Photo By Cpl. Mackenzie Binion | 210516-M-UV498-1005 PACIFIC OCEAN (May 16, 2021) – U.S. Marine Corps Col. Fridrik...... read more read more
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Marine Col. Fridrik Fridriksson, 15th Marine Expeditionary Unit commander, came home to Alaska as part of his command’s participation in Northern Edge 2021 (NE21).
NE21 is one in a series of U.S. Indo-Pacific Command exercises designed to sharpen the joint forces’ skills; to practice tactics, techniques and procedures; to improve command, control and communication relationships; and to develop cooperative plans and programs.
During the exercise, the 15th MEU arrived in early May at Cold Bay, Alaska, with the three-ship Makin Island Amphibious Ready Group.
Located at the southwest reaches of the Alaska Peninsula at the root of the Aleutian Islands, Cold Bay hosted disembarked Marines training as part of a joint force of nearly 15,000 service members operating across the state and in the Gulf of Alaska.
The training ground wasn’t far from the Aleutian island where Fridriksson grew up.
“I was born and raised for the majority of my childhood on Adak island, which is to the west of Cold Bay,” he said. “My mother was an airport manager for Reeve Aleutian Airlines – which used to serve throughout the Aleutians – and my father was an engineer and commercial fisherman out here.”
Adak can only be reached by air or boat, and Fridriksson said he managed to make the most of the Last Frontier’s outdoors.
“It was a great experience – pretty isolated, pretty sheltered – but hiking, hunting, fishing, all of that type of stuff was available,” the colonel said. “Because my mother worked for the airlines, we got into Anchorage quite a bit, and for high school basketball and wrestling, we got to travel all through Alaska down to Juneau, Cordova, Sitka, Anchorage, all through the Kenai Peninsula, up to Fairbanks, even out to Nome for wrestling and basketball tournaments.”
The military has a long history at Adak, which was the site for an airfield supporting World War II military operations against the Imperial Japanese encroachment of the Aleutian islands of Attu and Kiska. Following the war, the Adak Naval Air Station granted a home to the maritime service until the base’s closure in 1997.
With the Air Force at Shemya to the west of Adak and with periodic visits from the Coast Guard, Fridriksson said he garnered a respect for the military.
“Growing up as a civilian, I had a lot of positive interactions with all of the services,” he said.
Fridriksson said he ended up joining the Corps as a matter of course.
“It was a sense of duty,” he said. “I always knew I wanted to serve, and I looked at quite a few of the services. The Army was very appealing to me because there was an opportunity to get stationed back home in Alaska. But there was just something about the Marine Corps that drew me there.”
Fridriksson enlisted in 1991 and was designated Military Occupational Specialty 0311, Infantry. After service as a fire team leader and squad leader, Fridriksson completed his degree and entered the Enlisted Commissioning Program, pinning on second lieutenant.
He was assigned to Camp Pendleton, California, with Battalion Landing Team 1/4, which today provides the ground combat element of the 15th MEU. Despite being a prior-enlisted Marine, Fridriksson said he was intellectually and professionally challenged by those he was called to lead.
“What was interesting was how incredibly proficient the young Marines were, and they demanded the best in the leadership,” he recalled. “You couldn’t just sit around. You had to constantly develop your skills because if you didn’t, the young Marines were so fantastic they would just flow right by you. If you weren’t on your game, you were left behind.”
Upon promotion to captain, Fridriksson was assigned to the Basic School for newly commissioned officers as a staff platoon commander and company executive officer. He then attended the U.S. Army Advanced Armor Course, crossing military branches to the world of tanks for a different perspective on the profession of arms.
Fridriksson said the foray would be part of an ongoing journey for his appreciation of the joint force.
“There used to be pretty big divisions and a lot of jealousy between the services,” he said. “Now, we’re such an integrated joint force. It really set me up for success to be able to be there and talk with different branches and international officers as well. The joint and allied education I got was incredible.”
Crossing back to the realm of infantry, Fridriksson took command of India Company, 3rd Battalion, 8th Marines, at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina.
“Company command is one of those life-changing billets,” he said. “That was the time I decided this was what I wanted to do for the rest of my career.”
Fridriksson’s company deployed three times with tours in Afghanistan, Okinawa and Haiti. Working closely with higher headquarters, and having a weapons platoon with medium machine guns and mortars, the officer said he was getting to grips with higher levels of command.
“Being able to integrate combined arms and to really be able to see what the battalion is doing, and how the company fits into that battalion’s scheme of maneuver, it’s a crucial point in any officer’s career,” he said.
As a major, Fridriksson was assigned to Iraq as a Joint Improvised Explosive Device Defeat Organization team leader with the Army’s 10th Mountain Division out of Fort Drum, New York. He said the team’s work helped to rapidly develop technology and tactics to prevent IED attacks while working to improve medical care for service members injured by roadside bombs.
“It was very difficult duty being around IEDs,” he said. “Every single device that went off, you were responding once [explosive ordnance disposal] cleared everything out. You had to collect up all the data, you had to get everything going, and you had to try and get ahead of the next event. It was a year in Iraq, and that was probably the most tired I have ever been in my career because the amount of travel and the amount of work involved in getting these IEDs off the battlefield.”
Fridriksson then commanded 3rd Battalion, 1st Marines, Camp Pendleton.
“Being an infantry battalion commander, you’re definitely looking at the bigger picture,” he explained. “You’re looking at MEU- or brigade-level operations. You’re really starting to make a big difference in making sure you plug into the divisions and higher-level units.”
Fridriksson said he had to work to further hone his interpersonal skills in order to rise to the demands of the billet.
“The biggest thing I learned when I was mentoring my company commanders, and my communications skills had to be so much better than what they were when I was a company commander because I couldn’t put my personal presence everywhere, whereas a company commander can,” he explained. “As a battalion commander, you have got to make sure you give absolutely crystal-clear commander’s intent, so Marines can go out and execute the mission the way you need them to.”
Today, Fridriksson commands an agile task force tailor-made for worldwide contingency operations.
“The MEU is the smallest of what we consider a Marine Air Ground Task Force,” he said. “A MEU has a ground-combat element, which is based around an infantry battalion; we have a logistics element, which is based around a combat logistics battalion; and we have an aviation element built around an MV-22 Osprey squadron. Then we have a MEU command element that sits on top and integrates all three of those, partners up with the Navy and gets ready to deploy.”
The colonel said MEUs are an ever-ready, ever-vigilant force of Marines on high alert.
“At any time, 365 days a year, there’s a MEU that’s out currently deployed ready to respond to whatever a combatant commander needs them to,” he said.
The unit can deploy in support of the full spectrum of operations from high-intensity conflict with a peer competitor to responding to a regional humanitarian crisis.
“Since I have been with the MEU, one of the most rewarding evolutions is humanitarian assistance,” he said. “MEUs have been involved in everything from tsunami relief to providing medical and dental treatment to people throughout the world.”
The most critical feature of the MEU, however, is its capability to kick in the door when necessary.
“The MEU is designed for forcible entry,” he said. “We have our own attack helicopters with the AH-1[Z] Viper and the UH-1[Y] Venom that can both go after targets. We have the F-35 [Lightning II] that is capable of striking targets. Through MV-22 [Ospreys], [Landing Craft, Air Cushion], small boats and other forms of maneuver, we can quickly mass forces onto the beach and continue operations inland from there.”
Fridriksson said he has seen a lot of changes throughout his career, especially when the military pivoted to fighting counterinsurgency operations following the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
“Fast forward 20-plus years, and the world has changed dramatically,” he said. “While we were involved in Afghanistan and Iraq, other countries have really looked at the way we fight, and they have built some incredible capability.”
The pivot back to preparing to confront peer and near-peer adversaries requires practice and innovation, Fridriksson said.
“Exercises like Northern Edge and other exercises in the Indo-Pacific Command area of responsibility are really getting after taking a look at a lot of these difficult problems we will face if we go into combat,” he said. “The No. 1 thing to remember is we’re going to be working together: Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, Space Force, our civilian partners, our allies, it’s going to take all of us to get after some of these very difficult problems.”
Fridriksson said he is heartened by what he saw during the exercise.
“I’m really excited to be participating in Northern Edge because watching what is going on, it’s just so impressive to see the way the exercise is tracked, the air plan, operations on the ground where we’re integrating with the Army for our [High Mobility Artillery Rocket System rocket] shots, and the sortie generation the Navy can get off the ships, it’s really, really impressive, and I know if I was the enemy watching this, I would be very nervous.”
Amid the ballistic ballet of air sorties and ground maneuvers, Fridriksson was reflective on his time back in his home state of Alaska.
“It was almost surreal,” he said. “The cold brisk air, the rain on your face, it reminds me of growing up. This was a real strategic location during World War II and the Cold War, and it’s exciting that people are starting to look back north to Alaska to develop more training here. Northern Edge is such a fantastic evolution, and I’m so incredibly blessed to be back home.”
| Date Taken: | 05.18.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 05.18.2021 12:30 |
| Story ID: | 396717 |
| Location: | AK, US |
| Hometown: | ADAK, AK, US |
| Web Views: | 884 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
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