President to Spend 9/11 at Fort Meade for Worldwide Troop Talk

By Amaani Lyle DoD News, Defense Media Activity

WASHINGTON, September 10, 2015 — President Barack Obama is slated to visit Fort George G. Meade, Maryland, for an unprecedented, live, worldwide televised troop talk with service members on the 14th anniversary of 9/11, Pentagon Spokesman Peter Cook said today.

The president, Cook said, will open with words of appreciation for the service and sacrifice of troops and their families before taking questions both from service members present at the event, and online via Facebook, Twitter and Skype and satellite. 

The event occurs on the heels of the viral success of Defense Media Activity’s Worldwide Troop Talk, Sept. 1, 2015, featuring Defense Secretary Ash Carter.

“[The President] very much values face time with troops -- listening, asking, and answering questions, and he looks forward to taking time on the anniversary of 9/11 to engage directly with service members,” Cook said.

Those who want to ask a question should go to the Defense Department Facebook page at facebook.com/deptofdefense and leave a comment or visit Twitter using the hashtag #AskPOTUS.

Face of Defense: Soldier Overcomes Injuries to Continue Serving

By Army Spc. Alisha Gredzlik

115th Mobile Public Affairs Detachment

LOGAR PROVINCE, Afghanistan, Sept. 24, 2012 – For Army Sgt. Matthew Maddox, 9/11 brings memories of his fifth-grade music class, where he first heard the news that would begin his path toward the Army.

Eleven years after those attacks, Maddox is serving his second tour in Afghanistan. But his journey has not been easy.

Maddox joined the Army when he was 17, and left for training just a month after graduating from high school.

“I had my mind made up,” he said. “This was what I had wanted to do since the fifth grade -- since 9/11.”

After basic training, Maddox was assigned to Vicenza, Italy, at the headquarters of the 173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team. In late 2009, he deployed to Afghanistan. After six months, he headed home to California on mid-tour leave, never suspecting that he would not return to finish his tour. On May 26, 2010, at his home in Wallace, Calif., Maddox was run over by a grading tractor.

“I broke my left tibia, left femur, pelvis, tailbone, right orbital eye socket and suffered nerve damage to my right leg,” Maddox said. “I couldn’t walk for three months.”

He spent the next 18 months recuperating in California on “hospital status,” still in the Army, but at home working on a full recovery. Yet it was nowhere near the end of his military career.

On Jan. 3, 2011, Maddox reported back to Italy for a medical evaluation board. Instead of leaving the Army, he fought to extend his service and deploy again with the unit. After 18 months of rehabilitation and fighting for a spot in the fires platoon, Maddox finds himself on his second deployment to Afghanistan with the 173rd to settle what he calls unfinished business.

“I wanted to come back and finish a whole deployment. That was my personal goal. I wanted to finish what I started,” he said.

Now serving as a fire support specialist in Afghanistan, Maddox tracks the status of the 173rd’s artillery and mortar systems and their fire missions across two provinces. As a newly promoted sergeant with four soldiers working for him, he has to ensure their success as well as his own.

His enlistment will come to a close at the end of this deployment, but Maddox said he still sees a future with the military and plans to retire with the Army.

“When I get home I am joining the California National Guard, and I am going to apply for the California Highway Patrol to follow in my father’s footsteps,” he said.

Having rebuilt himself from the ground up, Maddox retains a positive attitude that he passes along to other soldiers.

“If you take pride in what you do and feel like there is more for you to accomplish, then it is worth it,” he said. “It is an experience everyone should endure. I have no regrets.”

NATO’s Rasmussen Discusses Afghanistan, Syria, 9/11 Attacks

By Cheryl Pellerin

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON – NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen discussed progress in Afghanistan, the brutal civil war in Syria and the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks during his monthly news conference.

Rasmussen called the 11th anniversary of the attacks “a moment to remember the citizens of 25 NATO and partner countries who died that day, and all the victims of terrorist atrocities around the alliance and around the world, from Madrid and London to Istanbul, Bali and beyond.”

Speaking from NATO headquarters in Brussels, Rasmussen said terrorism never can be justified or tolerated, and that NATO is determined to play its full role in the fight against it. “It is vital to our own security, and it is vital for the values and principles of international law that we uphold,” he added.

Allies and partners work tirelessly to detect and prevent terrorist acts, the secretary general said, “and that is why we have more than 120,000 soldiers in Afghanistan -- to ensure that country can never again serve as a sanctuary [from which] terrorists can plan and launch attacks against our countries.”

On the months-long civil war being waged between the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad and Syrian rebels, Rasmussen said NATO has no intention of intervening militarily in the conflict.

“We do believe the right way forward is to find a political solution,” he said, “and we urge the international community to send a strong and unified message to the Syrian leadership to accommodate the legitimate aspirations of the Syrian people. So our position remains unchanged.”

Regarding Afghanistan, Rasmussen said the alliance views insider attacks on the coalition by Afghan security forces with great concern.

“We are looking very carefully into each one, and we are doing everything we can, together with our Afghan partners, to reduce the risks as much as we can,” the secretary general said, outlining some of the steps being taken.

“The vetting and screening of recruits is getting stronger. We are seeing better counterintelligence efforts. [International Security Assistance Force] and Afghan forces are getting more training to understand cultural differences. And we are constantly adapting the measures to protect our forces to the situation on the ground,” he explained.

Last week, Rasmussen said, he discussed the attacks with Afghan President Hamid Karzai and they agreed to do everything they can to tackle the problem.

“We will simply not allow the enemies of Afghanistan to change our strategy,” Rasmussen said, “and we will not allow them to drive a wedge between us and our Afghan partners.”

Every day, he noted, tens of thousands of ISAF and Afghan troops fight together against the same threat and for the same goal.

“We know that despite these tragic incidents, the vast majority of our forces have a bond of trust with their Afghan comrades and many Afghans have sacrificed their lives for ours.”

Challenges and setbacks should not overshadow the significant progress made so far, Rasmussen added.

“Afghan forces are getting more professional, more confident and better equipped,” he said. “Within weeks, they will reach their full strength of 352,000.”

The Afghan forces are genuinely moving into the lead, assuming more responsibility in the campaign and taking the lead in providing security for three quarters of the population, the secretary general said, and every Afghan province is part of this process.

“The insurgents are being pushed further back from the population,” he said, adding that 80 percent of their attacks take place in areas where just 20 percent of the population lives.

In what Rasmussen called an “unstoppable” process of transition, ISAF will continue to train and support the Afghan forces over the next 28 months so they can assume full responsibility for security.

“It makes a big difference that the face of the defense of Afghanistan in the future will be a very visible Afghan face,” the secretary-general said. “The enemies of Afghanistan will now be faced with their compatriots in the fighting. This will also make it more difficult for the Taliban and others to claim that this is a fight against foreign invaders, which is one of their most popular propaganda claims.

“Already now it’s clear that the Taliban can’t prevail on the battlefield,” he continued, “and that’s the reason why the Taliban and others resort to cowardly attacks against civilians, including children, as we have seen recently.”

As Afghans step forward, ISAF is moving into a supporting role, he said. “Planning for our new mission -- to train, advise and assist Afghan security forces -- is already under way, and I expect the initial guidance to be completed in the next few weeks,” he added.

Rasmussen said he will discuss the NATO mission in Afghanistan and other global security challenges in New York when the United Nations General Assembly meets later this month.

“We all know the cost of our mission in Afghanistan, and the investment we have made over the years,” he said. “So let me say this: we have an important goal and a mandate from the United Nations. Our strategy is set, our timeline is clear. And we will stay the course.”

General Assesses Progress, Momentum in Afghanistan

By Karen Parrish

American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON – Less than a week before the 11th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, a senior U.S. officer assigned to NATO’s International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan said each such observance “serves to remind me of why we are here.”

Army Lt. Gen. James L. Terry, commander of ISAF Joint Command, spoke today with Pentagon reporters via satellite from the Afghan capital of Kabul. The general offered an assessment of Afghan forces, ISAF’s future role, challenges involving the Pakistan border and the Haqqani network, the insurgency and this summer’s drawdown.

“I understand the importance of this mission, and over time my understanding of Afghanistan has grown, as has my appreciation for the people of this country,” Terry said.

The general noted this will be his third 9/11 anniversary over his three tours in Afghanistan. There has been “tremendous progress” in Afghan security since his first deployment there in 2006, he said.

“Back then, [Afghan army and police forces] were barely 132,000 strong,” he said. “The [Afghan forces] are now approaching 352,000, and more importantly, they are growing more capable every day.”

Terry noted that with the third phase of security transition from ISAF to Afghan forces now under way, Afghanistan’s own army and police units are in charge of providing security to about 75 percent of the country’s people. The combined ISAF-Afghan team and its campaign make up a continuum that will arc naturally over the next 28 months toward Afghan-led security throughout the country, he said. Meanwhile, Terry added, ISAF’s structure for its supporting role is taking shape.

“The way or the method will be security force assistance,” the general said, as ISAF is moving toward developing security force assistance brigades that will advise, assist and build capability within Afghanistan’s army and police forces.

Each brigade will man, equip, train and deploy together, the general said, and “will come with typical brigade-level enablers in terms of battle command, intelligence, communications, fires, sustainment and force protection.”

ISAF’s resolve and commitment remain strong leading up to 2014 and the decade beyond, Terry said, and he acknowledged the coalition will retain some combat role.

“We will fight alongside them,” he said. “[Security transition] does not mean that there will be no challenges along the road ahead. It does mean that we have momentum. And while our role and our methods are changing, our commitment will endure.”

Responding to reporters’ questions, Terry said the border area between Afghanistan and Pakistan, and cooperation between the two countries, remains a key factor in long-term security.

“What I would offer is that we'll continue to make military-to-military contact,” he said. “I think that is going to provide a mechanism that potentially will be calming over time and reduce some of the tension that's up on the border.”

The Haqqani network based in Pakistan is “very lethal,” but has recently succeeded in mounting fewer attacks in the Kabul area, Terry said. 

“We have arrayed our forces so that we can counter that threat, and at the same time [have] arrayed the Afghan national security forces … in depth from the border back. It appears to be pretty effective,” he added.

Insurgents, including the Taliban, remain threatening and deadly, but “are trying hard to stay relevant,” the general said.

“The insurgents' position with the people of Afghanistan -- these are the very people the insurgents seek to control -- is continually eroding,” he said.

Insurgents are killing and maiming Afghan people “at an alarming rate,” he said. “Their intimidation and assassination campaign is working against them,” he added, “their leadership is under constant pressure, and their resources are strained.”

Most Afghans are tired of war and tired of “the heavy-handed approach of the insurgency, an insurgency that attempts to control the people of Afghanistan by limiting their education, controlling their freedom of movement and intimidating them,” he said.

Terry said the Afghan Peace and Reintegration Program, designed to bring former insurgents back into their communities and into support for the Afghan government, is “alive and well.” More than 5,000 former combatants have formally entered the program, and about a thousand more are waiting to be accepted, he said.

“It's very effective,” the general said. “It's most effective where the provincial and district governors get involved in it. And I think it provides some opportunities for the insurgent population to come back home.”

Terry said the surge of U.S. forces, which began in 2010 and saw an additional 30,000-plus troops deploy to Afghanistan, is “on track” to end by late September, when U.S. troop levels will return to the previous level of 68,000.

“The surge has served to break the momentum of the insurgency and has provided the time and space for our Afghan partners to develop,” the general said. ISAF is setting the conditions for an Afghanistan that will contribute to regional stability and never again provide safe haven for terrorists, he added.

“There is progress over here in the campaign; we have momentum,” Terry said. “And the Afghan national security forces, again, are steadily moving out into the lead. I think that the insurgents out there are really growing more concerned about that every day.”