Hello From Ft. Riley

Greetings from Ft. Riley Kansas. It has now been 6 weeks since I have arrived here to begin Post Mobilization Training. We conducted our home station mob at the site where I have been assigned to as a reservist, Parks RFTA in Dublin CA. We flew out late on the 28th and left a temperate California to a snowy and cold Ft. Riley.

As a Task Force Battalion Commander I have the responsibility to ensure that the soldiers under my command receive the necessary combat skills,survival training and refresher training in their military occupation. Most of the Soldiers are from the logistics field. We are part of Task Force Desert Wolf, which is the name that our task force has been given. Most of us are from the 104th Division (IT) which is headquartered in Vancouver Washington. The Division is known as the "Timberwolves" and our patch has a wolf on it. The Soldiers are from the 12 western United States.

The first three weeks here we conducted Soldier Readiness Processing (SRP) which is where we are issued all our equipment, examined for medical, security clearance and other categories to see if we are deployable. Additionally we have to sit through a ton of briefings and unfortunately some are death by powerpoint! I knew that I was getting old as my hearing hasn't been that great and the last Army Physical Exam I had my hearing downgraded from a 1 (Best) to a 2 (Some Loss). To my surprise my hearing has deteriorated and according to them I am now a 3 and have to go before a Medical Review Board, plus I will be receiving some hearing aids. I have been recommended as a retain on active duty and am eligible for deployment.

In these past three weeks we have been conducting combat and survival training. We have received drivers training and have been licensed for the HMMWV both the standard and up armored HMMWV's which are the ones that we will be using in the box. Part of that training was the HMMWV Egress Assistance Trainer (HEAT). This simulates the dreaded rollover of the HMMWV and we after landing upside down have to get out of the vehicle and provide medical assistance to any injured soldiers. The soldiers really enjoyed this training and according to what we have been told, we will be receiving more of this training when we arrive in the box.

Last week we have most of our ranges beginning with Primary Marksmanship Instruction (PMI) on the M4 rifle and the M9. I qualified as sharpshooter for both the M4 and the M9, which made me very happy. Additionally we provided security escort in HMMWV's to the buses that transport us to various places. We train 6 days a week and usually turn in our weapons late on Saturday and get to enjoy Sundays off and then either pickup our weapons late on Sunday or first thing on Monday.

Language and culture training has been a mixed bag, the culture training has been well received, but the language training has been in the lab on computers and then we get a chance to meet with Iraqi's and use interpreters in various scenarios that may take place in the box. Tomorrow we will be firing the M2 50 Cal Machine Gun after having received hands on training today, that should be interesting.

The weather has finally broken and today we were in the 70's and should remain that way for the next 10 days, this is a great change to the cold weather that we had in early February where temps got as low as 1 with windchills down to -15.

That's all for tonight, I have to prepare my gear for the range tomorrow and submit some of the usual daily reports. COL TS out!!