The Civil Affairs Planning Team, (CAPT)

Photo By Sgt. Tyler Morford | Being evaluated for their upcoming deployment to support Atlantic Resolve is the CAPT team of the 308th Civil Affairs Brigade, Homewood Illinois. Their evaluation was conducted at Fort Custer Training Center, Augusta, Mich., for validation exercise VALEX 3-21, named Crimson Dawn 3.0. Col. Caroline Pogge, from Hopewell Junction, New York, is the CA Planning Team Chief who led the team through Crimson Dawn.  

FORT CUSTER, MI, UNITED STATES

03.24.2021

Story by Spc. Tyler Morford 

First Army

Fostering host-nation relations, together with our allies, is crucial for commanders who employ Civil Affairs operators and teams that are placed throughout the operational environment; the chosen team, the Civil Affairs Planning Team, (CAPT), provides the commander with essential information and the necessary tools to initiate the mission.

The CAPT team assists in developing theater campaign, support, operational, and contingency plans based on the information developed from the Civil Information Management Team, (CIM). This team supports the overall CA efforts in theater to ensure that operations are successful at their assigned locations in understanding the needs of the various countries as well as ensuring that local infrastructure is supported in order for host-countries to become self-supportive with the opportunity to be as self-reliant as they can be.

Being evaluated for their upcoming deployment to support Atlantic Resolve is the CAPT team of the 308th Civil Affairs Brigade, Homewood Illinois. Their evaluation was conducted at Fort Custer Training Center, Augusta, Mich., for validation exercise VALEX 3-21, named Crimson Dawn 3.0.

Col. Caroline Pogge, from Hopewell Junction, New York, is the CA Planning Team Chief who led the team through Crimson Dawn, “One of our responsibilities over the course of the year as we head over is to really set the stage for the Civil Affairs efforts, throughout USAREUR-AF; we will be the first element that will formalize a Civil Affairs Planning Team and a Civil Information Management Team at the brigade level.”

Being evaluated by Observer Coach and Trainers, OC/Ts, from First Army and a contingent from the 308th, this exercise enables the teams to learn from themselves and to find Internal strengths and weaknesses, while enabling the best capabilities of stepping into their roles.

“The great thing about these types of exercises, and this one specifically for us, is that it enables our group to really get to know each other, in many cases, it’s people who have not worked together previously; we come from three different units that we incorporated, so we have been able to select different soldiers for different skills to make sure we have the right compliment on both teams, because of the type of work that we’ll be working on.” Joining the 308th CA BDE on their evaluation was the 415th CA BN who are also deploying and being validated for VALEX 3-21.

• Date Taken: 03.24.2021
• Date Posted: 04.06.2021 09:43
• Story ID: 393103
• Location: FORT CUSTER, MI, US
• Hometown: HOPEWELL JUNCTION, NY, US