1 50 1 https://omeka-test.library.appstate.edu/files/original/cf0b855fd30544341a060fd0242a5502.pdf 8ce621536de54bd1671bd959296a299f PDF Text Text Oral History Interview with David Owen Me?? DO: David Owen Me: Alright, so what's your name? DO: David Owen Me: What rank were you? DO: Lance corporal, Marine Corps Me: And how old are you? DO: 22 years old Me: So when did you first enlist? DO: I was 20 years old Me: So you got out of high school? DO: When to work for a while, just noticed things that with my job and everything weren't that happy and everything, kind of got in with the wrong crowd. I just knew if I kept going the way I was I wouldn't have a very bright future so, one of the guys I worked with had been in the Marines for seven years at that time and just the way he carried himself and the way he acted around all of us influenced me to join. Me: Alright, so that was a big influence on. DO: Yeah he was my main boos at work so, it kind of, you know being around him all the time made it easier for him to influence and always be there and stuff and just the way he carried himself, and solved all the problems and stuff we had. Me: Did you have anybody in your family that was in the service? DO: No, nobody in my immediate family or like great grandparents or grandparents or anything. Everybody we have is like one or two cousins, nothing real, real, close. Me: So how long were you in? DO: I'm still in, I've been in for three years now. Me: What unit and battalion were you? 1 �DO: I deployed with CLR-15, out of camp Pendleton, CA. My unit is out of Greenville, SC. But we attached with CLR-15, originally it was Ammo Company then deployed and went to Security Company CLR-17 of camp Pendleton and did some security with them. Me: How many times did you deploy? DO: Just one time so far. Me: Where were you at? DO: We were in the Helmand province of Afghanistan for most of my deployment it was mostly the southern region of Afghanistan. Me: So what was that like, what was Afghanistan like? DO: It was pretty hot. Me: Really DO: The hottest day of the year for us was July 14th, it got to 146 degrees. And it's a real dry heat, if it was around here it would be worse feeling that hot with the moister in the air, but with that heat your sweat is evaporating as soon as it appears, so it’s easy to get dehydrated. If you're out doing anything you got 80 pounds of gear on you, you're wearing the camo, which is long sleeve, long pants, Kevlar helmet, the big MTV or the military tactical vest which has the sappy plates in it, you carrying a rifle, it’s real heavy. Me: So are you carrying that kind of weight every time you go out? DO: anytime you leave the base you got 80 something pounds strapped to you with armor. Me: God, so where you in a pretty well built fire base or was it something you constructed when you got there? DO: The main base we went into was camp leatherneck, which has been there since the initial push back in 01 after September 11th, which has been the biggest base, longest base that's been in Afghanistan. It was pretty well, like built, I mean it's over three square miles, it’s pretty caught up on times, like it’s not like, you got like two or three different chow halls, you got a PX to go shop and buy little things you need.' But for us doing security we were jumping base to base, taking convoys from one base to another and doing security for them so some of the bases we went to wouldn’t be but 500 yards of base and just always taking fire and getting mortared, always have a full alert on those little bases but the bigger bases you weren't always full alert it was more secure. Me: So you were running security on convoys? 2 �DO: Yeah I was the Mark-19 gunner on a MRAP and a, what was the other one called, we had MRAPs and, I can't remember what they're called now. But it was the two new vehicles that replaced the Humvees, I was a gunner for most of it on a Mark-19, which is a belt fed grenade launcher, so it was uh, I had the big gun. We'd take the supply convoys from the bigger base, everything comes into leather neck and gets dispersed out from there, and you got to take you know, for the enemy, like if they see nothing but the MRAPs and stuff coming through their not going to really mess with them because that's just recon and all the bigger like, all the infantry battalions just pushing through doing patrols trying to find people. What they would do is attack the supply convoys, they knew if they could cut off our supply's it would hurt us more than anything, so that and it's a longer chain of vehicles so there's more chances of hitting something, weather it was one of the bigger, like the 18 wheeler looking trucks we have, where it was something like that or the security trucks, they knew they had better chances of hitting something in a supply convoy than anything else. Me: Did you all have a lot of routinely heavy fighting, or was it in spurts? DO: It was in spurts, the first couple of months I was there it was pretty calm, I deployed from March till October and it didn't really pick up till late April. In late April and May is when it really started to pick up and everything then by the time it was early July and August it was staring to calm down a little bit, but then after, after August for some reason it picked back up again pretty good. I don't know why it happened in spurts but it was different areas we were going to and everything else so it might have just been the area we were at. Me: So what was the first fire fight you got in, like I sure that was a pretty hectic crazy experience? DO: First one we had, we had took like we had been out of the wire and had taken just a couple small ambushes and our command told us just to push through so we didn't return fire, the gunners just get down inside the truck where their protected by the armor of the truck too, but we just pushed through. But then, the first one we were stopped because we had a truck problem and it was right before an area they were already going to attack us probably, and we were down for a truck having a flat tire, and the security, we left out from where the convoy was and pushed out a little ways to where we could see more of an open range around us. So one of the trucks, I think was west facing took an RPG round, it didn't hurt anybody but that's whenever we knew things were serious now. So we had to just light up the mountain side because we couldn't see anything that was going on or where anybody was really at we couldn't see any actual personal or people so we just go the word to aim at the mountain side and light it up. Me: So a lot of their stuff is small ambushes that you encounter? DO: Yeah, we had a couple that was caused by the IED's, the explosive devices that take out a vehicle. And right when we're down because they blew the axel or tire of a vehicle or something, 3 �we'd be down for that reason and then, when the place an IED they'll watch it, watch that are and wait for you to get hit with it and while your down and they sense your vulnerable that's whenever they would attack. Because they know you can't leave that area. Me: So being over in Afghanistan, what was the main thing you missed, what were some of the main things that, I don't know, you're not use to being without? DO: Well like while your over there it really bugs you not to get to talk to everybody that much and everything, I missed the simple things like being able to go out and do whatever on the weekends, like go out and just work your normal work day as a civilian and then go out in the evening and drink beer or go to a nice restraint or go to a movie theater, you know hang out with your other friends but like when your over there everybody's going through the same thing and you know you're stuck there for the time your deployed so you like start to adjust to it and you start to miss your family a lot because you don't get to talk to them a whole, whole bunch. Just moving from different bases and different things that go on, you go two or three weeks without talking to anybody so. Me: So like when you’re deployed with this group of guys you all train together, have been together for a while right? DO: Yeah, some of the best friends that you'll ever make is the guys you know are stuck in the same situation you are over there and you knows no matter what happens they got your back. I mean I'm not saying that normal civilian friends won't have your back if something goes down but like the military guys that are there when it does come down to people shooting at you and everything and knowing you have to trust them to have your back and they have to trust you too, It's a totally different friendship than anything else. Me: So the bonds that came out, the friends you made there... DO: Oh yeah Me: That's pretty important stuff? DO: Yeah through the military you meet people from all over the place, I got friends that I still talk to today that were with the British Marines and stuff, that we had to do convoys and stuff with them, and like just the difference in the world that they grew up in and you grew up in, not to mention just different Marines from like Texas or California or up north compared to just the people you knew from just being raised and not being that far away from the place you've lived your whole life. Me: So you still keep up with a lot of those guys? DO: Yeah, I talk to an awful lot of them on Facebook or e-mail or stuff like that, just different Marine buddies and different British Marine guys I met. Me: So are you still in that same unit or... 4 �DO: Yeah I'm with the same unit. Me: So in the Marine Corps will you stay with that same unit or will you get transferred out? DO: You can get transferred out with any branch, like4 my unit in Greenville isn't going to change because I'm with the reserves and everything now but like as an active duty personal, it’s hard to be active duty and stay on the same base, or same unit, you'll have orders come in from like Camp Lejeune, NC and they'll move you from there to Camp Pendleton, they'll move you to Japan and the bases there, just where ever the military sees that it needs you or your rank. Because they look at you as an individual but over all they look at everyone as, ok we need two or three lance corporals or two or three sergeants or something, we need them to be in Japan so, they'll be like well we have more than what we need at Pendleton so we'll just take a couple from there, I mean when you sign up for the military you sign your life away for that contract and where they need you they'll put you. Me: So what kind of lessons, did you have any lessons that came out of your time overseas or any kind of long lasting change? I know that's not a very well worded question... DO: You learn more about yourself in an environment like that, like not like your alone by yourself or anything like that, but just knowing what you can mentally handle in life, I mean a lot of people without joining the military or anything like that don't really know how stressed out they can be, I mean I'm not saying that any other job should be that stressful compared to the military but the life on the line situation and then someone at a base is telling you orders to do when they aren't even out there in the trucks with you to see what the really situation going on is, and like us getting shot at and them telling us to duck in the truck and run off and not fight back, then two weeks later in that same area the same ones that were shooting at you end up hurting somebody or killing two or three people because they got a bigger ambush that time or just being able to pass up the opportunity to take out the enemy now to do it later on and maybe they end up hurting more people between now and then. Me: So how did you feel about the officers in your... DO: You'll like some of them, some of them you won't agree with their decisions but over all you do what your told and if, you can lose your rank and all kind of stuff if you disobey a direct order from an officer, I mean it's better to so what they say right then and if it's wrong their the one that takes the fall for giving you the order, it's better to do what's said then to think for yourself and do something that's wrong in the long run and lose everything you have for a small decision. Me: So what was the thing you hated most about being overseas? DO: It's hard being over there, I mean I was over there for 8 months straight pretty much, missing your family is tough, and like at the time I was deployed I had a girlfriend over here, just missing her and not just seeing people and not having the real ability to touch people while 5 �you're talking to them, you know using Skype if you have a web cam you can use to actually see them the rest of the time it's just Facebook chat of phone calls home, you know not being able to see them or actually be with them when you're talking to them being 13 or 14 hours ahead of their schedule make it hard to line up a time to communicate with someone back home. So mainly just like the small things about communication and not being with the ones you care about the most. Me: Other than missing people or not getting to see friends and family were there any day to day things that drove you nuts over there? DO: Foods not very good because it's the cheapest food there is and it's made for a thousand or so people at once. So it's not like, every now and then we'd get something decent to eat but if you out on convoy its nothing but the MREs which will stuff you up and they're not very delicious either and in the chow halls its eggs that are made out of, powdered eggs and stuff like that, just small things like that not nothing horrible to deal with. Me: Were there a lot of political feelings in your unit, did you all talk politics or where the officers political or any sense of political allegiances or was it just kind of doing your job? DO: We didn't really talk politics we'd see it on the news and we'd get news updates if it was something that was happing back home, if it was something happing with the president or something bad or weather a certain governor was pushing for this, but mainly over there it was just focusing on what we needed to do there not about anything going on back home unless it was directly going to affect me. But like I had been deployed during the pay stop for two weeks, when that happened I'm sure that everyone that was deployed when that happened changed a lot of stuff over there, being something political that happened here, I mean that would have been something weird to deal with. Knowing you're going out to put your life on the line for the government and your country and everything you believe in, and all the sudden they stop paying you while your over there fighting for their rights and freedom. Me: So what was the thing you enjoyed most about your deployment? DO: It would be the bond that I made with some of the guys and other friends over there, one of my buddies from South Carolina Randy, me and him didn't even know each other before the deployment and now we're like best friends. One of the other guys I deployed with he was from Boston and he'd always pick on me for being a country boy and I'd pick on him for being a Yankee and just like the bond you make with different people that you would have never met any way in the world except for being in the military with them. Just like the friendship you've made with other people. 6 � https://omeka-test.library.appstate.edu/files/original/8e06d26fe4ae33b93a8b58977204206a.mp3 9805ab753d494dd85aec321e3b0f735c Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Appalachian State University American Military History Course Veterans Oral History Project Description An account of the resource Each semester, the students of the American Military History Course at Appalachian State University conduct interviews with military veterans and record their military experiences in order to create an archive of oral history interviews that are publicly accessible to researchers. The oral histories are permanently available in the Appalachian State University Special Collections. The project is supervised by Dr. Judkin Browning, Associate Professor of History at Appalachian State University and all interviews are transcribed by the student interviewers. Copyright Notice: Copyright for the Veterans Oral History Project’s audio and transcripts is held by Appalachian State University. These materials are available for free personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that proper citation is used (e.g. Veterans Oral History Project, University Archives and Records, Special Collections, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC). Oral History A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge. Interviewer The person(s) performing the interview. Interviewer unknown Duration Length of time involved (seconds, minutes, hours, days, class periods, etc.) 0:21:14 Transcription Any written text transcribed from a sound. 6 pages Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Interview with David Owen, undated Description An account of the resource David Owen, Marines, Lance corporal, 22 years old. In this interview David Owen talks about how his boss at work influenced him to join the military. He goes on to discuss his deployment to Afghanistan and some of his experiences there. Some of his experiences include; dealing with the heat and environment, combat, the things he missed, and the bonds that were created with other soldiers. Date A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource Undated Rights Information about rights held in and over the resource Copyright for the Veterans Oral History Project's audio and transcripts is held by Appalachian State University. These materials are available for free personal, non-commercial, and educational use, provided that proper citation is used (e.g. Veterans Oral History Project, Appalachian Collection, Special Collections, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC). Subject The topic of the resource Owen, David Veterans United States Interviews Language A language of the resource English Afghanistan David Owen Marines