Camp Holloway Discussion Forum - Research Archive - 11/11/00 to 01/21/10

Retirement Ceremony Remarks

MG David Fastabend remarks at the Ft Monroe Retirement Ceremony Ft. Monroe, VA March 23, 2006

Good morning ... it is an honor to share the stage with these retirees ... and they are a tough act to follow. Each of these individuals has lived a life of service, each has had a special moment in that life of service.

If we could put all these people together, and make all of their stories into one story, imagine what that story would be! That story might go something like this:

Good morning. I have collectively spent over 150 years in the Army ...from 1972 to 2006 ... and in that time ...

A lot of stuff has happened. I've seen cotton fatigues turn into permanent pressed fatigues that turned into NATO woodland camouflage battle dress to desert BDUs to digitized ACUs. I went from starch to no starch, from pressed to fluff dried only to get back to starch again ...and now no starch. I've gone from skinny ties to fat ties to not so fat ties. From leather to corfam to suede, from green socks to black socks. From white t-shirts to green t-shirts to brown t-shirts to beige t-shirts. From sew on rank to pin on rank to velcro rank. From a green wind-breaker to a black-wind-breaker to a really expensive Gortex windbreaker - that no longer matches anything. I think all of that old uniform stuff is somewhere in my basement.

A lot of stuff has happened. I've gone from:
- M16A1's to A2's to A4's,
- From M79s to M203's to Mark 19's,
- from M60s to SAWs,
- from LAWs to AT-4's,
- from .45 Cal pistols to 9MM pistols.
- From quarter ton jeeps to HMMWV's to uparmored HMMWVs.
- From TA-50 to RFI.
- From butt packs and cargo straps to cadillac rucksacks with aluminum frames to Individual Load Bearing Equipment.
- From a real entrenching tool to that darn aluminum thing.

A lot of stuff has happened. I've been:
- totally quality managed,
- micro-managed,
- one-minute managed,
- synergized, and
- Lean Six Sigma'd.

I've had my paradigms shifted, had my paradigms broken, and learned about highly effective habits...or was it habits of highly effective people? I've also been down-sized, built-down, drawn-down, right-sized, restructured, reorganized, centralized, decentralized, deployed, extended, flagged, stop-lossed, modularized, ARFORGEN'ed, rotation-based, put on double secret probation, and finally, hopefully, today -- ETS'ed.

A lot of stuff has happened. I've been:
- Myers-Briggsed,
- Psych-evaled,
- Equal-opportunitied,
- made Considerate of Others, and
- Warrior-Ethos'd.

I'm told, by the way, that I'm an introverted, sensing, thinking, judging kind of person with a dominant, insensitive, blunt, type A+ personality, who likes to get the job done, the way it's supposed to be done, when it's supposed to be done without putting a lot of emotion, hugging, kissing, and back slapping into it.

A lot of stuff has happened. I've gone from the pay-line to "check's in the mail" to "direct deposit" to the MyPay Web-site. From the "no mistakes allowed" morning reports to, well, SIDPERS! -- which means Silly Individuals Duly Pretending Everything Is Running Smoothly. From Underwood manual typewriters, carbon paper and mimeograph machines, to IBM selectric and 3M thermal transfer ... to dot matrix to letter quality to laser quality to "paperless."

- I've been:
LANned,
WANned,
WEBbed,
E-mailed,
Home-paged,
Portaled,
Wirelessed and
Blackberried.
Somehow I feel more out of touch than ever!

A lot of stuff has happened. I've gone from PT in fatigues and boots, to yellow banana suits, to Army gray, spandex and "just do it" shoes. I've gone from a male PT test and a female PT test to a unisex PT test to a harder PT test, at least for us older folks. From WACs to no more WACs. From male and female segregated basic training to integrated back to segregated and back to integrated. From Basic Here and AIT There to OSUT. From draftees to volunteers. From "the Army wants to join you," to "be all you can be," to "the Army of One."

And now I realize I really have been all I can be, but it's going to take a lobotomy to get that "be all you can be" jingle out of my head!

A lot of stuff has happened. I've gone from long hair to no hair from handlebar mustaches to almost invisible ones. From no awards to awards bloat to no awards and back again. From "no control" to "weight control" to "less control" to "out of control." I've gone from MOS tests to Skill Qualification Tests to Self Development Tests to "no tests," unless you count the Common Task Test.

A lot of stuff has happened. I've gone from Cold War to post-Cold War to Other than War to Global War on Terror. I've seen Forward Deployed turned into Power Projection turned into Global Repositioning. Active Defense turned into Airland Battle, Airland Battle turned into Full Dimensional Operations, and now Full Spectrum Operations. I've been ARTEPd, ExEvaled, NTCd, JRTCd, BCTPd and MRE'd. Somehow all of these events were consistently hot, cold, dusty and wet.

Yes, my retirees -- A lot of stuff has happened. And we honor you for it. But a lot is left unchanged. In a few moments the audience will have a chance to shake hands with you. They will look deeply into your eyes. In those eyes they will find a message. Your eyes will tell them this:

lf you want to find out who we are, Just ask us where we've been - From the frozen fields of Valley Forge To the trail called Ho Chi Minh. Through the glory and the sacrifice We did our job each day. We were citizens and soldiers And Army all the way! When we were needed, we were there. We were there when we were needed, We were there. No, it wasn't always easy, And it wasn't always fair, But when freedom called we answered We were there!

A Lot of Stuff Has Happened. You were There. Thank you and your families. God bless you and keep you on the rest of your Journey Through Life!