GTMO's Installation Training Team to Focus on Emergency Preparedness

By Mass Communication Specialist 1st Class (SW/AW) Justin Ailes, Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba Public Affairs

GUANTANAMO BAY, Cuba (NNS) -- Installation Training Team officials at Naval Station (NS) Guantanamo Bay, Cuba will hold an annual emergency response drill on base Jan. 9-10.

Scheduled to be held at W.T. Sampson Elementary and W.T. Sampson High schools, the training exercise will focus on the proper method for conducting shelter-in-place, lockdown, and evacuation procedures.

"This exercise is part of an ongoing Training and Readiness program driven by the base Commander and lead by the executive officer, aimed at making sure we are ready and able to care for our base residents," said NS Guantanamo Bay Installation Training Officer Kevin Robarge.

The training evolution will involve representatives from the installation's Fire, Security and Medical departments, as well as staff from both schools.

"We do this every year to ensure that our teachers and students are familiar with base policies and procedures associated with these events," said W.T. Sampson Administrative Officer Carl Davis. "It's become even more paramount to focus on these procedures since the recent school tragedies in Connecticut. Comparatively, we are very safe here in GTMO, but it is imperative to take all necessary precautions to protect our community."

According to Davis, normal transportation and school start and end times will not be affected.

Installation Training Team officials continue to focus on community preparedness. Recently, team members facilitated and emergency response drill at the installation's Windjammer pool.

"Our goal was to run an emergency response to an injury at the main pool with the life guards and ase emergency responders," said Robarge. "This provided a chance for all areas to evaluate, train and improve their skills. Base emergency responders and Morale, Welfare and Recreation life guards were able to practice their lifesaving skills in a realistic scenario."

The scenario tested and evaluated the life guards, 911 dispatching and emergency responders (Medical, Fire, Security) ability to secure and injured swimmer.

"The drill featured a diving injury where a swimmer suffered a spinal injury," said Robarge. "The member had to be stabilized in the water, placed on a spine board to stabilize their neck and extracted from the pool by life guards."

According to Robarge, ensuring the installation's emergency responders are properly trained and capable of adapting to potentially hazardous situations is of the upmost importance.

"The key to success is being able to do the basics with precision, so the more training personnel have, the better they can get at what they do," said Robarge.

Community Support Coordinators focus on resiliency

Air Force Materiel Command Public Affairs

1/2/2013 - WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Ohio -- Amid a challenging fiscal and personnel climate, the Air Force recently created a Community Support Coordinator position at 71 Air Force installations to help Airmen and their families withstand, recover from and grow in the face of stressors and changing demands.

The position was developed to operationalize the four pillars of Comprehensive Airmen Fitness -- mental, physical, social and spiritual. In response to the follow-on report from the Fort Hood, Texas, incident in 2009 where 13 people were killed and 29 others were injured, the Air Force wanted to create a focal point for installation resilience programs.

The primary responsibilities of the CSC are to serve as the executive director of the installation Community Action Information Board, chair of the Integrated Delivery System, and act as focal point for Comprehensive Airman Fitness to include all things resilience.

The objective of the CAIB is to identify and resolve issues impacting the readiness of the Air Force members, civilians and their families. The primary focus is to promote a positive way of life while enhancing the ability to function as productive Air Force community members. Top leadership chairs the CAIB (vice commanders at Air Force and MAJCOM; wing commanders at installation level), allowing for high visibility and the capability to maintain well-informed perspectives on a multitude of human factors affecting the Air Force environment. The IDS is the working group formed as the action arm of the CAIB. These two structures exist at the Air Force, MAJCOM and installation levels, drawing together a multidisciplinary team working in collaboration to resolve and impact readiness issues.

As part of Comprehensive Airman Fitness efforts, each installation will send a team of four to Master Resilience Training at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J.

Once qualified as Master Resilience Trainers, the team will in turn train Resilience Training Assistants from each unit on a base, according to Jennifer Treat, Air Force Materiel Command's CSC. The number of RTAs trained in each unit will depend on the unit's size, though the recommended number from Air Force is four per unit.

"Installation CSCs will be a tremendous asset to Airmen and their families," Treat said. "But the RTAs serve as a familiar face, right from your own unit, trained and ready to help."

DOD Offers Non-medical Counseling to Troops, Families

By Army Sgt. 1st Class Tyrone C. Marshall Jr.
American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Jan. 2, 2013 – The Defense Department continues to ensure the well-being of service members and their families through no-cost, short-term, non-medical counseling in the interests of military and family readiness, a defense official said.

Jena M. Moore, program analyst for counseling in the Office of Military Community and Family Policy, explained the program during an interview with The Pentagon Channel and American Forces Press Service.

“The Military and Family Life Counseling program … offers short-term, non-medical counseling,” Moore said. “And it’s confidential for our service members and family members.”

The program, administered by licensed professionals with master’s or doctorate degrees in a mental health-related field, provide services for active duty, National Guard and reserve members and their families, as well as DOD civilians “serving as part of the expeditionary workforce and their families.”
The program’s goal, she said, is to prevent the development of or the exacerbation of mental health conditions that can detract from military readiness.

“Another goal of the program was to establish a different avenue of counseling for service members and family members, in addition to what’s already available through their military community,” Moore said.

Data indicates usage of non-medical counseling has increased from 10 percent of active-duty service members in 2003 to about 35 percent, she said.

According to Moore, the program provides non-medical counseling for issues that can be resolved or supported through short-term support.

“These are daily issues that come to our lives like dealing with work or dealing with family,” she said. “And, specifically for the military community, it’s those normal reactions that service members and family members can have to the stressful attributes that can come with being a military family member.”

Moore said medical counseling is not provided through the program since such care typically would be used for health issues requiring longer-term care. Counselors ensure service members or family members are connected with the right resource before finishing the counseling sessions, she said.
“Examples of [medical counseling] would be issues related to child abuse, spouse abuse, or suicidal ideations,” Moore said. “These are counseling sessions that you could find within a military medical treatment facility or through TRICARE.”

Moore explained how the MFLC program delivers counseling to the military community in a variety of ways.

“One of the largest ways that we’re utilized is on installations on rotations up to 180 days,” she said. “And typically these MFLCs are found within our family support centers, but they also can be found throughout military installations as well as embedded in military units.

“We also have our child and youth behavioral MFLCs that support child and youth on installations,” Moore continued. “Those can be found in our child development centers as well as public schools that have high populations of military children.”

For commanders, Moore noted, there are surge support services available to units that are returning from combat. And there are on-demand medical services that primarily support National Guard and reserve members, she said, which are usually available at family events and during drill weekends and deployment-related events.

“If a commander is interested in receiving surge support for their unit that is returning from deployment, they would request through their family program manager at service headquarters,” Moore said, “and then that request would come through to the MFLC program where we’d review it, and provide support as needed.”

For troops with privacy concerns, the sessions with the MFLC counselors are confidential -- even their commander won’t know -- and the counseling will not impact their security clearances, she said.

Additionally, Moore said, full-time program counselors can be accessed through joint family support assistance programs, available in all 50 states, territories and the District of Columbia.
And MFLC program options include speaking to a military chaplain, or going to a family support center, she said.

Moore said research data indicates the program is working.

“In a recent review of the MFLC program that was conducted by Virginia Tech, [of] those that were surveyed, 98 percent indicated that the MFLC counseling program was effective in dealing with their issues,” she said.

Senior commanders like retired Navy Adm. Eric T. Olson, who led U.S. Special Operations Command, also have provided feedback, Moore said.

“In 2010, [Olson] spoke to the MFLC program and the support that the MFLC program provided his service members and family members,” she said. “[Olson] mentioned how the MFLC program is flexible, and it’s so accessible … that his families and service members feel comfortable in utilizing it.”

Olson “really thinks that it’s a value added for his service members and family members to have that resource,” Moore said.

Face of Defense: Army Captain Recalls Journey from Cambodia

By Army 1st Lt. Will Martin 49th Military Police Brigade SACRAMENTO, Calif., Dec. 31, 2012 – Army Capt. Thoeuth Duong’s life story is a study in contrasts. Parts tragedy and providence, it is torn from the annals of history and speaks to the authenticity of the American dream. Army Capt. Thoeuth Duong, a California National Guardsman serving with the 49th Military Police Brigade in Fairfield, Calif., escaped war-torn Cambodia and is now living the American dream. Courtesy photo   (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. For Duong, now serving with the California Army National Guard’s 49th Military Police Brigade, that dream has become reality -- but before the dream, there was the nightmare that was his Cambodian childhood.   Born into stark, agrarian poverty in 1969, Duong could have just as easily grown old as a farmer in rural Cambodia, but destiny had different plans for him. Chaos in his homeland, where Pol Pot energized a revolution that bloodied Cambodia, thrust darkness into Duong’s childhood. “I remember I had to work on a boat downloading food, and we had to harvest the leftover rice in the fields,” Duong said of his forced labor at the hands of the Khmer Rouge revolutionaries, who seized his country in 1975 before carrying out a three-year genocide that claimed an estimated 1.7 million lives. Just 5 years old when the Khmer Rouge claimed power, Duong’s father was murdered and three of his brothers were forcibly relocated to communist-run factories. Only Duong, his 7-year-old brother and his mother -- now a widow -- remained at home. Soon, his mother was forced to spend her waking hours at a nearby labor camp, allowing her neither the energy nor income to care for her starving sons. “For a whole year, it was just me and my brother. We did everything; we took care of ourselves,” Duong said. “Once in a while my mom stole some stuff for us, fruit or whatever, but I got sick all the time. She didn’t think there was any chance I was going to make it. I had a bloated stomach -- I looked like I was going to die.” Duong’s first rays of hope came from an unlikely source: the North Vietnamese. Though brutal in their own right, the invading Vietnamese deposed Pol Pot in 1979 and brought order to the chaos that had saturated Duong’s life. “I remember when the Vietnamese came, they dropped propaganda leaflets. And after the leaflets, they dropped bombs,” said Duong, who recalled hiding and watching tracer bullets fly overhead in the darkness of night. “But they kicked out Pol Pot and allowed us to move around wherever.” Reunited with all her children, Duong’s mother saw a window of opportunity in their newfound freedom of movement. His mother quickly gathered her children, Duong said, and for two weeks traversed westbound on foot -- in slippers -- in an effort to reach neighboring Thailand. At the border, the Duong family narrowly escaped pirates and Vietnamese troops before reaching a United Nations rescue station. From there they were bused into Thailand and found a temporary home in a U.N. refugee camp. For the first time in his memory, the 10-year-old Duong experienced something resembling a normal childhood. “It was the first time going to school and brushing my teeth,” Duong said. “I was excited about being in a stable environment and getting to go to school. There was stuff there I had never seen before -- gum, candy, painting -- I learned a little English.” The English soon proved useful. Duong’s family lived as refugees in the camp for three years, until 1983, when an educated Cambodian who had fled to America to escape Pol Pot’s wave of terror brought the Duongs to Long Beach, Calif. Embarking on a new life in an unknown land, Duong was struck by the strangeness of it all.  “I started school in the last half of the 7th grade, didn’t speak hardly any English, in the middle of big city,” Duong said. “People thought I was in 3rd or 4th grade because I was so small and skinny [because of malnutrition]. The craziest part was to see all those buildings. It was very interesting.” With the help of a Cambodian classmate who pointed him from class to class, Duong soon picked up the language and excelled in his classes. His surroundings, however, were marked by violence and despair, encouraging Duong to seek out a way to further improve his station in life. “In high school, the environment was really, really bad. Many of my friends joined gangs and used drugs. In the late ’80s, crack was big, and people I knew were getting shot,” Duong said. “After graduating [from high school], I had nowhere to go, no destination, so I joined the Army. Nobody wanted me to do it, but I had to do what was best for me.” Duong’s decision to enlist in the Army was “the best decision I could have made,” he said. Multiple combat deployments, a two-decades-long marriage, a college degree and an officer’s commission through the California National Guard stand out as highlights of a life rooted in military service. “When I came back to Long Beach after Desert Storm, I found out three of my best friends had been shot and killed [in California],” Duong said, reflecting on how easily he could have shared their fate. “The Army saved me,” he said. Duong will soon retire from the Army after 22 years of service. He plans to spend more time with his family and put more energy behind his civilian career as a probation officer. But in reflecting on his nightmarish childhood, when death and poverty were the norm, his gratitude is obvious. “I came out from a war zone,” Duong said, “and then to have a commission in the best army in the world, a college degree, married with kids, a house, a good civilian job … Yeah, I’m living the American dream.”

Military Injustice

 Commentary by Lieutenant Colonel John Lewis Cook, USA (ret.)

American military justice is highly regarded throughout the world due to the  safeguards against abuse built into the Uniform Code of Military Justice.  The military is justly proud of the fairness of this system, free from political influences that could determine the outcome of any court martial proceedings.   Everyone involved must swear a sacred oath to be impartial and be influenced only by the evidence presented against the accused.  All oaths are taken seriously in the military because the penalty for violating any oath is swift and usually severe. The accused is even allowed to bring in civilian attorneys to mount a defense.  As a result, the decisions rendered at a military count martial are rarely challenged in federal court. The key to the system is the fact that it is applied the same way, hence  uniformly, across all services and all ranks.   

However, two cases currently working their way to trial presents a cause for concern.  First is the Sergeant Robert Bales case.  Bales has been charged with sixteen counts of capital murder as the result of an alleged shooting spree he went on in southern Afghanistan on March 11th, 2012.  He is charged with murdering unarmed Afghan men, women and children. Bales was on his fourth combat tour at the time and had previously been diagnosed with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  However, he was cleared for his fourth and final tour in spite of that.  Last week, the Army announced it will seek the death penalty in the case and plans to move it quickly to trial.  The last time the military carried out an execution was on April 16th, 1961, when John A. Bennett was hanged at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. 

Now consider the case of Major Nidal Malik Husan.  Husan has been charged  with shooting forty-two Americans at Fort Hood, Texas on November 5th, 2009, killing thirteen.  This was over three years ago and the case has not yet proceeded to trail.  The government is not expected to seek the death penalty in this case. Husan, a devout Muslim,  has never served in combat and it is unlikely he can raise the PTSD defense.  We know now that he had ties to radical Muslims and that his colleagues and superiors at Walter Reed Army Medical Center were very concerned about his irrational behavior before he was assigned to Fort Hood.  Yet no one intervened. Why?  What were they afraid of?

So why are these cases being treated so differently?  We know that President Hamid Karzai has demanded that the shooter responsible for killing the sixteen Afghans in southern Afghanistan be “severely punished.”  In the Muslim world, that means the accused must be executed.  Is the administration putting undue pressure on the Army to dispose of the Bales case as quickly as possible, in the severest possible manner, in order to appease Karzai?  How else do we explain this unusual rush to judgment in such a serious case?  And how does the Army explain the unusually long delay in getting the Husan case before a court martial.  And why does the administration insist on calling the shooting at Fort Hood “work place violence” rather than a domestic act of terror committed in the center of the Army’s largest installation?  No one ever called the Afghan shooting “work place violence.” Is this a case of discrimination based on rank, where an enlisted man is more severely punished than an officer? Or is there a deeper, darker agenda at work here?  At this point, it appears that both cases are headed for a gross miscarriage of justice and the highly respected military justice system is about to be permanently stained.  If that is allowed to happen, we all lose. Was Karzai secretly assured that Bales would be “severely punished” in order to appease the Afghan president?  And if he was, who assured him?  Certainly not the Army.  Could it have been our President, who has shown unusual deference to the Muslim world since taking office? Was the Muslim world secretly told that Husan would escape the death penalty in order to appease Islam?  Right now, we don’t know.  The problem is the perception of unequal treatment that the Army has allowed to fester in both of these cases. That’s why professional journalists need to dig into both cases and get to ground truth.  As of now, no adequate explanation has been offered by the Army and it doesn’t appear one will be forthcoming willingly.  Why the difference? Is military justice about to be sacrificed at the alter of political correctness in order  not to offend Islam?  Both of these cases scream out for answers immediately  because neither case passes the smell test right now.  

About the Author

Lieutenant Colonel John Lewis Cook, United States Army (Retired), “served as the Senior Advisor to the Ministry of Interior in Kabul, Afghanistan, with responsibility for developing the force structure for the entire Afghan National Police.  As of 2012, this force totals 157,000.  From March 2008 until August 2012, his access and intimate associations with all levels of the Afghan government and coalition forces have provided him with an unprecedented insight into the policies which will determine the outcome of the war.  It is this insight, coupled with his contacts and associations throughout Afghanistan that form the basis of Afghanistan: The Perfect Failure

Click to read more about Lt. Colonel John Lewis Cook

Academy falls to Rice in Armed Forces Bowl

by John Van Winkle
Air Force Academy Public Affairs

12/30/2012 - FORT WORTH, Texas (AFNS) -- The Air Force Academy fell 33-14 to Rice University in the 2012 Armed Forces Bowl today.

Rice University used a combination of size, speed and better execution to dominate the second half and end the Falcons season with a loss.

After a few initial three-and-outs, Rice mounted its first sustained drive to score when quarterback Taylor McHargue connected with receiver Jordan Taylor from 16-yards out in the corner of the end zone to go up 7-0.

McHargue would later go with a concussion and not return. Air Force also switched out under center, pulling senior quarterback Connor Dietz in the second quarter in favor of sophomore Kale Pearson, hoping to spark a offense that can stay on the field for more than three consecutive plays.

"We came into the game expecting both guys to play for us at quarterback," said Falcons head coach Troy Calhoun. "Kale played well for us in the second quarter."

Pearson commanded the Falcons' first sustained drive of the game and ended the series with a 9-yard run around the right to tie the game at 7-all. The Falcons took the lead a few series later when senior running back Wes Cobb dove in from a yard out for the Falcons' second touchdown. Kicker Parker Herrington added the extra point, giving the Falcons a 14-7 lead. The Owls evened the score before the half, and took control of the game from that point on, keeping the Falcons out of the end zone and on their heels for the remainder of the game. Rice would score four times in the second half to mount and sustain a 33-14 lead until time ran out.

"At every single spot, we didn't play well enough in the second half to win a game," said Calhoun.

On offense, the Falcons would end the day converting only four of 14 third downs, and one of two on fourth down. Two critical turnovers in the fourth quarter also killed any chance the Falcons had of mounting a comeback.

"We put an awful lot of strain on our defense," said Calhoun. "Sometimes it was in field position, and sometimes it wasn't getting enough first downs. Sometimes it was in third downs for the other team. When your opponent has 20 third downs, you aren't stopping them enough to give your offense a shot."

Defensively, the Falcons allowed 503 yards of offense to sustain several long drives and win time of possession battle by over 15 minutes.

"It just came down to execution," said senior linebacker Austin Niklas, Air Force's move valuable player for the game.

Size was also an advantage that Rice monopolized. It is an advantage that most opponents have over service academy football teams. Service academy teams compensate for this up front with their triple-option offenses, and utilize technique, strength and mobility to overcome the opponents' mass advantage. But against Rice's offense and their three wide-receiver set, the Falcons smaller secondary spent the game in their opponent's shadows. Between Rice's two quarterbacks, the Falcons gave up 295 yards in passing offense and had zero interceptions.

"It was a combo of our secondary, our defensive backs, getting beat up, and our pass rush. Rice has a lot better size on the ends and our pass rush just didn't bring it home," said senior linebacker Alex Means.

Rice receiver Jordan Taylor used his 6'5" frame to tower over Falcon defenders and score all three of Rice's touchdowns.

"I wish we had won," said Niklas. "We fought hard the whole game. Rice has a good football team, and we were unable to stop them consistently in the second half. The Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl people were great, and we appeciated our time here."

For the Falcons, this concludes their 2012 college football season. After a few more days of holiday leave, next up for the players will be off-season workouts in the weight room in January for the underclassmen. For most of the 22 seniors, it's the last game of their collegiate careers, so they have just one more semester and graduation awaiting them. For the coaches, recruiting trips and recruiting visits will take the forefront of the days to come, as well as preparations for spring football in early 2013.

Navy Training Commander Sees Benefits of Desktop Virtualization at Gulfport Training Center

By Steve Vanderwerff, Naval Education and Training Command Public Affairs

GULFPORT, Miss. (NNS) -- Naval Education and Training Command (NETC) announced Dec. 28 that the commander of NETC visited the Center for Naval Aviation Technical Training Unit (CNATTU) Keesler Air Force Base to see firsthand how the learning site has successfully implemented a Virtual Desktop Initiative (VDI).

Rear Adm. Don Quinn, NETC commander, was briefed by Cmdr. Jonathan Vorrath, CNATTU Keesler's commanding officer, about the learning site implementation of VDI and how they use it to train students.

VDI is a five year plan to deploy the VDI to more than 36,000 daily users and will replace 80 percent of the more than 23,000 desktop computers in more than 2,500 classrooms at 68 learning sites around the world.

Desktop virtualization provides multiple student and instructor workstations from a centralized server environment, which eliminates physical workstations residing in an electronic classroom.

"CNATTU Keesler is the first learning site to implement the virtual desktop initiative (VDI), which will expand throughout the NETC domain," said Quinn. "We have thousands of computers. To keep pace with current technology, security risks and software, each computer currently has to be updated. When you virtualize a classroom, you shift from multiple updates to an update of a single server. In this case, we went from 152 computers to three servers. Now when we update, we only have to do it three times instead of 152. It's a huge time and money saver."

Besides being a money saving venture, Quinn says he is also pleased by how VDI saves electrical power and time, and benefits the students.

"There's also a power issue - instead of running 152 desktops we now have only 152 monitors and three servers. So we save on electricity, manpower, and time," Quinn said. "In terms of mission effectiveness, the most important thing is speed. It's so much better for the students. It's reliable, it's faster, and instructors now spend less time fighting technology and more time teaching. It is clear that once we incorporate this change in more than 2,500 electronic classrooms containing more than 23,000 computers, that this is a huge deal for NETC and the Navy."

Spearheaded by NETC's Information Technology Services Department, the initiative stemmed from a mission imperative requiring cost effective delivery of training content.

During the planning process, the integrated project team determined VDI should be phased in throughout the domain because of diverse training environments and multiple stakeholders with varying requirements. For example, the Center for Surface Combat Systems Detachment West's mission is to provide surface ship combat systems training, which varies significantly from the Center for Service Support Learning Site San Diego, whose mission is to provide training to the Navy's administrative, logistics, and media communities.

Because several training applications are learning site specific, the team needed to consider each site and decided which workstations, programs and applications could be delivered as a service to the student. The virtual system requires no desktop operating system or disk drives, and no virus or spyware monitoring requirement.

It would also need to have full Universal Serial Bus (USB) capability to support thumb drives, and dual monitor capability but no refresh requirements due to software updates or new applications, and no media, graphics or memory restrictions.

Desktop virtualization separates the different computing layers and executes all of them on a secure server, which allows end users to access all of the data and applications without being tied down to a specific hardware device.

According to Cmdr. Sean O'Brien, NETC's deputy chief Information Officer, it reduces desk-side support costs by up to 40 percent through centralized desktop and application deployment and management, and improved desktop reliability.

"Productivity and flexibility is boosted by providing users with anywhere and soon any-device access to their work," O'Brien said. "Security of the user's data is also bolstered, and it simplifies disaster recovery by separating processing and storage from desktop hardware and lowers operational expenses by extending the life of peripheral desktop hardware. The benefits of virtualization are that it's engineered to meet current requirement, it's expandable for future demand and provides a standardized solution for student application loads."

O'Brien said the successful implementation of VDI is the result of outstanding cooperation and teamwork.

"The success of this project is the result of close collaboration of the dedicated VDI integrated project team and CNATT's commitment and willingness to work closely with the team to ensure that all training delivery requirements were incorporated into the solution design," he said. "Traditionally, Information Assurance (IA) is done on the backside when a project is completed and then needs to be made IA compliant, which generally delays deployment and requires rework because of IA requirements that don't work. We brought IA in from the beginning to ensure that compliancy was designed and built into the system."

Using the lessons learned from the initial roll out at the Keesler training unit, NETC can template the process across the domain.

"An important part of the process was ensuring that the documentation was written conversationally so non IT technicians could read the instructions and understand how to set up the system," said Angie Chase, Electronic Classroom program manager. "This is truly the first step toward being a cloud computing environment. When you talk about cloud computing you're talking about accessing information from anywhere at any time, but it's more than that, it's delivering software, the desktop, data and computing power as a service."

The team also considered security.

"VDI creates a much more secure environment. In a VDI environment, when a student logs in and then logs off, any changes to the operating system disappear," said David Thomas, project IA compliance lead. "In a secure VDI environment, if a student generates or downloads a virus or malware from the Internet to the desktop, when they log out it's gone for good. What do viruses and malware do? They effect changes to your operating system. With the VDI environment you get a fresh pristine operating system every time you log in."

Cmdr. Vorrath said students and instructors benefit by desktop virtualization, and it could benefit other commands as well.

"VDI creates ease for students to log in to the programs and the ease for our administrators that maintain those systems. It benefits the students because the technicians we have that to do the trouble shooting will be able to focus more on customer issues instead of having to worry about security updates on each individual desktop or individual system program updates," Vorrath said. "When you think about all of the desktops across the Navy and all of those systems that have to be deployed as a result of NMCI, it would be an incredible cost saving.

"Our first step in VDI is a huge success. I knew that before I visited here, but I wanted to look the people who made it happen in the eye and thank them. It took multiple players from multiple organizations to make this happen and I am proud of them," Vorrath said.

American Heroes Book of the Year Recognition

Each year American Heroes Press recognizes a book written by a US Military servicemember and a book written by a US law enforcement official.

The application period for the “Military-Writers.com 2013 Book of the Year” and the “Police-Writers.com 2013 Book of the Year” is now open.

For more information about the contest and awards:

Military Personnel – http://www.military-writers.com/annual_recognition.html

Law Enforcement Personnel – http://www.police-writers.com/annual_recognition.html