Let me just start by saying I understand the reasoning the Army has adopted the use of the PT safety belt. PT is usually held in the early morning hours, often when it is still dark outside. Individuals are seen easier by cars when wearing them. I also understand their use while deployed. Most bases don't have many lights and it can get extremely dark late at night. Mandating soldiers wear reflective belts past a certain time makes sense. Hell, in 2007 before wearing PT belts at night was mandatory I was nearly struck by an Abrams tank late at night on FOB Warhorse outside of Baqubah.
Nearly my last image of this world
I can just imagine the conversation between the casualty notification officer and my parents had I survived most of a 15 month long deployment only to be crushed by a tank on the damn base.
Still, the Army comes up with stupid rules. In 2004 we were issued black fleece jackets. They were awesome and very warm which was great in December when it gets bloody cold in Iraq and Kuwait, especially at night. However, some Sergeant Major decided that the fleece jackets were meant to be worn under the uniform and not over it. This logically made no sense since the jacket did not fit under any top issued by the Army at this time. Rumor spread that the jacket was not being allowed to be worn because there was no rank on it. Eventually a new jacket was issued, and this one had velcro on it where you could attach rank. And all was right with the world.
There were other stupid decisions made. MPs were posted on certain roads on the Victory Base Complex to catch speeders and issue tickets. Pretty sure we needed those MPs for other things. On one section of road on FOB Marez in Mosul there was a sign posted that stated "speed checked by radar." I never saw a radar device or an MP.
The highest level of stupidity I ever saw came out of my own brigade however, the good old 3-2 SBCT. During the '09-'10 deployment the brigade actually established a "standards patrol" or something of a similarly stupid name. It was made up of a group of soldiers who would go around FOB Warhorse and issue warning tickets to individuals who were breaking the uniform standards. They even occasionally made field trips to the other bases. The best part of the patrol was that all infractions were logged onto a spreadsheet and uploaded to the brigade's website for all to see. It became a source of humor for those of us out in combat outposts and other far off bases.
The standards patrol came out to COP Cobra once. This was fine since our Sergeant Major and the leadership ensured we followed uniform regulations. We all joked about wearing our PT belts at night but when it's late at night and there are no lights the only thing between you and that Iraqi soldier plastering you with the bumper of his HMMWV may be that PT belt. The patrol coming to our base was a complete joke. Especially since the only person they caught out of uniform was one of our CAT III interpreters (US civilian with a clearance) not wearing a hat when he was outside. The patrol told him he had to wear his hat. We told him he was making way more money than any of us and was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more valuable to our efforts than any soldier in that standards patrol. Wear the hat, don't wear the hat...we didn't care.
To really emphasize what a joke these "safety reports" were to us at 1-14 I will share one last story. The standards patrol actually started to monitor the "blue force tracker" to determine the speeds of vehicles moving around the brigade's operating area. The blue force tracker is basically a GPS software system that shows were all brigade vehicles are on a map. The "SP" was using this to figure out who was speeding (anything over 45 MPH) and then posting the culprits' vehicle number on the website. The vehicle with the highest speed? Our squadron sergeant major...followed immediately by our squadron commander.
The B troop commander took one look at the speeds posted and said, "I can beat that."
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