A business financial manager’s day is filled with crunching numbers, moving money and reconciling accounts, but for a NAVAIR BFM and single mother of two, it meant deploying for nine months to Baghdad, Iraq, in support of the warfighter.
“When I saw this opportunity to serve in Iraq, I knew this was something that I really wanted to do,” said Vicki Leonard, BFM, Aircrew Systems Program Office (PMA-202) here.
Leonard left for Baghdad February 2009, returned to Pax River in mid-October 2009 and has been busy since then.
Leonard said she’s had time to decompress; enjoy time with her two children, family and friends; return to work in PMA-260, move into her new home and got a new job in PMA-202.
“I learned a lot about myself while I was deployed,” she added. “I learned not to take for granted what our military members do and that I should have offered to complete my 12 months in Iraq by volunteering for another job. Someone asked me if I’d go to Afghanistan, and if they offered me a position, I’d go. I know it would be difficult on my kids so I’d need to really, really evaluate that, but I would go if they asked me. I wouldn’t go for a year, but I would go for six months.”
Just getting to Baghdad was an experience in itself, said Leonard.
“I got to Fort Benning, Ga., Feb. 7; I finally arrived in Bagdad on Feb. 16, where I served for almost nine months,” said Leonard. “I was originally supposed to be there for 12 months, but our mission changed.”
Leonard said there were about 400 military, Department of Defense civilians and civilian contractors going through in-processing at Fort Benning. Once that was complete, they flew to Kuwait. Upon landing, they were separated into groups again and went through another round of in-processing. “I had my orders saying I was going to Iraq, but I didn’t know where in Iraq I was going to end up,” she said.
Leonard said her trip to Bagdad encompassed four days of constant travel and very little sleep.
“For anyone who’s been in the military, the phrase ‘hurry up and wait’ should be familiar,” she said. “I was always on the go, told to show up at 6:30 a.m. then told to come back in two hours; all the while I’m carrying four huge bags of gear and it’s 120-degrees. It was such a relief to get to Baghdad and finally find out what I was going to be doing.”
Once in Baghdad, Leonard worked as a budget analyst in J-8, a joint office for the Multinational Security Transition Command – Iraq (MNSTC-I) on Forward Operating Base (FOB) Phoenix. The unit’s primary mission was to train, mentor and assist the Iraqi’s in building up their police, Air Force, Army and Navy. She was one of two operations maintenance budget officers. She and the Air Force master sergeant who shared duties with her managed an annual budget of $173 million dollars.
“We supported many MNSTC-I personnel in the outlying FOBs including those in Taji, Shield, Besmaya and Habbiniyah,” Leonard said. “Once I got to Baghdad, I settled in pretty quickly.”
I found out that I could survive with less than what we think is important in our everyday lives. You get used to living in a small self-contained housing unit. I had a little eight foot by eight foot space with one bed, one dresser, one lamp, and one closet; I wore body armor to and from work and during the many drills of si
