In an exclusive interview with our partner site HistoryNet.com, Elaine Rogers, president and chief executive officer of the USO of Metropolitan Washington, speaks about how the organization has evolved during its 70-year existence. (She has been with the USO for half of that time.)
Among the subjects she discussed was the USO2GO kit, often called USO in a Box, that delivers—among other things—console games and the equipment to play them to forward bases in Afghanistan and Iraq. She calls gaming "huge" among service personnel.
The following is excerpted from the HistoryNet interview:
Elaine Rogers: The USO2GO kit, which is often called USO in a Box, provides comforts to base camps in the field in Afghanistan and Iraq. It contains everything from toothpaste to books to DVDs to electronics like consoles for gaming. All these things come in a box, and it’s pretty terrific.
Subscribe Today
HistoryNet: Playing console games in the desert? That’s pretty amazing.
ER: There is a lot of gaming at our centers, too. It’s huge. We have things like Xboxes that service members can use to connect and visit with troops in other places and play games with them.
In these new centers we’re building, we’re going to have a golf simulator that can simulate any golf course in world. If there’s a simulator at another base, we can actually do golf tournaments, with players in the U.S., Germany, Iraq. It’s amazing, and the troops will love it.
Click here to read the entire interview about what the USO is doing today.
