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Originally Posted by lksteve
in one sense, i acknowledge that the team tech position has added experience to the detachments...but i wonder if i'm the only one that wonders if being able to groom a lieutenant wasn't another way of doing business?
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I know that they wrestled with this when they were contemplating the 180A business. Certainly from your experiences your were the exception because you had SF experience long before you got commissioned. The problems I saw with having brand new LTs on an A-team were several fold and certainly varied from individual to individual. First there was a maturity problem, and I am not talking about age but the ability to differentiate between personal and professional relationships. Many came into the Army, much less SF, not really understanding what the military was really all about. Second, their basic branch experience really brought not a whole lot to the team when it came to the UW mission. With the team supposedly being able to organize, train, lead, a guerrilla battalion a 2LT had only a grounding in platoon tactics as an infantry officer and not even much of that if he came from some other branch of the army. When he was cut loose for his next assignment as a senior 1st LT or junior CPT he was behind his peers in his basic branch many that I have known that went back to the regular army got shafted by their superiors because they had the audacity to consider themselves as soldiers first and officers second. Consequently many got chewed up by a system that looked at SF as something alien to their idea of what the military officer should be-you know them: rank is status, enlisted folk exist only to enhance your career, do as I say not as I do, I'll push from the rear not lead from the front...etc. The result of that produced, in some cases not all, an officer who might have been able to return to SF but did not get that chance to perform as a company commander or battalion staff officer. When he becomes that detachment commander, while he was comfortable with the SF soldiers he hadn't a clue how to become that "BN Cdr" to organize, train, advise, assist and lead that guerrilla battalion nor plan for it, nor have a feeling about how the conventional forces operated with whom he might be called upon to support in a FID role or joint planner/operator. In short, I think that in those cases where this happened we not only did the officer an injustice but also SF. Now the branch has some of the same short comings in that there is an advantage, as far as I am concerned, to see SF officers go back and forth between conventional and SF assignments. That conventional experience at different echelons in the Army provides some good insight as to what the Army is doing, provides experience in levels of staff training and command that are applicable to the different levels for command and staff requirements as an 18A moves forward in his career. Don't misunderstand me, I am not looking at the 18A's career progression as being the most important aspect here. What I am considering only, which as far as I am concerned the most important, is his ability to get the job done for his troops regardless of what rank he achieves. Now I am sure others will have different view points on this, but these are my observations based only on my experiences dealing with officers in SF. Certainly there are those that don't fall in this situation, but there were a lot that did. So do I think it would be good to groom our own from 2LT? In an ideal world, where we did not have folks more concerned about ticket punching and what career progression officers had to follow to stay competitive and meet the "standards" of what an officer should look like on paper as an ARMY officer,sure. Couldn't agree more. But what that means is that we need to fill in all the blanks from commissioning to retirement for this guy to make sure that what we produce is fully capable of doing what the troops need and expect from an 18A and what the Army, who still determines if he survives in his career, expects from him as an officer. The only other approach would be to create a 5th branch where SF was SF and not US Army SF. Just my thoughts.
Jack Moroney