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FORT POLK, La. >> It was just after 10:30 a.m. when Maj. Fred Choi learned that 10 to 15 Bosnian Serb protesters were milling in the town of Zvornik to demonstrate against attempts by the city's minority Muslim population to lay a cornerstone for a destroyed mosque.
Schofield soldiers tackle a
Peace in a powder keg
realistic scenario as they prepare
for delicate duty in BosniaBy Gregg K. Kakesako
gkakesako@starbulletin.comA day earlier, there had been another massive demonstration in the Serb-occupied town of Srebenica because a memorial built to honor 7,000 men and boys killed during the war in the Balkans had been vandalized with graffiti.
Srebenica was the world's first U.N. "safe area" and the site of what has been described as the worst case of genocide in Europe since World War II. In July 1995 the Bosnian Serb army staged a brutal takeover of the small, intimate spa town and its surrounding region. Over a period of five days, the Bosnian Serb soldiers separated Muslim families and systematically murdered more than 7,000 men and boys in fields, schools and warehouses.
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Today, the situation ended peacefully for the 25th Infantry Division, based at Schofield Barracks, and the setting was at the Joint Readiness Training Center in west-central Louisiana and not the northern section of Bosnia-Herzegovina.But the incident was real, taken from the pages of recent history.
During the exercise, intelligence reports had already warned Choi, operations officer of the 25th Infantry Division's aviation task force, that Bosnian Serbs could try to delay or disrupt the ceremony. As his staff monitored the division's various radio frequencies, questions as to whether the mayor of Zvornik would allow the local police force to get involved or render assistance to the protesters remained unanswered. Officials also were concerned whether the local police or the NATO-sponsored police force would even let the demonstrators into the village.
Choi already had 0H-58 Kiowa helicopters in the air over the town, surveying what could be an explosive situation between warring Bosnian Serbs and Muslims. UH-60 Black Hawk helicopters had been positioned in a landing zone outside of the village, ready to evacuate its key leaders.
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Throughout the morning, Choi and other leaders of Task Force Eagle monitored the four roads leading to the village with a population mainly of Bosnian Serbs. Bosnia-Herzegovina is 44 percent Muslim; 31 percent Serbs of Eastern Orthodox background; 17 percent Croats, who are Roman Catholic; and 8 percent other ethnic groups."My job is to monitor the situation," said Choi, a 1986 West Point graduate who has spent 15 years flying Kiowa helicopters, "and report any changes to my higher-ups."
At Zvornik a crowd began to grow as several dozen Muslims and their leaders prepared for the 1 p.m. ceremony. Peacekeeping soldiers from the 25th Division, some riding Humvees and armed with machine guns, provided a presence in the village. Patrolling the streets with them were Italian troops in light-blue uniforms and black berets.
Five minutes before the ceremony was slated to begin, Maj. Gen. Charles Swannack, commander of 1,600-member Eagle Force Task Force, arrived to observe the situation. He quickly met with key leaders of the village and Muslim clerics. He told them through an interpreter that "it's important to have a peaceful ceremony."
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Even as he talked, five demonstrators entered the village yelling loudly. One carried a flag over his head. The local police moved in and arrested the flag-carrying demonstrator. The 50 or so Muslims were allowed to conduct their ceremony without incident.By 1:10 p.m., Swannack, after commending the local police commander for his handling of the situation, and his staff were ready to leave the area. One lone protester continued to talk loudly in the street under the watchful eyes of both American soldiers and law enforcement officials.
Another violent incident in the Balkans had been averted.
The training idea was to provide the soldiers of the 25th Infantry Division and their affiliated Army National Guard units from Indiana, Idaho and Montana with as much realism as possible. If mistakes are to be made, the Army wants the commanders and their soldiers to make them here and not on the crucial roads and villages of Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Maj. Jan Kroon, a Dutch army exchange officer, told reporters from Hawaii that soldiers -- once schooled in the art of combat -- must now be retaught that "their gun is purely for self-protection.
"That's the challenges for the soldier who has been trained to kill. Now we are telling him to do just the opposite."
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Since New Year's Day more than 1,900 Schofield Barracks, Fort Shafter and Army reservists have been in training that ended in what is called a mission rehearsal exercise in preparation for the real thing, which will come in March when the 25th Infantry Division is sent to Bosnia for six months in its first European assignment.There, as part of a 2,100-member Task Force Eagle, the Tropic Lightning soldiers will be responsible for Multinational Division North -- one of three divisions created under the terms of the 1995 Dayton Peace Accords that ended the Balkan conflict. Task Force Eagle is the U.S. component of the Multinational Division North. Turkish, Russian and NORDPOL (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Poland, Sweden, Denmark and Finland) brigades are the other elements.
There are two other multinational divisions -- one headed by Canada and the other by France.
Most of the 1,200 combat soldiers from the 25th Division who will be sent to Bosnia belong to 2nd Brigade's 1st Battalion, 14th Infantry Regiment, nicknamed "Golden Dragons." They will be located in the southern sector, with the Indiana Army National Guard and 25th Division aviators assigned to the northern part.
Lt. Col. William Bryan, the division's deputy chief of staff, said Tropic Lightning units are normally sent to the Joint Readiness Training Center every two years to sharpen their combat skills. However, this time the training is very specific.
"The idea was to give them an experience they can later relate to," said Col. Douglas Horn, the division's chief of staff.
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Although there are no written grades, it could be considered the task force's final exam.Maj. Gen. James Dubik, the 25th Division's commander who spent part of last week reviewing its Bosnia training, said pre-deployment evaluations so far show that the Tropic Lightning soldiers have been able to coordinate and integrate well with the Army Guard troops it will have under its command.
The soldiers conducted patrols through places named Brcko and the Arizona Market -- named after locations they will find in Bosnia. They responded to simulated bomb threats. They dealt with Serbs demonstrating against Muslim families trying to return to their homes.
Bosnia, the poorest republic in the former communist Republic of Yugoslavia, was the center of the 44-month-long civil war that killed as many as 200,000 people and left millions homeless. The fighting began in 1992. Bosnian Serbs backed by Serbia defied a Bosnian referendum on independence and took up arms, aiming to partition the republic along ethnic lines and join a "Greater Serbia." This struggle introduced the phrase "ethnic cleansing" into the modern vernacular.
In 1994 the Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats united against the Bosnian Serbs. Three years of warfare ended in 1995, after NATO airstrikes on their positions brought Serbs to the bargaining table.
Swannack, who just completed two years as commander of Fort Polk and the Joint Readiness Training Center, said he believes his task force is "ready to go."
He views the period the 25th Division will be in Bosnia as "a very important milestone" in the country's history because of the local elections that will take place in the fall.
Swannack, who has served several tours with the 25th and commanded a brigade that undertook a 1995 Haiti peacekeeping mission, said it will "take several generations before the conflicting societies will learn to live together."
As Bob Donnorummo, a Balkan expert at the University of Pittsburgh, evaluates the situation: "We don't have a deep appreciation of peoples who base their national identities on ethnicity. We have to be aware that these people don't want to live together."
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FORT POLK, La. >> Bosnia may have slipped from the headlines, but soldiers headed for the Balkans know that it is still a powder keg. Training to wage peace
in a powder kegBy Gregg K. Kakesako
gkakesako@starbulletin.comSgt. 1st Class Steve Noonan, a Gulf War veteran, said the 25th Infantry Division's six-month mission to the Balkans, beginning in March, has uncertainties.
His advice to the Tropic Lightning soldiers: "Pay attention. ... It can go from good to bad in a heartbeat. And trust your training."
As a member of the 25th Infantry Division's Golden Dragons, Noonan will be among 1,200 soldiers from Schofield Barracks who will be a part of Task Force Eagle, patrolling towns and villages in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
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For the past month, these soldiers have been practicing here what they learned in the training areas at Schofield Barracks over the past two years. At the Joint Readiness Training Center, Army leaders have replicated Bosnian towns; staffed them with civilians, some of them Bosnian refugees; and created situations based on actual incidents.
Noonan described this month's stay at the JRTC as "invaluable training for the soldiers."
"It gives them experiences they would not normally have at their home station (Schofield Barracks)," said Noonan, a team leader with the Golden Dragons' B Company.
A similar assessment was made by Staff Sgt. Charles Henry, a member of the Indiana Army National Guard, as he monitored from a distance people entering a replicated Bosnian flea market, known as "Arizona Market," which has a reputation in dealing with black-market goods.
Henry's unit will be attached to Task Force Eagle and under the control of 25th Infantry Division leaders. While the soldiers from Tropic Lightning's 1st Battalion, 14th Infantry Regiment, will be responsible for the southern sector, the Indiana National Guard soldiers will be patrolling areas in the northern sector.
Henry, 30, is also a Gulf War veteran who rejoined the Indiana unit only five years ago after serving for six years on active duty.
He said that members of his unit who already have done patrols in Bosnia said "the training is actually a lot harder than the actual conditions."
Henry said it is important "to get into the proper mind-set before things get bad."
Specialist Fatu Iaulualo, 31, said he believes his training will pull him through.
"I'm not worried about my safety," said Iaulualo, who is completing his first active-duty tour.
"Everything we learned here, we just have to apply it, and we will come home in one piece."
Although this will be his first deployment with the 25th Division, Iaulualo spent four years in the Army Reserve in American Samoa before opting to go on active duty.
Over the next six months, Iaulualo will miss the birthdays of daughter Jarodene, who will turn 4 on Sept. 14; son D'rtania, who will make 2 on Sept. 17; and wife Irene on Sept. 18.
Established: 1941 Fort Polk facts
Named after: The Right Rev. Leonidas Polk, the first Episcopal bishop of Louisiana
Size: 198,000 acres
Location: Seven miles southeast of Leesville
Joint Readiness Training Center: Established in 1987 at Fort Chafee, Ark., then moved to Fort Polk in 1993 to train combat infantry soldiers
