My Iraq Experience

My Iraq Experience

Steve SmithFormer US Army Captain

Combat Engineer Platoon Leader and OIF Veteran

Background• Enlisted in Ohio National Guard in January

1995• PFC, 75F, “Personnel Information System

Management”

• Joined ROTC after returning from basic training / AIT

• Graduated and became 2LT, Engineers in 1997• Platoon Leader, C 112th EN BN, Columbus, Ohio

Going Inactive

• Joined Inactive National Guard (ING) in early 2001

• A year later, was automatically transitioned into the Inactive Ready Reserve (IRR)• Where I figured I would serve out the remainder of my

military commitment

2004

Getting Called UpApril-June 2004

Orlando Trade Show – April 2004

On the answering machine…

“Lieutenant Smith, this is Bob Jones. When you report for duty, since it’s going to be the weekend, you won’t be able to check in. Just go directly to the barracks to get your lodging.”

25 April 2004

In IraqJuly-December 2004

C 105th EN BN, 30th BCT, 1st ID

FOB Caldwell aka Kir Kush MTB

From my blog in 2004…

“Something that strikes me as funny, though, is that we're doing these pre-mobilization tasks while we're already mobilized and deployed. For example, failing the APFT or failing to qualify with a weapon within the last 12 months would make a soldier non-deployable (back in the 90s, anyway, before we decided that we needed to ship everybody with a pulse to Iraq). So, what, if someone fails the APFT here does that mean they get sent home? What if they can't qualify with their weapon? If it doesn't have any bearing on deployability or mission readiness, then what's the point?”

http://ardalis.com/9243

From my blog in late Sep 2004“I've been receiving an alarming number of emails recently from IRR-activated soldiers who are just now reaching their units in Iraq, only to find that the unit had no idea they were coming and has no slots open or jobs for them to do in their actual MOS. This was the case for several of my peers when I arrived in country, too.”

http://ardalis.com/9255

IEDs and Car Bombs

• A huge car bomb explosion missed our Baghdad convoy by about 2 minutes

• An IED hit our convoy to Bernstein while in downtown Tuz; two soldiers were injured, mildly

• One of the most frustrating parts of being trained to fight is that we never encountered the enemy directly – we could never return fire

A General visits…

http://ardalis.com/9259

Thank You