2008 08 19 Team Griffin Photo

Team Griffin Photo

Bottom Row (Left to Right): MSG Ortiz, SFC Berry, SFC Gamble, MAJ Hardy, CPT Vasquez.
Middle Row (Left to Right): MAJ Staats, COL Holdren, CPT (P) Mai, SSG Zimmerman, CPT Eddy, SSG Ortiz, SFC Villareal, SSG Welles.
Top Row (Left to Right): CPT Frederick, CPT Robles.

MiTT Training Week 4

Monday, Team Griffin began training this week with crew served weapons Primary Marksmanship Instruction. Team Griffin learned how to assemble and disassemble the M240, 7.62mm Machine Gun and the M2 .50 caliber Machine Gun. We also learned how to load, shoot, perform immediate action and clear the weapon systems. For the .50 cal Machine Gun we learned how to set the "head space" and "timing" for the weapon system.

In the afternoon Team Griffin conducted a Electronic Simulation Trainer for qualifying with the M4 rifle. It's a very "high speed" electronic marksmanship trainer similar to a large video game. It simulated the M4 qualification tables we were to fire on Tueday.

Tuesday, Team Griffin qualified with the M9 pistol and the M4 assault rifle. Team Griffin also qualified with the M4 assault rifle at night. For some reason the buses were not scheduled for the night fire range. All the bus drivers had to get called in for an "emergency" mission. It didn't affect the running of the night range. We all made it out there just prior to nightfall. However, with 128 people needing to get qualified that night, the night range went until 3am. Luckily for us, the schedule allowed us to sleep in for Wednesday morning. Other teams were not as fortunate.

Wednesday, Team Griffin cleaned weapons. MSG Ortiz organized a BBQ for the team.

Thursday, Team Griffin went out to qualify with the M2 .50 cal Machine Gun; both day and night.
Team Griffin needed to qualify a minimum of two members. Team Griffin qualified six for the day and four at night. SFC Ortiz learned an important lesson during the day fire portion of the range. Don't touch the barrel when picking up the brass from on top of vehicle !!! (I think he now has a permanent "browning machine gun" mark on his hand). The night range did not finish until 1.30 am... so it was 2 am before we were back to the barracks. This time Team Griffin was not so fortunate with the schedule, we had a 5 am wake up call so we can eat and make the 06.15 hrs bus to the M240 range.

Friday morning, started very early for Team Griffin. The team got no more than 3 1/2 hours sleep before waking up, getting breakfast and loading up the bus for the M240, 7.62mm range. Team Griffin needed to qualify a minimum of fourof its members on the M240. Team Griffin qualified five. The night range finished at 23.00 hrs and we were back in the barracks by 23.30 hrs. A very tired Team Griffin went immediately too bed. Fortunately for us, Saturday was a free day and allowed all of us to sleep in.

This week's "Shocking Lesson Learned" -- Math is a very important skill set to know

Why is Math sooooooooooo very important?
Well... if a person knows math, then a person can plan things better.

Let me give you two examples:

Example one: Loading a bus of full grown men

Yes, it's true a school bus has 12 rows of seats (total of 24 seats). Certain seats can only carry one person but the majority can carry two. So, mathematically the seating capacity for a yellow school bus is approximately 42 people. However, there is a little mathematical trick with these yellow school buses. These yellow school buses maximum gross weight is 16,000 pounds. A standard car sitting in your driveway weighs 3-4,000 pounds, therefore, a yellow school bus probably weighs in at somewhere closed to 11-12,000 pounds. Mathematically, that leaves no more than 5,000 pounds for passengers.

A grown man... say "me" for example, weighs 170 lbs. (in PT gear). But I'm not wearing PT gear. I'm carrying a pistol, an M4 assault rifle, IBA which alone weighs at least 35 pounds and I'm taking a small ruck sack of gear. In total that adds about 45 lbs to my weight. I think I'm one of the lighter guys on the team, but for the sake of argument lets say I'm just about average. That would make the average person getting on the bus 215 lbs. Hmmmmm.... So, if 16,000 lbs is the maximum gross weight, and the bus itself weighs 11,000 lbs empty.... then the bus maxes out at 5,000 lbs worth of passengers. At 215 lbs per person, that means no more than 23 people should load the bus.

Guess how many buses the "Tranportation Manager" orders for 105 people to go out to the range?
Answer: 3... YES THREE.... Remember, mathematically the bus has enough seats to carry 42 passengers. It's just that the "Transportation Manager" doesn't read the fine print... called maximum load capacity.

Using my assumption that the average person on the bus weighs 215 lbs x 35 people on the bus... that gives you 7525 lbs. Add the bus weight of 11,000 lbs you get a total of 18,525 lbs. Or... 2525 lbs overweight.

Which would explain why the Yellow School Bus was more like the "little engine that could" when it came to climbing Custer Hill (I think I can, I think I can, I think I can....)

Oh... and just as a side note... it really sucks to be crammed in like a bunch of sardines in 90 + degrees of heat to travel 30 minutes to the range in a bus that can barely drive up a hill. For more info on my original comments with regard to Ft. Riley's Transporation Manager... please see my blog dated 20 June (The Bus Ride).


Example 2: Estimating Range Qualification Times.

In this example we will examine why it's important in scheduling to use math. While the rule of thumb that one range takes approximately one day to qualify a large group of people is true... A military planner could actually do much better than that if he used MATH !!!

For example, a planner could use the following information to build an actual schedule for a range, in order to maximize everyone's time, and not just the time of the people running the range.

The bus takes approximately 30 minutes to get to the range.
It takes the average crew approximately an hour and a half to set up the range.
The average crew starts showing up at the range around 07.00 hrs and 07.30 hrs.
Meaning the first firing order won't be ready to fire until ~ 08.30 hrs.
If the range isn't ready to fire until 08.30 hrs or 09.00 hrs...
A planner might calculate that the bus shouldn't have to depart until 08.00 hrs. But to be safe 07.30 hrs should be plenty of time. A planner who used this type of math would have been much more valuable in my opinion, compared to the planner who decided the buses should leave at 06.15 hrs each morning.

The M4 and M2 Firing tables take approximately 15 minutes from start to finish. It also takes about 5 minutes to change firing orders. Therefore, running at peak optimum performance a range with 15 firing stations can qualify no more than 45 soldiers in any given hour. (The real average was close to 30 soldiers every hour). Therefore, you really don't need all 105 people to show up at once. A planner, who would have been able to make this type of calculation and therefore only send out the first 3 firing orders; followed by the next firing order every 30 minutes to rotate the folks in and out of the range, would have been extremely valuable.
It wouldn't have taken more buses, but it would have required the buses move back and forth more often.

Finally, it would have been no surprise to the planner that knew how to apply MATH, that the night ranges that attempted to qualify 105 or more soldiers will take a much longer time than it takes to qualify 75 soldiers. This is quite an unfortunate error, because the one 2LT that was praised for running an efficient range that ended an hour and half earlier than the range run by his peer; didn't truly run a more efficient range. He just had fewer people that needed to qualify, and therefore finished faster.

Hopefully, I've demonstrated the point, that math is truly an important skill set to have on your team.
If for no other reason... it might save you some grief, if properly used.

MDMP and COL Holdren's Leadership Philosophy

Monday, 27 July, Team Griffin conducted a "in-progress review" of their Military Decision Making Process (MDMP) brief to COL Holdren. The task: To make a recommendation for Team Griffin's unit coin.

COL Holdren had Team Griffin follow the Military Decision Making Process to train the staff in using MDMP in making recommendations to senior leaders. The in-progress review (or IPR) was very useful for both the staff and the Team Chief. The Team Chief was able to see what information had been found on developing, procuring and purchasing a coin. The staff was able to confirm or deny some of the assumptions it made.

The key take-away from this IPR was that if Team Griffin wanted to have the coins available before we deploy to Iraq, a decision on the coin design and the order must be processed by 31 July 2009. Otherwise, Team Griffin would have to have the coins shipped to Iraq and pay an additional 10% in fees. That one key fact made the "coin decision" a priority for this week. Which will be a challenging task for the staff considering there are 3 night ranges planned for this week !!!

After the IPR, COL Holdren introduced Team Griffin to his Leadership Philosophy and his concept or "model" of Military Leadership. Below is COL Holdren's "Military Leadership Pyramid" framework:


Military Leadership can be viewed as a pyramid with four levels.

Leaders at all ranks apply all 4 levels. However, the leader’s primary leadership role is focused at one of the 4 levels depending on his rank.

Level 1 is “Fundamental Leadership” which lays the foundation of military leadership. This is the “Be, Know, Do” of leadership. The US military relies on the NCO Corps to instill this type of leadership. That is why the the NCO Corps is considered the “backbone” (or foundation) of military leadership.

Level 2 is “Tactical Leadership” and it’s mostly applied by the military’s Company Grade Officers. This style of leadership is often branded as the “Follow me” approach. Leaders lead from the front. They set the example. The are also charged with inspecting and verifying the mission is accomplished.

Level 3 is “Operational Leadership” and it’s mostly applied by the military’s Field Grade Officers. This is where the leader transforms himself from being the primary “doer” to being the leader that guides, mentors and coaches his junior leaders.

Level 4 is “Strategic Leadership” and it’s mostly applied by the military’s General Officers. These leaders set and inspire a vision. They focus more on the art of persuasion, negotiation, compromise and influence. Decisions at this level are mostly made by establishing a consensus.

As one goes up the Pyramid from one level of leadership to another the decision required goes from being “Black and White” to more and more shades of gray.

Fewer and fewer leaders are required to make higher level decisions as you go up the pyramid. But even as you go up the Pyramid, a senior leader must be capable of exercising leadership at the lower the levels.

COL Holdren Leadership Principles and Philosophy

On Leadership.
-- NCO Corps: Fundamental Leadership – “Be – Know – Do”; Set and enforce high standards
-- Company Grade: Tactical Leadership – “Follow Me”; Set the Example, Lead from the front, Inspect and Verify.
-- Field Grade: Operational Leadership – Guide, Mentor and Teach. Allow decisions to be at the lowest level possible, but always retain the right to “veto” a decision.
-- The Generals: Strategic Leadership – The art of persuasion, negotiation, compromise, and influence. Decisions made by consensus.

My Leadership Principles
-- Be Visionary. Inspire those under you to achieve a common goal
-- Set Goals and be Results Oriented. Know where you want go, set the direction and stay the course.
-- Be Decisive. Don’t allow other people to make your decisions.
-- Be Visible and Involved. If your soldiers must do it, then so should you.
-- Be a good listener. Seek first to understand, then to be understood.
-- Be Pro-active. Anticipate what must be done and do it.
-- Be Optimistic. People want to associate themselves with the doers, not the complainers.
-- Be Honest, Fair, and Firm. Respect is more important than popularity.
-- Avoid procrastination. Get it done, NOW.
-- Live the Army Values. Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honesty, Integrity and Personal Courage.

My Leadership Philosophy
-- The “Golden Rule”: Lead others as you would want others to lead you.
-- The leader’s job is to make the tough choices; the easy ones will have already been made.
-- Understand and enforce Decision Authority. Know who the decision maker is. If it’s you, then make your decisions well known. If it’s not you, make recommendations. If there is no decision authority, assume you’re the decision maker.
-- The Decision maker’s job is to manage risk. Decision makers make decisions under the conditions of a volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous environment. Follow your gut, take acceptable risk, mitigate the risks you’ve identified, but most importantly… DECIDE and COMMUNICATE that decision.
-- At some point in time even a “non-decision” becomes a decision. Know what the “default decision” will be, and at what time a “non-decision” becomes the “default decision”.
-- Create and establish Strong Alliances. Remember loyalty and trust only exists if it goes in both directions.
-- Challenge your subordinates. Set high standards. Praise and Reward them.

References:
Lincoln on Leadership… Executive Strategies for Tough Times; by Donald T. Phillips.
How to Win Friends and Influence People; by Dale Carnegie.
The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People; by Steven Covey
Powell’s 18 Leadership Principles; by Oren Harari (and GEN (R) Colin Powell)

Week 3 in Pictures

Below are some pictures and a video highlights of Team Griffin's Week 3 - MiTT training.
A more descriptive detail of what happened during week 3 is written in yesterday's previous blog entry.



Thursday, 23 Jul 09: Team Griffin getting ready for Driver's Training
(Pictured from left to right: CPT Frederick, CPT Robles, CPT (P) Mai and MAJ Staats).

The "Roll-over Drill Trainer". The purpose of this trainer is to familiarize the soldiers with the roll-over procedures of a HWWMV. The trainer will first put you at a 22 degree angle on the driver's and passenger side. An up-armored HWWMV will rollover once it hits a 22 degree angle.

The trainer will then conduct a full 360 degree roll, followed by a 180 degree roll. The trainer will stop up-side down. Personnel in the trainer will need to unlock their release the door lock, unlock their seat belt and exit the vehicle.

Saturday, 25 Jul 09, Team Griffin spent the morning conducting Primary Marksmanship Instruction. Above is MAJ Hardy, demonstrating how a real shot group should look like.

Above is SSG Welles, demonstrating how a good prone supported foxhole position.

And finally, after 2 hours of instruction, Team Griffin prepares for the M9, Pistol familiarization training.

MiTT Training Week 3 - (Murphy Week)

I'm going to warn the reader up front. It was a very busy week for Team Griffin and "Murphy" was in full play this week. The training we received was excellent. The execution given the conditions was very good. The soldiers conducting the trainnig were first rate. The logistics and overall planning for this week was a total failure and did not meet acceptable standards.

Monday started in the nomal 1st Bn 16th Infantry way - a 0600 hrs formation. After formation we were all told to be in our designated spots no later than 08.00 hrs and that the buses would leave at 08.15 hrs with or without us on the bus. The bus would take us up the hill to main post for our individual "skill set" training (Medical, Commo, Blue Force Tracker, Logistics, etc).

At 08.00 hrs the troops formed up as required.
By 08.15 hrs... No Bus.
By 08.30 hrs... No Bus... and the Delta Company 1/16 INF Commander's and 1SG are scrambling to figure out what's going on.
By 08.45 hrs... D Co 1/16 INF ISG tells us there was a mix-up in the scheduling and that the buses are on their way (The bus parking lot is no more than 200 meters from our barracks).
08.55 hrs... buses start showing up.

Once we got on the bus. We found out that our bus driver didn't know where to drive us, except for somewhere up the hill. We gave him the Building number of the place we were supposed to go, based on what was on our training schedule (Building 77462). So, the bus driver takes us to building 77460. By this time it's 09.20 hrs. The trainers for the medics were wondering where we were, and met the bus and took the medical folks to their training site (to a different building).

The Blue Force Tracker folks dismounted the bus, found Building 77462, entered the building and asked where the Blue Force Tracker training was supposed to be. No one knew. The training scheduled in Building 77462 was the Combat Lifesaver's Course. So, we exited the building and started wandering around. Some of us went across the street to Building 77465 (a brand new building with a security fence) and we found out that this was the place for the Blue Force Tracker training. The instructors had been waiting for 30 minutes. Once we corralled everybody in, they started the training. The retired 1SG who gave the class, was excellent, very professional and he taught the class very well. You can tell he was very knowledgeable with the system.

Tuesday, there was a scheduled VTC for 20 of the MiTT Chiefs to talk about manning issues with Department of the Army - Human Resouces Command and MNC-I. The VTC was scheduled at 09.00 hrs and was routed through an international line (via Stuttart, Germany). However, the phone in the Brigade's VTC suite did not have IDSN (International DSN) access. Therefore, we were unable to "dial in" to the conference. The VTC suite could dial any CONUS number, but there were no CONUS lines availabe to handle the VTC. So we had to postpone the VTC until Wednesday.

Also on Tuesday... You would think 1/16 INF would have the bus scheduled fixed... No.
The buses didn't show until 08.55 hrs this time as well. Half the Blue Force Tracker class didn't wait for the bus and took there POVs instead. Only a handful of folks actually took the bus. I ended up taking a taxi to the class, because there was no plan to get us MiTT Chiefs to where we needed to go after the VTC (the VTC that never happened, that is).

Wednesday... Both soda machines and the Ice Cream machine in the Dining Facility broke down. Which might have been a good thing... since those items aren't the most healthy for us !!! Interestingly, the morale of the Dining Facility workforce was more worse than the soldiers'.

Thursday... Team Griffin began it's driver's familiarization training. The training facility is roughly 1 mile from the barracks. (Remember, the bus lot, with about 50 buses, is 200 meters away). When we were here prepping for our Leader's Recon, we were bused to this location. This time we had to walk, while the Delta Company Commander and 1SG drove to the site to "check on training". On this day Team Griffin conducted roll-over drill training, PMCS familiarization, Change a tire familiarization and techniques for towing a disabled vehicle familiarization. The class of about 115 of us received an hour's worth of instruction on the training we were about to conduct. We then split into 3 smaller groups to exectue the roll-over training, familiarization training and the day-time driving familiarization. Most of our time was spent waiting in the cue for our 8-10 minutes worth of training.

Thursday night we did night time familiarization. Here, we find out the the OC's had to turn in their Night Vision goggles last week. So they didn't have night vision goggles and had to borrow ours. The first group of vehicles that went out for training... one of the vehicles ran into a ditch and nearly flipped the vehicle. I don't know if the OC was wearing night vision goggles or not. But my guess is, he wasn't. It took about 30 minutes to recover the vehicle and continue the training.

Friday... We received 3 hours of classroom instruction on Pre-Combat Checks/ Inspections, Troop Leading Procedures, Battle Drills and convoy tactics, techniques and procedures. This was all done in a hangar facility, in 90+ degrees heat and two high power fans blowing. This instruction was probably one of our most important classes, but the training environment was not conducive to any constructive learning. After the 3 hours of instruction we broke for lunch. Once again we had to walk 1 mile back and forth to the training site. We got a little smarter this time; we had one vehicle carry our IBE (which weighs approximately 45 pounds) and we carried only our weapons back and forth.

Before we broke for chow, the Delta Company Commander drove to the training site and asked to speak to all us MiTT Chiefs. Once he gathered us all in one group he asked us to tell our soldiers to refrain from parking in the parking spots next to the row of Company office trailers. His soldiers had no place to park and had to walk 100 meters to work !!!

Obviously, it's this Company Commander's opinion that it is a complete "NO GO" and failure of leadership on the MiTT Chief's part, to make regular army soldiers walk 100 meters to their place of duty, but it's ok to have "trainees" walk a mile back and forth to class !!!

(honestly... I didn't realize this was the "leadership" lesson I was going to learn while training for this mission).

Guess what the Dining Facility decided to do during lunch on this Friday? They decided to take a survey on what we thought of the facility and the food !!!

If you've been following this week so far... you can only imagine what's sitting on those survey forms. The honest truth about the dining facility - It's under resourced. It's smaller than the facilities on top of the hill. It's busier then the facilities on top of the hill. It has a smaller workforce. It doesn't carry the same quality of food. There are many shortages. And the workers at times have an attitude. But the root problem is... the facility is under-resourced for the soldiers it's supposed to support.

Friday afternoon began the IED lanes. This is where we go out on a patrol and react to a roadside IED that hasn't gone off. And then we react to one that has, where we must recover the disabled vehicle. Since, Team Griffin was the 7th team in the "pecking order" to go out, we had 2 hours to talk over and rehearse how we would conduct the mission. The NCO that OC'd Team Griffin was absolutely superior. He listened to our "game plan" pointed out some weaknesses to it, and helped us improve it. He also watched our rehearsal and asked questions to see if everyone knew what their role was supposed to be. He also helped us think through alternate plans and alternate responsibilities. He was a tremendous asset to our training.

We also learned that most of the HWWMVs the unit had for this training had been shipped to JRTC. And because the mission was being shipped to JRTC so has the funding. So, simple things like having night vision goggles or ordering speakers for the radios can't be resourced. The old standard had been that Team Griffin would have been issued our vehicles in the first 3 days of our training. But now we must wait for the class ahead of us to finish before we will get issued the vehicles. So for now, we're short vehicles. This is true for both the OCs and the classes going through the training.

Saturday... we again walked 1 mile to receive our Primary Marksmanship Instruction. We broke off into four groups and conducted the training round robin style. Team Griffin was scheduled to go through the Electronic Simulation Trainer, which is a "shoot or don't shoot" simulation, at 12.00 hrs. We showed up early to see if we could go through the simulation first and then eat at a more liesurely pace, since weapons turn-in wouldn't be until 14.30 hrs. But no one was at the training facility when we checked at 11.20 hrs. Team Griffin ate lunch and returned at 11.55 hrs for training. The facility was still locked up and no one in sight. We called D 1/16 IN 1SG to find out if we were at the wrong location. The ISG was unable to contact the folks who run the training. At 12.30 hrs, we got word the training was cancelled and to show back up at 14.30 hrs to turn in weapons.

So, basically this week started out with a failure to coordinate for buses and ended with a failure to coordinate a facility. For the two months of being here... this is just a "standard" week for 1st Bde's training mission at Camp Funston. Next week is range week... Oh Joy !!!

On a serious note, this week adds more evidence that this training mission is severely under-resourced. Some aspects of the training is absolutely first rate while other parts simply do not meet the Army Standard. It won't mean we won't be ready to deploy. It just means the training is not to the standard you'd expect from a professionally run organization.

MiTT Training - Week 2

This week Team Griffin spent three days (mon - wed) learning how to operate and program the different radio systems we will work with downrange and we spent three days (Thu - Sat) taking the combat lifesavers course. Pictured above are members of Team Griffin preparing learning how to initiate a "Saline Block" and establish an IV.

Below is a short video that demonstrates the process we learned... (we all survived, by the way).

SSG Welles won the "Pin Cushion" award since he had to be "sticked" three times before a successful "saline block" could be established. CPT Robles won the "Red Badge of Courage" award for losing the most blood during a "saline block" procedure. (He still hasn't washed the blood stains from his trousers). CPT Mai won the "Michael Jackson's Glove" award for it taking him six attempts before successfully putting on his surgical gloves.

Also, during this week, the team formally presented its Military Decision Making Process brief on the Team's name. The team recommended Team Griffin. So now we are officially "Team Griffin". The next MDMP decision will be on the Team's coin.

After the Combat Lifesaver's Course completed, the instructors asked me to fill out a critique form. My critique of this course is similar to our critique of the other courses being taught here at Camp Funston.

The one thing we have decided to do, is to develop a honest critique of this course to assist the Army in developing a first class "Military Advisor Training" course. Two re-occuring themes are emerging:

1. The military advisor course should be set up very similar to the old CAS3 course. The Army should put some serious consideration into making a Military Advisor an additional skill identifier. Once established, a certain percentage of CSL positions should have Military Advisor as an additional Skill Identifier.

2. The MiTT training here at Camp Funston is under-resourced in manning, facilities, and equipment. For example, the dining facility has run out of certain types of food (wheat bread, Tuna fish, cereals), and the ratio of cooks to soldiers being served is significantly higher than on the main post. The instructor to student ratio of the combat lifesaver has gone from 1 instructor per 6 students to 1 instructor to 18 students.

MiTT Training - Week 1

Week 1 Training for Team Griffin focused on learning Iraqi Arabic, Iraqi Culture, and an introduction to being an advisor to a foriegn military force (or security force, national police or border police). The training is all classroom focused. Lots of power point. Class 77 is broken down into smaller groups of 3-4 MiTTs of approximately 30 people. Team Griffin's small group is being taught by a team of 4 small group instructors. Two military and two contractor. One of the military small group instructors is from JRTC and he's observing how Ft. Riley conducts the training. The instructors did a good job in presenting the material. It's very hard to keep 30 soldiers focused on power point briefings 6-8 hours a day. But they kept it interesting.

Initial impressions of the MiTT training are:

1. Leader's Recon (or Pre-Deployment Site Survey) is essential for MiTT Chiefs or their designated representative. As the Army moves towards the new concept of imbedding it's Military Advisors into the Brigade Combat Team, those advisors should be sent downrange for a Leader's Recon to meet with the teams they will replace and meet their Iraqi counterpart they will advise. Only in this way, will they have some knowledge of what they will need to know prior to deploying downrange.

2. Military Advisor Training must be set up to look more like a formal TRADOC school vice looking like a "national training center". It's ok to have the "school" located at the training centers but the focus should not be "training center centric". As Team Griffin goes through it's tactical training drills, more comment can be made on how much "maneuver training" is required vice "school house" training.

3. The Chief of Staff of the Army has identified the skill set of "Military Advisor" as being a critical skill set for the Army inventory. The Army should consider developing a standard "Military Advisor" training school (course) that combined with an operational deployment, gives the soldier an "additional skill indentifier" as a "Combat Advisor". The Army can also consider setting aside "x" percent of higher level assignments (CSL positions) to be filled with officers with that additional skill set identifier. A Military Advisor course should be formal and should be patterned more like the old CAS3 course.

4. Soldiers attending the course should be treated like the soldiers the Army sends to ILE, JPME, the War College, the Old CAS3 course, Pre-command course or the Sargeant Major's Academy. It should be a well structured school: resourced, man, trained and equipped to handle the level of soldiers needed to go through the school.

5. Recommend training be conducted in small groups the size of MiTT teams (10-15 soldiers) and be modelled similar to the small group instruction done by the old CAS3 or the US Army War College. Non-graded, self taught, focused on teaching eachother the material and learning from each other's experience. The modified military decision making process for Military Advisor's should be practiced just like MDMP was practiced for all decisions in CAS3.

6. The MiTT training conducted at Ft. Riley is under-resourced, under-manned and doesn't have the emphasis you would expect given the Chief of Staff of the Army e-mail on the importance of "Military Advisors".

Starting with class 79, JRTC will assume the mission of training advisors. Team Griffin recommends that JRTC focus on professionalizing the Military Advisory Course in the above manner.


-----Update on manning:-----

Team Griffin acquired two additions to the team over the weekend, bringing us from 11 members to 13. On the "bench team" there are two combat arms officers (a Major and a Captain). I'm requesting both them get added to Team Griffin, but that requires approval from the Department of the Army and Human Resources Command. We have a VTC scheduled for 21 July to discuss manning requirements.

4th of July Weekend

The 4th of July weekend, I spent at Camp Funston while most of the other folks on the team spent the weekends visiting family. Saturday and Sunday the MWR facility was closed, so Friday I went to the internet cafe at the MWR facility to get some Rosetta Stone Arabic lessons completed. The MWR internet cafe upgraded their "adobe player" so Rosetta Stone now runs. The speech recognition software isn't uploaded, so we (or I) can't practice speaking the language, but we (I) can at least practice listening and learn some Arabic that way.

I also tried the Defense Language Institute software the language team gave me. The DLI software is not as intuitive as the Rosetta Stone. So for right now, I prefer the Rosetta Stone way of learning.

On Friday evening I had a filling pop out of my tooth. So, saturday morning, I decided to walk to the Hospital emergency room to see if they were able to put a temporary filling on the tooth until tuesday, when the Dental clinic opens. The Hospital is about 3 miles from Camp Funston. It took me approximately 55 minutes to walk it. When I got to the hospital, the nurse on duty apologized, because they did not have the capability to put in a temp filling. They did offer me pain medication, but I told them that I didn't need it. I started my walk back to Camp Funston. On my way back a Ft. Riley police officer picked me up and gave me a ride back to Camp Funston.

Sunday, it was a cloudy day. I decided to see how far it would be to walk to the AAFES PX or mini mall. Since I knew generally which direction I needed to go, but not the exact way, I figured I might learn the lay of the land as well. So, I started my own personal "volksmarch" to the PX or mini mall, which ever place I came to first. One hour and 50 minutes later I reached the Dining Facility that is near the mini mall. Since I was hungry, I stopped there first and grabbed a bite to eat. The mini mall is only 5 minutes from the Dining Facility. So it takes approximately 1 hour 55 minutes to get to the mini mall from Camp Funston. I estimate it's about 6 miles. It was good exercise and a good time to just think and enjoy the open nature of Ft. Riley.

Even though it was cloudy out, I still got a bit sunburned. Even more surprising to me was that I got a few small blisters on my feet. I don't ever remember getting blisters walking in tennis shoes before. I remember going on a volksmarch every Saturday and playing a soccer game on Sunday, back when I was a Lieutenant in Germany. Now my body gets sore after walking 6 miles !!!

I quit playing soccer on a local German Team in 2006 when I started the Army War College's Distance Education Program. I couldn't do all the studying and make the soccer practices, so I gave up the soccer. While the soccer made me sore after every practice and game; it also kept me in very good athletic condition. These past 3 years of not playing soccer is certainly beginning to show !!!

Getting back into athletic condition will be important before deploying down range. I plan on using this time at Camp Funston to slowly get into better shape. Once I'm down range, I plan to continue working out.

Today, Steven and I will go out and do something together. Probably go out for dinner, and hopefully he will tell me how his weekend went. (He had a friend come visit this weekend !!!) He just sent me a text message saying he is on his way. So now I will go.

Official Hand-Off

Today, Class 77 has been officially handed over from D Co. 101st FSB to 1st Bn 16th Infantry. My team (ULN 10507) will now officially belong to D. Co 1/16th INF. Will be known as Team Kilo. So now the guys are joking about how to create a nickname that has both Kilo and Griffin in it.

I can hardly wait to see !!!

Tomorrow we will have some classes on the Rule of Law, the ROE and other legal matters. Then we will be released for a 4-day weekend.

7 July we'll start our cultural training. It will be another long 4-day weekend for me. The last 4-day weekend I had here (the Army's Birthday), I tried to log onto the Army's e-learning website only to find out that the computer's here at Camp Funston don't have the required "adobe player" and speech software to work. After bringing this to the attention of S-6 and commander, it still hasn't been fixed. The same problem exists. I'm being told the network is controlled via contract, and they haven't figured out how to get the contractors down here to fix the problem.

It's appalling to me, given how important "language" is to this mission, that this problem can not be fixed in a matter of minutes. All it takes is "admin rights permission" to downlaod the right software. This is crazy !!!

So, yet another 4-day weekend, where I could have put it to good use learning Arabic, I won't be able to. I suppose this would be ok if I were among the first classes coming through this place. But I'm class 77 !!! Hopefully they can get this right at JRTC. (that's where the next set of MiTTs will be trained).

Everyone is ready for this 4-day holiday to blow off some steam. I think we all anxious to start training and getting prepared for the MiTT mission ahead of us.

First Day with Team Griffin

After a long flight, we made it back to Camp Funston this Tuesday afternoon. I originally planned to have a dinner social with my team on Wednesday, but the XO recommended we do that tonight instead.

Therefore, a dinner social event we did. As of right now Team Griffin is manned with 10 of our 15 positions. Two positions were taken away by HRC and DA. Why they decided to take my two combat arms officer, I don't know. When I spoke to MNC-I, the rep for MNC-I told me that MNC-I took two soldiers out of each MiTT to conduct a test of principle in MND-S. That is probably why HRC and DA decided to do the same. However, no one in Iraq or at CENTCOM changed the MiTT requirements. Their expectation was that each MiTT would arrive in country fully manned and not degraded by one or two positions.

From my perspective, if you're going to short a unit. You're better off shorting the unit that has 5,000+ soldiers assigned to it, than shorting the unit that has 10-15 soldiers assigned to it. In the former case, the two soldiers are neglible, in the latter case, they are significant.

Based on my leader's recon, the two combat arms positions (maneuver trainer and Fires and Effects trainer) will be absolutely essential for the success of our mission. So we must fight to ensure those two slots are not forgotten. With regard to the other three slots we are missing. It is my expectation that they will be filled from the bench or a late arrival.

Once again, I'm not so impressed with how these MiTT are formed. Especially with the CSA's emphasis on these teams.

I'm very impressed with the 10 members I do have. They want to be here. They are excited to do their job and they are ready to be trained. They all have demonstrated the ability to take the initiative and and do what's right. I'm very proud of their service and proud to be associated with them.

Farewell to Mosul - Leader's Recon Complete

It is now time to say farewell to the current Griffin Military Transition Team and time for me to return to Ft. Riley to train the new Team - Griffin for the mission ahead.

In this picture, I'm standing next to one of the interprettors (John) that accompanied us through many of the patrols we conducted while I was at Camp India.

One particular patrol will stand out in my mind. That was our patrol of the University District of Mosul. The streets were completely void of people with only a few stragglers out to be noticed. Most were well hidden behind their fences or closed doors. It was a very eary feeling to watch a kid run up an ally and disappear. You can't help but wonder what the kid was up to and where he was going. The patrol was quiet and nothing significant happened. But you don't feel completely safe. It was far to quiet to feel that way.

The Leader's recon was very rewarding for me. It gave me a glimpse of what to expect, what to train for and what we will need to learn in the next coming months. Special Thanks to COL Jeff McClain and the rest of the Griffin team.

Jeff explained to me that the 2nd Iraqi Army Division MiTT team has always been call sign "Griffin" and while we might come up with our own "nickname" at Camp Funston, once we arrive in Iraq, we will be "Team Griffin".

I'll let the team back in Funston decide if they want to invent their own call sign while at Camp Funston, but once we arrive in Mosul, our call sign will be "Griffen" like the other MiTTs before us (it's not practical to change the call signs).

So, now you know how this blog came to be called.... Team Griffin.

Command and Control - The TOC

The MiTT's Tactical Operating Center appears to have the minimum capability it requires to monitor MiTT movements and communications with higher headquarters. However, I would like to look into getting some of the Common Operational Pictures, UAV feeds and if possible a Tandberg to improve the capability within the MiTT's TOC.

While I'm not sure if that will be possible. I can see that being very useful when it comes to monitoring post 30 June 2009 activities. After 30 June, US forces are no longer supposed to roam freely in the Iraqi cities. US Forces will require Iraqi escort to enter the city areas.

This is being heralded as great news for the Iraqi's. Iraqi units are deemed capable enough of controlling the cities and will now have that responsibility. American Forces will assist by controlling the non-populated regions. The intent is to give no safe havens for terrorists, with the Iraqi Forces securing the cities and the Coalition Forces securing outside the cities.

The next coming months will be a crucial test.

Dust Storms

Dust Storms are very common in Iraq. They had one practically every day that I was there. Not only does it effect visibility outside, it effects the living conditions inside. The dust easily penetrates through the doors of the warehouse building filling the place with Talcum powder-like dust particles.

The danger with the dust is that it's more like fecal matter that has dried in the hot desert sun, crumbled on by vehicles and foot and then spread all over the desert by the wind. Constant hand washing is necessary in this environment. I was warned that most, if not all members of the team will come down with some type of "Iraqi crud" which will make them sick, not for just a couple of days or weeks, but for months.

When I was deployed to Georgia, I remember COL Everett speaking about the same "Iraqi Crud". He insisted that his soldiers wash their hands and bodies 5, 7, 12 times a days and especially before eating. He said that is the only way to keep yourself from catching the "Iraqi Crud". In this case, I think his advice is spot on.

The MRAP

I was very pleased to see that the MiTT's vehicles will be the MRAP. It is designed to better protect the soldiers from the blasts of IEDs, making it more survivable. Another improvement is that the MRAP is air-conditioned. Making it more bearable in the hot Iraqi summer and for the crew members in the back of the vehicle. The MRAP is a very tall vehicle and therefore one must be cautious not roll the vehicle at high speeds or vertical grades.

MiTT members will need to rehearse crew drills and radio procedures while at Ft. Riley in preparation for this deployment. Crew drills must include convoy procedures, reaction to hostile threat, battle commands and reporting procedures on the radio.

Al Kindi - Camp India

This is where we will call home for 12-15 months while deployed to Iraq. It's an old warehouse that has been modified, thanks to "self-help" projects done by the MiTTs who were here previously. Each individual now has his own sleeping quarters. Some have a combined sleeping quarters/ office.