캠프 잭슨 의정부 이시우 2002/12/07 404

Camp Jackson is one of the forty-two camps north of Seoul authorized Hardship Duty Pay of $150 per month as of 01 January 2001. The Hardship Duty Pay is paid to troops who are permanently assigned to areas where it is authorized or who serve 30 consecutive days of temporary duty in those areas. Several factors are considered in determining whether a location qualified for the pay: climate, physical and social isolation, sanitation, disease, medical facilities, housing, food, recreational and community facilities, political violence, harassment and crime. The extra pay provides meaningful financial recognition to troops assigned in areas where living conditions are substantially below US standards.

The Wightmen Noncommissioned Officers Academy is located at Camp Jackson, about twenty minutes south of Camp Red Cloud in Uijongbu. The 30-day Primary Leadership Development Course course at the Noncommissioned Officer Academy helps soldiers take the first step up the ladder of NCO professional development. The course is required for promotion to sergeant for US soldiers. Korean Augmentees to the United States Army [KATUSA] participants are recommended by their unit commanders, but they volunteer for PLDC. They make up about 20 percent of the 190 students per cycle, and they don’t have to graduate, or even be there in the first place, to pin on sergeant stripes.

The 19-day KATUSA Training Academy course involves subjects essential to function with the American units, such as nuclear, biological and chemical training, how to put on and work in a protective mask, the M-16 rifle, first aid, land navigation, customs, courtesies and English classes. KATUSAs are already soldiers when they arrive. They have already obtained in ROK basic training the military skills needed to survive on the battlefield, but it is the academy’s mission to train them once again on the same tasks in English. Instructors at KTA are volunteers from the ranks of the US Army, ROK Army, and KATUSAs. Every instructor goes through an instructor-training course at Camp Jackson, which teaches them how to write a lesson outline and how to teach a class. To the KATUSAs, it is an assignment open only to the infantry troops; they can volunteer after a year of service. Continuing it’s long history of KATUSAs on the peninsula, the academy helps train an essential fighting force that was initiated 50 years ago in the Korean war. The US Army still embeds up to 4,000 KATUSAs at any given time.