AFOSI commander: 'Can do' attitude makes agents stand out

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Jennifer Lindsey
  • 447th Air Expeditionary Group Public Affairs
SATHER AIR BASE, Iraq (AFPN) --  Constantly on the hunt, Air Force Office of Special Investigations agents listen carefully and watch for clues, gathering information that will help them zero in on the insurgents they seek. They're after the improvised explosive device directors, makers and planters, and cell leaders who are directly responsible for base attacks, planning kidnappings, killing service members and holding locals hostage.

In the past year alone, AFOSI Det. 2408 agents have identified more than 550 threats. Since July agents aided in the capture of more than six local insurgent cells, seven high-level individual insurgents and a large weapons and bomb-making materials cache. And that's just roughly one-third of the total threat-neutralization missions the team has accomplished.

"It is their 'can do' attitudes that make the agents in the AOR stand out," said Brig. Gen. Dana A. Simmons, Air Force Office of Special Investigations commander, during a recent visit to the detachment here.

"We send them equipped and trained to perform their missions here, but they refine that duty to help keep Airmen, Soldiers, Sailors and Marines alive," he said. "Their job is to go 'outside the wire' to collect information and hand it off to the U.S. Army or Special Forces to make the capture."

However, it is the inherent dangers that come with working outside the safety of the base and in some of Iraq's most hostile environments that end up costing agents their lives. 

Three special agents stationed at Balad Air Base, Iraq, died from injuries sustained by a roadside bomb Nov. 1. A total of seven agents have been killed in action since the beginning of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Despite the danger, Det. 2408 teams -- information collectors, linguists and analysts -- work together with the U.S. Army, Navy and Marines to protect the Victory Base Complex and its surrounding areas from threats against peace in the region.

"Their threats are our threats," said Special Agent Terry Krebs, the AFOSI Det. 2408 commander.

Capturing the "bad guys" is just a part of the mission; agents also search for evidence to be used to convict them and end the threat they pose to society.

"Two strengths our agents have is they are a military fighting force and we operate as a federal law enforcement agency," General Simmons said. "We do what it takes ... to not only ensure the insurgents' capture, we present the evidence to have them locked up for good through the Iraqi court system."

The agents deployed to AFOSI Det. 2408 are just a few of the 3,200 agents working at 220 locations worldwide to help ensure the safety of U.S. and coalition forces and missions operating worldwide.

"It's easy for us to think our role in (Operation Iraqi Freedom) is most important, when our part is a small part of the big picture," the AFOSI commander said. "We're part of an Air Force (Operation Iraqi Freedom) team. We do our duty to support that team.

I have 3,200 reasons to be proud everyday. I serve in the company of magnificent people who make my job easy."

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