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Ah, the memories!

By The Armorer on November 21, 2005 | | Comments (20)

Pictures like this kick in the reflexive trips down memory lane... I can almost smell the JP8. And the smell of diesel exhaust on cold-enough-to-freeze-nosehair mornings will always carry me back to Maneuver Rights ARTEPS... those who know, know.

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11/14/05 - U.S. Marine Corps 2nd Lt. Jim A. Neville of Delta Company, 2nd Tank Battalion, sits on the top of an M1A1 Main Battle Tank during an early morning sunrise in Batra, Iraq, Nov. 14, 2005. (U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Robert R. Attebury)

There are very few pictures of The Armorer As Lieutenant, as he was usually Hosting provided by FotoTimebehind the camera, and most of the pictures he took during the era were lost in moves (or one very bad bout of temper). But I did find this website which, while it's the 11th ACR, could just as well have been 1/46 Infantry, 2/81 Armor, or 1/22 FA, units where the Armorer spent his Lieutenancy. Same era. Ah, Wildflecken!

The only difference between this M113 and the Armorers FIST M113 is mine would have 4 antennae on it.


Turning to other topics, and recycling this posting surface...

Musings from those who don't drink the Kool-Aid... Rino-Sightings at Searchlight Crusade.

And finally (for now, anyway) - Carnival of the Recipes #66 is up at Rocket Jones. H/t, Denizenne Puncitilious.

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20 Comments

By AW1 Tim on November 21, 2005 8:36 AM
Comrades, It's just like the smell of OD Canvas under a warm sun. Whether it's the cover on a deuce and a half, or a tent or even the helmet cover, it had THAT smell that was unmistakeable. I can close my eyes even now, and remember that smell.... Respects, AW1 Tim
 
By SangerM on November 21, 2005 11:16 AM
Or maybe the rank smell of damp camo screens (that old hemp stuff) that some nutcase had stored wet instead of drying properly. But yeah, what you two said about the other smells... Tanks and cold and old canvas and maybe the smell of breakfast in mermac cans. Or some of these (speaking of 2/81). . . www.canted.com/temp ~Sanger
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 21, 2005 11:26 AM
Ohhh - great pics! Who's the idiot on the M113 with no helmet on? And Luxury Quarters at Hohenfels... or Graf... or any of the training lagers!
 
By Heartless Libertarian on November 21, 2005 12:35 PM
You mean your FIST track was an actual 113, not an M981 FIST-V with the hammerhead? And don't forget the smell of the mud, or it's seasonal opposite, the dust. Snowball fight in the motorpool...with all three platoon leaders flinging snow at a new private who, lord bless him, insisted that he couldn't attack an officer. We, of course, pelted him mercilessly until he fought back.
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 21, 2005 1:25 PM
Dave - I'm *old*. Yeah, my FIST track was an M113. We didn't get the M981s until I was a snarlingly unhappy Captain on the DIVARTY staff. 1st Armored fielded the M1/M2/M3 during my time there, and then I went through it all again in 1st ID at Fort Riley. Where I finally got issued my custom-made kevlar. And had an arms room full of M1911A1s (to include *two* Singers and one Union Switch and Signal). Mine, before I traded it off for a Guidelamp M3 with my VTR driver was a 1943 Remington-Rand that shot sweet, straight, and true. Well, after I swapped the barrel and bushing, anyway... I also had a 1962 Studebaker-built Deuce in the motorpool... in 1988. And the M981 sucked, mostly. Gimme a BFIST anyday!
 
By cw4(ret)billt on November 21, 2005 2:01 PM
Sanger - I noticed nobody had been chumming for birds from the Hubert. Smells I *don't* miss: 1. Rice paddies at planting time. 2. Frying hydraulic fluid. 3. Burning aluminum. 4. Phosphorous from the tracer that just zipped past my nose. 5. Essence of three-holer the day after the p-o'ed cook put laundry detergent in the mashed potatoes...
 
By Heartless Libertarian on November 21, 2005 5:52 PM
John-honestly, I think I'd rather have a 113 track (and I assume the grunts rode in those, too) for one big reason, other than whatever suckiness the M981 might have had (I know they couldn't keep up with our Brads, that's for sure): The First Default Rule of Targeting Priority Against a Mechanized Enemy: When in doubt, shoot the funny looking vehicle(s) first. The 981, especially after the M901 ITVs were retired, definitely stuck out.
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 21, 2005 6:02 PM
Perzackly - which is why I gave away radio range and had 3 of my antennas tied almost flat. My instructions to my FOs and FISTS were - when shooting Copperhead, go for antennas, not cannon. After the 1st Tank got M1s and Brads, the only 113s were us and the Engineers. Then we got the 981s, which were their own brand of hell. Gimme a BFIST!
 
By msg keith on November 21, 2005 7:45 PM
Okay. You guys have me reflecting back to my younger days. I'll have to dig up some pics for a few "Back Then" posts on my site. Things like the old 5/4 trucks, M42 Dusters, and some range firing at Ft. Sill in '75....
 
By SangerM on November 21, 2005 8:34 PM
Hey, Ya'all, I got TONs of this crap (and who doesn't)... But the best part is the answer to your question, John: The guy most out of uniform, most casual about it, most likely to be found that way: Why, the 2nd Bde, 1AD CO, of course, COL Price! He ALWAYS went around out of uniform, wearing taker overalls, hat back on his head, field jacket hanging open, hands in his pockets, etc. But man, did people care for him! And it was a sad day when the new Bn CO who replaced Griffits made us start wearing chin straps all teh time...What crap! :-) In that track: - COL Price, 2nd Bde CO - LTC Griffits (2/81) Bn CO (far side, in shades) - CPT Gaylord (I think), CSC CO (and former professional clown, down in hatch) - 1SG Matthews (former field-commissoned and then RIFd CPT, died in '78/79 after a ^#$% bull kicked him in the chest -TINS- he was president of the European Rodeo Assn., in hatch, back to camera) SP4 Caspar Sablan, Driver TC was, I think SFC Birdwell, or BTW, those are Matthews' Feet next to the Mermac cans. He was a GREAT 1sg, very much influenced me, made me grow up a lot. I still miss him sometimes. I was royally PO'd when he died. :-( But you know how that is...
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 21, 2005 9:25 PM
Perfect! I didn't know Price, but Griffits I did. That Army was gone by 1981, mostly.
 
By SangerrM on November 22, 2005 2:23 AM
Oh yeah, Griffits was just swell.... So was his frau, who showed up at a change of command ceremony in a bright yellow nearly see-through dress w/ almost nothing on beneath it, on a VERY sunny day. Suffice to say our CO was NOT a happy camper. We in the ranks, of course, were just tickled stupid. :-D As for Price, I liked him. He was easy to talk to and generally respected as far as I knew. He really liked 2/81 Scouts, and he spent a lot of time with them/us. I saw him up close and in action (so to speak) when his OH-58 blew-up over Graf, he wasn't on it, but our Bde Chaplain was, and his pilot, and some other folks were. We had to go out to guard the site and pick up pieces (THAT was not fun), and he was out there. He was NOT a happy person, to be sure, but I was impressed by him that day. Anyway, that army may have been gone by '80, but with it went a lot of the fun--or maybe stateside never was fun. All I know is that by '87, the Army I was in had completely lost it's sense of humor, and had got peacetime stupid, ESPECIALLY at Ft. Hood under Gen Saint. But that's another story.
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 22, 2005 9:01 AM
Oh, it lingered on until 81, but the clamp down on fun for safety (which killed the club system and seriously damaged MWR for a while) was fully-established by 1983. I got to live through that jerk Saint when he took over 1st Tank in 84, then he followed me to the US, and as the III Corps commander ruined your fun at Fort Hood and reached his tentacles out to Fort Riley and crushed us, too. The flip side to killing fun, however - we *did* kill fewer soldiers. But it was done in typical Army style - by over-reacting and over-kill.
 
By SangerM on November 22, 2005 10:10 AM
The funny part about Saint was that he did pretty interesting stuff, when it came to us in the field... He deployed my platoons in decent interesting ways (we were Div assests, as you knw); however, I was there in 1AD when he showed up (and was matched by Horvath), and then I swear he had everyone in the 1st AD sent to Hood because everyone in my platoon who PCS'd out of FRG in 85/86 ended up at Hood, even though! there wasn't a lot of call there (read NONE) for people with my special flavor or skills.... that's how I ended up on west-fort instead of main post. And yeah, at Hood, it just got worse than it was in Germany.
 
By John of Argghhh! on November 22, 2005 10:20 AM
Well, we were both there for him in 1st Tank, then I escaped to the Advanced Course, only to have him show up at III Corps and meddle from a greater distance. And the 1st Foot people wouldn't believe me when I told them what "Sergeant's Time" meant. Nope. Paid for that in a bruising briefing session on their plans, too. Saint's only comment to me was "You were in the 1st Armored, weren't you Captain?" Yes sir, I was.
 
By MajMike on November 22, 2005 10:23 AM
ahh, the good old days of the wild-chicken... and Kreuzberg beer right across the valley at the monastery....
 
By cw4(ret)billt on November 22, 2005 10:28 AM
From '80 to '82, the clubs at Fort Dix and Fort Drum (just to cite two examples of which I have first-hand knowledge) were only open for lunch (1130 to 1300) and dinner (1630 to 1800). Adult beverages were only available after 1700. The object was to reduce the excessive (i.e., in excess of one) consumption of adult beverages by us low-ranking types, ossifer and unlisted. However, if you worked past six in the evening--and everybody in my circle worked past seven, at least--you had to grab supper in one of the local gin mills. Beer 'n' burger 'n' beer, usually. End result was that 1. the clubs became burdens on the MWR system instead of revenue-producers, 2. off-post ticketing for DUI increased ten-fold and 3. the alcohol-related accident rate skyrocketed. 'Nother grand social experiment with unanticipated side effects. Somebody should have been horsewhipped for that one...
 
By fdcol63 on November 22, 2005 12:38 PM
As a lowly PFC S-3 clerk/driver, I didn't get to hob-nob with The Saint like you guys did. But, once, shortly after he took over the 1st AD, we were on a CPX somewhere near the Windischeschenbach / Kirchendemenreuth / Pressath area. I had driven the S-3 to the 2nd BDE TAC, and moved my jeep downhill to wait for him. I was standing there, stretching my legs, when another jeep pulled up and the passenger asked for directions to the TAC. I said something like, "Well, chief, you go up this hill and take a left ...." etc. Whereupon the passenger pulled his head down a little, and I saw the 2 stars that had been hidden by his jeep's top. I came to attention, saluted, and they drove off. LOL
 
By cw4(ret)billt on November 22, 2005 12:49 PM
He was just nodding graciously at the compliment you paid him--you thinking he was a Warrant Officer prolly made his day...
 
By fdcol63 on November 22, 2005 1:56 PM
LOL
 
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