JRTC

54 ARMY n September 2009

September 2009 n ARMY 55

raining rotations at theJoint Readiness TrainingCenter (JRTC), Fort Polk,La., prepare brigade com-bat teams (BCTs) for de-ployment to Iraq and

Afghanistan. JRTC employs arange of technologies and sensoryenhancements along with hun-dreds of cultural role-players andits opposing force, the 1st Battalion(Airborne), 509th Infantry Regi-ment, to replicate as much as possi-ble the environments and situa-tions that soldiers will face.

Last summer, the 4th BrigadeCombat Team (Stryker), 2nd Infan-try Division, from Fort Lewis, Wash.,came to JRTC for a mission re-hearsal exercise before deployingto Iraq—its brigade-level collectivetraining event before combat. TheBCT’s vehicles and much of itsequipment went directly from FortPolk to the port in Beaumont,Texas, for overseas shipment.

Following are remarks from fivesergeants major regarding JRTCand the training from the view-points of those who provided thetraining and those who received it.Boasting approximately 125 yearsof collective experience, they alsotalked about being noncommis-sioned officers in the U.S. Army.

Photographs and InterviewsBy Dennis Steele

Senior Staff Writer

A fireball erupts from a junked car as an element of the special effects employed by theJoint Readiness Training Center (JRTC), Fort Polk, La., to provide realistic training forArmy brigade combat teams (BCTs) preparing for deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan.

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Remarks by CSM Christopher GrecaCommand Sergeant Major, JRTC and Fort Polk, La.

The Joint Readiness Training Center is a diverse installa-tion that is helping our Army win this war.

This is not the JRTC of 10 years ago. The Atlanticans andCortinians are long gone. I think we won that fight. But aswe have made the transition to overseas contingency oper-ations, we have continued to train soldiers for the fightthey are going into, based on the situations in which sol-diers and leaders will find themselves overseas. A differ-ence between today’s JRTC and theJRTC of 10 years ago is how flexibleour opposing force is, and how flexi-ble our trainer-mentors [TMs] are inassisting BCTs for the mission sets thatthey will experience in Afghanistan orIraq.

Certainly, our soldiers have to beproficient in their core competencies—their battle drills in sector and whendealing with kinetic operations—and

they must react to the emerging threats that exist both inIraq and Afghanistan. JRTC, however, has put a lot of em-phasis on combined operations, improving how we put anIraqi or an Afghan face on our operations. With Americansoldiers at all levels advising and assisting Coalition part-ners, we want to ensure that their level of proficiency is in-creased at the individual and collective organizational lev-els so that when we hand over security missions to theIraqi army, for example, we can do it with less friction.JRTC does a tremendous job of being part of that.

The training rotations are tailored. It begins with the


A Stryker vehicle covers soldiers from the 4th BCT, 2nd Infantry Division, as the brigade trains at JRTC.

Soldiers from the 4th BCT watchfor opposing force activity at a

JRTC training village.

planning process, building on a BCT comman-der’s intent and training objectives and whathe is looking to achieve. Obviously, weknow that a fundamental part will bebuilding the staffs through the CPX[command post exercise], and buildingcoordination between the company in-telligence support teams and the battal-ion or squadron staffs, and the battalionor squadron staffs with the BCT staff. Weknow that it’s critical for them to pushand pull information at all levels.

At the individual soldier level, over thecourse of 17 days, kinetic scenarios are going to be

thrown at them that they need to experience hereat JRTC. If they face those scenarios here, they

will discover what they didn’t do right andwhat SOP [standard operating proce-dure] or TTP [tactic, technique and pro-cedure] needs to be adjusted. They flexit here, come through the rotation, andafterwards adjust SOPs and TTPs asnecessary to help defeat that threat.

JRTC keeps soldiers alive.JRTC is constantly improving. We want

soldiers to get out to the forward operatingbases, combat outposts, joint combat out-

posts and other locations in what we historicallycall the box and truly feel that they arelocated in either Iraq or Afghanistan.We have tremendous training facili-ties and tremendous assets to replicateand allow soldiers to better feel theculture and the difficulties associatedwith working in those environments.We are in constant contact with boththeaters to ensure that we incorporateemerging threats into our training so


Smoke billows at a JRTCtraining village.

Soldiers read acasualty card,indicating the typeof wound received,during a JRTCsituational trainingexercise.

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our soldiers see it here first before see-ing it in theater.

On the training side, as the com-mand sergeant major of JRTC, I haveoversight. My boss, BG James C.Yarbrough, and I ensure that soldiersand organizations are given the mostrealistic training possible. I also ensurethat my TMs are not observing andcontrolling—which is old school, say-ing that you’re a “go” or a “no go”—but are training and mentoring indi-viduals at all levels. We’re not outthere to say “go” or “no go.” We’re outthere to ensure that an organizationand its soldiers are better prepared forcombat.

The bottom line is this: If I save onesoldier’s life by the tough, realistictraining that he or she has comethrough here at JRTC, I have done myjob. I am all about saving lives andsafeguarding soldiers, so that’s mynumber-one mission.

I try to educate leaders and soldierson security basics, how you keepyourself alive in a combat situationwhere you live among the locals. Wehave to ensure our soldiers are safe-guarded.

I drive around looking at the forceprotection posture of our soldiers. Sol-diers do not determine uniforms—leaders do, based on the threat and theenvironment. Leaders determine theprotection posture, but if we, as lead-ers, educate soldiers on why they’re

wearing that protective equipment, itwill make sense to them.One of my biggest lessons in the field is

to fight the enemy, not the plan. I know thatyou have a plan, but you need to be flexible

enough as a leader to adjust. Once your enemy presentshimself with hostile intent, it becomes a battle drill. Andthe battle drill is to find, fix and finish. My big thing is fin-ish, finish, finish.

I think a sergeant major’s role is primarily as a trainer.Twenty-plus years of experience has given me a set of eyesthat see things on the battlefield. I see things in trainingthat I know are not the right way of doing business.

My job as the sergeant major, the primary trainer—theguy who has done it at all levels, who has been a rifleman,grenadier, employed an M249, who has been a team leader,squad leader and platoon sergeant—is because I under-stand the frictions associated with serving at every level.As the JRTC command sergeant major, being the primarytrainer is what I do. I ride out in the box, and I observe.


Right and below,soldiers from the4th BCT scan for

threats duringtraining.

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And when I observe, I’m not there to say, “I’ve got you.”I’m there to say, “Here’s a better way of doing business,and I’ll tell you why I think this technique will keepyou alive.”

I go into the box and advise commandersand their NCO leadership on what I sawand why I don’t think it’s correct, onwhy I think there’s a better way of do-ing business. I offer them examples. Igive them experience. I attempt to in-fluence their behavior and the waythey do business a little, aimed at theresult of keeping a soldier alive. Andthat is truly what this is all about.

Historically, in our legacy Army, youhear “That’s NCO business,” or “That’s offi-cer business.” Today I think you hear thosewords being changed to “It’s leader business.”

That’s because NCOs are so diverse in today’s Army,and so educated. Look at the education levels of most ofour senior noncommissioned officers.Their education levels, in most cases,are very close to most of their officercounterparts. And I think officers aredoing a tremendous job of leveragingthe capabilities that they have aroundthem. It’s not position based; it’s capa-bilities based. If you have a sergeantmajor, first sergeant or platoonsergeant who has the education andcapabilities—technically, tactically,from the individual through the collec-tive task capabilities—commissionedofficers would be crazy not to leverage

it. You have to leverage the capabili-ties that are around you.

In today’s Army, I think the officershave absolutely done that. I thinkyou’re seeing partnerships formed atall levels in these teams, and the teamat JRTC is the commanding generaland me. At the BCT and battalion lev-els, it’s those commanders and theirCSMs—at the company level, the com-mander and first sergeant, and at theplatoon level, the platoon leader andplatoon sergeant. You’re not seeing“us against them”; I think you’re see-ing a partnership. And everybody un-derstands his or her role on the team.

To use a football analogy, the officers are the quarter-backs, the running backs are the NCOs and the line is our

great soldiers who we have around us. The reality isthat you’re seeing teams—not “us against

them,” not “NCO business” or “officer busi-ness.” It’s leader business. If it affects our

soldiers, if it affects the ability of the or-ganization, it’s leader business.

I absolutely see the division lines go-ing away. I see teamwork, great com-mand teams, and I see great noncom-missioned officers advising and assist-

ing commanders in making their orga-nizations better and more prepared every

day. It takes a good officer to leverage, andon the other hand, it takes a capable NCO

counterpart—because it’s capabilities based, notposition or rank based—to give good advice to those com-manders on how to utilize and employ soldiers on the bat-tlefield.


Bullet holes arepart of the effects

in a JRTC trainingvillage.

A 4th BCT soldier pulls his buddy towarda Humvee during a JRTC exercise.

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Remarks by CSM Jeffrey HugginsCommand Sergeant Major, 4th Brigade,

2nd Infantry Division

I think officers in the U.S. Army have really grown in theireducation and their appreciation of what NCOs can pro-vide them. It’s no longer: “Hey, we do these things in thedark, and we’ll let you know what they are later.” TodayNCOs are sounding boards. We have the experience; we’vebeen out there doing it for a long time. And I think that’sbecome a lot more valued by officers now that we are instrife and conflict as opposed to when JRTC or NTC [NationalTraining Center] rotations were their Super Bowl, whenthat was what an officer got evaluated on. Now it’s: Themission has to be successful. Who knows best what we needwhen we come up with the ideas of the plan? Well, it’s theNCOs. We know what’s going to work; we know what’snot going to work. It requires a lot more team-level build-ing. A team, that’s what this brigade is. The colonel came

in with a very clear vision of how we would build a team,and that was exactly my mind-set. I am part of a team; I amnot an individual running around the battlefield. The“Raider Brigade” is a team. It’s a family organizationwhere we are concerned about everything from the familyreadiness groups taking care of the families back home toevery one of my casualties and what’s being done for himor her. If somebody’s in a fight and they need us, thenwe’re ready to roll out the door. And everybody across theboard understands that we take care of each other.

As noncommissioned officers, we make sure that thestandard baseline of soldier discipline is never dropped.We always go out and look at the same things: standards,safety, soldiers—what they are doing, are they in the rightgear, have they got everything they need to sustain them,and what’s their focus? If their focus is wrong, then we’renot going to win. So we make sure that they’re acting in ac-cordance with our guidance and make sure they under-stand how they should relate to the civilian population be-

cause this “strategic corporal” piece is a big deal.Any soldier has the opportunity to make us

fail, so we have to make sure that theyhave a clear understanding of what real-

ity is. As NCOs, we must make surethat they’re in their equipment andwearing it properly for the conditionsthat they’re in, that leaders are doingtheir job of inspecting and that they un-

derstand that while we may be a lonebrigade doing the fight out there, those

kids are not alone. If something happensto them, they know that we will be there for

them, and they are not out there by themselves.


SSG Louis Tirado,a JRTC trainer-mentor (TM),watches as soldiershandle a trainingscenario.

Live-fire trainingdummies awaitrepair at JRTC.

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We go out there to make sure they know we’re paying at-tention to them, that we understand they’re in thefight and we’re out there with them.

I think it is an honor to be a soldier. It’shard work. It’s a strain on the family withall the deployments, but it’s something Iwould recommend. It’s a great way oflife. I think that we’re the only organi-zation that cares about every aspect ofyou, from your family to the car youdrive to how you balance your check-book to your mental stability and health.Nobody else out there does that.

I’ve got to pick and choose when I’m themean grumpy sergeant major and when I’mthe happy jokester sergeant major, and it’s all de-pendent on the environment we’re in and what they need

to hear. Sometimes it has to be hard-core: “Hey, you’ve got to stand upstraight. It’s time to go back and do itagain.” Sometimes, though, it’s theright time to kick back and slap themon the back and ask how their familyis doing or tell them a joke.

I always tell my soldiers that theyneed to know why. Soldiers are smart,and a lot of times when you explainsomething to them, they have a betterway of doing it. But if you don’t ex-plain why, they don’t get the com-mander’s intent; they don’t knowwhat they are trying to accomplish.

And they have to understand howbig a deal they are—if that privatepulling security in that sector fails his

mission, he may not understand that he’s a security linkfor the entire brigade. That’s how important that

one soldier is. If you give them a mission setlike that, it makes them feel like they’re

part of the team. They’re important.As NCOs, I think the biggest thing we

have to get our heads around is—and Isaw this on a sign the last time I wasrolling into Iraq—“We need leader-ship, not likership.” I think we’ve hada problem in the Army where every-

body wanted to be everybody’s friend. Ihave great relationships with most of my

soldiers, but there’s never a question ofwho’s in charge, and when I have to make a

hard decision, they understand that I have theirbest interests at heart. If you don’t do that, then it gets con-


Handling multipleradios, a TM

coordinates specialeffects for a JRTC

training event.

A Stryker creepsinto a JRTC

military operationsin urban terrain

site.

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fusing, and the chain of command falters.NCOs need to understand that when you inspect a sol-

dier, you aren’t questioning that soldier’s ability; you’revalidating what your responsibility is as a noncommis-sioned officer. Your job is to make sure that the standardsare adhered to, that your soldiers are straight all across theboard with their equipment, with their morals, with howthey do business, and how the Army is viewed by the pop-ulations of both the United States and the world. The sec-ond anyone thinks we’re full of rabble, they will lose re-spect for us.

When I joined the Army, I was looking for the discipline,the adrenaline. I joined the Army to be an airborne Ranger,and that’s all I wanted to do. I wanted to see what I wasmade of. I wanted to go with the best. I wanted to learn.My dad is a Vietnam veteran. He never talked about Viet-nam until I told him I was joining the Army. Then he toldme about being a leader. He said, “Don’t ever fake leader-ship. People’s lives depend on you. If you’re out there topunch a ticket, you’re going to get somebody killed.”

Remarks by CSM Julie WalterCommand Sergeant Major, 202nd Brigade Support

Battalion (BSB), now reflagged as the 702nd BSB

A lot of people have asked me why I never became a war-rant officer, and I’ve told them that it’s because I alwaysthought about being a sergeant major. As I moved throughthe ranks, I just thought that’s where it is—leadership ofthe soldiers.

The bottom line is that the NCOs are in charge. That’swhat I tell my guys: You are in charge; you are the guyswho make everything happen. And I really believe that, es-pecially for the senior NCOs. I try to push that so I can em-power them. They have so much power as individuals andin their ability to influence individuals in a good way, so Ireally try to lead by example and show them that they’re incharge. They’re the ones responsible for leading their soldiers.

My command philosophy includesthree things. Basically, what I tellbrand-new soldiers when they comeinto the unit is first, Army Values. Youhave to live by the Army Values. Andthen I tell them that I want them tolive by the NCO Creed. I even tell theprivates that, and the reason is thatone day they are going to be leaders.So if they start thinking about thatand start being instilled with thatnow, I think it will help build them asjunior leaders. The Warrior Ethos and

the Soldier’s Creed are the third thing. That is my entirephilosophy. I said, “Why make something up? It’s alreadygiven to us.” All we have to do is emplace it, enforce it andlead by it.

It’s a difficult balance in trying to just teach, coach andmentor soldiers and let them try to go as far as they can. Itry to guide them, give them guidance, a task and a pur-pose, let them do it and then come back, supervise, check,AAR [after action review] it and let them do it again, espe-cially something like a CLP [combat logistics patrol]. I pre-fer teaching and coaching them through it. Something likethat is hands-on—they have to go and actually do it. It’shard for some soldiers to conceptualize how to stop at ashort halt or a long halt. They have to see and do the battledrill for that.

My training point for this JRTC rotation is first, disci-pline. If we instill discipline in everything, I think they’llbe better soldiers all the way around. Along with that isteaching individual soldier skills such as security, commu-nications skills, self-defense, tactical care/first aid andweapons systems.

But even down to the lowest private, I also think it’s vital to get them to understand how important they are inthe whole piece.

The training at JRTC has been excellent. Even if wecould replicate this training at home station, it would behard to block out other distractors, the normal home-sta-

Soldiers from the 4th BCT entera building to clear it.

Notes are writteninside a Strykervehicle.

tion distractions. It would be difficultto get everyone to focus on whatwe’re doing and what we’re gettingready to do. I’m personally glad thatwe came down here, and I think thetrainer-mentors have been excellent.They’ve been able to give advice andteach, coach and mentor at the sametime, as opposed to just standing backand taking notes. They’ve been totallyengaged. My trainer-mentor has givenme great tips—great things that hesees about everything going on. I’vebeen able to ask him about what hethinks I need to fix, and that’s awe-some.

Basically, the things that he has ad-dressed involve helping my comman-

der and keeping a good, tight relationship with my com-mander. He thinks we have that foundation, so we justneed to continue to grow that while I also continue to helpmy company-command teams to build that relationshipbetween their commanders and first sergeants, and helpthe staff and the company commanders come together as ateam. My TM has been looking at the overall big picture

for battalion sergeant major—where I can influence the battalion

the most.I’m taking from this training that I

need to help maintain the partnerships,establish responsibilities and duties—making

sure everybody knows what they are supposed to do—andcontinue to try to empower the NCOs, continue to instilldiscipline and the need to stay focused on soldiers.

For me, leading 700 or so soldiers to Iraq is very hum-bling—the responsibility for looking out for all these sol-diers and making sure they’re safe and that they all comeback.

Remarks by SGM Vincent E. Jones Sr.Task Force Sergeant Major, Operations Group, JRTC

My job is the senior noncommissioned officer of Task Force1, an infantry task force that covers down on infantry bat-talions that come through JRTC. I pretty much oversee allthe training of the RTU [rotational training unit] battalionand ensure that our TMs are coaching, teaching and men-toring the RTU according to operations group standards.The biggest thing is that I am the counterpart to the battal-ion command sergeant major. My job is kind of differentbecause I don’t think I’m training the battalion commandsergeant major. He has his own way of how he wants hisbattalion to run. I’m more of the eyes and ears for the bat-talion sergeant major, looking at his companies. He givesme focus points, and I give him feedback on how his com-panies are doing.

The focus points of this sergeant major involve the toneand stance of his soldiers, making sure they are respectful


SPC Brittany Bell, a 4th BCT medic, protects theperimeter around her Stryker during a halt.

Strykers advance through thepine trees of Fort Polk.

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to the populace but also making surethey can flip the switch when they areconfronted.

I’m not with him 24 hours a day,seven days a week, because typicallywhen you attain the rank of sergeantmajor you know what you want tosee. You don’t need anybody escort-ing you or pointing things out. I’m notwith him 24/7 because I only want togive him two or three things to chewon at a time. If you’re with him 24/7,you’re constantly telling him this iswrong or that is wrong. Pretty soonthe hearing aid gets turned down, orhe pulls it out—he’s not listening toyou. So you give him a couple of things at a time that hecan focus on, and they have to be big things.

You have to be diplomatic. Nobody knowseverything, and you really have to bediplomatic. The sergeants major takeownership of their battalions, and youhave to come at them a certain way.You can’t say “Hey, this is screwedup.” He’s the master trainer of thatbattalion, and if you tell him that this isscrewed up, it’s on his shoulders. Soyou have to come a different way aboutit—typically, as NCOs we can tell youeverything that’s screwed up all day long,but if we don’t have a solution for you, it goesin one ear and out the other.

I enjoy being a master trainer. Besides coaching, teach-ing and mentoring units that comethrough here for training, I also haveto coach, teach and mentor my en-listed soldiers and officers for theirtasks.

As a senior leader, when I show uparound TMs, they sometimes get ner-vous, different. So I try to make themcomfortable. Yes, I’m the sergeant ma-jor, but I’m still a human being. Every-body knows I’m a sergeant major; Idon’t want them doing things crazybecause I show up. I want them to bethemselves, too.

As always, I make sure they’re in the proper uniformand are doing the right things. As they are out

there coaching, teaching and mentoring—es-pecially escalation of force—I observe. Af-

ter sitting back and letting the RTU setthings up in a way that is not correct, Imight come and coach, teach and men-tor them. But the worst thing you cando is get out there and talk to the RTUas a sergeant major and direct the waythey set things up. A TM might think

that because the sergeant major is outthere, I must be doing something wrong.

So I coach, teach and mentor them. Just likethe units that come through here, we have

young NCOs to groom and coach, teach and men-tor the right way.

My personal philosophy on NCOleadership involves having a varietyof different types of leaders—guyswho lead by fear or guys who lead byrank. My personal philosophy is that Ilead from the front. I try to be me,SGM Vincent Jones—the same as mydad, who was an NCO. I watched himas I grew up in the Army.

I used to be a hell-raiser, yelling atsoldiers and the whole nine yards.Now I think if I talk to them and showthem what they did wrong, and if to-gether we can find out that we can fixit, it’s a lot better. I don’t think theywill tune me out as fast as they wouldif I came out yelling and cussing andscreaming at them. Everybody makesmistakes. I made plenty of mistakesthroughout my military career, and Inever thought I would make it to ser-


Sweat pours off SGT BrandonMcKinney, Troop A, 2nd Squadron, 1st

Cavalry Regiment, during the 4thBCT’s training rotation.

JRTC role-players enhancetraining realism.

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geant major—but I had some good senior NCOs who tookme under their wings to groom me to be the person I amtoday in the Army.

Remarks by CSM Robert GallagherCommand Sergeant Major, JRTC Operations Group

A sergeant major needs to be approachable.If your personality is such that peopledon’t feel that they can come and talk toyou, you lose some of your effective-ness as a sergeant major—especiallythe ability to feel the pulse of the orga-nization and the morale, especially inan organization as large and as variedas an operations group that has ACU[Army combat uniform] wearers, civilianemployees and contractors, who all fallwithin our group and are all part of my re-sponsibility.

I’ve kept my eyes and ears open my entire career, watch-ing the good with the bad and seeingwhat is effective and what isn’t. Themore effective leaders I’ve seen werethe more approachable ones.

You can improve just by gaining asituational awareness, understandingwhat the “little people” do—becausewithout the little people, the organiza-tion doesn’t work. There’s a wholehost of things that go on behind the

scenes. So leave yourself open to everyone, senior and sub-ordinate, and your efficiency is increased across the board.At the end of the day, it’s not one person, it’s the entireteam.

I love being a sergeant major, but every position has dif-ferent pros and cons, its ups and downs. To me, maybe thebest noncommissioned officer position is platoonsergeant—going to combat with a platoon of men and theapplication of force and precision fires that you have a rolein controlling is just an incredible responsibility. And youhave to step up to the plate for it. It’s the same thing as afirst sergeant—a fighting first sergeant in combat. Being asquad leader is the hardest job in the Army, without adoubt. You’ve got to lead two fire-team leaders with agrand total of nine men, including yourself, and maybeyou’re about 21 or 22 years old. There’s nowhere elseyou’re going to get that responsibility—the responsibilityfor the health and welfare and lives of those soldiers andalso to be the “strategic sergeant” on a street corner inBaghdad or in a province of Afghanistan. Where else canyou get that? That’s why I stayed in the Army, and that’swhy I love it.

No matter what rank, you always have to re-member what it was like to be that other guy. I

am here actually because I’ve made mis-takes. I’ve made honest mistakes, and

people recognized they were honestmistakes. I learned, but it was onlytheir teaching and mentoring that en-abled me to do that.

No one joins the Army to retire as aPFC; we’re in the business of making

leaders, and that’s what we do.My guidance to TMs is to develop a re-

lationship that’s open. What I don’t want isour trainer-mentors to stand back with a note-

book in their hands, just writing it down, andthen, three days later, regurgitate it and say, “You did this


Military police leaders discussoperations with an Iraqi police

officer role-player at JRTC.

Goats and otheranimals enhancerealism at JRTCtraining villages.

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wrong, you did that wrong, and this is how todo it better.” Your personal interaction—not only with your counterpart but withyour counterpart’s soldiers—is going toset the conditions for whether theycome away from the rotation herelearning or just suffering a beatdown.We’re past that day and age where thebeatdowns occur. It has to be a learningenvironment.

No matter at what level an organiza-tion comes to JRTC, it is going to leave at ahigh level. A large part of that depends on the

relationship of the TM with his or hercounterpart. So let the mistake bemade, but don’t undermine the lead-ership in front of the soldiers. Just pullthem off to the side. Punish in private;praise in public. We’re not here to un-dercut or undermine the chain ofcommand. We’re here to help them,and the most important things are toinstill in the soldiers confidence inthemselves, their leaders and theirequipment.

In many ways, I’m jealous of thefolks who come here because they are

deploying into one of the theaters, but at thesame time, the bottom line is that it’s our

function to prepare them so that theirtime in theater is successful, especiallywithin the first 60 days.

During the training, we have to bal-ance kinetic actions with the nonki-netic, especially the ability to directprecision fires in an urban environment

at the right target at the right time. Prob-ably there are more nonlethal activities

occurring here than lethal, but soldiers haveto be prepared to switch at a moment’s notice.

The best way I’ve ever heard it put is “tone andstance.” Just your physical appearance—the way you carryyourself, the way that you present yourself to the popula-tion—says a lot about the reason you’re there. But at thesame time, you have to be able to deliver precision fires inan urban environment.

Imagine a team leader—who could be 18 or 19 years old—a young sergeant who is responsible for the applicationof force in accordance with the rules of engagement and insupport of national policies. He has to make decisions thatnot only support his fire team but national policy.

In today’s environment, every action has the potential tobe a headline on TV in 20 minutes. Our soldiers have tolive up to the Army Values. In the absence of anything else,if you follow the Army Values, you’ll do well, and no one

can second-guess a thing that you do.The NCO Corps and NCOs have to

evolve. You can’t be that guy who isliving in the 1990s. It’s 2009, and youwill be treated as a dinosaur if you’renot able to stay abreast.

December makes 28 years in theArmy for me, and I’ve been an NCOfor 26 years. If I could go back to dayone as a sergeant, and if I had learnedthe importance of the three confidences26 years ago, it would have made lifea lot easier as an NCO: Build soldiers’confidence in themselves, their lead-ers and their equipment. M


A 4th BCT soldierguards the gate at

a JRTC jointcombat outpost.

SSG MarkDubuisson, 4thBCT, inside aStryker.

SFC Brad Moyers,left, a JRTC medi-

cal TM, observesas soldiers treat a

mock casualty.

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JRTC