In my letter of December 31st, I mention that I started to receive mail, two from my family and one from Rodney, a good friend from high school.

“Damn it, we’re going on ambush tonight so I’ll have to finish this tomorrow. These ambushes are really a bloody waste of time. The CO just hates to see us laying around relaxing.” Such a whiner! I go on to explain that they aren’t dangerous since there has been no reports of enemy activity in the area, so no worrying necessary.

“We go out in squads (8-10 guys), perhaps a thousand meters from our FOB (field operations base).  We set up trip flares and mines. Then we go to sleep. Each man stands radio watch for one hour. If one of the flares is tripped, he blows the accompanying mine and that’s usually that. Then we come back to the FOB the next morning and hope there is no mission during the day, but usually there is. I really hate it, but there is nothing I can do about it.” More whining. Is it the soldiers lot to bitch and moan? It would appear so. It would also appear that there is no great rush to engage the enemy.  I then ask my mom to send pictures from home and I express dismay that I haven’t heard from my “girlfriend” Peni. Not sure she was actually ever my girlfriend. It might have been wishful thinking more than anything.

“But you know what irks me the most about this whole situation. It’s the little shit things they find for you to do when you have some free time. Our company moves into an area. It then becomes our FOB. We set barbed wire around the perimeter. Then we blow bunker holes with TNT. Then we dig these holes out and sandbag them for extra protection. Then we put up little shade hootches. This all takes place over a couple of days. Finally we take the machetes and cut a field of fire out 100 meters from our sector of fire. We finally have finished securing and putting up defenses for our FOB. Then we figure we can relax. But word comes down from our squad leader that the next day we are moving to a new FOB. Naturally while we are preparing these positions, we’re also going out on combat assaults, ambushes, search and clear, blocking force, quick reaction force, road clearing, and road security. So you see, we don’t have much free time.” I will point out that during this time we did not engage any hostile force.

This is a long letter, but I think an important one. “The morale in this company is reaching a new low because of the little crap details we get solely to keep us busy. I’m afraid something is going to happen, and we all carry loaded weapons all the time. A lot of guys are getting fed up, myself included, and I’ve only been here a month. Last night they told us we were no longer allowed to bring poncho liners (what we sleep on) on ambushes. Last night I hardly slept at all. I was cold, damp from the dew, and constantly being attacked by mosquitos. I now have a dreadful cold. I’m really considering writing my Congressman. For guys that are out here risking their lives every day, I think this is pretty unfair.”