Airmen complete first Air Advisor Course

  • Published
  • By Tech. Sgt. Scott T. Sturkol
  • Air Force Expeditionary Center Public Affairs
FORT DIX, N.J. (AFPN) --  The first class of Airmen headed to Iraq and Afghanistan to train foreign military members on Airmanship graduated here March 7. 

A total of 59 Airmen completed the course, developed to prepare instructors to train Iraqi and Afghan airmen to re-establish their national air forces. 

The U.S. Air Force Expeditionary Center staff teamed with experts at Air Education and Training Command, U.S. Air Forces Central and USAF Special Operations, along with others, to develop a "train-the-trainer" course in less than six months for Airmen tasked to complete this high-priority mission for the Air Force." 

"The Air Advisor Course is a fast-paced, team-oriented course designed specifically for Airmen deploying to support Air Force combat air advisor operations in Iraq and Afghanistan," said Senior Master Sgt. James Schmidt, the course director. "In this course, we provide training in two phases -- combat skills and cultural awareness."

In the combat skills phase, Sergeant Schmidt said students are trained in offensive and defensive driving skills, introductory convoy procedures, combat first aid and advanced combat firearms training using the M-4 and AK-47 rifles and the M-9 pistol.

"The cultural awareness training hones in on host nation-specific understanding of where these Airmen will be deploying in either Iraq or Afghanistan," Sergeant Schmidt said. "For example, they receive mission overview training, an understanding of the host nation air force organization and its capabilities, and conversational language training in Arabic or Dari."

Capt. Wes Venters, a behavioral scientist from U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado and a student in the course deploying to Iraq, said language training was one area he found especially helpful.

"The language training essentially helps us to communicate with the people of Iraq and Afghanistan," Captain Venters said. "As air advisors, we'll be working a lot with the Iraqi population and more specifically the soldiers.

"We'll also go over there and work in a joint environment," Captain Venters said. "Knowing we'll be working directly with the Army, I could see a lot of the training paralleled with what the Army teaches. That's good because when we go over there and get into the joint environment and are asked to be on a fire team or something related to that, we'll know what to do. We're certainly better prepared as Air Force air advisors."

Tech. Sgt. Darnell Gordon, an air surveillance technician from the 552nd Operations Support Squadron at Tinker Air Force Base, Okla., said although he has deployed and trained for deployments in his 15-year career, the Air Advisor Course shined some new light on things he hasn't done before, such as extensive weapons training.

"It helps for those of us in the Air Force who aren't trained continuously in combat-related activities," Sergeant Gordon said. "The weapons training we received gave us a better familiarity with our weapons systems. We're not going to be experts, of course, but if something happens we can always fall back on our training from having that familiarity."

Now more prepared for the air advisor mission is Lt. Col. Chris Lyons. He is a student in the course from Air Mobility Command at Scott AFB, Ill., and will be deploying to Afghanistan.

"It is a great combination of focused classroom, field, range and obstacle course instruction to prepare us for the jobs we will be doing in Afghanistan," Colonel Lyons said. "The language and cultural training helps us better communicate with and understand our Afghan counterparts while the combat and field training keeps our warrior skills at their peak."

Sergeant Schmidt said the course wasn't easy for the students.

"Students must be mentally and physically prepared to perform various types of rigorous combat scenario-based physical tasks in this course," he said. "With any class you may have minor issues that come up but you deal with them and continue on. All students were able to critique each class they attended. Any items that we felt could be adjusted based on student input -- we did."

Master Sgt. Bonnie Trajanowski, a student from the 2nd Bomb Wing Plans Office from Barksdale AFB, La., who will be deploying to Iraq, said she was happy to be able to contribute to future versions of the course.

"It's a learning curve," Sergeant Trajanowski said. "It's exciting to be a part of this first class because we get to have our inputs used to make the course better for future students. The training put us into the mindset of what we're going to be doing. It prepared us. When I first learned about being an air advisor, I was unsure. Now, when I know I'll be working with the Army and doing this special mission, I know can be more of an asset. This training is an asset for us to help them as opposed to going there and being a possible liability."

Sergeant Schmidt said the continuing mission of the course will be to make sure Airmen are ready for the air advisor mission.

"We'll continue to provide deploying air advisors the skill sets they need to adapt to an ever-changing deployed environment," Sergeant Schmidt said.

Comment on this story (comments may be published on Air Force Link)

View the comments/letters page