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 Latvian armed forces train with Illinois National Guard during training exercise Operation Northern Strike By Air Force Staff Sgt. Lealan Buehrer
                182nd Airlift Wing
 GRAYLING, Mich. - Tactical  air control party specialists with the 169th Air Support Operations Squadron  and the Latvian military joined forces to sharpen their special operations  skills at the third annual Operation Northern Strike training exercise at Camp  Grayling Maneuver Training Center here in August. The exercise brought the TACPs to train as one team  directing close-air support from the skies above them. Air Force Master Sgt. John Oliver, a TACP with the  169th ASOS in Peoria, Illinois, had a front-row seat to the multi-national unit  in action. He served as the team leader for a squad of American and Latvian  TACPs during a reconnaissance mission that pitted the team against enemy  ambushes and simulated explosions and small-arms gunfire. "The training was very good,” he said. “It was  intense at times, which allowed for pretty realistic combat scenarios for us to  run through.” Oliver already knew several of the Latvian TACPs from  working with them during earlier training exercises, and he was glad to be in  the field with them again. "It was good to see them, good to work with them,”  he said. “They've got a really good (joint terminal attack controller) program,  and they're squared away.” Just as some of the Latvian TACPs knew the Peoria  Airmen, they were also were no strangers to the state of Michigan. The Michigan  National Guard  is partnered with Latvia  in the National Guard Bureau's State Partnership Program and the Latvian TACPs  began their training at the Camp Grayling, said Capt. Armands Rutkis, a TACP  with the Latvian National Armed Forces. Rutkis, a member of the Latvian TACP program for  almost three years, said he enjoys the job because he can work in a tactical  environment even as an officer handling leadership-level tasks. "You need to be always good at your training and  getting information, and how to use the information working with all assets to  support your ground-force commander," Rutkis said. "So, a lot of  knowledge and that's challenging, and it's challenging for yourself." Rutkis appreciated the benefits of working with the  169th ASOS Airmen, including being able to share their understandings of  procedures and tactics. "Working with multi-national forces, you can get  all of this knowledge from them, because everyone has in their nation a  different approach of things how to do that," he said. "I mean, we're  following the same tactics, techniques and procedures, but still there's some  different ways how to approach things." Senior Airman Ryan Godar, a  TACP with the 169th ASOS, said he enjoyed working with the Latvians for the  same reason. "It's nice to see how other countries operate,”  he said. “You pick up on some of the things that they do that you like, that  you think are a little bit smarter. And the same thing for them. So it's kind  of like a way to share different tactics from other countries and learn from  what they're doing and pick out the things you like." Northern Strike was a National Guard-sponsored  exercise that practiced the combined power of air and ground forces. TACPs with  the Illinois Air National Guard's 169th ASOS and more than 5,000 other Service  members from 12 states and two coalition  nations took part in the exercise.
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