“‘Incredible’ is the word that comes to mind.”
That’s how U.S. Army Lt. Col. Kevin Cronin described his two years as commanding officer of Pohakuloa Training Area.
That assignment comes to an end Wednesday when he hands over the reins of PTA to Lt. Col. Tim Alvarado in a change of command ceremony at the training installation, which is at 6,200 feet in elevation in the saddle area between Maunakea, Mauna Loa and Hualalai.
“It’s just been one of those awesome experiences, rewarding personally and professionally,” Cronin told the Tribune-Herald last week. “I got two years nonstop of incredibly rewarding work and meaningful work, and I think it’s gone really well.”
Cronin and his wife, Anne, have two children — daughter Anna, 2, and son, Terence, 9 months. He leaves to become the U.S. Special Operations Command liaison officer at the U.S. Embassy in New Delhi, India.
“This is an assignment that my wife and I wanted. So, we’re really excited,” he said. “My wife is a Foreign Service officer, so she’ll be serving in the embassy, as well.”
Cronin described it as “a privilege and an honor” to have been PTA’s commander.
“This is the Pacific’s key training area,” he said. “As Secretary of the Army Christine Wormuth said when she visited in January, ‘It’s the center of gravity for Army training in the region.’”
“That wouldn’t be able to happen if it weren’t for the team here that makes it happen and the incredible work that they do,” Cronin continued. “That ranges from public works to emergency services to airfield operations to base operations to environmental stewardship.”
According to Cronin, he thinks the relationships built in his two years here “will be long-lasting and enduring, between both PTA and myself and my family.”
“Being part of a community with incredible people with a rich tradition, history and culture has been both a personally and professionally rewarding experience for me,” he said. “And I think we’ve done a really good job of being part of the community and embracing the community as a member of the community, not as a separate entity.”
Cronin also pointed with pride to the Joint Pacific Multinational Readiness Center, which held a large-scale training exercise in late October and early November 2022, with about 2,000 troops at PTA.
Those exercises included practice receiving and offloading equipment, maneuvering and overtaking enemy positions, conducting resupplies in combat situations, simulated air support and more — using blank ammunition and simulated explosives, but real aircraft and vehicles.
“From a fiscal resource perspective, you save a lot of money not having to shift the personnel and equipment all the way back to the mainland for training, and get a lot of good training opportunities with our partners, the Air Force and the Navy, and with our allies and partners,” Cronin said.
Those allies and partners in the training exercise, Cronin said, included troops from Thailand and Indonesia.
A 392-page draft environmental impact statement was released in April 2022 that will determine whether a significant part of PTA will remain under Army management, because a lease with the state for 23,000 acres of the installation’s 132,000 acres is set to expire in 2029.
Those 23,000 acres contain the garrison and Bradshaw Army Airfield, and connects those facilities and other parcels of PTA owned by the federal government.
“We’re still conducting the environmental impact statement,” Cronin said. “We’re still going over the comments we received from the draft EIS.”
According to Cronin, there’s currently no target date for the release of the final EIS.
“It’s really important, because that environmental impact statement informs the senior leader decisions on what way to go,” he said. “It’s important to have as good an environmental impact statement as possible before moving forward.”
Cronin said he’s been working with his successor, Alvarado, whose last post was in the U.S. Special Operations Command at Fort Liberty, N.C. — the former Fort Bragg.
“He’s also a Special Forces officer, and we did cross paths in Afghanistan in 2020, so we have met before. So, when I learned that Tim was going to be the next commander, I immediately reached out,” Cronin said.
“We started a weekly phone call, and I shared as much information as possible with him, as early as possible. Tim came out to visit PTA and Hawaii for a week in March.
And he moved out here with his family a little over a month-and-a-half ago, so he could get his family settled, and then we could start the on-the-ground handover. We’ve participated in numerous events with the garrison and have met with a variety of members of the community.
“He’s a great leader. I think his background is well-suited for the job, his variety of experiences in the Indo-Pacific region, being stationed in Hawaii as a lieutenant and a young captain — and the handover we’ve conducted — I just know he’s going to continue to carry things forward to even greater heights.”
Email John Burnett at jburnett@hawaiitribune-herald.com.