FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. — The Marine Corps’ Basic Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Warrant Officer Course held a graduation ceremony today in the CBRN Regimental Room at the John B. Mahaffey Museum Complex.
During the ceremony, seven Marine warrant officers and two Air Force officers received their diplomas. While joint-service training happens all the time here, this was a unique occasion for the Air Force, as these two officers’ experiences will help shape how junior Air Force leaders are educated on their CBRN duties going forward.
Air Force Col. Thomas Bongiovi is the Civil Engineer Readiness Division chief for the Headquarters, U.S. Air Force Air Staff, responsible for the Air Force’s program for readiness for engineers, which includes explosive ordnance disposal, fire emergency services and emergency management and CBRN defense. He attended the graduation and said the Air Force believes very firmly that joint training and joint exercising is critical to preparedness.
“There’s great benefits to (working with the other services),” he said. “Interoperability in the context of the deployed environment of the war fight is what we’re all preparing for. This is a perfect example here at Fort Leonard Wood, an Army installation with a Marine training curriculum — with all branches represented here. We think the relationships and the familiarity they’re going to gain from this kind of training environment is going to benefit them.”
Bongiovi called this course completion “a pilot test case,” with an eye to sending more junior officers through this course — or something like it — in the near future.
“We have been reemphasizing our investment in developing our CBRN Defenders, to include our officers and our NCOs,” he said. “We thought this might produce some synergies and collaboration that will help both of us.”
One of the Air Force attendees was Maj. Clark Smith, who has been tasked with assisting Bongiovi’s office with the transition. While not a junior officer any longer, Smith said having this kind of an education would’ve been beneficial to him as a lieutenant.
“About 10 years ago, I came into the Readiness and Emergency Management Flight at Peterson Air Force Base (in Colorado Springs, Colorado),” he said. “I didn’t have a class to go to learn this CBRN trade. Now, going through the class, I’m looking back at my experience as a lieutenant and thinking, ‘This would’ve been beneficial.’ Not only for credibility, but to know these are the actual things I need to be ready to advise a commander on.”
Smith also said the Air Force has transitioned a bit throughout the past decade, making partnerships with the Marine Corps all the more ideal.
“We’re looking at more of an expeditionary mindset in different areas and for different reasons and for different threats, so embedding with the Marines for several months, they really have that expeditionary mindset,” he said. “I think it’s great to get in their head and understand how they make decisions, because there are certain things that maybe we wouldn’t think about or we wouldn’t think of in the same way.”
For Air Force 1st Lt. Rita Bowen, who was the class distinguished honor graduate, what she learned throughout the course will come in handy in her next role as a civil engineer officer at Hill Air Force Base, Utah.
“They thought it would be valuable for us to see how the Marines do it,” she said. “We also got to experience a little of how the Army does it as well. I’ve never had the opportunity to work with Marines before, and definitely any time you can interact with another service and build that mutual respect and understand a different perspective, it’s valuable — especially as a company-grade officer.”
The Marines gain value from the experience as well, said Marine Staff Sgt. Christopher Hollenshead, a curriculum developer and one of the instructors for the advanced CBRN courses here.
“I think the benefit is we get a different viewpoint, from a sister service,” he said. “As Marines, we have our viewpoint on how things should be when it comes to CBRN and how we operate, and it’s completely different on the Air Force side. So, it was really good to see their viewpoint on all things CBRN. I think it was a lot of us teaching them, and then them teaching us.”
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