others converted to transportation and joined the new truck units that stood up in the absence of the Infantry. I ran into several of them on my long tour in the sand...they had been busting their butts. I got nothing bad to say about the 184th...nothing at all. |
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45 Days Suspension - Has Notes 04/30/2008 - ErichG |
I just googled it and found all the information needed. I am sure if I post it here people will go nuts despite the fact that a simple google under "I.E.D. and Nine Line Report" will find exactly what you are looking for. So, I will leave it to you to google but it is all out there. And, by the way, the sources I found were official military sources so it was not like the "evil empire" was posting it publicly on the web. |
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Member |
CPTKevin;
You are absolutely right...however, we've all been briefed in the recent months about OPSEC until we are blue in the face. I even got jammed up by folks back home about my posts here, and had to change my profile page. Hence the reason that nobody wants to post stuff like that. I don't really think Haji is spending his days perusing this forum for intel, but enough people get their balls busted out of this forum that it's better to let certain things go un-posted. Besides...I didn't go online to get that info when I was mobilizing...I went to the pubs. Train as you fight...pubs are available when the net is down. The question wasn't a specific thing that folks with experience could help with...it was "what's a 9 line?". Who the hell doesn't know that by now? Why not? Time to get in the pubs. |
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Basic Training |
Yeah, the good majority of Bad Voodoo came from B Co 1/184 IN.... its changed a bit from what you described, though. I guess five years of war and waning numbers of enlistments kind of took its toll as was being the only infantry unit in the bay area.... We've got less then high-speed people in the unit now and we converted to a straight up from AASLT. We've actually been reflagged though as A Co 1/185AR and those of us who didn't go with Bad Voodoo or 143FA are getting sucked up by the 81st HBCT to go to Iraq soon. |
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Member |
How is 184 today? Who is 1SG at C company?
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Member |
It's the idiots that post FOB locations (city, distances from main roads, etc.), personnel numbers, etc. on MySpace/Facebook/etc. that we have to worry about. Or, when we left, the less-than-smart folks who left weapons manuals out in the hallway for anyone (including local national cleaning staff) to take out. IS1(SCW) |
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Member |
Ha, Ya got me boss. You must know where that is if you know it's the DFAC parking lot. It is kind of stupid though. SaraSnipe out |
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Member |
Probably not, it's Infantry, but there were in ViperBlack, My platoon. We had the "Guntruck mission for the 867 at Taji from Sept 06 to Sept 07. My TC was Female. Tough Smart and definitely new her job. I was an ASV gunner. BTW lstgnfghtr, Taji Rocked. Swimming pool, Gym better than Golds Gym, 1/2 decent PX, AC in the Barracks. Now you want to talk about HOLES Kalsu, Warhors, Falcon, Loyalty, Sikes, Rusty,Hammer, Now those are some of the Fobs we visited on our one year vacation rolling the High ways and by ways of Lovely Iraq. They suck raw sewage through a four inch fire hose  Oh and don't forget Iskan, OMFG what a dump. But Taji was not a bad place. granted it wasn't Biap or Anaconda but it wasn't all that bad. BTW My wife won't let me watch it. As soon as I showed her this thread she went off, said that there is no reason for a National guard veteran who did a year on Gun Trucks to watch another deployment about National Guard veterans on a one year deployement on Gun trucks. I'll have to wait until she goes to sleep tonight and watch on the computer with my headphones on. |
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Experienced Member |
I can't get away with that, even if I have headphones on my wife will come to find me. She has some sixth sense, she can be sound asleep. She will wake up and realize I'm up.
Keep smiling, everyone will wonder what you've been up to! |
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Basic Training |
Not sure who the 1SG is over at C Co, but I do know we're taking a good chunk of their company with us (B Co) to Iraq as part of the 81st HBCT. When 184 got back from OIF III there was a lot of mixing up and shuffling around, and theres a lot more going on with the upcoming deployments. From what we've been told the rest of the BN is going as part of a Kosovo rotation when we're in Iraq. As for Bad Voodoo, they left about a year ago, they should be coming home any day now, probably within the month or so. |
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Basic Training |
Ha, Ya got me boss. You must know where that is if you know it's the DFAC parking lot. It is kind of stupid though
LOL well actually it is the big sign in the background that says... "DEFAC parking" |
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Member |
I'm not sure what you're getting at, but around 40% of the active Army has yet to deploy to Iraq/Afghanistan. |
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Member |
Yeah. That's true. But one morning, after a really bad night with one KIA, one WIA a destroyed truck, EFP complex ambush, we pulled into Scania. I was immediately (as Escort Commander) set upon by two very crisp officers, and a senior remf NCO and taken to task for A. Bringing a HMMWV into their FOB with blood all over it's hood, and B. for taking my helmet off as soon as my ASV rolled through the gate. After they walked away, I lit up a smoke and tried to lose myself in thought for a minute or two before all the paperwork began, when this little E6 with missing teeth and IQ points picks that moment to inform me that I was not allowed to smoke anywhere but designated smoking areas...that was his job, his entire job in Iraq, to walk around and tell people where not to smoke. I really don't mind something that tends to differentiate me from those types of soldiers. But it ain't gonna be a combat patch. The one poster is right when he points out the first troops to don them the second they became eligible were all the career remfs. |
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Member |
SFC Nunn has a tough battle to fight, and most of it isn't against Hadji. Maintaining the edge and situational awareness through hours and days and mile after mile of monotony is part. His own warrior spirit and previous exerience in contrast with this particular mission is another. Noone likes "route roulette" just waiting for the "boom". I don't know SFC Nunn, but I know and have served with a few other guys in the 160th in other deployments. My unit handed our mission over to SFC Nunn and the 160th when they first arrived in country. We did some missions with them while they transitioned. It occurred to me then that one of the roughest things they would face, especially the 184 guys, was that this was a mission where the enemy always had the initiative. They were used to being the door kickers, the attackers. This wasn't going to be like that. I would guess that the feelings of frustration, and even a little depression leaking through SFC Nunn's narratives stem from a feeling of abrogation of the warriors way of doing business. It's tough job. When they came to my unit to ask for volunteers to go to Iraq, my Airborne, 11B, 19D, 1SG straight up said to us that driving down a road waiting to get blown up wasn't his idea of the war he signed up to fight. (It wasn't a courage issue. Top belongs to a SWAT team in the civilian world) But no one should come away with the impression that what we did...what the 160th is doing, is useless, fruitless or not necessary. We guarded the convoys that moved the Surge's equipment into place. That in itself contributed to the sought after victory. We lost two KIA, and one seriously WIA (sent home)doing it. The unit before us lost more. 160th to my knowledge has one death from a rollover that happened while we were still there with them. Things are getting better...and more boring for troops that spent their first tour raiding houses in Baghdad. I have some added insight when I watch the frontline show. I know exactly where they are. I know when the film is being cut and manipulated for...I want to say "dramatic effect" but it's not really that. The truth is the job they're doing is very boring and monotonous alot of the time. To get enough footage to make an interesting series, you're going to have to tweak things a bit. I spent a year there, on missions that averaged out to about one day in two on the road. I had maybe 30 total hours of blood pumping action and excitement in that whole year, and probably only about 4 hours of actual combat. |
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An Infantryman wears blue discs, hangs a blue cord, and can earn a CIB because he is one of the few in the Army that, by his Job Description, is trained to close with the enemy, engage with the enemy, and kill the enemy.
Many people, when the CAB came out, asked why other Joes couldn't get issued a CIB for combat action. The job description explains that pretty well, to me. Receiving vs. closing with and neutralizing is the issue. Clear as mud to the regular Joe...crystal clear to the CMF11 Joe. Becoming a de-facto 88M, waiting for the enemy to execute the exact same Job Description in the opposite direction, has to be a bit more than I would care to bear. But you are right. And anyone who has run those routes knows you are right. The beans and bullets have to get where they are going. I would much rather see locals doing the majority of the transport, and assuming the risks...but such is apparently never going to be the case. Locals don't seem to have any pressing need to take over the security of their own country. Would you? Just like the Kuwaitis...they have their own version of "The Pinkertons" on patrol. Why should they step up? They have no need. In the absence of Iraqi leadership, or the growing of some local nuttzacks to step up to the occasion, we have no choice but to call on people like the guys in the 160th/184th. NOT your average Joes (certainly not your AVERAGE weekend warriors, either), but when thrown into a mission that requires average Joe taskings, they obviously handle it with Infantry pride. That means, like it or not, if they say it's gonna get done...it's gonna get done. Hooah? My little brother...a green hat out of Bragg...just buried one of his closest Battle Buddies. He was PCS'ed to Arlington Cemetary this past Saturday (SSgt Jason Brown, a 5th Group 18C out of Campbell...died on the 17th of this month). He took the Golden BB kicking in doors..."fighting the good fight". I'm quite certain that he would have taken just as much care if he were assigned to an MSR 'rolling stock' mission as he would have with any of his normal high-speed, low-drag missions...but to bite it rolling a load of copper wire or turnip greens up somebody ELSE'S highway, for somebody ELSE'S supplies...would have probably caused his eternal spirit to pause upon bodily exit...just to shake his head at the irony in it all. Just a guess on my part. God Bless all of you. I left the green suit for the blue suit, and am 1/2 way through the MC-130 flight engineer course at present. My time in the sandbox will forever hence be different than it was in the Army...which (I cannot lie) is part of the reason I switched teams...but I will NEVER forget who I am hauling in those beans and bullets for. In this new job, we might spend but 10 minutes at your FOB doing an Engine Running Offload (with me...babysitting a couple of college grads in a cockpit)...but I will ALWAYS remember what it felt like to be that Joe...watching the bird boogie in, and then boogie out (without me)...and wishing like HELL I was on board when it went wheels up. Love you guys...keep your head on a swivel, and stay alert/stay alive. |
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I myself am guilty of buying in part into the Hollywood perception of war...prior to my deployment that is. All my career has been combat arms. Infantry, Armor, Cavalry. I took pride in being "the tip of the spear" and admit I looked a little askance at those troops who comprised the "shaft of the spear". But, without the shaft, the tip falls in the mud, useless. This is truly an asymetrical war; a strong man with a spear fighting a weaker one with a short sword. The spear-man is generally successful at keeping his adversary at a distance, while the swordsman hacks at the spear's shaft hoping eventually it will crack or his enemy will decide he's taken enough damage to his expensive spear, and leave. Someone once said, "Professionals study logistics, amateurs study tactics." I think that's a bit of an oversimplification but it is more true than not. I saw just about every stripe of the service guarding the roads in Iraq. Army, Guard, Reserve, Air Force, Navy, Marines, Infantry, Artillery, Armor, Cavalry, Engineers, Transportation, Medics, Military Police, cooks, Sea Bees...just everything. The roads are a major front in this war without battle lines. It's not without precedent. Winston Churchill felt the most important battle of WWII was the Battle Of The Atlantic. It was in essence, a logistical fight. It didn't boil down to how many U-Boats we could sink (Insurgents we can kill). The criteria for victory (in that battle) boiled down to tons of shipping we could move to Europe. The gun trucks are today's destroyers, the diesel trucks today's freighters, and the insurgents are today's U- Boats...striking and then fading from sight. We've already won this battle. If we lose this war it will be a matter of economics and the fight to influence the perception and will of the average American to continue. 99% of soldiering is NOT glorious. This new generation of soldiers who grew up having their "self-esteem" constantly looked after; who grew up perceiving war as a place where they alone were the star of the video game, racking up points...has trouble with the reality of this war. Not so much the blood involved, but the sweat and tears that go with it. To my knowledge no one has ever glorified in film the WWII sailors and merchant seamen who did their job day in and day out just waiting for the torpedo to hit, or the Kamikaze to strike...winning their war with hardly a trigger pulled by them. People just don't realize. I'm in the 11th ACR. Alot of people don't know the Blackhorse Regiment's first casualty in it's history was a private named Gibbs. He was a Cavalry trooper who was killed by Islamic insurgents while escorting a logistical wagon train in the Phillipines at the turn of the century. |
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An Irwin dog...been out there more times than I can count under rotor power, and a few times back in the 11C days under Leather Personnel Carriers Left & Right (LPC power).
Your words there are very well put...I agree wholeheartedly, both about the logistics (the analogy to the ships is quite apt), as well as to the point about the Nintendo Generation. I wish more people would think about that for a while...chew on the thought until it makes a bit of solid sense. |
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Experienced Member |
*
Keep smiling, everyone will wonder what you've been up to! |
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