Over 30 calendar days, I just ran 300 miles. I didn’t run 300 miles in 30 days — I actually did it in just 26 days. But we’ll get to that.

I’m not really sure where this idea came from. Last month, I was in Baghdad for a 10 day visit, and while there I ran about 66 miles on 5 runs. That seemed like a lot of running to me — my shortest run was 10 miles, but my longest was 18. I had been able to get off of the airplane, after flying half way around the world, and I’d needed only a short stop at the chow hall before I’d knocked out a 10 mile run. In Baghdad, in the summer.

When I got back, I was feeling strong. I was feeling fit. I was realizing that I was a stronger runner than I thought.

Which, by the way, is a very odd realization to make.

When I got back to the office, after the 4th of July weekend, I was talking with one of my sections about the trip and the holiday weekend. 5 runs in Baghdad, for 66 miles. And the long 4 day weekend? I’d done three runs for a hair over 40 miles. I bet, I said, I could sustain 10 miles per day.

Now, I won’t tell you exactly what they said — Soldiers can sometimes use, um, colorful language — but suffice it to say, this section (hereafter referred to as The Zombies) disagreed. Nope, you can’t do it, they said.

Fine, I said. I’ll prove you wrong. In fact, I bet I can do it for a month.

Oh, wait — better still. I’ll race you to 300 miles. I’ll do it in 30 days, and I bet you I can do the 300 miles faster than you can.

Did I mention that The Zombies number about 15? Yeah — big section of Soldiers. Me, vs. more than a dozen Soldiers, running to see if:

1. I could average 10 miles per day for 30 days;
2. I could run 300 miles in 30 days;
3. I could run 300 miles before all of them, combined.

300 miles. Sparta!

Yeah. Not really sure what I was thinking. On the surface, that seems like an insanely dumb challenge to issue. I hope it’s no surprise that they agreed. They eagerly agreed. Of course, I had also run 10+ miles that morning, meaning that in the first 5 days of July, I’d run 50+ miles. One Zombie had run about 10 miles over the weekend (their so-called ringer).

I was winning.

So, how does one run 300 miles over 30 days? Well, carefully and with a lot of planning. I’m quite sure my wife thought I’d gone mad when i told her I was doing this. Not that I was trying, but that I was going to actually do it. I run at a pace that is often between 9 and 10 minutes per mile — that’s 100 minutes of running per day. Do you have an extra 100 minutes every day for running, and extra time for a very good shower and a change of clothes? I didn’t. Certainly not every day.

I had to make it in the morning. On weekdays, my units meets at 0630 for accountability. Most days, we then exercise for an hour, but I often do not have to be in the office until 0900. Done right, I could run for some time before the 0630 formation, and then I could run for maybe 90 minutes more before I’d need to be rushing into the shower and on to the office.

On Schofield Barracks, I put together a few runs of the right lengths. A 3 mile run up a hill. A 6 mile loop. An 8 mile loop. A 9.25 mile loop. I found that, if I was parked and suited up, I could start running at 0530 for the 6 mile loop, and would finish in time for my 0630 formation. If I was parked and suited up, I could start running at 0500 for the 8.25 mile loop, and be finished in time for the 0530 formation. I could do another 6 or 8 miles (or even 9.25 if I pushed it) and still make it to the office.

But being parked and suited up at 0530 means leaving the house by 0500, or maybe 0510 by the latest. Which means getting up at 0430, to finalize my gear (which I’d pack the night before), have a bowl of Cheerio’s, and to use the facilities (a very serious part of the day).

Ugh. 0430. That’s early. To get 7 and a half hours of sleep, that means being asleep at 2100 / 9 pm. Not in bed, but asleep.

How important is running to you? Would you be asleep at 9 pm most every night, just to be able to have a lot of rally great runs?

And yes, that hour got earlier and earlier, based on just how early I was trying to get up. I had days when I started running at 0500, which meant I was up at 0400. The earliest was this morning; I was up at 0330, running at 0430, and had done almost a half marathon before I even said hello to the Army or my Soldiers at 0630.

Oh, and yes — Cheerios. Every morning, if I can, I have a big bowl of Cheerios. Not big, like Seinfeld, but a good sized bowl of Cheerios, preferably with 1% milk. I have no special eating plan, no special diet. I start my day with Cheerios because I like them and because they seem to work well with running.

Those who known me best also know that while I am not a serious runner, I am very serious about my running. It’s a big, big part of my life. But not something that dominates my life.

I don’t live on Alaskan salmon and brown rice grown on the eastern slopes of the Andes. I don’t eat mega-protein bars, or take special gels. I haven’t sworn off ice cream or alcohol — I mean really, doing that would ruin everything.

No, I try to eat right, but I also eat whatever the hell I want, or whatever the hell my body tells me it needs. Swedish fish? Yeah, sometimes. Peanut M&M’s? There are those days. Sticky rice and mixed vegetables? Sometimes that’s what just seems right. I don’t load up on things, to prepare me for running, and I don’t act differently after runs, to recover / grow muscle / lose weight / etc. I eat, I run, I sleep some.

Have I lost weight? Not really. I had lost some, more for sure, in the prior year. Mid 2009, I weighed maybe 212 lbs. By this summer, I was down at or below 200. Sometimes below, sometimes above. I didn’t / don’t care. But I certainly do feel fit these days.

And my weight certainly does wiggle some. In a week, I could go from as low as 195 to as high as 207. A lot of that is water and food and everything else. It all tends to even out around 200, but it does wiggle. Weird, huh?

Anyway, that’s sleep and food. Now, about those miles.

As you can see, it’s a slow and steady climb to get to 300. Nothing big, nothing brash, nothing fancy. A lot of run. 26 out of 30 days.

But look at that pie chart. Now, I’ve known for a long time at the 10 mile to half-marathon distance was my sweet spot, the length of run with which I am happiest. 5 out of the 26 runs were less than 10 miles, with the shortest being just 3 miles. But that 3 mile day came right after I had a 21.75 mile day, one of just 3 days when I ran 15 or more miles. I wonder how many times one of the Zombies ran 3 miles.

But look at that big wedge — 18 of the 26 runs were 10 or more miles, and less than 15 miles. While I averaged 10 miles per day for the 30 days of this challenge, I actually averaged 11.54 miles per run, for the 26 days I did run during this 30 day period.

That just seems like a lot. A lot in that range, and a lot to average.

But, I did have 4 days when I did not run. One was the 4th of July, and as I mentioned, I had done 40+ miles during the 1-3 July window. There were two days when I had duty, and was unable to run in the morning. And one day I had a meeting at 0600, and could not run. I knew there’d be those days, and I did my best to plan for them and to adjust for them. Obviously, with some success.

I’d like to add, though, that this wasn’t some mad dash for mileage. On the weekends, especially, I’d often take to the hills to continue my adventures in running and seeing Oahu. Some of those runs turned out to be less than 10 miles, sure, but they were insanely beautiful, and included some places that have long been on my list of places to go run.

And it’s been anything but flat. My 6 mile loop goes from about 950 feet of elevation, up to about 1150 feet of elevation. The 9.25 mile loop goes further, up to about 1250 feet. But I did runs that went from the beach to a mountain pass at 1150 feet, and even from the beach up the side of a mountain, to about 2300 feet of elevation. I’d run where I wanted to run, not where I’d easily be able to get my miles. I’d have preferred to have not made the 300 mile mark, than to have missed those runs.

Three more things, and then I’ll wrap this up.

1. It’s hard to run these kinds of miles while in the Army, and not draw attention. Showing up to the first formation of the day literally dripping with sweat after 6 or 8 or more miles, well, it kind of sticks out. Showing up wearing a Camelbak, too, is a bit out of place. Towards the end, I’ve had people asking me how far I’d run that day, how I was doing on reaching 300 etc. It’s been an unusual project, even by Army standards.

2. My shoes are near death. They are a pair of Nike Pegasus, one of two pairs I bought this year back when I had maybe 600 or 700 miles on my last pair (which were ultimately good for 1000+ miles of running). This pair, though, started to split on the sides after 300 or 400 miles. I’ve been hoping they’d last through this adventure, and they barely have. I’ll do one more victory run on them in the morning, before I hide them in the yard next door (they really, really stink, too — happy birthday, Chandra!).

3. Somewhere in the middle of all this, I tried out for the 10-Miler team for my Division. I actually made it as an alternate, not because I’d fast, but because I don’t quit. While running the race, and at other times, people would ask me why I run so much (especially for an old guy). I tell them I train as I fight — this is my zombie plan. When the going gets tough, I’m going to grab my shoes and my camelbak and I’m going to outrun the zombies.

Which, by the way, I did. I did my 300 mile before The Zombies did. I won.

They are dirty and nasty. They stink like you would likely not believe, even though I have been washing them semi-regularly to try and fight that. Any sense of spring in them left a few hundred miles ago. If I believed Nike, they would have been retired on OCT 7 when I passed the 300 mile mark. I’m sure glad I didn’t.

Because last week, these are the shoes I used to outrun an angry adult bull. These are some good shoes.

I had started in these shoes in August 2009, when I formally returned to marathon training. I was in Iraq, I was under a lot of stress with my job, I was ramping up to start IBOL, and I needed to get back to running to help balance out life. Training for a marathon, the Honolulu Marathon set for after I returned home from Iraq, seemed like a good way to do that. New phase, new shoes. The choice of shoes was uneventful — I had bought one pair of Nike Pegasus when I was on block leave, liked them, and bought another pair through the mail knowing that Nike would phase them out before I was ready to try something else. That second pair is what I have been using.

I ran on them in Iraq. I ran on them in Hawaii, and Arizona, and California. On land and in the sea, and through too many puddles and creeks and streams to try and count. In the desert, and in the snow, on paved roads and muddy trails. I don’t think I ran on them through fire, though — I just never happened on any when running. I’m not some elite athlete, some fancy Ferrari of a runner who needs a special diet or special gear, and these are just running shoes. They’ve taken me where I needed to go.

And along the way, I learned a few things.

I enjoy running. OK, not the actual running part, but I love getting out and running. Maybe when I slow down some later, I’ll transition to hiking. But during all these miles, I’ve seen some beautiful scenery, run some awesome trails, and enjoyed getting out to run. Along the way, I’ve taken a few thousand photos (ah, thank heavens for the age of the digital camera), with some decent results. But I’ve found a way to get out and run and explore and see things no matter where life and the Army has taken me.

Replacing shoes every 300 miles, just because you’ve run 300 miles, makes no sense. A while ago, I was researching running at the Army website for safety, and they had very little to say about running and shoes — except that there isn’t scientific or academic research to back up a prescribed need to replace shoes based on miles — it’s the feet and the shoes that determines that, it said. And I’d have to agree.

Running injuries can be terrible, but a lot of them aren’t so bad. With these shoes, I’ve sprained my ankle five times — as in, swollen up like a grapefruit, hurts to walk on it, and people see it and say, “Damn!” The first time, I was 1.89 miles into a 4 mile run — and I finished the 4 miles. The 2nd time, I was a quarter mile into a 7 mile run when I rolled my ankle off the side of the road and went sprawling onto the desert floor — and I still went ahead and ran the 7 miles. #3 and #4 really hurt — I only finished half the planned mileage because the ankle not only hurt, but also started to swell a lot right away. #5 was bad enough to get me to take 2 days off from running — something I did not do for the previous 4 sprains. And I’ve had other minor aches and pains — a knee that sometimes hurts and sometimes just makes a lot of noise, a rotor cuff that really doesn’t like me, and then there was the period when my Achilles tendon and I weren’t really talking but more ignoring each other. All the while, I’ve kept running. At worse, on the earliest sprains, I took anti-inflammatory meds to help with the swelling, but other than that, I’d kept on running. I didn’t think I’d be able to.

And I’ve learned that old farts like me can do a lot more than they think. I am averaging close to 40 miles per week this year, at a time when most of my soldiers are doing 10. In 2005, when my PTSD was at its worst, I was a good 30 lbs heavier than I am now, and all I am doing these days is running and eating ice cream. And my PTSD? As stressful as this job is, it’s under control — like an alcoholic, I suppose, I’ll have to live one day at a time with it, but the running helps tremendously when my stress levels go up.

So, on Monday, I will break out the new shoes. I already have some miles on them — I took them to Prescott with me, and wore them one week here. And I think they’ll be good for some miles; they’re the Nike Pegasus model from last year or the year before, one year newer then the pair being retired, and they look and feel about the same — just new and springy. Give me a few months — I’ll beat that springiness right out of them.

Well, of course it’s terrorism. Investigators have shown up and have begun to ask questions of the locals — have there been strangers in the area recently? Maybe Chechens? Or some other terrorists from the North Caucasus region?

I have no doubt that it’s terrorism, and would not be surprised in the least if it turns out to be tied to Grozny or Russia’s own internal Muslim conflict. Basayev may be dead, but the conflict rages on, the issues remain unresolved.

And it will be interesting, in these next couple of days, to see how the US responds to Russian cries about the threat she faces from Muslim terrorists. Sometimes, Russia and others like the US see eye to eye on the subject, but not always. I wonder how it will play out this time.

My little bi-phasic sleep experiment drew out of a need to be in the office a whole lot. I was left with the choice of getting maybe 4 hours of sleep a night, or breaking it up into chunks. So, I went with chunks.

For four weeks, I did sleep 3 hours, twice a day. I generally went to sleep around 2200 or 2300 — 10 or 11 pm — for the whopping 3 hours. On good days, I’d get up and run, on bad days I’d just get up. Shower, shave, and on to work. Some days, there would be food on my desk, waiting for me, and on other days, I’d tough it out until 6 or 7 AM when I’d sneak out for some breakfast.

I’d finish around 10 or 11 AM, on most days, and go back to sleep until after lunch. No, no lunch for me. I’d be sleeping. I’d make it back to the office sometime between 1 and 2 pm. Most days I’d sneak off to get some before the close-out meetings of the day started. By 9, maybe 10 pm, my day was over and I was heading back to sleep again.

Does it sound like all I did was sleep and work, and sometimes run? Well, that’s a pretty fair description of my 4 weeks. Did it kill me? No. Could I do this forever? Yes. Does it take a lot of attention to pull this off? Yes. Could I have done this by myself? No.

Would I ever do this again? Yes — but only if I was back in a situation like this. Being awake all day and being awake all night just isn’t… normal. I did get a lot of work done, it did have the effect I wanted, but to a “T” everyone thought it so abnormal as to be troublesome. Some worried about my health, others worried if I was eating enough. Thankfully, no one seemed to think that my work was slipping.

For me, it was all about the 9 hours. I’d wake up knowing I just needed to make it 9 hours and I’d go to sleep and reset. If I could make it to then, I’d be good.

There were a half dozen or dozen days when I did not make it to sleep during the day until well into the afternoon. There were at least two days where things were so busy that I did not get to sleep during the day. Being late was one thing; missing sleep was something entirely different. Being late was generally OK, but missing sleep left me trying to make it up over the next one or two sleeps — 4.5 hours vs. 3. Which worked.

I could do this, long haul. I’d take care and attention and dedication to the hours, the missed meals, the need to fit running into all this. But it can be done. It’s very regimented, but very possible. And very possible in a military environment, where there are people working 24 hours a day, every day.

I have no idea if this would translate to the regular world, to a regular job. I guess if your boss would be OK with you just sleeping all the time. I had the two windows every day — early night, and late morning / lunch — when I could sneak away to sleep like this; I don’t know how many others have windows like that.

So, today I sleep some some and tonight I go back to nights. But maybe a run first, since my foot has felt rock solid for a couple of days.

Figured it out yet?

That is, of course, me and Frank Shorter. Frank Shorter (book), winner of the gold medal in the marathon at the Munich ’72 Olympics (YouTube). And silver medal winner in the same event in ’76. And winner of just about everything else. Frank Shorter, arguably the American voice of marathon running.

I say arguably, because there’s this other American runner, Bart Yasso, who could also be described as the American voice of marathon running.

That’s Frank and me and Bart Yasso (blog, book, Twitter, Yasso 800′s).

Wow. Just wow.

These two superstars came to Iraq with the groups, The Warriors Tour (Facebook, YouTube, Twitter), which was sponsored by Under Armour.

Oh, and with them were others — like Sandy Magnus. (Twitter). Did I mention that she was amazingly nice? Even gave me a signed photo to take to my daughter — girls need to go to space (she was there 4 and a half months).

Sadly, we did not get to race. The crew brought with them everything necessary to have a fully sanctioned race, just like in the US. Only weather shut us down.

I thought it looked OK. But what the hell do I know?

Does make for some pretty photos, though. Here are some of the war / peace machines.

I told Frank that I took to running because of my PTSD. He said he took to running because of the stress of Yale. Oh, and he said that life has been grand because his running has not defined him — when he runs, he runs, but the rest of the time he has a life.

Oh, and I love that everyone was blogging, posting to YouTube, active on Twitter, etc. Very well covered events.

I hope I hear from Frank. I was to ask him about ’74 an Japan. And Bart? Egads, he has me wanting to go run, and run long again. He’s a dangerous man!

This was the view of my world, an hour before the start of 30 June. Dark, quite, not much moon. Alone. Many people, I suspect, fear darkness because of the great unknown. I have come to embrace it, for all the potential it holds. It’s fitting, then, that this was my image heading into 30 June.

In 2003, I spent the dark hours listening, watching. If I found you, I probably tried to kill you. Depending on how you view things, I was probably either a great guy, or the harbinger of death. I usually vote for the former.

But like then, I have been quietly waiting for the arrival of 30 June, waiting through the nights, listening, looking. Waiting, since the US and Iraq signed the security agreement which said that US forces would be out of the cities, villages, and localities by 30 June. Or maybe on 30 June. Whatever.

Out of the cities. It such a simple thing, that is really so very complicated.

The US, I fear, is very worried about not just security in Iraq, but all of the folks and groups here who really, really, really hate America. In the grand scheme of things, that’s probably less than 1 billionth of the total population of Iraq, but when you line them up, shoulder to shoulder, or AK47 to AK47, car bomb to car bomb, it’s a bunch of folks. And US forces have been in the cities, because that’s where they are, and they’ve been in the cities because that’s where we have been.

Some, but not all, of those same people also hate 1. the government of Iraq, 2. the Iraqi military, 3. the Iraqi police, 4. other Iraqis, and / or 5. something else about the Iraq of today. If the US were to actually get out of the cities, what would this do to the Iraqis themselves?

Together, these form something of a Jungian struggle — protect ourselves, but protect them, too.

But for the Iraqis, I think this all has been so much simpler. US, get the hell out of the cities, and in due time, get the hell out of Iraq. Love ya, love what you’ve done for us, but it’s time for you to be going. Ready or not, the Iraqis seems committed — socially, politically, and every other way you can think of — to taking care of themselves, their way.

Not long after we got here, we started to throw around the phrase by, with and through. I am unsure how many of us here really understood what our leaders meant when the started to use this phrase, but I think I picked up on it pretty early on. Instead of waking up and deciding what we needed to do that day, we needed to start waking up in the morning and asking the Iraqis what they wanted to do today, and if there was anything they needed us to do to help.

If others didn’t pick up on that back then, they’re seeing it today. Because that is the really of today. There is very, very little that US forces can or even want to do unilaterally — or, entirely on our own.

In four words, Iraq belongs to Iraq.

And I’m just here for the comic relief. I saw something in the paper the other day, saying that in this new era, post 30 June, information was going to be key. Information, and how it’s used in cooperation between the two countries. I firmly believe this — and not just because I’m an information guy. And it’s not just information about what the bad guys are doing — it’s information about repair parts, about new training techniques, about best practices, or ideas for new or unexpected problems. It’s about waking up in the morning, and sharing information about what to do today.

It’s exciting. In many ways, it may seem to observes that I’m still sitting in the dark of the night, watching, listening, taking it all in. Which is fair, I suppose. But this is their deal now, completely. If I can help, I will, If they need me, I hope they’ll ask. I will work as hard as if I was about to send my own soldiers out into harms way, because in many ways that has not changed — it’s just that the first guy going in the door is probably going to be an Iraqi, not an American. So be it, and good for them. I hope we help, not hinder. Iraq stands on the brink of such amazing potential, I hope they are able to realize all that they can be.

A few pieces have been in the press recently. I am not going to try and sum them up, but am going to recommend going and making the time to read them.

Read this, then this, and then this. Below, there’s a letter from the Director of National Intelligence — so yes, this is kind of serious stuff going on.

Don’t be the one, twenty years from now, who remembers that there was talk of interrogation and torture. Be the one who read up on it, developed and informed opinion, and who can talk about what it means to you and how you view the US.

Need more information? Here’s the Taguba Report entry on Wikipedia, and info on Abu Zubaydah and KSM.

Unclassified

Director of National Intelligence
Washington, DC 20511

Apr 16 2009

Dear Colleagues:

Today is a difficult one for those of us who serve the country in its intelligence services. An article on the front page of The New York Times claims that the National Security Agency has been collecting information that violates the privacy and civil liberties of American citizens. The release of documents from the Department of Justice?s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) spells out in detail harsh interrogation techniques used by CIA officers on suspected al Qaida terrorists.

As the leader of the Intelligence Community, I am trying to put these issues into perspective. We cannot undo the events of the past; we must understand them and turn this understanding to advantage as we move into the future.

It is important to remember the context of these past events. All of us remember the horror of 9/11. For months afterwards we did not have a clear understanding of the enemy we were dealing with, and our every effort focused on preventing further attacks that would kill more Americans. It was during these months that the CIA was struggling to obtain critical information from captured al Qaida leaders, and requested permission to use harsher interrogation methods. The OLC memos make clear that senior legal officials judged the harsher methods to be legal, and that senior policymakers authorized their use. High value information came from interrogations in which those methods were used and provided a deeper understanding of the al Qaida organization that was attacking this country. As the OLC memos demonstrate, from 2002 through 2006 when the use of these techniques ended, the leadership of the CIA repeatedly reported their activities both to Execute Branch policymakers and to members of Congress, and received permission to continue to use the techniques.

Those methods, read on a bright, sunny, safe day in April 2009, appear graphic and disturbing. As the President has made clear, and as both CIA Director Panetta and I have stated, we will not use those techniques in the future. I like to think I would not have approved those methods in the past, but I do not fault those who made the decisions at that time, and I will absolutely defend those who carried out the interrogations within the orders they were given.

Even in 2009 there are organizations plotting to kill Americans using terror tactics, and although the memories of 9/11 are becoming distant, we in the intelligence services must stop them. One of our most effective tools in discovering groups planning to attack us are their communications, and it is the job of the NSA to intercept them. The NSA does this vital work under legislation that was passed by the Congress. The NSA actions are subject to oversight by my office and by the Justice Department under court-approved safeguards; when the intercepts are conducted against Americans, it is with individual court orders. Under these authorities the officers of the National Security Agency collect large amounts of international telecommunications, and under strict rules review and analyze some of them. These intercepts have played a vital role in many successes we have had in thwarting terrorist attacks since 9/11. On occasion, NSA has made mistakes and intercepted the wrong communications. The numbers of these mistakes are very small in terms of our overall collection efforts, but each one is investigated, Congress and the courts notified, corrective measures taken, and improvements are put in place to prevent reoccurrences.

As a young Navy officer during the Vietnam years, I experienced public scorn for those of us who served in the Armed Forces during an unpopular war. Challenging and debating the wisdom and policies linked to wars and warfighting is important and legitimate; however, disrespect for those who have serve honorably within legal guidelines is not. I remember well the pain of those of us who served our country even when the policies we were carrying out were unpopular or could be second-guessed.

We in the Intelligence Community should not be subjected to similar pain. Let the debate focus on the law and our national security. Let us be thankful that we have public servants who seek to do the difficult work of protecting our country under the explicit assurance that their actions are both necessary and legal.

There will almost certainly be more media articles about the actions of intelligence agencies in the past, and as we do our vital work of protecting the country we will make mistakes that will also be reported. What we must do is make it absolutely clear to the American people that our ethos is to act legally, in as transparent a manner as we can, and in a way that they would be proud of if we could tell them the full story.

It is my job, and the job of our national leaders, to ensure that the work done by the Intelligence Community is appreciated and supported. You can be assured the President knows this and is supporting us. It is your responsibility to continue the difficult, often dangerous and vital work you are doing every day.

Sincerely,
//Original Signed//
Dennis C. Blair

Unclassified

Our army is on the warpath again, this time trying to affect the suicide rate in the Army. The rate is up these days, higher than it’s been, higher than it should be. Higher than that in the regular US population.

Why? Well, the Army says:

– Sixty percent had no deployment history. ?That?s causing us to go back and ask some questions about the enlistment history ? the behavioral health history ? of new, junior-level individuals,? he said.

– Relationships were a contributing factor in 75 percent of the cases. ?That doesn?t mean that that was the major contributing factor. It may have been an aggravating factor ? but it was a factor,? he said.

– Half of the cases involved some unit integration or reintegration issues. ?We all know how important that is,? he said. ?In [the continental United States], it?s important. It?s doubly important for a junior enlisted soldier forward-deployed.?

– Half the cases involved some substance abuse, with alcohol and prescription medication being the biggest problems. ?It?s most especially alcohol,? he said. (Link)

I don’t think these things can be considered without also looking at the war (see this), and the repeated trips our soldiers are making to Iraq, Afghanistan, and other far-flung battlefields.

It isn’t just relationship problems. It isn’t just financial issues. It isn’t the difficulties of adjusting to life in regular America after a year or more at war. It’s not the isolation, the silence, the “warriors are strong” mentality, or any of the other things that come up in these discussion (here).

It’s when all of these things stack up on top of each other.

See, I’m lucky. I have this kick-ass wife, who pays the bills, takes care of the kids, keeps the cars insured, emails me and calls me on Skype any time she sees that I am there. She not only keeps my life going when I over here, taking care of all of the administrivia things and keeping our family together and functioning, and keeping me at times from crawling into the deep, dark well of despair.

She knocks down stacks.

I also have a good friend as a roommate. When my day is bad, I don’t get to keep it to myself. When I have worries or concerns or angst over something, he’s there to draw it out. To force it to the surface. To make me deal with it, instead of pushing it further down into the belly of despair.

So, I am lucky. Very lucky. It helps, I suppose, that I’ve done this before — a half dozen times or so. And it helps that I painfully came to terms with my ow PTSD, and have learned to take it one day at a time. I have an idea of how things can go wrong with me, and know what to look for — the only issue is having the umpf to do something about it.

But that’s often not the case for our young Joe’s. Kids, late in their teens or early 20′s, away from home for the first time. Kids who are just getting their feet wet with car loan payments, with owning things beyond what was in their rooms when they grew up. Kids who are having their first serious relationships, maybe with their high school sweetheart, maybe with someone they met at the bar just before coming over here.

Kids who may not even be fully grown up. Kids still maturing. Stack a soured relationship onto a late car payment, maybe a sick parent, IED’s and snipers and car bombs, and a work load that leaves little free time and no actual down time, and poof! it can all come to a head.

Hopelessness. Isolation. Drowning in your own self. Being 10,000 miles from the real world, and unable to control or really influence anything.

So, yes. It’s a problem in the Army, and it won’t get any better any time soon. This Long War — and it is a long war, and it is a war — is going to put a strain on both our country and the men and women that serve her.

I am not, though, throwing my hands up in the air in frustration.

The Army has new training that has started, and I actually like it. After years and years of mandated annual training on the subject of suicide prevention, the Army is actually starting to get it right. I sat through it last week — well, not really. It’s video, and it’s discussion. And it talks about how pressure builds, about how things compound each other.

it talks about leadership. Real leadership. It talks about knowing your soldiers, about talking to them about everything. Knowing more than if they’re ready to go on mission tomorrow. It talks about all of the things the Army teaches as the fundamentals of leadership, and ties the need for leadership right back into the stresses of life and the need to put effort into caring for soldiers — as soldiers, and as people.

For once, I walked out of the training with a smirk. Hopeful.

I’ve met folks on their 4th and 5th deployments to this battlefield. I’ve met folks who have burned through marriages and relationships like they’re matches. I’ve met folks who have missed damn near every major event in the lives of their kids. And I’ve seen that look on the faces of too many, that look of stress. That look of running on all eight cylinders, with the foot on the gas and the pedal buried to the floor. The stress of giving it their all, all day, every day.

And what separates giving it your all, and falling over the edge and into the abyss is either having the skills and tools in your kit bag, to keep yourself safe, or having leaders around you who know enough to ask, and care enough to act. Every day, I pull from my bag of experiences, to try and find the tips and tricks necessary to take care of not just myself but also those I lead, and every day, I take comfort in know that there are countless others in the Army — in the military — doing the same.

I don’t think anywould would fault me for being bummed, or bitter, or a sour-puss. Not just being apart from my family, not just the stress of being here, but also because of the death and destruction that continues on — at a greatly reduced rate — here in northern Iraq.

But this time here in Iraq has actually given me a great sense of optimism. I know I wrote about it some, with regards to the elections. The Awakening worked; the tide has turned on those who would wage war on the Iraqis. The elections went off very well, with certification of the results expected next week. The Security Agreement, between the sovereign nations of Iraq and the US, has been implemented, and seems to be working well. And the President has laid out a time line for US troops leaving Iraq.

Yes, there is still death and destruction. Yes, there is still violence. Yes, there are still those who would overthrow the Iraqi government, or fight American forces until the last one of us leaves.

But really, at long last — Iraq is doing pretty damn well. I smile a lot here. There’s open discussion. There’s rule of law. There are police on the streets, and food on the shelves, and children in the schools again. As someone who has read way to much about the 90+ years of this country, I really feel that Iraq is on the verge of a great new dawn. And that is an awesome feeling.

So, I’m happy. I still wish I was in Hawaii, drinking a beer and bouncing kids on a knee or something, but it’s a great time to be here, to be a part of all this and to see such an awesome change overcome a society.

It would be a glorious day. Glorious.

The last provincial elections were in 2005. To my surprise, and to that of the world, the Sunnis opted to boycott. Sure, they are a minority in this country, in comparison to the 65% or so that are Shi’a, but still, they have large percentages of the population in a bunch of the provinces.

They could have made a difference.

But they boycotted.

And wow, do they regret doing that. In the years since, they have realized (I think) that this was about as stupid a thing as any group could do — not being a part of the political process means having to take whatever shit the other folks decide. Yeah, that’s not so cool, especially when the Sunni ran the country before and folks were willing to dole out a little payback to the, all the more since the Sunnis were outside the political process.

But in the years since then, I loved, loved, LOVED watching the awakening. Sahwa. In staying out of the politics, the Sunnis were also hammered by Al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), and it got to the point where the Sunni leaders — not political leaders, but social and tribal leaders — said that enough was enough, and they approached the Americans and the Iraqi Security Forces. And the Sons of Iraq were born. The Sunni came back into the fold, and became part of the solution instead of being a part of the problem.

This just blows my mind. No representation in the government, hated for what the last regime had done, bad mouthed for having Ba’thist ties, despised for just being followers of their Sunni faith. And they did what was right, in reconciling their differences and working for a greater Iraq.

And this year, in forming political parties and looking for their future within the framework of the Iraqi society.

31 January, something like 50 to 60% of the eligible Iraqis went and voted. Seriously — 60%? America would divide by zero before it would turn out in those numbers to vote, even if the ticket was Gore/Jesus Christ. But turn out they did.

So, I’ve really, really been looking forward to this day.

I haven’t cared what the results would be, but rather how the people would respond. I want to see the excitement in their faces when the hear the news that their party got 17% of the vote in this province or that one, and that their party and their candidates would get 3 or 5 or 10 seats on the Provincial Council. I wanted to feel the rush, their sense of ownership, of involvement.

Because if you’re excited about politics, and actively taking part in the political party, you are investing in your country and your society. You again believe. You have faith, you have hope in what your people can do, and life will get better.

Today was to be an important day for me.

Right up until just after lunch, when someone — reports now indicate it was a woman — in northern Diyala apparently walked into a restaurant and detonated some sort of belt or vest of explosives.

My first thought? Mother fuckers! Can’t we just have a good day in this country, and not have is scarred by the violence?

A few hours later, the preliminary results were released, and it has been a good day. But it’s been a good day marred by this tragedy.

It pains me when there’s loss of life here. This country has made such strides in the years I’ve been watching. It’s changed so much since my first trip here, back in the mid 90′s. I am captivated by this holistic transformation it has undergone, and continues to undergo. There is such potential here, such beauty, such a future.

And there are setbacks.

I don’t pretend to fully understand what drives someone to do something like this. I am male, I am American, I am shaped by the things I have seen, the things I have done, what I have learned along the way. It’s not Arabs doing this, it’s Iraqis. It’s not Sunnis doing this, it’s Iraqis. And it’s not even just women doing this, as men have done it here, too.

I have seen examples — too many of them — of what my peers will do in times of war. When the grenade is thrown through the hatch of the HMMWV, and the gunner yells GRENADE before dropping onto it, pulling it tight. The explosion kills him, but his buddies live. The guy who stays on the heavy machine gun to literally hold off the waves of attacking enemy, long past the point where he himself could escape, because he knows that if he lets that gun go silent, they will all die because his soldiers need just a little bit more time to prepare their defenses. In the end, he dies of his wounds, but his soldiers live.

These are things I understand. Deciding on actions that have a reasonable expectation of causing your own death, usually so that others may live. Firemen running into a burning building, police charging a gunman, spectators diving into an icy river after a car goes off the road and is submerged.

But this is the exact opposite. Something that means so much to someone, that they will take action that they reasonably expect will cost them their lives, in order to take the lives of others.

I want to understand. I really, really do. And I’m trying. But it’s hurting my head, trying to reconcile things that are held in a different light by others, given different values than I would give them or that my culture would give them.

When I ask myself, what would drive me to do this, I come up empty. Would I kill Hitler this way, if I had the chance? I couldn’t do this to people just eating lunch.

But some people would. And today someone did. Damnit. Today, of all the fucking days.

They’re going to the polls today, and there is no doubt — this is their election. We, the Americans, just happen to be hanging out. It is their doing, lock, stock and barrel. Their security, their plans, their officials, their sites. If you think we’re here to help the Iraqis learn the joys of democracy, watch today and smile.

They’re going to the polls today, in keeping with the fine Iraqi tradition of voting. I was speaking the other day with a woman born and raised in Kirkuk, just after someone had tried to assert that this was Iraq’s first real chance to vote. She and I had a good giggle over this; Iraqis have voted ever since Iraq was created, except during times of occupation by others. Sure, us westerners might take issue with how elections were done esp. late in the Saddam era, but still, they had elections much as Egypt still has elections. Iraqis are very clear on what it means to go and vote. And today, they’re going to be out in HUGE numbers.

They’re going to the polls today, and for thousands upon thousands of them, there is nothing that will stop them from voting. In 2005, not far from here, there was a polling (as they call their voting) site not far from here that came under attack by a sniper. The polling site was a building with a few rooms for voting, so the masses were formed in a long, long line outside. The sniper had lined them up in the rifle sights, and started firing. While the Americans rushed to kill the sniper and end the threat, the Iraqis waiting to vote had just taken a knee, and waited in place. Quickly, the sniper was out of the equation, and the silence of the day had returned; the people literally stood back up, still in line. Ask yourself if casting your vote means that much to you; it means that much to the people here.

They’re going to the polls today, and more than anything I wish I could go and walk among the crowds. I’d love to ask them how they feel today, if they’re excited, who they’re voting for and why. I’d like to ask them about the changes of the last 10 years, and of their hopes and dreams for the future. I’d like to ask them about their children, and what they see in their Iraq. I’d like to be able to share in the joy of the day, because it is going to be a glorious day, for sure.

They’re going to the polls today, and more than anything in the world I wish I could share this with my wife. During the ground war, I held back so much. The death, the destruction — those are things you want to keep from your loved ones. I did not want her to ask me how my night was going, and hearing the words fall from my mouth about how many we’d killed, or that the hunt was going well. I want her to see and hear and smell the freshness of this land, of the uplifted spirits, and the sense of limitless future and optimism that comes from standing with your peers to decide your fate, your future. These are the days of glory, the best it can be, when a man of violence is given the chance to also be a man of peace. I don’t want her to know how many widows can look to me with blame, but to know that I am capable of service not just to her and our children, not just our people and our nation, but to so many others.

They are going to the polls today, and I am going to go to the office and make a lot of PowerPoint slides. For the Iraqis, today is the pinnacle, a high point. For me, I am already onto the next giant rock that needs to be rolled up a hill, surely to just roll back down when I am almost there. They will enjoy the quiet time, their national holiday, and surely be at home with family and friends and maybe even a nice meal. And I, I will change fonts, and add transitions, and arrange colored boxes, all in support of the free will of the people.

They are going to the polls today, and I want you to know that it’s a damn great day.

It was as if time stopped. The words just hung there in the air, like cigarette smoke on a cold day. Pissed off? What the hell was he talking about?

13 years later, or what was probably only a second and a half, I spat out something about just having a lot on my mind lately. No, not angry, just lost in thought. Preoccupied.

1. Saying that, I realized later, probably made me sound like one of those guys you watch closely, because he probably just got a dear John letter or something. Take his ammo — he’s got a lot on his mind. I suck with words. Really. Yes, there is irony in a guy writing that on his blog. But I am horrible when it comes to interacting with others verbally. Speeches? Well, other than the before-mentioned nervousness and tendency to have my heart race abnormally fast, I do just fine. But waaaaay too often, just talking one on one, especially under pressure, words fail me. You might not think it, you might not notice it, but I sure do. I suck.

2. I take too long in responding to people. I know this. I’ve had this issue for a long time, but only really zeroed in on it a couple of years ago. Sure, I can brush it off a lot of the time, saying I’m deaf (I am) or something, but I know that what I think is an OK time to think about the question posed is outside the social norms for most Americans. My brain is like a virus, and it’s off and running all the time; if I wasn’t conscious of the need to actually answer people, you could probably ask me a question and then have to wait like 5 minutes while I thought it over and came up with an answer. It’d be a good answer, just not a wait-5-minutes answer.

3. I totally suck at answering rhetorical questions. Too often I’ll just miss the whole set of indicators that a question is rhetorical. My roommate thinks it’s pretty funny, I know, because he’ll just throw a question out there, and I’ll answer it. Or try to. And no sooner do I start than I realize that, uh, no, I really wasn’t suppose to. Did Iron Man, the song, come out before Iron Man, the cartoon hero? What’s making that damn glitching sound at the beginning of this MP3 file, and how the hell do I remove it? Did I just rip my shorts in the crotch?

4. I’m an introvert. Seriously. Stop laughing. It’s true. All those Myers-Briggs type tests all come back with the same two things: I am an analyst, and I am an introvert. And being deaf, these days I literally have missed the phone ringing on my desk. I tend to crawl inside, and ignore things. Well, ignore everything. Does that make me seem mad, or angry, or upset? I hope not, but I can see how it might.

5. I love the problem, and really am interested in the problem more than I am the answer. When the answer arrives, usually the problem is over. And, well, the fun stops. I love problems. There, I said it. I love problems. When things don’t work, I get to tinker. When things don’t make sense, I get to ponder. I favor the abstract, too, because then it’s all about the logic in the answer.

6. I joke with my wife that I probably have Asperger syndrome. I know what you’re thinking — it’s not nice not joke about that. But I didn’t say that I joke about Asperger syndrome, I joke that I probably have it. But it’s only a half-joke. The more I read about it, the more I realize that it could well be used to describe me.

7. On Sunday, while sitting in a briefing (in the peanut gallery seats), I got so fed up with the bureaucracy, I decided to take on a project, with or without the support of the unit I work in. Seriously, I have probably lost my mind. I am either going to be run out of the Army, or people are going to see that I am undertaking this mother-of-all-projects, realize that it is absolutely the right thing to do, and join me as I charge at a freakin’ windmill. Right now, I have three converts — one of whom does not have a choice, because she works for me. How big is this undertaking? I could employ 40 people, all day every day, to nug through this, probably for a month solid. And then we’d spend the rest of the year changing Iraq. Yep — done lost my mind. Why have I been a bit out of it lately? I’m trying like hell to wrap my head around a set of issues, in order to get to the root of the problem, so I can then force an American Army Division to go forward and do my bidding, in support of the people and government of Iraq. Preoccupied is probably a pretty accurate description….

So, there it is. My day, and seven things related to it.

1. Review the year that is about to end. Write down some of the highlights of all the good things that happened to you. Be sure to include all the basics like no more dishes, not choosing what to wear, never choosing shat’s for breakfast, lunch, or dinner, or fond memories of yesteryear when you only had an 8 hour work day.

2. Share and celebrate your successes this year with your family and friends. Oh, wait. OK, try celebrating it with a bunch of semi-strangers who are armed to the teeth, amped out of their minds on caffeine, and probably wound a weeeeeee bit too tight. It’s almost the same, I swear.

3. Send greetings of appreciation and thanks to those people who have helped make this year special for you. Do it two weeks ago, because the mail takes that long. Be sure to use paper from the laser printer, because, well, it’s that or TP. Forget stamps — just write “free” up in the corner instead, and see if that works.

4. Review your current to do list for work. Be ruthless and eliminate as many unnecessary or futile tasks as you can, without doing them. Don’t worry — someone will put them right back on your list for you in the morning anyway.

5. Finish off any unresolved matters. Like Kurd-Arab tensions, Article 140 and 23, the problems with kerosene distribution, health care reform, the American auto industry, SEN Obama’s vacating Senate seat, and the future of Lebanon and the West Bank.

6. Clear up some clutter. Start with MSR Arizona and then move on to MSR Tampa. Not just the trash — go big and see about the rubble, too. Maybe the intersection at 8th and Nebuchadnezzar, because it really looks bad right now. It sure could use some flowers.

7. Go through your important paperwork and bring it up to date as much as possible. Start with your powers of attorney, and then your Soldiers Group Life Insurance. And make sure you’re getting your combat pay, etc.

8. Review how you have spent your time this year, and identify those things that have been draining your energy. Don’t bother writing them down — you are in the Army, after all, and it’s not like you can really do much about it anyway. Begin to say NO this year to things that you don?t really want to do. Wow — I almost said that with a straight face. Say no… yeah, that’s a good one.

9. Be different and do something new. Because the Army loves that. A nice broach? A ribbon in your hair? Grow out some mongo porkchop sideburns. Streak. Stop wearing your reflecting belt over one shoulder, but instead as a thong. Sleep in. Salute with your left hand, Benny Hill style.

10. Start walking every day for at least 20 minutes until the New Year begins. Be sure to wear at least 100 pounds of extra gear — water, ammo, armor, steel plates, grenades, a tourniquet, etc. Because it’s not the walking that’s as important as the effort you have to put into each. damn. step.

11. Rest and relax. Sit back and turn on the TV, and realize that you get no channels. Open your fridge and pour yourself a nice, cold….. water. Drag that chair outside and enjoy the dust and flies.

In minutes, it would be my turn to speak. No overhead projector, no big screen with my slides. Two senior officers sat at the head table, flipping through slide packs. Buried in there were four slides of mine — Northern Iraq 101. No chance to read from a script — I’d be cold-stone-talking about it, solo.

We all get the jitters before events. Pre-wedding jitters, the jitters before while waiting for the big race, the stomach butterflies waiting for that big test in third period. It’s natural. It’s the anticipation of what is to come, that moment when it will all begin.

I get that a lot. I talk and brief for a living. I don’t write long analytical pieces, I don’t make fancy slides. I do best sitting with folks, and talking them through complex ideas using the simplest of terms.

I should be good at this. I need to be good at this.

So, sitting there, I was wondering just one thing: Would my body drop into fight-or-flight mode, and dump a ton of stimulates. All that endorphin, from when your mind decides that survival is on the line, and it concludes that stimulants are what you really need.

Why? It’s called hypervigilance, and it’s a part of PTSD.

It wasn’t always like this for me — the worrying and waiting not just of what I am about to do and about which I am nervous, but the dread that my body is really sensitive to stress. This is one of those lively byproducts of PTSD — my fight-or-flight trigger has been out of whack. Like a lot of folks with PTSD, it goes off at inappropriate times – too early.

And sitting in a conference room, waiting to talk about a topic I know well, is not an appropriate time. Jitters, yes — my body getting the sudden sensation that it’s time to get up and go? No.

It is a wildly shitty sensation. Waiting to do what is a key part of your very career and capabilities, and waiting to see if your body is going to illogically go postal on you.

Can I influence it? Sure. Is it a problem? No. Do I have it under control? Yep. But it’s a daily struggle, something for which I start every day with just a clean slate. In a flash, it could be back, and with the stress levels up being back here, I am ever vigilant about it. If I had a good day yesterday, that’s fine, but I start all over again today. And I don’t see it ever going away.

It is, as I understand it, the kind of daily struggle that recovered alcoholics face — one day at a time, with a very conscious effort.

I don’t normally talk about this stuff, but I am going to try and write more this year, and specifically talk about what it’s like to come back to war with PTSD. I don’t think it’s something that people talk about, mainly because I know I don’t talk about it. It’s my own quiet struggle, something I have to live with and something for which there just isn’t a reason to talk about it.

(PS — I kicked ass at both briefings)

I can blog. Which means a bunch of other things have changed, too. Like heat. I have heat this winter, which is cool is ways most of you would not really grasp. That winter, I slept in a sleeping bag, on a cot that was missing parts and was thus not fully set up or functioning (and really, how hard is it for a cot to be fully functioning?) Now, I have a bed and sheets and laundry that someone else does, and as best I can tell, they use a washer and a dryer.

I have electricity. Back then it was small generators and wires run everywhere. No power where we slept. Internet access? I think they had it in the HQ building, but I don’t remember seeing it. I bought a cheap card so I could make phone calls at the MWR — Morale, Welfare and Recreation — tent, but that was about it. My mail never made it to me — I had Xmas and presents in Kuwait weeks later.

I packed so much crap with me this time, bringing it with me vice having stuff mailed in. Vitamins. A ton of toiletries. Blank CD’s and DVD’s. Extra locks. Books. Spare everything. Back then, I had one ruck sack, one duffel, and one foot locker. I’d pick up a book, read it, and then exchange it wherever I found the next one.

I am not loaded down to the gills with a shit-ton of gear every day. I wear my regular Army uniform, a hat that sure looks like a baseball cap but that I can’t actually call a baseball cap, Combat Boots, and I carry a pistol. No turtle-shell like helmet. No body armor. No 1000 pounds of bullets and grenades and things that blow up or shoot sparks into the sky. Basic clothes, a pistol in a holster, and a little green book in which to take notes. Hell, this time I even brought my fancy watch to wear every day!

And my work. Yikes, it’s different. Somewhere along the way, I became a lover, not a fighter.

Lastly, things get to me a lot more. That’s the PTSD, I know. Every morning, I sit in to hear the briefing to the general about that’s new in the world. Two things get me. The first is the tale of the hero of the day. They are awe inspiring. Professionalism, dedicated, conviction, willingness to do extraordinary things to protect others — American and Iraqi.

The other is on those sad occasions when the Chaplain talks about a Soldier who has given their life in service to the country. That just hurts, and I well up every damn time. I use to not do that — I had ice in my veins, for sure. But damn, it hurts now — it hurts a lot.

And as an aside, thanks for all the emails. Keep ‘em coming. Send your questions — I’ll answer what I can.

I am going back to Iraq.

Field Manual 30-5, Combat Intelligence, February 1951

I’ll be there for a year, or until they tell me to come home. I should get a two-week-or-so break somewhere along the way.

I’d like to keep blogging here during the year. I am sure there’d be things to write; I know, though, that the Army is a bit cautious about blogs, so I will have to see what wickets I’ll need to jump through in order to blog. Feel free to email me and ask questions; if I can answer them, I will, and if not, I’ll either lie (ok, no, not really) or I’ll just fess up that it’s not appropriate for me to answer, for whatever reason. If I upload photos, or blog here or elsewhere, or bookmark neat things, it’ll all show up in this RSS feed.

“As crutch attests”

About going

I’ve had people ask me different questions about this adventure. The questions generally fall into a couple of categories.

Aren’t you worried about going? No, not really. Things started to sink in Sunday morning, early, that it was almost time for change. I think I get more angst about the change, the picking up and going someplace, than I do about where I’m going or what I’m going to do there. I do a pretty good job of living in the now, and it’s only that slight anticipation that my now will likely change that gets me thinking about it. But no, it’s not worry. I’ll be fine.

Are you worried about being there? No, not really. I know that some have a view that Iraq is some horrible place, but that’s not a view I share. Yes, there is violence, yes there are crimes occurring. But there’s that in Los Angeles, New York, Moscow, and so on. I’m a believer — I believe in the Iraqis, in the Iraqi government, and in what we’re doing there. So no, I’m not worried about being there. I’ll be fine.

Victory in Europe (VE) Day, 08 May 1945

How’s your family taking it? Well. I don’t like saying that we take separation well, or that we’ve done this enough times that it’s not new. That sucks. But it is true — we have done this enough times, for the war, for other missions, for schools and the like, that we’re pretty good at it. My wife runs the house, with or without me there. The kids have their routines, with or without me there. We have mail, and email, and sometimes video chats. My wife covers down on the gift shopping for us when I’m not there, and I work hard to draw out of our kids info on what’s going on in their lives. I don’t like being apart, much less for a year, any more than I like missing another set of birthdays, another holiday season, another recital or event. But it happens, especially when service to the Nation and to the Republic comes before family.

What’ll you be doing there? I’m a staff guy. There’s no door kicking for me, no jumping out of a helicopter as it gets ready to set down on the objective. I sit and think deep thoughts, ask questions, give a briefing from time to time, and make an all-out effort to avoid making PowerPoint slides (not just while in Iraq, but in life in general). It’s not a bad deal, and it’s stuff that I’m actually well suited to do. But through all that, I remain ready to all of those basic soldier skills we expect of every soldier; if they need an extra gunner, I go.

Band-Aids, circa 1944

What do you do?

And every time I get ready to go somewhere, I seem to end up fielding questions from friends / family: What can I do to help while you’re gone?

So, some thoughts on that, too.

Email. You have my email address, right? A note, something personal from time to time, would be cool. Sure, send me the link to that NY Times article; even better is cutting and pasting it into the email itself (because some web sites get blocked or require that I go to an MWR (Morale, Welfare & Recreation) computer to see) or as an attachment. Best, though, is including it and offering up your thoughts on it, too.

Actual mail. You have stamps, right? As long as there have been literate soldiers, there have been letters from home in their pockets. An actual letter is awesome, probably all the more so in this age of email. Yes, it takes longer to write, yes, your penmanship might be a bit off, but so what. Real letters are awesome. Throw in an article from the hometown newspaper, or something from Time or Rolling Stone or Hot Rod, and you’ll make my day.

If you want to go above and beyond that, well, there’s a ton of other things you can do.

Wounded Warrior Transition Units. Find your local military installation, and get in touch with the Wounded Warrior unit. These are the units where our banged up, battered, and slightly-damaged guys go to mend. Guys and gals whose role in life is to get better, after something has happened to them. Want to help someone locally, to help make the world a better place and to maybe honor our soldiers just a bit? Contact the unit, and see how you can help.

Family Readiness Group. Peek around and find the local unit near you. They might be on a base, they might be a Guard or Reserve unit in your area. This is the group of spouses, kids, and extended family (parents, loved ones, boyfriends / girlfriends, etc) who are working to help each other and themselves while their loved ones are gone. Sometimes there are problems to be solved, sometimes there are bake sales to raise money to send care packages to their loved ones.

Army Emergency Relief. AER is help for soldiers in need. A quick loan in a jam or a grant in a time of need, it’s money to help soldiers during their hour of need. It’s run locally — here‘s the link to the one at Walter Reed Army Medical Center — and it’s tax deductible.

Footlocker, packed in 1946

No wallowing

I suppose it would be easy to wallow in my own misery, over having to go. Or over having to go someplace again, or over having to go for a year. There are a million reasons one could be upset about going, or be upset about a loved one going.

But I won’t. I don’t think I can. Things could be so much worse.

As I was getting ready to go, I was looking for those last little things I would need to take with me, I made a stop off in the footlocker that had belonged to my wife’s grandfather. The photos in this post — I took the photos that day as I was peeking here and there.

Los Angeles Times, 08 December 1941

On December 7th, he got the call. He left the next morning, heading off with the 32nd Cav, his National Guard unit. Apparently, he bought the paper on the way that day. He came home from the war in 1946.

5 years. Sure, he got R&R from time to time, but still — five years. That’s a long time. That’s a lot of letters to write. That’s a lot of great experiences with your kids that you’ll never get back.

Late in his life, when I was a lieutenant stationed in Germany, he came to visit us. I made the time to go show him all of our equipment — M1A2 tank, M2 infantry fighting vehicle, M109A6 self-propelled howitzer, and everything on down to machine guns and pistols. It was fascinating to hear his views of our military today — our equipment, our organizations, our capabilities, our training. He had been, at times, want for things as simple as a heavy machine gun that worked reliably — that’s hard to reconcile today with my worries about things like access to email and Skype. Understanding this history not just of my profession but of my own Army and the sacrifices asked of our soldiers in the past, is helping me balance the pressures of heading back to Iraq.

I don’t know how much, if any, difference I’ll make, but I’ll do my best.

Alright, that’s enough for now. More later — whenever that is.

The easy thing would be say, “Watch how he engages Iran (or North Korea)” as the indicator of where we are going as a nation.

Nah. That’s too easy.

Watch how he handles Syria. Iran and North Korea — those are both already boiling. Those are the obvious and easy ones to deal with. Those are, as we say, 5 meter targets. Greatness will be found in building a solid relationship with Syria, as Syria has a finger in both Lebanon and Iraq.

If he gets picked up for a second term, watch for his engagement with India or China. I don’t think it’ll be both — but I could be wrong. India would be easier, but China would be a wise long term investment.

America had no plan for handling POW?s when WWII started, and spent the war refining the tactics, techniques and procedures necessary. The US had signed the 1929 Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armies in the Field, also known as the Third Geneva Convention, and was legally bound to abide by its provisions for the POW?s. Under this Third Geneva Convention, prisoners are:

? To be quickly removed from the battlefield, and their status reported;

? Afforded conditions similar to those used by soldiers of the state holding them, to include comparable food and living quarters;

? Provided health and religious support;

? Transported when healthy, and told the details of their move;

? Allowed to correspond;

? Held under the detaining powers own military code;

? To be repatriated when seriously sick or injured.


The US signed the convention in 1932, but was unprepared to treat prisoners in accordance with it when WWII started. The US was rapidly building combat units, in order to join the war and support Britain and the Soviets, and did little initially to build units or organizations to handle POW?s. The US was also not ready for the sheer volume of prisoners of war that it detained in WWI. By mid-1943, the US held over 240,000 German POW?s alone, and by May 1945, the US held over 425,000 POW?s in the almost 500 POW camps it operated in the United States. In June of 1945, the US, UK and France held a combined 7.5 million POW?s.

As the number of POW?s held by the US rapidly increased during WWII, the US tried different approaches to handling them. Interagency efforts failed, and the administration quickly gave the burden to the military. But early in 1942 and 1943, the US focus was building combat units, not guarding prisoners; POW camps became dumping grounds for failed leaders, which only exasperated the problems associated with implementing the requirements of the Geneva Convention. This changed in 1943 and 1944, as American Army finalized its techniques and procedures for handling POW?s.

By war?s end, the American POW camps in the US had become a proven asset to their communities. The Third Geneva Convention allows for the use of prisoners as laborers, under certain provisions, and small communities across the US benefited from this. From logging to harvesting the crops, the prisoners helped sustain the American economy and indirectly support the war effort, largely through the efforts of the effective and efficient procedures established by the US Army.

Things, though, changed with the defeat of Nazi Germany. General Dwight Eisenhower, Military Governor of the U.S. Occupation Zone in Germany, designated newly detained civilians and soldier as Disarmed Enemy Forces, and applied the label to personnel already in US custody in Germany as POW?s. In doing so, Eisenhower did not have to afford these personnel the same provisions accorded POW?s under the 1929 Third Geneva Convention. The convention would have required the release of POW?s to their parent nation upon the completion of hostilities, and would have afforded them the above specified protections and treatment as POW?s, neither of which Eisenhower did for the Disarmed Enemy Forces. Eisenhower argued that, with the collapse of the Third Reich, there was no parent country to which the POW?s could be returned. Some one million Disarmed Enemy Forces were kept in Rheinwiesenlager (Rhine meadow camps), the official name for the Prisoner of War Temporary Enclosures (PWTE) that were little more than open fields. Others were put to work in hard labor, to include clearing minefields.

Additionally, US forces captured a number of German soldiers in China after the German surrender but before the Japanese surrender. The US military transported these personnel to Germany, and subjected them to a trial by a military commission, for violating the laws of war. The trials and detainees were held outside of the United States. In Johnson v. Eisentr?ger, 21 of these prisoners sued the US Government, claiming their treatment violated US law. The US Supreme Court, in hearing the case, concluded that it had no jurisdiction over the case, as the prisoners, captured in China and transported to Germany, had never been on US soil. The Court ruled that ?the Constitution does not confer a right of personal security or an immunity from military trial and punishment upon an alien enemy engaged in the hostile service of a government at war with the United States.? The US military could continue its practice of trial by military commission outside the legal framework of the international treaty, Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armies in the Field.

The United States thus looked to the Johnson v. Eisentr?ger extrajudicial process in 2001, when American began its Global War on Terrorism. The Bush administration viewed the developing conflict with Al Qaeda and, to a lesser extent, the Taliban as itself being an extrajudicial battle, given that Al Qaeda is an organization and not a state, and that the Taliban government in Afghanistan was not recognized as being valid or sovereign. The White House identified their fight as unconventional warfare, and expected to rely heavily on Special Forces, the use of intelligence, and covert action.

Specifically, the US Administration sought to exclude the use of the term Prisoner of War and the status it brings to those detained. White House lawyers coined the term Enemy Combatant, much like Eisenhower user Disarmed Enemy Forces. Doing so specifically allowed the US administration to treat detainees in a manner not prescribed by the Third Geneva Convention, since Enemy Combatant, like Disarmed Enemy Forces, is not used in the language of the Convention.

Enemy Combatants would not need to be quickly evacuated from the battlefield, or afforded care or living conditions comparable to those of US or coalition soldiers. Enemy Combatants could be subjected to interrogation methods beyond those permitted under the Third Geneva Convention and, in keeping with its ?The gloves are off? approach to the conflict, the US Administration would be free to do as it deemed necessary to win its conflict. By not granting them POW status, though, the US could not fall back on its examples from WWII, in establishing low-risk, low security camps around the United States to handle the detainees until the conflict ends. Those rules established by the Third Geneva Convention, and those techniques and procedures learned the hard way in WWII, became inapplicable with the creation of the extrajudicial term Enemy Combatant.

Like the Rheinwiesenlagers, the Disarmed Enemy Forces, and the 21 soldiers from Johnson v. Eisentr?ger, the US Administration actively sought to keep these Enemy Combatants from transiting US soil, specifically in keeping with the Supreme Court findings in Johnson v. Eisentr?ger. While the US has had some success in detaining personnel at Guantanamo Base, Cuba, it has had few other choices for locations for detention facilities for the Enemy Combatants, given the international acceptance of the Third Geneva Convention. Many of these individuals are being detained in Iraq and Afghanistan, on the very battlefields where they have been detained, or later subjected to rendition, their return to the security services of their home nation.

The Bush Administration misunderstood the American history of POW?s and detainees, and thus has mismanaged detainee operations during the GWOT. The US administration failed to capitalize on its own lessons learning from during and after WWII, by not declaring those detained today to be POW?s and by not being able to process these thousands of modern detainees in the same manner as had been the POW?s of WWII or the 21 Germans detained in China.

Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armies in the Field, Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, 21 October 1950 (http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu3/b/q_genev1.htm).

Johnson v. Eisentr?ger, 339 U.S. 763 (1950) (http://www.law.uchicago.edu/tribunals/docs/jve.pdf).

Johnson v. Eisentrager Talking Points – Background for Current Cases, U.S. Federal Courts (http://www.uscourts.gov/outreach/topics/habeastalk_johnsoneisentrager.htm).

Joint Investigation Into September 11th: Fifth Public Hearing, Cofer Black, Joint House/Senate Intelligence Committee Hearing, 26 September 2002 (http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_hr/092602black.html).

Medical Department, United States Army Preventive Medicine in World War II, Volume IX, Special Fields, Prepared and published under the direction of Lieutenant General LEONARD D. HEAT0N The Surgeon General, United States Army Editor in Chief, Colonel ROBERT S. ANDERSON, MC, USA Editor for Preventive Medicine, EBBE CURTIS HOFF, Ph D, M D Assistant Editor, PHEBE M. HOFF, M.A., Office of the Surgeon General, Department of the Army, Washington, DC, 1969 (http://history.amedd.army.mil/booksdocs/wwii/EPWs/EPWs.htm).

Testimony, George Tenet, Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, 6 February 2002 (http://www.fas.org/irp/congress/2002_hr/020602tenet.html).

Trouble in Germany, Time Magazine, 22 October 1945 (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,778431-1,00.html).

Was Ike Responsible for the Deaths of Hundreds of Thousands of German POW’s? Pro and Con, James Bacque and Ernest Fisher, Jr., History News Network, George Mason University, 17 February 2003 (http://hnn.us/articles/1266.html).

World War II Prisoners of War in Georgia: Camp Gordon?s POWs, Kathy Roe Coker, Command Historian Office, US Army Signal Center and Fort Gordon, Augusta, GA 1994.

Zawahiri is a longtime Mujahid. He began his involvement in the Salafist movement in his home country of Egypt, as a member of the Muslim Brotherhood and later with the umbrella organization al-Jihad, or the Egyptian Islamic Jihad. By the time al-Zarqawi took up arms against the Jordanian monarch in the mid 1990?s, Zawahiri has been detained and tortured by the Egyptian authorities for his crusade against what he perceived to be an apostate regime in Cairo, had fought in Pakistan and Afghanistan, had been expelled from Sudan, and even been arrested in Russia as he began his global effort to united the Salafist movements.

Zawahiri?s global perspective drives his view of the contemporary operational environment, and in his letter to al-Zarqawi, Zawahiri stresses the social critical variable over all others. Zawahiri believes that ?the strongest weapon which the mujahedeen enjoy – after the help and granting of success by God – is popular support from the Muslim masses in Iraq, and the surrounding Muslim countries.?

Zawahiri stresses the cohesiveness and unit of action amongst all Muslims, and thus all Iraqis. He urges al-Zarqawi to conduct operations and undertake actions that will unite the Iraqis against the Americans and what he see as an apostate regime in Baghdad. They will find success, Zawahiri argues, ?by the alliance, cooperation and gathering of all leaders of opinion and influence in the Iraqi arena.?

But at the same time, Zawahiri also urges to show more restraint in conducting operations against the Shia, if for no other reason than embracing the importance of the social critical variable of the Iraqi environment.

?We must repeat what we mentioned previously, that the majority of Muslims don’t comprehend this and possibly could not even imagine it. For that reason, many of your Muslim admirers amongst the common folk are wondering about your attacks on the Shia. The sharpness of this questioning increases when the attacks are on one of their mosques, and it increases more when the attacks are on the mausoleum of Imam Ali Bin Abi Talib, may God honor him. My opinion is that this matter won’t be acceptable to the Muslim populace however much you have tried to explain it, and aversion to this will continue.?

But in addition to the social critical variable, Zawahiri also stresses the importance of time in al-Zarqawi?s operations. He urges al-Zarqawi to understand, appreciate and embrace the long struggle of which his efforts in Iraq are only a part. Zawahiri stresses that it will take considerable time to expel the Americans; establish an Islamic authority in Iraq, in the void created with the departure of the Americans; extend the jihad to neighboring secular states; and finally to take to war West, in order to defeat Israel. Zawahiri stresses this, knowing the strategic importance of the role time will play, and understanding al-Zarqawi?s tactical background.

Lastly, Zawahiri stresses the role that information plays as a critical variable both in the contemporary operational environment in Iraq, and in the global contemporary operational environment. He emphasizes recent media coverage from the international press, messages sent to the followers, and he specifically cites the role of the media in the struggle for the support of the people. He urges al-Zarqawi that ?more than half of this battle is taking place in the battlefield of the media. And that we are in a media battle in a race for the hearts and minds of our Umma (community of believers). And that however far our capabilities reach, they will never be equal to one thousandth of the capabilities of the kingdom of Satan that is waging war on us.?

Zawahiri used his letter to al-Zarqawi to stress the information, social, and time critical variables of the contemporary operational environment in Iraq and around the world. Zawahiri?s emphasis on these three critical variables stresses the integrated nature of the critical variables, and his understanding of their role in the contemporary operational environment.

I chose that subject ultimately because, after reading everything I could about why they wanted us to blog during this course, I realized that what the Army wanted was a story like this. They think America needs to hear these things. And I think they’re right.

For the folks who are in the year-long version of this course, not only do they have to blog, but they have to do two other things: submit something for publication, and speak to a group (outside the military).

I sent the link for my piece, to the lady here at Ft Gordon why runs the on-post magazine. We went back and forth some on email, and they opted to print it. September has Patriot Day, and it fits well into that theme. I sent along a couple of photos I had with me — to include one with my dad, which I thought was super cool. I also asked for and got her agreement to include the copyright notice – that the piece is protected under the Creative Commons license, and that it was being published with permission. Viva Creative Commons.

When I got back from lunch today, there was a copy of the magazine on my doorstep. Sure enough, page 27 has the article. I think it came out pretty well.

The PDF for the magazine isn’t online yet. I’ll throw up the link when it’s online.

Now, the question is: Who in my school’s administration reads the post magazine? I’m not going to say anything to the school about this being published; I want to wait and see if they notice. If nothing else, I’ll tell them when I’m about to leave.

Yeah, it runs opposite a whole page of awesome ads. Hey, nothing says “Patriotism!” like self-storage, world poker leagues, and real estate agents!