Major Patrick “Gene” Enriquez

Major Patrick “Gene” Enriquez enlisted the Army in 2004 as an Infantryman deploying to Ramadi, Iraq in 2006. In 2007, he completed his degree from Norwich University, the Military College of Vermont and attended Officer Candidate School, commissioning as an Infantry Officer into the Vermont Army National Guard. Enriquez was assigned to the 86th Infantry Brigade, and served in Paktia, Afghanistan in 2010, as part of the OEF mission, together with soldiers from North Macedonia. Enriquez visited North Macedonia over ten times as part of the State Partnership Program, and participated in NATO exercise Cooperative Lancer, as commander of the U.S. contingent. Later, he served as Aide-de-Camp to the Deputy Commanding General of the U.S. Fifth Army and returned to the Vermont serving as a Company Commander. He arrived in North Macedonia in June of 2017 to serve at the U.S. Embassy in Skopje as the Vermont National Guard’s Bilateral Affairs Officer in the Office of Defense Cooperation. In three years in North Macedonia, Enriquez helped coordinate some historic events for the country’s military including the largest military exercise in the country’s history - Decisive Strike 2019, the first ever foreign military sales case, and the country’s first NATO missions to KFOR. In September 2020, Enriquez returned to Vermont and is now the Executive Officer for the 1st Squadron of the 172nd Cavalry Regiment, headquartered in St. Albans, Vermont and preparing for another deployment to Europe.