COP Apache

It's Monday, June 09 and I arrived back at Camp Taji this morning at 0130 following an interesting and somewhat frustrating trip to COP (Combat Outpost) Apache. What I have been doing to this point is to trade off with the prevention team here on the base. I take two of my soldiers out to meet the units and soldiers on and around the base while the other team comes to the clinic to work. Due the "troop surge" part of the new strategy is to push out from the larger bases into more neighborhood based small out posts called COPs and JSS's (joint security stations). The Cops and JSSs are very small, some having only one platoon or so at them. Last Thursday, I took my two teammates, SGT DeLuna and SPC Antonich to COP Apache, home of Crazy Horse and Apache Troop of the 3/7 CAV. Tankers and Cavalry scouts by trade, these guys took over the neighborhood from the 1^st ID (my combat patch) about 15 months ago and have done incredible work since. Falling in on an area where the previous unit lost almost 30 of their men at a time when the war still seems almost lost, the Cav troopers as they are called worked very well with the local population and to this date, have not lost a soldier of their own. We boarded a U-H 60 Blackhawk for the short trip over to Apache at around 1300 on Thursday and were treated to a first hand look at the Baghdad outskirts from 100 feet or so from the ground. There were lots and lots of palm trees and way more vegetation than people think of when they think of Iraq. In addition to the green plants, the sand colored buildings were a little different to what I'm used to. Baghdad is pretty big and it was interesting to me to see bridges over the Tigris, businesses, homes with swimming pools (most did not have water), and large buildings. Once we landed at the COP, we exited the helicopter, which promptly took off and we soon found ourselves in what appeared to be the middle of the city with a much different look and feel than the big army FOBs I'm used to. The CAV troopers had a couple of HUMVEEs there to pick us up and drove us to the main area of the COP and we later found out that the heli-pad was not even on the COP. So there my two teammates and I were in the middle of a Baghdad suburb not on an army base, which was way cool. Once we arrived at the COP, we soon found out that it was much smaller than we expected and had virtually none of the "comforts" of the army bases that I have stayed at in the past. Instead of KBR contracted food service, these guys had actual Army cooks that were able to serve two meals per day, with lunch on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday s. The Cav troops were doing pretty well all things considered but it might have had something to do with them being almost done with their deployment and are heading back to Ft Stewart Georgia very soon. We had planned to stay approximately 24 hours and return to Taji the next day again by Blackhawk. We saw several soldiers and met with the Chaplain and medical people and found us a place to stay for the night. They ended up putting the three of us in some type of overflow room that had several very run-down bunk beds. With SPC Antonich being female, we had to take special measures to make sure that she was never alone during our trip. In spite of then extra work for SGT DeLuna and me escorting her to the bathroom, she proved to be a valuable asset for us. Imagine 200 male soldiers spending 15 months on a very small COP and then we show up with a 22-yea-old girl wanting to talk about stress. We had no shortage of people wanting to talk. Well, Friday rolls around, we pack up our assault packs and we go down to the heli-pad to wait for our bird, which we soon found out was grounded due to a weather hold. Central Iraq has had a lot of killer dust storms this spring and when they get bad, the helicopters do not fly. So there we were, stuck out on the COP with only enough clothes for two days now looking at spending a third. Our third day came and went and we were still at COP Apache being told that no flights were coming. On the fourth day, it looked like our only option was going to catch a ride on the CLP (pronounced "clip" but stands for Combat Logistical Patrol a long military name for convoy) leaving sometime after dark. Usually, ground convoys require a special risk assessment submitted to my unit leadership long in advance but I just made the call as I needed to get my team back and this our only viable option. We loaded up our stuff and walked off the COP down a long road to what we were told was motor pool 6, where the Bradleys were parked. I remember it being humid and still hot at 2130 and my body armor felt especially heavy, laden with my 210 rounds for my M-16, my advanced first aid kit complete with my tourniquet, special blood clotting agent, Israeli bandage, and my nerve agent antidote and valium auto-injectors. I also carry water, a flashlight, a couple of knives, a strap cutter, gloves, eye protection, and my very dirty fire-resistant ACUs as I spent four days in my uniform that was supposed to last two days. Once at the motor pool we found out that my team would be riding in an MRAP, the Army's new answer to all the IED deaths over the last 5 years. It's a very large vehicle that carries four passengers and is crewed by a driver, TC, and gunner. Inside was illuminated with red for night vision purposes and there were a lot of electronic counter-measure devices. We rolled out of the COP and drove the streets of the city for about 2 hours with a stop at a place called FOB War Eagle and one other right on the road that we later found out was because the lead vehicle spotted an IED and we had to wait for EOD (explosive ordinance disposal) to blow it up. We rode the rest of the way to Taji and were dropped off at our little home away from home this morning at 0130. All in all, it was a very interesting experience for us. We ended up seeing quite a few of the soldiers on the COP struggling with mental health and combat and operational stress problems, we rode on our first convoy in the combat zone for this tour and I think we worked well as a team. I came back to find that I have all the pieces of my bike except my actual bike meaning I have the trainer, wheels, tools, pump, clothing, etc and I am excited to get the rest. Thanks Liz! I found out this morning that I may have to take my team to Ramadi to open up CSC services there. More to come on this in the future.