I am a lifelong resident of Wisconsin. I joined the Navy via the delayed entry program while a senior in high school, getting permission from my parents as I was only 17. I went to boot camp at the end of July 1997.
Following boot camp, I went through the Nuclear Power schools pipeline in Orlando, FL; Ballston Spa, NY and NPPO Emergency Welder Training at Groton, CT.
After schooling I was then attached to USS Santa Fe (SSN-763) in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii in the Fall of 1999. Upon arriving in Hawaii, the boat was in the middle of a Western Pacific Deployment(West-Pac) so I got to wait while they attempted to get me to meet up with the boat somewhere. During this deployment the boat was rushed to the Gulf region and was within minutes of launching Tomahawks into Afghanistan on an Al-Qaeda camp, so I was told after meeting the boat.
While aboard the USS Santa Fe (SSN-763), I went to Bahrain; Singapore; Okinawa, Japan; Guam; Subic Bay, Philippines; Sasebo, Japan; Yokuska, Japan; Chinhae, South Korea; Diego Garcia, British Indian Ocean Territories; San Diego, California; Ketchikan, Alaska; and Victoria, British Columbia. I also attended HPAC, gage calibration, firefighting, and leadership school for PO2s during the summer of 2001. The leadership school being interrupted by 9-11-2001. The boat had just gotten back from West-Pac and we almost went back to the Gulf but due to the delay in launching the invasion into Afghanistan we did not. We were scheduled for another West-Pac in June 2003 but this deployment was canceled by the declaration of the end of major combat operations and was delayed until after the end of my active duty commitment.
The main thing I saw that shaped my current beliefs was the disparity of quality of life between the U.S. and other countries (discussed some in my interview below, mainly what I saw in the Philippines). I was also definitely shaped by the belligerently racist views of my shipmates on and after September 11. In addition to what I saw, I started to read a lot of nonfiction during the West-Pac of 2001 and continued to read a lot while underway later on. While I can write what my beliefs are, they are constantly evolving based on my experiences so a snapshot of a certain point in my life would be better. To learn more about some of my beliefs listen to a radio interview I did here (http://tinyurl.com/24af2d) in the middle of May 2006. In the course of my reading I learned that the bus we took from the base in Singapore to the Yishun MRT station was under surveillance by Al Qaeda and there were plans to attack around the time I was there. This is detailed in the book Inside Al Qaeda.
Upon leaving the Navy I lived near Eau Claire and helped to form a Veterans for Peace group which is in the process of becoming an official chapter. I joined IVAW In 2006 because I wanted to work with veterans of my generation on the issues that are affecting us and because of what I was seeing happen in Iraq after 'major combat operations' were supposedly over back when I was still in. In the fall of 2006, I moved to Madison. That Fall IVAW-Madison was founded by myself and two other members.
