getting comfy

Well I have finally gotten settled into four corners. The camp here is quite small. It’s about 200 meters (think yards) by 300 meters with the helo pad taking up about a 1/3 of the space. When everyone finally shows up we should have about 150 soldiers here. Considering where we are this is actually pretty nice. The camp itself is an old Russian camp left over from the Russian occupation of Afghanistan.
When I say settled I should say I haven’t completely settled in since I found out they may want me to go back to Ghazni and serve as a liaison for a battalion there. I guess now would be appropriate to discuss structure so everyone will have an understanding of how things work. Almost all military forces follow the same sort of structure.

Team = 3-5 soldiers

Squad = 6-10 soldiers

Platoon = 3-4 squads with anywhere from 30-40 soldiers with a Lieutenant in charge

Company = 3-6 platoons with anywhere from 60-200 soldiers depending on the company and companies have a Captain in charge of them usually reffered to as a company commander or the CO. This is the level I am working at and is probably the most enjoyable of all levels IMO as an officer. My job here is to assist the company commander with an US Forces that he may need or assets or contracts.

Battalion = 3-5 companies and has about 300-500 soldiers in it

Brigade = 3-4 Battalions and has roughly 1000-1500 soldiers in it

I tell you all to tell you this. I am no working at the company level with the polish but I may have to go back to Ghazni and work at the Battalion level. Because it is a larger organization I would be a little more focused on doing just operational stuff and not messing with the logistics so much.

So what do I think about this place. For now I don’t think I would mind spending the rest of my tour here. We are in a fairly remote location and rely heavily on helicopters for supplies. Which makes me worry a little about the winter. The Winters here are quite severe with lots of snow that is measured in feet rather than inches. The cold will make things pretty difficult and I wonder how we will adapt. The Polish are in the process of changing their soldiers out so this is an entirely new group. Some of the challenges I see will be keeping water running. We have a small well that is our water source for showers and washing clothes. We have our drinking water brought in by helicopter and it is all bottled water. I washed my clothes the other day for the first time in the late afternoon which was a mistake. I used one of the 2 working washers if you can call them that. You have to check the washer about every 20 minutes because when it is time for the spin cycle you have to undo the plug so the water can drain. They have no pump to pump the water out. So after your laundry is done you have to go hang it up wherever you can. Problem is if you remember I said I did my laundry in the afternoon, by the time it was done it was almost dark. So I had to string parachute cord all throughout my room and hang up 2 weeks worth of clothes (remember I’ve been in transit for awhile). I had to be careful walking in my room as I literally clothes lined myself about 3 or 4 times. Another thing that I realized about our water situation. Our water smells, not bad but like bleach, we add HTH which is basically bleach to the water tanks we fill with the well. SO everything has a slight bleach smell to include my room now since it was the location for my drying attempts. I should have know better since I had already realized this issue the first time I took a shower and came out smelling like I had been swimming in a pool.

We have a camp pet. His name is Outlaw. He looks like a small german shepard. He probably weighs in at about 60lbs so not to small. I’m not one to really make friends with camp pets since they are a source of disease and what not but the first time I walked out of the command center at night and he didn’t recognize me and started barking at me I decided we should become friends. Last thing I need is our guard dog attacking me.

I ran around the camp the other day for PT. I think I may have forgotten to mention our altitude here is over 6k feet so what I considered running might have only been a very fast walk or a poor attempt at running. The altitude does have an affect.
Well that’s enough deep thought for now.

Brent