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Deleted member 43454
I'll share a story here because well... I'd like to tell someone.
Perhaps somebody visiting the forum might read it and feel they can relate.
Potential trigger warning.
________________________________________________________________________________________
While on probation I dropped out and got my GED. But Bush passed a law in Texas where if you had a drug charge (less than a bowl of pot) you were in-eligible for Financial aid to go to school (probably would of dropped out of that eventually had no interest in school.) Loved the normal shit growing up, guns, cowboy boots, Terminator, Doom, Duke Nukem, used to shoot pigeons all summer with a pellet rifle. A mischievous little shit really. Authority problem. Big time.
Marines wouldn't take me until my case was dismissed and it was in a large pile at the court house. I was just about out of a place to live when I tried the Army. The recruiter took me to the court house spoke with the judge and bamn on the spot my case was dismissed. Didn't even have to wait 11 days to get it in the mail. My mom seemed to understand Infantry was bad, ...but Combat Engineer didn't seem as harmful so I went with that. Go figure. I was shown a video that showed Door charges and breaching asked if I liked the 4th of July. To which I of course replied, "f*ck yea."
A little ways into basic I was finally told by the Drills in the war room, that we'd be looking for bombs conducting route clearance most likely. I just about shit my pants at the thought. Such a naive kid. A number of guys in each company got kicked out on purpose prior to deployment because they didn't want to do that shit and felt conned. It is what it is. It looked a lot more appealing being Special Forces. Eating lobster tail and crab legs every Friday rolling around with mini-guns on RG's looked awesome at Camp Price. Not to mention the Dutch women on standby all around.
The goal when I got back was to get my GT score up 10 points so I could try out for selection. But I broke down overseas. Oddly enough it wasn't in any ambush, or firefight. It was a night I wish I could convey. The constant radio chatter, shitty NOD's, UAV's reporting a lot of enemy movement with heavy mg's. Yet we could see nothing. And no air support was bombing these f*ckers out. Luckily our time on station was up we had to be elsewhere, and upon leaving the way we came back in one of the trucks took a hit. THOOOOM. I felt it was back-layed some sneaky f*cker attached the battery pack after we moved past. Or maybe the pressure plate finally gave way. Either way I lost it. My squad leader who was TC started to scream at the top of his lungs, "God, can't kill me mother f*cker!" something to that effect. Asking for god to kill us and I just stood in the gunner hatch terrified and quiet.
That night the fear had finally caught up with me. Previously two days after I linked up with my platoon after R&R. I had been blown up with a pressure plate I.E.D only about 80-95Ib’s of H.M.E (Homemade explosive.) It was on the side of a canal. Poppy seeds ran across the dirt road horizontally ahead. The front vehicle a one man HUSKY (Mine Detecting vehicle with ground penetrating radar) exploded and broke apart as designed. He responded over comms, he was good but had only cleared the right side of the route due to an offset vehicle formation.
My vehicle pushed up to clear the left with the mine rollers. I notified the TC from the gunner hatch that the poppy seed was the indicator that this road had been mined. He made the call to push forward and clear it. I said quietly, “Here we go…” and griped the machine gun clenched my butt cheeks and braced for impact. THOOOM! Dust, debri, pieces of all kinds of shit from the rollers I was in a f*ckin tornado. I pulled up my shemag over my nose and was able to breathe through that. It cleared. Somebody laughed. It was the most abrupt and violent thing I had ever experienced. You can feel the shock-wave move your organs it seems. Nobody to shoot at. Nobody at all. Just these quick, sudden, life takers. Recovery vehicles got everything set up and we pushed on to clear the rest of the route. I was terrified. I wanted to go to base for the rest of the day and get the f*ck away from that road. But we cleared it.
This went on for the rest of the deployment. Bomb after bomb. Dare I say 80+ detonations. Various sizes. Some from a far. Some from up close. Five in a row. Find a few. Mostly find you.
TO BE CONTINUED…
Perhaps somebody visiting the forum might read it and feel they can relate.
Potential trigger warning.
________________________________________________________________________________________
While on probation I dropped out and got my GED. But Bush passed a law in Texas where if you had a drug charge (less than a bowl of pot) you were in-eligible for Financial aid to go to school (probably would of dropped out of that eventually had no interest in school.) Loved the normal shit growing up, guns, cowboy boots, Terminator, Doom, Duke Nukem, used to shoot pigeons all summer with a pellet rifle. A mischievous little shit really. Authority problem. Big time.
Marines wouldn't take me until my case was dismissed and it was in a large pile at the court house. I was just about out of a place to live when I tried the Army. The recruiter took me to the court house spoke with the judge and bamn on the spot my case was dismissed. Didn't even have to wait 11 days to get it in the mail. My mom seemed to understand Infantry was bad, ...but Combat Engineer didn't seem as harmful so I went with that. Go figure. I was shown a video that showed Door charges and breaching asked if I liked the 4th of July. To which I of course replied, "f*ck yea."
A little ways into basic I was finally told by the Drills in the war room, that we'd be looking for bombs conducting route clearance most likely. I just about shit my pants at the thought. Such a naive kid. A number of guys in each company got kicked out on purpose prior to deployment because they didn't want to do that shit and felt conned. It is what it is. It looked a lot more appealing being Special Forces. Eating lobster tail and crab legs every Friday rolling around with mini-guns on RG's looked awesome at Camp Price. Not to mention the Dutch women on standby all around.
The goal when I got back was to get my GT score up 10 points so I could try out for selection. But I broke down overseas. Oddly enough it wasn't in any ambush, or firefight. It was a night I wish I could convey. The constant radio chatter, shitty NOD's, UAV's reporting a lot of enemy movement with heavy mg's. Yet we could see nothing. And no air support was bombing these f*ckers out. Luckily our time on station was up we had to be elsewhere, and upon leaving the way we came back in one of the trucks took a hit. THOOOOM. I felt it was back-layed some sneaky f*cker attached the battery pack after we moved past. Or maybe the pressure plate finally gave way. Either way I lost it. My squad leader who was TC started to scream at the top of his lungs, "God, can't kill me mother f*cker!" something to that effect. Asking for god to kill us and I just stood in the gunner hatch terrified and quiet.
That night the fear had finally caught up with me. Previously two days after I linked up with my platoon after R&R. I had been blown up with a pressure plate I.E.D only about 80-95Ib’s of H.M.E (Homemade explosive.) It was on the side of a canal. Poppy seeds ran across the dirt road horizontally ahead. The front vehicle a one man HUSKY (Mine Detecting vehicle with ground penetrating radar) exploded and broke apart as designed. He responded over comms, he was good but had only cleared the right side of the route due to an offset vehicle formation.
My vehicle pushed up to clear the left with the mine rollers. I notified the TC from the gunner hatch that the poppy seed was the indicator that this road had been mined. He made the call to push forward and clear it. I said quietly, “Here we go…” and griped the machine gun clenched my butt cheeks and braced for impact. THOOOM! Dust, debri, pieces of all kinds of shit from the rollers I was in a f*ckin tornado. I pulled up my shemag over my nose and was able to breathe through that. It cleared. Somebody laughed. It was the most abrupt and violent thing I had ever experienced. You can feel the shock-wave move your organs it seems. Nobody to shoot at. Nobody at all. Just these quick, sudden, life takers. Recovery vehicles got everything set up and we pushed on to clear the rest of the route. I was terrified. I wanted to go to base for the rest of the day and get the f*ck away from that road. But we cleared it.
This went on for the rest of the deployment. Bomb after bomb. Dare I say 80+ detonations. Various sizes. Some from a far. Some from up close. Five in a row. Find a few. Mostly find you.
TO BE CONTINUED…
