It has been a few days since I have written a post but as you can imagine I have been very busy. Step 5 completed with another stop in Germany and then onward to Baltimore, MD. The stop in Turkey was not really a great one. They put us outside in a covered area, but it was still outside. The weather was very hot and humid, something none of us were really used to. Afghanistan is a dry heat and we have not felt humidity in a very long time. Even though we had just came off a chartered aircraft that is only for military and military families, we had to wait outside for each person to walk back through a metal detector and security. That made no sense to any of us since we had just come off this plane only for a re-fuel stop. After a while we all finally got back into the terminal and everyone was running for power outlets to sit next to and plug into. There was free wireless access in the Airport building on this Turkey airbase, so many of us just got our first taste of fast internet access in a very long time.

After the time in Turkey we boarded the flight, and as a change we had families on our flight. The type of flight we were on is called a rotator and is a regularly scheduled flight that goes between the US and Manus moving soldiers, and families to and from Germany and Turkey. So it was little different having wives and kids get on a flight that was nothing but soldiers and airmen earlier. The flight from Turkey to Germany was just a little less than 4 hours. Even though we had people board in Turkey, some Air Force personnel had got off in Turkey so the number of seats were about the same. In the first leg I had a person sitting next to me that moved across the aisle into a nearly empty row so we could both have room. I picked up a new person in Turkey as a row-mate and was able to get him to move also and enjoy two seats to myself.

The stop in Germany happened at the Rahmstien Airbase which used to completely belong to the US, but we had turned it back over to the Germans a few years ago. The last time I had been here was when I first flew to the Gulf War in 1990. It looked like a small modern airport, but was only for US military and their families. While sitting in this very modern airport and enjoying some free wireless internet access from the USO, I checked out the foxnews.com website and read that they had just busted some Muslim extremists that were planning on killing soldiers at Ft. Dix, NJ, which is where we would be de-mobilizing. I could not believe it and quickly told everyone else from my NY team about it. We pretty much felt that even when we though we were safe, they are still trying to kill us. Of all the places they had to bust these guys, it had to be at the one base that we were going to….what luck.

The Germany to US leg of the trip was going to be the longest one of the whole trip. The pilot announced that it would take 8 hours, 40 minutes to get back to the US. This leg of the flight was also the most filled, with almost every seat taken up by family members if not by soldiers or airmen. In order to help with sleep on this last long leg, I ordered two blood-marys and downed them with dinner. As predicted, the vodka helped in putting me to sleep and getting through the flight. I was not as lucky as earlier and had a person sitting next to me. So I was not able to stretch out as nicely and had to stay cramped into my seat.

I woke up feeling the altitude drop and seeing lights down below. I actually could see the plane cross over the coast going from feet-wet to feet-dry. As I put my boots back on, stretched out, and put away my ipod and other gadgets I kept watching out the window and looking at civilization for as far as I could see. We eventually landed in Baltimore and worked our way through customs and to the baggage area. As we sat there collecting up our baggage and leave the airport the goodbyes started. It was at this point that the other guys that were part of our group but not from NY would split from us. The NY team was going to Ft. Dix, NJ and the rest were heading to Camp Shelby, MS. I said goodbye to all of the guys from Arkansas and Maryland, but gave big old hugs to guys that I considered true friends. Guys like Loon, who I had spent almost the entire year with and my good friend Marc B. I will miss those guys but hope to see them again this summer as I will be in their neck of the woods.

As we walked out of the secure area, I was glad to see our State Command Sergeant Major there to greet us. He said that he has got off of a plane in 1971 form Vietnam to nobody there to greet him and shake his hand welcoming him home and he was not going to let that happen to anyone else if he could help it. He is a great guy that Christine and I both love and get along with a lot. He helped me a lot over the last year to help work through issues and knock-down roadblocks whenever I needed something to happen for one of my soldiers. It was great to see him here as our official welcoming party.

So that was step 5, we were home in the US and dang glad to be here. The trip started on April 26th when we left Sharana, Afghanistan and it was now May 8th and we were all standing in Baltimore, MD. There had been a lot of stops in between, and even though we were close…the trip was not over yet.

Well I am writing this from a country that does not end in “stan”. I am actually writing this from Turkey as I sit here on a re-fueling stop. The flight home has begun. The total flight time will be over 24 hours, but that is ok because we are heading west and that is all that matters. I have a lot to write about and will be posting more as I can. There was a big concert last night in K-stan and was a nice way to end out last night there. Anyway I will be writing about that and a lot more later.

Until Then…

Well we finally got out of Afghanistan and into K-stan. There are way too many syllables and not enough vowels for me to try and spell it. Anyway, we packed up and moved out of our tent the other night. After going through customs we moved into the passenger terminal for what we thought would be a lock down (because we had just went through customs). But they let us walk across the street to the Pat Tillman USO center and get some coffee; so much for locked down. Quite a few of us took that time to have coffee and enjoy some Dominican cigars that our BDE HQ had sent to me last year. I had held onto them until we could all be together, so on our last night in A-stan the fat lady was singing and it was time to fire them up. As we sat around joking, talking and smoking, SFC V from Arkansas grabbed a guitar from the USO center and started playing some tunes. He plays and sings well and did a good job at playing some requests. He played Folsom Prison Blues, Freebird and several other songs. You could see guys finally starting to relax and let loose. We were going to make it out of this place alive.

After a while it was time to move back into the terminal and wait out the time. After several long boring hours or sitting there and trying to find something to do, they finally called us. We moved out into the busses and went to our plane. Everyone boarded the freedom C-17 out of A-stan for the last time. I settled into a side jump seat like always (I don’t like the middle airplane seats), put in my ear-plugs and got as comfortable as possible. The flight was shorter than I remembered coming into A-stan from K-stan a year ago and before I knew it they were giving us a 20 minute warning. After landing, we boarded busses which took us to the living area on the base for our in-briefings.

Once the briefing were over, we moved to our huge tent, put away our weapons for the last time and changed into PT uniforms. This was a place to relax, a place that used to be part of the Soviet empire and a place where we are allowed to drink up to 2 beers a day. Nothing like having a 7.2% beer called Soviet Crown as your first one out of Afghanistan.

We finally got out of Kabul and Camp Phoenix and onto the next step of the process of getting home. The night before was a crazy time of final packing, last minute phone calls, figuring out what we were keeping or throwing out, and of course trying to get some rest. The next morning was an early first call, moving gear outside, getting showers and getting some chow of course.

Some friends of ours, two guys that supported us and helped us every time we came to Camp Phoenix over the last year did one more favor for us. They are the Armament Maintenance Chief Warrant Officer and Vehicle Maintenance Chief Warrant Officer. They decided that they needed to come to Baghram too, so they let several of us ride up with them in a pair of Toyota SUVs. Trust me a Toyota is much more comfortable than the back of a 5-ton truck. So those two guys were great and said it was the least they could do for us. They had both came down to our FOB a few times to help out with weapons and vehicle maintenance issues and they saw what we had to live in and what we went without. So they wanted to at least give us a comfortable ride out of here.

Another thing that happened on the morning we left was that we held a little formation for our New York team, plus Loon. Loon is actually from Arkansas and even though their team is returning with ours, we consider him part of our team and he always will be. Anyway, Loon had earned his Combat Infantryman’s Badge (CIB) 11 months ago and still had not received it yet. His took the longest out of all of them that I had ever seen, due to the incompetence of all the staff sections from Brigade up through the highest command in Afghanistan. They kept losing parts of sworn statements, his whole packet, and many other things that it took for him to have a complete award packet. Ironically Loon had earned his CIB more times over than anyone on the team. He had been in more enemy contact than anyone on the team and had probably shot the most rounds at the enemy than anyone on the team. He had more than deserved it. However all the different levels kept screwing up and losing his stuff or they just sat on it and never told us the problem. The CIB is probably the most coveted badge to earn in the Army. It is such a highly valued badge that the Army two years ago created the Combat Action Badge for all jobs that are not Infantry. I guess the CIB jealousy had gotten bad enough from all the other branches that the Army decided to cave in and give all the non-infantry types their own badge. It is not as highly respected as the CIB, but it gives them something. The Infantry is a proud branch that has all rights to be, so I will leave it at that. Anyway, we finally got his in at the 11th hour the night before leaving Kabul, so we took the moment to award it to him.. Big D decided that Prophet, who was Loon’s partner for just about the entire year here, would be the one to present and pin the CIB on Loon. Prophet is Infantry and so is Loon, so it was fitting. Afterwards we took the tradition of having all the NCO’s to step up and help “re-pin” it in Loon and shake his hand.

Besides Loon’s CIB, my 2nd award of the CIB was also delayed, lost, etc a lot over the last 7 months. Like Loon, I had earned it several times over but it took a long time for it to finally get approved. They had told me before that it was approved, then no it was still in the works, then it was missing something, then it was back to the board, then it wasn’t there yet. Mine was also all up and down the chain like Loon’s was. I had no idea that it had finally came in last night. Big D kept a good secret on that one, so I was surprised when they called my name up there. I had earned my first CIB in Desert Storm, so because this is a separate war, I am allowed to earn what they call a 2nd Award of a CIB. It is a CIB with a star above it, between the wreath points. Staying with tradition, Big D called up Puss, who has been my right hand and one of my best friends along with Prophet over the last year, to pin mine on me. In keeping with all true Infantry standards, mine was pinned in me also, and then Big D called up all the NCOs and Officers of the NY team to help in re-pinning it in me. Needless to say, I had some nice blood splatter marks on my t-shirt when it was all said and done. Of course having what felt like my heart stopped by Ranger (who benches 385 pounds) pinning it in me, was just icing on the cake and made it all the more worth it. I have served side by side in the thick and thin with most of these guys over the last year so it was a true honor to have them pin it for me.

After all of the formalities were over, and the convoy brief was done we all loaded up. We took headcount, we loaded weapons for one last time and rolled to the gate. As we left the gate, we bid Camp Phoenix farewell and enjoyed seeing Kabul (City by the Sewer) disappear behind us as we moved onto Step 3 of the trip home.

I have been hanging out with the guys from AWAC the last few days. The other night when I first went over, Doug Traversa was not there and I talked with 3 of the other authors of that very popular blog. The next day, Doug sought me out and found me in the mess-hall. He looks just like his pictures and I knew it was him when he walked up. We said our hello’s to each other and I promised him I would stop by. I was about to go into some briefings, so I could not talk long. Later that night, I stopped by their b-hut and we ended up talking for several hours. I started talking to Traversa and Templeton, but not long after Morton and Toomer joined us and we went late into the night.

Yesterday I went over for a quick visit, but since it was already dark and I kept them up the night before I did not want to do that again. So I spent just about 15 minutes with them and we chatted a little bit before I promised I would be back the next day during daylight hours and we could smoke a few Cuban stogies and not be cold from the night air.

Today I went over and as promised, it was in the daytime. The guys pulled out a few chairs, and we sat around to talk more about the ANA, their past careers, mine, what I do now in civilian life, what we will do when we get back, and many other topics. I talked about some of the not-so-good times downrange, about the bodies and body parts. I talked about working with the ANA in a combat area, etc. I ask Doug Traversa a lot about his conversations with his terp, which are the blogs of his that I love the most. I told Doug that reading about his conversations with his terp remind me a lot of the ones I have had with mine, but never did write about. I wish now I would have written a lot more about my conversations that I did. The terps are unique in that they are raised in this culture, but by virtue of working with us get some experiences and insight into our culture. There is a lot to learn from them that is not muddied with the stuff they are brainwashed with.

Anyway, we talked about his terp Hamid and about Air force Schools versus Army schools, and about the ANA and the new replacements coming in. We talked about the replacements because today we palletized all of our bigger bags and boxes for movement from here. While we were doing that, 3 truckloads of new replacements came in along with all of their baggage. So as we were getting our baggage ready to go, theirs was just getting here. Needless to say, there were a few smart-alleck comments from our outgoing guys to the new incoming guys. That is just the nature of the beast, as we have done our time and they have not even started yet.

Doug, Doug, Mike and Drew ( the AWAC guys) are just waiting to fly like I am and ironically we will all be in Manus, Kyrgyzstan together as they arrive there the day after I do. So even though I am leaving them here, I will get to see them all again and in a different country no doubt. It has been great visiting with them over the last few days and getting to see through their eyes how it is to work with the ANA, terps, and in this country in general. I spent my year downrange and the perspective is much different than working here in Kabul. However corruption, incompetence, and the culture of the ANA working in Kabul are not all that different from the ANA downrange. We called out meetings this week The meeting of the Afghanistan Milblog Conference, since none of us could make it to Wash. D.C this weekend for the real Milblog conference.

I have made many friends over here, but not many with people from the Air Force….until now. I am glad I got a chance to meet these guys. God Speed AWAC.

I am writing this while I am still at Camp Phoenix, and am close to getting out of here. We started the out-processing last night with a series of briefings on what to expect and how things would happen. The Commanding General talked to us all about the accomplishments over the last year while we have been here. Today we started the morning with the normal series of briefings that all soldiers leaving a combat theatre get. These include ethics briefings, suicide prevention, family reunion, benefits available to us, and a few others thrown in. They did not take as long as we all expected so we went right into the actual station out-processing of all the different staff sections. I was pretty surprised that before lunch, we were all done. We had all the initials on our checklist, we had all of our records and were cleared to leave the Task Force.

As part of this mission and being over here, we get a handful of medals and ribbons. These include Afghanistan campaign medals, NATO medal, and several others. I think the total number was five. Even for the lowest of medals, I have always held a formation to present a soldier just one medal, much less five. But not here, they just handed us a Ziploc bag and said, “here you want these?” Not that I care personally because that is not why I am here or need. I have plenty of salad (that is what we call the collection of colorful medals on a dress uniform) on my uniform. But for some of these guys, I think it would have been nice and showed that the command cared a little bit more had they held a formation and actually had someone from the command present them. To have some staff-weenie just throw you a Ziploc bag of salad just puts the icing on the cake here and really exemplifies how little this task force cares about the soldiers, the ETTs, the Warriors that put their lives on the line every day and fought to make this a better place. Well we will be out of here soon enough and will never have to deal with these people again.