Slavonski Brod, Croatia, circa 1997. Know as Camp Sava North. I am the SIGO (Signal Officer for the Camp HQ known as Task Force Pershing). Oh, and I know crap about being a SIGO as I am a Chemical Officer.

I am tabbed (as SIGO) to oversee a contract regarding the words below.

The Camp was established in 1996 and when we took over, we had MSE (Mobile Subscriber Equipment) phones and internet via satellite and cable through a large plug in hub.

Big Army has decided to use my Camp as proof of principle replacing the phones with a more civilian type setup and running fiber optics for our computers. If it works well here they will do the same throughout the theater of operations. The contract is in two parts because these are two different systems (this is important later).

S----t had done a site survey when the base was the theater headquarters with several hundred more people than we have now. Now, since the Camp now has fewer Soldiers and facilities it has been greatly downsized and given back to the Croation company that owned it.

I sit with the S----t manager and go over the installation plans. He has already informed me that each phone drop will cost the government $500. I point out that their survey has about 50 drops in areas that the US no longer controls and they need to drop those from the contract and save money. He informs me the contract says they will be paid based on the number of drops in the site survey. I read the fine print and he is correct (who writes this stuff?)

The phone install is first and it goes well. Next we sit down to review how many computer drops there will be at $1,500 a drop. We had inherited a network with about 50 drops on it. Since it was an unclassified network, I had no issue expanding it to others who needed it, like our aviators who flew med evac for theater, PX manager and many others. In all, my E5 and I had hooked up about another hundred.

The S----t manager was talking about doing the original 50 drops from the site survey. I pointed out that the contract said they would replace the existing network. I was right and won back the governments money. (That's how to write a contract).

Happily enough, after that little conflict I got along very well with the manager and his personnel who remained on site throughout my tour.