Oral History of CPT Lilia Barera and SSG Lauren Montoya

title:

Oral History of CPT Lilia Barera and SSG Lauren Montoya

creator:

Barera, Lilia || Montoya, Lauren Ashley (1991 April 29 -

subject:

Army | Cultural Support Team (CST)

description:

Lilia joined the Army at 18, her dad was a 22-year Air Force veteran. She had a child at 16, so she enlisted for job stability. Lilia went to basic training was at Fort Linnerwood, Missouri; AIT at Fort Huachuca, Arizona; and her AIT was as an intelligence analyst. She joined the Army before 9/11, so she knew she'd be deployed there. She had been in Kosovo for a peacekeeping mission the day it happened, and deployed twice to Iraq and once to Afghanistan afterwards. Lauren was born April 29, 1991 in Austin, Texas, and she enlisted in the Army in 2011 at 19 because she was in college an working full time, but had wanted to do it and found her job and studies too mundane. Her basic training was at Fort Jackson, South Carolina; AIT at Fort Huachuca, Arizona as human intelligence collector. They both) think their experience with the Cultural Support Team (CST) helped them be better intelligence analysts because they was able to see firsthand how their intelligence impacted missions. At their selection, there were about 95 women who came, and after those 10 days about half of them had been cut. In the following five weeks was another set of tests and training, and another twenty or so were cut or didn't come, so they ended with 28 women. In the five weeks of assessment, the groups observing them would use assessments to recommend Direct ACtino or Village Suppor Operations to people, and each woman wrote an essay on which one they'd prefer. Lilia and Lauren both wanted to join VSO because they found the variety of work that it involved and were drawn to the challenge of it. They had grown very vlose during training, so when it was time to be paired off they were immediately put together. Their deployment to Afghanistan together was LAuren's first deployment ever, o she was glad to be partnered not only with a friend, but with someone who had experience taht could help her adjust more effectively. They were the second CST team to work with the larger special forces unit they were sent to in Shah Wali Kot in the Kandahar Province. The two of them would more often be invited into Afghan family's compounds because they were women ,so they were able to gather more information from inside than men were able to. Their interactions with moms and women also helped them learn more about the way schools firls were atteding were being targeted, so they were able to protect those places and girls more effectively than if only men were available to try and gather that same information. Lilia was on that deployment for six months, Lauren for about five and a half. Lauren was normally in the third truck wehn they were driving, but on one trip she ended up in the first briefly when an IED went off above her seat in the truck. Lilia was in the vehicle behind them and she initially thought that the whole truck was gone. No one died in the explosion luckily, and Lauren---who was pinned in the vehicle immediately after the explosion---still isn't quite sure how everyone made it out alive. After mostly recovering from her injury, which left her with a traumatic brain injury, Lauren returned to her origial MOS in intelligence. The parts of the transition that were hardest on her were that it wasn't voluntary and Lilia had to stay in aFghanistan, and that she was dependent on her family for care she couldn't do herself because of her injuries. After Lauren left, Lilia had a new team and CST partner come in after another couple weeks. She then returned to her station in Hawaii at the end of her tour, because there wasn't really a path for her to continue her CST work moving forward. Very early into their tour in Afghanistan, they initially didn't know where they were meant to pee in the compound until they walked past it later one day. Because they didn't know about the PVC tube constructed urinals, their team sergeant had to pull them aside and tell them they couldn't just pee against the wall after seeing one of them one night doing so. Lauren and Lilia both think it must have been one of the strangest interactions he must've had in his service. Along with her time in Afhganistan, Lauren also serrved in Romania as a part of Operation Atlantic Resolve, and was awarded a Bronze Star and Purple Heart for her service. No transcript of this interview is currently available.

publisher:

Military Women's Memorial Foundation

contributor:

Poe, Amy B. | Henn, Jessie

date:

2022-10-07

type:

Moving Image

format:

Born Digital

identifier:

1359; 2022.1359

source:

CST - FTP

language:

English

relation:

NR

coverage:

Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan)—2001-2014 | Operation Atlantic Resolve | 2011-present

rights:

Unrestricted