Cavalry Trains Afghan Soldiers

Legion Academy trains first class
by Sgt. Gerald Wilson 2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment

Kabul, Afghanistan- Troopers from 3rd Squadron,2nd Stryker Cavalry Regiment gathered alongside their partners from the Afghan National Army Thursday, October 21 at Combat Outpost Azizzullah to honor the first graduating class of the Legion Academy.  The Legion Academy is a two-week long course designed to familiarize ANA Soldiers with the basic soldiering skills and tactics used by their Coalition counterparts.

“We started with the basics like weapons maintenance, components and capabilities,” said the Academy Commandant Staff Sgt. Ildefonso Perez. “Then moved into individual, buddy team, squad and unit movement techniques.”  Perez said students also practiced room and building clearing techniques as well as the more mundane administrative tasks such as range operations.   “It was meant to refine their basic skills and also their leadership roles,” he said.

Perez explained that each student was placed in different leadership positions to experience what it means to do the job of a team or squad leader. Students were rotated through the team and squad leader positions and instructed on how to lead troops in a variety of scenarios.  According to Staff Sgt. Javiar Lozano, the senior instructor for the course, his students have come a long way since the course began.

“They have shown a big improvement since day one,” Lozano said. “At first their attention span and discipline level wasn’t very high,” he said. “After the first week, once we got past all the boring administrative stuff, they respected us more and really got into the training.”

“As a first class, it was a good stepping stone for us to know how to better train the next,” Lozano said.
All in all, the course was deemed a great success. Out of the 22 Soldiers who started the program 12 students graduated from the class.

The ultimate goal of the program is to better equip ANA Soldiers to provide for the security of their homeland. Programs such as this assist the Afghan National Army to become stronger and more independent.