SOUVENIR HUNT

Back in the “good old days” (i.e., Nam) when the Army invaded Cambodia in 1970 (I was about as far in the rear at that time as one could get), the lack of a major number of enemy to kill turned the assault into “The Great Souvenir Hunt.”

Getting your hands on stuff to take home has always a big deal in those after combat moments, no matter what war, but how would you like to have been these two troops?

It happened in Ninewa Province, Iraq, back on February 9. From Military.Com.

“Two Garry Owen troops assigned to Ghost Battalion, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, Pfc. Ryan Kennedy and Spc. Isaiah Johnson, grunts assigned to Company A, 2nd Battalion, 7th Cav, made the discovery during a search.

“The day's find included 30 blasting caps, about 250,000 rounds of small-arms ammunition, 25 grenade fuses, 37 high-explosive anti-tank weapons, 100 unfused grenades, one Iranian PG-7 grenade rocket, six Chinese 75mm APERS rocket fuses, 13 French 68mm SPAMV rockets, 72 rocket motors, 10 Iraqi 40mm rockets, 221 mortars, 300 various fuses, 40 pounds of propellant, 50 pounds of detonation cord, 13 PG-7 launchers, 17 AK-47 assault rifles, one Russian machine gun, two sniper rifles, one PKC machine gun, 40 million Iraqi Dinar, more than 400 fake identification cards, and various Motorola radios, including one Iraqi police radio believed to have belonged to an IP who had been previously kidnapped and subsequently killed.”

Nice going, troopers.

You will also want to check THIS video out. It's just another story about the guys you won't hear about.

In this case it's the people who disarm IEDs. There is some footage that had me wincing away from the screen waiting for the bang to go off.

I salute anybody doing EOD anywhere!