10 Feb

Our week at Ft. Benning is finally over. It has been pretty much what I expected except for a lot less down time. Every day we were doing things from around 6AM to 4PM. A lot of it was waiting in line but it still felt like a long day by the time it was over. About half the time was getting us physically ready (medical checkups, shots, equipment issue ect.) and the other half was training (IED identification, first aid, weapons training ect.). It's always a challenge with training centers like this because you have a lot of different specialities and logistically it is impractical to train people separately so you have to come up with some base level of training that is required. As a result you end up with a lot of training that doesn't apply to your mission but everyone goes through it. On this rotation we had a lot of medical service personnel (more COLs and LTCs than I have seen in one place) that will never leave the hospital but they were still out there with us. They were exempt from the first aid classes but for some reason the nurses had to go (I guess because they were enlisted).  Overall the training was relatively painless and if you have to be outside in southern Georgia February is a good time to do it. We did get some amazing equipment - we have a five layer cold weather system with the outer three layers being fire resistant Gortex. I have no idea how much it costs because I have never seen anything like it on the commercial market. The bad thing is we probably won't wear anything more than a couple of the jackets and we have to turn it in when we come back. We do get to keep the base layers so combined with my other deployments I now have close to a lifetime supply :). The one size fits all system of these centers affects the equipment issue also but fortunately we were able to get a memo that exempted us from having to take the equipment we didn't want. Everything is geared towards the infantry soldier which makes sense but I have no desire to drag multiple duffle bags of rucksacks, sleeping bags, hydration systems, ammo pouches and the like. As it is I am still leaving here with two additional bags of gear, it turns out body armor is still a requirement for entering a combat zone :). Right now there is still some question as to whether we will be delayed getting into country but the closer we get the delay is less likely. The only place they can hold us now is Kuwait which would be pretty miserable. Right now we are locked down in the Freedom Room waiting to board the plane (I always found the choice of names a little amusing). This one is much nicer than the one in Kuwait - we have recliners and of course ESPN and Fox news on the TVs. Cloudy H62 L47