Operation enduring freedom from the military engineer perspective

Engineer: The Professional Bulletin for Army Engineers, July, 2002 by Jerry T. Colonel Mohr, Frederick A. Lieutenant Commander Mucke, Donald L. Lieutenant Commander Maconi

Lieutenant Commander Frederick A. "Fritz" Mucke

On 11 September 2001, U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) Engineer Division, and its equivalent staffs within component commands, began the daunting task of directing military engineer efforts for a war unlike any this nation has ever faced. Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) required engineers to support a unique contingency operation that required extraordinary resourcefulness. Key OEF activities requiring engineer support included contingency planning, engineer unit deployment, airfield repair and upgrade, mine and unexploded ordnance (UXO) clearing, troop protection from environmental hazards, and base camp construction. An obstacle to meeting these challenges was the need for staff augmentation. This article discusses these engineer challenges and some of the lessons learned from them.

Contingency Planning

As the dust settled from the 9-11 terrorist attacks, engineers immediately engrossed themselves in contingency planning. They evaluated the condition of available infrastructure in the area of responsibility and compared this information with engineer assets and capabilities, including those of several units already deployed in the Middle East Gulf region. This helped CENTCOM planners select force bed-down locations. Using this information, they oversaw the deployment of engineers supporting OEF operations.

Engineer Unit Deployment

The initial deployment of OEF special operations forces into the area of responsibility did not include supporting engineer units. This shortfall became obvious as the demand for engineers quickly escalated. Some engineer forces already in the area revised their deployments to support early OEF requirements. One such example was an Air Force RED HORSE unit that diverted from a programmed project in one country to a contingency tasking in another.

As OEF progressed past the initial special operations force stage, the flow of forces into the area increased significantly. To support this, Air Force RED HORSE and PRIME BEEF, Army engineer and prime power, and Navy Seabee units received deployment orders to OEF contingency installations to repair and upgrade airfields, construct base camps, and provide electrical power. Army engineer detachments relieved Air Force and Navy Seabee units to continue base construction, maintenance, and repair. Engineers from several coalition partner nations also deployed into the area and supported runway-repair, well-drilling, and mine-clearing projects.

OEF engineer deployments overcame many obstacles to mission accomplishment. For example, limited construction materials and equipment hampered engineer missions. And additional short-fused taskings further strained engineer deployments, such as the construction of short-term holding facilities for detainees.

Yet engineers persevered with innovation and determination, using unique materials and techniques to compensate for resource shortfalls. For example, Navy Seabees at Camp Rhino, lacking equipment to clear foreign object damage debris, brought back to life an old Russian street sweeper from a local junkyard and used it to clear debris from airfield runways and taxiways. Once again, the engineer "can-do" spirit proved indomitable!

Airfield Repair and Upgrade

To support OEF in Afghanistan, warfighters needed airfields in several Central Asian countries surrounding Afghanistan and eventually within Afghanistan itself. These airfields would support fighter operations, logistical hubs, and force bed down. Because U.S. and Coalition forces had conducted only limited military operations in the region before 9-11, the only airfields and bases available quickly enough to support OEF were several fighter air bases of the former Soviet Union. The Soviets hastily constructed or expanded these airfields during their 1980s Afghanistan campaign. They used precast concrete slabs without rebar and emplaced them over graded ground without a subbase. Years of neglect and conflict, as well as OEF air strikes, had damaged and deteriorated the airfields and the supporting utilities and ground transportation infrastructure. Thus, engineers "operationalized" seven such former Soviet bases with significant infrastructure repairs and upgrades which established air operations for cargo (C -130 and C-17) and fighter aircraft.

Initially, rapid runway repair was the project du jour for engineers. They patched numerous bomb craters, repaired spalled pavement, and laid AM-2 matting to get airfields operational quickly. A more innovative technique was the Navy Seabees' use of "gorilla snot" palliative to suppress dust and stabilize soil for a desert dirt airstrip. But traditional concrete repair techniques necessitated closing sections of runways for days, while waiting for freshly placed concrete caps and patches to cure. Engineers discovered an alternative to conventional rapid runway repair that drastically reduced runway downtime--harvesting undamaged slabs from unused areas of airfields to replace damaged slabs. By replacing these slabs during several consecutive nights, airfields remained operational with minimal disruption while undergoing pavement repair.