Visiting BCT gets cool stuff; we get shafted

The Army Times ran a story on the 26th about the 4000-soldier strong rotational armored brigade combat team that's in Korea right now [Source]

In contrast to the permanent units here, which experience 8 to 12 percent turnover monthly, the brigade is on a nine-month deployment. The article highlighted the unit's experiences and training since its arrival in July, including a 35 day exercise in the area closest to the demilitarized zone.

According to the 2nd Infantry Division commander, MG Ted Martin, the division staff has had to iron out some administrative kinks along the way, including the type of deployment orders to issue and whether people receive meal cards to eat at the dining facilities. Unlike most deployments, such as those to Iraq or Afghanistan (where nobody needed a meal card because *everyone* ate at the dining facility), some people will keep their food allowance.

Other issues include bedding materials like sheets and pillowcases -- the unit didn't bring any, so everyone is getting fielded sheets at the unit's expense. Meanwhile, the soldiers in my unit -- the ones on 12 month assignments -- still have to buy their own.

And the dining facilities will be improved. According to Martin, “Soldiers coming here on a nine-month tour, we want them to have the best possible places to unwind ... we invested quite a bit of our money into enhancing some of them with some of the creature comforts you normally wouldn’t find." Additions include blenders for fruit and protein shakes, Panini presses and waffle irons.

So the guys on nine-month "deployments" get cool, new stuff, while the guys on 12-month "normal" assignments get ignored.

How typical for us logisticians.