BlackFive

Chief Warrant Officer Dave Williams has just been appointed the new Officer In Charge of the Survive, Evade, Resist, and Escape School being established at Ft. Rucker, Alabama. Ft. Rucker is the home of Army Aviation.

You may have heard of Dave Williams before. He was the senior ranking POW of the six American Soldiers held captive during the invasion of Iraq.

Here's more from DefendAmerica:

Shot, beaten, locked in a 7-by-7 room with no electricity, windows or plumbing, and held captive for 22 days, Chief Warrant Officer 2 Dave Williams said he has reason to hate his captors, but he does not hold any animosity towards the Iraqi people.

“I’m not going to shun the whole community. The Iraqi people have the opportunity to live a new life. They don’t have to live in fear anymore of a dictator,” Williams said recently.

The ethnic and religious diversity of the American soldiers was puzzling to the Iraqis who held Williams and six other soldiers captive a year ago. “For us to be so diverse, the Iraqis could not comprehend it.

"One Iraqi officer, who spoke broken English, questioned me. 'You are American and your friends (are from different ethnic groups). You are all in the same Army and you do not fight each other. How can that be so?'”

As for the other POWs, Williams has this to say.

He said he never thought his group wouldn’t be rescued. The senior ranking officer of the POW group said it was this knowledge that helped him lead the other soldiers and himself through the torture suffered at the hands of the Iraqis.

“People throughout their day-to-day business get irritated,” the 30-year-old pilot explained. “But when the time of truth comes, Americans look after their own. Whether right or wrong, we are all one family. When we are abroad and someone is picking on my family, I’m going to get ugly.”

Williams family has been enlarged by six members since the events of March and April 2003.

He stays in regular contact with his fellow POWs. “Every week one of them will call me and let me know how they are doing," he said. I want to know if I can help them anytime, anyway.”

Two of the POWs have left the military for different reasons. Dave Williams has chosen to stay to pass on his knowledge and experiences to the students of the new SERE course at Rucker.