I'm off to Iraq

[EmptyneSs]

dont get beheaded bro

[Ahoym8e]

I'm guessing internet policy is preventing you from posting....

It'd be nice to hear that your'e ok though.

[Tom Yum]

Update

Darrian? Approaching 2 years....can you drop by?

[Bjjexpertise@be]

Maybe he just forgot about us?

[GQchris]

I gotta respect you for going out there. But if it were me, and I had a loving wife at home, there's no way I'd go over there unless the sh!t really hit the fan and I was called back on active duty.

[Tom Yum]

I gotta respect you for going out there. But if it were me, and I had a loving wife at home, there's no way I'd go over there unless the sh!t really hit the fan and I was called back on active duty.

Its amazing how great & loving women can influence our lives.

[GQchris]

Its amazing how great & loving women can influence our lives.

Yeah; gotta love 'em.

[Tom Yum]

Water balloons and seltzer spritzers, I'm sure.

Wrong. Squirting flowers and pies.

[darrianation]

Tom and others,

I am back, I have been back twice actually…or should I say I have been to the sand box twice. I spent a total of 14 months there. I also spent some time in Pakistan and Chechnya. This time I’ll be back for awhile. But I am getting ready to move (to another state), so I am very busy.

I still see some familiar names here and a hell of a lot of new ones. I hope to get more involved here but who knows, I have a lot of things going on.

[gregimotis]

Tom and others,

I am back, I have been back twice actually…or should I say I have been to the sand box twice. I spent a total of 14 months there. I also spent some time in Pakistan and Chechnya. This time I’ll be back for awhile. But I am getting ready to move (to another state), so I am very busy.

I still see some familiar names here and a hell of a lot of new ones. I hope to get more involved here but who knows, I have a lot of things going on.

Welcome home, and thanks for letting us know you're back.

[stabbychick]

.............................

[treelizard]

Thank you for your service!!!

[EmptyneSs]

Tom and others,

I am back, I have been back twice actually…or should I say I have been to the sand box twice. I spent a total of 14 months there. I also spent some time in Pakistan and Chechnya. This time I’ll be back for awhile. But I am getting ready to move (to another state), so I am very busy.

I still see some familiar names here and a hell of a lot of new ones. I hope to get more involved here but who knows, I have a lot of things going on.

dude you cant just tell us you have returned from such places like Iraq and Chechnya and not tell us about some of things you saw and experienced. please do share if thats cool.

were chechnya and iraq pretty nuts? man you must have seen some shit, i have so many questions you dont even know. please do inform us a bit.

and also are americans in chechnya currently? i can see why they would be interested in operating over there ........

[darrianation]

I don’t have the time this morning to address this issue in any detail. I am getting ready to leave town for the weekend (going up to the mountain cabin for R&R). I’ll be back Tuesday but then I am leaving for San Diego on Friday (and back the following Tuesday). So, I may not get around to writing much until after that.

I worked in different areas, mostly providing security for convoys, individual protection (VIP), and site protection. A lot of what I did was driving around corporate types.

Chechnya was another civilian contract that we were preparing curriculum for training governmental multi agency emergency management. The actual training hasn’t taken place yet. I was only there for a couple weeks.

I have some other projects I’ll be working on for these regions and also Africa, probably getting started late in the year and Africa next year (from the talk I am hearing it sound like we will be going to the Sudan). The Africa thing can be as long as two years out.

Anyway Iraq is one hell of a dangerous place. My recommendations…stay as far away from that place as you can. I think we are doing some good there and the Iraqis sure need the help but they are caught between two very different, dominating, and opposing cultures that if they choose one over the other they become targets, if the choose neither they become targets. For many of them it is their Kobayashi Maru.