Cadre makes Eagle Flag come alive

  • Published
  • By Master Sgt. Paul Fazzini
  • Air Mobility Command Public Affairs
Eagle Flag brings together expeditionary combat-support people, role players, observers and exercise controllers to create one of the most dynamic exercises in the Air Force, officials said.

Eagle Flag, which ran for the first time Oct. 13 to 22, is the Air Force’s newest flag-level exercise. It is the creation of a cadre of professionals from the Air Mobility Warfare Center’s 421st Training Squadron at nearby Fort Dix. Many of them, including 1st Lt. Andrew Malakoff, exercise control and opposing forces flight commander, bring their own deployment experiences with them to make Eagle Flag come alive.

“We try to recreate events from our own experiences … ,” he said. “Although they are compressed in the time element, meaning they wouldn’t all happen in one day but rather over three months, the scenarios are events exercise participants could actually experience at a forward location.”

For that reason, Malakoff said the exercise, which practices opening and establishing an air base, can move in almost any direction.

“A lot of wing-level exercises are scripted to go a certain way, and (exercise coordinators) force them to go that way. But Eagle Flag is built entirely around a reactionary-type mode,” he said. “However, (how) the participants play out the scenarios and events (determines) how we proceed.”

The script for Eagle Flag is composed of more than 80 core events and more than 120 supporting events and scenarios. All of these are designed to help validate the force-module concept used to open and establish air bases in a forward-deployed location, something the Air Force has done 36 times since Sept. 11, 2001.

Developing the scenarios was not an overnight event, according to Staff Sgt. Robert Miller, master scenario-events list manager and scenario development control-cell coordinator.

“We’ve been working on the script and putting the ground floor of the exercise at Lakehurst together for approximately six months,” he said.

With the script and event list in hand, actually orchestrating the exercise is something entirely different for the people in the exercise control cell where Miller works.

“The (control cell) is a hectic place to work because there’s a lot of phones ringing, and there’s a lot of talk across the (radio network),” Miller said.

Fortunately for him, it is also easy when the staff commits to initiating scenarios in the same manner each time. With more than 200 events, consistency plays a major role.

“When we first come on duty, we look at the (scenario list) for the day and determine what the big events will be,” Miller said. “Then, starting with the first event, we’ll contact a cadre -- an observer (and) controller -- and make sure he knows the time and place it’s going to happen.

“That way someone is there to watch over the event,” he said. “We’ll also call up the opposing-forces cadre to see if he’s got his role player and if his role player has been briefed on the event.

“About a half hour before the event is scheduled to go off, we’ll call to make sure the cadre and role players are ready and ask if there are any last-minute questions. Then we’ll send them on their way,” he said.

Because the participants are using the skills they learned before deploying to the simulated village, the cadre observers no longer consider their role as that of an instructor or the participants as students. They will interject if there is a safety or medical concern, but other than that, they will allow the events to unfold naturally.

Once an event is finished, the observers and other people of the cadre involved in the scenario do after-action reports to document what went right, what went wrong and what they think should be addressed in the next Eagle Flag. That process was one of the most critical steps in the inaugural exercise, Miller said.

One of the more challenging, yet fun jobs of the exercise, is the role player. Of the 130-plus cadre people involved, many stepped out of their military uniforms and into those of host-nation military officers, bankers, protesters, reporters and even terrorists.

These people are all part of the “red cell,” the opposing forces and role player’s cell. They make Eagle Flag come alive, officials said.

Citheron, located on Fort Dix, is the simulated village where role players interact with exercise participants who are challenged with obtaining goods and services required to perform the mission at the new air base. Tech. Sgt. Terry Walsh, 421st TRS raven program manager, played the role of the mayor of Citheron. He worked as a liaison between exercise participants and people of his exercise community.

“(As mayor) I work with the embassy and the base commander to try and get things done for the village, like the road we want to get fixed,” Walsh said. “But I also try to create positive relations between the Americans and the citizens of Citheron.”

Even though he does not have any acting experience, Walsh’s six years at the training squadron, combined with his real-world deployment experience, made him a good fit for his current role. And he takes his job seriously.

“When something goes sour, I’m the guy to get it fixed. And, if something needs to go sour, I’m the guy to make it go sour,” said Walsh, who grew a beard to get ready for his role.

Getting ready for the roles also means the cadre have to put their military life to the side, said Staff Sgt. Jacob Stankus, 421st TRS opposing forces instructor and observer controller.

As a top lieutenant for the terrorist organization working to disrupt the Americans’ mission at Chimaera, Stankus also interacts with other role players. This interaction helps to add more realism to scenarios.

“Role players have to interact with themselves so the information they’re giving to the (participants) is accurate,” he said. “If (Air Force Office of Special Investigations agents) take a reporter in for questioning and then take me as well, our information has to jibe. Otherwise, the scenario would be a bust.”

While most, if not all, the role players said they like what they do, their role is critical to validating the force-module concept.

“Anyone who comes out here has to know there is a threat,” Stankus said. “There’s no way we can show them there’s a threat if they can’t see the villagers, the terrorists and interact with the role players.”

“We’ll look at things like crashing vehicles into the gate to see how participants respond,” Malakoff said. “Then, the next day (we’ll) do the same thing, only we’ll counteract what they do. In essence, we learn from them and use what we learn against them.”

No matter what their role, Malakoff said opposing forces flight airmen have a goal for every exercise they participate in, and it can be summed up through the motto inscribed on the back of their T-shirts; “Bad guys making good guys better.”