LIBREVILLE, Gabon — If you don’t believe an Army marches on its stomach, just ask the soldiers of the 3rd Infantry Division’s 703rd Brigade Support Battalion.
About 25 soldiers from the battalion, led by Lt. Col. Joshua LaMotte, are here providing support for the almost 1,200 military personnel from 14 countries participating in Central Accord 2016, considered the largest, most complex exercise U.S. Army Africa has ever led on the continent. Central Accord includes airborne operations, a field training exercise and a command post exercise.
“We’re responsible for the exercise support cell, here to extend the operational reach of everything that’s going on,” LaMotte said.
This includes transportation, housing, food, water, showers and agreements with local contractors. LaMotte’s soldiers even contracted with Gabonese landing crafts to get people and supplies by sea to Pointe Denis, where paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne Division and the French and Gabonese armies are conducting international jumps Wednesday and Thursday.
Here’s a look at some of the supplies and services the soldiers from the 703rd Brigade Support Battalion, which is part of the 3rd Infantry Division’s 2nd Brigade Combat Team, have provided since June 13 across five locations in and around Libreville.
- More than 42,100 Meals Ready to Eat – this is in addition to a locally-contracted chow hall that serves three meals a day at the Cooperative Security Location here in Libreville, the site of the headquarters for the exercise.
- About 138 pallets of water have been distributed, with as many as 57,000 bottles of water available at any given time.
- More than 2,120 gallons of fuel.
- Conducted more than 200 transportation movement requests, which are requests to move people or supplies from one location to another, with the locally-contracted drivers driving almost 11,000 miles.
- Processed more than 1,200 personnel into one of the five locations involved in Central Accord.
The work his soldiers have done is a “really good example” of the Army’s focus on honing its ability to deploy quickly to austere or unknown environments, LaMotte said.
“It’s not like you’re going to Afghanistan and you’re falling into a place that already has all of that,” he said. “Over 54 percent of my guys have never even deployed. Being outside the U.S. and not having a combat patch, you can’t take that for granted.”
Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Stewart (left), maintenance supervisor with 703rd Brigade Support Battalion, 2nd Infantry Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division, and U.S. Marine Corps Lance Cpl. Matthew Little, electrician with Combat Logistics Battalion 2, roll a fuel barrel June 14, at the Cooperative Security Location in Libreville, Gabon.
Photo Credit: Staff Sgt. Candace Mundt/Army
LaMotte and his soldiers have had to think of everything soldiers might need to be mission-ready. This includes providing hand sanitizer, bringing in a local barber to give soldiers haircuts, giving troops access to religious services, and bringing to Libreville weights and makeshift workout equipment.
“When my biggest complaints are there’s too much trash and I don’t have enough running water in my VIP shower, I guess I’m doing OK,” LaMotte said. “The real heroes are the preventive maintenance team and our cook, who came out and worked with the contractor to do all the proper things to keep people from getting sick, making sure soldiers take care of themselves through showering, through food cleaning, through keeping their hands clean.”
Working together in Western Africa also has brought his team together, said LaMotte, who deployed to Gabon on May 27, just two days after taking command of the battalion.
“It really helps us come together as a team much faster, and it helps us solve problems much faster,” LaMotte said. “If you don’t solve these problems, bad things happen.”
