They say there are VWs here ... haven't seen any.

That's why I parked my leather personnel carriers next to my reserved parking sign. If I see some bombed-out Kubelwagen, I'm buying that sumbitch!

Hey Cory. Take care of yourself over there.

You watch your SIX sir. And come home safe and sound.

Oh great now I have another friend in harms way.. Will keep you on my mind Cory but please be careful. Don't take any risk sir..

Hey if you uncover a german tank that sucker is 12 clyinders air cooled If I remmber right??

What does "watch your six" mean?

ITS THAT PART THAT VINCES WIFE HAS GIVEN UP ON

Watch your six = watch your back. (Like six o'clock---get it?)


---Jack

They may have VW's there, but if that sign reads correctly they have really big combat cameras too. Geez, you have to park the camera? That thing must be huge! ;)

Take care of yourself over there. You're missed by all here. Keep in touch.

From that picture Africa looks much like South Carolina. Let's hope it's no more dangerous for you. Take care of yourself, buddy.

Wow....

In that shot, Cory really does look like the guy on "Pinks"!

Stay safe, Cory. There's a lot of us over here worrying about you.

gn and kn (and the pups)

Lane said "From that picture Africa looks much like South Carolina" 'cept in SC they carry shot guns and beagles in their PUs while in Africa its AK47s and RPGs.

Cory - Let us know if ya need anything and we'll get you a care package in the mail. Guys in IRAQ like M&M, baby wipes, and DVDs/Books. Maybe we can send ya our collections of VW/Porsche history books? Keep up your drawing over there - good way to capture the sights.

Be safe - kick ass when you can!

Hi, guys!
I have some time now for the first impressions of this place. The base is a pretty small, expeditionary outpost on what used to be a French colonial-era piece of land.
The French Foreign Legion built some concrete buildings here, in typical colonial fashion; just what you need. Their operation was a lot smaller than ours is, so we're using Con-Ex boxes -- intermodal shipping containers -- and living and working in them.
I got lucky. My job needs a little bit of infrastructure, so me and the team I'm with are in a building. That air conditioner in the picture there was plopped down outside the door with elephant trunks running down the hallway to the office door. Power comes from Cat generators run by SeaBees (Navy Construction Battalions -- CBs; hence SeaBees).
We're next to the national airport. The French have fighters here; Mirage 2000s. They don't seem to fly them very fast, compared to our military front-line jets, but they're more than adequate for the task at hand.
So far, the crew here has brought in images from the African Union, humanitarian well-digging and bridge-building efforts and a change of command ceremony in the week I've been onboard. Nothing earth-shaking.
Meanwhile, in neighboring Somalia, the newly-elected president of that country has returned to his palace. No sooner was that cat inside than mortars started falling on his residence. Stay tuned; we're nine miles from the border.
Interestingly enough, the elections were held in Djibouti. ... Hmmm.

Please DO post a list of anything, (short of BERT / Hoopty), for us SOC members to ship to you.......Keep your butt down....

Do a search of NBC's stories for Somalia and the U.S. Navy.

Hey Cory, I had no idea you got deployed......be safe and I will save a few fires out here for ya so you can have some diff action when you get back.....haha.

Take Care Bro

Thanks, Darren!

Update: I finally saw a Volkswagen here. Djiboutian plates on a third-generation Golf. It looked like it had been washed recently, too. Good-looking car, but not the beater Beetle I was expecting to see. Still no air-cooled VeeDubs of any description. I'm not giving up.
(Can't find any decent Dominican cigars, either. Also not giving up on that.)

Oops. Shouldn't have tried to load a particular Google map. (Who knew that didn't work?)
I'll try to locate an aerial photo, so you guys can see what we've got here.
Looks like a dried-out shipyard. Without ships.

It's pretty interesting over here, on a number of fronts. The United States Agency for International Development, or USAID, has a number of projects going on throughout the Horn of Africa. They're drilling wells, building bridges, repairing water-pumping windmills and working with immunization programs for people and livestock. There's a lot more going on than I realized.
There's also a huge effort to stop genocide and to rally African countries into an African Union. THAT's a big deal here.

If I hadn't said so already, it's good to be able to check in with you guys. I'm glad there's a way to stay connected to this forum and you folks. Thanks to all who've passed greetings. It means a lot.
Without connections back home, this'd be a lonely place. There aren't a whole lot of things to do here but work, read and eat.
Off the reservation, so to speak, is exciting, but nothing I can really go on about (other than being topical) here.
So, thanks. I truly do appreciate it, and Teresa does, too.

ory,

Saw a report on ABC evening news about the US Navy intercepting and arresting a bunch of Somali piarets. Showed a few of you guys but couldn't determine if one was you. I believe it was on the US Navy ship, "Lewis and Clark" Were you in on that sortie? Those Somalies didn't look very threatning w/o their AK 47's but then I wasn't there. Keep up the good work.

Bruce in Oregon Lewis and Clark country!

Cory, lock and load on those chicken $hit pirate a$$holes

This base hasn't been terribly affected by the pirate thing yet. I'm sure there might, maybe have been some people involved ... somehow ... but we're more than eight miles from the border, for crying out loud.
I'm pretty sure my face wasn't on the news. Honestly, this job has more of a public relations face on it than anything else. I'm about done turning over with the NCOIC of the shop, and when that happens, I think I'm going to find out how much fun it is to train up the (sigh) younger guys to go join the fight. I'll get to cover fun and exciting events like dictators who kill lots of people in their sovreign states, dump bodies in Lake Victoria and such.
Just last week, one of the guys I'm responsible for brought back some images that would make you vomit.
I'll be earning the checks, that's certain, but probably not in the capacity I signed up for. There's some seriously dorked up stuff going on in this neighborhood.
If I get a piece of the pirate stuff, I probably wouldn't do much more than post links to publicly available information or military photos in publicly accessable locations.
You'll know about it if it happens, but not right away. Those ships and their crews are doing good work out there, but I can't claim any of it.

OK, so forget the pirates, there must be somebody you can
"lock-n-load on...

Why am I not surprised? The man (Gaddaffi, not Cory) is a loon!

"The Libyan leader envisages a single African military force, a single currency and a single passport for Africans to move freely around the continent." - With him as the king, of course.

For the interested:

http://gbcghana.com/news/24482detail.html
http://www.dvidshub.net/?script=images/images_gallery.php&action=viewimage&fid=152104
http://www.dvidshub.net/?script=images/images_gallery.php&action=viewimage&fid=152084
http://www.dvidshub.net/?script=general/general_search.php&table=images&query=Uganda&type=
http://www.dvidshub.net/index.php?script=images/images_gallery.php&action=viewimage&fid=152130

There's metadata buried in each photo on DVIDS. If you look at, then past, the cutline information ... I think we know a guy involved with this stuff.
Bookmark a link:

http://www.dvidshub.net/unit_rss.php?unit_id=238

He's not as unpopular as one might hope. There are tribal loyalties, and traditional kings, whose influence spread across the international boundaries. It's almost like there are two Africas; the one you see on the political map and the one you see on the vellum overlay, which ties beliefs and families into the pre-colonial territories of the tribes.
Khadaffi is the current leader of the Traditional Kings of Africa, and he has a lot of non-traditional support. From the living room window, it looks to me like they're all in line behind him for a massive political shift. That could make Africa a haven for any militant government official looking to retire and avoid prosecution.

(Mind you, I'm just a dumb fireman. I COULD be completely off-base.)

But did you sleep at a Holiday Inn this month? That's good enuf. Ghadaffi is a thug like the rest of those politico bastards that do nothing for their people (most of the continent) while they live lavish lifestyles. A buddy of mine is involved in a Cdn Govt. rebuild program in Sudan.... what a hell hole.

I don't believe that at all. I think millions of corpses would prove this as sensationalism journalism. Africa is lawless and an absolute embarasement to the human race.

So Mike....
Should we nuke 'em?

Vince.....

Sorry kids, as always, there is more to this story than the standard main stream media sensationalism.......
What if you lived in a place that had no law & order or maritime regulation , thus making it possible for "civilized" nations to profit from dumping toxic waste off your shores and strip your off-shore fisheries clean of your main food source?
Maybe, just maybe, you too would be a pirate.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/johann-hari/you-are-being-lied-to-abo_b_155147.html BTHW, this in no way my only source on this issue.
Quote: "As soon as the government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died. Ahmedou Ould-Abdallah, the UN envoy to Somalia, tells me: "Somebody is dumping nuclear material here. There is also lead, and heavy metals such as cadmium and mercury - you name it." Much of it can be traced back to European hospitals and factories, who seem to be passing it on to the Italian mafia to "dispose" of cheaply. When I asked Ould-Abdallah what European governments were doing about it, he said with a sigh: "Nothing. There has been no clean-up, no compensation, and no prevention."

At the same time, other European ships have been looting Somalia's seas of their greatest resource: seafood. We have destroyed our own fish-stocks by over-exploitation - and now we have moved on to theirs. More than $300m worth of tuna, shrimp, lobster and other sea-life is being stolen every year by vast trawlers illegally sailing into Somalia's unprotected seas. The local fishermen have suddenly lost their livelihoods, and they are starving. Mohammed Hussein, a fisherman in the town of Marka 100km south of Mogadishu, told Reuters: "If nothing is done, there soon won't be much fish left in our coastal waters."

IMHO.... This is just another classic case of economic opportunism. Ever read Naomi Klein?....
Seriously, why do you think pirates such as in "Pirates of the Carribean" are cool? Because they are fighting the system just like YOU & me.

These poor dumb slobs (pirates) are appartently just doing what they do for the very survival of their families.

What would YOU do if YOU were in thier shoes?

As for Cory........... Hang in there Amigo, This ol' Marine applauds your service!

Thanks, Ernie. The interesting thing here -- for me -- is the behind-the-scenes USAID stuff. There are vegetables growing in the deserts. The stuff those guys have been doing here, since the inception of the program, I guess, has the immediate effect of shaking a hand. Right now, there are 11 partner countries working on irrigation, and the Tennessee National Guard are over here drilling well after well.
The fishermen who're going where they have to to make a buck are no different than the ones in the Spratley Islands, the P.I., off of South America or anywhere else; you're right in that they're trying to feed themselves.
If I was a smart pirate around here, maybe I would stick to raiding the lower-value fishing boats, and maybe just ... grab myself a boat-load of "corporate" fish and call it a day.
It is true, I think, that Europe and America take advantage of the developmental process in underdeveloped countries. I'll tell you what, though ... you can't swing a dead cat in the halls of governement here without hitting a Chinese guy. ...
I'd rather maintain a presence inland, and maybe sic the international community on the offshore problems.
Odd too, that I didn't give a damn about this stuff as long ago as Christmas.

Cory, I suspect that the Chinese presence is the reason that the USA has decided to make this area an "Area of Interest". What are the Chinese doing there? Keep safe!

CORY BE SAFE OVER THERE.(trust no one)shoot first ask ? later.ah heck just kill them all and let god sort them out!!!!
THOSE DAMN TENNESSEENS WILL VOLENTER FOR ANYTHING.
ps.we carry AK's in TN to just not for hunting whitetails.
GOD BLESS YOU CORY AND YOUR FAMILY/COME HOME IN ONE PEICE I'D LIKE TO GIVE THE "HOOPTY A RUN FOR the money THROUGH (DEALS GAP) STEVE

Will, if I had to guess, they're after a cheap deal on natural resources.

Steve, there's an Army civil affairs (read as: help the locals with complex problems) team working in Djibouti.
That team is ALL from Knoxville. I don't know any of them personally, but my young AF sergeant here just told me to pass that on to you. They are all National Guard.

Cory tell the AF Sargent (GO VOLS)tell some one in (djibouti) play some "ROCKY TOP" OVER THE LOUD SPEEKER if you want to see the (Rednecks start DANCING)if you want a good laffff try it, ---YEE HAA--STEVE --- ps; my uncle went back to veatnam last month and he said that our (news) in AMERICA IS HIGHLY SENSURED.--FREDOM OF SPEECH MY A$$.----

Cory:

As an American who lived in Honduras well before the "Contras" became popular because of Reagan (believe me, he totally backed the wrong horse), PLEASE....watch what's going on. Listen a lot, ask questions only when you have to. Listening right now is far more important than talking.

Remember that ALL politics is local and many of those people are doing what they do just to eat. Of course, and especially in Somalia which has been without a government for the past 15+ years, a LOT of the shady things going on is done with the backing of politically strong individuals (who also hold Swiss bank accounts).

You're astute to see that the Chinese have a strong presence there and want to make it stronger. Natural resources is one reason, a place to sell their goods is another, investment (of a whole lot of American dollars) is next and the last is very cheap labor - The Chinese standard of living is rising quickly and they're looking for cheap foreign labor to finance (and they have a LOT of money to finance with). They'll be wanting to make political and influential inroads to exploit that cheap labor down the road as their Chinese labor becomes more expensive.

Organizing the African nations into something similar to the European Union was inevitable....The EU has been an economic success (even if they can't agree on anything politically) and the Africans (and soon, the Asians and Latin Americans) will want to capitalize on that concept. Lining up behind Ghadaffi is interesting, but how many strong, educated and non-wacko leaders are there over there???? The continent is about to lose 45% of their population to AIDS in the next 20 years and everyone is wondering who will be left to lead them into the (non-AIDS) future. Certainly not the leaders of the Congo or Zimbabwe (who deny that AIDS exists) but those educated enough to understand what's going on and set themselves up for the aftermath.

Read a lot, Cory. The local stuff, not Sky News or (God forbid) anything from the States. Get the local stuff translated. Find out what's really going on and let that influence your thinking.

Isn't it a fascinating place to be right now???

gn

Wow, Steve you carry an AK?

Spelling......er....ABC's. I don't know but if one wants to make an articulate POINT yet cannot spell it sort of defeats the effort. Am I wrong?

TROY (wow) is that suprizing to you. Yes it fits nicely in the gun rack in the back window of my F250, and i haven't been car jacked yet. TROY/ HOWS THE GUN BUILDING BUISNESS? WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN THE SPEEDSTER SITE. I THOUGHT YOU BUILT AK'S NOT SPEEDSTER'S/ WHAT WRONG WITH CARRYING A AMD-65/ I HAVE WILD DOG THAT CHASE MY LIVE STOCK!STEVE

MIKE we can always depend on you for spell checking.