DVIDS - News - NCO delivers readiness to DEFENDER-Europe 21, other missions across Europe dvidshub.net - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from dvidshub.net Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
1 TAPA, Estonia – DEFENDER-Europe 21 involves about 28,000 U.S., NATO and partner militaries from 26 nations conducting live fire exercises, airborne operations, missile defense activities and a multitude of complex, bilateral operations simultaneously.
To outfit an operation of this scale requires a lot of equipment. Several hundred pieces of equipment were shipped to Europe from the U.S. by cargo vessel, but over 1,000 pieces were drawn from the 405th Army Field Support Brigade’s Army Prepositioned Stock-2 sites here in Europe.
Rhona Habets, a heavy wheeled vehicle mechanic foreman at the APS-2 site in Eygelshoven, Netherlands, said her team helped to prepare all the vehicles for movement to Estonia, to include getting the vehicles certified by German inspectors for transport across international borders.
1 TAPA, Estonia – DEFENDER-Europe 21 is a highly complex, multinational, joint exercise involving over 26,000 forces from 26 nations conducting operations across more than 30 training areas in 12 countries. But how do you support all these troops logistically?
That’s a feat all to itself and one not taken lightly.
Army Capt. Triada Cross knows exactly what it takes to support DEFENDER-Europe 21. She’s the commander of the Base Operating Support-Integrator cell in Tapa, Estonia, for exercise Swift Response 21, one of several exercises being conducting simultaneously as part of DEFENDER-Europe 21.
“As the commander of BOS-I, I’m in charge of all the life support for all the U.S. Soldiers here in Tapa,” said Cross, whose normal job in Wiesbaden, Germany, is Contingency Command Post company commander, Headquarters and Headquarters Battalion, U.S. Army Europe and Africa. “I’m the tie between the support that’s happening on the ground and the units th
17 Grafenwoehr, Germany – Former Shelby County resident and Oakhaven High School graduate U.S. Army Maj. Mitchell Brooks is sending a clear message to would-be European antagonists.
“The Army is ready at any given moment in time to hold off any aggressors around the world,” said Brooks, a logistics officer assigned to the 405th Army Field Support Brigade.
The brigade, under operational control of the 21st Theater Sustainment Command, U.S. Army Europe and Africa, based in Kaiserslautern, Germany, ensures soldiers have the equipment and support they need to rapidly deploy and respond to threats across two continents.
Brooks is among more than 28,000 participants from 26 nations participating in DEFENDER-Europe 21. The event takes place through June, with the 405th AFSB and other 21st TSC units transporting equipment, ensuring interoperability with Allies and providing logistical support for the nearly simultaneous military exercises taking place across 13 cou
1 VILSECK, Germany – Even though there are more than 150 employees assigned or attached to the battalion, there are only two enlisted Soldiers working at Army Field Support Battalion-Germany – the battalion sergeant major and Staff Sgt. McKinely Suell III.
When you first meet this outgoing and highly animated staff sergeant, you can literally feel his energy. He presents himself very well – a professional Soldier, a great communicator and young Soldier at heart. But you might be surprised to learn he joined the Army almost 40 years ago.
“I signed a split option contract with the Army in high school and went to basic training at Fort Dix, New Jersey, in 1982 between my junior and senior years,” said Suell, a native of Boston, Mass. “And then I went to Advanced Individual Training at Fort Sam Houston in San Antonio, Texas, the very next summer to become a medical specialist with the U.S. Army.”