Upon encountering a snake in the Area of Operations (AO) — Airborne: Lands on and kills the snake. Armor: Runs over snake. Never knows it, as well as where he is on the battlefield. Continues directly ahead wondering what all those new buttons in his turret do. Army Aviation: Has GPS ten digit grid to snake. Stands off at a range greater than any other weapon system and destroys snake with precision fire at a cost equivalent of one Mercedes 350SEL. Returns to base for fighter management and a "cool one." Ranger: Plays with snake, then eats it. Navy SEAL: Expends all ammunition and several grenades, then calls for naval gunfire in failed attempt to kill snake. Snake bites the SEAL, and dies of salt water poisoning. Field Artillery: Kills snake, and several hundred civilians in the vicinity, using a massive TOT with three FA BDEs in support. Mission is considered a success and all participants (Cooks, Mechanics, Clerks, etc.) are awarded Silver Stars. Marine Recon: Follows snake and gets lost. Combat Controllers: Guides the snake elsewhere. Para-Rescue: Lands on snake upon descending, thereby injuring it, then feverishly works to save the snake's life. Air Force Fighter Pilot: Misidentifies the snake as a HIND and engages it with missiles. Crew Chief paints snake on airplane. Combat Engineer: Studies snake. Prepares in depth analysis based on obscure 5 series FM about how to defeat snake using counter mobility assets. Complains that maneuver forces don't understand how to properly conduct doctrinal counter-snake operations. (Engineer School tries to hide the fact that M9 ACE proves ineffective against snakes). Special Forces: Makes contact with the snake, builds rapport, wins its heart and mind, and then trains it to kill other snakes. Ordnance: IDs snake as having improper scales. Deadline snake and order parts against snake. Parts come in 15 days later but the snake has been upgraded to FMC due to scrounging of parts through improper channels. Quartermaster: Encounters snake, then loses contact. Can not identify who owns snake by hand receipts . . . orders new snake through supply channels. Once to higher echelon, request is denied since issuing the unit a snake will bring the manager to a zero balance; one snake must remain on hand at all times as per their boss' guidance. SJA: Swear they saw something like that on the Discovery Channel . .. spend weeks arguing if it was a snake or not. Navy SeaBees: Build snake elaborate rec room, complete with secret still. Transportation: Soldier replies "Snake? What snake? We were sleeping in the truck." Military Intelligence: Reports to ground troops that snake is a non-combatant. Six Infantry wounded. MI states that if the ground forces would have read the nesting diagram provided in the 24 page enemy intel report, they would have known the snake was a possible threat. MP: Snake safely infiltrates rear area of operations. Signal, Enlisted: Tries to communicate with snake . . . fails despite repeated attempts. Complains that the snake did not have the correct fill or did not know how to work equipment a child could operate. Signal, Officer: Informs the commander that he could easily communicate with the snake using just his voice. Commander insists that he NEEDS to videoconference with the snake, with real-time streaming positional and logistical data on the snake displayed on video screens to either side. Gives Signal Corps $5 Billion to make this happen. SigO abuses the 2 smart people in the corps to make it happen, while everybody else stands around, bitches, and takes credit. In the end, GTE and several subcontractors make a few billion dollars, the two smart people get out and go to work for them, and the commander gets what he asked for only in fiber-optic based simulations. The snake dies of old age. Chaplain. Tries to get snake to attend services, mend its ways. War Correspondent. Decides snake is patriotic nationalist agrarian reformer being molested by imperialist U.S. forces, asks snake for directions to nearest bar. If bitten by snake, charges U.S. troops with neglect of duty to protect freedom of the press. Members of the Stealth Cobra Webelos Patrol, Pack 253, Dhahran, Saudi Arabia received the Arrow of Light Award and crossed over into Boy Scouts on February 23, 2000 Back to Cry Havoc #30 Table of Contents Back to Cry Havoc List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 2000 by David W. Tschanz. This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com