Contributions a solider can make for his fellow comrades-in-arms can come in various forms and many of those tend to be obvious when you are a Field Artillery Targeting Technician. However, during an Operation Iraqi Freedom deployment in November 2003 the future role for one Warrant Officer would change drastically.

While assigned to a tactical unit Chief Warrant Officer 4(RET) Eric Adair was pulled out of theater as the Army had an even more pressing need, which his expertise was ideal for. During the early stages of the Global War on Terror (GWOT), the increased importance of counterfire radars in theater was becoming evident; there was an immediate need to include an operational expert on counterfire radars in the Program Manager Radars office,. Adair found himself thrust into a new environment as the Assistant Product Manager for PM Radars.

“I was able to bridge between both communities, and after I got my feet wet in the acquisition world taking some basic courses I was able to forge those connections,” said Adair about his assignment. “I’ve been on the other side and it is having the person in the middle to translate in some aspects and also to shake things up on the acquisition side that is the importance of having a technical expert in the mix.”

Serving as the APM for Radars, Adair was instrumental in ensuring numerous capabilities made it to the front lines. “Pretty much everything that involves radars I have had my hands on over the past five years,” said Adair.

One example of his ability to uniquely meet a demand of the soldiers in an extremely short time frame was demonstrated by his ability to answer a call from soldiers in the field for a capability, which could provide 360-degree counterfire radar coverage with increased range. Through his diligence, he was able to field two systems that met the capability need within 70 days to include ensuring they met all fielding, maintenance, training, information assurance, and material release requirements. In another example he pulled together a team of experts and spent four months in Korea meeting the need for critical repair on all of the U.S. Army counterfire radars deployed.

Although, Adair was pulled out of theater to become the APM for radars, his duties in that role led him to deploy several times since then. Whether it was supporting the fielding of a quick reaction capability (QRC) or ensuring a critical software capability met the needs of soldiers Adair noted, “I was going out providing field support and collecting lessons learned so that we can improve our products.” According to his Legion of Merit citation Adair’s deployments helped Multi National Corps-Iraq (MNC-I) achieve a greater than 95 percent operational readiness with its counterfire radar fleet.

Following his retirement from active duty in November, Adair has decided to remain in the program management world. He is currently responsible for total package fielding of Army ground users for GPS units. “As a fielding manager I will be able to stay in tune with the soldier in the field and that is what appealed to me the most,” added Adair regarding his decision to accept a government position within the Program Executive Office for Intelligence, Electronic Warfare & Sensors (PEO IEW&S).