Photo By Brad Staggs | Afghan nationals play the Harmonia and drums during the traditional Afghan dinner held...... read more read more
BUTLERVILLE, Ind. – The Afghan music amplified through the room… a sad song played on traditional instruments for the Day of Ashura, the tenth day of Muharrum… as the Afghan governor welcomed the American military and civilian guests to his home. Only in this case, his home is in southern Indiana.
The Thursday evening Afghan dinner has become a tradition over the past 18 months of joint civilian-military training. After a full week of immersive, 24-hour a day field exercises which partner civilian government employees from agencies such as the State Department, United States Agency for International Development, and the United States Department of Agriculture with members of the United States military, the Afghan dinner serves as a time when the Americans can relax and eat a meal with the Afghan role players they have come to know.
The war on terror is in a transitional phase and the training which takes place at Muscatatuck Urban Training Center near Butlerville, Ind., on a monthly basis has become more popular with commanders and Soldiers who will be deploying to Afghanistan soon such as Col. Geoffrey Slack, commander of the 27th Infantry Brigade Combat Team out of New York.
“This training is absolutely essential,” Slack said during a rare break. “I can tell you that I’m honestly and sincerely impressed and proud of these folks that I have worked with here. It’s inspiring to watch the level of intensity that they bring and the level of commitment to this program in Afghanistan.”
Col. Slack is preparing to deploy to Afghanistan in the near future and had been actively seeking a course which would give him the skill sets he needs to do his job efficiently alongside his civilian peers.
“I went to the Brigade Commander’s course a year and a half ago when I was just coming on board as a brigade commander, and the topic of conversation often came to the whole issue of partnering with the civilian surge,” Slack continued. “I had no experience with that whatsoever. I would think that brigade commanders, if they chose to come to this course or send their senior people, they would have to look at it carefully to see what would work for them. But if they can get their key people and themselves out here, it’s worth their time.”
While training at Muscatatuck Urban Training Center, the Soldiers and civilians are split into teams from which they must operate day-to-day. Vignettes are designed to realistically create events which they may find themselves a part of in Afghanistan.
While everybody being trained learns valuable lessons from the vignettes, some such as Spc. Marya Wolffe with Wisconsin’s 432nd Reserve Civil Affairs Battalion, are looking for specific things.
“While I was in the vignettes, I was looking for the beautiful phrases, kind of the Afghan phrases,” Wolffe shared. “There were two that I’m walking away with that happened at separate vignettes, but I’ve put them together in my mind and they’re beautiful. ‘This is the truth and it cannot be denied.’ I love that. Then the other one was ‘This is no longer a time of war, this a time to build peace.’”
Wolffe came to the Army Reserves as an older recruit, already 40 by the time she went through basic training. She believes this helps her understand and empathize with the issues facing Afghan females much easier.
“From the vignettes that I went to, especially in these women’s engagements, they want education; they want the lives of their children improved. These are very brave women,” Wolffe said. “I’m certainly military, I’m going to have my weapon, I know how to use it, but if I can be helping people, that’s why I got into this job.”
Since July of 2009, the joint civilian-military training has been teaching both sides how to work together and with the Afghan people. The training goes on monthly and has trained nearly 1,000 civilians for their time in Afghanistan.
The civilian and military jobs being done in Afghanistan are sometimes dangerous but always very important. This training teaches that there is hope in what the U.S. military is doing.
“There are a lot of people out there who seem jaded after nine years of operations in Afghanistan,” Slack said. “You hear it in the press, you hear it everywhere you go, but you don’t hear it here. Here, you hear optimism and you hear determination and you hear professionalism, and it’s a really nice thing to associate with these great Americans.”
| Date Taken: | 12.17.2010 |
| Date Posted: | 12.20.2010 13:06 |
| Story ID: | 62342 |
| Location: | BUTLERVILLE, ILLINOIS, US |
| Web Views: | 61 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Joint civilian-military training at MUTC makes the Army better, by Brad Staggs, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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