Photo By Sgt. Wesley Petrus | First sergeants from Task Force Sword pose for a photo during a break at the First...... read more read more
PAKTIKA PROVINCE, Afghanistan – U.S. Army and Air Force enlisted leaders of over 20 engineer companies in the Northern Engineer Region of Afghanistan attended the initial quarterly First Sergeant Forum, held by Task Force Sword at Forward Operation Base Sharana, Oct. 1.
U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. David Clark, command sergeant major of TF Sword, from Knoxville, Tenn., hosted the forum along with several senior leaders from the TF and Regional Command East, giving the first sergeants the opportunity to receive mentorship and address concerns about their daily mission.
“I don’t want you to have any questions in your mind about your role as company first sergeants,” said Clark in his introduction. “The decisions you make everyday has a major impact on future missions of the U.S. military and coalition forces,”
Clark also highlighted the importance of the engineer mission and discussed the challenges first sergeants face while trying to accomplish it in Afghanistan.
“Your job is even more complicated while in theatre because of the extra stress, operational tempo, and loss of Soldiers’ lives that some of you have already faced while here,” he said.
U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. Isia Vimoto, command sergeant major of Combined Joint Task Force-1, of American Samoa, was the feature guest speaker for the forum. During his address, he paralleled the perplexities of the mission in Afghanistan to the Walt Disney’s movie The Sword in the Stone.
“If you recall in the movie, young King Arthur who was mentored by Merlin faced many challenges while growing up and becoming the great king of England,” said Vimoto. “King Arthur wanted to unite England, but he had many issues to overcome in order to do so: the difficult geography of the area, the solitude of castles, their lack of trust of outsiders, and a difficult history ... Now compare the same issues he had there to us here in Afghanistan.” Most first sergeants, if not all, easily understood and agreed with the points to his reference.
The remainder of the schedule featured presentations on a variety of topics from changes to the retention program to continuing the partnership with the Afghan National Army.
Clark ended the forum by saying, “I know there’s a lot of new information for us to take in, and it can change at any given moment, and we all are in a leadership position. With that position comes responsibility, and right now we are responsible for using this new information to mentor not only our soldiers but also the engineer military leaders of Afghanistan.”
| Date Taken: | 10.01.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 11.04.2011 18:46 |
| Story ID: | 79590 |
| Location: | PAKTIKA PROVINCE, AF |
| Web Views: | 59 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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