Who Fights This War? A Single Mom

Until September 11, 2001, Michelle Delta made family her first priority. On that terrible Tuesday Delta was a 35-year-old single woman living in her own house in Bridgeville, Delaware. In the months that followed, she decided to give up her shop supervisor job and put America at the top of her priority list and, with no military experience at all, joined the Army National Guard in May of 2002. In August she went to basic training. “I was very naive,” Delta said. “Soldiers were heroes. I am not sure what I really expected, but when I got to basic training I was in a holding area with more than 20 girls between 18 and 21 years old. On the other floors of our training area were hundreds of young men the same age. They were kids.” All through basic Delta helped to take care of and watch over the ‘kids.’ In basic Delta received extra responsibility because of her age and rank—her college degree allowed her to join as a Pvt. 1st Class. All of her drill sergeants were younger than her. It was not easy for her to go from living half her life as an independent adult, to getting yelled at “…by a cocky little punk younger than me,” she joked. But she has the kind of personality that galvanizes with hardship. Her father died when she was eighteen leaving two younger siblings with her step-mother. When her step-mother passed in 1994, Delta became legal guardian of the two. “You do what you have to do,” she says. Delta’s life changed from that point. “The kids had problems. You lose your father and mother at an early age and it is tough to move on.” Deltas’ sister was shot five times in 1996 and managed to survive. By the time Delta left for basic, the children were in their early twenties and on their own. Delta trained to be a CH-47 Chinook aircraft mechanic, came home and landed a job as an Army technician for the National Guard. She went from almost 36 years of civilian life to working in uniform full time. In 2005, Delta went to school to be a flight engineer. She was a sergeant and finding that the military is not always an easy place for a woman. “Yes we are all soldiers but we are not always treated equally” she said. “You have to choose your battles wisely”. In 2008 her unit got the alert order for deployment and in January of 2009 moved to Fort Sill, Okla., for pre-deployment training. In one of the quirks that lead to jokes that never stop, Staff Sgt. Michelle Delta is a flight engineer in Delta Company. “The Delta jokes are just part of the deal,” she says with a weak smile. In April, her unit arrived in Iraq with the 28th Combat Aviation Brigade and was station at Contingency Operating Base Adder, Iraq. “We were supposed to be going to Balad, but were redirected when we arrived in Kuwait,” she said. Once the birds and support equipment arrived in, all of the flight operations had to be set up, then the night missions started. “Sometimes we fly five nights in a row and get to be airfield boss on the sixth night. Other times the sandstorms move in and we don’t get off the ground but it gives us a chance to work on our aircraft. We usually work long days and it’s tough on everyone.” Since starting the deployment Delta and her fellow Chinook crew members have prepared the ships for missions, the door gunners mount and arm the three machine guns on each bird and make sure the pilots’ weapons are ready for use. The cockpit crew does the pre-flight inspection. Delta says “We are all a team and each of us has our section of responsibility”. Their day is just beginning when, for most of the other soldiers, the day is winding down. The aircrews sit together the whole length of two or three tables with eight soldiers on each side at the dining facility. They laugh, joke and speculate about where they might be going and whether they will be flying. Weather and last-minute changes cancel some missions. After dinner, they return to the large company headquarters building near the airstrip and wait for the mission. If the mission goes, Delta and her crew will usually fly hundreds of miles in heavy body armor peering through night-vision devices manning their weapons. They will move cargo or passengers to many different locations through-out the night. If the mission is scrubbed they go back to the flight line in the dark, dismount the guns, and tie the bird down for the night. “If the mission is scrubbed and we leave early, it gives us a chance to go back and do laundry,” Delta said. “When we fly, we get back late, do all the post-flight work, daily inspections, and grab a few hours sleep before we are back again.” Delta loves what she is doing but has not decided on whether she will stay in the National Guard as a career or not. “I am 43 now. I will be 56 when I get out, if I stay for 20 (years),” she said. “That’s a long time and this can be a physically demanding job. But I am going back to my technician job for now. I’ll see what the future holds when I get back.”

Thanks and Requests

Amy--The CS Lewis books arrived yesterday--Screwtape Letters and The Four Loves. We start the Four Loves on the first Monday in October. Thanks very much.

Susan--the Propel Powder, razors and SGT Reiner's M&M's arrived the day before yesterday. The M&Ms will be going up to Base Garry Owen the next time one of our guys gets a Blackhawk ride. Many thanks.

Ginny--I got all those amazon notices. I'll be looking for Purgatorio soon as well as dictionaries. Thanks much.

Shiri--I'll also be looking for dictionaries from you. Thanks.

Katie and Darren (and anyone else who wants to send stuff). The Education Center needs:
--a printer/scanner
--20 copies of the ASVAB (aptitude test) Study guide (send one, five, whatever)
http://www.amazon.com/Kaplan-ASVAB-2010-Services-Vocational/dp/1419550675/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253217169&sr=1-1
--one and two-inch three-ring binders, lots, with tab inserts
--10 or more copies of the AFAST (FLIGHT) study guide
http://www.amazon.com/Master-Military-Flight-Aptitude-Tests/dp/0768927935/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1253217367&sr=1-1

And I would like TUL Pens, black medium point and other colors also.

Thanks in advance

Neil

I was on the BBC World Service Last Sunday

On September 11, just after my blog was linked to the "At War" blog, a producer for the BBC World service called and asked if they could interview me for a story on military blogs and blogging. I agreed and the link blow is the result. It's a 6-minute interview and I am about the last four minutes. If you want to hear it, I should be able to email it from gmail--no size restrictions. But be sure if you want it you give me an Inbox that allows 8mb files.

Eight Minutes and Gone

From the time the Medevac call comes in, the first pair of Blackhawks in the rotation have fifteen minutes to be airborne. Actually, the standard for our Medevac unit is eight minutes, the Army standard is 15. When I heard the call at the Medevac hangar I went straight out to where the birds sit in low blast walls waiting to take off. The crew chiefs of both birds were already getting the aircraft ready for flight. The medic ran to the Evac bird, the door gunner ran to the chase bird.

Within three minutes the twin turbojet engines were screaming and the huge rotor blades were starting to turn. I walked along the revetment walls to the from of the aircraft so I could watch the takeoff from directly under their flight path. The main rotor turned faster and faster. I moved to a dead air spot where I was not being buffeted by the wind from the main rotors. The tail roters were spinning crazy fast looking like they might pick the whole aircraft up from the back.

Suddenly the medic bird took off. At first slowly upward, then twisting to the right it banked up into the air, straighten out and shot into the distance.

The chase bird was seconds behind following the same counterclockwise curve into the sky. These pictures are some of two dozen I took in about 20 seconds until the Blackhawks sped out of view.

Always Moving

I got back from dinner tonight and two other sergeants in our company were in the room. When I walked in I said hello and said I was just picking up the books for tonight's book group. My roommate said, "Our door is the net and Gussman is a tennis ball. He bounces in, he bounces out." I do. But I need to have different things with me for each activity, especially especially on book group days. Today we got done in the motor pool at about 230pm. I went from there to the Charlie Med hangar for a meeting then back to the room to change from the uniform to PTs. I did some writing, rested for a while (we get up at 0445), called a couple of coworkers back in the states about a meeting, then went to the coffee shop to read for tonight's book group and a few pages of French (Le trois mousquetaires).

Then I came back to the CHU dropped the books and rode the perimeter of the post. After that I made two more phone calls about work and then off to dinner. I need to have my weapon to go to dinner, but not a backpack, since they are not allowed in the DFAC. After dinner is when I bounced through the door on the way to book group. Now I am going to the gym then maybe make a phone call back to the states.

There is always some point in the night when my head starts to hurt and I know it's time to sleep. Not yet though.

Med-Evac

Today I went to a meeting at the Med-Evac building. The meeting was very routine, just a discussion of how to get soldiers' photos from across the battalion on a single computer. Just after the meeting I was talking to one of the pilots on duty. There are two aircraft that are on standby for immediate take-off and another pair of Blackhawks as a backup for the first. The lead bird in each pair is the medic bird. The trail bird is in air assault configuration with guns in the doors.

When they get a call, team one goes and team two goes on alert. Yesterday there were two calls almost simultaneously. I got to watch the preparation and take-off. The first pair were gone inside of eight minutes--jumping from the pad where they rest into the air one right after the other.

But there were only three Blackhawks on the ready line, not four. It turns out the fourth was on an instrument check flight--guns mounted and ready to go. I watched as the crew chief and pilots made final checks and started up the lone medic bird on the ground. Just as the rotor blades started spinning quickly, the chase bird came into view in the southern sky. It wheeled above the airstrip and landed after a rapid descent, but never stopped moving. As soon is it touched down 300 meters away from the medic bird, it slowly taxied, making the angry noises helicopters make when they are on the ground with the engines pushing those big rotors.

In a few seconds the Medic bird took off. The chase Blackhawk jumped from the concrete taxi five seconds later. It was beautiful to watch. And good for the soldiers at the other end of the trip. Because the calls were clearly very serious.

Shadow Blog

Several of you, especially Daria and Meredith, have insisted I keep a "Shadow Blog" the one in which I talk about all the bad stuff I can't really publish while I am living and working so close to the soldiers I am writing about. They are right of course. Someday soon I will need to look at my sphere of life from above, from every side, and from below. At Meredith's advice, I took down a post about a guy who failed at everything but maintained a thoroughly condescending attitude to everyone around him. I serve with people who rise to the worst occasions and really perform and some who have been relieved of duty for incompetence, and more who should have been.

When I went back in the Army I remembered the friendships I made during the time I spent in Germany. In particular Abel Lopez and Cliff Almes, true brothers and friends for life--in fact since all three of us are believers, friends for eternity. But the messy recriminations and power struggles at every level here are starting to remind me of what I had forgotten: there are people who I served with back then who I found revolting, and because we spent time together in cold tents and colder tank turrets, I know very well their failings and they know mine.

We are now getting to that point in the current deployment when the infighting becomes more visible. The adrenaline of training and the good feeling of going on an adventure is wearing off. I will keep the shadow blog, but I will write when I can about the people and things that are falling apart.

Who Fights This War? An Ex Marine

One of the administrative sergeants I run into once in a while was a Marine for 10 years before joining the Army National Guard. He is aloof and old enough that no one bothers him very much. He mostly keeps to himself, but will occasionally burst into a lecture about safety, security, the political situation in Iraq or how this war should be fought. His outbursts, like the lid sliding off a boiling pot, show that the heat has been building for a long time and finally he explodes. An early commentator on the Iliad wrote about Achilles saying, "An angry man never thinks he has spoken enough" and this sergeant proves it. Today I was waiting for some other soldiers and had some time to sit and listen to this sergeant talk about his last deployment. It turns out the reason he keeps his distance and thinks about security issues goes back to his deployment three years ago. He was also on a large base then, but worked with people who went on convoys. For the most part he did not eat dinner, but one of the guys on convoy was a particular friend, another ex-Marine, so he would always change his schedule and eat dinner when his buddy was on base. One day the aloof sergeant got the word that his dinner buddy got killed in a mortar attack. As he described it they were great friends, "And I decided I was not going to let that happen again. I'll talk to people but I don't want to care that much have them taken away. I still think about all the plans he had for his family, to travel--all gone." The alternative to love is self-protection, keeping others at a distance so they won't hurt you by leaving. It's a choice we all make to some degree, to risk love or draw back.

September 11 Ceremony Went Great

It was really great today to be doing something I like to do and am good at. The event came off perfectly--we started at 310pm had four songs, two speeches, two prayers, the reading of the names of the dead here at COB Adder/Tallil Ali. It is wonderful to be the emcee of an event with all military participants--they do what they are told!

Anyway, so the songs, prayers and speeches were spot on length and when I announced the moment of silence, the base loudspeakers announced the moment of silence for the whole base 10 seconds later. My perfectionist event manager friends Kristine Chin, Nancy Vonada and Karen Coker, amazing as they are, would be jealous of hitting those marks!

The event ended seven hours ago and I am still buzzing. I was the first speaker. The other speaker was an Air Force colonel who talked about being in the underground control center in Colorado for the US and Canadian Air Forces when the 9/11 attacks happened. He is a passionate speaker. He talked about how the military responded to the attacks and what it was like to be at the nerve center of air defense.

I spoke as a civilian on 9/11 who came back to serve. We complemented each other very well. Here's the text of my speech--5 minutes, no more, no less.

Good afternoon. I am Sergeant Neil Gussman of Echo Company, 2nd Battalion, 104th Aviation. On September 11, 2001, nearly 3,000 Americans died. I am going to tell you about one of my friends who lived through the 9/11 attacks and something about why I am here in Iraq today.

Eight years ago I was a civilian, about as civilian as I could be, and now I am serving with you. So how much of a civilian was I? On that fateful Tuesday morning I was 48 years old. I first enlisted in January 1972 and had served till July of 1984. My wife and I had just adopted our fourth child and the oldest of our four children was 12.

I was the communications manager of one of those dot-com internet businesses that burned money faster than Pentagon procurement and sometimes had the lifespan of a firefly.
We had the best computers in our Philadelphia offices and we all watched in horror on those expensive screens as the World Trade Center Towers fell into heaps. I have never felt so helpless. For years before the attack, I had gone to New York almost every month on business and had worked with many editors with offices near the World Trade Center. I tried to call some of my friends in New York, but no one could get through.

One of the editors I tried to call was Helga Tilton—a thin, tough woman in her late 50s who was the editor-in-chief a trade magazine located on Rector Street, just two blocks south of Ground Zero. Helga was born in Frankfurt Germany in 1943. Frankfurt was one of the most heavily bombed cities in Nazi Germany. She grew up in ruins, deprivation and poverty. But she worked hard in school, studied English and wanted to live in America. By the early 70s she finished a PhD at New York University and was fluent enough to get a job as a writer in America.

When the twin towers fell, Helga got out of the building knowing from her grim childhood that when one building falls it can take down others. Helga had married a very nervous American who was an NYC native. She decided it was her duty to make sure he was all right. So she put on her walking shoes, grabbed her purse and walked past Ground Zero almost six miles north to Central Park West.

I talked to Helga the next day. She was fine. Her husband was a wreck. At that time I thought about enlisting, but I was too old then. Even with 11 years prior service and a waiver, I was too old.

That was then.

In 2006, the rules changed. The enlistment age went up to 42. I could re-enlist, but doubt held me back for another year.

But over the winter, I decided I really could serve again. I never thought it would be easy to come back at 54. In late April 2007 I passed my enlistment physical and ASVAB test. The only thing I was waiting for was an age waiver that thankfully took until July. But the biggest hurdle I would face was just two weeks away. Since the early 90s I have been an avid bicycle racer. On May 9, 2007, I was in a downhill race just about to pass for the win and touched wheels with another rider at 51 mph. Within a half hour I was Med-Evaced from the scene. I had broken four ribs, my right shoulder blade and collarbone and my nose. I cracked the first two vertebra in my neck and smashed the 7th. The next day I had emergency surgery to replace the smashed C-7 with a bone from a cadaver.

The injuries made me even more sure I wanted to serve. If I was going to risk my life, I wanted it to be for something more than a trophy. I got the waiver on July 13th. I told the recruiter I could enlist in August because the neurosurgeon said I would be out of the neck and chest brace I was in on August 2nd. I enlisted on August 16, 2007, at age 54 after a 23-year break in service.

But at the same time I was recovering and trying to enlist, Helga got sick. She was something of a health nut, but got pancreatic cancer, one of the most aggressive forms. She survived so much it was sad to think that the end of her life, like the beginning, was marked by death and ruins.

I talked to Helga and her husband a few times during her last months. She was calm and courageous facing a hopeless diagnosis while I was working to recover my health to join the Army during a war. An irony not lost on Helga. She died on November 14, 2007. For me, Helga will always be the face I see when I think of September 11. America inspires people to do great things, to survive the worst circumstances.

I am glad I could serve once more in honor of Helga, my own immigrant grandparents, and everyone who loves this country. I am very happy to be here today, a citizen soldier, serving with other soldiers who love America and are willing to make the huge sacrifices necessary to defend it.

Thank you.

Who Fights This War? Math Teacher and Drill Sergeant

"I'd rather be digging a damn ditch than sitting on my ass in an air-conditioned office pushing FRAGOs (Fragmentary Orders)." That was one of the first things Staff Sergeant Pamela Allen Bleuel said to me when I met her walking across on open area in a sandstorm. She is a cheerful, imposing, funny woman of 43 who joined the Army Reserves on a whim just before 9/11 and now has an intense love-hate relationship with life in camouflage.

Until last month SSG Bleuel was the sergeant in charge of the convoy training school here on Camp Adder. She taught troops how to drive and fight in convoys and how to best use the ungainly MRAP fighting vehicles that are now the standard troop carrier across Iraq. She loved convoy training and did not mind when her tour was extended. When she did the unit she went to decided her training as a military police officer would be best used processing FRAGOs--the daily changes to orders that bubble through the military system day and night.

Bleuel loves being outside, moving troops, and has no desire to sit in air conditioning, but she will do the job as well as she can until the end of her extended tour.

She joined the reserves in 2000 at age 35 with no prior military experience at all, because she saw two soldiers hanging up a sign in the small town in Kentucky where she lives. The sign said the Army would repay student loans for reserve soldiers. She had three daughters between 8 and 13 years old at the time, taught math at the local high school and had $30,000 in student loans. She signed up. She went off to basic at the end of the school year, trying to fit basic and advanced training into the summer break. Training did not quite fit her school schedule and she was just about done with training when the 9-11 attacks hit.

At that point she just wanted to serve and was jealous of the regular Army soldiers who were whisked away to airborne schools and other assignments. She served as an MP until 2004 when she trained to be a drill sergeant. Every summer after that she would "push troops" through Fort Knox, Kentucky, during the 11-week summer break at her school district. Her experience as a drill sergeant and an MP lead her to convoy training here in Iraq.

Now she is ready to go back to being a drill sergeant part time and a full time teacher. "Each year it gets easier to go back to pushing troops and harder to teach school," she said. "It's not the kids. It's the damn parents." She then gave her version of the teacher's lament that parents call her, email her, come to school to say their little child is special. "In the Army you don't deal with that. Mom doesn't call basic training," she said.

She also likes the structure and clarity of Army life, at least in training. "We have a goal; get the trainees ready to be soldiers." She also likes the deference of soldiers when compared to civilians. "When I get back from Knox and I am in a crowd at Wal-Mart, I wish I could yell 'Make a hole' and have everybody get out of my way."

Bleuel's wall is covered with pictures of her three children. She is very proud of them--even the one who, "Is a liberal and wants to save the whole damn world. She voted for Obama. We don't talk about politics." Bleuel is somewhere to the right of Oliver North politically and hates everything about France, which is a double layer of irony given her name.

At age 43 she has eight years of service and will have to decide soon whether she will make the Army a career or not. I'm guessing she will. The look she has in her eyes when she talks about basic training and convoy ops is not there when she talks about Algebra 2.