Ex. Ex. Ex. – Embrace the Red: Dover pursues perpetual progress

  • Published
  • By Senior Airman Aaron J. Jenne
  • 436th Airlift Wing Public Affairs
DOVER AIR FORCE BASE, Del. --  The 436th Airlift Wing conducted its annual force protection and major accident response exercise Oct. 24 through 26 at Dover AFB.

The exercise, conducted under the Commander’s Inspection Program, met annual requirements and provided valuable and realistic feedback to units across the wing. These units were evaluated on their response to several scenarios affecting installation safety and security.

“There was learning going on at all levels,” said Lt. Col Brian Moritz 436th AW inspector general. “From the wing commander to the IG team, the wing inspection team and the lowest ranking Airman executing their job, everyone was learning more about their role.”

Team Dover Airmen gained valuable training and experience in responding to both an active shooter and a suspicious package.

The exercise represented more than two months of preparation by the wing inspector general staff and WIT. Following the Air Force Inspection System, they carefully crafted several events and pieced them together in a realistic scenario, intended to evaluate emergency response and the installation as a whole.

Both Moritz and Morris agreed the AFIS, the guideline for unit evaluations for the last two years, is significantly different from the previous model. Traditionally, major command inspectors would evaluate unit performance in a large, formal, pass or fail exercise that prompted units to prepare for months and send their best performers to be evaluated. The phrase, ‘paint the grass green,’ was used to describe the extreme effort placed on making everything appear perfect during exercises, regardless of how things actually were.

Morris elaborated AFIS puts control in the hands of the wing commander, and focuses on a day-to-day, honest review of unit effectiveness. Shortcomings or discrepancies are embraced, because they provide a foundation for improvement, Morris said, while large-scale exercises do still occur, the focus remains on honest evaluations and feedback.

The focus, once placed on ‘painting it green,’ has been shifted to ‘embracing the red.’

“This shift is really a culture change,” Moritz said. “You need leaders at all levels to foster a culture focused on identifying weak areas and devoting the appropriate resources to improving them, versus the artificiality of gathering all your best people, and prepping them for months to put out in front of some inspection team. It’s about transparency, and some people view that as vulnerability, but how can we improve our weaknesses unless we identify them.”

Morris said the biggest challenge was finding a balance between exercising a realistic scenario with maximum participation while at the same time, minimizing disruptions to the mission, but Moritz added the price for not being prepared could be too great to risk.

“With the current known threats within our boarders and the recent unfortunate trend of active shooters, we’ve absolutely got to make sure we can protect the billions of dollars’ worth of government assets assigned to us, an airlift capability vital to the nation and all the Airmen in our command,” Moritz said. “We need to validate the ability of our decision makers to evaluate all the factors and make the best decisions in these critical situations. I wish we didn’t have to prepare for these kinds of things, but unfortunately this is the world we live in, so we’ve got to be ready.”