Same caveat - there's some OPSEC delay in timing.
I spent the last two days in Bahgram Airfield meeting with the eastern regional commander (82nd Airborne) to discuss how things were going so far. Now when I say “meeting with” of course I mean I sat in another room listening to him give his assessment without him knowing I was ever there.It was a fun trip and it was great to get out of ISAF for a while and see something new. We took a convoy to Kabul Airfield late at night. (As we piled into the SUV with our guns the Brit driver was listening to rap…It all seemed so right somehow.) Then sleeping the night away at the airfield in a tent for transients (insert joke here) and off the next morning on a Blackwater plane to Bahgram. The base is huge, and was interesting to see so much “America” after two months in a European command.
The effects assessment branch here at ISAF asked us to go, but pretty much ignored us after that, so we traveled on our own. The trip was easy considering we weren’t on any schedule. I had a veteran Special Forces Major who showed me the ropes of inter-theater travel. Most of which apparently consists of lying and obfuscation. The Air Force people who run the flights do revel in their power, so it was kind of even.
There is this 82nd Lieutenant Colonel as liaison here we call “Colonel Flagg” from MASH. He suddenly appears and disappears and seems to know everything and anyone. Of course while we were trying to find our contacts from ISAF who were coming up another flight (they neglected to tell us where the meeting was) who do we see but Colonel Flagg rounding the corner, going to the same meeting. Later we stopped to get badges for the building, needed a signature, and who turns the corner? Colonel Flagg. Needed to find a contact for their J5? Ran into Colonel Flagg. Saw him today too to set up another visit.
We stayed in transient barracks in Baghram, listening to the Talilban trying to mortar the runway, at night. Now I know sailors haven’t really carried guns since the cry “boarders away!” went out of style but someone needs to do something about the Air Force. While in barracks a newly arrived AF officer pulled his pistol out of the case, racked the slide a few times, pulled the trigger a few times, slipped in a magazine and walked out. The soldiers in there and I stared at each other in shocked silence. You know what I said about being polite and having a plan to kill everyone? I had a plan to kill him as well. You are just as dead from an accidental discharge as from one on purpose. During the safety briefing the old British corporal who convoyed us out said “in the past three months I have been shot at seven times, all of which came from inside the vehicle.”
Anyway the ride back to base from Kabul was eventful; there is always lots of traffic and lots of stupidity. Now it is everyone’s best interest that military vehicles get off the road as soon as possible (especially for those of us in the vehicles) and ISAF drivers have a tendency to pull into the oncoming lane, block other cars, and go the wrong way around traffic circles. All of which means we blend right in. It’s reasonably hard to separate out the stupidity from the complex IED attacks. On the way back a motorbike with three guys pulled in front of us, slowing us down, then when we got around them a van pulled right across our front from the right lane. (I thought “uh oh here it comes”) but it was just two unrelated idiots. We took the van’s bumper off and knocked it across the road. Now when ISAF vehicles get in an accident, the driver just hands out a paper in Dari and Pushtun basically saying “you have been involved in an accident with an ISAF vehicle, come to the gate and we will give you money” and then off we go. I think I’ll bring a few of them home.
We were talking about the Osama video in the office last night and his demand we all convert.
Me: “I’d convert for a 2.5% tax rate.”
Carl: “Joe you’re Catholic that’s almost the same thing right?”
Me: “First off we’re the senior varsity, and they would have to change the ‘pray five times a day’ thing to ‘just Christmas and Easter.’”
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