United States Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Williamson, Communications officer in charge, looks over a phone roster with United States Marine STAFF Sergeant Jesse Shurn during advance team deployment from United States Central Command (U.S. CENTCOM) in Almaty, Kazakhstan, prior to the start of Centrasbat 2000. The Central Asian Peacekeeping Battalion exercise Centrasbat 2000 is a multi-national peacekeeping and humanitarian relief exercise sponsored by U.S. CENTCOM and hosted by the former Soviet Republic Kazakhstan in Central Asia. Exercise participants include approximately 300 U.S. troops including personnel from U.S. CENTCOM, the United States Army's 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg,...

The original finding aid described this photograph as:

[Complete] Scene Caption: United States Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Williamson, Communications officer in charge, looks over a phone roster with United States Marine Staff Sergeant Jesse Shurn during advance team deployment from United States Central Command (U.S. CENTCOM) in Almaty, Kazakhstan, prior to the start of Centrasbat 2000. The Central Asian Peacekeeping Battalion exercise Centrasbat 2000 is a multi-national peacekeeping and humanitarian relief exercise sponsored by U.S. CENTCOM and hosted by the former Soviet Republic Kazakhstan in Central Asia. Exercise participants include approximately 300 U.S. troops including personnel from U.S. CENTCOM, the United States Army's 82nd Airborne Division, Fort Bragg, North Carolina, and 5th Special Forces Group, Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and approximately 300 Kazakhstan soldiers. Other participating nations include: Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan, The United Kingdom, Turkey, Russia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Mongolia. The objective of Centrasbat is to strengthen military-to-military relationships and regional security, and to increase interoperability between NATO and partner nations. Centrasbat originated in 1996, and was concepted to form a battalion of soldiers from the former Soviet Republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgystan and Uzbekistan to serve as a key component in developing a regional security and cooperation structure. Centrasbat 00 will test U.S. and Central Asian units combat readiness and ability to conduct peacekeeping and humanitarian operations, as well as develop and build cooperative relationships between the respective states and assist in laying the foundation for future peacekeeping and humanitarian operations.

Subject Operation/Series: CENTRASBAT 2000

Base: Almaty

Country: Kazakhstan (KAZ)

Scene Camera Operator: TSGT Jim Varhegyi

Release Status: Released to Public
Combined Military Service Digital Photographic Files