Photo By Sgt. Robert Adams | Lt. Gen. Carl Strock, U.S. Army chief of engineers, talks to troops in engineer units...... read more read more
Spc. Robert Adams
11th Public Affairs Detachment
CAMP ARIFJAN, Kuwait - Supporting the warfighter is the engineer's bread and butter. He does it day and night, building a safer environment and improving the quality of life for servicemembers in Kuwait.
Lt. Gen. Carl A. Strock, chief of engineers, visited Kuwait Jan. 15-17 to view the progress of current operations and to ensure engineers get the support they need in the future.
Strock began his tour at Khabari Alawazem Crossing, a large engineer project at the Iraq and Kuwait border that will replace the current military border crossing at Camp Navistar.
After getting a bird's-eye view of K-Crossing, site engineers briefed Strock on the project layout and escorted him around the site to view the work in progress.
Strock said he was eager to meet Soldiers on the job and jumped up on machinery to commend them on their hard work.
"He asked me where I was from, what's going on at the site and what my future plans were," said Spc. William C. Maynes, 63rd Engineer Company, Combat Support Engineer Battalion.
Strock also praised the good working relationship between the Army, Navy and civilian personnel who are all sharing responsibilities and equipment to get the job done.
He stressed the importance of maintaining a strong working relationship between military and civilian engineers and Kuwait officials.
"This site is an important aspect because we are working on making the U.S. presence less visible," Strock said to the Soldiers. "We are going to be saving lives because of the work you are doing here."
He then visited Camp Buehring where engineer personnel briefed him on operations before escorting him around to current projects.
He learned about the northern camp's current tasks, facilities, services, training opportunities, completed projects and future operations.
"Your job is all over the place with a diversity of projects â?¦ at ports, airfields and border crossings," Strock said. "This remains to be an important effort here and the war couldn't be successful without it."
Strock then visited the Kuwait Naval Base to view port operations and met with Army divers before spending time with U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Kuwait Area Office workers at Camp Arifjan.
Along with the responsibility of overseeing military engineers, Strock is also in charge of about 35,000 civilian engineers within USACE, who support military missions in deployed environments as well as work civil-works projects, research labs, and river, land and flood-protection projects in the United States.
Strock learned how the KAO supports the military mission in Kuwait and around the Middle East as well as sustainment activities with the host nation and foreign military sales construction during the past few years.
"We were very pleased that he was able to spend as much time with us as he did on this trip," said Ashraf Wahba, USACE, KAO area engineer. "That time allowed him to truly absorb the entirety of what is going on here from border to border."
After viewing progress reports, Strock also awarded some KAO engineers for their hard work.
"My staff takes great pride in their professional efforts and any recognition from the top engineer of their command structure is certainly well deserved," Wahba said.
"I know that they would all do it simply because we have Soldiers here, and the chief engineer (Lt. Gen. Strock) understands that motivation as well, and he commended all of them for their dedication and professionalism," he said.
Strock also held a town hall meeting to explain more about ACE and the overall impact the engineer community is making around the world.
He spoke about engineer priorities; the first being support to the global war on terrorism and the military and civilian mission in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the second being support and response to disasters and terrorist attacks like 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina.
Since the post-Katrina rebuilding project is still underway, Strock went over how ACE engineers and military units reacted to the disaster.
He stated that the engineer response included debris removal, temporary housing and roofing to put families back in homes and relocated schools. He also said, through personal observations, the support from the Mississippi National Guard, Army engineers and Navy Seabees and ACE engineers was incredible.
Strock also talked about how Army transformation is changing the roles of military engineer units and how important it is for all services and civilians to work jointly to solve problems.
A final point Strock stressed was the importance of improving the infrastructure, safety and quality of life for not only servicemembers across the Middle East but for Iraqi and Afghani civilians as well.
"We are constantly improving the damaged Iraqi infrastructure that has been neglected, sabotaged or looted," Strock said.
"Iraqis must see improvement and hope and see that things will be betterâ?¦ This will allow us to turn things back over to them."
| Date Taken: | 01.25.2006 |
| Date Posted: | 01.25.2006 09:55 |
| Story ID: | 5196 |
| Location: | ARJIFAN, KW |
| Web Views: | 338 |
| Downloads: | 161 |
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