If you are not training because you are short people, then treat them as if they were battle casualties and ask yourself, "How do I still accomplish my mission?" -SMA William A. Connelly, "For NCO’s: Leadership, Hard Work and TRAINING." ARMY, Oct 1980, p. 23

In all training situations, always look for the answers to these three questions: 1. WHERE AM I GOING? What must my soldiers do as a result of their training? 2. WHERE AM I NOW? What can my soldiers do now compared to what I want them to be able to do as a result of training? 3. HOW CAN I BEST GET FROM WHERE I AM TO WHERE I SHOULD BE? What techniques, training methods, and organization offer the most effective and efficient use of available resources? -The NCO Guide, 1982, p. 29

Planning and preparation are crucial out here [at the NTC]. You have to plan in detail to stop the OPFOR, because there are so many of them and they know the terrain. -SSG Willie Plummer, in "NTC: Learning the Hard Way." Soldiers, Feb 1984, p. 15

Training is one activity in which more cooks simply make for a richer soup.... Once troops start thinking about their own training, it becomes easy to integrate training with everything else they are doing. In fact, most training distractors can become training opportunities. Vehicles need washing? When was the last time your crew practiced nuclear, biological, and chemical decontamination procedures? Treat the soap as STP or DS-2, put on mission-oriented protection posture gear, and give it a shot. -SFC Charles C. Sharp, "There’s Always an Excuse Not to Train." Field Artillery, Jul-Aug 1985, p. 10

In the area of combat service support, the exclusion of NCOs from the operations order planning process equally affects the mission. SGM Glenn E. Shaw, senior logistics trainer at the NTC, says, "Most CSS NCOs have difficulty executing the required troop leading procedures to support the CSS plan. Routinely, they’re given neither warning nor fragmentary orders. When they are, seldom is there enough time to properly execute the required troop leading procedures."... CSS operations dictate what does and doesn’t happen on the battlefield. CSS sergeants who lead successful operations know what is expected of their soldiers, execute the plan, and contribute to the outcome of the battle. -CSM Jerry T. Alley, "The NTC Challenge." NCO Journal, Summer 1991, p. 13

If one can find time to think up a make-work project, one also has the time to better plan for training. -SMA William G. Bainbridge, "The Professional." in DA Pam 360-832, CDRS Call, Mar-Apr 1977, p. 5

Training management [taught in the 1SG course] was a big help. I learned about setting up training meetings daily. Now, I get together with my NCOs every evening and talk about what had been accomplished that day and what we need to accomplish the next day. Just sitting down and discussing the operations with my NCOs makes things run smoother the next day. Everything falls right into place. I learned how to get more out of people just by communicating better. -1SG Walter Spann, in "A Top Course." Soldiers, Jul 1984, p. 7

Rehearsals are a key to success in both combat service support and tactical operations. Rehearsals help identify deficiencies prior to combat. -MSG Terry E. Hildebran, NTC Senior Mechanized Trainer, in "The NTC Challenge." NCO Journal, Summer 1991, p. 13

There are many things to consider in developing a plan for squad training. The following are only a few of them: What has the squad done recently in its training?... What is coming in the way of field time?... What tasks in the mission essential task list have not been worked on recently (or at all)? -SGT Don F. Metters, "A Squad Leader’s Thoughts." Sergeants’ Business, Jan-Feb 1990, p. 19

Develop a Pre-Combat Inspection and a pre-execution checklist to make certain your soldiers have everything they need for battle. Tailor the checklist to the platoon and assign soldiers specific tasks. Create a checks-and-balances system to ensure all equipment is there, shortages are identified and reported to the company. Break down the checklist to encompass a full company move, a platoon move from a tactical site and preparation for tactical operations. Use the checklist and continually update it. -SFC Lawrence Kordosky, "OREs Just Tools of the Trade." NCO Journal, Spring 1995, p. 18

It’s the NCOs who put iron in the chain of train-up for NTC.... Examples of NCO involvement:

Hip-Pocket Training

A Serjant...ought to have a quicke spirit, and active body, able both suddainly to conceive, and painfully to execute, his superiour Officers, orders, and commands, it importeth much that hee bee a skilfull valiant Souldier; in regard hee is put upon weighty and dangerous services; hee ought to be very ready and skillfull, in ordering and rancking the Company, and in knowledge of exercising the same, hee ought to take all occasions in time of peace, to call forth such squadrons as have the guard, and duly to exercise them there. -Anima’dversions of Warre, 1639, p. 196

The squad leader must be prepared to present impromptu or "tool-box" classes at any opportunity.... Any time the squad leader has five minutes, he should be prepared to instruct squad members on subjects such as safety, personal hygiene, or maintenance of equipment. -CSM Johnny W. Greek, "The Noncommissioned Officer." Engineer, Fall 1980, p. 33

[Combining] tasks and training to do two or more things at once...can increase productivity and readiness. When sending soldiers to perform vehicle PMCS, do you dismiss them and watch as they all scramble to the parking lot to drive separately to the motor pool? Have them instead assemble as a group, practice drill and ceremony and march to the motor pool. Upon arrival they report activity noted along the way using the SALUTE method or submit an NBC 1 report made up along the way. Perhaps they could identify land features through terrain association. A phone call to another section can be sent as a radio message for practice. -MSG Lydia R. Mead, "Increasing Training Effectiveness in the Reserves." AUSA files, 1995, no page number

When you spot something that is being done wrong, or could be done better, instead of just making an "on the spot correction" (which is fine), go one step further and make a five- or ten-minute training situation out of the problem. -SMA William A. Connelly, "For NCO’s: Leadership, Hard Work and TRAINING." ARMY, Oct 1980, pp. 23-24

Realistic Training

Soldiers...know if you’re really training or if you’re conducting makeshift training to keep them busy. They see and know the difference between that and realistic training.... I learn things daily from young soldiers going through training.... Realistic training stands out. Realistic training motivates soldiers and it also motivates NCOs, me, and anyone who sees it. -CSM Henry J. Goodwin, "TRADOC." Army Trainer, Fall 1989, p. 13

The best NCOs look for ways to make training as realistic as possible. They know the more challenging and worthwhile the training is, the more it will reflect and create cohesion among their soldiers. They put their soldiers through...experiences in which they do things they didn’t believe they could do as individuals or as a unit.... Training in the way you plan to go to war brings your soldiers together as a team and builds their confidence. That confidence, in turn, gives your soldiers the deep-seated belief that the unit can and will accomplish the mission, no matter how unfavorable the odds. -CSM George D. Mock and SFC John K. D’Amato, "Building the Force: ‘Skill, Will and Teamwork.’" NCO Journal, Summer 1991, p. 19

The whole setup [at the NTC] is a training scheme and you are expected to make some mistakes. You are also expected to learn from your mistakes because there will be no forgiveness when the steel flies in earnest. -SFC Richard Wagner, "Lessons from the OPFOR." Armor, May-Jun 1984, p. 33

If you go to the NTC, you’re going to find out the real truth about your unit. -CSM Collin L. Younger, USAR CSM, "CSMs: Future Must Stress Training, Soldier Quality." NCO Journal, Summer 1992, p. 10

Simulators will not, and are not intended to replace live firing. Those psychological aspects of firing have to be experienced first hand. Gunners have to see and feel that weapon go off, experience the smoke and noise, and watch that round go down range and hit the target. Live fire is crucial to those first round hits. And we cannot afford to give our adversaries the chance to shoot back. -SMA Glen E. Morrell, "As the SMA Sees It." Army Trainer, Fall 1984, p. 24

Introduction of difficult situations is one of the chief benefits of free-play tactical exercises.... This is realism. -SFC Charles R. Souza, "MILES Cheating: Key to Failure." Army Trainer, Summer 1985, p. 5

The use of simulators will certainly increase as training dollars shrink [but] we don’t want simulators to take over reality. At some point you need "the real thing." -CSM Fred M. Luttrell, "CSMs: Future Must Stress Training, Soldier Quality." NCO Journal, Summer 1992, p. 11

Absolute realism demands absolute honesty in training. -MSG Miles C. Pitman, "Are We Training Soldiers to Kill Each Other?" NCO Journal, Spring 1993, p. 11

All too often, tank identification training consists of passing out a few decks of "Tank I.D." cards and putting some posters of Threat vehicles up on the walls in the arms room. Although these cards provide a good starting point, their use becomes stale quickly, usually because of the sterility of their presentation.

"I think you can pull off any kind of training right if you use your imagination.... I’ll show you," [said SFC Travis McWilliams.] He used one track, two quarter-ton trucks, three portable radios, and seven soldiers. The company sat on the side of a low hill overlooking about 500 meters of open land with a tree line and woods behind it. He put the track with the driver deep in the woods on the left, about 1200 meters away. He placed one quarter-ton in the woods behind a cluster of old buildings, about 1000 meters away. The driver stayed close to the truck. The other truck he located at the crossroad about 700 meters distant. It had a radio. Two other soldiers with a radio were in the woods about 700 meters distant. One soldier was in the cluster of buildings while another was on the other side of the hill we were on. He had a radio. We waited until 1900 hours and total darkness. The trainer started his introduction.

For our [NBC] Olympics, we built activities around tasks the soldier must do to perform his mission. We decided we should try to have some fun. We made the conditions as challenging and close to combat situations as possible. Creating challenging conditions was right in line for our chemical waste specialist, who had received extensive fire-fighting training. Firefighting conditions are similar in some respects to combat: ever-present danger, oppressive heat, blinding smoke, numbing noise, poor communication, and terrifying isolation. We couldn’t create real physical danger, but we provided darkness, heat, noise, and isolation in abundance. We built the games around seven stations, giving practice in...soldier’s common tasks.... The entire olympics gave a taste of operating in a real combat situation. -SFC Karl Soucie, "NBC Training with a New Twist." Army Trainer, Winter 1992, pp. 21, 22

Training Standards

The rapid development of modern warfare as exemplified at present in Europe [WWI] indicates clearly that the standard soldier of this year may not meet the requirements of next year’s warfare. In other words, the soldier standard may change as rapidly in our modern times as do the models of the automobile world.

There were no shortcuts [during Desert Shield and Desert Storm]. If you take shortcuts, the troops become lax. -SFC Larry Ingram, "Moving Beyond Victory." NCO Journal, Summer 1991, p. 15

You can always continue training if the training hours run out in a day. Look at it this way: Training standards aren’t lowered. It has just taken more time to train soldiers to standards. -CSM Henry J. Goodwin, "TRADOC." Army Trainer, Fall 1989, p. 13

Allowance for mistakes during training must happen, but only when training failure is corrected.... This means extra time must be planned to retrain failures. Lack of training resources will always be a problem, but failure to train to standard can only lead to tragedies like [the fratricides] at Grafenwoehr and Desert Storm. -MSG Miles C. Pitman, "Are We Training Soldiers to Kill Each Other?" NCO Journal, Spring 1993, p. 11

The only way to [bring soldiers home alive] is to train, Train, TRAIN and the only way to train is to TRAIN TO STANDARD! -SFC Lawrence Kordosky, "OREs Just Tools of the Trade." NCO Journal, Spring 1995, p. 17

Historically, combat support and combat service support units only had to worry about supporting the combat arms force. Today that’s not the case. Today they must be prepared to defend their own work sites, rearming sites, refueling, re-equipping, resupply points, and that sort of thing. Not only must they be prepared to perform their primary mission; they also must be prepared to do those things that allow them to fight and win- how to dig a foxhole; how to cover, camouflage, and conceal; how to use their weapons systems; how to lay tactical wire; and so on. -CSM George L. Horvath, "Keepers of the Peace." EurArmy, Mar 1990, pp. 5-6

A lot of time, support personnel say, "we do our wartime mission every day." That’s not so. You’ve got to look at the conditions in which you’re performing those missions. -CSM Bobby Butler, in "Iron Time Training." Army Trainer, Fall 1989, p. 9

Once standards are met, they must be sustained. The only way to do that is through sustainment training. It’s as important to sustain standards as it is to meet them. Sustaining and building provide the cutting edge needed in battle.... Sometimes that edge means the difference between victory and defeat, or life and death. -CSM James A. (Art) Johnson, "Vantage Point." Military Intelligence, Oct-Dec 1992, p. 3

Evaluating Training

During after-action reviews, don’t pick apart the soldiers’ every action, but concentrate on the major points, good and bad. -1SG Jeffrey J. Mellinger, "Open Letters to Three NCOs." Infantry, May-Jun 1989, p. 21

AARs are one of the best learning tools we have.... AARs must be a two way communication between the NCO and the soldiers. They are not lectures. -NCO Lessons Learned, Oct 1989, p. 11

It’s easy to point fingers at the support assets [during NTC AARs], so I make every attempt to use examples where the platoon has direct control. These include logistics reporting, crew-level maintenance, and dissemination of paragraph IV information to the platoon. -1SG C. R. Johnson, "Make the BOS Work for You and Your Platoon." NCO Journal, Spring 1995, p. 7

Don’t think of [an ORE] as a pass/fail evaluation. Think of it as a learning process that will help focus your training.... Take what you learn and use it to develop and plan the next year’s training. -SFC Lawrence Kordosky, "OREs Just Tools of the Trade." NCO Journal, Spring 1995, p. 18

[During after-action reviews] together we reconstruct the mission from when the operation order is given at the end of the mission. For instance, I’ll say, "Such and such a tank was killed. Why do you think that happened?" Then someone might say, "Well, I skylined on the hill and got shot," or "There wasn’t a proper base of fire before I moved." This way the soldiers- especially the leaders- learn exactly what happened, why, and what to do so it won’t happen in the next battle, whether it’s here or in real combat....

The Basics and Building on the Basics

What we try to emphasize at the soldier level, and what has made the brigade successful, are the basics. We are constantly drilling them with simple things like maintenance, occupying fighting positions, and engaging targets. Most of the time, what allows either side to win battles [at the NTC] is their opponents’ lack of attention to those basics: not zeroing weapons, not analyzing and using the terrain, becoming fatigued and careless. -CSM Glendon Baker, in "NTC’s Bad Guys." Soldiers, Oct 1993, p. 14

The basic difference between a well-trained unit and one that is not well-trained is found in the attention paid to fundamentals of tactics, marksmanship, com-munications, camouflage, maintenance, administration, and all the other arts and skills that contribute to making a unit combat-ready. -DA Pam 350-13, Guide for Platoon Sergeants, 1967, p. 18

No football coach sends his team out to scrimmage on the first day of practice. He would end up with chaos and a lot of injuries. Instead, he drills the players on individual skills like blocking, tackling, and passing. Then he works on collective tasks such as setting up the pocket and pass-release timing. When the players are trained to proficiency in these skills, the coach has them work on plays. -SSG Rico Johnston, "Battle Drills." Army Trainer, Fall 1981, p. 14

NCOs can weld their soldiers together through tough, realistic battle drills. Battle drills will provide training necessary to develop strong bonds and confidence between soldiers and leaders. Battle drills reflect the Army’s commitment to professional excellence and the warrior spirit. -NCOPD Study, Vol 2, 1986, p. J-6

If we do not maintain our focus on the basics during these times of a seemingly endless spiral of programs and thrusts, we could easily get lost in the curlicues of some marginal program or theme. -CSM Marcelino Malavet, "Regimental Command Sergeant Major." Military Police, Jan 1994, p. 3

The best way to build soldier confidence is through training that allows soldiers to take on tough challenges and to succeed. -MSG John McLennon, "How Do You Set Their Souls on Fire?" NCO Journal, Fall 1991, p. 13

The basis for success is sustained efforts in painstaking practice of the elements of the task. -CSM Matthew Lee, "Bridge the Gap." Engineer, Mar 1988, p. 3

The system of instruction crafted by [MG Frederick von] Steuben at Valley Forge was published in early 1779 under the title Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States, Part I.... It broke down the elements needed for combat success into individual tasks, each of which built upon mastery of preceding tasks. One of the simplest systems devised anywhere in the world, it was quickly absorbed by the soldiers. To speed that process along, Steuben displayed a genius at practical psychology. He assembled a "company of instruction" built around Washington’s bodyguard and personally drilled it, encouraging all off-duty personnel to watch. Punctuated by a colorful array of epithets and jokes in several languages, his method of teaching made training enjoyable and challenged each soldier to excel. Members of the company then returned to their original units where, under the watchful eye of a select group of officers, they extended the system to the rest of the Army. -The Story of the Noncommissioned Officer Corps, p. 42 [Note]: The troops appreciated what Steuben was doing for them despite (or perhaps because of) the original quality of his invective: "Sacre! Goddam de gaucheries of dese badauts! Je ne puis plus, I can curse dem no more!" -The Army of Frederick the Great, p. 211

Squad Level Training

We will continue to have a great Army only as we continue to produce superb small units. Superior squads make superior platoons, battalions, regiments, divisions. The spearhead of every attack is a small unit. -GEN J. Lawton Collins, "Stress the Fundamentals." Combat Forces Journal, Nov 1952, p. 11

A division, or a corps, or an entire army is no better than its squads and sections. -Handbook and Manual for the Noncommissioned Officer, 1952, p. 3

No battle will be won without [the squad leader]. The rifle squad leader...commands the smallest fighting unit in the Army and the chance of combat may find him a private or a sergeant...but his skill and fortitude are the certainties upon which depend the fortunes of war.... The rifle squad leader- backbone of the battlefield- is part-time engineer, artilleryman, communicator, medic, and counselor- but he is always a leader. -"Combat Leader: The Rifle Squad Leader- Backbone of the Battlefield." Infantry, Feb-Mar 1960, p. 40

Squad-level training is the most important deterrence we have against superior numbers. -CSM Frank B. Gibert, "What You Can Do- Right Now- To Improve Unit Preparedness." Engineer, No. 1, 1987, p. 3

The most brilliant plan devised by the most capable general depends for its tactical execution on the section-leaders. Poor section-leaders may ruin the best-laid plans; first-rate section-leaders will often save badly devised plans. This for one simple reason: the section-leader is the sole level of command that maintains constant and direct contact with the men who bear the brunt of the actual fighting. It follows, then, that the section-leader is to be trained as a tactical commander and as an educator of his men. -GEN Yigal Allon, The Making of Israel’s Army, 1970, p. 265

Each serjeant and corporal will be in a particular manner answerable for the squad committed to his care. He must pay particular attention to their conduct in every respect; that they keep themselves and their arms always clean; that they have their effects always ready, and put where they can get them immediately, even in the dark, without confusion; and on every fine day he must oblige them to air their effects. -MG Frederick von Steuben, Regulations for the Order and Discipline of the Troops of the United States, 1779, p. 148

Train and support your squad leaders. You already know from experience that their job is the toughest. They cannot do this job effectively if you don’t give them all the support, assets, and quality training time that they need to do it. -1SG Jeffrey J. Mellinger, "Open Letters to Three NCOs." Infantry, May-Jun 1989, p. 20

The young squad leader must also be the most inquisitive soldier of the squad, always asking questions about situations, tactics, and strategy that may not be covered in operations orders. Squad leaders must know the tactical situations. The only way they can properly prepare their squads is to ask the question not covered in the briefings. If leaders don’t have the answers, then they should find and pass the information on so that the squad is fully informed and able to respond to what could be the unknown.