StrikeFO Goes To Washington (MilBlogCon From Another Angle)

So apparently everyone on here likes to introduce themselves. My name is Paul, I’m a Marine infantry vet, and I DO have a DD-214. My call sign is StrikeFO. Instead of blathering on about where I’ve been and what I’ve done, I figured I’d write a story about the conference. This one is going to be a long one, but I think it’s fairly entertaining. Enjoy.

I showed up to D.C. around 11am on Thursday. My best friend from my first infantry battalion (3rd Battalion, 3rd Marines, 81s Platoon) picked me up. We hadn’t seen each other in about 4 years, but we talk on the phone every so often. He had a sign like he was a limo driver making a pickup that said, “Munson, Roy E.” With this, I knew it was the start of a great trip.

So we left the airport and headed over to another friend from 3/3’s house in Alexandria — Shawn. I hadn’t seen him in over 6 years. We took a drive to get something to eat in Old Town. Within about 5 minutes, we were back to telling the same old jokes, calling each other dipshits, and telling stories we hadn’t told in years. The military bond truly is amazing.

After lunch we dropped Shawn off and Chris and I went into D.C. (via Metro) to be tourists for the rest of the day. We got off at the National Archives and walked up the Mall. We had a brief departure over to the Korean War Memorial, which is truly amazing. If you haven’t been — it’s a small wall with the faces of soldiers etched into it looking out on a platoon on patrol. The most important part of the wall states that “Freedom Is Not Free.” We took some pictures then headed to the Lincoln Memorial. We got to say hi to Abe, read the Gettysburg Address, sit on the steps of the memorial like we were in Wedding Crashers, and then we moved on. We also saw a group of kids on a tour who were forced to wear reflective belts. Looks like Army and Marine Corps regs are spreading.

We pulled out the iPhones to figure out the best route to get to the Marine Corps Memorial. We were going to take the Arlington Bridge but we thought we found a better way. We were wrong. We ended up literally running through traffic and then playing the “if you can dodge traffic, you can dodge a ball” game. We miraculously survived and then made it to the memorial. We took some photos at the base and then we thought we would head back.

We were planning on going the following day but since we were so close, we decided to go to Arlington Cemetary. It was around 6:30pm so (luckily) most of the dipshit tourists that don’t understand what hallowed ground means were not there. We walked to Section 60 together – myself for the third time, him for the sixth – retelling stories of our friend and mentor, Staff Sergeant Jason Ramseyer.

Sidenote: One such story – we were training on the big island of Hawaii and we got a rumor that they brought some beer over for us. Ram came up with a plan to “tactically acquire” the entire beer supply for our 81s Platoon. Briefing all the NCOs over an extremely hasty map, he laid out the plan.

“Situation – We need more beer. Mission: Get the beer supply. Execution: Alright – 1^st Squad, you’ll go down this way and recon the left side. 2^nd Squad create a diversion on the back side of the camp. 3^rd and 4^th Squads you’ll assault the objective…”

Anyway.. so we move up the road. We make the turn and move into Section 60. SSgt Ram’s grave is about 300 feet down after the turn. As we move in amongst the graves and look for his – I’m struck by the fact that it’s grown so much larger. It had been about two years since I’d been there and there were so many more of our fallen brothers there.

His grave was right by a tree. We didn’t really say anything to each other. We just looked – like we always do —  JASON C RAMSEYER, SSGT, US MARINE CORPS, OCT 21 1977, APR 20 2006, BRONZE STAR, PURPLE HEART, OPERATION IRAQI FREEDOM – in disbelief. The invincible platoon sergeant; he was the last person we thought would be killed.

We also looked for and found the grave of another fallen Marine from our battalion in Afghanistan – Lance Corporal Nick Kirven. Apparently he was promoted Posthumously and his grave  now reflected Corporal. Beside his grave was a small tree with flags placed in at its roots. Chris and I spent a few minutes fixing up the flags and placing them upright.

We headed back to Ram’s grave. As I walked back and looked at others – I saw names that I recognized but had never met. GySgt Elia Fontecchio – a name I knew through my friend Eddie. Captain Patrick Rapicault – another name known through an old 1stSgt that I served under. Both names carried significance with them – so I did what I thought they would like. I snapped a photo of both and said Semper Fidelis.

Before I left, I pulled out a picture of my son Jason and placed it on top of Ram’s grave. He is named for a hero, so I thought that he should be with his “uncle.” I placed his photo under a small rock and we left, sad about the loss of our friends, but happy that we had made the trip.

We headed back to Shawn’s house on the metro and showered up and changed. Later on that night, we headed up the street to Friday’s — eating what could be called a “ridiculous amount of nachos” and drank ourselves silly while telling every story possible – to include old crowd favorites including, “Remember that time…” and “There I was… balls deep…”

Day Two

Friday morning Chris woke me up at 8:30 even though I had an alarm set for 9. He must have been all hopped up on Mountain Dew or something because he actually woke up at 6am. So we got out the door and headed into D.C. once again to try to see as much as we could before the Conference started at 7 (That’s 1900 for those that don’t Habla).

We were driving towards D.C. with the intention of going to the Spy Museum first. On the way there we were passing the Pentagon. I asked Chris if he had ever been to the Pentagon memorial. He said no, and I hadn’t either. We turned around and after a lot of u-turns and getting a bit lost, we found parking and our way to the metro to head to the Pentagon.

We walked across the parking lot with the Pentagon to our right and headed into the memorial. I had seen the memorial in pictures before and always found it strange. It didn’t seem to look like any memorial I had seen before. When we entered, we read on the ground below us, SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 9:37 AM. Seconds after I read this, a woman standing there said, “If you have a few minutes, I can tell you about the memorial.” We said sure.

She started with, “On September 11^th, planes attacked the World Trade Center, The Pentagon, and there was a crash in Shanksville, Pennsylvania.” At this point, I almost stopped her, because I of course watched it all on television. I’m glad I didn’t.

She continued, “The plane came from that direction,” as she pointed to what is now the Air Force memorial. “Coming at over 500 miles per hour, it hit the ground first, then went into the building.” She pointed between columns of the Pentagon that were restored. The restoration coloring didn’t quite match the rest.

After telling the story of the hijacking, she talked about what the memorial meant. Each bench represented one of the 184 who perished at the Pentagon that day. The first bench also represented the one that almost brought me to tears. Her name was Dana Falkenberg. She was 3 years old, she was on her first plane ride ever, and she died with her mother, father, and sister. “If you read the name and see sky, that person was on the plane,” our guide said, “If you can read the name and the Pentagon is behind, they were in the building.”

The details of what the memorial meant came to light as she spoke. The angle of the benches represent the trajectory of the plane. The distance of the benches between each other depended upon the year of birth. The outer wall rises from 3 inches to 71 inches – representing age; the youngest being 3, and the oldest being 71-year old John Yamnicky, a retired Navy vet.

After we left the Pentagon, Chris called another friend from our former unit who now works at Department of Justice. He took a lunch break and met us down the road from the White House. We walked around both sides of the White House – him pointing out stuff to us – and talked like the years hadn’t passed by. He snapped some photos as the Secret Service guy whispered into his radio, “We got that fuckin’ Duffel Blog guy here…” [Ok so that part didn’t happen]

He left us at the Smithsonian American History Museum. I told Chris that he had to see the Star Spangled Banner. We went in and walked to the second floor to see that huge, amazing flag that inspired our national anthem. Needless to say, it was an experience to see it and learn about the history. We also saw the “George Washington Gone Wild” statue and then took off. If you aren’t sure what I’m talking about, it’s a statue of George Washington sitting in a chair shirtless. Apparently he did his Crossfit training.

We had knocked out most of the things we wanted to see when we were there, but we still had the Spy Museum and the Holocaust Museum left. In the interest of time, we decided against the Spy Museum. I felt the Holocaust Museum was not going to be the most fun or exciting – but would be much more important and worth our time. I was right.

We came in the door and encountered heavy security. This was of course due to the crazy guy that shot a guard a few years ago right inside the lobby. So we grabbed tickets to the main exhibit hall and then walked around the other areas. The main part of the Museum is time-restricted so we had to wait until 4:45. We had about 45 minutes, so we went downstairs where they had a collection of Nazi propaganda and showed how they were able to manipulate the German people into acquiescing to such atrocities. The main theme was always that it was not something impossible. Propaganda is effective anywhere it is used – especially if the public is not able to educate themselves and identify it as such.

When the time came, they packed us into a large elevator and we headed up to the fourth floor. Packed meant packed. There was a large number of people in the elevator and I almost thought this was for a purpose – to demonstrate, even if only for seconds – the feeling the Jews must have felt being packed together in such small spaces as the box cars on their way to camps.

I thought that the exhibit would start with the rise of the Nazi state and gradually work up to the concentration camps and then death camps and Nuremberg. When the doors to the elevator came open, the first thing we saw were photos of bodies. Mass graves. Nazis shooting Jews – black and white. It was the “gut check” that everyone needed to understand immediately.

The exhibit featured a slew of evidence of the Holocaust. Photos, testimonies from survivors, diaries. It’s all there. The most powerful part for me were the shoes. In one hallway on both sides – they dumped thousands of shoes. They were the shoes taken off the dead before they were gassed. It’s such an unbelievable and horrific site to witness.

We were not allowed to take photos in the museum so I don’t have any here, but what we saw there was meant to be shared. I was a witness and now you, dear reader, are as well. If you are in D.C., you should go.

We hopped on the metro and headed back to Shawn’s. I showered, changed, and he drove me up to the conference in Arlington. I showed up about 30 minutes late due to traffic. I walked up to the second floor and saw empty reception tables. No one was in the hall. I took a name badge and wrote, “Paul Szoldra, Collegeveteran.com, Duffelblog.com” on it, and put it around my neck.

I crept in the door and sat at a table with open seats. An older gentleman was speaking to the crowd. I later learned he was Colonel Charles McGhee of the Tuskegee Airman. Him talking about overcoming diversity, beating stress, and always staying positive are points that were well received. It was quite the honor to listen to him, speak with him afterward, and shake his hand.

In the middle of the speech, another guy walked in a bit late and sat right next to me. He saw my nametag and said, “hey, you’re the Duffel Blog guy?” I said yes, of course. “I’m Powerpoint Ranger,” he said, “your site is freakin’ hilarious.”

I couldn’t believe this for two reasons. First – I can’t believe the luck that the two “funny guys” of the milblog conference end up sitting next to each other right off the bat, and two – he’s frigging Powerpoint Ranger. He’s been doing this for a while. This was pretty awesome to hear that he liked what we were up to.

So they of course did the awards thing. We didn’t win. I think Duffel Blog was obviously robbed but I’m not Al Gore so I’m not going to cry about it. Anyway, afterward I made a b-line over to Jonn Lilyea. I’ve been emailing him tips over the past year, so I had to finally meet him in person. I also met with Ben King of Armor Down who I had met via Twitter. It was definitely nice to be among some other military folks and guys who you’d already met in the virtual realm.

Although my tag said CollegeVeteran.com as well as DuffelBlog.com, I kept getting introduced as the guy with “that Duffel Blog site.” Apparently we’re a big hit among military folks. Who knew? I also had to continue to correct people and say, “No. I didn’t write that article. Justin wrote that one… or Ron wrote that one.” I don’t like to take credit for the efforts of others, especially when they do such an awesome job. Needless to say, TDB was well received by everyone there.

Jonn introduced me to his Business Insider “handlers” – Robert, Jenna, and Eloise. All were great people; reporters actually interested in covering the military the right way. I know, that last statement is a bit shocking. I also was mingling with plenty of the Military.com folks who were very gracious and also love The Duffel Blog. So much so that David from Kitup is trying to get us to do stories for the site. We’ll see.

So we all went out to this bar in Arlington called “Carpool”. We grabbed some beers and sat around shooting the shit. Suddenly I heard a big thud and something hit the back of my chair. I turned around and see a dude just lying there on the ground. My first reaction was that someone had knocked him out, so naturally I was about to go Chris Tucker on his ass. But it wasn’t the case. He was just super drunk and apparently locked his knees and fell over like a ton of bricks. His girlfriend was flipping out, saying “Wake up, wake up.” Two seconds later, Doc Bailey of The Mad Medic was on the scene treating him. The civilians looking on closest were offering tips – move his legs this way, turn him that way… etc. I turned and said, “Hey, he’s a Combat medic. He knows what the hell he’s doing.”

Bailey kept him in place and didn’t let him move. He eventually came to and wanted to get up but was forced back down. He did the standard ‘you know what your name is questions’, checked his pulse, and talked to him for a bit, until EMT’s arrived. Around that time I went to the head with another guy from the conference — James from Hiring Our Heroes — and we both agreed it was that guy’s lucky day to fall over right next to the one person that knows exactly what to do.

Since it was getting pretty late, I decided I had to head back to Shawn’s. He had told me earlier that I could call him no matter what time, and he would pick me up from the metro station that was about 2 miles away from him [Huntington]. It was around 2 am at this time, and I had to take 3 trains to get back. Orange to Rosslyn, then switch to Blue to get down to Pentagon, then Yellow to Huntington.

The first Orange trip went fine, but then I got to Rosslyn and had to wait over twenty minutes for the next train. Since I was bored, I pulled out my phone to play a game or something. The battery was dead. This was bad. This was very bad.

Once I got to the end of the line, I couldn’t call Shawn. I also didn’t have his number or his address memorized. I was basically screwed. So here I am, walking up the steps at about 2 am, saying, “Please be a cab up there. Please be a cab up there.”

I reached the top of the stairs and saw a dark and empty parking lot. Shit.

I walked across the street to a 7-11 and used the head. When I came out, I asked the cashier, “Hey can you call a cab for me?” He pulls out this sheet of paper with a number on it and handed it over. “No no. Can you call for me? My phone is dead.”

He agreed and dialed. With the first one, he handed me the phone and I got a “We’re sorry, this number had been disconnected.” Not good. The next one brought on some guy who I couldn’t understand but was saying something like, “No cab, no, too late, no cab.”

Resigned to my piss poor planning, I started walking. The problem was that I had no freaking clue where I was going. I just had to guess. Luckily I was a Sergeant when I got out of the Marine Corps and not a 2^nd Lieutenant, so my intuition was pretty good. I mostly used terrain association and remembering stores that I had passed in the car previously. That didn’t make the 2 to 3 mile walk in the dark any more enjoyable, but I made it after about a 45-minute hump. I didn’t call any cadence.

Day Three

The next day I woke up and ate breakfast at Shawn’s. He once again drove me up to the conference where I checked in and went inside. I said hello to John from Powerpoint Ranger, as well as Jonn, Ben, and others that I had met the previous day. The first panel to come up was Military and the Media. It was composed of journalists – NPR, NY Times, etc. I thought it was fairly interesting and they got some good questions from the audience about their biases, especially towards the military. When we took a break, I went over to Greg Jaffee from Washington Post who was on the panel.

“Is there any recourse; any punishment for reporters who do not fact check or verify claims in their stories?”

He wasn’t sure what to make of the question, so I clarified, “because there are people out there like Rick Strandlof and others who get interviewed by people like you who don’t ask for a DD-214 and they say that they are combat heroes and veterans and no one challenges them.”

He agreed that it happens but unfortunately, it’s not something that kills a reporters’ career. I thanked him for his honesty and asked that he inform his colleagues to do the extra work to stop these stolen valor scumbags. It’s pretty fun exposing these asshats but we unfortunately can’t get them all.

The next panel was on benefits. I won’t speak too much about the panel, but I will say the most entertaining part was Jonn getting up and calling out Rick Maze (Military Times), Brandon Friedman, and the IAVA for their support of the current President. The irony that they were talking about benefits being eroded recently and Tricare hikes under the very President who was helping it was completely lost on them.

There were some other panels – Social Media, which featured the Army and Marine Corps Facebook/Twitter dream teams. They were talking about how awesome they were on Facebook and engagement and all this craziness. I just hoped that they wore their reflective belt when they were posting status updates. I’ve been told it gets a ton of “likes”.

We also had a Q&A with the co-director of Act of Valor, Scott Waugh. He was a pretty cool guy. Talked about a little bit of the “inside baseball” of the movie and how it was actually done. The logistics of it all and the story. I actually really liked the movie so it was cool to hear from the guy who made the thing. I asked the question of whether any money from the film will go to fallen heroes, and he said that it does. Definitely some good stuff there. I also went up to him afterwards and told him that, “When those boats came around the corner and opened up with the mini-guns, I had a freaking moto-boner right there.” He was certainly amused. Everyone also got signed copies of the book and a DVD of the movie to take home.

The last panel was the main “big bloggers”. The old timers who have been doing it for a while – Blackfive, JP Borda, Alex Horton, etc. This was good to hear what they were up to and how they did it. I met Alex Horton from the VA and Matt Burden from Blackfive — and both were both modest and really good guys.

It then all wrapped up around 5pm that day. We all said our goodbyes – except for Jonn. He pulled a ninja move on me and disappeared.

So I headed to the metro once more, this time with a fully charged phone (I brought the charger with me in my back pocket this time). I called Shawn and he picked me up. We went back, changed up, and headed back out. We were meeting with our old Platoon Commander who was in the area.

We went to a bar in Old Town where our old L-T, “G”, met us. We hadn’t seen him in about 6 years but it was great to be back together. We did the normal talking, drinking, and storytelling. Shawn had to take off early so we said our goodbyes and then we all left. I went back to G’s pad and crashed for the night. It was around midnight. “When’s your flight?,” he asked.

“11am. It kind of sucks I didn’t get to see 8^th & I… I almost went there with Chris but we didn’t make it.”

“You want to go? We can go tomorrow?”

I said sure.

“Well when do you want to wake up? 7?”

“Shit. Ok.”

So I set the alarm, hit the rack and slept like a champion. In a dark room with a belly full of fine Fat Tire beer, you can’t get much better. When the alarm woke me up, I showered up, packed the hell out of my bag, and we headed out.

8^th & I was actually pretty interesting. It’s the Marine Barracks in Washington, D.C. It’s not behind some big fence with C-Wire and MP’s checking ID cards. It’s all right there on the street. G gave me a little history lesson on the place, took me around the corner to say hi to the Commandant (he didn’t answer the door), and then we headed out.

So we hit the airport. He grabbed my bag out of the trunk and placed it on the curb. We shook hands, exchanged the old ‘bro hug’, and acted like it was no big deal. “Thanks for breakfast, and thanks for everything.” He probably didn’t catch it, but I was thanking him for being such a shit-hot platoon commander as well – not just for letting me stay at his place. I think we both wondered when we would see each other again.

I only hope it’s less than six years.

Category: Pointless blather, Reunions, Who knows