The NFL is continuing this summer its legacy of visiting U.S. military troops overseas. Forty-four years after the first trip, with more than 160 active and former players having traveled to more than 20 countries on USO tours, the NFL-USO partnership is continuing to break new ground. This current summer tour to Afghanistan represents the second time the NFL has brought a group of coaches overseas to visit the troops.
The NFL's Director of Community Affairs, David Krichavsky, is accompanying four current NFL head coaches -- Minnesota's Brad Childress, Carolina's John Fox, Cincinnati's Marvin Lewis, and Philadelphia's Andy Reid -- on a tour of U.S. military bases in the Persian Gulf.
Day 4
They say that when a soldier goes to war, his entire family goes to war. That axiom was poignantly depicted for our group on Day 4 of the 2010 NFL-USO Coaches tour.
Andrew Childress, the 21-year old son of Minnesota Vikings coach Brad Childress, enlisted in the Marine Corp at 19, fulfilling a goal he had since he was 8. After over a year of training, Andrew Childress deployed this past May to southern Afghanistan with the 3-3 Marines and is stationed at a small combat outpost, COP Spinghar. Southern Afghanistan, the ancestral home of the Taliban and still a Taliban stronghold, has seen some of the most intense fighting of the war.
Before our USO tour departed for Afghanistan, the NFL and USO inquired as to whether it would be possible to reunite Brad and Andrew Childress on Afghani soil. However, all signals we received were that such a rendezvous would be highly unlikely. Andrew is stationed in the south of Afghanistan; we'd be in the north. Air assets to move people from one place to another -- as we experienced in trying to get from Germany to Afghanistan -- are scarce and especially hard to come by for non-essential missions.
Therefore, it was a total surprise when we landed at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan on the morning of Day 4 of our tour and Scott Past, a veteran planner of several NFL-USO tours who is stationed at Bagram AB, boarded our C17 airplane and quietly pulled me aside to let me know that Andrew Childress was waiting outside our plane, waiting for his father.
Hearing this terrific news, I quickly told our photographer to deplane with his camera to catch what would surely be an indelible moment. Then, wanting to reunite father and son, I asked Brad Childress to help bring our group's luggage to the van that was waiting outside the plane for us on the flight line -- handing him two bags to help get him on his way.
As a number of us watched from the plane, Brad Childress walked across the flight line, deposited the two bags in our van and returned to the plane -- all while walking right by his son who he hadn't seen in two months without recognizing him!
By the time Brad Childress returned, all the coaches were ready to deplane. He grabbed one last bag and left the C17 with the rest of the group. As has been the group's practice throughout our tour, the coaches said hello and shook hands with every man and woman in uniform they encountered as they walked across the flight line to their van. After shaking five or six hands and stopping for a picture or two, Brad Childress approached the next service member down the line.
"Hi. How are you? I'm Brad Childress ... ANDREW!!"
Brad Childress had begun to introduce himself to his own son, before realizing that the now mustached and war-experienced man standing before him was his son Andrew. He wrapped Andrew in a bear hug, and they embraced for at least a minute. It might have taken months, thousands of miles of travel, and two passes at his son, but Brad Childress was now reunited with his boy.
The day didn't end there. The four coaches met with hundreds of troops across various parts of the sprawling base, which serves as our main hub of operations in Afghanistan. Also touring with us were Lance Corporal (LCpl) Andrew Childress and a buddy from his platoon, LCpl Garrett Carnes, who had made the trip up from COP Spinghar to Bagram Air Base with Andrew. LCpl Carnes was chosen to accompany Childress because, among other reasons, he's the biggest football fan in the platoon.
After having lunch at one of the DFACs on base at Bagram, the coaches visited a MRAP training facility. MRAPs -- Mine Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles -- are the latest generation of armored military Humvees. The four coaches went in the MRAP simulator the troops use to train. One maneuver the coaches practiced was the "rollover" -- where the vehicle flips a complete 360 degrees on its horizontal axis. When the coaches emerged from the simulator, they were a bit dazed and drenched in sweat, but they still had enough of their wits about them to sign autographs and pose for pictures with all those in the training facility.
A definite highlight as we toured Bagram on Day 4 was visiting with the helicopter and fighter jet pilots and learning about the various airstrike capabilities that we deploy in Afghanistan. We initially visited the rotary wing hangar (helicopters) and met with maintenance workers who keep our Apaches, Blackhawks, Chinooks, and other helicopters flying. The coaches took particular interest in the Apaches, which are devastatingly lethal assault helicopters that use 30-millimeter machine guns, hellfire missiles, and rockets to attack the enemy. Cpt. Clark gave the coaches a video presentation of the Apaches' strike capabilities, using footage of actual Apache missions from previous engagements.
After the "film session," Brad Childress said to Cpt. Clark -- referring to his and Andy Reid's background on the offensive side of the ball and Marvin Lewis' and John Fox's background as defensive coordinators -- "you got two offensive coaches and two defensive coaches in this room. All of us would agree though that the Apache is one heck of an offensive weapon."
Perhaps the most fascinating stop of our day was at the Bagram Detention Center -- the prison at Bagram that holds 600 enemy combatants, jihadists, terrorists, and various other criminals. Very rarely do "outsiders" get to visit this facility; it was real-eye opener for us.
When the four coaches arrived at the detention center, they first met with over a hundred of the MPs (military police) who work at the facility. After signing autographs, the coaches addressed the group. Fox might have said it best, "I know you guys may not have the jobs that get the most glory," alluding to the fact that the MPs work all day inside the walls of a prison. "But we are so thankful for what you are doing because you are keeping the bad guys away from all of us at home."
We then received a tour of one of the minimum security detention cell blocks. Each detention cell housed multiple prisoners -- maybe eight or so -- in a light, airy space. There was plenty of room. In a few cells, guys were running around in circles or jogging in place to stay in shape. There was also a yard out back where prisoners spent one hour per day and a library where they could access books as well as take language classes. Call to prayer was observed five times per day, as per Islamic custom.
All that being said, it was prison -- not Club Med. The walls were thick and the rules strict. And the guys were prisoners -- even though most of them didn't speak English, they had picked up a few choice words that allowed them to hurl cat-calls as we walked by on our tour of the cell blocks. Don't worry though, I think the coaches had heard worse.
Following the detention center tour, the coaches had dinner with MPs from the detention center, visited a small satellite USO Center on the east side of Bagram and stopped by one of the gyms on base to say hello to the troops working out there.
It had been a long day. It actually began in Germany with a long-overdue overnight flight to Afghanistan. We had crisscrossed Bagram AB. We spent the day with everyone from family to prisoners -- and several troops in between. We hadn't seen it all yet, but we had seen a lot. It was time to get some rest.
