This post is in reference to a promise I made in a post to another thread:
You'll all need a bit of the back story:
In 1984 I was helping to run RAF Lakenheath's Hardened Avionics Facility (HAF) as the 48CRS Assistant Avionics Branch Chief. We had nearly 500 personnel assigned to 5 different shops in three different buildings.
In addition to my 5 avionics shops, I had also assumed responsibility for running the DCM's "wood shop". The wood shop was normally run by the FMS Squadron and did stuff like make going away plaques for the higher ups, cut baseboard stock to specified size for self help project, etc. It was staffed by people on 90-day temporary assignment from all across the maintenance side of the wing. I got tired of sending one of my people to the wood shop every 90 days just to learn that most people who were also there from other duty sections were pretty much losers... troops their duty sections were glad to be rid of for three months. I volunteered to assume responsibility of the DCM's wood shop as a function of the CRS Avionics Branch and man it totally out of my own assets. At first all the other branch chiefs around maintenance were quite wary. "We don't want to man the place... we hate having to shit bodies to the place every 90 days... but why does he want to take it over?? What's in it for him???" Well... they finally figured out there was nothing in it for me. I just wanted to take a marginal workplace and make it a productive workplace using my own assets, of which I had many.
An additional part of my back story is that I related much better to my lower ranked NCOs and Airmen. I was not a member of the NCO club... I didn't go drink beer with the squadron's higher ups on a Friday afternoons. I wandered the hallways of my shops and hung out both on duty and some off duty with my peeps. It was something that was noticed by others in the squadron and wing. I seemed to be different and not everybody liked it... but my stats were sky high, my production of avionics spares were spot on... My avionics branch always scored Excellent on NATO TacEvals... so I just didn't give much of a fuck.
So... back story complete - On to my war story:
One morning one of my newly assigned young female airmen came into the office in the HAF and said she had a bit of a problem in her dorm and was unsure what to do or who to go to. Her dorm refrigerator was not working and she didn't know if it was something she needed to do or if it was just a dead refrigerator. We headed her dorm, which at the time was what we called a "WAF Dorm" because all the wing's female personnel were assigned to their own dorms, somewhat isolated from the all-male dorms.
Sure enough... the fridge was dead. No circuit breakers, fuses or any other components were involved. It was just inop.
Back to the HAF we went and with her in my office I called the dormitory supply office and explained the problem in the best, deep, SNCO voice that I could muster up. They took all of the information down and assured me that it would be taken care of. There I was... this kid's Senior NCO and I had just demonstrated the power of the single shit repelling strip above my lower six. (Before it changed to two shit repellers for E-8). Problem solved. I was happy. She was happy.
Six weeks or so later, she catches me up and looks kind of shy and embarrassed apparently thinking she was taking up my valuable time. I asked her what was up and she told me that her refrigerator still hadn't been replaced. I was pissed to say the least. I called up to services, or whoever it was that was responsible for this crap and was told that Sgt P (long, greek name) was responsible for refrigerators but he was at the newly renovated Security Police dorm, getting all its new furniture and furnishings installed.
It was around noon and I immediately took a squadron vehicle up to the SP dorm and sure enough, the first two floors had been renovated and were occupied, but the top floor was not yet occupied. There was furniture being assembled, floor lamps, fixtures, etc... there was also a number of brand spanking, newly unboxed, dorm refrigerators sitting around. Being the Senior NCO that was, I recruited a couple of Security Police airmen to come up to the top floor, hoist one of the fridges and carry it downstairs and put it into my vehicle. They did so, no questions asked...
It was then back to the HAF to find my young airman and request her dorm keys. Once I had those, I took the refrigerator up to her dorm (luckily her room was first on the right on the first floor) and manhandled it into her dorm room. I hooked it all up and it started to run. I took the dead refrigerator out to my military vehicle and headed back to work at the HAF. Before I got there, I was undecided on what to do with the dead fridge and finally decided to take it down to my wood shop and store it there until I figured out what to do with it.
Mission accomplished. My airman was happy. She thought I was her hero - right off a damn recruitment poster. The word got around about how goddamn cool I was (once again, I must say) and points were made.
After a few days or weeks maybe I just logged the dead refrigerator out of my consciousness and it just sat in my wood shop, gathering dust. It was not taking up any needed room and my crew had eventually used it to set their coffee maker, cups, etc..
Fast forward a few months and I'm hanging out at the NCO club now and then... with my peeps, not my peers. I made a few trips to London and Stonehenge and this and that along with some of my people... my young female airman included. I even went on a 24 hour trip across the North Sea and back on an overnight ferry to Gothenberg, Sweden. One of my TSgts, a Staff or two, a couple of airmen, including my young female airman.
At some time in the ensuing months I was introduced to a young Sergeant that everyone called "Poo-Poo". He seemed to be an OK guy, but wasn't one of my own avionics troops so I didn't pay a lot of attention to him. He hung out with my people here and there around base, usually at the club.
It must have been three or four months later I learned his last name when I saw him in uniform. Ha! His last name was a long Greek surname beginning with P. Here was my services dude, in charge of dorm furniture and appliances. I told him about absconding six months earlier with one of his Security Police dorm refrigerators... Why I took it... Where I took it... and where his "dead" unit was located. We both laughed about it... He thought I had balls to just take a fridge and "get the job done, despite the "AF system". I told him that is what SNCOs are paid to do. He said he did come up one fridge short at the SP dorm but thought he had just miscounted, finally going back to his warehouse and picking up one last fridge for the dorm. I asked him when and where I should deliver it, to get it out of my wood shop. He said no big deal and he would swing by sooner or later and pick it up in his military flatbed. He never did and it sat there, gathering more dust, for a few more months.
OK... here's the OSI part:
I get a call one day from the Shirt telling me that I needed to report to the OSI as soon as I could. When asked what about, he said he did not know (yeah... right.)
So I walk out the rear entrance of my HAF to the OSI that was right behind my building... report in and was escorted to the dimly lit office of an investigating agent. I found out much later that he was an E-6 - not that this matters. He sits me down and asks me if I know why I've been called in. I said no. (I thought maybe it was gathering info about one or more of my many personnel.) He then told me he needed to read me my rights, which I agreed to. He read them to me and afterwards asked if I wanted a lawyer present. It was then that I understood this interview had something to do with me personally... My mind raced silently over a zillion things in the ensuing few seconds before I decided there was nothing in my recent past that should interest the OSI. I declined legal representation and he begun questioning me.
To be honest, he probably asked me a dozen or two simple questions to start out with... Did I know this person. Did I know that person. Have I traveled with this person or that person. Have I visited the enlisted dorms on official or non-official business, etc., etc, etc..
After these initial questions, I was relieved to understand that I had not unknowingly sold state secrets to the Russians. I had a TS SCI Clearance earlier in my career as an Intelligence Weenie... All kinds of drastic things were flying around in my head but after understanding that whatever he was headed for had to do with my time at RAF Lakenheath, I was confident that there was nothing much to be concerned about.
My confidence seemed to show as I was eventually totally relaxed, blood pressure under control, kicked back. curious about what was coming... and dare I say, a bit cocky by this point. Fuck, dude - I'm a goddamn Senior Master Sergeant helping to run a 500+ man branch... I'm a SNCO with 5 years in Vietnam, Ten Fucking Air Medals for 327 thirteen and a half combat missions over the Ho Chi Minh Trail.... Give it your best shot!
I only recall a few questions specifically... but they were the best ones.
Eventually, he got down to the nitty-gritty of his investigation. His first "gotcha" question was this:
OSIagent: Sgt GeneHil, have you ever traveled to Amsterdam? SMSgt GeneHil: No
With a look of total surprise, the agent asked me another question.
OSIagent: Are you telling me, Sgt GeneHil that you've never been to Amsterdam??? SMSgt GeneHil: Just a sec... allow me rephrase my answer to your question. No... I have never been to Amsterdam.
There ensued a slew of less memorable questions which only served to confirm to the agent that someone had fed him some bullshit information about this Senior NCO and he, the agent who was was apparently out to bust a SNCO and make a big name for himself, was in over his head.
After about 15 minutes of mounting frustration, the agent (very red faced, uptight and stressed) exited the room and after ten minutes or so, he came back in and asked me to accompany him to his boss's office. The boss, I learned later, was a Major.
We went into the boss's office and I was invited to sit. The agent stood. The boss, apparently convinced I wasn't purchasing and supplying drugs from Amsterdam, or anywhere else, to my troops had a few more questions for me.
The boss's first "gotcha" question was this:
OSIboss: Sgt GeneHil, do you have a dorm refrigerator in your office? SMSgt GeneHil: No
Again, but now with two looks of total surprise, the boss asked me another question.
OSIboss: Sgt GeneHil, are you telling me that you do not have a dorm style refrigerator in your office? SMSgt GeneHil: Just a sec... allow me to rephrase my answer to your question. No... I do not have a dorm style refrigerator in my office.
By now, the OSIagent has the reddest face I've ever seen. The OSIboss is pissed at me... but more importantly, he is pissed at his agent. I could see the frustration written all over both faces.
The boss seemed to be a much more level headed man. He knew obviously that his agent just didn't have his shit together and after letting them all sweat a bit longer, I finally said "Would you like to hear the refrigerator story?
"Please tell us" said the boss.
It was then that I told them the entire back story of the dorm refrigerator. How and why I procured the new one - because dormitory supply were lazy shits and couldn't fix their own problem, so I fixed it for them. How the original dead fridge was sitting in my wood shop - for months and months - awaiting pickup from dormitory supply - who was told where it was and who said they'd pick it up.
It took a few minutes to tell my tail in excruciatingly minute detail. Who I talked to... How I got the fridge... How the Security Police personnel helped me get it from the third floor of their dorm, out to the parking lot and into my military vehicle. Blah, Blah, Blah.
By now you could see that the OSIboss was contemplating how he was going to break the bad news to the Wing Higher Ups - because something like this - a SNCO being suspected of drug activity, not to mention theft of government property had certainly been briefed at the highest echelons before I was ever called in.
In frustration, the OSIboss finally said meekly... "Sgt GeneHil, can you please make sure that the inoperative refrigerator gets back to barracks supply. They... ummmmm... ahhhhhh... had an inventory and seem to be missing a dorm refrigerator."
Never one to leave anything on the table I said to the OSIboss "Well sir, do you think the dorm refrigerator missing from the supply inventory is actually the dead one I have in my wood shop, covered with sawdust, or might it be the dorm fridge in my squadron's Maintenance Superintendent office... or might it be the one that my Squadron Commander has tucked next to his credenza behind his desk, where he keeps his beer cold. (Both existed as described.)
Now, totally frustrated, the OSIboss tossed his pen onto the paperwork in front of him on his desk and just growled "Just get it back."
I later learned that Sgt P (long, greek name) was a nark who turned snitch after being busted himself... narking on fellow airmen here and there. He finally was sent home and kicked out... No doubt partially, I hope, from feeding the OSI some BS about a certain SNCO that kept company with his younger enlisteds rather than his peers.
It certainly affected my career because, as I was told by the Asst DCM, when the DCM didn't want to endorse my APR because I obviously was a "druggie" no matter what the OSI investigation turned up. Hahahaha... Like I cared. I was a a goddamn Senior Master Sergeant helping to run a 500+ man branch... I was a SNCO with 5 years in Vietnam, Ten Fucking Air Medals for 327 thirteen and a half combat missions over the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Fuck... I made SMSgt first time eligible without ever completing my SNCO Correspondence Course... Promoted by the SMSgt Board because of the strength of my APRs over the course of a very successful career... and I had over 20 years TIS to boot, by the time I left RAF Lakenheath... I wasn't interested in any APR endorsements by that point.
So, kids, that's my OSI war story... Hope you enjoyed it.
Submitted August 04, 2016 at 08:31AM by genehil http://ift.tt/2ajzorW MilitaryStories
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