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Interview with MAJ Mark Holzer

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Interview with MAJ Mark Holzer UNCLASSIFIED A project of the Combat Studies Institute, the Operational Leadership Experiences interview collection archives firsthand, multi-service accounts from military personnel who planned, participated in and supported operations in the Global War on Terrorism. Interview with MAJ Shawn Steele Combat Studies Institute Fort Leavenworth, Kansas UNCLASSIFIED Abstract In this interview, MAJ Shawn Steele, US Army, Air Defense Artillery; discusses his deployments to Iraq as the team executive officer in 2009 through 2010 in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). MAJ Steele discusses a typical day in theater and describes the interaction he had with the locals. MAJ Steele compares his prior deployments and acknowledges the changes made between his deployments. MAJ Steele closes his interview by stating, “Understand how to use interpreters.” UNCLASSIFIED Interview with MAJ Shawn Steele 23 November 2010 AS: My name is Angie Slattery (AS) and I'm with the Operational Leadership Experiences Project at the Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. I'm interviewing MAJ Shawn Steele (SS) on his experiences during Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). Today's date is 23 November 2010 and this is an unclassified interview. Before we begin, if you feel at any time that we're entering classified territory, please couch your response in terms that avoid revealing any classified information, and if classification requirements prevent you from responding, simply say that you're not able to answer. Before we talk about your deployment experience I'd like to capture a little bit of your background in the Army so if you could expand on that for me please. SS: I joined the Army 19 years ago; back in 1991 during Operation Desert Shield/Desert Storm. I've kind of served as a combat service support element and a combat support element. I have two prior military occupational specialties (MOSs) and received a Green to Gold scholarship in 1997. I attended school from 1998 to 2000 and got commissioned. I received my commission in 2000 as an Air Defense Artillery (ADA) officer. I went to Fort Bliss, Texas and did my basic course at Fort Bliss. I did my Captain's Career Course at Fort Bliss. I did deploy in support of OIF I. My battalion supported the 1 Marine Expeditionary Force (MEF) as they went north through Iraq out of Kuwait. I also deployed again in 2009 as a military transition team (MiTT) executive officer (XO) and fires trainer. AS: What inspired you to join the Army? SS: I needed a job. I really did. I kind of left home at a young age. My background would be that I dropped out of high school and was on my own when I was 16. I was 17 working commercial fishing boats in south Florida. I was walking through a strip mall during Desert Storm/Desert Shield and the recruiter saw me and was like, "Hey. Let me talk to you for a minute." The next thing you know I took the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) and I was at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri going through basic training. AS: Good for you. With all the many branches within the Army, what made you decide to specialize as ADA? SS: My professor of military science was ADA. Now we're air missile defense but we used to High Medium Air Defense (HIMAD) and Short Range Air Defense (SHORAD). As a SHORAD guy he had been in many of the divisions so he kind of romanticized what it was like to be an ADA officer; having your own platoons, being a battery commander, all those great things, and I got interested in it. When I was enlisted I had served in the 2nd Armored Cavalry Regiment (ACR) when they were an ACR and 3rd ACR so I knew Armor operations. My two choices were basically Armor or ADA. My wife, who I met in 1994 in El Paso, Texas when I was with 3rd ACR, was from El Paso which is the home of ADA. I put ADA first and Armor second and the Army said, "You're going to be an ADA officer." Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 3 UNCLASSIFIED AS: What does it mean to be an ADA officer? SS: We are a force protector. Prior to the restructuring of ADA we used to have SHORAD -- the Avenger, MANPADs, the Bradley Stinger fighting vehicle, and the Linebacker and those assets would establish a protective area over forces on the battlefield whether they're in the defense or offense against enemy air threats such as helicopters or fast movers. The HIMAD, which is what I've been branched most of my career, was targeted at helicopters and planes but also the tactical ballistic missile (TBM) as well as SCUDs. In Desert Storm/Desert Shield Iraq as the SCUDs and everything was worried about SCUD missiles. That's what the Patriot defended against there. In OIF I we were used for the same purpose -- to defend against SCUD missiles. There wasn't an air threat from enemy air weapon systems -- air breathing threat (ABT) is what we call them. That's what ADA does; it really protects the force. It's part of our protecting war fighting function. AS: How many deployments in support of the Global War on Terror (GWOT) have you had? SS: Two. AS: With those two deployments, what year [did you deploy], [what was your] duty position, and [please give] a brief overview of your missions? SS: I deployed for OIF I in 2003 with 2-43rd ADA Battalion part of the 108th ADA Brigade. We deployed in order to assist with the buildup of forces and we supported the Marines providing air missile defense coverage as they moved north during their attack into Iraq. I was the battery XO and we basically established an air envelope over the forces that were at Tactical Assembly Area (TAA) Coyote as they built up to go through the breach lanes into Iraq. We leap frogged the batteries up with the battalion and covered forward arming and refueling points (FARPs) as well as Staging Area Cobra. My battery covered An Nasariyah and the bridgehead crossings. Alpha Battery and Charlie Battery covered the river crossing. My battery went up to a place called Klitzcar in the middle of Iraq and we covered a Marine FARP and then we went forward to Numaniyah and we covered another FARP. We were basically providing air coverage to prevent against air attacks. That was in essence our mission during OIF I and then we did retrograde operations back down to An Nasariyah, we were there for a little while, and then we left theater. For my second deployment I deployed out of Fort Riley, Kansas as a MiTT member and my job was to be the fires advisor to the Iraqi battalion initially and then we got bumped up to be the brigade team. I was the fires advisor for the brigade as well as the team XO. We deployed to the An Najaf Province and we were partnered with the 30th Iraqi Infantry Brigade which is part of the 8th Iraqi Infantry Division. AS: What unit were you assigned to during your deployment? SS: Our host nation force that we were partnered with was the 30th Iraqi Infantry Brigade but we fell up under two different US Army brigades. The first brigade was the 172nd Infantry Brigade out of Germany and the second was 3rd Brigade 3rd Infantry Division (ID) out of Fort Benning, Georgia. We were partnered with them and within that we worked with a battalion that was the land owner for Diwaniyah and Najaf. Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 4 UNCLASSIFIED AS: For the remainder of this interview we're going to focus on your second tour which was from 2009 until 2010. With that when did you first find out that you would be deploying to the Iraq? SS: I was an observer controller (OC) at the Joint Readiness Training Center (JRTC) and I called up my branch manager after I'd been there for 18 months and my branch manager said, "I got your next assignment. You're going on a MiTT." That's how I found out and was basically notified. As an ADA officer I had to go through Field Artillery (FA) training for a month at Fort Sill, Oklahoma in order to be the fires advisor. I went through a month-long transition force to learn how to do battalion and below fires planning, do all the forward observer tasks, understand how to call for fire, synchronize fire, and do non-lethal targeting. A lot of the stuff I kind of knew because of the Combined Training Center (CTC); I learned a lot of that as an OC. I did a month-long transition course and from there I met my 10 other members of my team -- the team chief and the nine other members of the team -- at Fort Riley. We closed in on Fort Riley, we walked into the chapel, and there was our row that had our unit request form (URF) number for our 11-man team. We sat down and met each other for the first time and that was in March. AS: And you deployed in May? SS: We actually got into theater 14 June and we redeployed back in May; we were just under 12 months. AS: What was your family's reaction to your deployment? SS: They were sad. My family actually did not stay at Fort Polk; they moved back to my wife's home town in El Paso.
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