By Army 1st Lt. Miranda Summers Lowe
District of Columbia National Guard
DOUALA, Cameroon - National Guard
members from two states and the District of Columbia are participating in
Operation Africa Endeavor, a joint training mission sponsored by U.S. Africa
Command which focuses on communications interoperability and information
sharing among African Union, the U.S. and partner nations.
Two Air National Guard officers are
serving as observer/controllers during the exercise portion of the two-week
mission. One of their first tasks was to help develop the training scenario
which is based on African Union, U.S., and U.N. response to a major earthquake
in a fictitious country.
Air Force Lt. Col. Randy Coltrin, of the
217th Air Operations Group, and Lt. Col. Jeff Marks, of the 183rd Fighter Wing,
have been working with teammates from Canada, Uganda, Nigeria and Tanzania.
“Watching the African nations work
together has been a great experience. They treat each other so well,” said
Marks. “Through this training, spending two weeks together, we’ve really built
camaraderie with each other.”
Coltrin added that coordinating so many
delegations from across the world has been a challenge, but hard work had been
making the operation successful. Two planning conferences took place before the
event started.
“The planning that went into this
operation has been tremendous--and it paid off,” said Coltrin. “We came in and
hit the ground running. We were unable to go to the planning conference, but
because of the hard work that went into the planning, everyone seems to
understand why they’re here. The scenario planning has been thorough. There’s
so much background.”
And participation has been high among
those involved in the planning and execution of the exercise.
“I’m very impressed by the level of
participation I see from the African Nations. I’ve really enjoyed working with
so many people, so many different countries,” Coltrin added.
Operation Africa Endeavor is in its
sixth iteration.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment