Photo By Sgt. Andrew Turner | Cadet Justin Kolbeck cuts through a piece of wood to be used in a sun shelter at the...... read more read more
Subscribe
PARAMARIBO, Suriname – Actions speak more loudly than words, and this holds especially true for those in need.
Finding needy people is not hard to do in Suriname, a country with a large portion of its citizens living below the poverty line.
With this fact in mind, the U.S. military and the government of Suriname decided to partner together and take action.
Service members from all branches of the U.S. military traveled to Suriname, South America, between March and August of this year to participate in the 2011 New Horizons exercise, a cooperative mission with the Surinamese government providing valuable military training and quality of life improvements for citizens.
The overall mission ended up being a huge undertaking, involving a diverse array of engineering projects, medical clinics, security forces training events and civil affairs initiatives.
“We have over 47,500 man-hours invested in these projects,” said Air Force Capt. Charles Hansen, the New Horizons 2011 officer-in-charge for mission support, assigned to the 820th Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operation and Repair Squadron engineers from Nellis Air Force Base, Nev. “This is pretty incredible for the type of work these teams are doing and for the short amount of time they have.”
One of the time investments has been engineering projects.
Engineers from the U.S. Air Force’s 820th RED HORSE, the Air Force Reserve’s 555th and 556th RED HORSE and 445th Civil Engineering Squadrons, the Marine Reserve’s Marine Wing Support Squadron 472, and the South Dakota National Guard’s 155th Engineering Company and 114th Civil Engineer Squadron all participated in the construction projects, said Hansen. These projects included building two schools and two medical clinics, as well as making improvements to three community parks throughout Suriname.
Building the schools will help the Surinamese government meet their educational goals, while the clinics will help push to decentralize health care so it can be more accessible in locations further from Paramaribo, the country’s capital, he said. Hansen said that the engineers worked extremely hard to complete the construction projects quickly.
“The projects tasked to the engineers were finished ahead of schedule and under budget,” he said. “Because of this, we were then able to recognize some other needs in the local community that we were able to impact with our engineer’s remaining time.”
Many of the extra projects the engineers took on were aimed at improving the quality of life and health of the communities, such as fixing bathrooms and water lines, said Hansen.
While the construction projects were in full swing, U.S. military personnel from a full array of medical specialties conducted veterinary, dental and medical readiness training exercises in several communities in Suriname, providing free care to local citizens.
Like the construction projects, the medical teams involved in the various exercises were made up of healthcare professionals from the U.S. Air Force, Navy, Army and Marines.
“We’ve learned that general practice medicine is widely available and supported by the [Surinamese] government,” said Hansen. “Many of the patients that attended the exercises desired eyeglasses or dental extractions, because these specialized practices are much more difficult for local people to obtain due to the costs.”
Hansen explained that the turn out for these medical exercises was much better than originally planned, with the medical teams treating over 20,000 patients over the course of the exercise.
A third major task conducted by U.S. personnel during the New Horizons exercise was providing Basic Security Training for Surinamese forces.
Soldiers, airmen and Marines taught basic security techniques for three classes of 30 Surinamese students each, said Hansen. The personnel involved were assigned to the South Dakota National Guard’s 235th Military Police Company, the Illinois National Guard’s 183rd Security Forces Squadron and the Marine Reserve’s Marine Wing Support Group 47.
“Instructors worked with platoons, mostly formed of new Surinamese military members fresh from their basic and advanced infantry training, and taught them basic security operations,” said Hansen.
The training included the proper way to handcuff detainees, inspecting vehicles for explosives, and various other security topics, said Hansen. This diverse training gave the participants an important skill set, and helped develop a partnership where both the Surinamese and U.S. forces could work with, and learn from, each other.
“The hidden element of this is it gives the security trainers on the U.S. side the opportunity to teach a foreign national basic security tactics,” said Hansen. “They do this in a non-hostile environment, and are able to take those skills with them to places like Iraq or Afghanistan where the environments are a lot more contentious.”
Getting the word out about New Horizons, and building relations with the local communities has been the task of the Marine Reserve’s 4th Civil Affairs Group.
Hansen said the Marines reached out to a multitude of local organizations and individuals by distributing donated hygiene kits and school supplies, as well as ensuring the medical exercises were advertised to the local citizens.
“That’s often a challenge in these environments,” said Hansen. “Advertisement in other cultures is much different than in the U.S. They were able to figure that out and get the message to the people here.”
The Civil affairs team also worked with the Surinamese military forces that provided security for the MEDRETE’s, helping to find ways to best manage the large number of locals who were waiting in lines for medical care.
Behind all New Horizons operations in Suriname was a group of service members working to keep everything organized.
Airmen from the U.S. Air Force’s 820th RED HORSE, from Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., have been on the ground in Suriname since the exercise began, helping to ensure that everything runs as planned, said Lt. Col. John Blackwell, the commander of New Horizons 2011 exercise, assigned to the 820th. Blackwell said that each of the 643 U.S. service members who participated in the exercise were either in country for the duration of the exercise or attached to it on a shorter, rotational basis.
One of the biggest challenges of New Horizons 2011 was ensuring that member of each different rotation were integrated into the goals and objectives of the mission, he said.
Facing this challenge required “a persistent focus on the objectives that support the mission,” said Blackwell. “I would make sure everyone understood the context of exactly where we are at that point in time, in terms of the execution of the mission.”
Blackwell said he would state the mission of New Horizons to incoming personnel during their first day in country. He would also hold weekly formations, reviewing what happened in the previous week and what is to be expected in the exercise’s future.
Throughout the exercise, relations with the local government and its citizens have been very positive, said Blackwell. The relationship between Suriname and the U.S. was already very good before New Horizons began, and this relationship continued for its duration, he said.
“We have greatly enhanced an already good relationship by actual, concrete commitments instead of just words,” said Blackwell.
U.S. service members who participated in the 2011 New Horizons exercise acted, bringing aid to the Surinamese people. From schools and medical clinics being built, free health care, basic security training and community outreach programs, the actions performed by U.S. military personnel, and their Surinamese government partners, definitely speak louder than words.
“It’s been a super rewarding military experience, and the joint operations are the strongest things about the exercise, said Blackwell. “We’ve had the best execution of the New Horizons exercise ever.”
| Date Taken: | 08.23.2011 |
| Date Posted: | 08.23.2011 08:04 |
| Story ID: | 75772 |
| Location: | PARAMARIBO, SR |
| Web Views: | 212 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, US service members act to help Surinamese partners, by SGT Andrew Turner, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
No keywords found.
LEAVE A COMMENT