Springfield, Ill. –
Bafia is near the center of Cameroon in the tropics of West Africa, some 6,450 miles from Chicagoland.
In 2017, Juliana Nkafu took that journey away from the Snoutfish of the Mbam and Sanaga Rivers to the Bluegill and Largemouth Bass of the Chicago River; away from the African Oil Palm, Moringa and Mangos to the Elms, Oaks, Maples and miles and miles of corn and soybeans of Illinois. Nkafu took a journey to the “land of the free and the home of the brave.”
On April 26, after the playing of our National Anthem, she stood in front of several of her family and friends and dozens of her fellow Illinois Army National Guard Soldiers and took an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” She commissioned as the newest officer in the Illinois Army National Guard and the U.S. Army. Nkafu graduated from the Accelerated Officer Candidate School and was commissioned as a U.S. Army second lieutenant at the 129th Regiment (Regional Training Institute) headquarters on Camp Lincoln in Springfield, Illinois. She enrolled in OCS in the fall of 2024.
Nkafu, who lives in Evanston, holds a bachelor’s degree in accounting from the University of Buea in Cameroon and a master’s degree in data science from the University of North Dakota. She is branching as a U.S. Army cyber officer.
Lt. Col. Jaime Marlock, the Illinois Army National Guard’s information technology and cyber branch chief, said U.S. Army cyber officers are already engaged with the enemy as criminals, terrorists, and rival nations attempt to steal information or sabotage our vital networks all the time.
“You are entering a branch that is vital and fast evolving,” Marlock told Nkafu at her commissioning ceremony. Marlock said that the courses ahead of Nkafu are challenging but expressed confidence that she can meet each challenge. “In the cyber domain, the call (to respond) has already been triggered.”
Nkafu’s skills are in high demand in the civilian sector too. She was quickly hired as the digital transformation coach of a grocery store chain when she immigrated.
Although she was thriving in her civilian career, “I felt a deep calling to serve something larger than myself,” she said. In 2020, she enlisted in the Illinois Army National Guard. “This was one of the most challenging and rewarding decisions I’ve made. The military’s core values loyalty, duty, respect, selfless service, honor, integrity, and personal courage aligned with the principles my parents instilled in me. My time as an enlisted Soldier has given me a deeper understanding of what it means to serve as part of a team committed to a greater purpose.”
As an officer, Nkafu will be assigned to the Illinois Army National Guard’s newest unit, the 234th Electronic Warfare Co., which is still being stood up.
Nkafu excelled in athletics and academics in high school. She continued to excel in academics in college where she was actively involved in leadership roles in student organizations. In her civilian work she guided her team through challenges and fostered an environment of openness and trust.
Still, she said she was a bit out of her element when she began the Accelerated Officer Candidate School. “When I first started, I was ‘that’ kind of candidate,” she told a group of officer candidates at her commissioning ceremony. She encouraged the candidates to remain persistent and keep striving to graduate from the program.
“This started as only a dream to become a U.S. Army officer,” she said. “Today that dream is a reality.”