Military

COLLECTIVE SKILLS

LEADER SKILLS

In addition, chemical platoon leaders feel left out of the brigade planning process, and chemical soldiers often feel under utilized or neglected. Leaders can avoid many of these difficulties with a little foresight. Preparing for successful deployments or exercises is a constant process. We, as leaders, must make the connection from past training exercises or deployments to integrate crucial events into our home-station training scenarios. FM 25-100, Training the Force, describes the after-action process which includes retraining. Let's not forget this important step.

SOME RECOMMENDED KEYS FOR SUCCESS

1. Build a strong working relationship with the brigade and battalion staff at home station.

• Cultivate relationships with the entire staff at home station. As a result, the staff will recognize you as a valuable and reliable member of the team during more stressful times. The wrong time to give the brigade staff a class on the proper integration of chemical assets to support a brigade task force is during a JRTC rotation.

• Learn about special requirements and tendencies of the staff. Set up an office call with the task force executive officer or operations officer to discuss your role as a member of the team. Since their expertise is maneuver of combat assets, sometimes they are unawareof all the capabilities or they are too busy to recall the specifics we bring to the combined arms team.

2. Be tactically and technically proficient.

• Know Army doctrine and master your area of expertise.

• Know your platoon's capabilities and know your platoon's equipment.

• Know how and when to use smoke.

• Make a quick reference chart with pertinent data such as fog oil and fuel consumption rates, smoke-pot consumption rates, time to process vehicles through a decontamination point, water requirements, and additional support requirements.

• Be ready to brief your unit's capabilities.

3. Plan.

• Get involved in the brigade's planning process early. Furthermore, offer the doctrinal task and purpose for your section during the unit's wargaming. Standing by and allowing an inexperienced Brigade S3 or Assistant S3 to assign our task and purpose usually leads to the incorrect integration of chemical/smoke assets into the combat team.

• Incorporate smoke, NBC reconnaissance, and decontamination operations into the plan.

• Ensure that decontamination site reconnaissance is conducted and make it a priority.

• Develop an extensive decontamination site reconnaissance plan by phases.

• Integrate NBC (FOX) reconnaissance into the brigade collection plan and know how and when to use it.

• Know the tactical scenario.

• Do your Intelligence Preparation of the Battlefield (IPB).

• Keep everyone informed, both higher and lower.

• Attend the Leadership Training Program (LTP) at Fort Polk, LA.

• Deploy with adequate personnel and equipment. Fill vacancies and include a wheeled-vehicle mechanic (63B) and a chemical equipment repairman (63J).

• Bring PLL stockage of critical parts.

• Make sure you address your class IV and class V requirements.

• Conduct a thorough Pre-Combat Inspection (PCI) prior to deployment.

4. Prepare.

• Practice makes perfect. Therefore, rehearsals are a must.

• Battle drills are very beneficial. Tasks, such as React to Enemy Air Attack, React to Indirect Fire, and React to an Ambush, should be second nature. They allow squads and platoons to perform critical tasks instantly because they have practiced repetitively. They reduce the communications requirements because soldiers don't have to rely on someone telling them what to do.

5. Execute. Synchronize and integrate the platoon with the Brigade Combat Team.

6. Refine and Retrain.

• Refine your SOPs.

• Correct shortcomings immediately in your short range training plans and sustain in your long range calendar.

In conclusion, do not reinvent the wheel to prepare your unit for a rotation to one of the combat training centers. Talk to those who have gone before you and learn from their mistakes. There are tremendous resources available today that document the positive and negative trends at each CTC. A little research on your part can help in identifying the training necessary, justify the resources and time needed for specific training at each level and gain greater emphasis on chemical operations at the planning table. Demonstrating the knowledge gained from your research to the planners will help integrate your assets into the combined arms team. Most important, come to the planning table knowledgeable and prepared. Train at home station and reinforce home-station training at the CTCs. As a result, increased knowledge will help your confidence, unit performance will improve proportionally to the time spent in preparation, and you will enjoy a very successful and rewarding exercise with the payoff being a better trained unit and soldiers feeling that they are an intregal part of the operation and making a significant contributions to the effort.

IPB With a Purpose

Engagement Area Development and Battlefield Calculus