Capt. Caleb Rogers may have the most exciting assignment in the U.S. Army right now. On June 7, he became commander of the 111th Electromagnetic Warfare Company, the first unit of its kind in the history of the Army. The unit is part of the Georgia Army National Guard’s 221st Intelligence and Electronic Warfare Battalion. With an imperative for continuous transformation as set forth by Army Chief of Staff Gen. Randy George, the new company’s capabilities already are in great demand. Rogers, a former enlisted soldier with a passion for electromagnetic warfare, explains.

1. Can you describe the new company’s mission?

We [will] support a division by providing additional electromagnetic warfare specialists a commander can use as needed. So, in a division, brigade combat teams have platoons of EW [electromagnetic warfare] soldiers, and they have their mission, which is short-range sensing, where the enemy is based on anything that emits a signal. That’s electromagnetic support. Electromagnetic attack is what people think about as jamming, making sure the enemy can’t talk and their systems aren’t working. Three of our platoons can do either of those missions. And then we have a fourth platoon that’s dedicated only to electromagnetic warfare, which is electromagnetic protection. That’s working with units to make sure they’re not as vulnerable to enemy EW assets.

2. How would you describe the electromagnetic spectrum to a layperson?

I like to think about it as people yelling at each other across a field. Where we come in is with our three missions of support, attack and protection. The support piece is me standing on the side of that field pointing at a map and telling commanders, this is where people are emitting. Jamming is not about making signals quieter; it’s about being louder than the other people. So, that can be me with a megaphone just yelling nonsense, interrupting their ability to communicate. The protection piece is maybe I put up a barricade so the enemy EW assets can’t see us.

3. Do you use futuristic radios with lots of antennas?

In a way, you absolutely described it. The boxes, from the outside, absolutely look like that. As we move into the future, it’s all about the intelligence behind it, the way those boxes process information, so I’m not out there doing math with pen and paper. The equipment can receive this signal from this direction, and the computer inside can do the math to tell me where the signal is coming from.

4. Who is in your company?

We will be just over 80 soldiers. We are still growing, and it’ll take a couple of years to probably hit that. The majority of soldiers will be 17E, electromagnetic warfare specialist, and then we have some support officers. Right now, what’s exciting to me as a commander, and I love to brag about my soldiers, is they all volunteered to come to the 111th. Everyone volunteered to be here, and they are ready to go.

5. Where do you train?

We’re out of the Fort Gillem Enclave in Forest Park, just south of Atlanta. We are often at Fort Stewart, and Fort Gordon has ranges built specifically for the [U.S. Army] Cyber Center of Excellence. In August, we’re going up to the Chattahoochee National Forest. We’ll be out there for a couple of days to train on electromagnetic support. It’s a test for our soldiers, being out in that terrain, and a test for our equipment.

6. Do you train with any other units?

My soldiers are flooding me with ideas of how they want to train. We had our annual training on Fort Stewart with our battalion, and there are other elements for us to train with, like the 11th Cyber Battalion, but also our sister services. Ever since other articles came out and we activated, I’ve been getting emails from all of them. They’re interested in training with us, and I know our soldiers are just as excited to train with them.

7. Did you really enlist on the Army’s birthday?

Yes, I was actually the youngest one at the entrance station, so I got to cut the cake. It was the summer of 2012.