Some people think....

From the Soldier side this Memorial weekend 2008: I've been back from Iraq for over 2 years now....remember I had only been home from Bosnia for about 6 months before going to that lovely place in the sand.
I still have some very nice people say things like: "thank you for your service..." etc. I always say: "thanks."
Some people say things like: "thanks for risking your life" or "thanks for putting your life on the line."
Again, I always tell these nice folks: "thank you."
But, I have to admit something. I had very little intention of "risking" my life. Yeah, I got mortared a shitload of times and even had one little assholeinsurgentturd shoot at us one day...(he missed.)
But, I had no intention of getting killed. I carried an M-4 with 9 mags, a M9 with 7 mags. My intention was not to "die for my country."
My intention was to: "Make the Insurgentasshole die for his cause."
(I kind of stole this concept from General Patton...."A lot of people think it's Nobel to die for your country. Bullshit, make the other asshole die for his!!!")
Go enjoy your Bar B Que and have good American beer and have one for those little insurgentassholes who can't drink and will some day die for their useless cause....and they really won't get 72 virgins and all that crap.

LOOK TOUGH, and maybe nobody will mess with you

From the Soldier side: So I'll continue my story about going back to Fallujah. If you scroll back, you'll see the last time I was there (Jan 05) it was still a hot spot. Now, in May 05, they're trying to rebuild the place. My team has been tasked to look into why nothing is getting built.

So, we're in Camp Fallujah, ( A Marine camp) working to help the US Army Corps of Engineers, talking to Navy folks. How confusing... I had a hard time just figuring out what to call people in different uniforms. You'd think we were all from foreign countries. I had no idea what a Senior Chief was etc. Thank God I'd watched every episode of JAG, so at least I knew the officer rank system in the Navy. No F-14 flying attorneys though....disappointing.

So, I'm working with this Navy Commander...like I said, a nice guy- very professional. I explained that my team and I needed to get into Fallujah and talk with some of the locals in person. No problem. He'd set up a convoy with his Sea Bees. I walked over to the Sea Bee compound and introduced myself. Their group was almost all Navy Reserves...the "expert" they had was a civilian cop from the South. He kind of gave advise on how they should do things...he was very good.

After I talked to these guys, I figured I could learn a lot from them on how to run convoys etc into the city. They had some very good ideas and methods...which I will not talk about here in case some assholeinsurgent reads this. None the less, I took some of these ideas and put them to use with our teams later.

RIDE INTO HELL: to be cont.

How come nothing is getting done?

From the Soldier side: Remember I was going to tell the next chapter in: "My useless adventures in Iraq."? Well, here it is. My next assignment gave me a whole new team. My old team was split up and given to other team leaders to go on a do great things. (I'm kidding) So, my new team was made up of almost all regular Army soldiers, with one guy from my National Guard unit in CA. I guess the regular Army guys didn't mind me being their boss, because they never complained. I did take them out and really teach them how to shoot, as a bonus.

Our new mission? I can only say that we were tasked with looking into why some things were not getting done in Iraq. (something to do with re-construction) Of over 1,100 jobs in the Baghdad area alone, do you know how many got built? Zero! They couldn't even find over 300 of the jobs! When I read later in the news about Army officers etc getting arrested for stealing or loosing so much money, I lauged my ass off.

So,anyways... some friggen genius in Head Quarters thought that we could do even more stuff by traveling all over the friggen country. I learned a lot...Iraq sucks. It sucks really bad. It's hot, dry, smells, with stupid useless people all over the place. So, as part of the great plan that I seemed to have no control over, we went back to Fallujah, Iraq. This time I'd get to look around down town more and see WTF was going on-- first hand.

We arrived via Black Hawks to Camp Fallujah. I was to report to a US Army Engineer officer. Nice guys, I used to be a Combat Engineer, so I could talk to these folks. The Army officer told me that he was about to leave Iraq, so his replacement was a Navy officer. Huh? OH... a Navy Sea Bee. They're like Combat Engineers, so I could talk to them if they didn't use too many Navy words like Bow and Aft. (I have no idea which is which, and if I can't see land, I feel lonely.)

So, I reported to this nice Navy O5, Commander. I asked if he knew what we did. He didn't. I explained, he said he'd refer all of that "Stuff I did to me" since I was the expert. I told him that my team and I really needed to "chat" with the locals. He said sure, he had a good security team that could take us out. Navy Sea Bees. Oh wow.

To be cont.

What story should I tell next?

The CI -Roller is suffering a birthday. I know most people celebrate such an event, but the CI Roller would rather skip that day each year. I was going to write about another adventure in Iraq....but I guess I'll get to that later. Did you know that they have Navy sailors in Iraq acting as grunts? Well, they did when I was there. I think I'll tell that story next. Strangest thing I ever saw.... Navy people on convoys in Iraq...with M-16s and Machine guns and all. I might even have a beer or two....

And Here's a Little Video For My Buddies going to Kosovo...KFOR.

Sorry, I have no way to do that....

From the Citizen Soldier side: I often wonder how the California Army National Guard survives between one earthquake, flood fire or riots to the next one. The times in between, they seem to act like a drowning person who's just been thrown a brick to save himself with....

Today's example:
I use the Army's E-mail system for my normal National Guard crap I have to take care of between drills. I can log onto this e-mail from anywhere in the world... However, some months ago, I was told that I "Had to have a Cal Guard account".
So I had an account set up. All my e-mails went to this Cal Guard account and I wondered why nobody was e-mailing me back about important stuff for drills, (like how many bullets we'd need to shoot etc.) I discovered that since I'd had a Cal Guard e-mail account set up, my e-mails were going there.

Problem? I couldn't get into that e-mail account without going to the damn armory and logging onto one of the net work computers. Huh? So, I have to take my own time to drive 20 miles to the friggen armory to check my e-mail on my own time?

I told them to close that account so I could at least check my workable Army e-mail account from home or my "real job".

But I keep getting e-mails from the assholes in Sacramento telling me I have to go online, to there site, from a Cal Guard computer and take some dumb ass test...or I'll be blocked out.

I e-mailed them back and told them I didn't really give a shit. (my exact words) about what they thought I needed to do....

I'm not worried about them reading this because you can't get onto this blog site from the Cal Guard computers....

This crap will make you crazy!

From the Soldier side: this was sent via Army e-mail in recent days. After reading it, I think it made me crazy:

SUBJ: Policy Implementation - Mental Health Question 21In 2007, Army Cdrs & Army IG reported the negative impact Mental HealthQuestion 21 was having on the willingness of many Soldiers to seek neededmental health treatment.
Q#21 asked: "In the last 7 yrs, have you consultedwith a mental health professional or consulted with another health careprovider about a mental health condition?" Soldiers perceived that if they answer "yes" to Q21, they could jeopardize their ability to obtain or retaina security clearance needed for job performance or continued Army Service.
Army G2 checked with the Army Central Clearance Facility to see how manyclearances were denied or revoked solely on mental health issues, thenumbers revealed: Less than 1/4 of one percent of denied or revoked security clearances over the last 2 yrs were based on Psych issues (@ average 4 peryr). Self-disclosure of mental health treatment was not the deciding factor in clearance revocations & denials--in almost all cases there were unrelated concerns stemming from the clearance investigation process, which guided their judgment in rendering the adjudication denial/revocationdetermination.
In May 07, SECARMY requested SECDEF's personal support to get the Mental Health question eliminated to address Soldier perceptions that seeking mental health counseling could put their careers and service at risk. As a result of Army's efforts with SECARMY and SECDEF support, Question 21has been revised;
OMB will use the revised language on future editions ofSF86, but that will take a while; hence the OSD immediate implementingguidance pending a new form. Until such time, OPM publishes the updated SF-86, Security Managers will advise Army Personnel to use the revised language below when answeringQuestion 21 on the SF-86: --
Mental health counseling in and of itself is not a reason to revoke ordeny a clearance.-- In the last 7 years, have you consulted with a health care professional regarding an emotional or mental health condition or were you hospitalizedfor such a condition?-- Answer "No" if the counseling was for any of the following reasons andwas not court-ordered:- strictly marital, family, grief not related to violence by you; or- strictly related to adjustments form service in a military combat environment. -- If you answered "yes," indicate who conducted the treatment and/orcounseling, provide the following information, and sign the Authorizationfor Release of Medical Information Pursuant to the Health InsurancePortability and Accountability Act (HIPAA).POC is xxxxxx State Security Manager

Classification: UNCLASSIFIED
Caveats: NONE

I think what they figured out is a lot of troops going to Iraq are having friends die...and they go to talk to a shrink about it...then they're afraid they'll get axed or something.

HIT & RUN cont....

From the Cop side: OK, to get on with my hit and run story from April 24th. Like I said, there's been many times that I wish we had some big ass armored vehicles in police work. A USMC AmTrak would be one handy vehicle for example. It could be used to go after armed bank robbers, floods, set up road blocks and just crush assholes in general.... and stop silver Hondas.

So as we take up where we left off... I'd gotten a few calls on a silver Honda crashing into things. Each time I'd start towards one crash, I'd get called off and sent to a worse one. So I'm heading along to the last known location of the C.S.H. (Crashing Silver Honda) when dispatch gets a 911 cell phone call.

A citizen is behind a silver car with no bumpers, 3 flat tires and the Honda is running stop signs and almost hit 3 kids on bicycles. The Honda and the 911 caller are heading my way. I am in the down town (remember, it's a small town) when I see this rolling pile of shit heading towards my patrol car. I have to give it the gasssss and get out of the way to avoid having my nice brand new 250 horse power black and white Ford Crown Vic getting crushed. Damn, I wish I had a B.A.A.V. (Big Assed Armored Vehicle) at that point.

I get out of the way, then flip on my lights and siren and go after the C.S.H. We were not going over 15-20 MPH, but it ran every stop sign and red light for several blocks. As we're rolling through the down town, I'm just worried that some H.U.A. (Head Up Ass) driver will not see us and crash into the C.S.H. or my 250 Horse Power black and white Ford Crown Vic...

We make it through the down town and are approaching the next jurisdiction...my lights and siren are having no effect on the C.S.H. driver. We roll on.... I'm asking for more units, but remember I'm the only patrol officer on at the time...and the Sergeant is in the office doing paper work. Crap, I need some help getting this car stopped....and I still haven't even had my morning coffee yet.

As we got to the edge of our town, the driver heads into an empty parking lot...with only one entrance and one exit. The C.S.H. heads straight for a wooden fence, then stops....turns and heads back towards me. I can see the driver now...a little old gray haired lady about 100 years old. She's just staring straight ahead. I sure couldn't shoot her, but I had to stop her before she hurt someone or herself.

I have few options.....so I jump out of my car, and yell:"Grandma, stop!"

It worked. She stopped her car, I reached in and shut off the engine...then called for Paramedics to come and check her out. She had a stroke...not idea where she was or what she'd done.

The Honda was a total loss...but nobody had been hurt. Amazing but true.

Everyone needs training!

From the Cop and Soldier side: One of the things I have learned that make someone a better cop or soldier is good training. In police work we have required training we have to do each month. I the Army National Guard we also have training we have to do each month. All of this training is usually well thought out and planned to make us better at our jobs.

Well, keep in mind that even terrorist asshole insurgents must go to training. However, sometimes their training is not well planned out. Watch the video and wonder who planned this training. I'm sure it will make you very happy.

This POS can actually fly? CH 46

From the Soldier side: I was sitting in a training class for my cop job the last few days. My goal? To attend as many training classes as possible --then retire. As we were talking in the class, somehow we got to talking about flying in helicopters.

One person in the class said something like: "our military has some of the best aircraft in the world..."

I almost fell out of my seat. I asked if he'd ever flown in a USMC CH-46. He said: "oh, those are old, they don't fly those anymore...they were made in the 1960's."

Now, keep in mind that this guy was an expert. And expert at what I'm not sure, but if you asked him about anything, anything at all, he knew all about it. I explained that the USMC was still flying CH=46's in Iraq, and he continued to argue with me. I just let it go.

Look at the photo. Here' s me flying in a USMC CH-46 in 2005 in Iraq. Now, keep in mind that they don't fly this P.O.S. any more. I was there, he wasn't. I felt liking telling him to S.T.F.U.

But I didn't. I'm a nice guy.

3 hours after I got off this ride in Baghdad, this CH-46 lost power and crashed. Nobody was hurt due to the expert flying by the USMC pilots...I guess nobody told them that these things aren't flown anymore.