German-based ‘Ever Vigilant’ MP Brigade heads downrange

MANNHEIM, Germany — Nearly three hundred people from the Mannheim community gathered to bid farewell to the Headquarters, 18th Military Police Brigade, and the Headquarters and Headquarters Company, 18th Military Police Brigade at their deployment and casing the colors ceremony held on September 21.

The headquarters recently received orders to deploy to Iraq for a 15-month deployment. The brigade headquarters will serve its third deployment in five years this time in the Iraq capital.

“Military Police are always in demand. There will always be another deployment on the horizon,” said Brig. Gen. Scott West, Commanding General, 21st Theater Sustainment Command.

“Remember that because you are ‘Ever Vigilant’ our nation is ever free,” said West.

Michael Yon on medevacs to Germany

In his latest dispatch, as only he can, Michael Yon describes a medevac flight to Germany earlier this year.

After some time in the back of the C-17 sitting with patients, I went to the cockpit to talk with the pilot, looking at glowing instruments, occasionally seeing another jet streak by in the night, its ice trail glistening off the moonlight. Peering out the windows at the stars above, I remembered reading once that on a clear night a naked eye can make out roughly 2,000 individual stars. I wondered if it were true.

We glided down through the German night, where a large group of staff waited on the tarmac to load the patients into buses. During the bus ride to the hospital, electronic monitors beeped, IVs dripped, and the patients’ litters were jostled by the road. The ambulatory among us steadied the patients, to protect them from further pain.

Once at the hospital, the back of the bus was opened and we handed down the patients to volunteers and medical staff. Those sick and wounded who were able to communicate were greeted by liaison representatives from their service branches. Over the next couple of days, I saw these liaisons doing exemplary if inglorious duty, completing the paperwork that attends any and all aspects of military existence, making sure patients understood their options and advocating for services or resources.

The system for treating wounded soldiers and civilians is an example of the military at its best: the CSHs around Iraq, the “Mercy Flight” to Landstuhl, and then the Landstuhl staff itself, was among the best. It always amazes me that a soldier who is wounded in some strange Iraqi village in the morning, through a system of fast ground transport and aircraft, is in a top medical facility possibly before midnight on the same day. The first-class treatment and service for the patients, at every step of the way, has long been a source of both pride and controversy. (...)

Over the next couple of days in Landstuhl, dozens of wounded soldiers told their stories, and although soldiers can complain about most anything, no one had a single serious complaint about the treatment they’d received from the medical teams.

Much has been written about the excellent medical staff at Landstuhl, but very little about the "exemplary if inglorious" work of the liaisons (LNOs). The LNOs are among SA Germany's closest contacts and biggest "customers" at the hospital, and I have witnessed their dedication and long hours firsthand for years.

As Michael mentions, the LNOs meet their patients at the bus when they arrive from Ramstein AB, make sure they have comfort items like clothing and phone cards, handle paperwork between the units downrange, the hospital, and the Rear D and receiving medical facility back home.

They drive patients from the hospital to the Medical Hold if they are ambulatory, track baggage, do travel orders - a million things.

They often work 7 days a week (because flights come in every day) for the entire duration of their unit's deployment. The medevac planes, such as this "Mercy Flight", may arrive at any time of day or night.

It's a very tough job, for a lot of reasons along with the obvious ones, and I'm grateful to Michael for highlighting their service. These guys are my heroes.

Standing up for security

New Iraqi security volunteers from the eastern Baghdad neighborhood of Sha’ab wait to go through the screening process for new recruits on Sept. 27. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Mike Pryor, 2nd BCT, 82nd Airborne Division Public Affairs.

Medal of Honor to be awarded to US Navy SEAL Lieutenant Michael Murphy

From the Navy Times today:

“Mikey was ignoring his wound and fighting like a SEAL officer should, uncompromising, steady, hard-eyed, and professional,” Luttrell wrote in his recently published book, Lone Survivor, about his military experiences, his team and the events of that day and the deaths of his teammates, his friends.

The fighting grew more intense, but the team pressed on in the close-quarters battle. At one point, Luttrell wrote, Murphy took his mobile phone, “walked to open ground. He walked until he was more or less in the center, gunfire all around him, and he sat on a small rock and began punching in the numbers to HQ.”

“I could hear him talking,” Luttrell wrote. “ ‘My men are taking heavy fire ... we’re getting picked apart. My guys are dying out here ... we need help.’

“And right then Mikey took a bullet straight in the back. I saw the blood spurt from his chest. He slumped forward, dropping his phone and his rifle. But then he braced himself, grabbed them both, sat upright again, and once more put the phone to his ear.

“ ‘Roger that, sir. Thank you,’ ” Luttrell heard Murphy say, before the lieutenant continued to train fire on the enemy fighters.

“Only I knew what Mikey had done. He’d understood we had only one realistic chance, and that was to call in help,” Luttrell wrote. “Knowing the risk, understanding the danger, in the full knowledge the phone call could cost him his life, Lieutenant Michael Patrick Murphy, son of Maureen, fiancé of the beautiful Heather, walked out into the firestorm.

If you haven't read Lone Survivor yet, you are missing an unparalleled story of courage and valor.

h/t and much more at Blackfive.

Security detachment rides with Latin flavor

I love this story.

BAGHDAD - The sense of brotherhood Soldiers have with each other, whether they served together, with separate units, or even in separate wars, comes from shared experiences that only fellow Soldiers would understand.

For the Hispanic troops on the 1st Battalion, 18th Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade, 1st Infantry Division’s personal security detachment, there is a special bond due to their cultural background.

“I bonded with these guys right away,” said Spc. Oscar Tovar, a medic with the 1-18 Inf. Personnel Security Detachment from Palm Springs, Calif., of his Latin American battle buddies.

“I try to get along with everybody,” said Spc. Gustabo Pena, a gunner with the 1-18 Inf. PSD from Miami, “but we grew up with the same things.”

While there are similarities between the Hispanic Soldiers on the ‘Vanguard’ PSD, they say their heritage had less to do with their decision to serve as much as a calling to do the right thing.


“Our culture has a lot to do with the Bible and about doing good things. Part of that is serving our country,” said Spc. Daniel Montanez (right), a driver on the 1-18 Inf. PSD from New York.


For Tovar (left), it had less to do with being a Latin American as much as simply being American.

“I’m American so it just seemed right. The last Tovar to fight in a war was my great-grandfather’s brother at the turn of the 19th century in the Mexican Revolution,” said Tovar, whose father was denied enlistment during Vietnam for medical reasons. “I just thought it’s my turn.”

For Pena (right), who moved to the United States from Colombia at the age of 18, it was about giving something back to his adopted country.

“The country took us in as refugees. They give us jobs, and you can actually get a life for yourself,” said Pena, who is currently going through the process of obtaining his U.S. citizenship. “You should give back to the country, so I stepped up.”

Being Hispanic has had little bearing on how they have been treated in the Army, said Montanez. Instead, they get treated like every other Soldier and are rated on one thing – performance.

“I don’t think (race) really matters as long as you just do your job,” he said.

Pena and his battle buddies have been doing their jobs and giving back to their nation, whether it’s their adopted or native land, for the past 14 months, and they don’t seem to be ready to quit anytime soon. Tovar, Montanez and Pena have all re-enlisted to continue their service to the United States in a time of war.

The ‘Vanguards’ of 1-18 Inf. are deployed out of Schweinfurt, Germany, and currently attached to the 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 1st Infantry Division of Fort Riley, Kan.

Story and photos by By Pfc. Nathaniel Smith, 4th IBCT, 1st Inf. Div., Public Affairs.

Busy weekend at SAG

We're all packed up and ready for the upcoming move!





Fortunately we had lots of help. Volunteers Jessica, Eric, and Dan were on hand, but the biggest contributor was Dorothy, shown here. Dorothy's a long-time donor to SAG and spent four days of her European vacation with us.



Everything must go! Dorothy also filled about 50 backpacks - using many of the items provided through Leslie's supply drive - for distribution at Landstuhl hospital. SGT Brown, Casualty Liaison for the 1st Cav, poses in the background.



1SG Lowe, Dorothy, and CPT (CDR) Gawlick of the Kleber Medical Transient Detachment (Medical Hold) facility, which is transitioning into one of the Army's new WTUs, or Warrior Transition Units. Soldiers' Angels Germany has been supporting the Landstuhl Med Hold unit since 2004 and has been located directly within the facility since 2005.



Landstuhl ICU nurse accepts a quilt made by one of Dorothy's fellow members of the North Ft Myers Elks. The Elks Veterans Committee is very active in local community services including support of the Bay Pines VA medical center as well as providing hot meals, clothing, and personal items to homeless veterans. In addition, Dorothy volunteers two days a week driving local veterans to appointments at the "nearest" VA hospital which is several hours away.

It was great having you here, Dorothy! When are you coming back? ;-)

'Game on'

“It was pretty much ‘game on’ after that. Everybody ran to the rooftop, started opening up on them. I dropped almost two mags at the building that was shooting at us,” Horvath said. “It’s like an ultimate feeling of safety to fire back. Every round they shoot at us, we shoot a hundred back.”

BAGHDAD - Despite the dangers that linger behind street corners and on rooftops, the Vilseck, Germany-based 3rd Squadron, 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment, currently with Multi-National Division – Baghdad, wanted to send a clear message to the insurgency Sept. 20.

The Stryker Soldiers, who have been in the country for less than two months, are tackling their clearing mission one weapons cache, suspected insurgent and roadside bomb at a time in a fight that Staff Sgt. Jared Utter briefly described as possibly being "one of the biggest fights in Iraq right now.' ...

This particular day started off like all the others with the sun peeking above the horizon creating an orange backdrop behind the company’s formation of eight-wheeled Stryker vehicles. ...

It was a little after 1 p.m. and the company has been clearing homes all morning. Behind a shield of white smoke, 3rd Squad maneuvered across 60th Street, a road with a direct view of an open field, when something exploded and rounds started to fly.

“I saw tracers hit the ground. They opened up on us with PKCs (machine guns). We don’t know if it was a mortar or (rocket-propelled grenade that exploded), but it couldn't have hit more than 20 feet away from us,” said Spc. Eric Horvath of Mentor, Ohio, who later found pieces of shrapnel melted onto his gear. “It all happened so fast. It was like I teleported to cover.”

While they continued to receive heavy machine gun fire from the second story of a building across the open field, Spc. J. Jacobs of Bloomington, Ind., fell face down onto the cement.

Jacobs said he felt the blast, grabbed his neck, saw the blood and instinctively applied pressure to the wound, a piece of shrapnel in his neck.

“I felt loopy, was hot and dizzy, and fell,” the 32-year-old said. “At some point, I must have lost consciousness.”

“I heard the machine gun fire and turned around and got blasted in the face with something. I went to the corner and didn’t know he was down,” said Spc. Jason “Doc” Kucharski, the squad’s medic.

“I thought he was shot,” Utter said. “I thought he took one.”

Sgt. Michael Huffman said he saw his Soldier moving on the ground and then he stopped.

Three more smoke grenades were tossed out from different directions as rounds continued to fly over Jacobs. Pfc. Victor Flores who was the second Soldier in the file moving down the street rushed behind the cover of a building's corner and quickly laid down suppressive fire with his squad automatic weapon.

“The first thing that came to mind was to take cover and shoot back,” said Flores of San Jose, Calif. “I saw someone in a white shirt, blue collar, black jeans about 16 to 18 years old run into the building right before the contact.”

“We turn around and all we could see is Jacobs lying face first on the corner,” said Horvath. “We weren't sure if he was dead or if he was shot. I thought he was shot and so did Hawkins (Spc. Michael Hawkins, an infantryman from Palm Springs, Calif.)”

“We have a man down,” Owens echoed over the radio.

Huffman, a team leader, said he shot an M-203 grenade, as the rest of the company started to lay out suppressive fire.

“It took me about half a second to realize what was happening. You see bullets flying at you and that’s all it takes,” said Spc. Richard Main of Reno, Nev., “I was in the (vehicle commander’s) hole in the truck manning my 50-caliber machine gun.”

Main said knowing his buddy was down definitely made him fight that much harder. The infantryman fired more than 450 rounds at the enemy from the truck.

“Our main goal was to get him the (heck out of there),” Huffman said.

Still under enemy fire, Huffman and Kucharski grabbed the downed Soldier and pulled him into the closest courtyard.

“When we moved him, I saw a blood spot right where his face was,” said Kucharski. “He was struggling to breathe, but he was trying to.”

“When I came to, I was disoriented. I saw the blood. I couldn’t see or hear very well,” Jacobs said. “My chest felt like it was hit by a sledge hammer. I had a hard time breathing and I started to panic because I didn’t know what was going on.”

With a combat life saver, a combat medic, a physician’s assistant and his fellow Soldiers surrounding him, they assessed his wounds. He was quickly loaded onto a truck and medically evacuated out of the area.


“It was pretty much ‘game on’ after that. Everybody ran to the rooftop, started opening up on them (the insurgents). I dropped almost two mags at the building that was shooting at us,” Horvath said. “It’s like an ultimate feeling of safety to fire back. Every round they shoot at us, we shoot a hundred back.”

The company fired back with an AT4 (anti-tank rocket), two javelins and one wire-guided missile. They also support from attack aviation assets, both rotary and fixed-wing. Two hellfire missiles and a 500-pound bomb hit the structure.

“(The building) is nothing but the burnt skeleton of what once was a house,” said Hawkins as he pulled over watch on the rooftop.

Once the firefight came to an end, Utter told his Soldiers that they did a good job maneuvering. They went to their guy under fire and pulled him out.

As they loaded up and headed back to their base, they knew they will be back at it again tomorrow. This is just the beginning their 15-month deployment. ...

Jacobs, who suffered a concussion, a hairline fracture of the left check and sinus cavity, as well as the shrapnel wound in his neck, is recovering and is scheduled to be back out with his comrades in a week.

Story and Photos by Spc. Jeffrey Ledesma, 1st Cavalry Division Public Affairs
Oct 1, 2007

See you at Oktoberfest 2008, guys!

Bringing a bit of Germany to Southwest Asia, "Iron Soldiers" Staff Sgts. Jesus Cales-Rodriguez and McKinley Bradford of the 1st Armored Division's Headquarters and Headquarters Company recently painted their vision of how the division headquarters will celebrate this year's Oktoberfest on a wall at Camp Buehring, Kuwait.

The division troops are at the camp training and preparing for their pending move into Iraq to complete a 15-month deployment in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Here Division Commander Maj. Gen. Mark Hertling (far right) and division Command Sgt. Maj. Roger Blackwood (second from right) pose with artists Bradford (left) and Rodriguez at the wall. U.S. Army Photo by Spc. Alfredo Jimenez Jr., 1st Armored Division Public Affairs

Meanwhile, back in Munich....

173rd Airborne Brigade - August Hooah Video

Courtesy of the 173D ABN BDE PAO.


Click here for more 173rd ABCT Afghanistan posts.

Guess what's in these boxes?

About 345lbs of soldier "loot", including:

300 razors
165 toothbrushes
134 full size tubes of toothpaste & 50 travel size
110 white undershirts
85 phone cards
80 lip balm
59 nail clippers (many double packs)
36 pairs of flip flops
31 full size bottles of shampoo & lots of travel size
25 packs womens panties
28 sports bras
22 deoderant
19 packs mens boxer briefs
13 foot powder
19 color t-shirts
17 body lotion
8 shower gel
8 stuffed animals
7 towels
Get Well cards
misc. sweat, sleep, and wind pants and jackets

All of this started during a conversation about Blankets of Hope with Leslie of Soldiers' Angels. We were corresponding about the quilts she was working on for Landstuhl when she asked what other kinds of comfort items the patients here could use.

She mentioned the possibility of doing a supply drive and thought she'd bring it up at the next spouse coffee. Leslie's husband is based at RAF Mildenhall in the UK, and she works at RAF Lakenheath.

"After thinking it over I decided to go Bigger", Leslie says, adding "Everyone who knows me said, "You go bigger? No surprise there!""

Together with her friend Karen "who helped whenever and wherever I needed it", Leslie started working on publicity like flyers and announcements at spouse meetings and at their chapel, waded through red tape at the post office, booked tables at both bases, and prepared "shopping lists".

As the weekend of the drive drew near several people who planned to be out of town during the event began bringing stuff to Leslie at work. Seeing the bags coming in motivated her co-workers to donate items and voluteer to man the tables.

After the second day Leslie sent me this update:

"Another productive day. We had some of our young Captains helping out who just wouldn't take "no" for an answer. I think every person who walked into the Exchange today got a shopping list! It was amusing to say the least. My favorite quote, "Now come on, man, you know if you got hurt you'd want some clean underwear to put on. Help us out here." I had to turn away to keep from laughing!"

She adds it was a long and exhausting weekend but very exciting to have gotten such a great response.

"We were really overwhelmed at the generosity of people. As I unpacked the bags I noticed that some people spent $50 - $60 just on stuff for the drive. People really want to help our troops. They just need to know how."

When the boxes arrived here in Germany we were also overwhelmed. Many, many heartfelt thanks to all the fine folks at Mildenhall and Lakenheath, and in particular to Leslie for being the driving force behind this incredible fundraiser.

Oh, and a last word about the blankets... recently Leslie's husband and crew passed through Ramstein, Germany with a medevac flight.

On the flight he saw a nurse take a handmade blanket out of a backpack to cover a patient. He smiled and told his buddies, "Hey, my wife could have made that quilt."