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Wing leadership holds commander's calls

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Tim Jenkins
  • 379th Air Expeditionary Wing public affairs
SOUTHWEST ASIA --  Wing leadership collectively spoke to members of the 379th Air Expeditionary Wing at commander's calls at the CC Theater Monday.

The events, which were the first commander's calls since Brig. Gen. Randy Kee, 379th AEW commander, assumed command of the wing July 1, included comments from General Kee, Col. Paul Tibbets, 379th AEW vice commander, and Chief Master Sgt. Larry Malcom, 379th AEW command chief.

General Kee opened by thanking the men and women of the 379th AEW for their dedication and hard work, and expressed his excitement in serving as the wing commander.

"Thank you so much for your support of our mission here, taking good care of each other, taking good care of yourselves and taking good care of being the very best guests you can be," said General Kee. "I'm privileged beyond measure to serve with you. There is just no finer opportunity that I could ever imagine to have than to serve as your wing commander here. You've got to know, to the very core of my bone marrow, how very absolutely psyched and enthusiastically jazzed I am to be here to serve as your wing commander."

He also said he understands and appreciates what it means to be serving in a deployed environment, and the sacrifices involved with be-ing separ-ated from friends and family.

"Please know how very important you are to our mission, how very important you are to me as Airmen, and ultimately how much I value your service and the sacrifices of your families and loved ones," said the general.

Because Airmen are so important to the mission, General Kee also spoke about his emphasis on making safety an important focus by following the safety guidelines put into place and being good wingmen.

"You'll hear me as monotonous as a metronome talking to you all year long about how important it is to take good care of yourself, take good care of each other, and do things right, the way we are taught and the way we are trained," said General Kee.

As the new commander, General Kee explained his vision for the priorities of the 379th AEW, which include mission, Airmen and partnerships.

Mission first, the general explained, means executing the task that's directed by our superiors. It also means being prepared and vigilant for events with the capability of leading to higher threat factors.

"Everyone is here to do a job," said General Kee. "Our reason to be here collectively is to do what the boss told us to do and that's coming here first and foremost to execute the air and space tasking order. Ultimately, if we get a failing grade from our supported commanders in the field in Iraq and Afghanistan, then we fail, so from our vantage point, our job is to make sure we are in good formation."

According to Colonel Tibbets, putting the mission first requires a combined effort.

"(We are) at the tip end of the spear," said Colonel Tibbets. "This is where it's happening, taking care of our nation's focus right now. Everybody here has a part to play and we really can't do it without each and every one of you doing your very best to help take care of the mission."

The general explained that within the second priority, Airmen working to mitigate risk, we all must work as technical experts, safely operating in the ways we were taught and trained.

"From 365 to 30-day TDYs, we are borrowing you," said General Kee. "As borrowers, it's incumbent on us to make sure we have the relationships back home and that ultimately we have folks here that are taking good care in making sure when we send you home, that we haven't taken advertent risk with you or your equipment."

The general also explained that including honor, dignity and tact in everyday operations is an important part of mitigating risk. The end goal is returning Airmen home proud of their service within the area of responsibility, successfully integrated with their families and home units, ready for the next Air Force challenge.

"I ask you, I plead with you, help us collectively to keep Airmen on task," he said. "Honor and service and keeping all of our Airmen on task matters to me personally and I hope it matters to you as well."
As guests to the host nation, the general said the third priority of the 379th AEW, partnerships, is especially important.

"Every where we can, we need to be gracious guests working shoulder to shoulder with (members of the host nation)," said General Kee. "This is (the host nation's) base, we are their guests and we are going to work with them being respectful in every way."

He said the focus on partnerships also includes mission partners, whom are a necessity to successfully accomplishing our mission here.

"Our mission partner success is just as critical as ours," he said. "We will always seek yes answers to their requests."

Such a high-operations tempo can mean major stress on the people assigned here, which could lead to major emotion impact on people when mixed with problems at home. General Kee said in order to keep Airmen focused on the mission and to ensure a safe and healthy deployment, it's important to keep an eye on wingmen, especially in situations where suicide prevention is needed.

"The reality is that we have a lot of stress on our people," said General Kee. "Suicide prevention matters. It's wingmen looking after wingmen. So please help us keep pulses on your friends, your Airmen, and your wingmen."

Colonel Tibbets agreed that Airmen of the 379th AEW are expected to work hard, but that he hopes everyone keeps hard work, as well as individual needs, in balance while deployed here.

"Obviously you're going to work," said Colonel Tibbets. "And you're gonna work hard while you're here. You're going to go home every day tired. But, don't forget about your physical fitness, your spiritual fitness and your own individual development while you're here. I really encourage you to try to balance all those out."

He added a successful deployment should include a sense of accomplishment in successfully executing the mission, but also successfully meeting personal goals.

"I really would like to see everyone in here go home saying, 'I'm glad I got some of my own personal goals accomplished,' as well as taking care of the mission first, which is what we're focused on here," said the colonel.

Chief Malcom spoke about living and working within standards and building relationships during deployments, but focused largely on working efficiently to improve operations.

"We need to figure out how we're going to do it better," said Chief Malcom. "It's about efficiency. Find ways to make the operation better. We're not going to get more people, we're not going to get more assets a lot of times and we're not going to get more money. So we're going to have to figure how to do it smarter, better and faster."

With events happening, information changing rapidly and frequent turnovers in a deployed environment, General Kee will hold monthly commander's calls. Information and dates on future events will be released as they become available.