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CENTCOM Personal Statement

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CENTCOM was a beast the likes of which I had never seen. It was a massive conglomeration of information, orders, and intelligence. There is where I got a birds eye view of the how and why things are done at the Strategic level and how those orders trickle down to the tactical. I held several positions while there, from exercise officer to experimental teams to JIOC watch officer to courier. While in exercises I developed my passion for travel and love of working with foreign cultures and militaries. I worked in UAE, Qatar, Germany, and Egypt with nearly every allied nation in the AOR. Learning their cultures, the reasons for how they think and operate were eye openers for me. Although there was much good during my time at CENTCOM, there …show more content…
Upon reassignment there, I was immediately placed in training to be a Tomb Guard. I spent the next five months of my life completely dedicated to my work. The end result was that I earned the least awarded badge in the military: The Guard, Tomb of the Unknown Soldier Identification Badge. Less than a month into that training I realized that the Badge itself was the least of what that duty was about. That was the most honorable and amazing duty I have ever done and probably will ever …show more content…
I excelled in every respect and was having an absolute blast every single day. I also met the absolute love of my life while there: Caroline Bernabei. She is everything that I could ever dream of and more. Caroline, is intelligent, driven, successful, beautiful, and one of the most caring people on the planet. It was not until I met her that I knew what true love was. She was also an excellent KW pilot as well! I made Pilot in Command extremely quickly and was selected to deploy to Afghanistan with a small contingent of Scout and Attack pilots. My deployment as a pilot was a whirlwind. It was during this time that I was able to see the effects of raw data being transformed into actionable intelligence and being acted upon. I witnessed intel that we collected come full circle and was able to prosecute several targets in that manner. I was in many firefights and had several close calls, but none as close as when I got shot in the chest while leaning out the door maintaining eyes on insurgents so we could come back around and do a gun run on them. The bullet struck my radio and fragmented, cutting my face and neck with pieces penetrating my chest and eye. I was able to stay in the fight for another two hours until the engagement was over. I was later awarded the Purple Heart, or as I call it the enemy marksmanship badge. It is one award that I never wished to receive, but I am so thankful for how it

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