A Week in Review........

Friday, September 17th

Hey Everybody!

WOW!!! That pretty much sums up the week so far. A lot has happened over these past 5 days that answers many questions that have been lingering for a while and probably brings new questions to light. With that being said, by the end of this post, you will know what the past 5 days have been like, whether or not I graduate or restart, and where I have been assigned. There's got to be suspense right???

Okay, so Sunday morning (around 10:00) we got on the buses with our 60lb rucks and headed for our FTX sight. We got there and set up our hasty's, distributed blanks, and just organized everything for the next few days. A common theme around FTX is to pull security. So wherever we went, we had to have 6 guys. So for example, if 1 guy needs to piss, 5 others have to go with him as security. It also meant that at night we had to secure our Patrol Base (PB). So our platoon pulled 50% security throughout the night for every hour. So 1 person up and 1 person sleeping and it switched every hour. Of course there's a tactical reason for this because this is when the DS love to attack our PB and see if we are actually doing what we're supposed to. So Sunday night we get attacked around 23:30 and we hold them off. Basically imagine sleeping and then waking up to explosions and gun fire, and you have to stay where you are because you have to watch your section, while a quarter of your platoon fights on the other side of the PB. Needles to say, we held off the attack. 2nd Platoon 1 DS - 0......

Monday came and we sat around until after lunch until we finally worked on Mounted react to contact. Basically you ride around in a Humvee and stop for casualty lying in the road. The we get fired at. One team pulls security/suppressive fire while the other team flanks to take out the enemy. Overall...didn't take too much away from this one, because I just layed suppressive fire. Monday night we got attacked again and lost. The DS destroyed 90% of my platoon when they went up to "revive" our casualties. Basically, one of the DS "killed" the SAW gunner, stole the weapon and then lit up about 35 people in my platoon. Don't worry, I made it out Okay, HAHA!

Tuesday was a lot of walking. We did Land Nav.to different locations for different scenarios. We set up a Recon mission on which I was one of the team leaders. Later we did a react to contact which I thought went pretty well, maybe a little slow, but apparently it wasn't up to par. Either way, it was a long day...followed by a long night of Land Nav to find our MRE's for Wednesday. Georgia woods suck at night by they way.....but we found them after about an hour. Tuesday night, the DS took it easy on us since we got back late and everyone was running on about 3 hours of sleep...

Wednesday was our squad assessment. We walked/Land Nav. all day to different objectives and had to complete each task. We only got to 6 of 8 events, but my platoon overall was deemed the best combination of squad, which basically means overall, we knew more about being/performing as the infantry. So, nasty blister and all after all the marching/rucking this week, but FTX was finally over. All that was left was clean up and the Bayonet on Thursday.

So Thursday we cleaned up, got back and slept till dinner chow. We came back from chow and went back to sleep until 22:30. We got everything together (rucks) and brought them out to do the Bayonet. At 00:15 we kicked off, We finished at 04:48. We dropped our rucks and weapons (~60lbs) and were led up Honor Hill. I won't go into Honor Hill details, but I did receive my Infantry Cross rifles! Now all I need is my Blue Chord and then I am officially an infantryman. At Honor Hill, everyone was excited and pumped up. The ceremony itself was pretty simple, just like the infantry.

So after a long past 4/5 days we got some more sleep and received our orders This is also when I found out that I WILL BE GRADUATING OCTOBER 1ST
No Restart!!!! Oh, and I will be stationed at...........................................................................................................................................................................ALASKA!!! More specifically....Fort Wainwright, AK

I think Alaska will be what I want it to be. Ft. Wainwright is in Fairbanks (or by it) Supposedly I'll get to see the Northern Lights and Mt. McKinney(spelling?) There's skiing/hunting/fishing/etc. out there so I may be picking up some new hobbies, HAHA

Either way, I'm excited

Time for Bed, but wanted to get this out. Take Care.

SPC Martin