Patriots & Victims

I served in the in the US Army for nearly 29 years. I served as an Active Duty soldier for nine years-and-a-day, and then in the Army Reserves for a bit over two years, before finally ending up with the South Carolina Army National Guard (aka "SCARNG") for over 17 years. 

In those 28-plus years I had some interesting assignments and met some amazing and incredible people. Today, I want to talk about one those amazing people, a man I'll call Abdulla. I cannot know his status today, so I don't want to place him in a position of danger. You'll soon see why.

In 2004 I was sent to a school to train on the AH-64D Apache at Cecil Field, outside Jacksonville, Florida. A former Naval Air Station, the base had been turned over to civilian authority and a contractor had bid on the contract to train National Guard personnel on the "D Model." The 1st Battalion (Attack), 151st Aviation Regiment (aka "1/151 Aviation" or to the personnel of the unit "the battalion") was to be reequipped with the AH-64D and we had a group their to learn the finer points of a far more advanced helicopter. While there a VIP group came through that included the recently retired Army Aviation Branch Sergeant Major Edward P. Iannone, Jr., whom I had met just months before. He was then working for the Army Aviation & Missile Command, or "AMCOM." We struck up a conversation and I mentioned why we were at the school. Cryptically, he told me that those new, more advanced aircraft may be delayed.

Right after our group returned from Florida, 1/151 Aviation received warning orders to prepare for deployment to Iraq. Which we did. In Summer 2004, we moved to Ft. Bragg, NC, for training and soon were loading up for deployment to Iraq. In the meantime our commander had somehow finagled a favor and was able to have 14 of our 16 AH-64A helicopters painted into two-tone gray by the US Marines. It was absolutely scandalous in the eyes of the US Army, but the US Army was able to do nothing about it if it wanted the battalion in Iraq! And we deployed with gray aircraft. It was a highly successful experiment, so therefore it was rejected by the US Army.

Interestingly, while we chose the call sign "Ghostrider," the same used by no less than two other units in-theater, the insurgency would call us the Blue Dragons. It referenced the occasional appearance of the gray helicopters that would appear in a bluish tint in the right light. Our commander refused to adopt it. 

We arrived in Kuwait where we unloaded the ships that had our equipment aboard and moved to the forward base in the Kuwaiti desert called Camp Buehring. I was assigned to the advance party and in early October we arrived at Qayyarrah West Airbase in northern Iraq to prepare the transition from the 10th Mountain Division's OH-58D Kiowa Warriors. Once the crown jewel of the Iraqi Air Force and called Saddam Air Base, the base had been essentially decimated by coalition forces during Desert Shield and Desert Storm, as well as Operation Iraqi Freedom. American forces had occupied it and termed it "Q-West" which was universally spoken as "Key West."

And it was here that I met Abdulla. 

I was assigned by my battalion commander as the liaison for our local Iraqi workers. They were hired through a local Iraqi contractor who provided the US forces on the base with laborers who would handle minor repairs and maintenance efforts to keep the infrastructure that was slowly being repaired in working order. I would take a HMMWV (High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicle which is universally known as the "Humvee") and head to the main gate every morning to pick up "our" workers, who had spent a great deal of time avoiding the gaze of local insurgents on the way to work.

I learned much from them. After signing them in, I would distribute them to the battalion's individual company areas. The D Company contingent, which was my company, had five workers. They had a small building from which to work and I was immediately invited inside where tea was brewed and we discussed the days tasking and other "important" things. They were able to teach me enough Arabic that I was nearly conversational within five months, surprising myself greatly! And I helped them to improve their English. 

Abdulla was the "straw boss" and clearly the senior member of the five. He and Ali (also not his name) carried themselves in a manner that reminded me of soldiers, which I would soon find our was a correct assumption. Ali had been a sergeant in the Iraqi Army. Abdulla was a retired infantry Sergeant Major, or likely referred to by their Anglophile army as a Warrant Officer 1 in that day. This meant Abdulla was the senior enlisted man in a battalion, with three companies of likely around 150-200 troops each.

During our time in Iraq we were engaged in Operation Iraqi Freedom III (OIFIII). During this time Al Qaeda and other groups had decided to take on the US and the nascent Iraqi National Guard across Iraq. The ING had been reconstituted from the Iraqi Army and was being trained by coalition forces. While it had many good soldiers, their loyalty to the new regime was questionable and their training was not complete. This led the insurgents to attempt the takeover of the northern, non-Kurdish portion of the country. This included Mosul and the smaller town of Tal Afar. The insurgents were rightly afraid of the Kurdish militia known as Peshmerga and stayed away from most of the country east of Mosul. They were, though, killing and intimidating anyone they could reasonably identify as working with, for, or doing business with the coalition. Beheading and public displays were the preferred methods.

I grew to respect Abdulla. He was direct and honest. He was also a patriot. I would later discover that he had a tattoo of the Iraqi Army crest on his forearm. There's no doubt he had fought the Iranians during the Iran-Iraq War. I felt real sorrow for him and Iraq. One morning during tea I could see he was agitated. During our conversation between the six of us one morning, Abdulla looked coldly and determinedly at me and startled me by saying, "You Americans just need to nuke the whole country of Iraq and start over."

I replied by saying that it would mean the death of him and his family. He didn't blink. "I know."

It was later that I learned of the tattoo. He always wore long-sleeved shirts. I had assumed that he did it due to the work we had hired him to do. But, the sleeves were there to hide the tattoo that was no longer on his arm. There was still some ink on the edges of a large scar where the tattoo had once been.

Abdulla was in charge of an infantry unit during the invasion of Kuwait by Iraq, and the subsequent defense of Iraq's new 13th province. They were literally on the Kuwait-Saudi border looking at the forces arrayed against them after their conquest and the subsequent build-up of the allies of strange bedfellows who were lining up against Iraq. Abdulla's soldiers had worked steadily and efficiently to build bunkers and fighting positions that were planned and placed in such a way as to funnel allied armor and troops into kill zones of minefields and intense crossfire. It didn't work. The initial aerial Operation Desert Shield was soon pounding their carefully crafted defenses into dust and splinters. Abdulla did everything in his ability to keep his troops ready for the upcoming battle. But, they mutinied. They seized him and, taking a heated piece of metal, scorched the tattoo off his arm.

I still wonder how Abdulla, Ali, and the other four men I met and shared tea with are doing today. I hope for them a stable and prosperous Iraq devoid of mad strongmen and the gross corruption it entailed. Maybe someday, we can meet again, and sit for some tea.

The Liars, Cheats, and Thieves the V.A. Believe They Serve

I am a veteran. I spent almost thirty years in service to the United States of America, willing to give my life, my health, and my service to my nation. I retired after having served on active duty, as a reservist, and in the National Guard. And while I was being recruited I was assured that the military takes care of its own. If I were to retire I would never have to worry about health care or destitution. I would be rewarded for my loyal service.

I retired with an honorable discharge, a stack of medals and ribbons, and a series of injuries mostly emanating from that service (from back issues, a torn knee ligament, broken noses, to exposure to burn pits and tuberculosis).

Today, I receive my health care from the Department of Veterans Affairs, or “V.A.”. So did my father. So does my brother. The three of us retired. And now, my mother does, also. She served in the Women's Army Corps, aka “The WACS.”

Now allow me to digress for a moment. What most Americans and many service members don't understand is that the V.A. has two 'divisions.' One is exclusively health care. The other is the bureaucracy that determines service members' disabilities, and their actual eligibility for these earned benefits. The system is archaic and incredibly bureaucratic. It takes many veterans years of applications, examinations, submissions, and appeals just to be recognized as even somewhat disabled. Many veterans could be technically labeled as 200% disabled (the max is 100%). But just getting the minimum for benefits (30%) can be an utter nightmare. I know a man who was severely injured and was medically discharged. He's in a wheelchair, but struggled to get even a 10% disability initially.

The health care side has had its moments of shame, also. We've all heard of secret wait lists where not a few veterans died while waiting for the most basis lifesaving care. It was not pretty. So far, though, they have done a decent job of caring for me. My hip replacement was well done. (I like to joke about being a cyborg now.) And my CPAP machine has helped me (as well as my long-suffering wife who endured years of my loud snoring) to sleep more comfortably and through the night for over five years.

Nevertheless, the greatest and most connective issue with both these sides of the V.A. is the apparent, though vehemently denied by V.A. employees, attitude that all us veterans are grifters, liars, thieves, and scam artists just waiting to con the system to get better disability pay and better benefits. I personally have gotten into heated discussions with V.A. employees who steadfastly claim there is no bias against the very people they are employed to care for.

BUT, if this were the case, why would every major veterans' organization in the nation train, direct, and have on hand thousands of Veterans Service officers whose only duty is to guide veterans through the quagmire and bureaucratic maze of applying for benefits we have all EARNED? This includes the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Disabled American Veterans, and many others. Why are there so many lawyers who do the same thing for a fee? Why do many states have their own veterans affairs offices whose mission is to get their citizen veterans the benefits they deserve?

It took me nearly a decade to get a disability rating despite severe and nearly debilitating back pain, and a deviated septum from two broken noses, my knee injury, tinnitus, and exposure to TB. The last two aren't covered despite them being caused by service duty. I went to doctors, clinics, chiropractors, acupuncturists, and therapeutic massage, much of it paid out-of-pocket, to prove the injuries were real.

Then, I was to have an examination at the V.A and was told that I would be required to have a driver to drop me off and pick me after the appointment. So, I arranged to have my son drop me off. He would then pick me up after I called him. I went to check in and was told they would need the signature of the driver. I told them he had left to perform some errands (he had arranged my issues around them), and I would sign.

No, I was told. My son had to sign.

I was stunned. They would take the signature of someone with no military or V.A. ID, but refused to trust the soldier standing before them? I became irate once it dawned on me that they didn't trust one of the veterans they are SUPPOSED to help and support. BUT, they would trust the word of someone off the street they had no record of. I was even escorted to the clinic in the facility by armed security! Unbelievable! That is when it dawned on me that they actually DO believe we're all lying scum who can't be trusted. The very people who have sworn to give their lives for this country!

Now, I have been using my CPAP for five-and-a-half years. I clean and maintain it. And I have even ordered a part three years ago as per the instructions given to me when it was issued. After half-a-decade parts are wearing. I need new ones. So, I contacted the V.A. with a detailed list for replacement. I got a reply to send detailed shipping information. THEN, I got a message that my primary provider had to send the request, despite my having contacted the provider and being told everything was good!

So, again. I run into the clear and obvious belief that somehow, after nearly thirty years of service, an Honorable Discharge, and a record in the V.A. system showing that I have a CPAP provided by them, I'm STILL not trustworthy.

If only getting V.A. benefits and support were as easy as getting funding for welfare or immigrant day cares.