汪达尔大聚会
作者:蒂姆·泰特.S.
巧合和偶遇会发生在每个人身上. 你正在度假或在一个陌生的地方, 坐在你旁边的桌子上，或者站在人行道上的，是你多年未见的朋友——一次奇怪的快乐重逢. In 2003, 陆军上尉布莱恩·吉尔伯特和少校罗里·汤普森(他们都是上大2000届的校友)就有过这样的经历. However, the strange place was Iraq and they were not on vacation.
吉尔伯特, 谁是第三步兵师布拉德利步兵战车连的指挥官, 回忆起那一刻.
“在巴格达地面战结束后的一段时间，我们正处于防御位置，这架阿帕奇直升机开始在头顶盘旋. They sat down right next to my Bradley and when the pilot got out, I said, ‘Hey! 我认识那个人.’ He was my classmate from back at U of I, Rory Thompson.”
MAJ Thompson (now with the Idaho Army National Guard) remembered it as well.
“我当时驾驶着一架AH64A(阿帕奇攻击直升机)，作为空中任务指挥官，带领一支由两架飞机组成的小组与伊拉克的一支地面部队进行联络. We landed near a company of Bradley Fighting Vehicles to get a situation picture of the battlefield. I climbed out and 20 feet or so in front of me was Captain 吉尔伯特. It was a chance meeting that was a surprise to both of us. 我在伊拉克呆了20个月，我想那是我为数不多的几次遇到我的大学后备军官训练班的同学之一.”
由于全球反恐战争，世界各地的汪达尔校友都有许多意想不到的遭遇. 很多人在排队吃饭时发现旁边的人是高年级学生和军校同学，或者在FOB Speicher或科威特的理发店理发时发现理发师的椅子上坐着一个兄弟会的兄弟.
当Tanya (Vittetoe) 先令少校(1996年)在Ft .的美国陆军指挥和总参谋部学院报到时. 莱文沃斯, she was surprised when several younger majors in her class recognized her. They explained they knew her from the university’s 军队参加后备役军官训练军团 battalion. They were freshman and she was finishing her degree in elementary education. MAJ先令, who never met or served with another Vandal in all her years in the Army, soon found herself surrounded by eight other Chrisman Raiders, 谁是1996-2001年毕业的.
不依赖于偶然的团聚, 席林最近组织了一群爱达荷州的校友交换故事，分享他们的经历——他们都讨论的一个话题是9·11, 以及它如何改变了他们的生活和军队.
"The whole mindset of the entire post changed overnight from, ‘OK, 让我们出去玩直升机吧,到“我该怎么做才能为战斗做好准备??“对很多人来说，这是一个非常发人深省的时刻, 因为他们还有几个月就要去第一个部队了，然后他们意识到这是他们在军队的第一个任务.”
——贾斯汀·霍普金斯少校，2000届毕业生 (图右)
MAJ 凯利Boian (‘00), who was at the Jungle Readiness 培训 Center in Ft. Polk, Louisiana, recalled, “They froze all the training when it happened. One of the guys happened to have a field television with him, so we saw the video that morning ... There was a lot of immediate knee jerk reaction such as tightening up guard duty in barracks and such. 他们立即开始更换训练中心的旧训练，以适应这种新的威胁, 但这花了几年时间.”
先令, who was assigned to the 1st Cavalry Division’s communications section at Ft Hood, 德州, 也看到了变化.
“Normally, division staffs are very slow to make changes and aren’t known to turn on a dime. After 9/11, the staff really jelled together like never before. 我们被迫在很短的时间内对部门内的所有通信设备和操作进行微调. 看到这种凝聚力真的很神奇.”
作为第11航空骑兵团的新队长, Rob Hafen少校(96届), 他在Ft的国家培训中心. 欧文, 加州的解释, “The changes towards more modern combat were already in the planning stages, but now there was a lot of pressure to bring them about much faster. 我们现在加入了反叛乱, 战场上的平民和稳定行动的训练将通过训练中心轮流进行. Everything transformed more intensely, but we were relying on the lessons learned coming out of Iraq.”
2001年出生的Monte Koontz少校在9月11日之前四个月被任命为一名全新的军官, 那天早上他在上军官基础课程.
“我们仍然遵循着旧的克拉斯诺维亚主义(美国陆军如何与传统的苏联军队作战)。. . . When I came back to the officer advance course for captains in 2005, 只是新中尉的基本课程刚刚改为新的反叛乱学说. 高级课程仍然没有改变，我们甚至无法理解新中尉们正在学习和使用的词汇和术语.”
Ironically, 先令 and Hafen - both U of I education majors, later worked at Ft. 莱文沃斯, Kansas writing the new official Counter Insurgency Doctrine, which was published in 2007 and based on the lessons learned in Iraq and Afghanistan.
“你会遇到很多来自其他后备军官训练队项目或军事学院的人，我总觉得我们进入部队后受到了很好的教育. We were provided a very good base at the 欧洲杯买球 and the Chrisman Battalion.”
- MAJ 凯利Boian |植物科学，管理选项 (图右)
当话题转到他们的母校, 这群人一致认为，不管学位是什么，他们在欧洲杯买球接受的教育使他们比许多从其他机构接受委托的同龄人准备得更好.
“我总是开玩笑说，我的儿童心理学课程在与士兵和同事打交道方面给了我很大帮助. 但实际上, 教学方法确实帮助了我如何教不同的人以及如何与他们互动和激励他们,先令(教育)说。.
吉尔伯特(刑事司法)同意, “社会学课程帮助我了解人们，了解如何成为一名领导者，以及如何激励不同的人. 当我被派往伊拉克时, we were doing a lot of community policing and learning how the communities operated over there. The education in Criminology helped me to understand that whole operation.”
“I can earnestly say that being a civil engineer really made me a better Artillery officer,土木工程MAJ Eric Roth说. “了解火炮背后的所有科学和火炮弹道背后的数学给了我很大的帮助. 我在欧洲杯买球不是一个很好的工程专业学生, 因为我一心只想成为一名军官, but I still passed the Engineer in 培训 Exam on the first try, 通常70%的人需要重考. When I went into my functional area (for career advancement) as a captain, I was chosen for the Operational 研究 Analysis with Military Applications Course or ORSAMAC. 那门为期四个月的课程将所有大学水平的微积分和微分方程压缩到前三周，我第一次通过了必考，而大多数人都没通过. 这对我的事业发展有很大帮助.”
Justin Hopkins少校(人力资源部)补充道, “那里的商学院真的很善于推动我们在分析问题和提出解决方案时跳出常规思维. 我回想起商学院的顶点课程，给你一个问题，让你去研究，而不是用第一个答案，因为你需要不断地寻找更多可能的解决方案. 这是陆军运作方式的关键.”
“在犹他大学的ROTC训练更好, because the training we could do in an environment like U of I, 哪里的社区如此支持我们，哪里的我们有这么多的森林，远离大城市. We had the opportunity to practice our field craft and leadership much more. I don’t think you can do that in the city, we were very lucky for that.” ——布莱恩·吉尔伯特少校 (图左)
最后, 当聚会结束时, 他们都强调，大学的陆军后备军官训练团干部(现役教官)和训练帮助他们比其他学员和陆军军官更有优势.
“The communications skill sets from the Chrisman Battalion were the best. I knew lieutenants from other schools that could barely formulate a sentence. Our training at the Chrisman battalion was top notch,” said MAJ Darren Hasse (Geology – ‘99)
He further explained, “Lieutenants are notorious at not being able to brief senior leaders. They simply haven’t done it or they aren’t comfortable with it. They don’t write well, they don’t brief well, they don’t speak well. 我们在伊利诺伊大学和克里斯曼营都有这些. The written orders and the briefings of orders we did really prepared us.”
MAJ Hopkins agreed and closed by summing up how the group felt, “We all benefited from the ROTC program and the ROTC program benefited from a really good set of cadre. They did one of the better jobs of getting the most out of college students and cadets I’ve ever seen. 从1991年的坦尼娅到2001年的安迪，在那里有大约10年的时间，我们有一批优秀的学员，他们直接反映了那里优秀的干部队伍. When we went to Advance Camp and external events outside our battalion, we always looked good because of the time put in by the cadre. Even today when we run into our peers from the 欧洲杯买球 we see the same thing.”
关于克里斯曼营
The Chrisman Battalion is named in honor of Brigadier General E. R. Chrisman who was the battalion’s first professor of military science. The battalion has been at the 欧洲杯买球 since it’s opening in 1892. 1991年至2001年, 也就是全球反恐战争之前的那段时间, the battalion commissioned 103 second lieutenants into the Army. 记录显示不到2人,在克利斯曼营120年的历史中，有000名中尉被征召入伍.