but what about the NCO’s
Oh my Lord. What’s next? So, we will have a bunch of privates who have their own idea how to conduct this squad sized patrol, ambush, raid, etc. We are talking about teenagers, 17-18-year old private’s. Lord please help them for they know not what they are doing. What do you think Marines. Oh the joy of being retired! I can’t believe they are doing this at SOI for privates. Please read on and would love to hear your comments. Who knows, maybe I am just an old fart who hasn’t kept up with the times?
From the Stars and Stirpes. This is factual Marines
Marine Corps seeks to make ‘smarter’ infantry force with new course
Marine Sgt. Alec Escalante, a squad instructor with Alpha Company, Infantry Training Battalion, School of Infantry-West, moves a chess piece during a class on how chess correlates with battle tactics, as part of the first week of the Infantry Marine Course at SOI-West on Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif., Jan. 27, 2021.
ANDREW CORTEZ/U.S. MARINE CORPS
The Marine Corps is ditching some of its formation marches and adding board games to a new, longer entry-level infantry training course aimed at creating Marines who can better think and act for themselves.
The Infantry Marine Course pilot program launched last month at the service’s School of Infantry-West on Camp Pendleton, Calif., where instructors were pictured instructing new Marines on how chess relates to battlefield tactics. The course focuses less on micromanagement and more on individual responsibility, the service said in a statement.
“Rote memorization, instant obedience to orders are good for certain things, and they’re not getting thrown away from this course,” Chief Warrant Officer 3 A.J. Pasciuti, the training battalion’s gunner, said in Friday’s statement. “We’re just going a step further, and understanding that the individual — and a collective of individuals — is what wins in combat.”
The new course was developed over a year and is based on Commandant Gen. David Berger’s plan for revamping the service for future conflicts.
Under Berger’s vision, grunts will be expected to fight in small units that will be highly mobile and independent, and often dispersed far from headquarters. The new course is aimed at giving rookie Marines the tactical and cognitive skills to act on their own, and takes a “fundamentally different approach” than its eight-week predecessor, the Corps said.
“To be more dispersed and more precise, we need privates now that can operate by themselves and don’t have to be told and shown where to go all the time,” said Lt. Col. Walker Koury, the training battalion’s commander.
The unit’s Alpha Company is taking the course first before a second one launches at Camp Lejeune, N.C., later this spring. It’s expected to alternate two more cycles between the east and west coasts before being finalized next year, the statement said.
Already about double the length of the course it’s meant to replace, the pilot is expected to eventually grow to 18 weeks, USNI News reported late last year. The added time and a dedicated combat instructor to lead each squad of 14 Marines allows for more practical application and repetitions, the service said in its statement.
Reflecting the transition from the industrial era to the information age, the Marine Corps’ seeks to shift from creating what Koury described to USNI News as “automatons” to what Pascuiti has called “autonomous Marines.”
“Through freedom of thought and freedom of action … they’ll have a higher level of understanding,” Pasciuti said. “Rather than ‘Do a thing because I said so,’ it’s ‘get to a fundamental end state, and here are the tools that can help you achieve that goal.’”
After initial training on a topic, Marines will be expected to apply their own thinking the next time it comes up. Instead of following itemized gear lists and being marched where they need to be, they’ll be expected to be more responsible for themselves throughout the course.
Playing chess is meant to encourage them to think about their actions in a complex environment. They’ll also no longer be trained in terms of narrow specialties such as rifleman, machine gunner, mortarman or anti-tank missileman, but instead will be expected to be proficient in every company-level weapon by graduation.
“The infantry Marine of the future will be able to do all (the skills of the specialties) and understand when and where that skill needs to be applied,” said Staff Sgt. Jude Stewart, the lead marksmanship instructor for Alpha Company.
During the first nine weeks, trainees will learn individual skills in weapons handling, land navigation and radio communications, mainly using the M27 Infantry Automatic Rifle.
Later weeks of the training will focus on testing the Marines’ knowledge while they work in fire teams and squads, learning to patrol over complex terrain and employ fire and maneuver tactics. Students also will lead several force-on-force actions during the latter phase.
“What we have to recognize is these young Marines, through a collective of individuals, will win the day for us,” Pasciuti said.
OKAY, let me have it, tell me I’m all screwed up.
Originally posted 2021-02-24 16:56:29.
The article mentioned the Commandant’s vison. Given this action and other previous ones, IE: removing armor and arty, makes one wonder if General Berger has had his checked lately?
With so many Leaders, who will follow orders? I guess you won’t need followers since everybody is their own leader. Duh
LOL, You have Lewis, Heck, we don’t need them followers, we’ll all lead up the hill
As the United States slowly moves away from warriors to robots, the question may be academic. Yet another nail in our coffin.
Yes sir!!
Hello Colonel,
Couple things came to mind reading this article.
First, looking for the intelligent and “smart” Marine was something that I was told was the first priority in selecting Combines Action Group (CAG) volunteers in Viet Nam. The most important criteria in CAGs infancy was getting experienced combat marines. Experience made them smart and able to survive In out of the way villages with little support.
Secondly, I can see this “training” being convoluted into a classification rating like that misbegotten “human relations” training. If you completed the training you get 10 ‘smart’ points toward promotion. Doesn’t matter if you have a room temperature or not, your qualified!
Bill
AGREED!!!!
” Jack of all trades, master of NONE”.
When the squad leader is dead, we want the next man to be able to take charge … whether corporal, lance corporal, or PFC.
Yes, but I do not like the inference that he will think for himself and not do things because he is told to. I “may” be able to see some form of this sort of thing taught in NCO schools, Squad Ldr courses, and SNCO Academies, but in SOI? Come on.
Hmmm show me Marine recruits or any non rates that won’t screw that BS up for that narrative lol the bureaucrat’s will definitely regret that one Semper Fidelis….I was in the first group of motor t on camp Lejeune to “test the hummer” we destroyed hummers in the field cuz they said we couldn’t. LMAO …it’s earned and never flexible
Headlines the past few days indicate 1/3 of DOD personnel refuse Covid vaccine. They get to choose? I never had an option in 30 plus years of enlisted/officer service. Yes, smarter privates, who obviously can say “No.” I wouldn’t let anyone I love be all they can be. The woke military is, in a word, woke.
While I think….. All Marines should be proficient in more than one weapon, I don’t know if chess is the answer – we don’t fight wars on the field with PLAYSTATION and other non lethal attempts to game – ize the enemy.
Let the NCO’s be on the same level as they train the non NCO’s but they need to show superiority in levels of knowledge and seniority…Leadership does not come from the bottom.
Keep em coming Colonel – well done
I want smarter Marines. I want Marines that have more self discipline. The days should go in which all the recruits tested high with GCT would go to the high tech MOSs, of which there many more now. They use to put way too many kids with low IQ in the grunts and as box kickers. I want troops to lead. Heck, Jim, you were an infantry platoon cmdr as a buck Sgt. We want our privates to follow us because they respect and do not want to let us down. I would rather have a company of really smart Marines than one of two hundred not so bright ones. What say you? I want smarter SNCOs too.
I don’t know Tad, I’m on the fence on this one. Times have changed greatly since we were ion active duty. Haven’t stayed on top of things like most Marianne have. I just get what fo9lks send me. Don’t read either magazine, or Military Times or the Stars and Stripes. As far as I am concerned, I’m just “Jim” no longer the Col unless of course it’s official and I must. Having said that I loved my CAT IV’s, loved them dearly, tell them to “GET OUTSIDE” and they’d crash through the closed windows because you didn’t tell them to use the hatch. I also loved the smart ones, Hell I loved them all, they were my kids, my family, we respected each other; some probably looked at me as the maybe the father they never had as I got older.
The downside of the CAT IV was if he found a home and fell in love and decided he wanted to make the Corps his life. That was okay if he got smarter, took some courses, learned to be smart. And many did especially with his leader’s tutelage. But those that didn’t have that kind of leader and did nothing to help themselves never made it past SSgt and retired on twenty. I know we both saw lots of those types. Okay, where the hell am I going with this tome?
These efforts to make the private smarter may seem sensible to many, and I “may be” able to see “some” benefit in it, but some of the inferences made by those they interviewed scare the hell out of me e.g., “rather than ‘Do a thing because I said so.” Why are they going after the 17-19 year olds and not the NCOs and SNCOs? I see this as more of the touchy feely BS we are seeing and saw back in the early 70’s with the Human Relations training. I don;t know, there is something about it I do not like. But as I said at the beginning, this is a different time than we served. Perhaps I should have sent this in an email to you, but maybe it will stimulate some more discussion. I see that Mustang appears to like it, that was a surprise.
Ok, you may be screwed up. But so are the rest of us who are retired. The only thing I could possibly get out of this article is the hope of winning at playing games. Possibly some sort of strategy but it will not work without proper field training. I can see that the USMC is now catching up with the Army in lackluster leadership in the NCO and Officer ranks. It also appears that none of the services need any rank over an E4 as that is when the upper ranks get real stupid. Kow-towing to the trainees hurt feelings will not make better Soldiers, Sailors, Marines or Airmen. So you may be screwed up as we could not possibly know better.
AND this is the kind of touchy feely, La-La land kind of thinking you get with the Managers are in charge and the LEADERS have been shunted aside until the next war when they will be needed to un-screw up all the crap the managers have done to our Corps! Happens after every war throughout our history.