We had overlap, I was in the Army from 77-94, early retirement after Desert Storm. Jay Garner came to 2/29th ADA outside Nuremberg where I was. He took over command after the BN CDR was relieved by the 1AD Commander. Garner retired with three stars. I was the A Btry XO there until time to pcs back to the advance course and then Ft Campbell where Vinny Tedesco was our BN CDR, the best officer I ever worked for. After an ROTC slot in Georgia, I went back to Germany, to the 108th HQ in K-Town and was project officer to field the last Patriot BN that went to Germany, to Bitburg AFB. After that, I was S1 for 18 months until returning to another ROTC job at the Univ of KY. Then my last year was at Ft Knox in 2nd ROTC Region HQ where I retired. It was fun, the benefits and pay good and since then, I have not looked back.
Some of the places I was stationed at in the early 70s had NO WOMEN. No facilities whatsover for them. Hell holes in the middle of the jungle.
Think there might have been a better outcome?
I heard a lot of good things about Colonel Tedesco.
Believe it or not, I made the drive from Kleber Kaserne to Spangdahlem in 55 minutes (approx. 90 miles, of which maybe 60 was autobahn back then...lol). One of my passengers was the new S-3 who had never been in Germany. It all started when a meeting wrapped up at 5, and he blurted out, "I promised my wife I'd be home at 6 tonight." The other passenger, who was my eventual replacement, saw the gleam in my eye and said, "you shouldn't have said that."
I had a Volvo 242 GT, my favorite car of all time. I took it up to 115 on the autobahn, and was going 70-80 on the back roads to Spangdahlem. Damn, that was fun.