Sources: Arthur DeGroat, 785-532-0369, degroata@k-state.edu;
Lt. Col. Geoff McClendon, 334-953-2243, geoffrey.mcclendon@maxwell.af.mil;
and Joe Wilk, jpw632@aol.com
News release prepared by: Andy Badeker, 785-532-6415, abadeker@k-state.edu
Thursday, Aug. 2, 2007
AIR FORCE CADETS TRAIN AT K-STATE, FORT RILEY
MANHATTAN -- The combatives program, a recent addition to Kansas State University's curriculum, has attracted two dozen Air Force ROTC cadets for two weeks of intensive training on campus and at Fort Riley.
The cadets, from colleges as far away as Alaska and Puerto Rico, have been spending their mornings on the mats in Ahearn Field House and most of their afternoons at the fort, participating in military transition team training and small-unit exercises, according to Arthur DeGroat, K-State's director of military affairs. Their last day in Kansas is Friday, Aug. 10.
Transition teams are 11-member groups who will join Iraqi and Afghani military units as advisers, DeGroat said.
"We're always looking for good technique, rather than rushing it," said Joe Wilk, a level three combatives instructor overseeing the grappling in Ahearn. "We can add speed once they get good at it." He and fellow instructor Alex Di Benedetto will bring the cadets through 40 hours of training, which will certify them as platoon level instructors.
"We hope this will encourage them to continue their level of fitness and take back some of the things they've learned to their units," said Col. Owen Ragland, detachment commander at the University of Tennessee. He was sweating his way through drill one, designed to teach three of the four dominant body positions in combatives.
As the senior mentor for this group of sophomores, "I plan to do everything they're doing," Ragland said, "even though they have 28 years on me."
Edgardo Morales, sidelined on his first morning for lack of luggage, said he was looking forward to mixing it up. "I'm pumped up; I want to do it. These guys are real professionals." He was optimistic that his bags would find him after his three changes of plane en route from the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez.
The Air Force cadets' activities at the fort, including time at the Smoky Hill air-to-ground gunnery range and a "force on force" paintball match, are designed to give an early introduction to "jointness," Ragland said, or interaction between branches of the military. Instead of fanning interservice rivalry, Ragland hopes such events will foster mutual respect.
This is one of 24 professional development training sessions that take place across the country in the summer, said Lt. Col. Geoffrey McClendon, who is deputy director of operations for Headquarters Air Force ROTC at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama. The sessions range from immersion language training to the cyber boot camp in Rome, N.Y., where cadets attempt to hack into each other's networks when they're not out on eight-mile runs.
K-State helped design this program in hopes of making it a regular summer event for ROTC students, DeGroat said. It is a longer version of the university's modern combatives course, DAS 198, five sections of which will be taught to K-State undergraduates this fall.
"The main difference between 'modern' and 'military' combatives is that the soldier needs to be aggressive and close the distance," Di Benedetto said. "It's more intense, and more of a reality: They're much more likely than a college student to find themselves in hand-to-hand combat."