Marines invade Dayton Ohio

Marines may land at a training site close to you today
Assault with live fire planned on vacant buildings
By Timothy R. Gaffney
e-mail address: timothy_gaffney@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News
WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE | The U.S. Marines camped out here planned to stage a mock helicopter assault on an abandoned Dayton building between 8 and 9 a.m. today officials said Sunday.
The Marines are here for two weeks of urban training in the Dayton area and their military helicopters were seen flying throughout the region Sunday.
Col. Andrew "Andy" Frick, commander of the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, said the training will include two nighttime assaults and one daylight raid on abandoned buildings.
Some training will include live ammunition, Frick said.
"Yes, there will be some live rounds fired, but the danger to anybody, to any civilians in Dayton, is nil," he said.
When live ammunition is used, "The site is usually an abandoned building. It's very tightly controlled. We have bullet traps and these young Marines have spent a lot of time and effort training so that they don't miss the bullet traps," Frick said.
Only simulated ammunition will be used in "force on force" exercises, where some Marines will act as the enemy.
"We never mix the two," he said.
The 26th MEU is conducting the exercise as part of its regular 12-month cycle. It includes six months of training followed by a six-month overseas deployment, or "float" as Marines call it.
This exercise is called TRUEX, for Training in an Urban Environment Exercise. The Marines have been conducting TRUEX exercises since 1985, mainly in southeastern cities.
While a number of military bases have ranges built to resemble urban settings, Marines who spoke to reporters Sunday said training in real cities is invaluable.
"It's great. You're going to a place you haven't been before. You can't game it," said Cpl. Jeff Mason of Ravenna, who took part in a TRUEX exercise in July 2001 on the U.S. Territory of Guam, an island on the Pacific Ocean.
Mason's stocky body was wrapped in the weapons, radios and other paraphernalia of close-quarters combat. He was one of a half-dozen soldiers modeling the specialized combat gear Marines use for close quarters, regular infantry, arctic, desert, high-altitude skydiving, or underwater missions.
Mason said his close-quarters gear was "exactly what we'll be wearing" in the Dayton exercises. The gear weighs about 80 pounds, he said, "not counting special tools such as shotguns or crowbars."
Frick, who commanded the 26th MEU in Kosovo and Afghanistan, said urban training is important because the Marines are often deployed to urban areas. Besides learning to deal with problems like spotty communications, they need to be able to function in areas where there may be many innocent civilians.
Frick deflected a question about whether the next such area might be Iraq's capital Baghdad. The Bush administration has been girding for possible military action against Iraq while urging the United Nations to demand Iraq allow inspectors in to check for weapons of mass destruction.
"We don't focus on a specific area. We focus on honing our capabilities. After the first of the year we'll deploy, and we'll go wherever the president and the national command authority tell us to go," Frick said.
Meanwhile, the exercise also gives the Marines a chance to show off their capabilities to the public. Frick said that's become a secondary goal for TRUEX over the years.
"We need to show people what they're getting for their tax dollars," he said.
Not everyone welcomes the opportunity.
A few Dayton-area residents have protested what they consider a military intrusion into a civilian environment.
"Having Marines in town playing war games is extremely dangerous, and I'm absolutely against it. While my neighborhood is unlikely to be involved, the whole concept deeply disturbs me," Amber Mapp of Kettering said in an e-mail.
Frick said he hopes residents will take pride in being host to the exercise.
"I think they should have a certain sense of pride in that if we were deployed at some future point they can look back and say, because of what we helped the Marines to do, they were successful in their operation," he said.
On the net
26th Marine Expeditionary Unit: www.26meu.usmc.mil
· Contact Timothy R. Gaffney at 225-2390 or e-mail him at timothy_gaffney@coxohio.com
[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.16.2002]

Marine Landing

Choppers hover, swoop, thrill at former school

By Lou Grieco
e-mail address: lou_grieco@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

DAYTON | The two helicopters hovered over the roof of the former Jackson Elementary School. After a few seconds, black ropes fell down.

Then came the U.S. Marines, sliding down the ropes. Within minutes, more than 20 Marines were on the roof, and the two helicopters flew off.

Hundreds of Marines repeated that exercise throughout Monday afternoon.

"This is, in essence, a dress rehearsal for how we would take down a building," said Capt. James D. Jarvis, the public affairs officer for the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

The Marines are in Dayton for the next two weeks for urban training, which will include two nighttime assaults and one daylight raid on abandoned buildings. Some training will include live ammunition, according to Marine authorities.

The Marines will stage mock raids on Thursday, Monday and Sept. 26, according to Col. Andrew Frick, 26th MEU commander, who briefed local civic leaders at a Wright-Patterson Air Force Base town hall meeting Monday. Marine helicopters will be flying over the Dayton area frequently until the exercise ends on Sept. 28.

The Marines were supposed to start early Monday, but were delayed by weather conditions. By 10:15 a.m., a busload of Marines arrived at the former school, which is at U.S. 35 and Abbey Avenue, and has been boarded up for years.

About 11:30 a.m., three helicopters could be seen in the haze over downtown Dayton. When they got near the Delphi building across from the former school, the helicopters two CH-46 Sea Knights and one CH-53 Super Stallion swooped south, and then went north to land on the field in front of the school.

As the helicopters descended, heavy downwinds from the propellers sprayed grass and dirt across the onlookers, which included Dayton firefighters and police officers, some taking pictures, Delphi workers and others.

One gust blasted a tin can against the hood of a Corvette leaving the Delphi parking lot.

The helicopters picked up Marines, then flew off. A few minutes later, they were back. The Super Stallion dropped Marines onto the lawn, and the smaller Sea Knights hovered over the roof.

As those helicopters continued to drop off and pick up Marines, two other helicopters, AH-1W Super Cobras, flew overhead. In a real mission, the Cobras would back up the others, watching for and attacking enemies moving toward the school, Jarvis said.

Though some Dayton-area residents have protested what they consider a military intrusion into a civilian environment, the people who lined the sidewalk to watch seemed supportive. So did the drivers who beeped their horns as they passed by.

Retired Dayton firefighter and Korean War veteran Joe Abele, who watched from the sidewalk with his wife, said the training impressed him.

"Once a Marine, always a Marine," said Abele, 72, of Englewood, who joined the corps in 1949. "That's the reason I'm here. Anything to do with the Marine Corps, I go."

Abele noted that U.S. soldiers can expect more action in urban areas then he saw during his time in Korea.

"This kind of training is good," Abele said. "They find out what urban warfare is about."

The two-week session is the Marine unit's first training exercise since returning from combat in Afghanistan this year. They used the Super Stallions extensively in Afghanistan, because the helicopters can travel farther and refuel during flight, Jarvis said.

The loud sounds of the helicopters slowed traffic on U.S. 35, where drivers craned their necks to watch. Neighbors were warned in advance: the days before any exercises, Marines will go door-to-door to alert residents and business owners near the training sites, Jarvis said.

The Marines' exercise as part of its regular schedule which includes six months of training followed by a six-month overseas deployment. This exercise is called TRUEX, for Training in an Urban Environment. The Marines have been conducting TRUEX exercises since 1985, mainly in southeastern U.S. cities.

The drill gave the pilots practice landing in densely populated areas, Jarvis said. The Marines who landed on the building or the ground also got practice in an unfamiliar environment which is the whole reason the Marines came to Dayton.

"We need to be prepared to very quickly insert a force in an urban area," Jarvis said. "Surprise will save lives."

For more information

Residents who have concerns or questions about the military training being conducted in Dayton may call the 26th Marines Expeditionary Unit information hotline at (937) 904-3816.

 

Contact Lou Grieco at 225-2057 or by e-mail at lou_grieco@coxohio.com. Staff writer Timothy R. Gaffney contributed to this report.

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.17.2002]

 

Greene, Wright-Pat agree to cooperate

Provides protocol for military-civilian police interaction

By Joanne Huist Smith
e-mail address: joanne_smith@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

XENIA | In the midst of a large U.S. Marine combat exercise and considerable international tension, the Greene County Commission Tuesday approved a mutual aid agreement between the sheriff's office and Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.

The agreement includes protocol for everything from serving a court summons to handling a terrorist attack. Today, U.S. Marines are staging combat exercises at two Greene County locations.

"We've had a good, responsible relationship with the U. S. Air Force for a long time," Greene County Chief Deputy John Prugh said. "There is nothing unusual about it. This is for the lawyers."

The agreement follows similar protocols with other local governments.

"We have similar agreements with other municipalities," said Susan Murphy, a WPAFB spokesperson. "If this is something we haven't done before, there isn't any reason why or why not. These are commonly used at the base as an official way of securing a partnership with local authorities."

The agreement gives the base's 88th Security Forces Squadron control of security in the event of a crash of a military airplane or other vehicle. It also sets the procedure for handling the theft of a nuclear weapon or nuclear materials.

". . .members of the 88 SFS may pursue and stop, by use of deadly force if necessary, any person perpetrating such a crime and fleeing into areas within the jurisdiction of the Greene County Sheriff's Office."

In the event a crime is committed within the jurisdiction of the sheriff's office and the suspect flees onto the base, sheriff's officers may purse and arrest the person on base, according to the agreement.

In case of civil disturbances, disasters, or calamities that seriously endanger life and property to an extent that local police can't control the situation, the 88th SFS agreed to provide Department of Defense police to assist.

Both parties also agreed to make available its jail space in case of emergency. And the 88 SFS will provide a Military Working Dog Team to search for explosives as the result of a bomb threat or for humanitarian purposes such as searching for a lost child.

 

Contact Joanne Huist Smith at 225-2362 or joanne_smith@coxohio.com

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.18.2002]

 

Marines take to country

Training exercise moves to fields

By Joanne Huist Smith
e-mail address: joanne_smith@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

The U.S. Marines will expand their combat training exercises from the urban streets of Dayton to rural sections of Greene County today.

Marine helicopters also will land on football or athletic fields at three Miami Valley high schools to talk with students about military life and to recruit.

The 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit will begin an aircraft recovery exercise about 2:30 p.m. at an old Air Force radar site on Plymouth Road, just east of Heifner Road in Silvercreek Twp. Marine Capt. James Jarvis said the Greene County location will not be used as a mock raid site.

We try to mirror what we are trying to accomplish with the property available, Jarvis said.

According to the Greene County Historical Society, the radar site was built around 1947 and staffed by Wright-Patterson Air Force Base personnel.

From the Plymouth Road site, the marines move on to Skydive Greene County at 177 S. Monroe-Siding Road in Xenia Twp. The 160-acre private, skydiving school in Xenia Twp. is surrounded by corn and soy bean fields and has three runways. Jarvis could not say what exercise would take place there.

Jump Master Scott Snyder said the military contacted the business. We were told it basically would be a nighttime operation, Snyder said.

Also today, Marine helicopters will land at Belmont High School in Dayton, Beavercreek High and Stebbins High in Riverside for a show-and-tell on military life.

Contact Joanne Huist Smith at 225-2362 or joanne_smith@coxohio.com

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.18.2002

 

The few, the proud, the Marines

Marines cause stir in Valley

By Mary McCarty
e-mail address: mmccarty@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

It was, at first blush, alarming. I drove into Dayton on Sunday afternoon, after a week in New York City, to find the skies of Dayton swarming with Marine helicopters.

My son hopped up and down with excitement, certain they were on some top-secret mission.

The menacing thwack-thwack-thwack of the choppers seemed to put everyone on edge. My phone rang off the hook with calls from friends: "Are we attacking someone?"

These are, after all, the same units first deployed to Kandahar. But public affairs officers assure us that the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit is conducting the exercise as part of its regular 12-month cycle.

The nearly 600 Marines and sailors involved in the training, dubbed TRUEX Training in an Urban Environment Exercise are scheduled to be deployed to the Mediterranean Sea early next year.

Nothing out of the ordinary, perhaps, but hardly routine for Daytonians. Marine Sgt. Roman Yurek fielded dozens of calls Sunday on the TRUEX hot line at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base (904-3816). "People were wanting to know what was going on," Yurek said.

There have been a few critics. Two weeks ago, a handful of people complained before Dayton City Commission, concerned about war games being conducted in populated areas.

But the hot line response has been overwhelmingly positive, Yurek said: "The people who have called in are more curious than anything else," Yurek said. "When we tell them what's going on, they're enthusiastic."

While they're here, the Marines hope to give back to the community, to make up for the noise, the blocked-off roads and other inconveniences.

They'll be visiting area schools to talk to children, Yurek said, and some will spend a day working on a Habitat for Humanity house.

That's all very well for starters, but methinks the Marines aren't thinking big enough. More than a few worthy projects could benefit from a a few good enlisted troops around here. What if we put the Marines to work on a few thorny community problems?

We could have em manning pumps for the RiverScape fountains in the vain hope they'll finally meet in the middle.

They could re-roof Dayton schools so poor Dave Ponitz doesn't have to spend the rest of his fall on the campaign stump.

They could take out a few remaining downtown eyesores the crumbling Admiral Benbow Hotel in time for the opening of the Schuster Center.

They could settle the Veterans Commission brouhaha, once and for all.

They could sit down with some DP&L execs and politely explain the meaning of a "Blue Chip stock."

They could stick around until next year when the Ohio legislature and governor have to agree on a new two-year operating budget.

It could turn out to be the biggest battle they see in their military careers.

Heck, since we're thinking really, really big here, maybe one of them could quarterback the Bengals.

And get my son to clean his room.

After that, we might just think about letting them go back to defending the free world.

 

Contact Mary McCarty at mmccarty@coxohio.com or 225-2209.

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.18.2002]

 

Chopper practice brings reality home

Dayton Daily News

Are those marine helicopters cool or what? Their distant putt-putt-putt and not-so-distant, mirror-shaking roar have fast integrated themselves into the Dayton scene. Sometimes people don't even look up anymore. But the kids and the men love them. Maybe even some women.

Whoever had the idea of practicing landings in an urban area had a good one. Baghdad could be a challenge.

The Marine exercises have brought home to the people of Dayton especially to the young people that these are not exactly times of peace we're living in. There's a threatening world out there, and the United States is, to say the least, fully engaged.

The young Marines we've seen in pictures and in person are volunteers. They are the former boys kids who thought helicopters and military adventures were cool. They are getting much out of their jobs in the way of adventure, travel, growth and educational opportunities. Some of them are enjoying themselves, at least more than they would enjoy loading crates or pushing paper.

But they may be asked to pay dearly.

They are grown now, and they know what they're into. Some are motivated, at least in part, by a desire to deploy their youth and strength on work that others cannot do or are afraid to do and that is deemed necessary by an appreciative society. They want to be the brave ones, the heroes.

When the time comes for them to go to Iraq or someplace like that, some may begin to see more merit in other kinds of employment. But, in truth, some of them will be exhilarated by the prospect of real military action. It's what they've trained for, and war is not hell for everybody. Gen. George Patton was not the only one to love it.

Still, something profound separates young military volunteers from other young people weighing job decisions: The decisions they make could leave them with life-altering scars if they are alive at all long after the tastes that motivated those decisions are gone. They can pay a terrible price for finding helicopters cool.

The more practice they get in Dayton, the better.

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.19.2002]

 

Marines land at Beavercreek High

Troops take a break to show off aircraft

By Joanne Huist Smith
e-mail address: joanne_smith@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

BEAVERCREEK | The helicopters, a SuperCobra attack model and a Sea Knight troop transport, swooped down on Beavercreek High School like the opening scenario of a video game.

That's how 11-year-old Chris Rike described the arrival of the U.S. Marines on the soccer field behind Beavercreek High School and Ferguson Middle School on Wednesday morning.

"This has changed me. I want to do this. I want to join the Marines," Chris said.

The Marines, based at Camp Lejeune, N.C., arrived in the Dayton area this week to prepare for deployment in the Mediterranean Sea in March.

The 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit planned combat training exercises in Greene County on Wednesday at an old radar site on Plymouth Road in Silvercreek Twp. and at Skydive Greene County in Xenia Twp.

But, the troops also visited Stebbins High School in Riverside, Dayton's Belmont High School and the Beavercreek campus to show off their aircraft and talk about life in one of the toughest branches of military service.

"We're educating kids about who we are, what we do and how we fit in the military picture," Gunnery Sgt. Mark E. Bradley said.

The dun-gray helicopters stole the show.

"It was just awesome to see," Beavercreek seventh-grader Robby Kapaku said. "We heard the helicopters as soon as we walked outside the building. We looked up and they were circling around the school. That's not something you see everyday."

While some in the crowd of 3,130 students grumbled that the visit was just military PR, most clamored around the Marines and their flying machines.

"I think it's amazing that they took time out of their work to be here today," senior Kyle Stankowski said.

For one of the Marines, Cpl. Kevin D. Swallow, the Dayton-area assignment was just an hour drive from his Lima hometown. He enlisted in 2000, two months after graduation from Shawnee High School. As an intelligence analyst for the Air Combat Unit, Swallow briefs pilots on enemy locations before they leave on missions, and he gathers information about what they've seen when they return. He also provides pilots with images of mission locations.

"It's been an incredible experience," Swallow said. "Other people's lives depend on you. It makes you grow up real fast."

For 17-year-old Brittany Morris, the experience Wednesday was personal. Her dad, a U. S. Marine, is a troop transport pilot and serves overseas.

"This is so exciting. I've never been inside one of these before," Brittany said. "It kind of showed me what he does."

The helicopters did a final flyover as students headed back to class. For some kids, meeting the Marines and seeing the black barrels of the weapons mounted on the attack helicopter made the conflict in the world more real.

"It's kind of scary to think they (the Marines) have to go to the Middle East," 13-year-old Lauren Little said.

 

Contact Joanne Huist Smith at 225-2362 or by e-mail at joanne_smith@coxohio.com

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.19.2002]

 

U.S. Marine injured in grenade explosion

By Timothy R. Gaffney
e-mail address: timothy_gaffney@coxohio.com
Dayton Daily News

WRIGHT-PATTERSON AIR FORCE BASE | The 600 Marines performing urban warfare training in the Dayton area suffered a casualty Monday when a flash-bang grenade exploded in a soldiers hand, a spokesman confirmed Thursday.

The device, which uses a flash and noise to disorient potential adversaries, went off as the Marine was preparing to conduct room-clearing operations in the abandoned Jackson School on Abbey Avenue in West Dayton, said Capt. James Jarvis, spokesman for the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

Jarvis said would not release the Marines name at the request of his family.

Dayton police said a soldier lost at least one finger when a device exploded in his hand.

Emergency medical personnel and other Marines on the scene helped stabilize the victim en route to Miami Valley Hospital, where he underwent surgery, Jarvis said. The Marine has been released and is recovering well, Jarvis said. The incident is under investigation.

This is a very tragic and unfortunate incident. . . Right now, our thoughts are with this Marine and his family, Jarvis said.

Thursday night, the unit conducted a 45-minute mock raid on an old NCR facility in Miami Twp., at the invitation of a foreign nation. The assignment was to take the facility and disarm those inside.

The 26th MEU, based at Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, is conducting urban training exercises in Montgomery and Greene counties through Sept. 28.

 

T Contact Timothy R. Gaffney at 225-2390 or timothy_gaffney@coxohio.com. Staff writer Lou Greico and Cox News Service staff writer Steve Sandlin contributed to this report.

[From the Dayton Daily News: 09.20.2002]