*Note    I will be intentionally vague throughout this update to satisfy any OPSEC nazis out there who still think that the opposition hasn't figured out the inprocessing procedure for the half a million troops processed since the run-up the war.

     If we had had to rely on the current staff of this camp to win the first Gulf war Saddam Hussein would have had a palace in Mecca right now. Honest to god these guys couldn't find their own ass with both hands, a diagram, and a personal ass-locator beacon.

     2000 : My battle buddy and I arrived via commercial air and processed our M16's through local security. No problem so far. We look around to see who is there to meet us and finally find some guy from this camp who offers to give us a ride in. He loads us onto a bus (aided by an everpresent army of Indian stevedores) and our bus follows him onto this camp. He drives off as soon as the bus comes to a halt and we are dumped of in an area that resembles some sort of construction site. We takes turns guarding our stuff while sending the other guy out on recon missions to try and figure out where the inprocessing station is.

     0100 : My buddy comes back after the 3rd outing and reports that he has found the Space Available terminal and that they will put us up in some cots while we wait for our flight to the appropraite base in Iraq. Great, a bit of a Vietnam scene there where you just sort of arrange for your own transportation but ok whatever. We get checked in and are told to keep checking this board in the Space A place for flight info between 2-5 am. Sweet.

     0200 : After a shower (yes the shower trailers do in fact reek of feces) and a change of socks we go to our cots in a large open warehouse which also houses the Space A office. Each of us has a cot to ourselves and we try and rack out for a bit. Problem is that they never tun off the 1000 watt lights in this place. Never. Eventually fatigue wins out over the supernova lighting and the non-stop noise and I catch a few hours of sleep.

     0500 : No flights. Shit. Try to get some more sleep and fail. So we get up and head off the the Kellogg, Brown, and Root (KBR) chow hall. Talisein is right about the food. Hot, good, and lots would be an appropriate summary.

    0600 : I am still pretty sure we have not hit the right series of admin steps to be arrived in country so we explore random warehouse offices and just keep asking questions of the permanent party folks we can locate. They are just shy of complete and utter uselessness. Honestly this whole camp doesn't feel like a military installation at all but rather some sort of wierd Gypsy settlement.

    0900 : Finally we stumble into the Liason office for our "parent" unit the 18th Airborne Corps and hook up with a very shady SSG McShifty. His boss says that "They won't let you fly without doing a familiarization firing (to make sure our M16's work) and a class on Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDS (road side booby traps)) and Force Protection ammo". Greywar : "Are you sure they will let us on Space A with ammo? The manifest sheet said..." MSG Boss "Fuck it they would let you take a TOW missile if you had one. This is a war son, you are allowed to shoot people and shit." Great, so SSG McShifty (who has control of the most important currency in Iraq : ammo) takes us out on the southern end of the famed Highway of Death, pulls off the road behind a tank berm, hands us a couple of full magazines and tells us to "Just shoot at something away from the road". So we light up some patches of random sand for a while and hop back into the truck. IED class? We simulated it with McShifty's advice of "If you didn't put it on the road yourself don't fuck with it." and rolled back to the camp (After SSG McShifty gives us both full magazines of illicitly purloined 5.56mm ammo).

     1200 : back at the camp the is little to do that day so we just racked out mostly and explored our tiny little area

     0500 : Filght posted! Yay!

     1200 : Roll call for the light manifest. Both me and my buddy make it on. We load up a cargo truck with our bags (he and I each have 5 large bags of shit) along with 45 other people and head out on a bus to a base about 30 minutes away (the trip took 2.5 hours).

     1500 : We are told to get out of the bus and unload the baggage fromt he cargo trucks so that the Air Force guys there can palletize them for the C-130 ride. While we are doing this the buses take off. Problem. My buddy left his Kevlar helmet on it.

     1600 : the Captain (reserve) who is our chalk commander tells my buddy that he can't fly without a helmet so he goes back to the camp. Great no I am responisble for 10 bags when I get to Balad as the Air Force has already palletized everything and won't undo it to give him back his shit.

     1800 : We finally get through the processing to be manifest for the flight and move from the passenger "lounge" area out in to... another goddamn lounge?

     1900 : Board the C-130. Everyone briefed (found out that you don't need a helmet to fly so the Captain just fucked my buddy over for nothing, would have been to much trouble for him to ask anyone so he just decided to pull an answer out of his ass I guess)

     1910 : Find out that this aircraft is not in fact going where we all think it is going. Mass confusion. How the fuck do you go through a 4 hours manifest process with some 30 people sctruinizing the paperwork without realizing that the flight you are boarding does not in fact exist? Easy if your head is jammed tightly inside your colon I suppose!

     2000 : Everyone back off the plane. Fingers are poiunted blame exchanged (all meaningless since no one is in charge of anything here). 

      2100 : load up the buses to go back to the camp. Realize that the Military Police who are supposed to provide Force Protection for these bus convoys are nowhere to be found. Wait.

    2200 :  Our fearless leader finally figures out that they have no way of getting us any Force Protecion so he makes the "command decision" to have us provide our own. Fine. This is point at which I find out that I am the *only* guy with ammuniton and an M16! 50 mutherfuckers, some ranger infantry, some random combat arms and the only guy who is actually amed? The MI geek. So I become the "shooter" for the convoy which really just means I sit up front locked and loaded and am actually allowed to look out of the bus windows to "scan for threats". Super sweet.

    2400 : Get back to base and fuck around for 2 hours unloading my shit and my buddys with help from no one. Spend the next 2 hours trying to find my buddy and a place to store my weapon. (You see most places on this camp like the shoppette, eateries, and MWR facilities do not allow weapons inside. God forbid soldiers going into a combat zone have weapons.) I find that there are no places that will stroe weapons on this place. Great so lets see here... what sort of behavior does this asinine combo promote? Hmmm... Well to prevent prosecution later I won't tell you exactly how I resolved the weapons issue but it wasn't the way I was supposed to.

    0200 : Rack out again

    0500 : Another flight listed! Yay!

    0900 : Right now. We will see how it works out.

*Note : What you actually need to fly anywhere from Iraq, to Turkey, To Afghanistan? Orders and an ID card. *nothing else*