Soldiers with the 101st Sustainment Brigade listen attentively as they receive a block of instruction on conducting mortuary affairs at the Mortuary Affairs Collection Point at Bagram Air Field, Afghanistan, in March 2011. The brigade and the 101st Special Troops Battalion provided critical support to the MACP who processed the recent fallen members of the special operations forces team killed this past week when a rocket-propelled grenade struck their Chinook in Afghanistan. Photo by Sgt. 1st Class Peter Mayes

The first call came early Saturday morning, Aug. 6, about the 38 U.S. and Afghan troops, killed by insurgents who shot down their CH-47 Chinook helicopter. After getting the call, Sgt. 1st Class Mary Perez said she doesn’t remember getting much sleep from that moment on.

She, along with other senior leaders from the 101st Sustainment Brigade and the 101st Special Troops Battalion, began rolling up their sleeves and headed to the Bagram Air Field Mortuary Affairs Collection Point where they were tasked to provide support in preparation for the eventual ramp ceremony.

“You’re tasked out to do it and it’s your job. But to do something like that, it’s just … different,” said Perez, a brigade military intelligence non-commissioned officer in charge. “It’s not just a tasking anymore. It’s something personal. It’s a tasking that as a soldier, no matter who you are or what rank you wear on your chest, you execute, and you execute to your fullest capability.”

The members of the special operations mission – which included 22 Navy SEALS, three U.S. Air Force airmen, four U.S. Army air crew members and a K-9 unit dog – died after their helicopter was apparently shot down last week as they were flying in to help Army Rangers who were going after insurgents on the ground.

Eight Afghan commandos and an Afghan interpreter were also on board the downed aircraft.

The Department of Defense has ordered an investigation into the incident. According to official reports, the deaths are the highest number of U.S. forces killed during a single event in support of Operation Enduring Freedom.

The Mortuary Affairs Collection Point at Bagram is tasked with the retrieval, tentative identification, transportation and burial of deceased American and allied personnel. The brigade’s special troops battalion provides staff supervision at the site, which is operated by the 54th Quartermaster Company, based out of Fort Lee, Va.

The senior leaders from the brigade and battalion assigned to the detail are not specifically trained as mortuary affairs specialists. They helped with recovering and transporting the remains from the flight line, getting additional transfer cases, ironing the flags, and cleaning the MACP site.

They also took part in the ramp ceremony, acting as pallbearers and carrying the transfer cases of the deceased to the special operations forces units to load onto the planes heading back to the U.S.

“They provided the logistical support we needed, like the vehicles for transport and additional cases as we needed,” said Sgt. 1st Class Alessa Jose, Bagram MACP non-commissioned officer in charge, 54th QM Company “They also made sure we had additional refrigeration units for the fallen.”

Jose said her team normally receives between one and two remains a day to process and handles all aspects of the preparation. She said her team received the remains on Sunday morning, Aug. 7, and was able to process and prepare all of the remains by Monday, Aug. 8.

“Their (Lifeliners) support was critical because of the time involved,” she said. “If it was just us doing this, the processing would have taken longer.”

“By the Lifeliners coming in and helping with the other part, it allowed us to focus on the processing job and cut down a lot of the time. You’re looking at about a 36-hour time frame. That helped us out a lot.”

Brigade medical operations officer Maj. Dierdre Lockhart was part of the truck team detail for loading and unloading the deceased SOF team members and said the Lifeliners’ involvement illustrated their willingness to go above and beyond the call of duty.

“It definitely showed we were willing to pick up the ball and run with it when we were needed,” she said.

The brigade conducted Leadership Professional Development training on Mortuary Affairs this past March, where they were introduced to how fallen heroes are identified and processed in preparation to be sent home.

But even attending that training did not prepare the senior leaders for being active participants in an actual event.

Perez said she and other senior leaders in the brigade received a call to go to the MACP, but were unsure what their duty was going to be. As time went on, they started to figure it out, she said.

She and two other officers were also assigned to a truck team that loaded and unloaded the remains. It was the first time she’s ever been involved with something like this, she said.

“You come there to do a mission and then the reality hits you: all you could see, smell and feel was death,” she said. “And you have to maintain composure.”

Perez said she noticed the Navy SEALs carrying their fallen teammates to the trucks. “I mean, these guys are tough, they’re in it, they’re the ones kicking in doors, but I’ve never seen them look more vulnerable,” she said. “They’re not just machines. It brings light to the fact that we’re all in this fight together.”

The decision to use brigade and battalion senior ranking leadership to assist the MACP unit was not lost on Perez, she said.

“You don’t want to expose your junior soldiers to that. It’s emotional and disheartening when you’re in this fight to see mass amounts of casualties like that. There were majors ironing the flags and mopping the floors in the MACP, not because it was a task, but because it was the right thing to do,” she said.

The seniors also intensely rehearsed their part of the ramp ceremony, filling transfer cases with bundles of water and practiced carrying the containers on the K-loaders to deliver to the SOF teams.

“We wanted to do this right and give these guys the honor they earned and deserved,” Perez said. “As an NCO, you know what right looks like. These guys deserve the very best we could give them. Everything had to be perfect.”

DVIDS
Story by Sgt. 1st Class Peter Mayes

CLICK HERE TO GET INVOLVED NOW

Today is the 25th anniversary of Operation Urgent Fury, the invasion of Grenada.

At the time, due to little news coverage, it appeared to have been an easy operation. Since then, thanks to the veterans of the operation and the Internet, we have learned of the sacrifices made by many brave men in that endeavor.

This was one of the small wars we fight to ensure that there are no big wars. It serves as a reminder that brave Americans fought and are fighting in many places in the world that do not capture the media’s attention. We are safe because of those men and women.

Matt at Blackfive has a note from one of the veterans of Operation Urgent Fury. It s worth your time and attention.

Navy Historical Center

When the military looks for innovation, it typically turns to its special operators – those elite forces on the cutting edge of new equipment, tactics and techniques.

So if a new program here proves as successful as expected in helping Navy SEALs and their families cope with multiple deployments, officials hope to expand it, not just throughout the special operations community, but military-wide.

Several hundred SEALs and their support forces just back from deployments, as well as their family members, will take off next weekend for four days at a popular resort.

The retreat is part of a unique new Naval Special Warfare Group 1 program to build resiliency within the force, explained Wally Graves III, the group’s family support coordinator.

Few military units are as heavily stressed as special operators. These elite forces have endured repeated deployments since Sept. 11, 2001, and typically operate in the most difficult and dangerous circumstances. Many members of the West Coast SEAL teams, for example, have deployed forward seven or more times.

Intensive training and discipline builds a breed of warfighters who pride themselves in physical, mental and emotional toughness that’s critical to their missions, Graves said.

A retired SEAL himself, Graves said he believes combat stress isn’t all bad for warfighters. “Ten pounds of [post-traumatic stress disorder] is good in war. It’s hyperactivity, it’s anger, it’s all the good stuff that keeps you alive on the battlefield,” he said. “But 400 pounds of PTSD after you get home is not good.”

The new resiliency program is designed to identify and treat symptoms of combat stress early to prevent them from becoming bigger problems, Graves said.

“We need to get out front and be proactive,” he said. “You nip it in the bud. You educate everyone, provide training for the high-risk category and then intervene when you have to prevent this from becoming a life-lasting problem or stigma.”

And in the process, Graves said, the effort builds force readiness by ensuring the SEALs are ready to turn around for the next deployment.

There’s new recognition within the SEAL community that “under the exoskeleton of a warrior is still a human being,” he said. When that human being is in distress – whether suffering from post-traumatic stress or experiencing family turmoil brought on by repeated deployments – the warrior can’t operate at his peak.

As NSWG-1 strives to build resiliency within its force, it’s extending that effort to families. “The culture has changed, from the leadership on down,” Graves said. “There’s a recognition that family readiness is a big component of force readiness.”

SEAL families are a special breed, Graves is quick to note. “Our wives are fantastic. They’re not complainers,” he said. “But our goal is to give them tools that will empower them so they can survive and thrive.”

The Family Resiliency Enterprise seeks to accomplish that through three steps: assessing individual sailors’ and family members’ needs; providing educational programs and services tailored to those needs; and helping newly reunited families reintegrate after deployments.

Screening is conducted using scientifically-proven computer software programs, neuro-cognitive measuring equipment and questionnaires. NSWG-1 has started screening its members and soon will offer these assessments on a voluntary basis to their spouses and children ages 8 to 18.

The assessments provide important insights into individual and family psychological, financial and psychosocial well-being, Graves said.

For the sailors, these screenings represent a baseline that, when compared to future post-deployment assessments, will provide objective measure for traumatic brain injuries and combat stress symptoms.

The findings also help the command tailor the training, education programs and other activities it offers to meet the community’s needs. These efforts run the gamut, from interpersonal communication workshops to parenting and financial planning classes to command-sponsored activities for spouses and children.

“Each SEAL is responsible for his own family readiness,” Graves said. “We are just providing him the tools that he can use, either as a mirror image, or in developing his own.”

As part of this effort, NSWG-1 has piggybacked on the Marine Corps’ Project FOCUS – Families Overcoming Under Stress – program. The Marine Corps launched FOCUS at Camp Pendleton, Calif., and has expanded it to several other locations to help families cope with multiple combat deployments. NSWG-1 announced its new FOCUS program during a town hall meeting this summer and encouraged families to take advantage of its offerings.

The third phase of the resiliency program is designed to help redeploying SEALs leave the stresses of combat behind and ease back into family life.

Next week’s retreat is expected to be a highlight of the program, giving the sailors and their families a chance to kick back and enjoy each other as they tap into educational programs and other services to help them through the reintegration process.

“There will be a delicatessen of psychological education tolls there,” Graves said.

Graves emphasized that the retreat isn’t a Morale, Welfare and Recreation outing or field trip, and that it has specific objectives for the participants.

“What we are doing is transferring them from a combat mindset, giving them the opportunity to process what they went through, then helping them reenergize,” he said.

Graves called the NSWG-1′s resiliency program a “great litmus test” for the rest of the military in how to help servicemembers and their families through the challenges of military life and combat deployments.

SEALs, he said, are the perfect community to test out the concept.

“We’re small, we’re innovators, we’re not constrained, and we’ll use out-of-the-box thinking to get the job done,” he said. “That’s the way we’re trained to operate, and it brings a lot of perspective to process improvement.”

Graves said he’s optimistic the resiliency program will strengthen families so they have the confidence and resources to stand up to tough times, while enhancing the readiness of the SEAL community.

“What we’re doing is taking a good warrior and making him a great warrior,” he said.

DVIDS
By Donna Miles
American Forces Press Service

A California-based SEAL who threw his body on a grenade to save his comrades in Iraq will posthumously receive the Medal of Honor, a Defense Department official has confirmed.

Master-at-Arms 2nd Class (SEAL) Michael A. Monsoor, of Garden Grove, Calif., was holed up on the roof of a Ramadi house with three other SEALs on Sept. 29, 2006, when an insurgent grenade landed nearby.

Monsoor, a 25-year old with SEAL Team 3, grabbed the grenade and clutched it to his chest. The blast killed him, but his actions, officials said at the time, saved the men on the rooftop.

Monsoor will be the second member of the Navy to receive the Medal of Honor since the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan began, and the first sailor to receive it for combat in Iraq.

Michael Fumento, who’s written about Monsoor and combat operations in Ramadi, reported on his Internet blog over the weekend that Monsoor’s family would receive the posthumous award on the fallen SEAL’s behalf during a White House ceremony April 8.

A Defense Department official, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed that the award had been approved.

“We understand the decision has been made to give that award,” the official said Monday. However, it’s not clear when the medal would be presented by President Bush, as is tradition, and the White House hasn’t yet made any announcement.

“[The date is] very likely to change,” the Pentagon official said.

A spokeswoman at the Navy Office of Information referred questions to the White House. A call to the White House press office was not immediately returned.

Navy Times