The Strategic Corporal

[Tom Odom]

I too believe in training and education--kinda obvious given my background.

My key point is that we cannot teach or train experience. Maybe someday we will be able to "insert" it via brain chip. But in the interim, training, educating, and "experiencing" is an individual track, not a unit collective track. More unit stability is a good start.

But I believe that the Army (and I can't speak for the Corps) has wasted the rank of Major for too long. A successful young Captain who succeeds at company command can wait more than a decade before that officer commands a battalion. I believe Majors should command companies, Captains, platoons, and that Lieutenants lead sections of 2 squads. Army squads (again speaking heretically) are too small. Operating in sections would go a long way toward strengthening units below platoon.

We need to strengthen our NCOs and get away from making the NCO corps do the resume march of individual checkmarks that has long plagued the officer corps. Senior NCOs (E7 and up) should be rewarded and encouraged to remain tactical as long as possible. I would love to see the day when a platoon daddy was an E8 and a first sergeant an E9. Above that I would make SGMs and CSMs warrants like the Brits do.

All of this I would see as building years of critical experience into small units versus simply producing experienced leaders whose advancement removes that experience from small units.

I stand ready to be led to the stake; who has a match?

Best
Tom

[nichols]

I too believe in training and education--kinda obvious given my.........................to the stake; who has a match?

Sir, I find myself in disagreement with you on your enlisted structure. The Army changed the SquadLeader to a SSgt after WW II as an incentive, I might be wrong on this.

Could be that slowing down the enlisted ranks promotion but increasing the pay based on time in service vice time in grade could help.

With that said, I'm done working for today, reading your book excerpt gave me some flashbacks of Bangui.....I'm off to the MCA Bookstore to get a copy.

[Tom Odom]

Nick,

Yep they did. The Army also wisely look at the Marine Raiders structure using team leaders under those squad leaders. Our squad has varied over the years from 10+ to today's 9. I believe 9 is too light. I alo believe in the tactical superiority of "3" versus 2, be that 3 as a "buddy team" versus 2 as a buddy team or 3 maneuver/support elements versus 2. 3 inherently has greater depth and flexibility than 2.

Structure in the squads in that article came from very intense and repetitive discussions with the senior NCOs listed as co-authors.

Overall my point remains the same: we demand (not ask) much more of our small units in terms of fighting on a complex battlefield. We also have much fewer infantry and they are getting increasingly complex missions. We must look at adding capabilities and experience.

I never did Bangui though some of my friends did.

Best
Tom

[Uboat509]

I too believe in training and education--kinda obvious given my background.

My key point is that we cannot teach or train experience. Maybe someday we will be able to "insert" it via brain chip. But in the interim, training, educating, and "experiencing" is an individual track, not a unit collective track. More unit stability is a good start.

But I believe that the Army (and I can't speak for the Corps) has wasted the rank of Major for too long. A successful young Captain who succeeds at company command can wait more than a decade before that officer commands a battalion. I believe Majors should command companies, Captains, platoons, and that Lieutenants lead sections of 2 squads. Army squads (again speaking heretically) are too small. Operating in sections would go a long way toward strengthening units below platoon.

We need to strengthen our NCOs and get away from making the NCO corps do the resume march of individual checkmarks that has long plagued the officer corps. Senior NCOs (E7 and up) should be rewarded and encouraged to remain tactical as long as possible. I would love to see the day when a platoon daddy was an E8 and a first sergeant an E9. Above that I would make SGMs and CSMs warrants like the Brits do.

All of this I would see as building years of critical experience into small units versus simply producing experienced leaders whose advancement removes that experience from small units.

I stand ready to be led to the stake; who has a match?

Best
Tom

You are describing the rank structure for an SF company. The commander is a Major and his senior enlisted adviser is a Sergeant Major. Each of the teams is lead by a Master Sergeant and his senior commissioned adviser is a Captain. Of course SF does not have Lieutenants. Certainly, this structure could work in the the conventional army but with the Lieutenants as assistant platoon leaders rather than leading squads.

SFC W

[Steve Blair]

This is also creeping back towards the "Old Army" organization, which was fairly NCO heavy by today's standards. And again, you saw NCOs with a great deal of responsibility and authority. A Frontier Army company first sergeant was selected by the company commander and confirmed by the regimental commander, not based on checklists but on demonstrated ability. And a good thing, too, since that first sergeant more often than not ended up commanding the company if (as was all too common) all the officers were absent.

[Uboat509]

Over reliance on officers has been a weakness in many military organizations throughout the world and history. The solution to our problems today is NOT more officers and more micromanagement which is what will you will get by adding more officers or pushing them down to lower levels of command like squads. Doing that will weaken the NCO corps and no professional army can afford to do that. One of the best assignments I had on the conventional army was as an infantry fire teamleader in 1/509. The is the OPFOR at JRTC. During the Low Intensity Combat phase of each rotation the each fire team would be given its own sector where the teamleader would have significant autonomy. We would be given specific missions from time to time particularly toward the end of the phase but mostly we just had a commanders intent and specific parameters to work within. My point is that many of those E4 E5 fire teamleaders excelled in that situation. There is a tendency in the conventional army toward group think and a strict adherence to very specific guidelines. Initiative is encouraged but only in certain directions. In other words a subordinate leader may be expected to take the initiative to do what his higher would have told him to do anyway but not to do something on his own. Part of what makes SF good at what they do is the training that they receive, of course, but also it is the mindset. In SF the ability to work autonomously with little guidance is not only encouraged, it is required. I believe that in part at least, the NCO corps has lost focus. NCOnet is a prime example of this. If you go to the COIN forum there you will find a few topics with generally few replies whereas in other forums you can find long scholarly discussions about whether or not pens should be visible in the ACUs or detailed discussions on the minutia of uniform regs. Not all NCOs are like this by far but there are enough in influential positions that I believe that there has been a shift in the culture of some organizations from NCOs as trainers and leaders first to NCOs as guardians of the regulations first. This is what fosters the strict adherence to the letter of the reg rather than its intent and the unwillingness or inability to act autonomously. That is what we need to fix, not Lieutenants as squad leaders. That's my opinion anyway.

SFC W

[Steve Blair]

Over reliance on officers has been a weakness in many military organizations throughout the world and history. The solution to our problems today is NOT more officers and more micromanagement which is what will you will get by adding more officers or pushing them down to lower levels of command like squads. Doing that will weaken the NCO corps and no professional army can afford to do that. One of the best assignments I had on the conventional army was as an infantry fire teamleader in 1/509. The is the OPFOR at JRTC. During the Low Intensity Combat phase of each rotation the each fire team would be given its own sector where the teamleader would have significant autonomy. We would be given specific missions from time to time particularly toward the end of the phase but mostly we just had a commanders intent and specific parameters to work within. My point is that many of those E4 E5 fire teamleaders excelled in that situation. There is a tendency in the conventional army toward group think and a strict adherence to very specific guidelines. Initiative is encouraged but only in certain directions. In other words a subordinate leader may be expected to take the initiative to do what his higher would have told him to do anyway but not to do something on his own. Part of what makes SF good at what they do is the training that they receive, of course, but also it is the mindset. In SF the ability to work autonomously with little guidance is not only encouraged, it is required. I believe that in part at least, the NCO corps has lost focus. NCOnet is a prime example of this. If you go to the COIN forum there you will find a few topics with generally few replies whereas in other forums you can find long scholarly discussions about whether or not pens should be visible in the ACUs or detailed discussions on the minutia of uniform regs. Not all NCOs are like this by far but there are enough in influential positions that I believe that there has been a shift in the culture of some organizations from NCOs as trainers and leaders first to NCOs as guardians of the regulations first. This is what fosters the strict adherence to the letter of the reg rather than its intent and the unwillingness or inability to act autonomously. That is what we need to fix, not Lieutenants as squad leaders. That's my opinion anyway.

SFC W

I believe that the answer isn't shoving higher-ranking officers lower down the food chain. All that would do (in reality) is create more micro-managing and even more jockeying for command positions than exists now. I also believe that it would take the weight out of the NCOs that come up under such a system, as they'd be so used to being 'lead' by officers that they would have precious little incentive to develop the needed skills on their own. In a related vein, one reason you may see NCOs becoming the guardians of regulations is that their officers tend to rotate through faster and thus they end up being the pillar that gets the unit through each inspection. In the heavy peacetime mentality getting Outstandings on inspections can often be more valued than having a well-led unit. Obviously that's a generalization, but the mentality does tend to creep in.

At some point in the culture, maybe during Vietnam, we seem to have stopped trusting our NCOs to actually lead and relegated them to more administrative roles. Again, something of a generalization but it clearly does happen in many instances. I see that every day working with the Air Force. It produces good technicians, but poor leaders simply because they are never really expected to lead for the most part (with some exceptions based on AFSC, of course) until they reach E-8. Then *boom* instant leader time! It of course doesn't work. It's a shame, and a trend that must be reversed if we're to be successful in the coming conflicts.

[RTK]

The bottom line on strategic corporals is this:

Can you find the guy who can take commander's intent, key tasks, and endstate and run with it? The onus is on the leader to make a realistic, feasible, and reasonable intent and endstate backed up by quantifiable tasks that are achievable.

Empowering the young professionals below you to accomplish your end by whatever ethical and moral means possible is the essence of the strategic corporal. The young soldier who takes his job seriously, is professional, and, above all, competent, can do this with great ease if he's allowed to by his superiors.

In practicality, this works best when you don't have a micromanaging neolith in the position of greater responsibility; rather, someone confident enough of his own abilities as a leader to not get involved in every last detail and, most importantly, someone who knows his soldiers well enough to understand their strengths and weaknesses and place them in positions where they'll flourish.

[RTK]

Is it the responsiblity of the big Army to train the junior officers as to the finer points of warfare or the gaining units? How much additional training do you recommend? At what point do you write the kid off as a piss poor leader?

I've seen some stellar PLs. I've also seen PLs I wouldn't put in charge of the mess hall, let alone allow their soldiers to drag them through combat. I would recommend it is the responisbility of company commanders and senior NCOs within that young officer's platoon to mold him or her into being a combat leader.

I will admit that the younger generation is having a pretty hard time of knowing where their place is. I've written recently on the subject as it relates to generational effects of coddling, instant gratification through things as simple as 24 hour news or video games, and reasonable expectation. As a microcosm of sociey, it is reasonable to believe that certain elements of the miltary, particularly the newly indoctrinated custodians of authority, would be subject to difficulties adapting to a regimented lifestyle such as is the hallmark of military service.

What do we do with these young "leaders" when we find that for reasons good, bad, or indifferent they have joined the military with less than altruistic intentions and clearly cannot understand the culture? Do we conduct an ad hoc version of natural selection and thank them for their service and let them on their way? Do we continue to attempt to mold them and drag them along? Do we promote them with the hopes that added responisbility by virtue of rank will increase their own personal awareness as to the severity of their profession? One could argue that we're doing a combination of all of these down at the company and platoon level.

To paraphrase George Orwell "All animals are equal. Some animals are more equal than others."