Warriors in Peace Operations - Strategic Studies Institute - U.S. Army

More documents

Recommendations

Info

As I reflected on the emotions I was feeling—disappointment, sadness, bitterness, guilt, and so forth—I realized I needed to figure out why and determine how to deal with them. Otherwise I would not be effective as a commander or be able to deal effectively with the trauma that the rest of the battalion was beginning to go through. On the surface, not having to deploy to a miserable, cold, wet, disease-ridden country to perform a difficult mission under oppressive strain and with questionable objectives and uncertain political leadership would seem like a good deal. However, I felt genuine disappointment in not deploying. I attributed it to several factors. First, we are taught from an early age that we are part of a team. We become tightly bonded with the team—with the other commanders and units in the organization. Therefore, when you are broken away from the team, excluded to some degree, it hurts your feelings. Although, to his credit, Colonel Fontenot recognized this and went to great trouble not to exclude the Dukes from the brigade’s efforts, it was clear that in the minds of some we had immediately gone from being team members to outsiders. It is something that just happens naturally when there are some who do not share the hardships and risks of the others. The second factor was that we are taught that leaders never send their people to do things they are not willing to do themselves. We share the hardships and risks with our men. But here I was, sending some of my soldiers off to God knows what while I would be comfortably at home with my family. Although hard to admit, I was also feeling some embarrassment at not being chosen for something. In the movie “Patton,” George C. Scott, portraying General George S. Patton, delivers a speech about when, after the war 30 years from now, when your grandchild on your knee asks what you did in the great WWII, “at least you won’t have to say . . . well . . . I shoveled sh—in Louisiana.” Somehow, being the Rear Detachment Commander did not seem much better than being the head shovel man. All of these factors made it difficult to deal with having to stay behind. This recognition of why I was feeling 90
as I was did not make the feelings go away, but it did make it possible to deal with my feelings, continue to command, and begin to take actions to deal with the feelings that my officers and men were experiencing. The two hardest issues to deal with while we were at Grafenwoehr were remaining calm while being treated like second class citizens and maintaining the morale of the battalion. Although I do not believe there was an intentional snub of the battalion, as soon as it was clear we would not be going to Bosnia, the battalion lost priority for everything, including interest and information. While it was easy to understand why the priorities for ranges would naturally go to deploying units, the lack of information was less understandable and more frustrating. The range availability issue caused a major deterioration in the battalion’s training. We were delayed several times and ended up canceling on some ranges. We practically eliminated maneuver training and modified our platoon gunnery qualification. I decided to redeploy the battalion to Friedberg rather than remaining at Grafenwoehr to complete the training to standard. This was because of the uncertainty of resources, and the fact that the deployment to Grafenwoehr was continuing to stretch out with little gain. The lack of information was not deliberate, but the battalion staff found access to the brigade staff dried up—phone calls were taken less often, few calls returned, and meetings occurred where the battalion was not invited to send representatives. I got some insight into some of the factors causing the problems when Colonel Fontenot had a death in the family and I became the acting Brigade Commander for about a week. During the period I was in command, the brigade staff was working on the real plan for Bosnia, a plan for deploying to Hohenfels, the tactical plan for the CMTC rotation, the redeployment back to home station, and a major fire coordination exercise (FCX). In fact, the FCX was executed 91
Page 1 and 2:
WARRIORS IN PEACE OPERATIONS Edited
Page 3 and 4:
CONTENTS FOREWORD .................
Page 5 and 6:
FOREWORD The Personal Experience Mo
Page 7 and 8:
seldom practiced. The actual practi
Page 9 and 10:
BATTALION COMMAND I assumed command
Page 11 and 12:
all training, maintenance, and othe
Page 13 and 14:
company training and log efforts, a
Page 15 and 16:
the USAREUR staff was thought up an
Page 17 and 18:
new times. Ops Center at the battal
Page 19 and 20:
like the Jewish exodus wandering ar
Page 21 and 22:
marvelous job of coordinating the e
Page 23 and 24:
it. They did not want us there or n
Page 25 and 26:
containers as well. I told him I un
Page 27 and 28:
promptly chambered a round in his p
Page 29 and 30:
techniques, we found the railhead a
Page 31 and 32:
answer. He quickly made himself and
Page 33 and 34:
Tacsat systems with two independent
Page 35 and 36:
CHAPTER 3 THE BLUE FALCONS IN BOSNI
Page 37 and 38:
monograph. My omission of such elem
Page 39 and 40:
their advance around the safe haven
Page 41 and 42:
unusual. In today’s environment,
Page 43 and 44: He also provided his timeline for J
Page 45 and 46: Within about an hour I was reminded
Page 47 and 48: eter. Even along these paths, I had
Page 49 and 50: for deployment. The pre-deployment
Page 51 and 52: a rehearsal for leaders, using a ve
Page 53 and 54: • Heavy weapons platoon from E Co
Page 55 and 56: The Blue Falcons exited the aircraf
Page 57 and 58: esponsibility for the base security
Page 59 and 60: sandbagged for force protection. Th
Page 61 and 62: Weather continued to deteriorate ov
Page 63 and 64: east-west roads crossing the Zone o
Page 65 and 66: needed from his forces. This coordi
Page 67 and 68: This COP was manned by a reinforced
Page 69 and 70: attalion commander was executing a
Page 71 and 72: creativity in accomplishing every a
Page 73 and 74: On February 11, TF 3-325 began coor
Page 75: their security. Hence, the title em
Page 88 and 89: deployed with the battalion to the
Page 90 and 91: at a confrontation going on at a ch
Page 92 and 93: he was deadly serious. I was convin
Page 96 and 97: three times. The first time some ke
Page 98 and 99: pressure, intensity, and rigor of a
Page 100 and 101: gaining the sense of teamwork and s
Page 102 and 103: from 4-67, and now three tank plato
Page 104 and 105: Although the setup had changed in t
Page 106 and 107: trains per day to that point, thus
Page 108 and 109: soldier why there were differences
Page 110 and 111: One piece of frustrated cargo defin
Page 112 and 113: soldiers who deployed into an area
Page 114 and 115: support. After several false starts
Page 116 and 117: Group leaders, who were not paid pr
Page 118 and 119: Another lesson I learned was the ve
Page 120 and 121: We also developed a rotational gunn
Page 122 and 123: CHAPTER 5 COMMANDING A FIELD ARTILL
Page 124 and 125: Target Acquisition Battery (B/25 FA
Page 126 and 127: Rather than the anticipated three w
Page 128 and 129: DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY HEADQUARTERS
Page 130 and 131: usiness taking their husbands away
Page 132 and 133: transportation, shopping, and perso
Page 137 and 138: were required to carry these 12 rul
Page 139 and 140: The remaining combat elements of Ch
Page 141 and 142: As we departed Baumholder, I felt c
Page 143 and 144: 140
Page 145 and 146:
Figure 7. 1st Armored Division AOR.
Page 147 and 148:
forcing Service Battery to expend a
Page 149 and 150:
Zvornik to regain control of the se
Page 151 and 152:
likely a key storage site for a mec
Page 153 and 154:
deployment. When offered the opport
Page 155 and 156:
was due to retire from the Russian
Page 157 and 158:
equipment for turn-in both at Baumh
Page 159 and 160:
assume the FSG advisor role for the
Page 161 and 162:
assigned weapons. It was a great co
Page 163 and 164:
This created a daily stop at every
Page 165 and 166:
(at all times) and constant reporti
Page 167 and 168:
CONCLUSION The opportunity for batt
Page 169 and 170:
A. He did not countermand the major
Page 171 and 172:
CHAPTER 6 THE 28TH TRANSPORTATION B
Page 173 and 174:
deactivation of the 53rd Transporta
Page 175 and 176:
factors allowing us to stay ahead o
Page 177 and 178:
drivers could not operate a motor v
Page 179 and 180:
tied up with A/DACGS, CSCs, EAGLE E
Page 181 and 182:
heat I received from the families b
Page 183 and 184:
260th TTD relied entirely on the 28
Page 185 and 186:
When I split my battalion headquart
Page 187 and 188:
no IG or congressional inquiries re
Page 189 and 190:
unit home to Wuerzburg, Germany. Un
Page 191 and 192:
Drivers were also beginning to show
Page 193 and 194:
unnecessary wear and tear on his un
Page 195 and 196:
mileage during my first year in com
Page 197 and 198:
logistics operations in support of
Page 199 and 200:
The 127th ASB is a Combat Service S
Page 201 and 202:
along with a myriad of situations t
Page 203 and 204:
the battalion movement was not sche
Page 205 and 206:
INITIAL SUPPORT OPERATIONS, ISB Aft
Page 207 and 208:
SUPPORT PLAN The aviation brigade w
Page 209 and 210:
commander while assigned to the 1AD
Page 211 and 212:
The ground/air refuel and supply fu
Page 213 and 214:
Force protection became a necessary
Page 215 and 216:
military. As early as 1993, some si
Page 217 and 218:
command, because the National Comma
Page 219 and 220:
soldiers up at 1130 for a formal se
Page 221 and 222:
actions—all at the same time. Onc
Page 223 and 224:
eing, load-bearing equipment (LBE)
Page 225 and 226:
teams and had one team erect the EM
Page 227 and 228:
was ours. Once we received this add
Page 229 and 230:
hospital area and our consequent ab
Page 231 and 232:
our soldiers in a U.S. facility, bu
Page 233 and 234:
• Treated 19,899 Outpatients •
Page 235 and 236:
and Steve Walker, commanders of the
Page 237 and 238:
the unique tasks required for the u
Page 239 and 240:
could do to change it now. The good
Page 241 and 242:
THE SUBORDINATE REAR DETACHMENT COM
Page 243 and 244:
to Grafenwoehr for deployment-speci
Page 245 and 246:
Those were some of the major missio
Page 247 and 248:
kept track of the classified inform
Page 249 and 250:
considerable time updating the book
Page 251 and 252:
Fortunately, we never had to deal w
Page 253 and 254:
• Good rear detachment commanders
Page 255 and 256:
AFTERWORD Dr. Douglas V. Johnson II
Page 257 and 258:
Colin Powell’s philosophy—we we
show all

Warriors in Peace Operations - Strategic Studies Institute - U.S. Army

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?