By I’m back from doing Army stuff. Going to the field always brings back the appreciation for little things in life like being able to take a shower, sleeping in a bed, having heat, being able to order a pizza, taking a crap on a toilet, having access to a telephone, watching TV, etc. This last training exercise was just over two weeks which compared to other things I have done isn’t long at all.
During a National Training Center (NTC) rotation in the US you go to Ft. Irwin, CA and train in the desert there for one whole month. You live in either a tent or vehicle, in my case a Bradley tank, the whole time. And oh by the way it is 115 degrees out. I spent one month in the field here in Korea during an ARTEP and Foal Eagle exercise 4 years ago. Many of the army schools include over a month in the field also.
During the war and the aftermath of it in Iraq, I lived in a Bradley for two months before moving into old Saddam Fedayeen barracks on an Iraqi military base that had no air conditioning so we just slept outside anyway because it was cooler. We had to dig holes in the desert to take a crap and that was only after we safely probed the area for land mines. Fortunately none of us had diarhea yet. That came later from drinking the Tigris River water. Some of us actually had our own folding chair with a hole cut out of the seat to use to take a crap with. Nothing funnier than seeing a bunch of GI’s squatting out in the desert next to each other taking a crap reading a two week old Stars and Stripes newspaper. We took showers from a 5 gallon water can with water purified from the Tigris River and baby wipes. Food was prepackaged Army Meals Ready to Eat (MREs) for the first two months until the chow halls got up and running. Plus we were up on guard, patrols, or missions for 36 hours and off for 12 hours every day. There are no days off in Iraq. Plus the temperature would regularly hit 120 degrees. Than let’s not forget there are those guys there that want to kill us to.
So spending a couple weeks in Korea in the cold and rain is really no problem by comparison so I can’t complain. But I and others older guys that have been around the block a little bit always get a kick out of the new privates or even NCO’s that have never done anything in their career, complain about being out in the field, how bad the food is, or how cold they are.
You can’t teach experience so that is why it is so important that Army units regularly go to the field so soldiers can get experience practicing their field craft skills, develop confidence in their equipment, and they can also develop that mental edge it takes to endure long periods of time when things just suck. And yes believe it or not, in the Army many times you find yourself in a situation where things just suck. Like we say in the Army, it is important to learn to suck it up and drive on.
So I will suck it up and drive on with blogging soon once I get caught up with work. Work back in the rear doesn’t stop just because you go to the field. It just piles up instead.
7:12 am on January 6th, 2007 1
Welcome back jetiranger, hope you get back to regular blogging soon. Hearing more about Iraq sounds interesting to me.
7:13 am on January 6th, 2007 2
Welcome back. Know what you mean – it was always good to get back wither it was from a field exercise or a combat deployment. Really makes you appreciate those little things.
7:13 am on January 6th, 2007 3
Let me join the others in welcoming you back.
A question: is FOAL EAGLE an acronym or does it have any special meaning (or is it just two animal names stuck together)?
7:14 am on January 6th, 2007 4
Hey, welcome back! Heres my ftx, 1971 OP on Imjim River, near Munsan, they threw me out the back of the truck to man an OP with aiming circle for a week. Only shelter was a fox hole, and its the middle of winter! Upon waking in the morning, I was amazed at the number of icles hanging off my poncho from condensation. God was it good to get back to CP Stanley!!
7:14 am on January 6th, 2007 5
Not an acronym, a DoD-generated code name for a major military exercise usually involving two or more services (Army Navy AF Marines) and/or countries (allies, NATO, Korea, Japan), with participation of significant numbers of troops/ naval vessels/ aircraft. Most such exercises don't make into the general public consciousness; "Desert Storm" is one example of a one that did, in this case it was a one-time event.
Other names are for periodic exercises ("Reforger", Return of Forces to Germany, was annual, occurred for many years during the face-off of NATO vs Warsaw Pact). Sometimes it was in the winter, so heavy armored vehicles could maneuver across the German landscape and not tear up the farmers' fields too much. They would get generous compensation for any damage from a NATO fund, but it still tended to make their wives angry.
GI will have to tell you what FE was. The annual major exercises where US troops are brought to ROK from elsewhere (CONUS, Hawaii), to maneuver with 2nd ID and/or ROK units, will have some kind of name like this; don't know if they use the same name each year or generate a different one.
Such exercises get a mention in the US press peripherally, usually only because NorK makes a point of shouting about them as being a prelude to an attack on NorK. Then their objections sometimes make it onto commercial US news outlets.
US Army/Marines do this more than other nations IMO, costs big bucks, but it's one of the things that give them more combat readiness. I mention this because I always think of the Bradley incident involving the two Korean schoolgirls; with the annual turnover in Korea, US battalion and brigade commanders will always want to "exercise" their armored vehicles like this so their constantly turning-over troops will know the countryside and their defense sectors.
It's not the same thing as just jumping in your car and driving somewhere; US military doesn't just drive around looking for Koreans to run over (though that seems to be the impression of many excitable civilians).
7:16 am on January 6th, 2007 6
Thanks for the explanation for 'Foal Eagle'. Was Desert Storm generated the same way? They were pretty lucky to get two words that so well matched the exercise itself (sorry for the sarcasm- I meant to be a little funny).
In fact, my wife asked about the name. She is a police officer with the Korean coast gaurd (Hae-yang Kyoung-chal). I think a coworker asked her about it.
We, at least, don't think the American services are targeting middle school girls. American soldiers are humans like any others but I am damn grateful to have you here.
7:17 am on January 6th, 2007 7
Operation "Desert Storm" first started as Operation "Desert Shield". Until President Bush (41) made the definite decision to authorize US military to go on the offense to retake Kuwait (after Nov elections in 1990?), the official purpose of the US build up of forces in Saudi Arabia was to defend KSA against a further Iraqi attack out of Kuwait and Iraq proper.
Process of this decision-making was gradual, one way to review it quickly would be by reading the Bob Woodward book "The Commanders". I'm sure the name change from Shield to Storm would have been announced publicly at one specific time, can't remember when it was exactly.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/product-descript…
1991 book I think, should be a lot of inexpensive used copies around, don't think it ever came out in paperback, don't know about availability in ROK (is there any market for used bookstores with English language books?)
Remember that Woodward imaginatively "reconstructs" many of the conversations he presents, sometimes he only has one source for these so don't necessarily take them as gospel truth.
Can't remember where I read this, or even if it's correct. But — I think these names are often generated by computer, at some subordinate office within the US military Joint Chiefs of Staff, in the Pentagon (?)
Maybe they feed a whole bunch of acceptable words into a computer, have the computer generate random pairings (selected words only, I reckon nobody would want to be part of an Operation "Weak Sister" for example).
Then they pick out the ones that look the best, send a list up the chain for approval at whatever 3, 4 star level (or higher) wants them. Decision maker picks out one he likes (or sends back for more if he doesn't like any of them).
Desert Shield and Desert Storm were probably specially selected by somebody on Joint Staff (under the Joint Chiefs of Staff) and not a product of this computer process (if I'm right that such a process even exists).
The Woodward book may cover the naming process for DS (can't remember for sure now if it does or not). Any local English language library should have a copy, if no bookstores exist. Or any US military officers of your acquaintence might have one in their personal library. (I don't have mine handy to my location now or I'd check it for myself).