Too long in one Unit?

[tubman13]

I do not know how much discussion this merits. Last night I posted about being one National Guard Unit for a long time. I know our world today is vastly different, than the world of the later half of the 19th century.

Did the units back then become stagnant, suffer from lack of new blood at the management level?

Little opportunity for advancement?

Obviously lack of training?

Over a 20+ year NG career I had the opportunity to train with other NG Units, Regular Army, Regular AF, other govt. agencies, and some civilian groups as well. I trained in various locations; Davis Monthan AFB, Patrick AFB, Belgium, Camp Rapid SD, Eglin AFB, Savannah GA, and numerous other locations. Back in the day a fair number of the troops at the LBH on 6/25/76 had also been at the Washita, and many from LBH appear at Wounded Knee. I know when some of you guys got in you served with guys who had been inWW2, Korea, Lebanon1, and Vietnam, as did I. But the guys we served with had had updated  training, new commanders, new units, new weapons, new strategies, and so on. I guess what I am saying is? Chuck what was it Capt. Brittles said at the end of that famous flick?

Last question for you all is. How stale was the 7th?, I know their horses were about toast.   

Regards,

Tom

[fred]

You pose an interesting series of thoughts here, Tom, and I am not sure what the answer is. The Germans attributed much of their combat cohesiveness to the fact units were raised locally and even when almost wiped out, re-staffed with men from the same regions. We would break this down as Military Districts; they called them a Wehrkreis. Here is how they were configured:

I Königsberg (East Prussia)
II Stettin
III Berlin
IV Dresden
V Stuttgart
VI Münster
VII München (Bavaria)
VIII Breslau
IX Kassel
X Hamburg
XI Hannover
XII Wiesbaden
XIII Nürnberg (Bavaria)
XVII Wien (Vienna, Austria)
XVIII Salzburg (Austria)
XX Danzig

This technique kept unit integrity and a certain immediate bonding among men with things in common. I think it also helped that German NCOs had considerably more responsibility than what I think we give our own. The percentage of officers in the German army has always been extremely low, especially when compared to the U. S. Army, and I think that develops a greater sense of leadership.

One of my biggest beefs about Vietnam-- and this, of course, is super-controversial-- was the one-year tour. Just as you were getting good, learning the nature of the fight and the country, they sent you home. There never seemed to be the commitment. Maybe that was because there was no commitment, I don't know. Similar to Iraq and Afghanistan. You go to war to win it, not to girl thingy-foot around, so maybe we should think more before we make these damn commitments. My feelings were that you needed a two-year combat tour, not one.

As for the Seventh, officer promotion was to fill slots and time-in-grade had little to do with it. The army had a certain number of positions and you staffed as those positions required. Even when West Pointers graduated, if there was no 2LT slot available, the graduate got a "brevet" lieutenancy. When a slot opened, he got his real rank.

In today's military, I believe the training regimen is better than ever, though I still believe leadership skills are lacking. I see this especially among the more senior positions and an almost incredible lack of ability in the flag ranks. I also believe there is entirely too much political correctness and to me, this breeds a poorer quality soldier than what we should strive for. I also think our National Guard units are far, far superior to anything I saw when I was in the NYARNG. In my day, those were primarily guys trying to avoid Vietnam, especially in New York with NYC guys. But that's a conversation over a beer, not here.

By the way, you will get arguments about the Seventh's horses.

Best wishes,
Fred.

[Yan Taylor]

The British in WW1 raised what they called “Pals” Battalions, these were men and boys (teenagers really) that were from the same town or sometimes even street, they had strange names too like the Accrington Pals and the Grimsby Chums (Fred they even had a unit called the “Stockbroker Battalion”), even football teams joined up together along with public schools. I suppose it was done for the same reason as the Germans units Fred mentioned, the big drawback with this was that whole neighbourhoods or even streets lost all of their menfolk in one go, and after most of them got decimated they dropped the idea and amalgamated the survivors into other units.

The British Army was usually formed around Country Regiments or Battalions, and the one closest to Widnes was the South Lancs;
link
Widnes was only a small town in 1914 and suffered 818 men KIA, I don’t know how many were badly wounded.

I have always wondered, what is your National Guard, is it along the same line as our Territorials?

Ian.

[Yan Taylor]

Tom you don’t mean Captain Nathan Cutting Brittles;

link

[Yan Taylor]

How stale was the 7th?, I know their horses were about toast

I suppose after four days in the field and traveling around 60 miles (from noon the 22nd to the evening of 24th) both man and horse would be due a good night’s sleep, so I would expect that no one relished a night march.

Ian.

[tubman13]

Feb 21, 2014 8:44:54 GMT -6 Yan Taylor said:

Tom you don’t mean Captain Nathan Cutting Brittles;

link

As Bob Hope said in the song, Thanks for the memories!

[quincannon]

This is exactly what I meant about upping or game and reaching for where we have never gone before, but let's take care of my good friend Captain Brittles before we strew more flowers in the garden path we follow.

Ian: Not Nathan Cutting Brittles, rather Mary Cutting Brittles, his deceased wife buried in the cemetery at Fort Starke Cutting was her maiden name. For those of you who are John Ford fans that scene is lifted from another John Ford movie called Judge Priest, starring Will Rogers, set in post civil war Kentucky, as is :Your breath smells like a hot mince pie" A warning for those of you sensitive about racial subjects, Judge Priest? accurately portrays the "old south" and may be offensive to some. That does not change the accuracy of the portrayal though

Tom? Pennell - " I will be First Lieutenant" To which a chorus of voices adds "In ten or twelve years" Think that is the one you mean Tom. My favorite though is "The Army is always the same. The sun and the moon change, but the Army knows no seasons"

The National Guard: Since the beginning of the Republic, and even before, going back to the Plymouth Colony in Massachusetts the National Guard has been looked upon until fairly recently as Christmas Help, people hired at Christmas time and back on the unemployment line by New Years. In more accurate terms they along with the Army reserve, the Johnny Come Lately of reserve forces in the Army, the were considered a strategic reserve. Stating about 1981-82 the Guard began a transition to become an operational reserve, structured to fill in the gaps in the force structure where the Regular Army could not keep "nice to have" forces on active duty due to strength caps. The difference between the strategic reserve and operational reserves is in combat readiness. A strategic reserve unit was expected to attain a high state of readiness in 9 to 12 months after activation, those in the operational reserve were expected to be combat ready in 30 days or less. Those were the goals.

In the case of the Air National Guard, in theory they could be activated this morning and fly to a combat zone this afternoon. Our Air Guard and Reserve units here in Colorado fly missions on a daily basis, and fly operational and not just training missions. A typical commercial pilot flying for the airlines may have three or four days off and spends a couple of them flying back and forth to Europe or Afghanistan, and then back to work when he returns flying for United or American or any of our air lines. We have a USAFR C-130 squadron here at Petersen AFB and they fly every day.

With this upping in readiness from strategic to operational more training opportunities became available, trips to the National Training Center at Irwin, and the Joint Readiness Training Center at Polk became routine cyclical events. Guard participation in every major exercise was expected and demanded. During my son's time in the Guard he went to Wales once, England twice, and Central and South America so many times I lost count. Some of those missions were for training, others particularly Central America were operational

The Guard's great strength is its hometown nature, building units in the same communities that have been there in some instances for three and four hundred years. The unit in Frederick , Maryland for instance marched to Boston in 1775, and were the first American to use the bayonet at Long Island in 1776. A unit in Will's and DC's home state goes back to the North Regiment organized 7 October 1636. George Washington and Patrick Henry were Guardsmen. The Guards largest drawback is also its hometown nature. There is a reason the National D Day Memorial is in Bedford, Virginia, home of Company A, 116th Infantry (Stonewall Brigade). Not many of their sons came back. The 1st Minnesota and 20th Maine (both still in existence) had a lot of hometowns draped in black after Gettysburg as well. Don't have to belabor that subject.

The Guard then is similar in structure to the British in that they are recruited for a given local area. This may not still be true because of the many amalgamations of British Regiments in recent years, such as the Royal Regiment of Scotland, now having Scotland at large as its recruiting base. It is also similar initially to the old German system of home areas. The drawback was that in the German system they retained a flow to the unit from that home area, where the longer a Guard unit is on active duty the much more cosmopolitan in makeup it becomes with replacement coming from a geographical anywhere.

Fred : We don't often disagree, but you count up the days between D-Day and VE Day and you will find that those that served in Europe between those two dates served less time in combat than the average one year tour in Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghanistan. The one year in combat is enough and you have picked the wrong place to point your finger. It is not the one year. The problem is individual vs. unit rotation. Unit rotation is by far a better system where the unit goes to combat together, comes home together, retrains together, and if need be goes back together. We developed this from the German system you applaud above. So your basic thesis is correct, unit readiness as well as individual readiness peaks out at a point, but the problem is not solved by increasing time in actual combat. The problem is solved by keeping structure together both in and out of combat, and affording the newer joining replacements to train with those that have been in and know. If you wish to know a great example of a unit with to much combat, loosing their effectiveness look at the example of Galahad, the 5307th Composite Unit (Prov) in Burma. Units fall apart under continued stress. Human can only take so much. Keeping units together both in and out is the answer, not don't come home until you win

Political correctness: Nothing new here nor is there anything new about General, Flag Rank or senior officers in general sucking up to get ahead. It is a human condition found as much on Wall Street or at Wal-Mart as it is a Fort Benning or the Pentagon. Political correctness is relative to the times. The name for the malady may be fairly new, but the concept was around since man first picked his nose. Christ Himself was arrested and crucified for his politically incorrect action of throwing the politically correct money lenders out of the Temple. Go along to get along, suck up, asskissing, and political correctness are not products of the modern age, nor are the methods of character building which are the antithesis of those above mentioned fitonlyforswine diseases

[tubman13]

Feb 21, 2014 10:40:24 GMT -6 quincannon said:

 My favorite though is "The Army is always the same. The sun and the moon change, but the Army knows no seasons"

Mine as well.

Great update on modern Guard, early 80's was a time of growing up. Prior to this never had 3-10 day deployments, and these deployments, while short, were done with a purpose. These were not fill in the box AT.   

Regards,

Tom

[fred]

Feb 21, 2014 10:40:24 GMT -6 quincannon said:

Not Nathan Cutting Brittles, rather Mary Cutting Brittles, his deceased wife buried in the cemetery at Fort Starke Cutting was her maiden name.

Hey, that's what I thought! Great catch by the Master himself!!!

Best wishes,
Fred.

[fred]

Feb 21, 2014 10:40:24 GMT -6 quincannon said:

Fred : We don't often disagree, but you count up the days between D-Day and VE Day and you will find that those that served in Europe between those two dates served less time in combat than the average one year tour in Vietnam, Iraq, or Afghanistan. The one year in combat is enough and you have picked the wrong place to point your finger. It is not the one year. The problem is individual vs. unit rotation. Unit rotation is by far a better system where the unit goes to combat together, comes home together, retrains together, and if need be goes back together. We developed this from the German system you applaud above.

Yeah, well I'm not sure we disagree here, either. The D-Day/VE-Day analogy is more fortuitous than anything else, but I agree with you completely about "unit rotation" versus "individual rotation." You are absolutely correct about that.

Best wishes,
Fred.

[quincannon]

Tom: On the Army side we credit three men with starting that transition from strategic to operational reserve John Wickham, (CofS), Max Thurman (VCofS) and Herb Temple (ANG Director). They were three outstanding officers, who understood that there was a resource both waiting and willing to be tapped. It took a long time to fulfill their vision and the work is still incomplete, and always will be for times do change, and what was good yesterday, is OK today, and obsolete tomorrow. So continual change, along with continual upgrading is something both necessary and to be expected. Training, leadership, and cohesive units all go hand in hand in building a combat force that must be ready for all comers this afternoon.

A USAFR C-130 just flew over my house heading eastbound. I wonder where?

[tubman13]

Three nest ride I ever had in a uniform, were in order 141, 130 and Huey.

[quincannon]

Mine was in an OH6, below the treetops. Much like riding a roller coaster on steroids. Of course I am old enough to remember the H13 as well, the one with the bubble like those seen in MASH. It was all I could do to keep from loosing my lunch all over the windscreen. Yes I meant loosing, as in cutting loose. I knew where my lunch was when I started . Didn't lose it at all.

The absolute worst was in a CH47. Hated that damned thing, and my rides were in the early days when the damned thing had the rather unusual proclivity of shedding its rotors.

[fred]

C-141 was the "Starlifter," right? The name always fascinated me, but I never flew in one.

Caribous, C-130s, C-123s... used to do route recon in Hueys. Earned an Air Medal, but never put in for it, so I never got it. I guess medals didn't mean a lot at the time, though they take on added significance as one ages.

I loved recon in Hueys. They flew at tree-top level; you strap in and lean out.... What a hoot! God, I loved it!!!!

Best wishes,
Fred.

[tubman13]

My best Huey ride had nothing to do with a mission . It was a joy ride provided by SD Army Guard. They flew us at tree-top up and down, around the Black Hills, then along a stream bed trees on both sides. When we came out of the trees we passed a small village on our left and a big rock rubble pile on the right. The next thing I know is we are looking at George Washington's nose. I do not know how they got approval, but I will never look at MT. Rushmore the same again.

Regards,
Tom