What is an FOB-rat? And good for Beau for choosing to meet his obligation to the Guard regardless of motive.
A FOB is a "Forward Operating Base" which is the modern equvalent of the large bases in Viet Nam. FOB-Rats are people who are relatively unlikely to ever, ever leave relative safety of the FOB to actually do anything off the FOB in 'Real' Iraq or Afghanistan. It's a combat zone, and it's a very honorable choice to go, but it's not going into a 'Combat zone' in the same sense that Infantry, Cav, Tankers, MPs, or even Trans truck drivers experience it on a daily basis, i.e. there is not much chance of being killed by a roadside bomb if you are never on the road, though once in a blue moon it does happen. In Biden Jr.'s case we are talking about a signal command, the vast majority of which has an on-FOB mission, hence they are a FOB-rat unit. In that unit, his job is the even-more-sequestered service support mission of being their JAG, which may involve a lot of work but doesn't call for him to leave the FOB even if something really atypical happens and the signaleers have to go outside the wire after all. Credit is due him for going, but the truth is it's set up as a milk run, unless of course Obama manages to undo three years worth of steady progress during his first three months in office.
