Training is the cornerstone of readiness--it is the top priority for the Total Army.
The Army exists to deter war or, if deterrence fails, to win in combat. For deterrence to be effective, our enemies must know that the Army can mobilize, deploy, fight, and sustain combat operations. Effective training molds human and material resources into cohesive, combat-ready units.
To be successful in combat, the Army must train continually to develop and maintain combat-ready soldiers, leaders, and units that can perform assigned tasks to specific standards. The requirement for training continues even during wartime (especially within the combat zone). Training builds self-confidence promotes teamwork and esprit de corps, and increases professionalism in soldiers, leaders, and units.
Quote by General Carl E. Vuono
Commanders Role
Effective training requires the personal time, energy, and guidance of commanders. Commanders must personally observe and assess training at all echelons. Their specific emphasis is on training one level down and evaluating two levels down; for example, battalion commanders train company commanders with their companies and evaluate platoon leaders with their platoons. Company commanders train platoon leaders with their platoons and evaluate section, squad, team, and crew leaders with their units. Commanders must—
● Develop and communicate a clear vision or intent. This vision is based on an understanding of the following:
- Unit's mission, doctrine, and history.
- Unit capabilities, to include strengths and weaknesses.
- Supporting and supported units' doctrine and capabilities.
- Enemy capabilities.
- Training philosophy.
- Training environment (geographic dispersion, location, or unique )
● Train the trainer. They must—
- Develop junior leaders.
- Ensure subordinate leaders understand and use leader development programs.
● Establish a safe, realistic training program that is based on and enforces the Army's standards of performance.
● Foster a command climate which—
- Promotes learning.
- Allows honest mistakes.
- Encourages open communications and disagreement without fear of retribution. Instills discipline in units.
● Be personally involved in planning, executing, and assessing training.
● State their expectations of what the unit should achieve by the end of the training period (expected levels of proficiency on Mission Essential Task List (METL) tasks).
● Protect units from training distracters by ruthlessly enforcing the lock in of major events agreed upon during training briefings and contained in the signed training schedules.
● Ensure subordinate commanders understand the importance of training meetings (weekly for Active Component, monthly for Reserve Component), rigidly enforce their conduct, and (periodically) attend them.
● Protect resources (ranges, ammunition, land, training aids, and time) for training.
● Personally visit training to—
- Show that training is the top priority.
- Observe and assess the execution of subordinate training at all levels to ensure training is conducted to standard.
- Assess leader development and provide developmental feedback and guidance as coach, teacher, and mentor.
- Direct changes to improve unit training and enhance warfighting capability (within scope of unit training objectives, using the chain of command).
- Ensure quality of external training support and resolve systemic problems.
Leader Responsibilities
In addition to the above commander's responsibilities, all leaders must require their subordinates to understand and perform their roles in training. The commander assigns primary responsibility to officers for collective training and to noncommissioned officers (NCOs) for soldier training. NCOs also have responsibility to train sections, squads, teams, and crews. The commander is responsible to meld leader and soldier training requirements into collective training events using multi-echelon techniques. Additionally, all leaders must—
● Train the combined arms team to be proficient on its mission essential tasks. This includes training soldiers, leaders, subordinate units, and supporting elements. The key is to train the leader with the unit. Special attention must be paid to training newly assigned lieutenants and sergeants as they train with their platoons, and newly promoted sergeants as they train with their sections, squads, teams, and crews.
● Centralize training planning to maintain unit focus on the wartime mission.
● Decentralize execution to allow subordinate leaders the flexibility to focus training on their units' strengths and weaknesses.
● Establish effective communications at all levels. Leaders must talk to one another and exchange information. Guidance on wartime missions and priorities flows down; soldier, leader, and collective training needs flow up. Training meetings, briefings, and After-Action Reviews (AARs) are the primary forums for the exchange of training information among leaders.
● Demand training standards be achieved. They must—
- Plan time for additional training to allow for tasks not performed to standard.
- Plan to train a realistic number of tasks during a training event. It is better to train to standard on a few tasks than fail to achieve the standard on many. Soldiers will remember the enforced standard.
● Understand the role of the Reserve Component (RC) and the nature of the RC training environment. About half of today's total Army force structure is in the RC: the Army National Guard (ARNG) and US Army Reserve (USAR). RC units are required to train to the same standard on each task as AC units. However, they train fewer tasks because of—
- Reduced training time.
- Geographical dispersion.
- Availability of equipment for training.
- Adequate training areas.
Many RC units operate within two different chains of command. RC units receive their wartime missions through their CAPSTONE chain of command. Their peacetime chain of command, however, provides training guidance and day-to-day command and control. Additionally, the peacetime chain of command reviews and approves resources for RC units to train on mission essential tasks. Figure 1-1.
Source FM 25-101, Pg. 7-9
Photo by Matthew Hintz: https://www.pexels.com/photo/a-man-and-a-woman-in-camouflage-uniform-standing-on-ground-9844995/
Photo by Art Guzman: https://www.pexels.com/photo/snipers-lying-on-front-on-balcony-10853906/
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