An Army Engineer Officer's Deployment to Bahrain

摘要

After spending a year deployed as the facilities engineer with the Naval Support Activity in the Kingdom of Bahrain, I feel that it is my duty as an engineer officer to share my unique experience as part of a joint special operations task force. This yearlong deployment was unlike any I have experienced. The command at Naval Support Activity Bahrain is a dual one, including Joint Special Operations Task Force-Arabian Peninsula (JSOTF-AP) and Naval Special Warfare Unit 3 (NSWU-3). Within JSOTF-AP, 19th and 20th Special Forces Groups (Airborne) National Guard units complete 6-month rotations to Bahrain as Special Operations Forces liaison elements supporting the seven Arabian Peninsula countries-Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Yemen, and Qatar. In my time there, there were Special Forces units from Colorado, Alabama, and Utah. In addition, there were units of the Regular Army, Army National Guard, and U.S. Army Reserve, which all supported the JSOTF-AP and NSWU-3 mission. The unit mission was to plan and conduct special operations in support of the commander of the U.S. Central Command, leveraging foreign internal defense activities with Arabian Peninsula partner nation security forces in order to improve regional stability and countermalign actors within the area of responsibility.