A patrol base is a temporary defensive position established in hostile territory. It is not a home. It is not permanent. It is a place where a unit steps inside the wire long enough to rest, refit, and plan their next movement. The security of the perimeter is collective. Everyone pulls watch. Nobody stays forever.
In November 2020, Marine Corps infantry officer Tom Schueman founded a non-profit around that concept and named it after a man who never came home from his.
The Name
Sergeant Matthew Abbate was a scout sniper with 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines. In 2010, he deployed to Sangin, a district in Helmand Province that produced some of the heaviest fighting of the entire Afghanistan campaign. Abbate was awarded the Navy Cross posthumously for his actions there. He was 26 years old.
A decade after returning from that deployment, Schueman lost three of his former Marines to suicide in a single month. Not to enemy action. Not to the physical toll of combat. To isolation, loss of purpose, and the structural collapse that happens when the tight architecture of military service disappears and nothing fills the space it leaves.
Schueman recognized the pattern. The leading driver of veteran suicide is not combat exposure. It is the loss of community, the loss of meaningful connection, and the loss of a clear sense of purpose. The military provides all three in abundance and removes all three simultaneously at transition. The clinical and government resources available to veterans address symptoms. They rarely address the underlying structure that created the problem.
Patrol Base Abbate was built to address the structure.
How It Works
The organization operates through two primary mechanisms: a nationwide network of chapters organized around shared interests, and a five-day residential retreat called Return to Base, held at a primitive mountain property in Thompson Falls, Montana.
The chapter model is straightforward. Veterans are connected with others in their area who share the same interests, whether that is Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, Olympic lifting, literature, or something else entirely. The shared interest is the entry point. The community that forms around it is the outcome. There are no barriers to entry beyond having sworn an oath and worn the uniform. Combat experience is not a factor. Branch is not a factor. Where you served or how long you served does not determine whether you qualify. Service does.
The Return to Base retreats bring veterans and active duty personnel together in squad-sized groups for five days in the Montana wilderness. The format is peer-led, not clinician-led. The disciplines run from physical to intellectual: BJJ, Olympic lifting, campfire discussions, and structured reading. The experience closes with a ritual that is simple enough to describe and specific enough to mean something. Every participant fills a sandbag by hand and dedicates it to a purpose or a standard they commit to honoring when they return home. They leave not as attendees but as pointmen, the person out front, responsible for the people behind them.
The People Running It
Tom Schueman founded the organization and leads it. COO Kevin Fallon, Chief of Staff Dave Williams, and combat veterans including John Torres make up a team that has scaled Patrol Base Abbate's reach to thousands of members across the country. The growth has happened without diluting the core model. The organization remains committed to community built on shared standards rather than shared suffering, on mutual accountability rather than clinical pity.
That distinction matters more than it might sound. A lot of veteran support organizations are built around trauma as the organizing principle. Patrol Base Abbate is built around capability. The veterans who walk through the gate are not broken people who need fixing. They are capable people who need a perimeter.
Why Exray Is Here
Exray builds gear for people committed to something bigger than themselves. That is not a marketing position. It is a description of who our customer actually is and what shapes the decisions we make about materials, manufacturing, and the standards we hold the product to.
Patrol Base Abbate exists for the same reason. Not to celebrate the individual, not to put anyone on a pedestal, but to rebuild the collective infrastructure that makes individuals effective. The squad. The unit. The tribe.
We are proud to support their work. If you are a veteran or active duty service member looking for a way back inside friendly lines, the door is open at pbabbate.org. If you want to support the mission directly, they accept donations and every dollar goes toward putting more veterans through the gate in Thompson Falls.
Go far, together.