“All the news that’s fit to print….”

October 9th 2005, 1540B

It’s been a quiet week for this blog, & I’ve not typed anything up for it since Wednesday. Actually, that’s not quiet true, I’ve typed up a post for this twice since then, but I’ve ended up deleting both of them. One of them ended up as a mail to the one person who really needed to read what was in it though, something I should have said to them long ago, so it wasn’t wasted effort.
I’ve also been in a bit of an off mood lately, which hasn’t helped much, but that seems to have improved during the course of the day. Of course, my mood improving could also have something to do with the fact that it’s a beautiful day, and that the beer is cold & also tastes damn fine – what can I say, I’m a man of simple pleasures :P

But it’s also been a quiet week all round, & not just for the blog, so it’s not as though I’ve had much to put down here. The platoon has been fairly busy, but I’ve not been going out on the escorts with them because I don’t entirely trust the repairs done to my ambo. It’s not that I think the tiffies did a shit job, but rather I’m very wary of filters that were cleaned & then put back into the vehicle rather than being replaced. It speaks volumes for our logistics support that the tiffies don’t have even simple spares like fucking filters on hand, & have to do “make-do” jobs like cleaning the damn things instead of replacing them. Our medical logistics support is just as bad, worse in fact. Nobody is going to die because their vehicle is off the road waiting for spares to be sent up from the States after all. On the other hand, someone may just die because I haven’t got the equipment necessary to adequately open, maintain, & protect their bloody airway, which is the very basic principle of emergency care, the very first thing you do when start treating a casualty. And when you’re talking about a 2 hour drive to get a patient to a hospital from where I am, protecting the airway of an unconscious patient becomes very important. It’s not that my bag is empty, and I’ve got a reasonable amount of what’s supposed to be in it - if not in the quantities I’d like - but there are some rather large & glaring gaps. Such as no laryngoscope & et tubes, or trauma drugs. And the ambulances are hardly up to standard either. I’ve contemplated having Rob send up my personal medical bag from home, but I’ve held off on that because it’s big, heavy & also bloody expensive. And I shouldn’t bloody well have to – I’m supposed to be properly supplied & supported here, by the military, not by what I can organise to be sent up privately from home. You know what, fuck ‘em - the loggies can bloody well do the job they’re bloody well paid to do. Not a damn am I going to do it for them.
I’d love to know where the problem is, because we’ve submitted log requests through the channels a number of times but we’re still waiting for the equipment & supplies to arrive from SA. And I know that it’s not just this contingent that has tried to get the equipment & scales of issue, both for the personnel & vehicles, up to scratch. The logistics support to these missions is not a shadow of what it should be, doesn’t even closely approach minimum standards, and I’d like to know whose fuck-up it is so that I could have a pointed discussion with them. There’s a tendency to fall back on the old favourite of “there’s not enough money for everything”, or “there wasn’t room for that in the budget”, but it’s bullshit. Especially in the case of these external missions, because the UN PAYS us to bloody well do them. The UN gives us the money to conduct these operations - all we do is supply the personnel & equipment, so where is the bloody log support we need to do our jobs properly?
There’s a quote that fits this situation perfectly, attributed to a General Sir Peter de Bellierre, former OC of the British SAS – I think that’s how you spell his surname at least. He said that “An army can only fight the battles its logistical capacity allows it to”. If you don’t have food, if you don’t have fuel, if you don’t have ammunition, then it doesn’t matter how good your tactics are, or how well trained your troops are, or how many of them you have. You are going to lose the battle. Just to further illustrate the point, I’m going to share a little piece of military history with you here. In 1942, long before the wheels fell off for the Germans in WW2, a senior German officer is noted as saying “we have already lost this war”. What precipitated that remark was the capture of an American logistics convoy, in North Africa I think. It seems that included in the convoy was all the personal mail for the unit for which it had been destined before its capture, and one parcel to a GI included a chocolate cake his family had sent him for his birthday. A chocolate cake that was still fresh when the convoy was captured. In other words, it had taken only a few short days to get that cake from America to the operational area, & the logistical capacity implied by that - that you have enough slack that you can send a low priority item like personal mail so quickly to the front, in addition to essential shit like food, ammo & toilet paper - is something the Germans knew they would never be able to match. And the Germans were the varsity team of the day when it came to fighting wars, and had been cleaning the clocks of everyone who couldn’t get out of the way for over three years by that time. But it’s logistics that wins wars, not how good your strategy or tactics are, the standard of your equipment, or how motivated & well trained your soldiers. You’re going to have a hard time beating the other guy without those, but it’s getting enough troops, with the right equipment to the right place at the right time that will win a war for you. Logistics.
But I’m going to change the subject here, because I can feel my blood pressure climbing. Logistics support in the military, or more accurately the lack thereof, has been one of my pet hates for many years, & you’d think by now I’d have accepted the way things are. Thing is, I don’t think anyone reading this has much patience for crappy service at a restaurant or supermarket, so why should I be any more tolerant of it where my job is concerned? Loggies, bloody jam stealing REMF’s the whole bloody lot of them.
And if you ask me nicely, I’ll even tell you what a REMF is ;)

But enough of the rant & rave session, even if I do feel somewhat better for it. Of course, that could just be the beer making me feel mellow, but if the result is the same I ain’t going to quibble about it :P
Pretty much all else I’ve done for the last few days has been take photos, not that I’m especially pleased with how many of them came out, & spend a lot of time on GTA-SA. The SA has been fun, but also bloody frustrating. I’ve not gotten too far into it yet, only about the tenth mission or so, but I’ve managed without cheating so far which I’m happy about, & it’s not even been too much of a struggle actually. Where the frustration comes in is the little “extras” in the game, in this case the gang graffiti you need to spray over. I’ve got the official guide with the location of every sign you need to spray, & also every weapon, oyster, bunch of flowers, horse-shoe, bloody everything clearly marked, but do you think I can find that last bloody sign? Not a bugger can I find the damn thing, & I’ve spent the last two days looking for it lol
I think it’s a case of I didn’t quite finish spraying one of them before I got arrested or something, so I now have to go back over every single bloody one & spray it again to make sure of it. Still, it keeps me busy I suppose :P
I’m keen on receiving the next package from home this next Wednesday or so, with the external drives that Rob is sending up, because unless I’m mistaken the images of my Baldurs Gate II cd’s will be on one of them. For some reason I’ve had a real hankering to play that game again, even if it is a good few years old by now. Without a doubt it’s the best RPG ever made for the PC, & the amount of detail in it is incredible, as I’m sure Gareth F will attest.
Speaking of Gareth F & computer games, it seems he’s been having lots of fun with WoW, judging by his blog, & I’m very keen to get involved in that when I get home. I’ve never been a big fan of the WarCraft series – I suck at RTS games, in all honesty :P – but MMORPG’s have always had an appeal for me. My online gaming experience hasn’t been the most fulfilling one so far - Joint Ops & so on plain sucked ass except over a LAN, though R.O.S.E Online and GuildWars were fun enough - but I’m hopeful when it comes to WoW. I’m also keen to try StarWars Galaxies again at some point, but there’s a problem with my account that I’ve not been able to sort out for some reason. I don’t know if I’ll go so far as to buy another copy to get my hands on another account key, particularly seeing as you have to import the bloody game, but I’ll certainly be firing off a few unhappy mails to SOE when I get back home I can assure you.

In addition to receiving eagerly anticipated packages from home, I’m also quite keen to get back to town so that I have my communications access back again. I’m heartily sick & bloody tired of struggling with the cell service from this side, with my messages either not going through, even though I still pay for every one of the damn things, or having people waste money trying to send messages to me that simply vanish into the void. The phone at the office may not be much more reliable, but at least it’s free, and I always have access to email for those people I can’t get on the phone while I’m in town. Speaking of which, Gareth F, Gareth L, & Mark – I need email addresses for you, & I’d appreciate it if you could get them to me at some point. Shirley & Ash both have my email addy if you don’t want to leave yours here, & I’m sure they wouldn’t mind passing along anything you’d like to send to me, ok?
I’m also eager to see if Nicole has had chance to reply to the mail I sent her last week, as I’d really enjoy hearing from her again. Then again, she’s in Stockholm atm, busy with 9 months worth of catch-up with her boyfriend, so I won’t be surprised if she’s been a little too… preoccupied to reply yet :P
Actually, I’m generally looking forward to getting back to town, or at least to leaving Mwaro for a few weeks. I still love this place, & have really enjoyed the time I’ve spent here, but I’ve spent two out of the last three months here & I’m feeling the need for a change. I can imagine I’ll have had enough of Bujumbura in a few short days & will want to escape the town again, but it’s still going to be a breath of fresh air to get out of this tent for awhile.

Anyway, that’s about it for now. Also, I’ve just run out of beer, so I need to go hunt down a few more ;)
I’ve certainly made up for being quiet lately with this post though – about 2 ½ pages long in 10 point Arial in Word :P I should be fairly busy in the capital this coming week though, so I’ll likely have some more to add to this during the week, & I’m also looking forward to getting in touch with everyone again while I’m back in town.

Cheers for now though ;)