Hey all,

Joe10 was wondering about this here, and now so am I.

I'm actually about to be deployed for the 1st time, surprisingly. I'm PCSed to Kuwait for MiTT with TDY enroute at Ft Riley. I haven't received my orders yet, but that's because the system here is bass ackwards. Either way, I report very shortly to Riley to begin.

My question is really just what to expect. I'm a 25B that's deploying as a 25W, apparently, and I have no idea what I'm going to be doing or how I'm going to be living. This is the first time I'll be away from my wife for so long, and the 7-hour time difference will be hard to deal with. Either way, if anyone can give me any details on what to expect I'd appreciate it.

Thanks in advance!

I am a 25C and came off a Brigade MiTT team back in April, it was also my first deployment. I can tell you only about my experience as every single mitt team out there is different based on your group of guys, the support you get from your US unit, the quality of your Iraqi unit, and their readiness level. We received a unit that was still going through force generation, my counterpart Iraqi ( the brigade signal officer) had no equipment or Soldiers, it was just him. Over the course of the year we received his equipment, received Soldiers, together we developed training for them, we set up his base comms, coordinated with contractors to get his vehicles installed with comms, developed day to day work routines, and so forth. you basically have to think....what do i need to teach a brand new private to go from new guy to be qualified on all the equipment, then be a team leader, then section chief, then battalion signal NCOIC or OIC and so forth. thats how i thought of it. i was basically teaching the OIC, the NCOIC, and his section how to go from new private to the skills and knowledge they needed for each of their ranks and posistions. on top of that you have to learn about there equipment and deal with the language and cultural barrier. when i wasnt working with him i was taking care of my team comms, BFT, sincgars, HF, satcom, vehicular and base, you are the only guy so you will have your work cut out for you. and then if you are rolling out doing missions with them you will be a driver or TC or gunner but you should never be doing a mission by yourself, you arent a combat element. rolling with them to provide coalition effects (in-direct/CAS) is one thing but if your team chief says we are going door kicking, you got problems, your job is to advise and train. also things depend on your location, we were at camp taji which is half US, half iraqi so things werent bad for us. we lived in a compound on the iraqi side that we barricaded up like most the mitt teams. for chow, laundry, gym, etc we just drove over to the US side, did our business, and drove back. i know plenty of teams that were stuck out at crappy outposts, remote iraqi bases, etc sucking it up worse than any 11B at a JSS i know of. by the end of the year you are ready to kill your counterpart, half your team, and want to drop a 500 pounder on whatever building you live in, but i will say i probably learned more in those 12 months than i have in all 7 years of my service so far, both technically with the equipment, tactically from doing missions, and professionally working with Brigade level staff officers and NCOs. I have a bunch of info on my laptop I can try to dump to a CD and send you if you are interested. I am wrapping up my lunch break so just tried to type out what i could think of, if you have specific questions or anything just let me know.

some more stuff i thought of...riley sucks...there is no way around it. just deal with it as best you can and you will get through it. you feel like each day is the same because you are doing the same thing over and over again but just drive on. also, equipment shortages will be a headache for you over there. small stuff and class 9 was easy to get, but outside of that you have no budget to request/purchase anything so i hope you are good at making shaddy deals. thats how I got a lot of stuff for my team, ( i didn't steal anything) but I would go to places and find out what excess they had on hand and work on getting them to laterally transfer it to me. i came up with 2 complete BFT vehicle systems, 2 PRC-117 satcom radios with complete antenna kits, 3 or 4 extra DAGRs, and a crap load of HF stuff that way. so many units over there have so much stuff they don't use its insane, you just need to go looking around and talk to people because you won't have the budget to get what you want. until you learn your counterpart, dont under estimate him. my guy spoke great english, we never used a translator, he was an electrical engineer by college but had 20 years of work in signal in the old army, he knew HF way better than me but i could beat him on UHF/VHF and when it came to planning, task organizing, and getting the equipment where it needed to be. he knew what needed to be done, knew the steps needed, knew the equipment, but when it came time to plan it out or to execute he would shoot himself in the foot. learn his strengths and focus on his weaknesses, let them come up with solutions, because they will sooner let you do it for them than try themselves, even if they know the answer. they can do this stuff we just need to be there to poke them along every now and then.

quote:

Originally posted by Coinage:
Hey all,

This is the first time I'll be away from my wife for so long, and the 7-hour time difference will be hard to deal with.

Thanks in advance!

Good luck, if you relationship is strong, this is not going to be too hard. I was in Korea for a year, thats like a 12-14 hour difference, so trust me 7 is not that bad, just make sure you call/email as much as you can, communication is the key man.


Good luck.