An Excellent Primer for Light Infantry Training

books:

	• The Battle for Hunger Hill: The 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry Regiment at the Joint Readiness Training Center Daniel P. Bolger Presidio Press, 1997 - 384 pages average customer review:based on 12 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

Time to Revamp FM 7-10, FM 7-20, FM 7-30

The Battle for Hunger Hill should force the US Army Infantry School as well as the gurus at Ft Leavenworth to seriously consider re-writing current doctrine for light infantry units (especially with regard to Low Intensity Conflict and OOTW). The 1-327 Infantry proves again and again throughout the text that the "cookbook solution" (i.e. doctrine applied as dogma) is often the surest way to ensure one's own defeat. Rather, HOW to think instead of WHAT to think is the surest way to secure victory.

Any soldier or leader concerned with mission accomplishment and force protection through the artistic application of Maneuver Warfare (Auftragstaktik) simply MUST read this book. It is highly entertaining as well as informative. Indeed, any commander whose unit is scheduled for a rotation to JRTC should require every officer and NCO to read this book no later than twelve months out (thirty-six months out for RC units). You may go without it...but only at your own peril.

for more information click here

A Must Read for Anyone In Leadership

Daniel Bolger has done an excellent job explaining not only what goes on at the Joint Readiness Training Center, but he does much to explain how and why his first experience there was a bust and more importantly how he corrected his mistakes and performed outstandingly in a later opportunity. Excellent book on what goes into battlion level command.

I disagree with the reviewer complaining about jargon.If you are afraid of learning a little military jargon then you shouldn't be reading books about command and control. The small amount of jargon used in this book is easy to keep track of.

for more information click here

for more information click here

Bravo Company

First off, Col. Bolger was a great battalion commander who gave NCOs and Officers who screwed up second chances, something that was unheard of in the 101st Airborne Division at the time. What we learned at JRTC is, a leader must adapt his training to the environment and this case, the environment is MILES or laser warfare. You can't tell me the OPFOR would run around behind small bushes when a rifle Platoons SAW's and 60's are blazing, it just wouldn't happen. The enemy would break contact if the weren't cut down in a wall of lead. But we learned to be effective in an environment where small groups of soldiers who carry butt packs, wear boonie caps, and spend every waking minute zeroing their MILES lasers is, you have to do the same...that's what good leaders do. So we spent months perfecting the art of MILES warfare and honed our call for fire skills and essentially turned the tables on the OPFOR. We coined the "system" earth pigs!

I've been through JRTC six times and the most effective units are the units who spread their units out, spend a lot of time zeroing their MILES, and have good casevac plans.

I was a team leader in Bravo Company and during the first rotation and like SSG Eric Bitzer said, the Company commander showed his incompetence by leaving our platoon in the open on the side of the hill after the initial assault. In leadership theory you learn about the emotional competency known as self regulation. I saw a company commander have a virtual breakdown on the objective after our platoon leader LIED on the radio about our location. Self regulation basically refers to your ability to regulate your own behaviour, speech, and emotions.

I served in units after where this kind of mistake would have led to the automatic relief of duty on the spot. Something the comapny commander in question liked to do with the soldiers under his charge. Didn't have your PVS7 on when it got dark? Automatic article 15, even if they didn't work. Great way to look out for your soldiers?

I think not.

If you want to see the deatils of a unit preparing for combat and the training involved, I recommend this book. Col. Bolger was one smart officer.

for more information click here

An Excellent Primer for Light Infantry Training

This is another good book by COL Daniel Bolger, this time about his battalion's (101st ABN) rotations to JRTC in 1994 and 1995. Lots of great details and observations about JRTC and the OPFOR. Bolger's battalion was badly abused in its 1994 rotation and he decided to get even the next time, which was fortunately less than a year later. Bolger criticizes the Deliberate Decision Making Process (DDMP), big Tactical Operation Centers and suggests alternatives. Thought-provoking as always but I don't agree with everything he says. There is no doubt that the US Army's cumbersome DDMP is geared toward set-piece, short-term battles but Bolger's approach combines common sense with anti-staff bias to try and just avoid all that messy staff work. From the intelligence viewpoint, he is dead wrong because Intelligence Preparation of the Battlefield (IPB) does save lives and it does take time to do it right. Bolger's command instincts are good, particularly about nitty gritty items like reducing soldier loads, but there is bias here that detracts from his message. For example, sometimes he says erroneous things, like the S-2 (intelligence officer) is on the S-3's staff (the S-2 works for the commander, not the S-3). Maps are poor.

for more information click here

The fight for hunger hill

I am SSG Eric Bitzer I was there during this battle I was the Point Man for Bco 1/327inf when we hit the opfor the problem is not army doctrine but was in a decision that was made by the company commander of Bco 1/327 inf to stay on the objective after taking it instead of moving off the objective that all light units do. If we would have moved off the objective this battle would have been a total success. Remember that this book is from a Battialion commanders veiw not from a soldier that fought the battle Col. Bolger makes some great points and was also a great commander but the fault is not his it was with one of his company commanders.

for more information click here

reviews: page 1, 2, 3

At the JRTC, soldiers are trained for war in a setting so real you can almost smell the smoke.

hot