Archive for August, 2011
3rd Infantry Division Commander Maj. Gen. Robert “Abe” Abrams updated the Hinesville Rotary Club on Tuesday on the division headquarters’ upcoming fall deployment and the Army’s new nine-month deployment cycle, in addition to speaking about the installation’s renewed commitment to suicide prevention.
After the Rotary Club meeting, Abrams signed a proclamation in his office on Fort Stewart designating September as Suicide Prevention Month on Fort Stewart-Hunter Army Airfield.
Abrams told Rotarians he and about 700 headquarters soldiers should begin deploying to Iraq Nov. 5 or 6, to help complete the U.S. military’s final drawdown there. America’s troops are currently slated to leave Iraq by Dec. 31. However, the general hinted circumstances could change in as few as 90 days should the Iraqis ask the U.S. to stay longer.
The general said with all division brigades now redeployed, each brigade is in a different phase of reset, meaning soldiers have come off of block leave and are in the training mode again. Because the 2nd Heavy Brigade Combat Team redeployed ahead of the 1st and 4th brigades, it is currently undergoing gunnery field exercises and will deploy to the National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif., in April 2012.
Abrams explained the Army is undergoing force generation (ARFORGEN), meaning it is systematically rebuilding its units to be equipped, trained and prepared for future contingencies.
“We have to be ready for anything,” he said.
He said Fort Stewart is currently experiencing a 40 percent to 50 percent turnover in troops, with some soldiers leaving the service and others rotating out to attend military schools or report to new assignments.
“We’re getting new soldiers simultaneously,” Abrams said.
The general also explained the Army’s new deployment policy which has shortened 12-month deployments to nine.
“It should give 27 months back for dwell time,” he said. This additional dwell time should help soldiers and their families regenerate, especially after 10 years of war with back-to-back deployments, Abrams said.
Multiple deployments have left soldiers and their families “frayed,” he said.
Therefore, the Army now faces two challenges to helping service members become more resilient. First, military leaders are working to remove the stigma associated with seeking help for behavioral health issues. Secondly, the Army is recommitting itself to suicide prevention, Abrams said.
“I think we’ve turned the corner,” he said. “But we still have plenty of work to do.”
The general said 3rd ID leaders are being asked to attend at least one assessment session with a behavioral health practitioner. If soldiers see their commanders seeking help, they will be more open to seeking help when they need it, Abrams said.
“One suicide is too many,” he said.
The general added implementing more aggressive suicide prevention at Fort Stewart is working; 12 suicides have been prevented in the four months he’s led the 3rd ID, he said. Family members and fellow soldiers helped prevent tragedy by being aware of warning signs and alerting commanders to soldiers who were suicidal, the general said.
Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35389/
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KABUL, Afghanistan — A pact aimed at clearing up mistrust and confusion between Washington and Kabul about the future of U.S. troops and aid in Afghanistan has instead sowed more of the same.
Afghan official s worry that the United States is looking for a way to decrease support for Afghanistan after the combat mission ends in 2014, especially in light of U.S. economic woes and waning public support for the war, now in its 10th year. American officials insist the agreement is designed to allay that fear, but acknowledge the draft agreement is less precise than the Afghans want, and unenforceable.
With Kabul seeking detailed guarantees but Washington insisting on something more vague, it’s not surprising that each side is looking warily at the other.
Negotiators from both countries are to meet in Washington early next month to continue their talks. Discussions come at a time when relations already are strained, anti-Americanism is running high in Afghanistan and uncertainty abounds over what will happen to the nation as foreign forces continue their march home.
The document is meant, in part, to give Afghans confidence that the United States will not abandon them after 2014, when U.S. and other foreign combat troops have left or taken on military support roles. At the same time, it will give the U.S. a legal framework to continue counterterrorism, counter-narcotics and training missions, according to a senior U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the ongoing
negotiations.
The goal is to have an agreement done before an international conference in Germany on the future of Afghanistan in December, but many sticking points remain.
The document will leave several major questions unanswered, including how long American taxpayers will foot the bill for Afghan security forces, which in 2014 will cost an estimated $8 billion a year.
The agreement also sets up a potential conflict between two U.S. goals for Afghanistan — a base of operations for counterterrorism and a peace deal between the Afghan government and the Taliban insurgency. The Taliban demand a complete withdrawal of foreign forces.
The so-called “strategic partnership agreement” was sought by Afghan President Hamid Karzai, and U.S. officials are confident that Afghans’ desire to get something in writing is likely to trump their worry that the document is not specific enough.
But the talks have gone on longer than the Americans wanted, and there is palpable frustration at what two U.S. officials described as circular and repetitive discussions. The two sides already held talks twice this year.
Karzai has a string of specific demands, including that U.S. troops stop conducting nighttime raids to nab suspected insurgents and that Afghans be put in charge of detention facilities. He also wants a ban on U.S. launching operations into other nations from Afghan soil. The U.S. raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan was launched from Afghanistan.
Some Afghan officials also want the U.S. to equip them with F-16 fighter jets and Abrams tanks — military wares that U.S. officials say are too costly and not needed by the nascent Afghan security forces.
“We will come to an agreement only if our conditions are accepted,” Karzai boldly told a group of Afghan security officials at a recent meeting.
A senior U.S. official familiar with the negotiations said the Obama administration is not trying to water down the agreement, but can’t — or won’t — negotiate so many details of the relationship at once. The official said the agreement is supposed to be broad and by design will not carry the force of a treaty.
But Afghans say a vague agreement could leave them vulnerable to the Taliban, and that they need guarantees of support if they are going to risk the ire of neighboring nations like Iran by signing a long-term deal with the U.S. — especially one that will allow tens of thousands of American troops to stay in Afghanistan.
Many Afghans are afraid of trusting the Americans because they felt abandoned by the U.S. after 1989, when the Soviet Union withdrew its army from Afghanistan. U.S. support to mujahedeen fighters battling the Soviets dried up a few years later and Afghanistan then sank into civil war. That was followed by the rise of the Taliban and the Sept. 11 attacks by al-Qaida, which was using Afghanistan as a sanctuary.
“There’s a famous saying ‘Once bitten, twice shy,’” said Shaida Mohammad Abdali, deputy national security adviser and special assistant to Karzai. “We are worried about our destiny, our future.” Still he is confident the two sides eventually will agree to a new pact.
A central question is how many American troops will remain in Afghanistan after the international combat mission ends in 2014, and for how long. Estimates have ranged from 20,000 to 40,000.
Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35395/
Fort Stewart’s Winn Army Community Hospital officially opened the White Medical Home on Aug. 19 with a ribbon cutting ceremony and other events.
More than 120 children received health screenings and sports physicals during the day.
Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35351/
WASHINGTON — Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said this week that if the military retirement system changes, it will not affect serving service members.
“I will not break faith,” the secretary said during a roundtable meeting with military media representatives in the Pentagon.
Panetta’s predecessor, Robert M. Gates, asked the Defense Business Board to look at the military retirement system and make recommendations. The final report is due later this month, but Panetta said he is familiar with the outlines of the proposal.
“I certainly haven’t made any decisions” on retirement, he said.
“People who have come into the service, who have put their lives on the line, who have been deployed to the war zones, who fought for this country, who have been promised certain benefits for that — I’m not going to break faith with what’s been promised to them,” Panetta said.
People in the service today will come under the current retirement system, which gives retirees 50 percent of their base pay after 20 years of service.
“Does that stop you from making changes?” Panetta asked. “No, because obviously you can ‘grandfather’ people in terms of their benefits and then look at what changes you want to put in place for people who become members of the all-volunteer force in the future.”
One aspect of the retirement issue is one of fairness, the secretary said. Most service members do not spend 20 years in the military and therefore do not get any retirement benefits when they leave the service.
“They are not vested in any way,” Panetta said. “The question that is at least legitimate to ask is, ‘Is there a way for those future volunteers to shape this that might give them better protection to be able to have some retirement and take it with them?’”
Health care is another area that has to be dealt with, the secretary said. In fiscal 2001, the DOD health-care bill was $19 billion. It is more than $50 billion now, he said, and it soars to the neighborhood of $60 billion in future years. Among proposals Congress is contemplating is an increase in some TRICARE military health plan premium payments.
“I think those recommendations make sense,” Panetta said. “Especially with tight budgets, it does make sense that people contribute a bit more with regards to getting that coverage.”
The Defense Department — which is responsible for a large part of the nation’s discretionary budget — will do its part to reduce the budget deficit, the secretary said. But while defense has a role to play, he added, Congress has to deal with the more than two-thirds of the federal budget that represents the mandatory spending.
“If you are serious about getting the deficit down,” Panetta said, “you have to deal with the mandatory side of the budget and taxes.”
DOD has a responsibility to look at all aspects of the budget, the secretary said, and officials at the Pentagon are doing that.
“This is not because it is necessarily going to hurt areas,” he added, “because frankly, a lot of this can be done through efficiencies, a lot of it can be done looking at the administrative side of the programs: what can we do to make these programs more efficient?”
The secretary said he believes the budget crunch can represent an opportunity to make DOD a more efficient, effective and agile force that still can deal with the threats of the future.
The department also needs to ask how to provide benefits for troops and their families that will be effective at ensuring the nation always has a strong volunteer force, Panetta said.
“That’s a debate and discussion that it’s important for the Defense Department to have, the White House to have, the Congress to have and the country to have,” he said.
Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35223/
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(Savannah, GA — WSAV) WSAV News 3′s Sheila Parker interviews labor and delivery nurse CPT Frances Young and Chief of Maternal Child Health LTC Nancy Parson about the baby boom Winn Army Community Hospital.
If you are having trouble seeing this video, please visit the WSAV website. This video is streamed directly from their website so we have no local control of playback.
FORT BENNING — A post official says Fort Benning has sharply reduced its growth numbers. Instead of 28,000 new residents moving into the Columbus-Phenix City area as a result of base realignment, the new figure is about 22,000. The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer reports (http://bit.ly/oHUF25) that George Steuber, Fort Benning’s deputy garrison commander, says the post is bracing for cuts to its work force. He says there are plans to oppose cuts that would slash 15 percent from the civilian payroll. There are more than 5,500 civilians now working on the post, which trains infantry soldiers for combat but is now in the final stages of relocating the U.S. Army Armor School from Fort Knox, Ky. Steuber says there will be about 1,700 fewer soldiers and 600 fewer government civilians than had been estimated.
Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35115/
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Article source: http://beta.coastalcourier.com/section/35/article/35099/
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