Slovak Staff Sgt. Peter Sulgan (right) teaches an upright shooting posture to Afghan soldiers with the 4th Kandak, 2nd Mobile Strike Force Brigade, Afghan National Army, while Slovakian Capt. Lubomir Januska observes the training. Both Sulgan and Jan...
Slovak Sgt. Maj. Martin Bernath, an adviser with a Slovak Security Force Advisory Team, Regional Command-South, coaches an Afghan soldier while shooting a mounted .50 caliber machine gun at some targets from a mobile strike force vehicle in Kandahar ...
Slovak Staff Sgt. Roland Cvengel (left), Sgt. Maj. Martin Bernath (center), and Sgt. Marian Chmura rest between live-fire training iterations on a desert plain as a whirlwind passes by in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan, Aug. 21, 2014. All three Slova...
U.S. Capt. Scott Wright (right), an adviser with the 2nd Mobile Strike Force Brigade Security Force Advise and Assist Team, 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 4th Inf. Division, oversees training conducted by the Slovak Security Force Advisory Team, R...
Afghan soldiers serving with the 4th Kandak, 2nd Mobile Strike Force Brigade, Afghan National Army, shoot M4 carbines during a training lane in a desert valley in Kandahar province, Afghanistan, Aug. 21, 2014. The training was conducted by the Slovak...
Slovak Staff Sgt. Peter Sulgan, who serves with a Slovak Security Force Advisory Team, Regional Command-South, oversees prone live-fire training with Afghan soldiers with the 4th Kandak, 2nd Mobile Strike Force Brigade, Afghan National Army, on a des...
KANDAHAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan (Aug. 27, 2014) -- An arid wind lifted the flour-like dust from the parched landscape with such ease it made the hot wind visible. Whirlwinds seemed to be the only things traveling across the valley floor of Kandahar province, Afghanistan, on Aug. 21, 2014, but in a remote corner of the desert floor on a small hill, coalition forces gathered in the midst of the dust devils for weapons training.
A Slovak Army Security Force Advisory Team, Regional Command-South, chose the remote hillside for a culminating exercise for weapons training that the 4th Kandak, 2nd Mobile Strike Force Brigade, Afghan National Army, has received from the Slovaks.
"This exercise that we conducted today was the final day of weapons training that the Afghans have been receiving from us for the past month," said Slovak Capt. Stanislav Lucan, a native of Martin, Slovakia, who serves as an operations officer and adviser for the 4th Kandak, 2nd MSF Brigade. "My instructors trained them in weapons handling and basic tactical skills with the M4s, M16s, and mounted .50-caliber machine gun, as well as everything relating with firing those weapon systems."
The goal that the Slovaks were aiming for was to train the Afghan soldiers to be proficient with the weapon systems and enable them to train their own soldiers.
"This training allows the Afghans to become more self-sustaining, which is important for them as the coalition force's footprint continues to get smaller throughout Afghanistan," Lucan said.
"These train the trainer types of events are very important, because they (Afghans) need to be the ones training their new soldiers. It's imperative to have as many soldiers as highly qualified as possible to increase their training efficiency and limit our involvement as much as possible," said U.S. Army Capt. Scott Wright, an adviser with 2nd MSF Brigade Security Force Advise and Assist Team, 4th Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division, who was present to oversee the training.
Lucan explained that before the training even began, the Slovak SFAT worked with Afghan leaders within the kandak, which is the equivalent of a battalion in the U.S. Army, to hand-pick the soldiers who would make the best instructors for the upcoming generation of Afghan soldiers.
To perform this special mission of training Afghans, the Slovak SFAT was handpicked as well from within Slovakia's 1st Mechanized Brigade, Slovak Land Forces, Lucan explained. He expressed his feelings about the hefty responsibility and profound pride that comes with that responsibility.
"I feel proud of my mission. I have to say that it has been a challenge for me, and it's been rewarding for me, because I can see the results of my work," Lucan said, "and if I see that they're learning, I can see the results of my work, so it makes me feel good."
"I was really impressed with the Slovak team. They did an excellent job training the ANA," Wright said. "I wanted to see this culmination of training come together, and it was really well-executed by both the Slovaks and the ANA."
Providing the ANA with proficiency in weapons training was the Slovak's first step of more complex training that the ANA will receive in the near future. Now, they will move forward and learn to use their weapons training in squad-sized elements.
"Today's training was the first step of our work, and we're ready for the next step," Lucan said. "Now, we're going on to squad movement tactics and squad tactics under fire. So now we're faced with the challenge of creating squads and preparing them to act cohesively as a squad under fire."
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