Five Contractors I Met Overseas

***Inspired from a “Task & Purpose” article from 2016***

Being overseas has afforded me the privilege of meeting some of the most amazing veterans and humans to ever serve our nation. However, I’ve also met some the most “eccentric” and unique people as well. Here are some of the dudes I’ve met while security contracting abroad.

The One and Done-er

I’ve met a lot of these dudes. Confused about the next step in life, or even possibly awaiting another a city/federal government job back home. Either way most of them are usually pretty recently separated from service, with possibly a stint in a local community college to give the ‘ole college thing a try. These dudes are pretty solid, and are often extremely missed when they leave contract, but cheers for them for doing bigger and better things!

The Old Dude

This dude has been at it from the beginning. Most likely this man helped stand up the KBOSS contract with CSA or even the KFOR/IFOR contracts when KBR had them in the 90s, regardless, this dude has seen it all. From the 500 a dollar day static gigs to now barely being able to make 200 a day as a supervisor. His experience of doing static security is second to none and while you’d think he look like the epitome of the “GWOT MERC”, he’s honestly a sad overweight White/Hispanic dude who’s counting the days till he can be back with his 21-year-old Asian girlfriend.

The guy who was never in the military or a cop

You look at this dude and just go “what in tarnation?”. He has about twelve plate carriers, the best “frog”  tops, the newest 5.11’s, and the flyest solomans. This dude looks the part (in his eyes), but when you ask him about his background he gets real weird about it. Most likely his brother/friend/neighbor was in the game for a bit and was able to figure out a way to manipulate his resume to get him a flightline gig on Bagram. Sadly, that’s probably the highest point of his life coming from some small town in Alabama, even though now he has the unrealistic aspiration that he can hang on a mobile contract.

The Guy who is going to WPS

This dude was a motor T mechanic with probably a total of 9 hours outside the wire and barely qualified on the static range. He’ll tell you about all the NRA certs he has, and even mentions about graduating from CRI yet everything about him says otherwise. He’s also told you he’s been waiting on a class date for the past six months yet he’s been working the lanes at KBOSS for about 2 ½ years. He’s not a bad guy at all, just a dude whose “chasing the dragon”, thinking he’ll be in Benghazi running guns for thirteen hours when he probably couldn’t even last for 13 minutes.

The Liar/Embellisher

This dude is probably in his mid-40s and got out before the GWOT. He’ll tell you he’d try to come back but ended up on contracts instead. He’ll also possibly tell you how crazy Mogadishu was and how he was attached to the 75^th, or how he was training resistance fighters during the Balkan wars as well. Eventually it’ll most likely come out that he’s a creep, that did four years as a bulk fueler in the Air National Guard, and is desperately trying to get his DoD secret renewed so he doesn’t face the impending child support lawsuit that awaits him when goes back stateside.

Hopefully this gives you a brief view on some of the memorable characters I met while abroad! Please feel free to give a shout to anyone I missed.