Guard drops in new unit

EDINBURGH - Seymour residents will notice an increased amount of activity at the Indiana National Guard armory at Freeman Field over the coming months.

That's because one of the components of the Guard's newly activated unit, the 219th Battlefield Surveillance Brigade, will be based at Freeman Field as it trains in preparation for possible mobilization in 2011.

"There will be a lot more activity in Seymour right now," Col. Ivan Denton, the brigade's commander, said during a press conference Saturday after the activation ceremony at Camp Atterbury north of Edinburgh.

"The soldiers in the Seymour armory are the centerpiece of our organization," said Denton, the brigade's commander. "We spend more on training on their unit than any other unit in the Indiana National Guard less aviation."

The brigade, which consists of units in 16 cities across Indiana, began coming together a year ago. It also includes components in Terre Haute, South Bend, Bedford and New Castle.

It's just one of six in the guard across the nation and two in the active Army and is unique in that it is part of the Army's plans to increase intelligence capabilities to provide commanders on battlefields with accurate information, according to a press release from the Indiana National Guard.

The Seymour unit of the brigade is part of the 2-152 Reconnaissance and Surveillance Battalion, which will be headquartered at Columbus. The battalion also includes units in Bluffton and North Vernon and has an authorized strength of 485 soldiers.

Lt. Col. Chris Kelsey, the battalion commander, also said Seymour will play an important role in the battalion as well as the brigade.

Kelsey, who also is commander of the guard's Muscatatuck Urban Training Center at Butlerville, said one of the buildings at the Freeman Field armory will be refurbished into a rigger's shed to train soldiers to pack cargo and personnel parachutes and rig loads of cargo for heavy drop into theaters of operation.

The aircraft used by the unit are too heavy to land at Freeman Field at this time, but the guard plans to help repair runways so they can handle larger transport aircraft such as C130s and the heavy cargo aircraft such as C-17s, Kelsey said.

In the meantime, chutes will be packed at Seymour, the soldiers will be taken to Columbus and then flown back to Seymour where they'll jump into Freeman Field, Kelsey said.

Activity at Seymour will be noticeable on Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings, but there also will be some night operations.

"You'll see a lot more jumping onto the Seymour airfield," Kelsey said. "You've probably seen that the last six or eight months."

There will be about 160 soldiers based at Seymour, including 25 parachute riggers, who wear distinctive red caps, which will be moved here from North Vernon when the rigger's shed is completed in 2009.

Soldiers in the unit also will train in high-altitude low-opening jumping. It's the first time the Indiana National Guard has received training, funding and equipment for HALO jumping, which involves soldiers jumping from about 10,000 feet with oxygen full containment, Kelsey said.

The brigade itself will be headquartered at Camp Atterbury until a new armory is opened at Franklin in 2011.

Other components of the unit include the 2-151 Infantry Battalion headquartered at South Bend with an authorization of 810 soldiers; the 519th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion, headquartered at Terre Haute with an authorized strength of 449 soldiers; the 2219th Brigade Support Company, headquartered at Bedford with 211 troops; and the 438th Signal Company, New Castle, with 47 soldiers.

Denton, who lives at Fishers with his wife and three children, said the Indiana guard has added about 600 new soldiers, which played a key role in why the state was given the new brigade.

"We have just a great four years, and there's no doubt we got this brigade because of that (recruiting effort)," Denton said. In terms of guard recruitment, Indiana ranks fourth in the nation while the state's population ranking is 13th.

Denton, who also is the guard's director of personnel, said Seymour and North Vernon along with Columbus were selected because of their closeness to the urban warfare training center at Butlerville in eastern Jennings County.

"The southeast part of the state is very strategic in nature in that regard," Denton said. "We wanted to have the jump unit - the air cavalry - somewhere in the vicinity of the Columbus-Seymour airfields and Muscatatuck."

Denton said the brigade will likely be mobilized sometime with the next 12 to 24 months.

"Every unit in the Army and the National Guard have a mobilization date," he said.

Denton said the activation of a unit doesn't happen very often in Indiana and they generally aren't the most exciting ceremonies.

"We wanted to have an interactive event, so people could bring their families, do some rock climbing; we have the rappelling tower set up," Denton said of Saturday's ceremony.

Some members of the brigade, including those from Seymour, also performed a capabilities exercise after the uncasing of the colors for the brigade and each battalion and company.

The exercise involved a surveillance unit out of Seymour parachuting in to monitor a meeting among terrorists and a second unit rapelling in from a Blackhawk helicopter. That unit then attacked a building, brought out a leader of the terrorists and loaded him onto a helicopter.

The exercise was designed to show some of the unique characteristics that the organization has, such as being able to drop parachutists in behind enemy lines, being able to fast-rope off a rotary aircraft and being able to repel off a rotary aircraft.

On the battlefield, the brigade's role will be to find the enemy and determine what he is doing, Denton said.

"We will work hand-to-hand with combat troops in theater to neutralize whatever the enemy is doing," Denton said.

Staff Sgt. Robert Kinsey of Seymour, who is currently in recruiting but just recently left the Seymour unit, said the 2-152nd offers some of the things a typical guardsman doesn't normally obtain during their service.

"Like airborne school and ranger training," Kinsey added.

Spc. Chris Fuhs of West Lafayette, who is a member of the 2-152nd, said the job is simple.

"Basically, a small group of us jump out of a plane, walk into the woods and survey objectives," Fuhs said. "It can be kind of boring at times to be out there for days, but I enjoy it a lot."