thedrifter
05-10-07, 08:47 AM
Exclusive: American Goodness
By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
Author: By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: May 10, 2007
No armed force in the history of conflict has gone to such great lengths as our Marines and soldiers to minimize civilian casualties. FSM Contributing Editor Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.), comments on the foundations of America’s proud, honorable, professional military traditions.
American Goodness
By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
A recently released Army survey that reported troubling trends among soldiers and Marines and their views of civilians and ethics on the battlefield has the full attention of the services. It isn’t just this latest survey however that has caused the services to take a hard look at their entry level, leadership, and pre-deployment training programs.
From almost the start of the current campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army and Marine Corps have been constantly re-tooling training programs to provide deploying service members with the most appropriate preparation for everything from high-end combat to trainer/advisor roles. This constant improvement of training programs has included a great emphasis and effort to ensure our fighters understand and adhere to both the spirit and the rules governing ethical behavior on the battlefield.
Training covers the gamut from basics of the Laws of Land Warfare and each service member’s duties under those laws and rules to scenario based and role-player supported “situational training exercises” (called STX lanes) where Marine and Army small units are presented with as many different scenarios they are likely to encounter on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan as possible.
Beginning at service boot camps and at foundational leader training like the Marine Corps’ Basic School for second lieutenants, service members are taught and drilled on their responsibilities to adhere to the rules and laws that govern war. Training and education covers everything from the foundation’s ethical behavior -- “just war” and “justice in war” -- to specifics of the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. rules and laws contained in the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Specific rules for Escalation of Force and Rules of Engagement geared to specific theaters of war are drilled into the minds of soldiers and Marines.
At the two services’ primary pre-deployment training centers - the Army’s Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and National Training Center at Ft Irwin, California, and the Corps’ combat training center at Twenty-nine Palms, California, and Mountain Warfare Training Center at Bridgeport, California - the Army and Marine Corps have expanded use of scenario based training and role players to try and replicate conditions on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan as closely as possible.
Civilians-on-the-battlefield role players, drawn mainly from the Arab and Afghan-American communities, dressed as they would be on the streets and in the villages of Iraq and Afghanistan and speaking local languages confront Marines and soldiers with varying and complex challenges.
Marines and soldiers must identify and solve problems for everything from women and children asking for medical help and village leaders requesting water systems, to dealing with improvised explosive devices, complex attacks by insurgents, and civilian and military mass casualties. Several of the scenarios deal with multiple challenges like al Qaeda attacks causing civilian casualties followed by ambushes of Marines when they arrive to help the victims.
In each of these scenarios our military members are assessed not just on how they respond “kinetically” with force-at-arms, but on how they handle the human aspects of the complex battlefield. Did they correctly assess both the tactical and the human situation, recognize a correct response path, follow the rules and laws of war, and correctly apply the guidelines for Escalation of Force and the Rules of Engagement? Did they effectively use their knowledge of local culture and languages in their dealings with the “civilians.?” These scenarios are completed in real-time, with as much realism as can be mustered followed by extensive after-action reviews. Role players are invaluable forcing Marines and soldiers to consider these “civilians on the battlefield.” Our forces go to extraordinary lengths to prepare for Iraq and Afghanistan, not just to confront, capture and kill insurgents, terrorists and criminals, but to deal with the local populations correctly.
There have been countless interactions over the past few years between US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and the local people. Thousands of times every day in both those countries Marines and soldiers confront “three-block war” scenarios. The “three-block war” construct speaks to preparing forces to conduct high-intensity combat operations, peacekeeping or peace-making operations, and humanitarian operations, all in the space of three-blocks over a short time period. The vast majority of these daily interactions are carried out correctly, with good outcomes for both US forces and the local people.
Every once and awhile something goes wrong – and a few times something goes very wrong. But, no armed force in the history of conflict has gone to such great lengths as our Marines and soldiers to minimize civilian casualties and to treat the local populace correctly and with dignity as our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
We should never forget that in this conflict, as in every conflict where Americans have been engaged overseas, the innate goodness of the normal U.S. soldier, Marine, sailor and airman has never been in question.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Col. Jeff Bearor (USMC, ret.) is a career Marine Corps officer, the former commanding officer of the Recruit Training Regiment at the US Marine Corps Recruit Depot at Parris Island, SC, and has served as Chief of Staff, Marine Corps Training and Education Command, Quantico, VA.
Ellie
By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
Author: By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
Source: The Family Security Foundation, Inc.
Date: May 10, 2007
No armed force in the history of conflict has gone to such great lengths as our Marines and soldiers to minimize civilian casualties. FSM Contributing Editor Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.), comments on the foundations of America’s proud, honorable, professional military traditions.
American Goodness
By Jeff Bearor, (USMC, ret.)
A recently released Army survey that reported troubling trends among soldiers and Marines and their views of civilians and ethics on the battlefield has the full attention of the services. It isn’t just this latest survey however that has caused the services to take a hard look at their entry level, leadership, and pre-deployment training programs.
From almost the start of the current campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army and Marine Corps have been constantly re-tooling training programs to provide deploying service members with the most appropriate preparation for everything from high-end combat to trainer/advisor roles. This constant improvement of training programs has included a great emphasis and effort to ensure our fighters understand and adhere to both the spirit and the rules governing ethical behavior on the battlefield.
Training covers the gamut from basics of the Laws of Land Warfare and each service member’s duties under those laws and rules to scenario based and role-player supported “situational training exercises” (called STX lanes) where Marine and Army small units are presented with as many different scenarios they are likely to encounter on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan as possible.
Beginning at service boot camps and at foundational leader training like the Marine Corps’ Basic School for second lieutenants, service members are taught and drilled on their responsibilities to adhere to the rules and laws that govern war. Training and education covers everything from the foundation’s ethical behavior -- “just war” and “justice in war” -- to specifics of the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. rules and laws contained in the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Specific rules for Escalation of Force and Rules of Engagement geared to specific theaters of war are drilled into the minds of soldiers and Marines.
At the two services’ primary pre-deployment training centers - the Army’s Joint Readiness Training Center at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and National Training Center at Ft Irwin, California, and the Corps’ combat training center at Twenty-nine Palms, California, and Mountain Warfare Training Center at Bridgeport, California - the Army and Marine Corps have expanded use of scenario based training and role players to try and replicate conditions on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan as closely as possible.
Civilians-on-the-battlefield role players, drawn mainly from the Arab and Afghan-American communities, dressed as they would be on the streets and in the villages of Iraq and Afghanistan and speaking local languages confront Marines and soldiers with varying and complex challenges.
Marines and soldiers must identify and solve problems for everything from women and children asking for medical help and village leaders requesting water systems, to dealing with improvised explosive devices, complex attacks by insurgents, and civilian and military mass casualties. Several of the scenarios deal with multiple challenges like al Qaeda attacks causing civilian casualties followed by ambushes of Marines when they arrive to help the victims.
In each of these scenarios our military members are assessed not just on how they respond “kinetically” with force-at-arms, but on how they handle the human aspects of the complex battlefield. Did they correctly assess both the tactical and the human situation, recognize a correct response path, follow the rules and laws of war, and correctly apply the guidelines for Escalation of Force and the Rules of Engagement? Did they effectively use their knowledge of local culture and languages in their dealings with the “civilians.?” These scenarios are completed in real-time, with as much realism as can be mustered followed by extensive after-action reviews. Role players are invaluable forcing Marines and soldiers to consider these “civilians on the battlefield.” Our forces go to extraordinary lengths to prepare for Iraq and Afghanistan, not just to confront, capture and kill insurgents, terrorists and criminals, but to deal with the local populations correctly.
There have been countless interactions over the past few years between US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan and the local people. Thousands of times every day in both those countries Marines and soldiers confront “three-block war” scenarios. The “three-block war” construct speaks to preparing forces to conduct high-intensity combat operations, peacekeeping or peace-making operations, and humanitarian operations, all in the space of three-blocks over a short time period. The vast majority of these daily interactions are carried out correctly, with good outcomes for both US forces and the local people.
Every once and awhile something goes wrong – and a few times something goes very wrong. But, no armed force in the history of conflict has gone to such great lengths as our Marines and soldiers to minimize civilian casualties and to treat the local populace correctly and with dignity as our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.
We should never forget that in this conflict, as in every conflict where Americans have been engaged overseas, the innate goodness of the normal U.S. soldier, Marine, sailor and airman has never been in question.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor Col. Jeff Bearor (USMC, ret.) is a career Marine Corps officer, the former commanding officer of the Recruit Training Regiment at the US Marine Corps Recruit Depot at Parris Island, SC, and has served as Chief of Staff, Marine Corps Training and Education Command, Quantico, VA.
Ellie