Movement Officer. That is an interesting name for an officer much less a job. Kinda like “Brigade travel agent and tour guide” is a better name, but that might not cover it all. Tour guides keep you on track, travel agents schedule all the tickets and hotels and special busses; but still there is more. Can we add in baby sitter? Counselor? Police officer? How about adding Parent, principal and disciplinarian and sheep dog all rolled into one.
“I was like, gee, I can’t yell at my grandpa, you know? But he was talking to me and he must be about sixty or something, and I said, “Can we just insert “Ass chewing” here and get on with the conversation?” All that white hair and he says, “I guess you are pissed, huh?” I had already taken three breaths and of course they didn’t need me to help (they know what they are doing…) them so they got their own deal. I told him he would have to write his own letter to the General and I wasn’t going to do it for him. He is doing that now. She can be tough (recommendation: don’t get on her bad side!)
The Movement Officer plans all the movement and shipping for everything in the whole brigade. By plane, train, truck or automobile she plans it months in advance by weight, size, type, vehicle, container, contents and people. Who is going to get what shipped when is all decided by echelons above reality based on her inputs (via a special computer program or two). Those air force jets don’t just “show up”. They are scheduled weeks and months in advance as they figure out how to move all the stuff to where it needs to go back and forth on time and on budget. Some stuff goes by ship, some by air and some early and some late. Everything is weighed. Each piece has a “load plan” figured out by civilians and military and there is no “extra room”. Every load is perfectly filled. Not an extra conex, bag or pallet will fit. And if your carefully calculated weights aren’t right (oops! Too heavy!) the air force guys leave it on the ramp. They play hardball and being stupid isn’t an excuse.
Our movement officer is either extremely underpaid or is actually doing a lousy job and we don’t know it. Six months of training; a level of organization and an ability to lead a disparate group of people who don’t work for you is a tough job. Our UMO, CW2 Mandy Fischer is up for it!
About what is she, maybe 5’2”? (actually 5’ 1 ¾”) and about 26. You can tell she has a temper when she needs one. Oh, and she is a texting machine. Maybe Hispanic (okay, Mexican, but when you meet her you aren’t sure since she still uses her ex-husband’s name.) When we first met it was at Ft. Rucker at the ATX (Aviation Training Exercise) in February 2010 (which is where everybody is going again in two days that isn’t going early to Kuwait to “make smooth the way.”) She was texting and smoking and texting and texting and I would ask, “Can you do this on that computer for us?” And she would look at me with those brown eyes, raven hair and a wide pouty mouth slightly open and grimace a little, like she was going to think about it. Maybe a, “who are you? Why are you talking to me?” Then a little twist of her head, and say “Sure sir. No problem!” and get it done. Then she would text again.
She works for me but like most in the section they all do something highly specialized and the work can’t be cross trained. Why she came to that ATX exercise was a mystery (her job wasn’t simulated at all; all the rest of it is a big simulation playing BDE HQ). But when something needed to get done she would do it (and then get back to texting). Of course her job is hard to simulate. When you do the real job it is a lot harder than any simulation and takes months of preparation (for the big moves). For little moves it takes a week or two, but it all takes time after she does her part.
Married? No, boyfriend. Family? Moved away for a year or two and just missed the big Mexican family gatherings. She is the most successful one in her family of the children. The Army really helps people get ahead, make a living, be responsible and take responsibility. She missed it so she lives a few blocks away from Mom and everybody lives within three miles of each other. She volunteered to come. Works in the Big HQ at OTAG in Sacramento most of the time. How much fun can that be?
“They did what wrong again? I can’t figure this out.” I needed it explained again in small words because it didn’t make any sense. “They scheduled the air force to move a bunch of pallets for stuff that they don’t even have.” “What do you mean “stuff they don’t even have?” Incredible. We have been working like dogs inspecting (Coast Guard for sea borne), transporting, supervising crossing the “T’s” and dotting the “i” to make sure we have what we have and what we do have will ship and weighs the right amount and they ordered transportation for pallets of stuff they don’t even have? How can you make plans to transport stuff you don’t even have here? All the preparation normally requires that you see the equipment, inspect it, certify it, load it again and then stage it for later movement. But they just figured out they don’t even have it? Yes I agree. He does need to write that letter by himself!
Up to this point the 7-227th ARB has been down at SFH doing Apache (AH-64) training before we got here. It is a special Army program that keeps the whole unit together for 2 years while they learn the intricacies of the AH-64D. (This is where you should say “Ooooh! Wow! AH-64Ds! They must be special!”) They are special alright; so special that they have been busy and they weren’t working with us or for us until (officially) about 1 January. How about an example?
They have been so busy one of their S1 sergeants wrote an email to our S1 that was essentially this (and I quote from memory…) “Sergeant: We are really busy down here (and of course our HQ is just sitting around playing Hearts?). We are going to Iraq! (Aren’t we all?) We are working 8-12 hour days (Wow! They are on vacation!) We don’t have time to get you your Personnel Status report on time. Just be glad we sent it at all! (I wouldn’t want that sergeant to meet the S1 Officer in a well lit room; she would rip him a new body cavity and then remove his head from his neck and spit down it; in other words she was extremely put out!) So like I said we know they have been real busy because they told us.
So now that the “Grandpa” Warrant Officer UMO (for the 7-227th) ordered and then cancelled a plane that had been planned for months to transport by strat-air (airplane) stuff they didn’t even have he needed to write a letter.
But wait! There is MORE! Did I mention she has spunk and a professional attitude? Exhibit #2: Uncle LTC Lou…he deserves his own post to properly express how he communicates, but in summary she told me this: “He was yelling at me and yelling at me for like 10 minutes and I stood there with my hands on my hips leaning against a locker, trying not to scream or roll my eyes too much…” “I guess he really liked that!” “Yeah. It kept his fuse lit, but anyway I took a deep breath and waited until all his bad words were finished. When he was finally done yelling I said, “That’s great sir, I am glad that these are your helicopters and all your stuff is yours and you are a battalion commander and all that. But if that stuff of yours goes on MY airplane and if you don’t want to do it the way I say then it just won’t get on board.”
“Did that quiet him down?” “Oh yeah! All these people…I have to let them yell, complain and curse and when they finally finish I say, “Are you done? Because this is how you have to do it. I mean it isn’t me; it is the rules; rules from Movement Command, the Air Force, the ADAG at Hood, the port at Kuwait, the port at Beaumont and everybody else has rules. If you put the wrong stuff in the containers, don’t get it inspected and signed off, weighed, picked up on time, or look cross eyed at them they just leave your stuff. Or you have to get a General officer for every screw-up. Like the 7-227th.”
“So far we are doing okay though? It seems like everything is going really well?”
“So far we are doing great! Our little screw-up is nothing like they are used to around here at Fort Hood. Especially since we aren’t stationed here, we aren’t active duty all the time and even though we got a LOT of stuff, it is all going very well.” She returned to her texting.
My roommate on the first tour, CW2 Joe Haggarty, was a UMO. I rarely saw him as he was off daily doing UMO stuff that was a mystery to the rest of us. He must have done a lot measuring, though, for he took to having a tape measure with him at all times, even in the mess hall. It all worked out fine and we got there in good order. As I recall, coming home was a lot easier on him.
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