Henry's Web Log

We're official graduates of the class of ... IRRegulators. So named because it's got "IRR" in the name, and Regulators were an old western gang of misfits. Stephen King wrote a book using them. So it works for us.

We fly out on Wednesday (the 17th) in the afternoon. I'll deactivate my iPhone on Tuesday, and hopefully will be able to leave a "don't call me until November 2009" message.

I have posted our unit's mailing address in the top left corner of the blog site. If there's any update (like I get transfered to another unit, or stationed at a different operating base), I'll keep the most accurate mailing address right there.

We're looking at about 32 hours of travel, going the Atlantic route, if you can believe it! Our first hop is to Delaware, then Germany, and finally Kuwait. 10 days or so of training in Kuwait, and we should be in Tallil, Iraq around Christmas. Ho, Ho, Ho!

Where's Tallil? It's not quite halfway between Kuwait and Bahgdad, between the Biblical "Ur" and "An Nasiriyah".

The war stories are always better, and if you’re in a good bunch, they’re funnier, than the real thing. At least in training. Our culminating exercise at Ft Lewis was a HMMWV convoy through about a 6 mile loop, supposedly a recon to keep the main supply route safe, to meet a local farmer who had some intel, and meet with the mayor of a local village in order to improve relationships and offer an American medical assistance visit in appreciation for their support of our operations. 30 minutes before we departed, our convoy commander, a lieutenant, got pulled away for another mission! Mark Jadrich stepped in and did a great job briefing us all. Then Murphy took over, as he is want to do in war… Murphy of the “can go wrong, will go wrong” ilk.
On the way to the farmer, we were hit with an IED. While the first vehicle reacted, we spotted what we thought was a 2nd IED at the convoy tail (not a long convoy, just 4 HMMWVs!). So we couldn’t go forward to help. The lead vehicle’s radio went out, so they didn’t know what happened, the 2nd vehicle had been “hit” by the IED simulator, and the 3rd vehicle really froze because they knew our 4th vehicle had the recovery tow-strap…but we were separated by the 2nd IED. So we got gigged for not taking faster action. Turns out, the 2nd IED was really the 1st IED…just that it looked pristine because the simulated “boom” happened 10 yards away from it!
We got our act together, moved up, rescued the hit vehicle, fired up a sniper, and started moving out when the OC’s (Observer-Controllers) called a halt and we did a quick AAR (After Action Review, see my last entry). Mark had us switch out vehicles 1 (bad radio) with 3 (flakey vehicle commander) so that we could have good commo on our most important vehicle. The commander’s vehicle was #2, and I was in #4 for rear security and vehicle recovery.
We learned later that vehicle #1, in addition to bad commo, had an inexperienced gunner. She had worked out a few kinks with the machine gun during the live-fire, so we thought, “Surely she has figured it out now.” Nope. Every time she pulled the trigger, she jammed it up. And she didn’t have the strength or experience to clear the jam. Vehicle #1’s commander, Billy, has four years infantry officer experience and he did not tolerate this well, to put it mildly. On top of that, the gunner doubted herself. “Should I fire?... I see the sniper. I just don’t know if I should fire…”
Billy’s response, along the lines of “YES G## D##MIT! Waste the Mother F&&#%#!!!” was an attempt to motivate some action. Then he heard once again the “Bang! Click.” Yet another ammunition jam. He absolutely went ape, yanked the gunner down, and put a staff sergeant up in the gunner’s hatch. Then he had to listen to a barrage of “but I’m trained on the SAW [Squad Assault Weapon]. I passed the training course…the weapon kept jamming…”
After the gunner substitution, the weapon miraculously never jammed again. That was just the first of five little scenarios yesterday, and made for some hilarious stories last night. Our four vehicles were the last of 4 groups that went through the course, and it turns out that our little FUBAR wasn’t nearly as bad as the first group’s!

Over the last week, we’ve had a series of exercises and classes about all hazards in country: from camel spiders to suicide bombers. I had never heard of camel spiders, but the wikipedia entry shows them the size of a ping-pong paddle. They can be about lobster size! Search it on YouTube and the most popular videos are from soldiers in Iraq.
The Army has a program for senior NCOs to stay active-duty for 1-2 years after their deployment, ensuring they impart us newbees with their recently gained wisdom. They have also brought on Arabic-speaking actors, built a small Iraqi village, and run us through scenario-based training for manning the base ECP- Entry Control Point; manning a QRF– Quick Reaction Force; defeating IEDs – Improvised Explosive Devices; conducting presence patrols (connecting with the locals, no acronym for that one!); convoy operations; and an additional day at the range focused on SRM – Short Range Marksmanship. We’re combining it all together today, with a live-fire from our HMMWV convoy (HMMWV is the High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle, the Hummer. It’s more accurately called the M1151 because we’re using the new up-armored HMMWV’s). Live-fire means we’re using real bullets for our gunners. Tomorrow, we switch back to blanks and run through the convoy STX – Situational Training Exercises. That’s our culminating exercise where we put it all together, interact once again with both friendly and hostile Arabic-speaking civilians, and wrap this Ft Lewis training up.
The Army has a fantastic culture of continuous improvement: after every training event (or real missions), we conduct an AAR– After Action Review. Our emphasis is on “no thin skins” – every voice is equal, and no hurt feelings. It’s about saving lives and improving our mission performance. Organizationally, the Army has a better reputation for this among our sister services in the Navy and Air Force, so hopefully it catches on elsewhere. Certainly in the software-development world, our company has practiced close-out meetings as a required step of each project , or along each milestone for larger projects. No thin-skins, what went well and what ideas for improvement do we have, from the junior to the senior staff, everyone has equal input. Among process development and process improvement quality models, this is always a key component: who else knows better on how to improve than the folks who just did it? Moreover, the best ideas often come from the bottom. What better way to give junior soldiers or staff a real feeling of belonging as they make a positive contribution to the unit?

Lisa and I made a promise before I left: we'd each try to loose 10 pounds. I've got a lot more than she does to loose, and I've gotten right to work on it.
One of our briefings on "battle mind" (or as a football coach would say, "getting your head into the game") was about coming back as a 300. It's your choice whether that's a 300 on your PT test (perfect score on Army Physical Fitness), or 300 pounds. Because there's considerable discretionary time, and lots of really good food. See an online calculator for the Army's PT test
So I'm working on my weight goal, and hopefully improving my PT score in the process. I started at 226 pounds on October 5th. I was within Army standards, but have to be body-fat measured. My goal is to be below the screening weight for body-fat testing ("tape test" - because they measure your girth and use various look-up tables to guesstimate your body fat percentage). So my goal is under 214 pounds. Right now, I'm 218! I was pretty frustrated last month as I was eating right, exercising more than most of my peers, and still not loosing anything. Well, I took a dramatic step last week: I stopped all caffeine and artificial sweetners. No Diet Coke, my favorite beverage! And within a week, about 4 pounds have come right off.

I want to stress that this is all self-imposed. The Army is really not enforcing body-fat except in extreme cases right now: seeing as how they're calling us old Individual Ready Reserve folks out of the woodwork. In fact, I'll go so far as to confess that no one has given us a physical fitness test or tape-test since we re-entered active duty. I do know they looked at this in the medical fitness review, but it wasn't a very close look!

I'm pretty excited about my progress, though, and I look forward to the benefits of dropping this extra weight: faster run times, easier to do push-ups, less stress on my knees, and above all, looking good for my Lisa!

We did the HEAT simulator this week. That's the HMMWV Egress Assistance Trainer (an acronym within an acronym- the very best kind!!)
The HEAT trainer lets you experience a rollover in an uparmored HUMMWV, then practice releasing your seatbelt while upside down, while taking on water, or under darkness. Then you're balanced on your head, so you need to get out without choking! Rollovers are a big cause of injury right now, so this is very relevant training for us.
Take a look!