Kit Up! is Heading to The Stan

Well folks, the time is almost here for Kit Up! to pack our last minute snivel gear and lift off for another pump in the Sand Box.

We're wheels up the night of 9 May and supposed to hit Kabul International at 0600 on 11 May. We're heading straight for FOB Salerno (known in the AO as "Sal") and right out to our first unit with the 101st Airborne. The schedule is to hang in RC-East for two weeks and then thread our way down to RC-South to hitch a ride on some MV-22s.

I'll be traveling with Military.com Editor Ward Carroll on this trip and we'll be pumping out blog entries, stories, pics and vids with a reckless abandon (comms permitting) primarily here, but also on Defense Tech, DoD Buzz, Under the Radar and other Military.com properties depending on the subject.

We've set up a landing page where we'll consolidate all of our content as a sort of one-stop-shop for info and gouge.

A couple of knuckle head journos tramping around a war zone armed with pens and cameras didn't set well with the old CINC House, so we'll have our security contingent along to keep the bad guys at bay. Pictured above is my personal body guard who goes by the name "Tango." Ward's got a steely-eyed killer escorting him from the same PMC who goes by "Crash"... but he and the boss must be going on one last bender before they hit the private car for Dulles, so no mugshot yet of him.

But I'm pretty sure we'll see a lot of these guys throughout the trip as well because clearly they're not camera shy. And since they're well armed (Tango's bringing a freaking M-60!) they'll likely get into things a couple of weak-kneed scribes fear to tread.

Wish us luck and we'll post as soon as we can!