Lt. Col. Peter J. Koch, AFSBn-Bagram, 401st Army Field Support Brigade commander, (back row far right) stands with U.S. Navy customs agents following an awards ceremony Apr. 21. The Sailors were awarded Army Achievement and Afghanistan Campaign medal...
BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan-- Twelve Sailors from Navy Expeditionary Logistics Support Group working under Army Central Command in Kuwait who were temporarily assigned to AFSBn-Bagram, 401st Army Field Support Brigade received Army Achievement Medals during a ceremony held April 21.
The Sailors were part of a 'bridging strategy' to help the 401st AFSB move non-mission essential equipment from Afghanistan. They were on short-term orders and worked directly with Soldiers, Army civilians and contractors at the Redistribution Property Assistance Team yard at Bagram. Another group of Sailors performed the same functions at AFSBn-Kandahar and are profiled in a related article.
"We were on a 90-day rotation, and arrived in two waves" said Lt. Cmdr. Kendall B. Kalstad, U.S. Navy customs team officer-in-charge. "We performed U.S. customs duties to inspect cargo bound for the United States to make sure it is free of contaminants, contraband and ammo."
"It was my honor to be the first warrant officer to stand up Navy customs in Afghanistan," said Chief Warrant Officer Duc V. Vu, officer-in-charge of the first wave. "There were some frustrated vehicles. The purpose of our team was to establish procedures to prevent this from happening in the future."
"The Navy customs agents refined how the battalion conducted customs inspections and established a standard operating procedure for the CENTCOM Material Retrograde Element customs agents to fall in on," said Capt. Eric B. Kuyper, AFSBn-BAF S3 officer. "Their superb attention to detail and meticulous inspections of retrograding rolling and non-rolling stock were instrumental in quality velocity production of Army Field Support Battalion-Bagram over the four months they were a part of the team."
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