363 TFW COMMANDER�S BRIEFING TO SHAW AFB

File: aaazz_02.txt
Page: 02
Total Pages: 3
					UNCLASSIFIED
 [(b)(2)]								cold soda, or they can play a  
game of darts or ping-pong, or just sit around and B.S. for awhile. The Pub  
now is in a General Purpose or "GP" shelter which is bigger and better than 
the old "tent" pub we had. Likewise, our movie theater which runs movies 
around the clock has been put in a GP shelter. We now have seating for about
 175 people per showing and have gotten a large 100" TV screen to show the 
movies from VCRs. Quite surprisingly, we can get a lot of "first run" movies from  
the local economy here. As an example, tonight's schedule has 
Arachnophobia, Driving Miss Daisy, Innocent Prey and Murders C.O.D. Also at
 the movie theater, we have free popcorn provided at every showing with our own 
popcorn machine. 
Next to the movie theater, we have another tent set up where people can 
individually view VCRs like sports events, etc. or listen to tapes from home 
Then across the street, along what's come to be known  as "The Boardwalk", we 
have the ""Sandblaster's Gym" which is a tent set up with on exercise area,  
exercise equipment, and weightlifting equipment. It's become so popular that
 in about a week from now, we're going to replace it with a GP shelter to make 
it bigger and obviously nicer. 
	Next to the gym tent, we also have a Library Tent with an ever-growing 
supply of books for people to come and read there or take out. There's also
 tables and chairs set up for people to read, write letters, or just study. 
	And, just last week, we got our swimming pool open. Yes, it really is a 
large pool just like you'd find in the states. It was built and used by the
 German contractors who built most of the aircraft shelters on the base here. 
The pool needed a lot of repair work and we finally got a contractor to get  
the needed parts to fix it. Needless to say, it's a very popular item here.
	Next to the pool we also have a tennis court which we fixed p. It's
 complete with windscreens and backboard for practice. We're also going to get 
some non-skid paint and resurface that. Our tennis players have volunteered 
to do that. 
	Our dining hall tents have been doing great, too. We serve breakfast 
from 0400-0800 and our cooks have expanded service to include choices of 
pancakes or french toast, grits, hash browns, bacon or ham (sometimes spam), 
fresh eggs cooked to order, biscuits with SOS, toast and jelly and a variety 
of cereals, as well as juice, coffee, and milk. The noon meal is MRE's (a lot 
of us skip lunch) and the evening meal is another full hot meal served from
 1600-2000. Just recently, we added soda dispensers for coke/sprite. We also
 have plans to erect some "K-SPAN buildings". Those are metal buildings about  
150' long by 60' wide that a Civil Engineering Red Horse Team from CENTAF HQ
 with help put up. Then we�ll be able to replace our dining hall "tents". 
That will give us a much better facility that will hold about 500 people at 
one time. We�re hoping to see that in about 4-6 weeks. 
	Those K-SPAN buildings would also allow us to use one of them as a kind  
of �Shopping Mall" where we could consolidate our �tent� activities like 
Accounting and Finance, Hq Squadron, the Post Office, etc. Another thing  
we�re doing in tent city is building �bathhouses" to replace our tent showers 
and latrines which we�ve had a hard time keeping fully functional.  they 
constantly need repairs. One bathhouse should be complete next week and I 
think all the "tent" facilities will be replaced over the next 4 weeks. We've  
also just started (2 days ago, as a matter of fact) a service contract to have  
local nationals do KP duties in tent city and clean latrines and showers. As  
you might imagine, our people who pulled those details are real happy about  
that!  
	As far as activities off base are concerned, our current security situa 
tion is such that we can travel to off base communities in controlled groups. 
Right now, our MWR people run tours with bus transportation several times a  
week. We have oveknighters to local hotels like the Hilton, which are large, 
very nice hotels.  People have to pay their own room fees which range from 
 
				UNCLASSIFIED