In 2009-2010, freelance writer and editor Randy Brown was assigned as the Battle Command Knowledge Officer (BCKO) for the Iowa National Guard’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 34th Infantry Division (2-34th BCT). After paperwork SNAFU dropped from the deployment list just days before federal mobilization, he followed the unit through a rotation at National Training Center, Fort Irwin, Calif. He retired in December 2010, after 20 years of service and a previous overseas deployment. He then proceeded to go to Afghanistan anyway, embedding with his former “Red Bull” colleagues as civilian media in May-June 2011.
Now a freelance writer and editor living in Central Iowa, Brown is a member of the Military Reporters & Editors (MRE), the Military Writers Guild (MWG), and the Military Writers Society of America (MWSA). He is the author of the award-winning “Welcome to FOB Haiku: War Poems from Inside the Wire,” and editor of “Reporting for Duty: U.S. Citizen-Soldier Journalism from the Afghan Surge, 2010-2011.”