Staff Sgt. Luis Hernandez had fake blood all over his hands and camouflage uniform.
A short time earlier, a role player pretending to be a suicide bomber had "detonated" an explosives vest, sending flour, not shrapnel, in the direction of Schofield Barracks soldiers gathered for a "key leader engagement" in a mock Afghan town.
Two soldiers were designated as being killed and three were wounded, and Hernandez, 36, applied first aid to a mannequin stand-in that was losing blood.
Such is the realism of training for an upcoming deployment to eastern Afghanistan, and unfortunately, sometimes the reality once there.
Part of the more than 3,500-soldier 3rd Brigade Combat Team from Schofield is heading to the country this summer as a security force assistance brigade.
An element of the 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team also is anticipated to head out on a similar Afghanistan deployment, an official said. The deployments are expected just a few months apart.
How many Schofield soldiers will go is unclear, but under the construct of advising and assisting Afghan security forces, partial U.S. brigades have started to deploy to Afghanistan to take the place of traditional full-strength brigades.
"The number is going to be based on the mission," said Col. Brian Eifler, who commands the 3rd Brigade. "What we’ve got right now, it’s not the full brigade, probably around three-quarters of the brigade right now. That’s always subject to change."
Once in Afghanistan, the soldiers will be parceled off into 12- to 20-member security force assistance teams to provide training to much larger groups of Afghans.
From the 15th of this month through the 26th, companies of more than 100 soldiers with the 3rd Brigade have been conducting air assault and Afghanistan familiarization training at Schofield, the Kahuku Training Area and at Marine Corps Training Area Bellows, officials said.
Eifler said his soldiers are being put in challenging situations in the training, which includes some Afghan nationals.
"If they make wrong decisions, they are choosing their own destiny," he said late last week. "So if they miss stuff, they pay for it. It’s true for the (simulated improvised explosive devices) they have out there and it’s true with the local populace. If they don’t treat them right, guess what, they respond in kind."
The blank-fire training gives the soldiers the "freedom to fail" so they learn and won’t make the same mistake again in Afghanistan, he said.
The several days of training that each company goes through includes a Chinook helicopter trip to the Kahuku Training Area, and some rugged up-and-down hiking once there to link up with a simulated Afghan security force.
From there, they are flown to Bellows and occupy a forward operating base with Afghan nationals and role players.
The soldiers get roused late at night with a mission to interdict militants who have kidnapped an International Security Assistance Force member.
"They are tired, it’s tough and now they are having to make quick, decisive decisions to try to stop that," said Maj. Dan Rausch.
At a subsequent shura, or meeting, with Afghans, a suicide vest bomber tries to get close to a mullah and U.S. company commander, and the soldiers are supposed to stop him.
"This was all new to me — seeing this stuff and seeing how the people dress brings it (the realism) out a little bit more," said Pvt. Marcello Trevino, 21, from North Baltimore, Ohio.
Trevino will be heading out on his first combat deployment.
Assistance teams assigned to battalions of several hundred Afghans will be moving around with those security forces, but overall, the mission represents backing off a bit "because we’re not doing so much (ourselves)," Eifler said. "We’re going to be advising more."
Hernandez, a weapons squad leader who was helping with the "wounded" from the fake attack, will be heading out on his fourth deployment to Afghanistan, and second in a row to the east of the country, a region known to be particularly deadly.
Asked what he’s most concerned about, the San Bernardino, Calif., man doesn’t hesitate to answer.
"IEDs are what I’m most concerned about," he said. "That’s what’s actually mainly killing our guys, IEDs. I mean, they are all over the place. Getting more complex, more dangerous."
