Giving Thanks

And thank you and Jarhead Survivor for maintaining this blog. I look foreward to it daily. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

I am thankful for this blog, my family, my current freedom, and a God that has blessed me beyond deserving.

Merry Christmas to Ranger Man and Jarhead. You are two of the many things that I am thankful for.
Peace, Love and Joy to you and yours.

merry Christmas to Ranger, Jarhead and all of theirs.

Merry Christmas guys. I’m thankful for my family and friends, the way my parents raised me, and the community I grew up in. I’m also thankful for finding the preparedness community and all the work people like Ranger Man and Jarhead do that make this community possible.

For me this time of year reminds me of the 2 main things that I am thankful for, besides the ability to practice my religion of choice (Christianity, I am Baptist), and that is #1 My AWESOME family #2 ALL of the men and women who protect our country and its citizens from threats (both here and abroad), and the families that support/love them.
I feel the need to explain a little about these choices and why I am so thankful for them, so please “indulge” me for a few moments. Most of the people here in the US have not lived overseas, let alone overseas in a SHTF situation. My family was stationed in Panama from 1987-1992, for those of us who know our history, December 1989 was a little known/remembered event called “Operation Just Cause”. A complete A$$HOLE named Manuel Noriega took control of the country of Panama through military force in the months before 12/89, utilizing his money obtained through drug trafficking to further his aspirations of national domination. We were stationed on the main communications base for the US military called Corozal, which is located right on the Panama Canal. In the months before 12/89, when the S truly HTF, all civilians had been restricted to the bases they lived on and were only allowed off base with MP escorts. This meant that even our school buses had 2-4 fully armed MP’s on board along with 2 APC’s and several HMMWV “gun trucks” acting as escorts. There were several times that I can recall where the cowards Noriega had under him fired on my school bus, and there were casualties, although it is not publicized. The forces then in power were attempting to “starve out” the US soldiers and their dependents, meaning that for about 2 months before 12/89, supplies were VERY limited. One morning at about 0400, my mother and father came bursting into the room I shared with my brother. That was when things got REAL BAD, my mother had been awakened by the sound of small arms fire, my father had to go to his duty station with MTMC (to ensure our troops had their “beans & bullets”), leaving my brother, mother and I in our home on Corozal. Before he left, he and my mother set up the “A/C room” (think a medium sized closet with an air handler in it) in our house with a few sleeping bags, water, lanterns and a case of MRE’s. As he was leaving, he gave my mother the Mossberg 500 12ga riot shotgun he had purchased on our last trip to the states, and handed me his Taurus PT92 (I was 8 at the time) with 4 mags and a box of bullets, he then said “If ANYONE comes to the door and does not know our password… shoot… we will figure out what happened after everyone is safe!”. We spent 7 days in that tiny room, listening to the sound of firearms, and mortar shells landing all over the base because of the PDF’s (Panama Defense Force) attempts to knock out the communication systems that were about 200yds from our house. In the early morning hours of Christmas Eve 1989, a group of 4 soldiers came into our home shouting the “password” that our family had established and used for years before. They told us that my father had arranged transportation for all of the civilians that were left on Corozal to be evacuated back to the states. One of them scooped my brother under one arm, and tossed me over his opposite shoulder, they rushed us out to an armored HMMWV and we quickly joined a convoy taking us to meet up with my father. When we met up with him and fairly small convoy of M113 APC’s, and a few HMMWV’s along with 2 Bradley’s at Quarry Heights (the main Operations base in Panama), there wound up being to many people and not enough seats in the vehicles, so my father piled us into his Isuzu Trooper II and we made for Howard AFB. Wile in route we came under fire a few times, the worst was when we were crossing “the Bridge of the Americas”, the convoy was forced to stop and I will never forget the sound of those Bradley’s 25mm main guns “opening up” on the tree line, extinguishing any muzzle flash that became visible. We managed to get to Howard AFB, though a few of the soldiers escorting us and one civilian that I know of were injured. Most of us were loaded up onto a C-141 and about 20 of us (including my mother, brother and I) were put on then Sec. of State Dick Chaney’s leer jet. It seemed like the moment that the engines on the planes turned on the jungle surrounding the base exploded with small arms fire. There were a few RPG’s fired in the direction of our transport as well. I remember my mother crying as my father left the jet after making sure we were secured in our seats, and we were on our way to the states in minutes. We arrived at Andrews AFB in Md, during one of the worst winter storms they had in decades late in the evening of Christmas eve. We were dressed for the tropical weather we had become accustomed to and were freezing (it was 110F in Panama when we left). A female Air Force officer had scrounged up some blankets and jackets for us, and my mother called my grandfather to come and get us. As we waited in the ice cold, tiny terminal building, I remember my mother getting every one there to pray for the soldiers and our loved ones who had risked their lives to get us safely back to the US. About 2 hours later my grandfather came into the terminal with winter clothes for us that he had stopped and purchased on his way there. He drove us back to his house and my grandmother cooked us the first home cooked meal we had in months, “left-over” roasted chicken with hame-canned green beans, potatoes and homemade biscuits with butter and honey. After dropping us off, my grandfather went back out and drove to every store within 40 miles that was still open, taking him almost all night to get my brother and I Christmas presents so that we wouldn’t feel “left out” when the other grandchildren opened their presents. I still have the flashlight, pocket knife and foam disk shooting toy gun that he gave me, the candy did not last very long! We got a call that afternoon from my father letting us know that he was fine and that he would be joining us at Ft Benning GA, were he had been reassigned in a few weeks.
To me, many of us in the US don’t remember what truly matters and what we should truly be thankful for this time of year. Everyone says they are tankful for this or that, and that they appreciate everyone in uniform that is fighting for our safety overseas, but their actions speak differently. While those of us who ARE thankful for the troops pray for them, lets not forget to be thankful for the families that support them as well. I will NEVER forget what our service men/women did for me and my family, and I hope that what my family went through will remind others to not take them for granted either!
Merry Christmas to everyone, and THANK YOU to everyone who has served, is serving or will serve in our military! RangerMan & Jarhead, thank you guys for having an awesome page that lets us express ourselves and share ideas that will hopefully get us through the tough times that are sure to come!