981st MP - Football memories

 The year was 1981. I was a Military Policeman stationed in Kitzingen  West Germany. Assigned to work with the fine men and women of the 981st MP company. Tower Rats. Guardians of NATO's nuclear arsenal.  At the time the US Army was a peacetime Army, but the cold war was still on and there were active terror cells in West Germany. The threat was real. NATO Site 35, two miles from our barracks, was carved out of the Bavarian forest and local farmland. High fences, barbed wire, and America's finest made sure those nukes never got into the wrong hands.

One platoon would "move in" to the site and provide round the clock security. One platoon would be "on-call", providing backup, performing tasks around the barracks, doing maintenance on equipment etc. The other platoon would be off duty. The three platoons rotated, so every six days you were back at the Nato site. When you went to the site for your 3 day shift, you stayed. Nobody in, nobody out!  Food and mail (and first run movies!) were brought in. Only the driver was allowed to come and go. I was actually the driver for a while and it was nice! Security measures were in place, and for good reason. To work at the site we not only needed a top secret clearance, we also had to be part of the PRP (personal reliability program). Understandably, they didn't want any loose cannon carrying a weapon who had access nuclear weapons.

Our primary job while onsite was tower duty. Guarding the bunkers, watching the fence line. Maybe the most boring job in the world. As boring as it was, it was not "observe and report" tower duty. This was "shoot to kill" tower duty. We were armed. We were dangerous. We were authorized to use deadly force.

There were two towers. Tower one was the "nice" tower. The main tower for the site, it was connected directly to the living quarters down below. 75 some steps up a spiral staircase. Big and spacious up top, it was usually a two man tower. Tower two on the other hand was the remote tower. You had to walk the fence line to get to it. Rain or shine, night or day, hot or cold. Nobody liked working tower two. Especially when you had to walk out there at 4am in the freezing cold.  We would spend 2-4 hours in the tower. 

The year was 1981. The San Francisco 49ers were plowing through their schedule and looking like the Cinderella team they turned out to be. They had whipped the cowboys 45-14 in week 6. They had beaten the Rams twice! They were rolling!  I was rooting from afar. I was also getting close to the end of my tour of duty. By Christmas I would be out of the Army and home. My last trip to Nato 35 was memorable.  It was my lucky night on November 29th. The Niners played the New York Giants at home. Fortunately for me, the game was broadcast on the Armed Forces Radio Network. 10pm start for us in Germany. I listened to the first half in the comfort of the living quarters and the second half in tower 2. The field radio in tower two could pick up the game! The Niners beat the Giants 17-10. I can remember thinking how cool it was that, here I was listening to the game,  not only half way around the world, but out in the middle of nowhere, in a  8x8 box perched a top 60 steps with nothing but a beat up old field radio that could barely pick up the game. And I was as happy as could be. 

  When the Niners played (and beat) the Giants again in the playoffs 5 weeks later, I was out, and home, and partying like a rock star in Lake Tahoe with my brother and my buddies!!!  Of course, the Niners went on to beat the Giants again, the Cowboys for the NFC championship and the Bengals in the Super Bowl XVI. WOOHOO!!!   Many many MANY great 49er memories over the years, but none better than that first super bowl run, and listening to the game in tower two.

Comments

[Roselle Graskey]

Congratulations on your Marine Jim. I'm a former 981st Tower Rat as well 85-88. Thanks for the blog. Brings back some very good but "what was I thinking?" memeories. :). And yes Tower 2 was a long, lonely walk in the cold. And no Tower 2 never got any warmer.

Thanks much.
Roselle

[Kate]

I liked this post dad...glad i can read about some of the stuff you did....because you never talk about it when i am there!!!!

[Roselle Graskey]

Kate,

You can ask me, I'm pretty sure I know what your dad was doing duty wise back then. Jim, no I will not accept money to not tell...smirk.

[Roselle Graskey]

Actually Kate,

Your dad did some of the hardest duty back in his time. NATO SITE duty was hard time, and quite honestly to this day forgotten time. Your dad protected "special and classified material" for the army. Stuff that terrorists and the Russian's and East German's would have liked intel on. Your dad was one of the poor shmoes that kept said material safe at the risk of his life. No one remembers tower rats, no one gives a tower rat a medal, but fellow tower rats do talk and do lift a glass, (even if now at this age it is ice tea) and yes if convinced we tell kids what their dad's and in some cases, moms, did. hooah...98worst.

[jim]

Thanks for clarifying things Graskey!
Kate, I didn't know I was allowed to talk about it. Thought it was still classified material

[Roselle Graskey]

Jim,

It's actually still classified, but basically as long as you don't name said material or go into specifics you aren't breaking that rule.

[Randy Shields]

When I was at NATO 35 there were two platoons and four towers. We were on 48 and off 48 withh a different shift each time we were on site. Towers 1 and 3 were short wooden and metal structure and towers w2 and five were taller steel or stell and concrete. the one attached to the barracks was, in my day tower 5.