Photo By Sgt. Javier Amador | The soldiers of Bandit Troop, 3rd Squadron 71st Cavalry, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th...... read more read more
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GHAZNI PROVINCE, Afghanistan – On the morning of Thursday, March 13, two CH-47 Chinook helicopters touched down in an open, barren field where the Spartan soldiers of Bandit Troop, 3rd Squadron, 71st Cavalry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division, rapidly exited and assumed a defensive perimeter, lying low to the ground.
A small sandstorm caused by the huge rotor blades engulfed the soldiers as the helicopters left them on a patch of ground not seen by many American soldiers in over a year.
The Spartan soldiers got on their feet and moved out to their respective positions as they have been briefed. Some of them occupied the towers near the entrance gates while others established a command post and started roving patrols. Together, Bandit Troop had successfully established a comprehensive security presence on Forward Operating Base Muqar, a relatively large Afghan National Army facility under construction with roughly 40 soldiers.
The mission was conducted to provide security for a team of U.S. military and civilian personnel who came to conduct inspections of several of the facility’s buildings to ensure they were being built to a set of agreed-upon standards of quality and ready by a predetermined completion date.
“We came to secure the Muqar compound for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and their inspectors,” said U.S. Army 1st Lt. Jeffery Temple, a platoon leader with Bandit Troop. “It’s a $48 million project that is being built for two Afghan kandaks and they came to see how they are doing on their timeline, so our job was to secure that area and make sure nothing happened.”
The compound, which will eventually become the home of the two ANA battalions, or kandaks, in Pashto, had plenty of open or isolated areas which presented serious security concerns for the Spartan soldiers to overcome. With a multitude of other factors which also had to be taken into consideration, it was an extremely complex planning challenge to bring it all together.
“There are a lot of moving pieces you need to get on the same page,” said Temple, “There was my platoon, headquarters, other platoons from Bandit Troop as well as civilian and their military liaisons, USACE and air weapons teams.”
Keeping an experienced eye on the operation as well as his soldiers was Sgt. 1st Class Benjamin Gangwer, Bandit Troop’s first sergeant. His focus was on getting his soldiers to where they needed to be as quickly and safely as possible. Once in position, he kept checking on them, making sure his squad leaders knew what they had to do and had everything their soldiers needed.
For Gangwer, it’s all in the details and the application of hard-earned experience.
“The biggest thing for me is the overall planning, from the conception to the execution, but what I sweat the most is the unknown ... the variables ... planning for everything ... which you can’t,” said Gangwer.
Planning the mission also meant thinking of ways an adversary could possibly try to find a way to compromise its accomplishment. Temple approached the process holistically.
“The first thing I have to look at is what the mission will be and then what the enemy’s mission will be and what they would be doing in the area and from there - look at all of the different aspects,” said Temple.
The amount of coverage he had to support compared to the number of soldiers he had to work with initially seemed improbable because of the compound’s size. Knowing this, Temple knew he would have to strike a balance between their safety and accomplishing the mission.
“For this mission, I mainly had to look at the terrain because the compound was so big and my force was so small that I couldn’t secure it the way you would normally want to,” Temple said. “I had to look at what the mission was, where the enemy was and what the limitations were to mitigate as much of the risk as I could.”
The careful planning paid off as the Spartan soldiers hit the ground running and moved out with the cohesion and coordination which is only possible with a well briefed, close-knit team.
“The overall plan was executed to the numbers as far as the way it was rehearsed. What I was most impressed with today were the blocking positions and the quickness with which they got out there, set them up and maintained them,” said Gangwer.
Sustaining the sense of urgency of the also impressed Gangwer, who knows what can happen when things slow down and soldiers may find themselves losing their focus.
“When the mission starts, everybody is going to be ‘gung-ho’ - ready to go, but an hour or two into the mission, that’s when a soldier might start slacking off because it’s not as exciting, and I didn’t see that today,” said Gangwer.
Moving with a well-defined purpose and having the training to get the job done is what allowed U.S. Army Pfc. Stephen Waugaman, a cavalry scout, to keep control of a gate with confidence. His job during the mission was to man a tower as a machine gunner and a grenadier. He credited the training which he along with his team received from his troop’s leadership.
“We have a good platoon; we have good leaders. They trained us well, and they know what they are doing. I take my confidence from them,” said Waugaman.
With the inspection team’s work complete, the Spartan soldiers closed out their positions and assembled at their designated assembly area. A couple of hours after mid-day, the sound of rotor blades cutting through air was heard and the call was made for everyone to line up in their groups. For the last time that day, everyone boarded their respective helicopters and in moments, began the hourlong flight bringing everyone home safely with another mission accomplished.
| Date Taken: | 03.15.2014 |
| Date Posted: | 03.15.2014 13:51 |
| Story ID: | 122066 |
| Location: | GHAZNI PROVINCE, AF |
| Web Views: | 1,633 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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