Cooking 5-29-07

Cooking - 5/29/07
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Today I ran a familiarization range for the soldiers and airmen in my
section. Because most of the staff folks don't shoot much, it is
important to keep what little weapon skills they have by doing some
routine training. We had a good smattering of folks out to brave the
heat today for some basic rifle and pistol shooting, from the steely
eyed killers with tricked out M4s and itchy trigger fingers to the
shaking sheep who were so scared at the fact that they were holding a
deadly weapon that they didn't know which way to put the ammunition in
it ("Hey! The bullets come out of THAT end so don't point it at
anyone!"). Through some repetitive drills, a little bit of yelling and
lots of mentoring, we got most of them to actually put holes in their
targets only 7 meters away. Overall it was a good experience, until the
mortars came. Now mortar fire into the IZ is pretty regular. In fact,
you can expect to be taking cover at least twice a day. Most times the
alarms go off and you don't hear the boom, but other time you hear the
boom, followed by the sound of the alarms that are suppose to tell you
the rockets are coming. Kind of backwards if you ask me. In any case,
one minute I'm assisting a class on how to transition from their rifle
to their pistol and the next minute I'm hearing the sirens and hugging
the ground, wishing I could make myself flatter. Now, I'm going to let
you in on a little bit of info I failed to mention before. It's hot
here in the Middle East. It's not "summer hot" yet, but the temps are
still about 113 at the hottest part of the day. When the sun beats down
on things, like car hoods, sides of buildings, T-walls and weapons that
you lay on the ground, they too follow the laws of thermodynamics and
get hot. Picture if you will a bunch of folks, sweating from shooting
all day in the hot sun, suddenly throwing their bodies to the cement and
gravel deck in order to protect themselves from the possibility that an
explosion is about to land near them and ruin their day. You might see
them lay still for a little bit, but the hot concrete that they are
laying on is now radiating the heat it's collected all day right back at
them. Lying there, trying to avoid incoming, I could smell Korean
cooking.
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"Wait a minute, that's ME cooking" I muttered as I tried to achieve
a compromise between a low profile and a careful balancing act on the
toes of my boots and my elbows in order to keep as many body parts off
the ground as I could. The "All clear" siren had not gone off yet and I
was getting warmer and warmer. I was starting to understand the plight
of bacon in a hot skillet.
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"Great." I thought to myself. "I'm going to survive my first month
in theater only to be cooked to death on the ground of some rifle
range!" Eventually we got up and moved to a safer bunker, but not
before all the sweat on my uniform had dried up leaving only swirls of
white salt stains.
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Interesting fact of the day: Slab side full auto M-16 lowers are very
old versions of the Army's main assault rifle. When I say old, I mean
Vietnam era old. Most of us now carry the M16A2, or the M4 carbine.
Today, from the hands of a United States Air Force pilot, I held a M16
slab sided rifle in my hands (with A2 hand guards) and was shocked that
they actually issued this weapon to him to go to war with. I guess
when we start depending on the Air Force to start shooting their rifles
well in a land war, then we're all in trouble. I told the pilot to
stick to fighting his battles in the air. He and his only slightly
perforated target agreed.