Engineers Take on New Role

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Engineers Take on New Role
November 06, 2009
Army News Service|by 1st Lt. Brendon Hischar

JOINT SECURITY STATION CONDOR, Iraq - For most Soldiers assigned to the 4th Brigade "Highlanders," 1st Armored Division, the unit's advise and assist mission requires a rethinking of traditional roles in a stability operations environment.

The engineers of 2nd Platoon, Company E, 4th Battalion, 6th Infantry Regiment are no different.

When some people hear the word "engineer," they think route clearance, but that's only a small portion of the much larger combat engineer skill set, which these Soldiers are learning to apply in new ways to support the mission.

Based at Contingency Operating Site Hunter in southern Maysan province and attached to 2nd Sqdn., 13th Cav. Regt., "Task Force Saber," the engineers act as the Route Clearance Team for the squadron, clearing about 400 miles of rural highway each week to allow free and safe movement of U.S. forces and Iraqi civilians. Recently, the engineers began training jundees of 3rd Battalion, 41st Iraqi Army Brigade in the use of mine detectors.

One of the new applications of mine detectors is not finding mines or live munitions, but to discover hidden caches of weapons and components in the marshy surroundings of Maysan province.


Rest iof article at: http://www.military.com/news/article/army-news/engineers-take-on-new-role.html?col=1186032369115