I was lucky enough to have an RRT-Minus when I took the ACM detachment to Haiti in the beautiful spring of 2004. They had arrived ahead of me to "secure" the American Embassy (which meant they had the hot chow and showers while the rest of us sat on the tarmac for two weeks in the same socks). The RRT was smallish: Josh Smith and Jack Dansicker. The Fort had seen fit to attach two Army assholes to them, so that made the team total out at about 2.25 people. They did a great job, and before they went home, I took them on some little adventures around the country--mostly to some beach somewhere to swim.

One fun trip was when I miscalculated the distance and drove to the DomRep border with Josh, Jack, and a Haitian Creole linguist on loan from the Navy. A fine specimen of a sailor, this guy was a pasty, bubble-gum boy who absolutely believed in zombies and vou dou majick. He was always terrified when I asked him to come along on our little recces, but he was probably the best linguist we had, so I put up with him. When I realized where we were, I turned about and stopped at a huge saltwater lake. The linguist assured us that there were alligators or crocodiiles or something in the water, but Josh, Jack, and I stripped to our shorts, stacked out M4s with the linguist and took a nice long bathe. Curiously, the two Haitians who passed along the beach hardly paid us any attention.

Of course (as on two other occasions) when I met with the S-2 the next day to give him my SIGSUM, I was a little red from the sun. "You guys go to the beach again?" he asked me.

I smiled and said, "Nossir. We played frisbee all day out on the LZ."

He just smiled back. And that was that.

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