Well now. Here we are, finally. In Iraq in the middle of a war. People shooting at me, trying to kill me. I didn't appreciate that, to be honest.
The DSG was set up in a little sand-pit that the Iraqi's had originally had four Surface to Air Missles set up. But within the first day they suffered a slight case of Smart-Bomb Trauma. A couple of days later they moved out the wreckage and we moved in.
Tents, in the middle of sand. Blech.
The primary thing of importance is that this is where we were at during the "warfighting" stage of things. This and the Division Main Base [a couple of miles next to the DSG] is where we launched the "Liberation of Basrash" fighting, which involved EVERYONE. Anyone watching the news during those two weeks or so probably heard something to the effect that this was were the Iraqis first really tried to fight back. But then, maybe not...we didn't get the news and what we did see gave things a lot less hectic and dangerous than they really were. Bah, stupid propoganda machines, not wanting to tell the public how bad things actually were. But to be honest, there were a couple of days that really were touch and go. I can look back on that and honestly feel that I truly earned my combat patch. I'll not say more than that. At least, not right now.
Our home, after we had just gotten there:
And then, about 3 hours later...
And here I am in our humble little abode. I'd just sat down after a patrol and was about to unload and clean the sand out of "Junior" Note: That thing is damned heavy and that box of ammo almost doubles the weight. Sheesh, 200 rounds plus the belt links add up!
Here's the front gate, with a couple of lads on the lookout for the nasty badguys
And the pit right outside our tent, in case someone actually DID attack. SFG Soto, me, SPC Kampmier, SSG Courter, MAJ Whitcomb, CPT Mosel, CPL Yerkes and SSG Huff. (That's the people in my section, although we lost Courter a couple days later to another section)
SSG Huff (aka Sheila), with the symbol of the 7th Armoured Brigade, the Desert Rats
In the middle of a war, there's still beauty in a pretty sunset
Of course, turning around you see the lovely accommodations of our oh-so-private toilets...
The official Action Hero shot, all us Bad Boyz in the TPDD section
And, as always, you have GOT to keep your humour, don't you? No TV or anything like that, so we improvised with a sexy pole dance!
And NO, that was NOT me....it wasn't even my idea. Which all makes me kinda jealous, but still. It was all SSG Courter:
Here's another flatering picture of him. Just brushing his teeth, though it looks like he's picking his nose, eh?
And young Burke, Courter's driver. We also lost him to another section. (they had a loudspeaker HumVee, and the other sections wanted all of those)
