Foundation
I didn’t decide to join the military overnight. At thirteen, I enrolled at Lyman Ward Military Academy. By May 1984, at seventeen, I joined the Alabama Army National Guard and was assigned to Signal Company, 20th Special Forces Group (Airborne).
In August 1985, I began six continuous months of signal training at Fort Gordon. I graduated as Student Soldier of the Month and was twice selected to represent the battalion during senior command inspections. Then came Morse code. It seemed outdated, but it wasn’t. When satellite links failed, when radios were jammed, when the electronic battlefield went silent—Morse still worked. It was the last reliable method of communication in Special Forces.
After earning my Parachutist Badge at eighteen, I deployed to Italy for Exercise Flintlock. For thirty-three days, we fielded the AN/TSC-99—a prototype HF base station for Special Forces burst communications—and conducted joint airborne operations with Italian forces. That was my first exposure to a broader truth: communication isn’t just technical—it’s organizational.
In December 1986, I enlisted in the Regular Army and was assigned to the 8th Infantry Division in Mannheim, Germany. I ran radioteletype and high-frequency radio networks during REFORGER exercises—large-scale drills preparing for a Soviet invasion. Two years in Germany taught me what large-scale coordination really meant. Hundreds of vehicles moving across rough ground, every radio net a lifeline, and any miscommunication capable of causing real problems. It was systems thinking at its most basic.
