I've read 170 pages of a legal thriller from 1991 so far...its pretty good, definitely worth the cover advertisement that its about to be a TNT drama blockbuster with Tom Selleck. Yeah its old I know. LOL. Anyways we didn't get air conditioning back until 5pm, so ti was a long 4 hours. The lights are still blinking all over camp, so I suspect theirs no air conditioning again. Kinda blows.
I've decided I am gonna freeze my ass off in Baghdad. Yeah my camp is near Baghdad airport, did I mention that? Anyways it was 86 here last night, and it was 68 in Baghdad. Very freezing if you ask me! We keep the tent at 64 at night, and I sleep in front of the air conditioning fan so I sleep in sweats because I'm so cold in my poncho liner (My sleeping bag is packed in a bag that i will get in Iraq, a poncho liner is really a light polyester type blanket that ties into a poncho to keep ti warm when its wet. Its really good when you sleep outside in 70 or 80 degree temps and just want to feel covered like your in a bed. Its not good for much else though.
Keep in touch
I'm in Baghdad May 29, 2005
SO I'm finally here. First of all, I feel absolutely terrible for anyone who is unfortunate enough to be
assigned to Kuwait, Iraq, or anywhere else and never gets to go on patrol in Iraq proper.
Anyone who doesn't have to leave the confines of a US base is sorely deprived of a life experience.
We left Kuwait 3 or 4 days ago, I honestly can't remember. We left Camp Buehring and drove up to the border and
spent the night. We crossed the berm 2 days ago,
but it wasn't really a berm. A berm is a high wall of compact dirt and the expression "crossing the berm"
tends to mean here that you went north to Iraq.
But instead of a berm, we crossed a moat. Literally. No water, but a ten foot or so deep and equally wide hole
in the ground full of trash and walla, we were in Iraq. The first town we went through, and the largest of any
of them, was quite an amazing experience. I don't know how to describe it. People were living in mud huts
and remains of buildings that looked to be hundreds of years old. Nothing of modern construction, unless modern construction is looking like the building is from at least 50 years ago...
And yet, despite this, no matter how small the shack or how horrid the shape it was in, it had a satellite dish and usually a car. Most fo the cars here in Iraq are 70s and 80s model Cadillacs and Volkswagens,
or they look like it...ya know the big car your grandma drives? And the nasty diesel powered Volkswagen
that the annoying neighbor has? Those cars. I didn't take very many pictures coming up here because at
the time it didn't seem like their was much to see, but I wish now that I Had simply so I could show people..
I emailed my dad the few pictures i took and he was amazed and then it made me realize he was right.
And now I'm having trouble explaining what I saw. I saw lots of children, mostly barefoot and without parents,
begging. The begging here is horrible. I'm not sure what to do because if I give them
food and water, not only am I taking away from what I have, but I'm encouraging them to beg. And I know
that I'm not the only person they've begged to anyways, they probably have tons of MREs and water.
But at the same time..its sad that at one time, they had to beg. And now, if they don't have to beg anymore,
they still do because they know it works.
After we passed through the first town we went through Iraq's marshes. A whole culture of Bedouins used to live
in them, but following the first Iraq war, they tried to revolt, so Hussein dried up the marshes causing
them all to die. Wonderful, eh?
In the mud flats that there still are I saw lots of camels and goats and children begging without any signs of homes.
But the weird part was you'd be riding and their would be NOTHING, but than you'd see a hut or a tent...with a
satellite dish.
Another really cool/weird thing I saw was little mud huts on the side of the road (we drove up a paved highway
the whole way) that were about 3x3x3 feet in size. No satellite dishes, just tiny huts. I wondered if they
were from pre-automobile days (aka today since most Iraqis I saw were walking or had donkeys) and used to
store food and water for travelers. Who knows???
The evening before last night we pulled into FOB (Forward Operating Base) Scania, about 70 miles south of
Baghdad. From there up it was like I was in Vietnam.. Marsh, palm trees, etc. We all joked it looked more
like Vietnam than Kuwait.
Yesterday was also Haji-Mart at Scania! Haji is the derogatory, generic name for Arabs from soldiers..so
therefore, as you can guess, Haji-Mart was a bunch of local vendors coming to sell you stuff.
So I got to leave FOB Scania yesterday to go. I walked outside the FOB and I was only about twenty
five yards from the compound, but it was still cool and weird being outside it with just a loaded weapon.
ALl they had for sale was Cuban cigars, DVDs, and watches.. They were selling 2 for $5 DVDs and each DVD
had about 2 or 3 movies so I spent abotu $20. I bought Star Wars Episode III, Revenge of the Stith (Yes the new one), Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy, Kill Bill VOl. I, The Last Samurai, 13th Warrior,
Once Upon a time in Mexico, White Chicks,
Double Take, The Lady Killers, and a bunch of others. Unfortunately I didn't have $50, because if i did
i could have bought the entire CSI series! All the seasons! Also they had a camel you could ride but
I didn't bother, but I wish i had. I really have a lot of regrets from coming up.. but Ihope i get
a chance to make them up.
We pulled into Camp Stryker this morning. I'm right at Baghdad International Airport, which is cool as
hell because theirs a big palace on the horizon and I can look at all the bomb damage here. I took a bunch
of pictures with my telephoto lens of bombed out hangers, palaces, etc. I probably wasn't supposed to,
but oh well.
Today I just crashed the hell out. The entire ride north to Baghdad was uneventful, we weren't attacked or
anything, but I was (and still am) pretty tired. Tomorrow I'm taking the shuttle bus to the other US camps
here at the airport and going to sight see some palaces and the old Ba'ath party headquarters. It should be
very interesting and a lot of fun.
Some words about my camp. I'm living in a 20 man tent with concrete floors. I have more space now than I
did even in a building with a bed at Fort Stewart. Its absolutely pathetic that I have a better quality
of life here than the State of Georgia can provide me at the National Guard Training Center at Fort Stewart.
I absolutely love it here. I think. I'm really not sure. Since Iraq is nothing like I ever have seen in my life,
its poorer and dirtier than even Panama, I feel weird saying I Like it. I don't think thats the right word.
But I can't honestly say I don't like it, and I honestly feel guilty saying I dislike this place.
I have seen quite a few Russian aircraft since we've been here, and a couple weird pieces of US Air Force equipment that I have heard about but never seen. But of all the things I saw on the way here, the spookiest things I saw was when we'd be driving and you'd drive over a burned up piece of road. Or when we were in southern Iraq and you'd look off the road and there was a blown up Iraqi tank still in its defensive position.
From George Runkle, December 8, 2004
>> Hello everyone.
>> I'm finally being mobilized and sent to do infantry stuff
>> in the middle east.
>> I go to Fort Gordon later this morning, come home at xmas,
>> go to Fort Stewart, GA in January, and than Iraq in summer.
>> I will be on just about total restriction,
>> and may not have email access.
>> However, my love of Air Force history and mail will not diminish
>> so please feel free to write me and send cool stuff in the mail
>> and my parents will forward it along to me:
[George's military e-mail address and family home address deleted as
per his father's request.]
>> I really hope to enjoy hearing from all of you, whether by phone,
>> email, or snail mail, sometime between now and my expected return
>> home date of Summer 2006.
>> Someone please pass this note along to Ed Thelen,
>> whose email address I've lost again for the hundredth time.
>> George
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: rangermk@sbcglobal.net
> To: [George's military e-mail address deleted] ; BShearon@aol.com ; Jm660@aol.com ;
> bases@mindspring.com ; ed@ed-thelen.org
> Sent: Thursday, December 09, 2004 3:09 AM
> Subject: Re: Mobilized!
>
> Good luck, George,
> keep your head down and stay in touch as best you can.
>
> Will do the same from here! MK
>
> ------------------------------------
HEY - What the heck???
They can't send you!! You're just too young!!
Or am I getting older that fast? :-((
Yeh - I guess getting older!
I are a GrandPop :-))
Reminds me of some lines from "Fiddler on the Roof" :-((
Seems six months ago you were a high school kid
with an air defense web site
specializing in three Nike sites near your home in Pennsylvania,
garish yellow background if I recollect -
Then a picture of you and your father -
And now into the big league of really serious stuff -
like our future history.
Please don't do nuthin stupid
or have bad luck
or be in the wrong place at the right time -
Hard not to say something really mushy -
Very Best Regards
Ed Thelen
Freakin hot! May 24, 2005
Today was a pretty good day. Woke up at 5, headed down to the motorpool to do PMCS (Preventive Maintenance Checks and Services) on the Bradley, and than headed back to the tent at 9am for a calm day of playing computer, taking a nap, etc. After I ate lunch I headed over to the phone center and called my mom. It was the first time we talked since I've landed and it was great fun! Than I headed back to the tent.... To find, to my surprise, Thomas and Higgins butt ass naked. Many other men were also naked. Why were they naked? Because it was 120 degrees this afternoon, and the air conditioners in the tents died. So yeah, it was about 90 with 100% humidity in the tents. It was annoying. I've really gotten used to the heat, the only part that bothers me is how bright the sun is and the sweat in my eyes. But yeah walking feels like your standing in an oven the whole time. So going into the tent wasn't much of an improvement. since it was so hot all I did was get in my cot and read.
Feel free to pass this on, especially Mom to my fellow liberal relatives who don't quite share my view on Iraq haha!
p.s. The coolest thing just happened - we got mortared! Just one shell though.