Photo By Adam Holguin | Maj. Gen. Don Dunbar, standing, U.S. Air Force, adjutant general, state of Wisconsin,...... read more read more
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FORT BLISS, Texas - After a night of thunderstorms in West Texas, the rain let up just as the airplane that carried the 950th Engineer Company touched down here, Aug. 24. The Wisconsin Army National Guard unit returned stateside after completing a nine-month deployment in Afghanistan in support of operations Enduring Freedom and Resolute Support.
The route clearance engineers from Superior and Spooner, Wisconsin, will return home to the land of beer, brats, and cheese after completing the demobilization process with the Directorate of Plans, Training, Mobilization and Security.
Maj. Gen. Don Dunbar, U.S. Air Force, adjutant general for the state of Wisconsin, along with a contingent from the state, came to Fort Bliss to welcome home the 950th Eng. Company.
“I am very grateful to God to have them all home safe and sound,” Dunbar said.
While addressing the Soldiers at the welcome brief at the Silas. L. Copeland Arrival/Departure Air Control Group, Dunbar thanked all the Soldiers for their service and told them the elite group of citizens they all are, due to the deployment they have just completed.
“Only 1 percent of the public is wearing a uniform, but a much smaller percentage has gone overseas for combat operations,” Dunbar said, “a very unique group of men and women, I hold them in high regard and I know our country does too.”
Spirits and morale was high for the entire unit, and a collective sense of relief could be felt from after nine months in various parts of Afghanistan.
According to Capt. Andrew Thomas Redd, commander, 750th Eng. Company, upon their arrival in Afghanistan, the unit was splintered to three locations.
“We had two days when we landed (at Bagram) to in process into Afghanistan and then we had to ship them out to the two detachment locations, providing base security in Kabul and Kandahar,” said Redd. “We started running missions within in the first week, so we hit the ground sprinting, luckily the guys were ready for it.”
The ability for the entire unit to adapt to mission that was somewhat unexpected, is a testament to the each soldier’s ability to adjust fire.
“It was stressful, it was definitely a busy times,” Redd Said, “it was a lot more than we expected, a lot of stuff going on and we had to setup a new leadership arrangement at every location, it worked really well, my guys adapted well.”
First Lt. Phillip Bruer, platoon leader, third platoon, was located at Bagram for the duration of the deployment, and he oversaw his platoon work with a diverse set of coalition forces.
“We ended up working with the Czech army and the Georgian army, they had a really big presence at Bagram Air Field…they ran most of the combat operations for the base,” Bruer said. “So we went out and cleared for the Georgians and Czechs. We got to work quite a number of multi-national coalition missions which was pretty cool.”
Redd recapped the diversity of the deployment: “We worked with the Czechs, Georgians, Marines, Air Force, (Afghan National Army), and civilian contractors doing three or four different types of missions.”
“There was enough experience and especially enough competence in every different part of my platoon, form the squad leaders all the way down to the ‘Joes’ who were driving and gunning, that they were going to do what they needed to do,” Bruer said of his platoon.
“I’m super proud of my guys that they did what they had to do,” continued Bruer. “At the end of the day, every single person that we worked with had nothing but awesome things to say about the guys from Wisconsin.”
Before departing to billets and some much needed rest, Redd summarized the collective feelings of the 950th Eng. Company. “It’s good to be back; God bless America.”
| Date Taken: | 09.10.2015 |
| Date Posted: | 09.15.2015 14:55 |
| Story ID: | 176112 |
| Location: | FORT BLISS, TX, US |
| Hometown: | SPOONER, WI, US |
| Hometown: | SUPERIOR, WI, US |
| Web Views: | 430 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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