Welcome to another article covering my time as AFROTC Detachment 175 Cadre at the University of Hawai’i Manoa. The FTX was a crowning achievement, and considering the events of the past week or so, I think it is very timely. Perhaps now the cadets understand why we pushed “playing Army” so hard. If you enjoy this article, you should check out the other 170+ articles in the history of Norseman Creative. Also, check out our YousTubes channel. And go spend your schmeckels at the Shop.
During my last full Summer at Det 175, I spent a lot of time writing up an idea I had to enhance the training program for the cadets in the detachment. Military training in the Detachment felt really scatterbrained over the two previous years, so I resolved to fix it. My idea was to provide an end-of-semester, culminating training event to ground our military training over the course of the semester. Doing so was much easier said than done, and it took all summer and a full semester to see the Detachment 175 Field Training Exercise come to fruition.
When I pitched the Field Training Exercise, or FTX, to the rest of the Active-Duty Cadre, they were all immediately on board. It was immediately apparent to the rest of the Cadre that our training program would benefit from an injection of “real-world” influence and a guidepost to aim toward. We also realized that putting this FTX together would require a lot more Cadre input than our cadets were used to.
AFROTC training is supposed to be largely “cadet-run,” meaning the cadets are usually responsible for training other cadets. Of course, they are given a lot of guidance from the active-duty cadre whose job it is to oversee, educate, and correct the cadets. However, I’d like you to think back to when you were 18-22 and how you stubbornly knew everything and didn’t need the help of some worn out old Major. Many times “cadet-run” just meant the blind leading the blind through the easiest iteration of training possible.
The 2024 – 2025 school year felt different, and I was determined to capitalize on that momentum. Deep in our training archives, from the BC (Before COVID) times, I found evidence that Det 175 had indeed done an FTX in the past, but no real documentation as to what the old FTX entailed. We would have to build our FTX from the ground up.
With the rest of the Cadre on board, we set about designing an FTX to demonstrate to the cadets. To say that we built it from scratch is not necessarily true. All the detachment Cadre had experience developing, working, and participating in exercises throughout our Air Force careers. Pulling from that experience, we put together an exercise that would give the cadets a good idea of what’s possible so they could run with the next one.
The FTX took months to set up. First, we had to find a location as Det 175 is located in the space-constrained lower campus area of the University of Hawai’i in Manoa. Luckily for us, the commander of Bellows Air Force Stations (BAFS) was a Det 175 Alumnus. He had some space in the back of BAFS for us to set up, and even for the cadets to stay over night so they could get the full field experience. Then, we had to write and rewrite the exercise to give the cadets a realistic experience that could be executed within our resource constraints.
Of course, we had to prepare the cadets to perform. Setting them up for success was crucial, because if we just threw them into the FTX without preparation, they would fail and become discouraged. If they became discouraged, they would never want to do it again. So we trained the necessary field skills all semester to prepare the cadets for the FTX.
If there is one thing that frustrated me during my time in AFROTC as Cadre was the AFROTC approach to military training. When I was a cadet at USAFA, the military training program consisted of stuff that my roommate called “playing Army.” We went rucking through the mountains with fake M16s, shooting real guns, setting up ambushes, being ambushed, learning first aid, etc. Within AFROTC, the military training appeared to lean into the “Chair Force” stereotype. The “Leadership Laboratory” curriculum was more focused on learning how to write papers, memorizing quotes, and other meaningless drivel.
I chalk it up to the differences in generations. When I was a cadet at USAFA, there was no question we were going to war at some point. The GWOT was still in full swing, so we were training as if we were headed to the Middle East immediately after our post-commissioning training was completed. For many of us, that was true. By the time I assumed my position at Det 175 the GWOT was “over,” and there was only the persistent rumors of war with China or Russia or Iran or Venezuela or Canada. In my opinion, the AFROTC training had been stripped down to a degree it only looked vaguely military when viewed from a distance while squinting.
Do not misconstrue the direction of my ire. It is not directed at the average AFROTC graduate and it is directed at the AFROTC cadets least of all. My ire is directed at the officers who neutered the training program, deeming checklist-based training as “good enough” for a military environment. Those guys even tried to pull the military history out of the academic class and replace it with some sort of feel-good emotional intelligence tomfoolery.
The cadets, in my experience, were eager for more challenging training. While there were some growing pains, and concerns about change (especially among the older cadets), by and large the cadets rose to the challenge and seemed to have fun doing it. We enlisted the help of experts in different career fields and branches of service to give the cadets the best possible training, and it was fun to watch. I believe giving the cadets something to work toward provided a more tangible “why” behind their training.
After a semester of weekly trainings, it was time to initiate the FTX. During one of the Friday morning Leadership Laboratories, the Detachment Commander briefed the Cadet Wing as if they were an active duty unit given notice to deploy in support of Operation: Na Koa Lani. The 175th Expeditionary Cadet Wing was to secure BAFS against Zandorian (a suspiciously CCP and PLA shaped enemy) aggression until additional units could reinforce the 175th ECW at BAFS. Written orders were issued, and the cadets were told what to pack and the time and place to show up, then sent out to their teams to prepare.
The night before the FTX, the Det 175 Cadre drove out to BAFS and started setting up the myriad scenarios in the Hawaiian jungle in our small training area. BAFS had a convenient junkyard hidden in the back of the base for us to pull junk out and use for the FTX. We put out supplies to build checkpoints, hid fake IEDs and weapon caches, and pre-staged our food for the following morning.
In the dark part of the morning of the FTX, the 175th ECW arrived at Bellows to get set up. I gave the final mission briefing to the cadets and set them loose. Within an hour, the cadets set up their base of operations, their command post, and established a security perimeter. Once they were established, the next phase of Operation: Na Koa Lani could begin.
The next phase of Operation: Na Koa Lani sent small teams of cadets on patrols around the training area in search of IEDs, opposing forces, and injured and left behind civilian personnel. Leaning on the navigation skills learned earlier in the semester, the teams of cadets were given coordinates and expected to find their way around the training area. In the meantime, another team of cadets were tasked with further setting up our main operating base with a large tent provided by the local Civil Engineering Squadron.
At this late point, the senior (and super-senior) cadets had received notice on what Air Force jobs they would be stepping into upon commissioning. A large part of what we cadre hoped to accomplish with the FTX was to give the senior cadets a small taste of what they might be expected to do once they hit the big, blue Air Force. Together, we developed individual scenarios for Civil Engineers, Logistics Readiness Officers, Contract Managers, and whatever else the cadets dropped for jobs. Each of the cadets confronted with these scenarios did a pretty good job, especially considering they were given basically no warning before being handed the scenarios.
Our cadet who dropped Civil Engineering (now a CE Officer) did arguably the most realistic job of mimicking his career field, as he mostly just watched the enlisted CE troops and lower-class cadets construct the tent. It was a near-perfect rendition of the average CE officer.
Throughout the course of the day, the cadet went out on patrols, defended the base from Opposing Forces (OPFOR), took prisoners, and coordinated the chaos from a dormitory-turned-command post. The 175th ECW handled every scenario we threw at them, and I think they had fun doing it.
While we were planning our FTX our higher headquarters, AFROTC Southwest Region, decided they were going to send out the new Regional Commander to see us. The Colonel was on a tour of all the detachments in the region, and he was going to come see Det 175 while we were running around the jungle. Despite the headquarters trying to throw monkey wrenches at our monkey plans, I think having the Colonel present at the FTX helped. For one, he was very complimentary of the exercise. For two, it demonstrated that even these dummies could be trusted with more complicated training than marching up and down the square.
The FTX was, in my opinion, a rousing success. Not just because the cadets stepped through the challenges and handled whatever came up. To be frank, we didn’t even get all the scenarios in that we planned to. As tends to happen, some things we thought would happen quickly took longer than expected, as the cadets do have an amazing ability to overcomplicate scenarios.
I consider the FTX a success for two reasons. One, we did something the cadets had not been exposed to and provided a culminating event to ground our semester worth of training. As this was Air Force ROTC, I know some of the cadets were walking around in the hot Hawai’i sun wondering why the hell they were playing Army like this. If those cadets are paying attention to the events of the past several weeks, I suspect it makes a little more sense why Major Jacobson and the rest of the Cadre pushed these field skills so hard.
The second reason the FTX was a success was the next semester, the cadets planned and executed the end-of-year FTX all on their own. As fun as it was for me to develop the first semester, it was even more fun for me to just show up and play OPFOR. That showed us that we were correct: the Cadet Wing only needed a little prodding and some demonstration to know what “right” looked like, then they could run and execute on their own.
I was proud of the cadets for their efforts. Unless any of them are reading this right now. Then you specifically are still a disappointment and need to do better. Go do your homework and hit the weights.
Thanks for reading! If you made it this far I’d really appreciate it if you subscribed to the blog and maybe checked out the shop. You might as well, you read this far and you deserve a reward. To any of the Det 175 Cadets who made it to the end of the blog, if you’d like some free stickers, shoot me a message on Instagram with a good mailing address. I feel like I won’t lose too much money because I used to check your grades and I know your level of reading comprehension.