Afghanistan....so far

Thought it would be nice to put up some pictures of the lovely country side of Afghanistan. It really isn't all that bad looking when there's no excitement going on. Due to the amount of excitement I don't have nearly as many pictures as I'd like,but then again, I aint on a pleasure cruise right?
                     
Poppey and marijuana are their biggest "exports" I guess you could say. The drugs as well as it's profits mainly get exported to the Taliban and terrorists. You can probabaly guess what they do with the money. The big hill was built by Alexander the Great. We have a small base up there now.

A small compound we took over and made into a strongpoint. We would go down there 3 days at a time. You can tell how simple/primitive we're living down there. MRE boxes for stairs, ply wood pieces and ponchos and parachutes as our shade.

  

   The three "rooms" in the left picture are the spots to take a leak,burn trash, and go number 2. The guy with the sniper rifle is an awesome guy. One of the best guys in the company. Sgt Heinz. Loved watching him rock that rifle at the Taliban. Good stuff.

Some kids following the tractor. They would jump on the back and see how long they could ride the plow till they fell off. Reminded me of us crazy King kids. Of course, deployment can't be complete without a cat. Always is a small comfort to see that cat, even though I'm not as cuddly with it as I am with Commando and the cats we've had in the past.

This is me and my ammo bearer Gonzales (Gonzo) at the strong point. We shot off of the wall which isn't an ideal spot but it offered observation of the impact of my rounds (a soldiers way saves the day). One of our patrols started getting shot at from two sides. From my position I was looking North ,which is where our guys were. They were taking contact from the west and east. We immeidiately got the guys from the east with two rounds then pounded a tree line with five more rounds and then the shooting stopped. When I talked to the guys that were out there,they said my rounds were right on target. That's what I'm talking about!!  I ended up deaf again for a day or two but it was good fun. As you can see in the picture, my mortar tube looks like a bazooka or something. It's in hand held mode which means there's no bipod, big base plate or sight. You grab the top of the tube and use your thumb to aim, then you just squeeze the trigger at the bottom and BOOM!!!!

And of course, I can't leave home without my skull mask!!!