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www.aerotechnews.com/ntcfortirwin High Desert Warrior 3
June 3, 2016
Training

‘Ghost Brigade’ Soldiers prepare for
future con icts

by Sta Sgt. Samuel NorthrupSmall RSS Icon

JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash. – Since 1981, military personnel have come (U.S. Army Photo by Maj. Kelly Haux)
and gone through the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif., to prepare for missions A Soldier assigned to 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team prepares to re back at enemy
around the world. soldiers during Decisive Action Training Rotation 16-06 at the National Training Center in
Fort Irwin, Calif., May 16, 2016. The training focused on the 1-2 SBCT combating a near-
ese month-long rotations are usually geared to prepare a unit for an upcoming mission. peer enemy and smaller militant groups in a foreign country.
For the 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, their May 2016 rotation to NTC was a way to hone
in on those key ghting skills as a brigade. interact with each other back at home.”
According to Benedict, the U.S. Army has been operating and training in the last decade
“We jumped on the opportunity to try to build upon what we learned at the last NTC rotation
and what we learned during the missions we executed in the Paci c,” said Maj. Keith Benedict, with counterinsurgency (COIN) in mind. Many of today’s leaders have COIN experience, but
the operations o cer for 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team. “We are trying to combine lessons many of our most senior leaders were in the Army before the COIN era and understood how
learned both from the National Training Center and Paci c Pathways and bring them together to execute decisive action (the continuous, simultaneous combinations of o ensive, defensive,
during this rotation to experiment further and make our selves better as a unit.” and stability or defense support of civil authorities tasks).

In January 2016, the “Ghost Brigade” participated in Paci c Pathways, an operation in which “As an infantry o cer, I have deployed in a counterinsurgency environment,” Benedict said.
units from the brigade were sent to multiple countries in the Paci c, Benedict said. ere, the “I have learned to operate within that capacity, but I have not deployed in a decisive action
Soldiers worked and trained with their counterparts to build upon each nation’s capabilities environment. So the opportunity to understand how to maneuver, how to execute security
and to work through interoperability challenges. Paci c Pathways also helped leaders become tasks, while facing a capable adversary, is something that used to be the Army’s bread and butter.
accustomed to working in di erent environments around the world.
“We had gotten away from for a bit out of necessity because of the mission set we were
“While in ailand, Korea and the Philippines, our Soldiers trained and interacted at the
individual, company, and sta level in order to learn how to deploy into that theater with which See GHOST, page 4
our brigade is aligned,” Benedict said. “ is helped build the capabilities and partnerships with
those countries and will yield dividends in the event of a humanitarian crisis or any other time
our Soldiers may be called upon.

“We have got to make everything a learning environment,” he said. “We serve no purpose if
we don’t understand our operating environment. We must seek every opportunity to challenge
our ability to operate in a humanitarian aid, decisive action or combined arms maneuver capacity
-- while ghting an adversary, if need be.”

NTC is the only place where the unit gets to operate as a brigade in an environment that
trains and facilitates all aspects related to that, said Maj. Garrett Shannon, the intelligence o cer
for 1-2 SBCT. Even at home station, it is very di cult to replicate all the moving pieces, speed
and complicated measures that come into brigade operations.

“Back at home station, we don’t have the same training e ectiveness of a thinking enemy
with a chain of command that is planning and operating against us,” said Shannon. “It is just
really not possible to replicate the large mass of enemy Soldiers and be given su cient time to

U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Dedrick Johnson U.S. Army photo by Sta Sgt. Samuel Northrup

A Soldier with 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team acts as a guard during Decisive Action Sta Sgt. Cavener, a Chaplain Assistant with 1-2 Stryker Brigade Combat Team, pulls
Rotation 16-06 at the National Training Center in Fort Irwin, Calif., May 6, 2016. The training security during Decisive Action Training Rotation 16-06 at the National Training Center in
focused on the 1-2 SBCT combating a near-peer enemy and smaller militant groups in a Fort Irwin, Calif., May 14, 2016. The training focused on the 1-2 SBCT combating a near-peer
foreign country. enemy and smaller militant groups in a foreign country.

For more information go to www.irwin.army.mil