Thank You for My Service - Mat Best Page 0,19
No one could rip us apart; no one could wipe us out. We would be there, irritating the shit out of our instructors, the itch they couldn’t scratch, all the way to RASP graduation two weeks later.
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The most important moment of RASP, other than graduation, happens the day before, when you find out to which of the three battalions you’ve been assigned. Everyone had their personal preference for their own unique reasons, and with America engaged in a two-front war at the time, dudes were super anxious about where they were headed. Not surprisingly, a lot of guys wanted 2/75 once they heard that that battalion was next up in the deployment cycle.
Of course, the Army didn’t even bother pretending to give a shit about anyone’s preferences. All they did was split the whole graduating class into three sections, lined us up in formation, and randomly assigned each group to a battalion. My group got 3/75, right here in Columbus, the last pick on my list. Well, fuck. I tried to put my bad luck into context. Be happy that you passed, I told myself. You get to join one of the most prestigious units in the military, I reminded my deflated ego.
At this moment an instructor yelled out, “Best, you have orders to go to 2/75!”
Every man in the class turned toward me in confusion. No one else got orders, let alone orders to the place they actually wanted to go. Who was this little cocky Private First Class named Best? That was the question painted on everyone’s faces, instructors included.
“Why the fuck do you have 2/75 orders?” a fellow graduate finally asked me, in total disbelief. What do you say to a stupid question like that? Something witty and insightful, obviously.
“I’m a Make-A-Wish kid. Ken Griffey Jr. must have been busy. This was my second choice,” I said like a total dickhead.
“Fuck you, man.”
“You won’t get to, because I’ll be deployed. Have fun trying not to get the Waffle House waitresses pregnant.”
The next day, after graduation, I called my cousin.
“Hey man, I just wanted to thank you.”
“For what?”
“For the orders to 2/75.”
“No idea what you’re talking about.” Uh-huh.
“Okay,” I said with a chuckle. “Sincerely, thanks, cuz.”
“Good luck,” he said as he hung up the phone. He was a man of few words, but for the few words he offered on that day back in Airborne School and whatever good words he used to get me assigned to 2nd Ranger Battalion, I was grateful. God knows that by getting those orders I pissed off more people that day than I pissed on the previous four weeks, and I was grateful to be on my way to Fort Lewis, and from there into combat in Iraq.
Chapter 5
A Soldier Comes Home
My first real break in the Army, on something called block leave, came after graduating from RASP and returning from my first combat deployment to Mosul.
Hey, Mat, wait, WTF? Did you just skip over your entire first tour of actual warfighting?
I did. I accomplished jack shit on that first deployment. The operational tempo of my unit was high, but as a cherry private I didn’t get to do much of the cool stuff. On most missions, the more experienced guys kicked down the doors while I pulled security. I’d sit in the vehicle hearing flash bangs and gunfire, wishing I were a part of it. Then there were stretches of time where the closest I’d get to direct contact was when the Iraqis decided to lob mortars at our compound. Most landed short of the fence line, some sailed clear over us, but a couple landed on base. A few months earlier the enemy had mortared a mess tent on our compound during lunch, killing twenty-two and wounding sixty-six. They were clearly hoping that lightning might strike twice. The whole experience was frustrating, to be honest, because I had all this training and no chance to implement it fully. I felt like I was in the middle of a fight with both arms tied behind my back.
Anyway, block leave is basically an extended vacation that the military grants to an entire unit around the holidays and before and after deployments. It’s their way of giving soldiers an opportunity to relieve some stress, reunite with family, and find new and unique ways to get in trouble without bringing the rest of their unit down with them.
I decided to spend my ten days of block leave back home on