Saturday, December 7, 2013

Deanna Brown: Never Be Weak, Never Back Down - Part Three

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Third post in a five part story

DEANNA AND THE SPECIAL FORCES

It Seems someone told the 300 Haitians that the US was paying two dollars a day for tearing down that wall. She explained that was not true, and sent them on their way. They never figured out how that rumor got started.


     I asked Deanna how much of a problem being a woman in a world of fighting men was for her. “Well, there’s always initial skepticism. But once they get to know me, there’s never been a problem. My behavior generally influences those around me eventually. Never be weak, never back down, and never, but never, say, Can you carry this for me?” And, I’m sure, always use that gruff business voice I heard on the phone, though she never mentioned that.  She also mentioned that readily being willing to jump out of a plane helped a lot.


     Deanna’s initial team Sergeant in civil affairs was with the Special Forces, a Green Beret. He initially took her out to test her. They put on packs equal to one third of their body weight or 50 pounds, whichever is greater, and he took her out on a forced hike for 12 miles in less than the cutoff point time of four hours. He then gave her a compass and a map to prove she could master land navigation. After additional testing, she proved herself to Sergeant Foster. They remained close friends throughout their careers, and are still face book buddies today. Later during her tour in Haiti, she met up with Sergeant Foster and the team that she was pulled away from.  He told her that the Marines could have cared less that their team leader was a woman.  They were upset that they arrived without one.


     After five months in Haiti, she came home. She found her vet position in civil affairs had been done away with, and she was reassigned to the Army’s only airborne vet detachment, the 248th (The only one that jumps out of planes) which was also at Ft. Bragg.  Her team’s main function was to be ready for any kind of emergency situation where the Army needed vets and food inspection.  They had to be ready to go within 2 hours of being called.  She only had to deploy with that team once.  Her team was sent to do hurricane relief in the Virgin Islands. Not too bad, compared to Haiti.
     Her assignments officer suggested she put in for a year in Korea, which would be a good career move, though she would have to leave husband Keith. That was a bummer, but she grudgingly put in for Korea.


     While she was preparing for Korea, things were changing. Rules were changing regarding women in the Special Forces. The Special Forces had never had a woman attached. Some of them remembered Deanna from Haiti, knew she had proven herself there. The general feeling seemed to be, “we’ll eventually have a woman in this group, so we want one that won’t embarrass us.”
    So, instead of going to Korea, Deanna became the first woman vet ever attached to the Special Forces, the Third Special Forces Group.  3rd Group’s area was Sub Saharan Africa and the Caribbean. She immediately started preparing to support 3rd Group’s missions but since they had just returned home from Haiti, they didn’t have anything big planned right away.


     The Fifth Special Forces Group from Ft. Campbell, KY had lots of missions planned in the Horn of Africa. They would go in, work with the locals to help train them in fighting and helping with their needs. The population is very agriculture oriented. They needed a vet. They needed Deanna.  Her first mission was to Eritrea, a mixture of Christians and Moslem villages. The villages were permanent, not nomadic.  They are much like Ethiopians, and right on the Red Sea. There are two ports on the Red Sea that could become militarily important someday. This mission was humanitarian, and hopefully would help win their hearts and their good will. Their country has only been independent for six years, and they badly needed vet and medical assistance. They have very nasty diseases in their flocks, some preventable by vaccination, but they had a hard time getting the vaccine and had very few vets in the country.  Deanna worked with their Ministry Of Agriculture and planned to assist them with a vaccination campaign for Peste Petit de Ruminants (Plague of small ruminants).  It’s similar to dog distemper and was devastating to unvaccinated flocks. Deanna was able to obtain the vaccine in Kenya. Her and five Special Forces men along with their Eritrean vet assistants traveled to a different village each day in Land Rovers. They worked long, very hard days. They eventually vaccinated 140,000 of their sheep and goats. Each day, the village threw a big celebration at the end of the day, killing and roasting a goat, though they were very poor. Those people loved to see them coming. A very rewarding experience for Deanna and the men!                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                            Occasionally, they would go to a village where no, or very few, animals appeared. They would eventually learn that most all of the animals were killed the year before by the disease in a major outbreak, and only the ones that were naturally immune survived. If those immune stragglers came in, they were vaccinated anyway. The locals just felt better about it.



     These people are very hard, and very hard working people. They have to travel for great distances to reach a water well. Bad water kills many people in East Africa. After two months, her team returned to Ft. Bragg. 
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CONTINUED IN FOUR DAYS - Next, 9/11 occurs, and Deanna starts training for Iraq.


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