Every time I hear or see the recent troubles in Greece on the news it reminds me of the Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) my team ODA 014 conducted in 1998. I had just arrived in Germany for a three year tour about 3 months prior when my team was tasked to conduct the Military Freefall training with the Greek ETA commandos. The ETA are something akin to our Navy Seals and the training would be conducted at the Greek Airborne School in Elefsina just outside of Athens. Read More...

            The radio transmission we received told us not to engage any target west of the base of the Kani Domlan ridgeline. I asked for authentication due to the fact we had been pounding this ridgeline and the Iraqi troops on it for a few weeks with airstrikes. The order was authenticated and myself and my commo sergeant looked at each other and shrugged our shoulders. We made a transmission back to our patrol base in Klaw Kut where the rest of our team was located seeking further direction. Our Team Leader informed us that the Kurds had broken through to the city of Kirkuk and that he and the rest of the ODA would link up with us at a small village that was situated on a road intersection just north of our position. It would take them a few hours to arrive so we leisurely packed up our gear and threw it in our vehicles. We headed north until we stopped at the agreed upon meeting point and discovered it was already swarming with Kurdish Peshmerga. We dismounted our vehicles and greeted our allies with some small talk and those that smoked enjoyed a butt. Read More...

            If you set the way back machine to the spring and summer of 1983 you would find me on the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula conducting operations as part of the Multi-National Force and Observers (MFO). I was a PFC and the assistant gunner for an 81mm mortar squad. Specifically, 2^nd squad (base gun), Weapons Platoon, B Company, 1st Battalion, 325^th Airborne Infantry Regiment, 82^nd Airborne Division. Unlike the other regiments in the 82^nd, which are designated as Parachute Infantry Regiments, the 325 is designated as Airborne Infantry since our regiment actually landed in gliders during World War II. After the war, gliders were phased out and the 325th was made regular parachute infantry. The designation stuck however, such are the vagaries of military heraldry. Read More...