What does FOBIT mean in Military?

Forward Operating Base

Main bases and FOBs typically consists of larger footprint with reliable a power grid, internet and phone services, hard ball (concrete buildings) coffee shops, exchange (retail store), dining (DFAC) and fast food facilities, gym, and recreational facilities, medical, dental, walls or wll developed barriers, and security (think small city or towns). FOBIT is the approximate equivalent to the Vietnam era REMF (Rear Echelon M** F**), or POGUE (People of Greater Use Elsewhere), or occasionally "POG" (People Other than Grunts); it is a derogatory term, fully intended as an insult (usually rightfully so) toward those who live in the relative safety of a main base and are often guilty of imposing peacetime, civilized world rules such as uniform or grooming standards on troops who live and operate for days or weeks on end outside the wire. A couple of real life examples are: 1) the supply Master Sergeant who would not issue thermal imaging gear to soldiers because according to regulations that item was on their custody card and if they were damaged or lost that Sergeant would be accountable for the equipment; even though the item was issued out to another Soldier. That FOBIT jeopardized the safety of field personnel due to strict (and incorrect) interpretation of a supply directive; 2) the senior NCO who was reprimanding exhausted troops arriving at Bagram air terminal after spending weeks in the field without showers, uninterrupted sleep, or a hot, cooked meal for their out of standards shaves, haircuts, and dirty uniforms. That FOBIT worked in a well-protected office where they were not subject to shelling, IEDs, and random gun fire; they enjoyed civilized luxuries such as laundry service, a room in a building with heater, daily hot showers, coffee shops, and meals in the dining facility (DFAC) and when faced with troops returning from weeks in a mud hole without showers, running water, or sustenance other than MREs, instead of welcoming them safely back and asking what they could do to help, derided them for not having clean uniforms haircuts and shaves like the support personnel who rarely, if ever left the base.

Governmental » Military