A chapter ends

The latest deployment for 1-14 CAV and 3-2 SBCT is at a close. Many of the Brigade's soldiers are now back at Joint Base Lewis McChord with the remaining soldiers either sitting at Al Asad Airbase outside of Ramadi, in Kuwait getting equipment prepped and loaded onto ships, or waiting the last few days at various FOBs as part of a REARVON ensuring everything that is ours gets to where it needs to go.

Relief in place/Transfer of authority, or RIP/TOA as it is known, was quick but smooth. I only had about 10 days with my replacement and while I would have liked to have more time with him to discuss the operating environment and go into more detail about some of our successes and failures as an intel shop and a squadron, I believe 2-14 CAV's S2 will do fine.

As we started RIP I jokingly told my replacement that to really get to understand how we operate we'll need the enemy to conduct some attacks, activity had been quiet for a bit. The insurgents would not let me down and during RIP we had the standard indirect fire against a checkpoint, an IED attack on a patrol, and a VBIED in Qara Tapa. The carbomb targeted civilians and was not something we had really seen our entire deployment so it was an excellent opportunity for both myself and the 2-14 S2 to sit down and try to figure out the puzzle...who and why.

I left Northeast Diyala a little down, however. As much as I am ready to go home and as difficult and challenging as this deployment was, I really felt like the mission was incomplete. There were still pieces of the puzzle that needed placed, key insurgents I should have enabled the capture of, and goals for myself and my section that were not completed. Kurd-Arab tensions are still at the point of breaking out into civil war...but to be fair, there's nothing I believe we as a cavalry squadron could have done or could do to prevent that.

My first deployment didn't feel like that, primarily because we were a military intelligence battalion whose mission was to support the Corps HQ, so when it was time to go it was time to go. The mission was complete. The second deployment we had been in country so long, mentally and physically exhausting, that handing over the battlespace and going home was a relief more than anything.

This was different. I put my heart, soul, and best effort into this. There was some trouble letting go. But at the end of the day I look forward to getting back to my Xbox, beer, and friends.

Good luck 2-14.