Yikes! Now there's a scary thought: imagine that lumbering towards you in some E-ring corridor. Talk about a rough beast slouching towards Bethlehem to be born...
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I had a hard time trying to focus on a think piece for Friday (as you can tell: it's early Saturday and I've been up since 3 - thanks, Miss Lily. I'll remember this come next WinCo run; no more salmony goodness for you, girlfriend - it's turkey gizzard Little Friskies for you, my wench).
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Thing is my mind kept drifting sideways into memories of my time in the Sinai with the Multinational Force & Observers. Dunno why. Ever had that, where you try and discipline your mind to think about, oh, work, or a chore, or school, and the damn thing keeps haring off after wierd stuff like Turkish drummers, or who invented the steam jenny, or why are there echidnas or what your neighbors look like nude?
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I mean, there's so much fucked up stuff to talk about. Dick to Congress: drop dead. More dead people. Protection under law: useless fiction or outdated sentimentality? Even Hammerin' Hank isn't safe - some juicer is chasing his record. It's a sad old world out there. And yet for some reason I couldn't focus on any one thing to talk about. My thoughts just seemed a blur of stupid people and bad government.
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And that's when it hit me.
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Why I was thinking about the Sinai.
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When I was in the Sinai with the Multinational Force back in the 80's we were occasionally tasked to support the Egyptian troops stationed there (either their Army or one of their multiple "police" outfits) clear the many mines that have been scattered around that place. The typical mine-clearing detail consisted of an Egyptian "engineer section", usually about 10 privates and a sergeant with an officer along for the ride, and three Americans: a lieutenant, an RTO and a medic.
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(Here's a couple of typical "tourist police" from another website. They looked like any other soldiers to me, except for their deal where they'd take their boots off and hang them around their necks by the laces. The interpreter at CP-3A explained that this was because when you stand before Allah you have to take your shoes off. Either you're pulling my leg, I replied, or this bad attitude explains a lot about why the Israelis kicked your asses back in '67.)
Their method was simple yet horrifying. They would walk out into the desert (usually the bottom of a wadi where the things had washed in) looking for mines. When they found one they would pick it up and carefully place it in a pile. Once the pile was big enough they'd shove some demo into gaps between the miles, scamper behind their truck and blow the pile. 
Several times the blast launched a mine or three over the road we were parked on - these were sphincter-tightening moments, especially as the mine pop-up hung in the air and you had to guess: is it...long? ...short? ...in between...awwwwshit!
Several of these "engineer" teams took losses, as you can imagine: stepping on mines, mines landing on them... One in particular impressed me, wherein the Egyptian lieutenant showed his troops how a Russian "shoebox" mine worked.
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It did.
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Our lieutenant reported that mine-clearing operations were on hold waiting a "resupply of Egyptians".
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It occured to me that these fucktards probably thought they had a plan. And that their plan was the best possible plan they could think up.
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And it made me sad, because if that was true then they were as energetic and hopeless as a squirrel crossing the interstate, and just as doomed. And all of these sad, sorry, fucked up news stories made me think of them. So there's the tie-in. Dick and Dubya, their christopithecine preacher friends, the bloody-handed idiots cutting deals and stranding their workers or constituents or troops down by the jersey barrier facing the oncoming headlights...in the words of PFC Ahlers, Balboa boulevardier and M203-gunner to the stars: "What a freekin' goatscrew...!"
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I loved the Sinai back in the day, and had some great times then - probably the most useful, certainly the most peaceful thing I ever did in the Army - and I'd like to tell some of them. If nothing else, to tell you the story of these three not-so-wise men.
I loved the Sinai back in the day, and had some great times then - probably the most useful, certainly the most peaceful thing I ever did in the Army - and I'd like to tell some of them. If nothing else, to tell you the story of these three not-so-wise men.
But for now - to bed, insh'allah.
2 comments:
Having been to Egypt twice now, the following is one of my clearest memories. We were on the big, modern highway leading to the airport at 4 a.m. on a Saturday. Only three cars on the road and we watched the two in front of us run into each other. So it's too easy for me to picture how things were done during mine searches in the Sinai...
You've done it again with your brilliant wordplay. I'm stuck on "christopithecines"...
That, and you and your not-so-wise men. Do tell.
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