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Civilian historian deploys to Southwest Asia

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Connie L. Bias
  • 92nd ARW Public Affairs
FAIRCHILD AIR FORCE BASE, Wash. --  In 2005, the Air Force began transitioning historian positions from active-duty to civilian servicemembers. The transition ends with this fiscal year, and now that the turnover is almost complete, life for those civilian historians is starting to look more "active" than ever.

Dennis Pinner, 336th Training Group historian, found that out in October when he deployed to Southwest Asia. Mr. Pinner just returned from his four-month AEF rotation Jan. 12.

"A condition of employment for historians now is that the civilian is deployable," said Mr. Pinner, who retired from the Air Force in 2005. "We're assigned to an AEF bucket just like any military person."

As a retiree, Mr. Pinner's active-duty career, which included 10 years as a historian, prepared him for a deployment environment. But according to Dr. John Smith, Headquarters U.S. Central Command historian at MacDill Air Force Base, Fla., not all deploying civilians have such experience.

"It's very much a mixed bag," said Dr. Smith. "In some cases, we have civilians who have worked the field as active-duty historians, such as Mr. Pinner ... We're also picking up civilians who have not done this before, though, and that's where the real training comes in."

Dr. Smith said that much of the new historians' initial training deals with contingency operations, teaching them what to expect and how to deal with a deployed environment. He also said that the entire process for sending historians forward into the field is evolving as civilian-specific issues arise.

"There are all kinds of questions being worked out now," he said. "What are the deployment qualifications for civilians? Physical requirements? What goes into the deployment kit? What are the historians' responsibilities and benefits?"

Despite these changes and questions, both Dr. Smith and Mr. Pinner feel that the career field's transition and expeditionary nature have been successful over the past three years. And even with more than a decade of historian background behind him, Mr. Pinner found his recent deployment to be an opportunity to learn more about his field.

"The focus of what I did when I was deployed was different than here at Fairchild," he said. "Here, we concentrate on training and developing the students. There, I was part of the CENTCOM commander's staff, so I saw all of the operations as they transpired."

He also prepared a summary of area events three times each week for senior leaders in his command, which in turn fell into CENTCOM's responsibility for producing an ongoing operational chronology to document actions throughout the Southwest Asia command. With the constant flow of real-time information in a deployed environment, Mr. Pinner said he easily worked the normal deployment day of 12-14 hours, but his tour "flew by, because there wasn't any lag time.

"The best part of it was seeing the command decisions unfold in front of me," he added. "From a professional viewpoint, it was invaluable to see events happening, and then to see leadership plan and implement their tactics immediately. And to play a small role in those plans - it was exciting."

"Our historians get a close-up view of the unified combatant command and operations in the theatre," said Dr. Smith. "With CENTCOM, the deployment is a little bit different than the typical AEF. Most people are assigned to an AEF that's Air Force specific. CENTCOM historians see everything - air, ground and maritime operations, and some special operations."

Dr. Smith also said that Mr. Pinner handled the joint-command responsibility quite well. 

"We were extremely pleased with Mr. Pinner's performance," he said. "He exceeded our expectations; we would be pleased to have him back the next time a deployment rolls around for him."

Of course, as exciting as his deployment may have been, Mr. Pinner hopes that next deployment call keeps its distance for a while. He's happy to be home.

"I am very glad to be back with my family," he said, adding that he missed an anniversary, Thanksgiving and Christmas during his deployment. "My wife did keep the tree up, though, and we had another Christmas."