Category Archives: Guest Post

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What’s So Hard about Cavalry Anyway?

Finding, Tracking, and Fighting in Depth

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What is so hard about cavalry? Nothing, especially. It’s just different. To be frank, cavalry is not more dangerous or more important than other tactical enablers. It’s not even that mystical. Becoming a good cavalry trooper and leader is pretty simple: be better and faster than anyone else at understanding when, where, and why you are, within your recon and security operation. In other words, you need to be able to quickly—and without orders—recognize how newly discovered enemy, terrain, and civil considerations relate to friendly troops and time available…and what all that means to your mission. Knowing when to switch between the fundamentals of reconnaissance to the fundamentals of security (and back again) is a developed instinct.

Idaho Army National Guard Soldiers conducts platoon live-fire gunnery qualification, Feb.14, 2019, at the Orchard Combat Training Center, Idaho. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Mason Cutrer)
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A Look Inside the Best Ranger Competition

Q & A with a 4-Time BRC Competitor

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The Army’s David E. Grange, Jr. Best Ranger Competition is a three-day (62 hour), two-man team gauntlet of physical, mental, and emotionally challenging events meant to test the mettle, technical skills, and tactical proficiency of the competitors. The first requirement to compete – being Ranger Qualified, meaning that you are a graduate of the U.S. Army Ranger School. The 2019 Best Ranger Competition begins on Friday, April 12. The Company Leader conducted an interview with Mark Gaudet, a four-time BRC finisher and member the 2016 5th Place Team. Below are his answers, insights, and recommendations.

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Attacking Razish – Part II

Getting Punched in the Face

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After seven hours of fighting our way through the central corridor the support by fire was set, obscuration smoke was out, our task force engineers were reducing the breach and my assault force began moving forward to quickly secure the far side objective and seize a foothold in the city. After months of preparation and midway through our combined arms breach the brigade was poised to take the largest city in the national training center and my battalion was about to lead the assault. That’s when things started to go wrong and failure ensued.

Paratroopers with the 173rd Airborne Brigade, participate in Exercise Rock Spring 19 at Grafenwoher Training Area, Germany, March 6, 2019. Rock Spring is an annual exercise to validate platoon-level proficiency at conducting offensive operations under live-fire conditions. (U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Henry Villarama)
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Attacking Razish – Part I

Top 5 Keys to Success

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Twenty-four hours after completing our assault on the National Training Center’s largest urban objective, Razish, I took two pages of notes on the things that I felt made us successful. Like all lessons in the Army, none of these are new or novel. And, like all lessons at NTC, just because you know what you need to fix doesn’t always mean that you can pull it all together in the face of the short timelines, harsh conditions, and the ever-present 11thArmored Cavalry Regiment. Here are my top 5.

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Call for Fire

The Company Leader TDG 19-04

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After a long night supporting your reconnaissance troop’s zone recon mission, you do a final radio check with your Fire Support NCO in his OP on hill 509. The scout platoons are settled in to their positions on the screen line, watching the valley known as the 15 tango for enemy movement. So far, the troop has encountered Skolkan alliance Special Purpose Forces in trucks, as well as wheeled recon vehicles from the enemy’s Brigade Tactical Group (BTG) recon company. The troop’s 120mm Mortars are sitting at 60% of their base ammunition load after suppressing those enemy Ops the night before, with 30 rounds of HE between the two tubes. The troop commander is huddled in the CP on his headset, receiving an intel update from the Squadron on the enemy’s anticipated attack. The call concludes, and he looks at you. “You’re going to be busy today”, he says, only half-jokingly.

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Combat, Orders, and Judgement

The Nightingale Series

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Combat is decidedly mortal to the participants. Leaders, officers, and enlisted soldiers, are charged with execution of orders and the strict adherence to commander’s intent as the responsible agents for the men they serve—both above and below them. Failure to do so in peacetime can be professionally suicidal. Failure to do so in combat may be either suicidal or the key to success. The difference is called judgment. And good judgment is the Holy Grail of any combat unit. One case of leaders on the beachhead, on June 6, 1944, provides a sense through which to view disciplined initiative via calculated disobedience.

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TLDR – RE: CAVLOG

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TLDR is a popular culture acronym standing for Too Long; Didn’t Read. Urban Dictionary says it is a “frequently used by […] people in Internet Forums [whose] urge to type exceeds their ability to read…” A few weeks ago we published an Excel tool to aid troop and squadron-level leaders in logistics planning. CAVLOG, posted to The Rucksack, received a lot of attention on Social Media page via The Company Leader, Doctrine Man, and Army Leader Exchange. We appreciated and were humbled by the volume of interest and engagement. Some of it was praise. Other comments provided constructive feedback. And then some commentary fell into the realm of clear “TLDR.” Below, we hope to clear-up a few things about CAVLOG.

A U.S. Army Task Force Brawler CH-47F Chinook flies while conducting a training exercise with a Guardian Angel team assigned to the 83rd Expeditionary Rescue Squadron at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan, March 26, 2018. (U.S. Air Force Photo by Tech. Sgt. Gregory Brook)
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What I’ve Learned From Bullets

The Nightingale Series

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I was cleaning out my accumulated files when I came across a series of notes, regarding officers and leadership, accumulated through the years. I had the privilege of learning a lot through my commands of four rifle companies, three Airborne/Ranger battalions, and two Airborne/Ranger brigades. Many of these lessons learned were in garrison, while several more were in combat between 1965 and 1993. Bullets can be an effective teacher of lessons. This article is for those who wish the knowledge, hopefully without the pain.

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Building Houses that Stand

A Platoon Leader’s Perspective on Planning

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Nothing breaks a new platoon leader’s heart like hearing the words “change of mission.” I heard them within a couple hours of my first training exercise, rendering days of planning products useless in an instant. The lesson I learned – a painful one we all eventually suffer – exemplifies a common military expression: “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” While I was slightly discouraged, another question lurked in the recesses of my mind: if a plan is doomed to fail, why create a plan in the first place?

Capt. Wade Redenius of 2-1 IN discusses plan for upcoming mission with 1st Lt. Ross McDonald and 2nd Lt. Tony Eshoo at Yakima Training Center, WA. U.S. Army photo by Maj. Sonie Munson, 2-2 SBCT Public Affairs.
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Are You Passionate about Leader Development?

A Case for West Point Broadening Assignments

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West Point’s mission is “to educate, train, and inspire the Corps of Cadets so that each graduate is a commissioned leader of character, committed to the values of Duty, Honor, and Country, and prepared for a career of professional excellence and service to the Nation as an officer in the United States Army.” To this end, West Point selects senior captains and junior majors to serve as rotating faculty members at the academy. West Point’s rotating faculty members serve approximately two to three year tours in one of thirteen academic departments, teaching various core and elective courses. These faculty members are in the proverbial trenches, charged with mentoring our nation’s next generation of leaders. If you are passionate about leadership and contemplating a broadening assignment as a West Point faculty member, here is a list of things to consider.

‘Frozen in Time’ photo by Cadet Victoria Martin, USMA Class of 2020. Retrieved from West Point Facebook Page.