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| 101st Airborne leaders rescind order for soldiers to remove combat patches during training |
| 2016-03-06 |
| [ArmyTimes] The 101st Airborne Divisions 3rd Brigade Combat Team has rescinded a directive requiring soldiers to remove their combat patches during a unit training exercise. Soldiers in one of the brigades subordinate units on Tuesday "were given a directive to remove their combat patches in order to build cohesion during a unit gunnery exercise at Fort Knox, Kentucky," the division announced in a press release Friday. The brigade leadership has since rescinded the directive, and soldiers from the unit have been allowed to wear their combat patches. "This was a well-intended action taken by a now reassigned leader that was not well thought out and was quickly corrected," said Brig. Gen. Scott Brower, the division's acting senior commander, in a statement. "This division is amongst the most storied, battle-tested and prideful in all the Army. We are proud of all of our combat veterans and never want to take for granted their efforts and sacrifices." Looks like at least one Brigade does not share the collectivist vision. |
| Posted by:Blossom Unains5562 |
| #16 @#15: Our "Team Member," SSGT Padilla gave us that advice as we got off the bus. A couple of the guys didn't take this seriously and, when SSGT Clayton asked of us who could type, a couple of hands shot up. They spent the next 5 days (unhappily) typing blood (O, A, AB, etc.). |
| Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 2016-03-06 18:44 |
| #15 No call to use obscene language, Blossom! |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2016-03-06 16:47 |
| #14 It reminds me of that scene in Baron Munchausen, something like: "So this is the soldier who singlehandedly destroyed four enemy cannon and rescued twenty prisoners? Execute him. That sort of behavior is demoralizing to the regular soldier." |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2016-03-06 16:47 |
| #13 @#12: And don't volunteer for anything. |
| Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 2016-03-06 16:26 |
| #12 How are the newbies supposed to know who (which trainers) knows what they are talking about? Don't remember worrying about such things when I was a boot. Mostly concerned with avoiding being noticed by these demonic entities. |
| Posted by: g(r)omgoru 2016-03-06 16:19 |
| #11 Combat Veterans are kinda like veteran bull riders... the difference between the bull riders and the bullshitters becomes immediately obvious on first jump out the gate. Great analogy, and totally agree, just not necessarily if it is a person's first rodeo. I am of the school that the only thing harder than learning something new, is unlearning something wrong. |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2016-03-06 14:02 |
| #10 Concur with P2K. I wish we would bring back the Regimental affiliations as well. I grew up hearing about the units my father and uncles served in and wished to follow in their footsteps and serve in the same units... Immature inexperienced officers and folks like McNamara, whose lack of any real understanding of why men fight could only contribute by changing the names of units as their offering to the good idea fairy of incompetence. |
| Posted by: Tennessee 2016-03-06 13:54 |
| #9 Looks like at least one Brigade does not share the collectivist vision. Brig. Gen. Brower just made Zero's short list to be cashiered on some bogus charge. |
| Posted by: PBMcL 2016-03-06 13:05 |
| #8 PRIVATE HARRISON BERGERON reporting for duty... |
| Posted by: Clyde Borgia4967 2016-03-06 13:04 |
| #7 This is the stupidity of the Everyone Gets A Trophy mindset that Obama and the progressives are embedding into the government and is now seeping into the armed forces, eroding the meritocracy that must be the standard for a successful military. |
| Posted by: Creter Squank9797 2016-03-06 13:03 |
| #6 There was an advantage when I was in where the patches were sewed on. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2016-03-06 11:42 |
| #5 'Good intentions' get people killed. |
| Posted by: Skidmark 2016-03-06 10:58 |
| #4 "This was a well-intended action taken by a leader that was not well thought out and was quickly corrected," When the Army was in it's nadir at the end of the Vietnam experience, we had a McNamara boy who treated everyone as an interchangeable cog. Banned the headgear that marked esprit de corps. Now personally, I thought some of it was pretty odd, but hell, these were units that were on the highest level of being hammered if the balloon went up. One of the 'lessons learned' (and apparently unlearned) from the Vietnam experience was the importance of unit cohesion. Soldiers are not individual cogs or replacements. It's a unit. The unit trains and fights as one. When McNamara Boy left, the various headgear and unit ID came back. It was the beginning of the evolution to one of the finest, if not the finest military this planet had seen in history. Now the idiots are back again devolving the organization (which is still in recovery from over extended commitments). |
| Posted by: Procopius2k 2016-03-06 08:09 |
| #3 How are the newbies supposed to know who (which trainers) knows what they are talking about? Combat Veterans are kinda like veteran bull riders... the difference between the bull riders and the bullshitters becomes immediately obvious on first jump out the gate. |
| Posted by: junkiron 2016-03-06 03:57 |
| #2 How are the newbies supposed to know who (which trainers) knows what they are talking about? That is the whole point. I see we are well on the way to setting up another Task Force Smith. Gonna be decades cleaning up the mess left behind by these bozos. |
| Posted by: Nguard 2016-03-06 00:58 |
| #1 Buddy of mine was telling me something similar when he was training, to which I said something like, "Madness. How are the newbies supposed to know who (which trainers) knows what they are talking about?" |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2016-03-06 00:28 |