Mentor with a mission

There were a lot of things Chief Warrant Officer Charles Powell was looking forward to when he returned to Carson City after spending nine months in Afghanistan.

Seeing his wife and baby girl. Eating a rare steak and sushi.

But after being home for two weeks, he's finding some hard adjustments.

"I miss living there. I miss the camaraderie," he said. "I loved it. It was probably one of the most enlightening, challenging missions since I've been in the military."

Powell was a member of the first Nevada National Guard Embedded Training Team to go to Afghanistan.

Its mission was unique. They were assigned to an Afghan army infantry as mentors and combat advisers. Unlike most U.S. forces assigned to the country, the unit lived on Afghan army bases.

The 17 Nevada National Guard members were divided, some working with the Afghan National Army and others with the Afghan National Police.

Powell worked with the army.

"We trained them on the infrastructure of the army," he said, "how to do day-to-day activities."

They trained leaders on everything from payroll and processing to medical assistance and served as "force multipliers" in combat operations.

Powell said they provided assistance in combat evacuations, being that the Afghan army is not equipped with helicopters nor the infrastructure necessary to do it.

"We helped save some battlefield lives," he said. "When you don't have a helicopter, it's hard to get them to a trauma center."

Although there to provide support and training, Powell said, the U.S. soldiers were not there to take over operations.

"There was the Afghan way and the U.S Army way," he said. "We were supporting the views, thoughts, beliefs and the culture, yet giving them training and letting them build on it. Just because it was our way didn't mean it was the right way. We had to understand that."

And he trusted his fellow Afghan soldiers the same way he trusted those in his own unit.

"They're bright, intuitive, ingenious soldiers," he said.

Although there was a mess hall, he said they often preferred to eat local cuisine. However, the meat was always overcooked to prevent any kind of diseases, and Powell missed seafood, which the landlocked country lacked.

He said the situation there is complicated. Families are often large and very close-knit. Because they're so large, every family, he said, likely has a relative affiliated in some way with a counterinsurgency group.

And because of their closeness, they usually maintain a relationship with that person.

"Everybody's touched by it," he said. "It's always part of their lives."

For the most part, however, the Afghan people are supportive of the government, he said.

The problem is consistency. He said often the government will come into a village and rid it of the anticoalition militia, yet leave the village unprotected the next day.

The 1987 Carson High School graduate joined the National Guard in 1992. He is also a lieutenant in the Nevada Highway Patrol.

This was his first deployment during the global War on Terror. He was deployed to Panama in 1989 as an Army Ranger.

Staff Sgt. Derek Castro of Carson City also was deployed to the same mission, but is at Fort Riley, Kan., on medical leave.

"It's not completed until everybody's home," Powell said.

In the meantime, he's trying to "get back in the groove," which can be difficult.

Powell worked in mentoring, reconnaissance, intelligence, supply and combat.

"Of all of these, I miss every one of the commanders," he said. "I actually miss talking about their families and just their lives in general."