SF program prepares ACC Airmen for deployments

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Mark Haviland
  • Air Combat Command Public Affairs
LANGLEY AIR FORCE BASE, Va. (ACCNS) --  A training course developed by the Security Forces Directorate here is preparing Air Combat Command Airmen for the unique demands of operating in a combat environment.

The course, 16.5 hours of home-station “just-in-time training,” targets the weapons handling and ground combat skills of about 70,000 people, beginning with those deploying with Air and Space Expeditionary Force pairs 5 and 6. Participation in the course doesn’t exempt Airmen from participation in other recurring training, or in exercises like Eagle Flag and Silver Flag, which simulate operations in combat environment. Instead, the course signals a larger and long-term “cultural change” in the Air Force, said Col. Linda K. Fronczak, ACC Security Forces director.

“This program gives (ACC Airmen) a skill set that traditionally hasn’t been needed in the past, but that we think they’re going to need now and in the future,” Colonel Fronczak said. “This is an interim step we’ll use until the Air Force develops an institutional solution.”

ACC officials, aware that security forces Airmen, the Air Force’s security, law enforcement and ground defense experts, already possessed the skill sets needed in the Central Command Air Forces area of responsibility, tasked the directorate with the course development, Colonel Fronczak said.

While developing the program, members of the SF staff questioned deployed commanders, the CENTAF staff, and people who had recently deployed, said Maj. Kathy Dorish, Training and Air Base Defense branch chief.

Based on that feedback, Maj. Dorish and her staff devised lesson plans for topics such as weapons familiarization and maintenance, wear of personal protective gear, identification of unexploded ordnance and improvised explosive devices, an introduction to convoy operations, and Law of Armed Conflict training. Local security forces units will team with subject matter experts to provide the training at ACC bases nationwide.

“I think this is a good step forward,” Major Dorish said of discussions to incorporate the same skill sets into basic training and at all levels of professional military education.

ACC Security Forces has already provided the training package to other major commands, which face the same training issues.

“Airmen need these additional skills,” said Colonel Fronczak. “The Air Force realizes that we aren’t going to fight wars today, or in the future, like we did in the past. If you look at the battlefields of today, there is no ‘rear’ area, so Airmen have to be prepared to go into a different environment.

“Deployed commanders will receive basic combat skills trained Airmen who are better prepared to both respond and handle the realities of operating in a combat zone,” the colonel said. “They can be confident the troops will know how to react when a mortar round comes in, or when there’s the threat of an IED.”