Credit:

"Good Morning Vietnam," you remember, was a movie about an airman/disc-jockey named Adrian Cronauer. Adrian Cronauer is a real person who is an acquaintance and occassional lunch-date of mine. He does not look like Robin Williams. He looks, by his own description, like Robert Bork.

Adrian is a lawyer with the Department of Defense whose specialty is working with the governments of North Korea and the Vietnam trying to locate the remains of military personnel who are still listed as "Missing in Action." This is a very worthy effort, and Adrian is a very worthy guy.

I've never asked Cronauer if he really started his radio show with "Goooooood Morning, Vietnam" as Robin Williams does in the movie, but we will stipulate - for the next four months or so - that he did.

A former Member of Congress from Minnesota (a Democratic Member of Congress) and current friend and colleague named Gerry Sikorsky suggested the title of these Travelogues in an e-mail.

Both Cronauer and Sikorsky get full credit for the title. The content - for better or worse - is my responsibility.

Oh. Did I mention that the President stopped by on Thanksgiving?

Yes. He did.

And it was pretty exciting.

Here are the answers to your questions:

1. I knew nothing about it.
2. I had nothing to do with it.
3. I was as surprised and delighted as everyone else

Here's the front page of "Stars & Stripes the next day:

The President's visit had a remarkable impact on the military personnel here. Including those in the 82nd Airborne Division about 100 miles west of Baghdad which is, as luck would have it, where I found myself the next night and is the subject of this Travelogue.

The 82nd is a storied outfit. According to it's official history, it was formed as the 82nd Infantry Division in August 1917, at Camp Gordon, Georgia. "Since members of the Division came from all 48 states, the unit was given the nickname 'All-Americans,' hence its famed 'AA' shoulder patch."

During World War I a guy named Alvin York was a member of the 82nd Infantry. You may remember him as played by Gary Cooper in the 1941 film "Sergeant York"

For which Cooper won the Oscar for Best Actor.

In World War II, the Division was reconstituted as the 82nd Airborne Division under the command of Major General Omar Bradley.

After D-Day, the Division's post-battle report read:


"...33 days of action without relief, without replacements. Every mission accomplished. No ground gained was ever relinquished."

And then they got a load of me.

I'm not certain I have explained what I'm supposed to be doing here. I have a colleague, Dorrance Smith, who was a senior producer at ABC. He is responsible for getting our story on ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox.

My job is to get our story on the ABC or Fox affiliate in, say, Omaha or San Antonio.

To do that I have to depend on the assets in the major military organizations here in Iraq:

The 1st Armored Division
The 4th Infantry Division
The 101st Airborne Division

and

The 82nd Airborne.

I'm going to try and visit all of them on the theory that, if I don't show up where they are then I'm just another old, fat guy sitting in the cafeteria in Baghdad thinking lofty thoughts.

So, I arranged to hop a helicopter out to the 82nd on Friday night.

You know how many times I've been on a helicopter? Once. At Disneyworld on the helicopter ride for the kids who didn't make the height requirement for the spinning plate ride.

And I threw up.

While I was waiting for the helicopter to show up I was sitting in the flight center - which is a trailer.

I was going to be flying with a Chaplain, his Chaplain's assistant, a psychiatrist, and a bunch of soldiers.

The psychiatrist is part of a unit named "Combat Stress" and was going out into the field for a year. A YEAR! The First Sergeant of his unit, a reservist who is a former nurse and most recently was a member of the California Highway Patrol dealing with organized crime specializing in the Russian mafia in Los Angeles. I want to be there the day some soldier says something to this woman about her not being tough enough to be in the military.

Anyway, the Combat Stress folks deal with everyone from those of us in the Green Zone who walk around in our ballistic body armor - just because - to units who have been through a real battle and seen their buddies injured or killed.

This is a long, long way from being a psychiatrist on Park Avenue. In fact, this is about as far from Park Avenue as you can get and still be in the near Solar System.

This was going to be the second time I've been on a helicopter. In a Chinook. In a war zone. At night. With a bunch of soldiers, a psychiatrist, and a chaplain.

Perfect. I had every possible type of support I could possibly need.

I don't have a photo of the helicopter ride from Baghdad to the 82nd because (a) I was afraid to take pictures in case that was a violation of military policy; (b) I was afraid of the flash blinding the pilot, and (c) I was afraid.

Did I happen to mention to you that I am on the wrong side of my mid-fifties and I am riding in a helicopter going about a million miles an hour about 15 inches off the ground at night in a war zone?

No? Well, that's what I was doing.

When we got to the LZ (Landing Zone) I was a wreck because the pilot had been practicing evasive maneuvers including going left and right and up and down in rapid succession.

I didn't throw up like I did at Disneyworld, but I didn't miss by much.

SIDEBAR:

The military loves acronyms. They have acronyms for everything. LZ for landing zone is an easy one. But I had been here for nearly three weeks tossing out the acronym for the airport as "The BIAP" even though I had no idea what "BIAP" stood for, except I knew that it referred to the airport.

About 48 hours ago I realized it stands for Baghad International AirPort.

When that dawned on me, I looked around to see if anyone noticed that I had just figured it out. I think I skated. No one pointed and laughed.

Here's another one you hear now and again, and - unlike BIAP - you can use this in your daily life: My very excellent friend General Mark Kimmitt is opposed to spending time in a "BOGSAT."

Because he is my friend, if he is opposed to spending time a BOGSAT than, dammit, I am, too.

I finally asked him what it was about a BOGSAT was that we both hated so much.

"Bunch Of Guys Sitting Around Talking," he said.

END SIDEBAR

Like most of my travels, I wasn't exactly certain where I was going or who was going to meet me when I got there. But like most of my travels, I depend upon the kindness of strangers and I tend to get to where I'm supposed to be and meet up with the people who are supposed to be there.

The Chaplain, a Lt. Colonel, was very kind and told me he would take me into the Division Headquarters and help me find the Division Public Affairs Officer, Major Neil Harper.

While we were walking to the Division HQ I asked the Chaplain whether that was a normal ride. He told me it was much more aggressive and, as he was given to motion sickness, he had prayed the whole way.

I thanked him. "Well," I said, "it worked."

Be safe.

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