BAGRAM AIR FIELD, Afghanistan - The 1st Medical Brigade from Fort Hood, Texas, ceremoniously cased their colors here Thursday, transferring the authority of command to the 30th Medical Command from Sembach, Germany, as they unfurled their colors.
Brig. Gen. Ricky D. Gibbs, deputy commander, V Corps, presided over the event as Joint and Coalition medical command teams assembled to honor the transfer.
For the last nine months, 1st Med Bde led Task Force Medical-Afghanistan, the medical mission command headquarters in charge of the Afghanistan theater of operations under V Corps and United States Forces-Afghanistan. TF Med-A provides expert health service support and force protection to International Assistance Force Afghanistan Joint Command (IJC) forces as they perform the critical mission of transition to capable Afghan National Security Forces.
We executed our mission at hand, truly partnered with U.S. Forces-Afghanistan, the IJC, and each Regional Command that comprised a comprehensive battlefield healthcare enterprise that achieved marked results, measured by taking care of our wounded and saving lives, said Col. Bruce W. McVeigh, commander of 1st Med Bde.
McVeigh recognized the sacrifice of the Soldiers, Airmen, and Sailors who comprise the Task Force, and ended his speech with special thanks to their Families.
"There is no doubt that Task Force Med-A was truly the strength of the warrior, the hope for the wounded, the comfort for the dying, because that is the call for the medical care system on today's battlefield, as it has been for centuries of warfare" said McVeigh.
The 30th Medical Command assumes the mission for their second time, having completed the very first TF Med-A rotation in 2009-2010 here at Bagram. Since then, their team executed an incremental training plan which included numerous exercises in Germany to get ready to assume the mission.
"We worked on building our 30th MEDCOM team, and now we look forward to building our Afghanistan team with our new teammates," said Col. Koji Nishimura, commander of 30th MEDCOM, as he assumed authority of TF MED-A.
"For us there is no higher honor than to serve our great coalition service men and women, civilians, and the people of Afghanistan. For the next nine months we will strive for world record performance and professionalism," said Nishimura.
Theater-wide preventive medicine, concussive care, behavioral health care, veterinary medicine, medical logistics, far forward resuscitative care, and administrative oversight of all DoD hospitals in Afghanistan, and many other medical missions comprise TF Med-A.
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