Greetings, Comrades.

The Army has once again made a liar out of me. My orders changed, and I ended up in Balad, Iraq instead of Afghanistan. I arrived safely on 20 December after 3 weeks at Fort Benning, GA. I am assigned to the support operations section of the 402nd Army Field Services Brigade, a field unit of Army Material Command.

Thanks to a VFW post in Florida, everyone in the unit had a stocking filled with goodies to open on Christmas. The chow hall was decorated to the max to give everyone holiday cheer even if far from home.

I hope all is well on the home front. Everything is fine here so far, we’ve only been mortared 4 or 5 times this past week (as opposed to 4 or 5 times daily during my 2003-2005 deployment here!) 

Please give my greetings to everyone at the Post. Several of you had given me email addresses, but I unfortunately have lost them. I’d love to hear from everyone.

My snail mail address is:

MAJ Chris Shaner
402nd AFSB
APO AE 09391