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thedrifter
02-20-03, 01:24 PM
By Mark Oliva, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Thursday, February 20, 2003


ABOARD USS TARAWA — Marine Cpl. Jeffery Knipe looked over the list of gear he had to fit into his pack. Sleeping bag, a chemical suit, two pairs of desert uniforms and spare boots were just a sample of the more than two-dozen items that weigh Marines down. Some of the big-ticket items not on the list: the heavy Kevlar flak jacket and helmet he would wear when he landed in Kuwait, the water he would need to carry, or his bullets and rifle.

“We carry more than what you see here,” said Knipe, an infantryman with the 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit. He was spending his afternoon inspecting the gear he would carry on his back. “With my weapon and ammunition, this gets to be about 120 pounds.”

Knipe weighs little more than the load he carries on his back. Moving out into the field, his pack towers over him, digging into his shoulders, hips and adding extra pressure on his knees and feet. He practiced moving underneath the heavy load back at California’s Camp Pendleton, sometimes at distances of 30 miles.

“It gets pretty tough,” Knipe said. “Carry that much weight, you’re not moving very fast … maybe 4 mph at the fastest.”

That’s why Knipe’s unit packs for two different missions at the same time. The main pack is stuffed with the extra uniforms and hygiene kits — gear the Marines could live without for a day or two.

Attached to the main pack, though, is an assault pack. In there are the absolute essentials — a chemical protective suit, bullets and maybe a stripped-down field meal and a sweatshirt.

“We’ve got a saying,” Knipe said. “Pack light, freeze at night. … If you want to stay warm, you’re going to have to weigh yourself down. Most of us would rather shiver than carry something we can live without.”

But what goes in the pack isn’t always a choice. As a matter of fact, where something goes in a pack is also predetermined.

Gear is standardized and packed in an exacting manner. First-aid kits are all in the same place, so a Marine aiding another won’t waste time searching for it. Same for chemical suits. Even canteens are packed the same. Thick green tape covers the adapters for Marines to drink through gas masks. The tape keeps the lids free of contamination.

“The gear list is driven by the mission,” said Staff Sgt. James Haraway, a platoon sergeant with 15th MEU. “Right now, a very large part of it is our chemical gear.”

Haraway has carried these heavy loads for the past nine years. He’s seen his own packing list get longer as the years have gone by. Night vision goggles, global positioning systems, even improved flack jackets with bulletproof ceramic plates make the list longer and the pack heavier.

“Some of the stuff got smaller because of technology,” Haraway said. “But the more technology, the more we carry. We’ve far surpassed what we used to carry.”

Still, Haraway tries to make sure his Marines don’t carry too much. The heavy loads slow the pace, but sometimes the missions come back-to-back, and Marines have to pack for several days without immediate resupply.

“We try to go as light as we can,” Haraway said. “If it’s a sustainment mission where we’re going to be out for a while, then that’s going to call for the full combat load. For the mission itself — just the assault, we try to go as light as possible.”

Staying in shape for the heavy, long haul has also remained a challenge for Marines, who have spent the last month at sea. Thirty days is long enough for muscles, hardened through 30-mile forced marches, to soften. The ship doesn’t offer the hills like Southern California, so Haraway has his Marines hike from bow to stern on USS Tarawa’s flight deck and use the ship’s steep cargo ramps to serve as floating hills.

But Marines never get used to the weight; they just learn to live with it.

Lance Cpl. Anthony Chavez, who weighs about 140 pounds, knows he’s only a few radio batteries and a couple of canteens away from having his pack match his body weight.

Chavez, who is assigned to a helicopter assault company, said time in the field can get wear down anyone, especially for Marines like himself who don’t have a truck or armored vehicle to help carry the load.

“Whenever they say the helicopters are coming, expect to walk another 10 miles to the landing zone,” he said. “Anybody who says they have no problem carrying this is lying. It hurts no matter who you are.”

http://www.estripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=13185

Sempers,

Roger