I don't think the various creeds we memorize have much bearing on what we actually do. I think they mostly reflect what the author and approvers think we should focus on.

That said, let's not forget why we took up this whole 'warrior' verbage recently: the 507th Maintenance Company in 2003 and that unit's performance upon making contact with the enemy revealed a basic fault with some of our training.

Tom Kennedy is right, the amount of platitudes and "self-esteem" propaganda that goes on is so prevalent that no one really pays attention to any of it anymore. It has all just become a white noise.

Tom, the training for the Support Elements of the Army has unfortunately not improved much, they really just need to adopt the same training level for the support as they do the infantry initially if they want to prepare the troops. Then make them do infantry refresher training, basically follow the USMC Model. I do not think it will cure everything but it would go a long way to helping things at least.

...useless and disjointed creeds...and just had one "NO SHIT" code of ethics, we would be better off. [Full disclosure: I just finished writing just such a document]. If you believe the various definitions of what constitute a profession you'll see that in exchange for a certain amount of autonomy granted by our client (the American public and civilian authorities) we are supposed to self govern ourselves with a code of ethics (like a doctor's Hippocratic Oath or the more modern Oath of Lasagna - yes that is the real name). Absent that code, we can't really have autonomy, and we can't really call ourselves a profession. Uh oh.

Mcdonough gets the point. Timothy Challans writes, smartly I think, in a book called Awakening Warrior that we kind of lost our way when we began touting VICTORY as the desired end of war, instead of "A BETTER PEACE."

The Military is to in love with the idea of creeds, every bloody branch, ship, unit, tank, jeep, etc...has it's own creed. They have gotten to the point no one really pays attention to ANY of them and it would be hard to win back that trust for a long time due to the overkill of platitudes put out as "truths" and "sayings" and "ethos" and "creeds".
There is a way to make it a profession, I like some of the other ideas that had a Journeyman to Master type progress, perhaps for an Infantryman making EIB would be a Journeyman? Then go from there up to other paths and eventually reach the title of Master Infantryman for an example that I just pulled out of my bottom? I like the idea of us as a profession Hunter but when even you are making a creed, what hope do we have against that when even someone who knows they are mostly BS is still having to do one? They lost their power and meaning and they lost it a long time ago. They are just words on paper now.

Jeez. Do you really think the pre and post 2003 Creeds mean anything to anyone at all? I never heard of it in 1968, and anyone spouting on about it would be considered a wacko from Planet X. "Stark and chill inducing"? Please. Do you really think an 11bravo in the field would do anything more than roll his eyes are some garbage written by some clown that had access to a shower and warm food? Let's not believe the BS some chairmaster's wants us to internalize.

As far as my experience informs me, McDonough gets it because he lived it, smelled it, tasted it, and struggled the titanic struggle. It all comes down to the minute by minute infinite battles that you are entirely and forever immersed in.

"I am an American Soldier." I'd like to know what that means. Is it the E-4 who served Surf and Turf at the Officer's Club in Cam Rahn, who slept in a trailer with a/c and had a TV? Or is it the E-4 who slept in his own feces in a muck hole during the monsoon, and then had half his face blown off the next day.

Along with "challenge" coins, which I believe were originally internally distributed within elite units to prove that one had actually been in the unit when "challenged" to do so. Now every idiot supply battalion and moronic low-self-esteem Sergeant Major has its own or his/her own coin. Stupid watering down of an originally-cool idea.

And Army "Command" Sergeant Major ranks. "Change of Responsibilty" ceremonies. WTF? Basically the Army GO leadership has abandoned the troops and left them to the whim of mentally challenged senior NCOs and PC OSD/Pentagon types.

I fear the armed services are in for much the same as happened post-Vietnam in the 1970s and 1980s.

You said "I like the idea of us as a profession Hunter but when even you are making a creed, what hope do we have against that when even someone who knows they are mostly BS is still having to do one?"

First I didn't have to write anything, I chose to. I saw that all the Army hooah crap is really crap and disjointed disconnected crap at that. All those creeds and whatnots, overlap, confuse, and contradict. Second of all a creed and a code of ethics are two very different things. A code would be something to refer back to for examples of right behavior...a learning tool. A creed is just something for rote memorization, more intended to inculcate than actually educate.

Regardless the Army (and military as a whole) has a huge hard-on to be called a profession. But they demonstrate by not adhering to the basic premises and definitions of what a profession is that they are not meeting the mark. Personally, I think the next big question is "Why is it so important that the Army consider itself a profession?" No one seems to have asked that question...why? My answer, because we think its cool and we get the keys to the executive professional washroom. Cynical, yep. Accurate, probably too much so. Really it is an all but meaningless distinction between whether we are a profession or a bureaucracy or what. But you know what? The Army has spent gobs of money in the last year+ trying to figure out just this question - without ever really wondering why or what they will get out of the exercise.

I hear you - that's a good point about the Army professionalism. My take on it is that being an Army officer is one of those jobs that a large number of people think they can do better than you. There are a lot of armchair officers [some of them regularly make comments on this site] who have little to no military experience or education but throw peanuts at troops in the field. I don't know anyone who thinks that they can practice dentistry better than their dentist. I do know people who are convinced that they are capable of commanding a platoon (or more) in combat immediately. The Army's push for professional recognition is, in part, a reaction to that.

Getting back to what I said about the 507th. I meant that the problem there was more with their mindset than their training. I think their basic training and AIT probably gave them the bare essentials to destroy the enemy, but they weren't mentally prepared to do it. I'm willing to bet that many troops in that company said to themselves something like: "We're far back in the order of battle, miles behind the 3rd ID armor and infantry battalions. We won't need to fight, we just have to keep driving." And they reacted with that in mind even when they met the enemy.

The PoA campaign is a giant mutual jack-off for the guys at the top, at the tax-payer's expense I might add. And I agree that all the creed BS, especially after 2003, is pretty much the same thing. The Army's "warrior" nonsense since 2003 has been and remains flat-out ridiculous, embarrassing, and insulting (to the 11Bs and their comrades out there).

Still, IRR Soldier's point is well taken. Words have their effects--of course they do. If the institution sets a tone for dignity and gravity, it sets conditions. If the institution sets a tone for mental masturbation, cheer leadership, and cheap sentiment, it sets conditions.

This ego-jact all started because the Army wanted clerks to be killers--well you do that by training, not by making up some stupidly worded incitement to violence. There is a systemic reason why these kinds of cheap fixes seem like good ideas at the time, and it begins with the chicken-shit way we promote our senior leaders, guys who "don't read and are not bothered by the fact," to paraphrase one of the best posts I've seen from Tom.

Back in the 90's, when we were told to start wearing a dog tag with the Army values on it and carry a wallet card with the same, some of my peers suggested that the words should be in German. We all laughed at the time, but look how far we've come--I see no evidence the Army has gotten better, but there is plenty of evidence it has gotten worse.

I was deeply offended when they handed out the Army Values card and dog tag and essentially turned them into inspectable items. Did they think that by having it on my dog chain tag and in my wallet that it would help me internalize the Army Values? As an officer, even a 2LT, if you haven't already internalized them, then you ought not to be in a position of responsibility (i.e. a commissioned officer). Same goes for NCOs. As for junior enlisted soldiers, did someone think that they, in their idle time, would busy themselves by looking at the Values dog tag or card in their wallet? How much time do guys spend looking at their dog tags or other stuff in their wallet? And to think we spent tax dollars printing and distributing those things.

Once the writing on my AV dog tag wore off, I threw it away. I had clearly absorbed the AV directly through contact with my skin. Unfortunately for me, they probably used some kind of cancer-causing enamel to make those things. Thanks.

I really did not miss the point, I did miss that you did not have to make one, why are you doing it? Honestly, it is a waste of time and will be taken along with all the other platitudes and BS the military slings out as a whole.

We want it to be a profession, you ask if anyone has asked why? You have and I think answered it to a point-One of the reasons is that we want to have something to back us up when we want the public to give us autonomy. Another should be so that we give those people in our military their required amount of autonomy in training, leading and operation of their units from the squad up to the batt to the division. It helps or should help us with our skill level and to perhaps better select for positions of authority and advancement. Those are just a few and I am sure there are more we can add, this topic has been gone over a lot on this blog.

As far as us getting an actual profession? That is a pipe dream, plain and simple. The Officer Corps is broken at the senior level. Have seen it over and over again, examples of that too have been mentioned over and over again. Between careerism, politics, being a yes man in the first place just to reach those positions, the personnel system, the distance from ground truth, etc..again, I am sure there is more that we can add to this as well.

So, what is the solution? We can try to control the things in our immediate area, foster mentorship and GOOD training not the canned stuff the GPF do, be willing to do what is needed and care more about the troops than our careers is one thing. The other is to push for actual reform but there is where I just can't see it going anywhere, the movie "The Pentagon Wars" is a prime example of how good ideas get twisted at the top and that is if the top even want's to allow change.

The words really do not have an effect as much as people want to believe they do, maybe at boot but then again I took a lot in at boot as I am sure a lot of others did. As soon as I got out of boot I soon realized it was all BS. I do not know how long you have been out but the amount of platitudes, silly propaganda and BS that is posted on what appears to be every free space in the work areas on bases, that plays on AFN, that is talked about at quarters or that is done via GMTs online is almost Orwellian. The only good thing is that it is so cheesy, so stupid and campy that no one thinks of it as anything but they listen to it because they have to but it's all really just like I said before-nothing but white noise.

is the code of conduct, we don't need anything else. That and our oath is good enough for me and has been good for a while.

>The only good thing is that it is so cheesy, so stupid and campy that no one thinks of it as anything but they listen to it because they have to but it's all really just like I said before-nothing but white noise.

I know what you are saying--agree with it all in that post. I'm on base dancing with the one that brought me, so I see it everyday.

My point is a larger one about the command setting conditions--it transcends the words they use. And actually you confirm my point--it's so damn cheesy it just makes it worse. It would be way too elegant to have one simple common code, one without all the goddamn modifiers. My favorite one the "The Army Family Covenant."

was get met out of crap details in WLC because I was the only one that carried it on me in my class. My SGL flipped when I produced it when he asked about it.

That's the worst about all these creeds and codes, you have a sizable group of soldiers who fall in line and will follow and believe in them, but there's enough abuses so it doesn't matter, and no one gives a damn.

I would agree with that, it does make it worse. If I am reading you right, you are saying that since the Command puts the same cheese out, it goes in one ear and out the other, they see it everywhere on base, etc....eventually no one pays attention to anything eventually. Is that what you are getting at?

Honestly, watch that video on the other post from Tom, it will tell you just how bad the micromanagement is of even SOF Troops. It is 100% accurate on everything it says, a very disgruntled ODA lad took a lot of time to do that and show how bad the leadership is. That is a SOF Command in a Combat Theater, imagine how bad it is with the GPFs in country or even worse! How bad it must be at garrison. Ha!

Because despite what the smart pundits in this virtual room say (I am being serious when I say smart) one of the very first people to read my new paper and ethic responded saying, in effect "we have data that says the Army Values are well received by soldiers, or they are at least good enough." My, under the breath comment was, well when you don't know anything else, or anything better I suppose that is a natural reaction. The Army Values are redundant, poorly written, designed largely to form an acronym - which is putting a cart before a horse. Read the Challans book if you want to learn how that happened. It wasn't pretty, and it was an example of just the kind of stupid, shortsighted senior leader decisions we always complain about here.

Our Army, really DoD as a whole, has such a cobbled up amalgamation of Creeds, Oaths and mumbo jumbo but no one knows what they mean or why they are important. If we are serious about being a profession we need a code of ethics. The code of conduct is only good in the POW setting. The first and last article of the Code of Conduct are aspirational comments which are good starting points for a real code of ethics. The rest is only good in the one setting they were designed for. A good code would include elements of obligation - things you have to do to be (or remain) part of the organization - and elements of aspiration - things you want to do because it makes your organization better and because you want to enjoy the identity conferring nature of the organization.

Some would cite the Declaration of Independence (or as ESIII says the Oath) as their moral guidance. Guess what, the Oath of Office/Enlistment has no obligations in it beyond obeying orders and fulfilling the obligation to support and defend the Constitution. But the big problem is that the Declaration (or Constitution) are like the highest level OPORD you can get....don't you think our solldiers deserve some interim guidance - the equivalent of BDE, BN, CO, PLT level OPORDs. I do.

We have turds abusing prisoners, rape-murdering families, killing for sport, urinating on the dead (an officer was involved!), and so on and so on. I don't want that shit in my Army anymore. I'll do whatever I can to make it clearer, easier, and smarter for guys to function, do their job, be a part of the team. The code of ethics is one means of doing so.

Why not start from the code of conduct then? Make that the starting point, a Code of Conduct v2.0? The thing is, those words are NEVER going to stop that stuff from happening Hunter and unless you get rid of all the other creeds, oaths, whatever...it will be just another thing the guys will take on like they do the PPTs, GMTs and other CYA stuff that they get handed to all the time. I know that is not your intention, I know you want this to work and care about what you are doing but I think by starting from that point amid all the other things that are already out there is a bit like rolling that rock up a hill. I have not seen your code or guide Hunter, so I cannot say I would agree or not with it's content but I like where your heart is.

>since the Command puts the same cheese out, it goes in one ear and out the other, they see it everywhere on base, etc....eventually no one pays attention to anything eventually. Is that what you are getting at?

Yes--that's right--they havewatered things down so much that the baby drowns in the bath water.

And, I think HUNTER is 100% right, BTW.

Totally agree, I just don't understand how the top guys do not understand that? Are the willing blind to the ground truth or just in denial? I wonder about that at times. It seems to be a bit of both, that is just from anecdotal evidence but still I wonder what goes on in the heads of folks that implement these programs?

I want us to be a professional service too but I think it would take someone at the top who would be willing to dedicate his career to that goal or a massive upswell from the Senior NCOs and Mid-Grade Officers to effect actual reform. I like where Hunter's head is at as well as his heart but I remain skeptical of anything done by a lone Lt. Col, it would take a large network of folks who would need to actively pursue that goal. Hint...hint...

When I was required to attend an hour long briefing where we were issued "Army Values" dog tags I despaired for the Army. The Post-2003 Soldiers Creed is akin to a list of motivational posters.

If Hunter gives me a copy of his paper (Redacted Name if he'd like) I'll walk it to John McCain along with my horror stories of what happened to MI in the last 5 years.

I'm floored almost every day I work that I get more professionalism out of my Blockbuster guys than I got out of most Army personnel while in. We have no creeds or codes but my guys put in a lot simply because there's direct consequences to poor performance/inappropriate behavior. If they don't make the cut, then I cut hours for guys who can perform. Maybe when these threats of force reduction start happening (unless it's actually happening right now) the force will shape up. That'd be the first step towards a professional force, emphasizing that your contract can and will be terminated at any moment your performance becomes unsatisfactory, and actually evaluating not only your "warrior tasks and drills" but also your MOS tasks on an annual basis. If that happened I know there'd be massive cuts to the 35M/35F 20-30 levels at least to clean up all the MOS-T that decided to come over for the $30k bonus and then not care about their job.

Maybe that should be part of the new Army Creed: "I can and will be replaced with someone competent"

First, why is your name spelled incorrectly?
Second, while I agree that there is not as much professionalism as all of us would like, how do we cull the herd of the bottom 20%? They sing enlistments for a period of time, what do you do after investing all that time and money in that person? Look, I want a professional military as much as the next guy but we are a political ball that gets tossed back and forth all the time with not a lot of say in how we go about our business. More than a few Presidents who were not fans of the military became fans because they were the only group that they could directly influence without Congressional approval, you think that even if we do become Professional that a President at some point won't just re-org and re-set us?
I would love to implement this but I think people are not looking at this honestly.

One, we would have to get a ground swell of current folks to buy into this and those same folks would have to be on the same page as far as goals and what a "professional" is. That will take years and the idiotic GOs will attempt to have the most pull which will make it useless.

Two, we would have to have a ground swell of vet do the same thing. Easier and more time to do it but still hard to come to a consensus. So they come to a consensus, the hard part comes next.

Three, unless you have these "ideals", "targeted skills" the "Journeyman to Master", whatever they come up with that constitutes a "professional" military. You have to have it written into law by Congress and signed by the President to make it stick.

If we really want to do this all of these factors have to be taken into account.

My goal would be that the singular code (really a "statement") would replace or eliminate the NCO Creed, the Soldiers Creed, the Army Values, the Soldier's Rules, and potentially the Code of Conduct. I have zero desire to add another worthless document to the pile that already exist. This is a slash and burn method I am talking about. Ideally you would have the Oath and the Statement, that is all.

ESIII you posted an email on here once, not so long ago. Post it again and I'll send you the doc.

As for one lone LTC, just takes a spark to light a fire. My goal right now is to get this published twice. I'd put it all over the place right now but if I do no publisher will touch it. So patience is required.

I believe that he was saying the the difference between the two versions was a reflection on Army leadership. It has little to do with what the individual soldier does or doesn't get out of them; it's what his leader's leaders self-image is. This warrior crap is embarrassing. Wearing fatigues in the Pentagon is an embarrassing affectation. When I see the staffers low-crawling up the ramps, then I'll see a justification for wearing these rag bags.

First, your creed or code of ethics is what you brought with you when you enlisted. The one service that may mold its troops in a new image is the Marines. Their training is a right of passage. There has always been a very good reason for that approach. Attacking a defended beach by exiting whaleboats or open landing craft is not something a sane person would do. You need obedience to orders and a sense of belonging to a tradition of men who have always done this. Semper fi is all the creed anyone needs. Semper fi to each other, the Corps, the country and the country's founding principles. What it also means is not this year's general's reinterpretation of this country's founding documents. It is also the simple beauty of the Coast Guard's Semper Paratus. Always ready to do their duty which used to be the singular saving of lives. Their informal creed was that "You always have to go out, but you don't have to come back." It was the lifeboatman's way of saying, "With your shield or on it." There is a tattoo some wear which at first sounds braggadocio, "Death before dishonor." In reality, it says a lot.

In combat, it's mostly about not letting your buddy and your unit down. Everything else, save fear, falls by the wayside. I suspect that we have that as an internal mantra because we hope it means that your buddies won't let you down. In fact, they are Semper fi.

Just add yahoo

Shwan is my nickname, if you've seen the movie Billy Madison the scene in the bathtub would explain it all. Plus since Iraqis apparently can't pronounce Shawn, I was known as Shwan to the local populace during my deployments.

I don't think it'd be that hard to project a more professional image of the military. The thing about an AVF with a draft "just in case" is we'll always have the manpower to give training to. Personally I can't lament about lost money through training if we make large cuts to the force when reports are coming out that the overruns on the F35 has pushed it past the Trillion mark. So we lose a few "good" soldiers, paying unemployment is cheaper than paying for food, housing and healthcare and there's always the reserve. What we gain by showing the world we're no longer the ridiculous and irresponsible force from 2003-2012 is credibility, respect, and that little taste of fear that drives deterrence. At this point groups are thinking they can take us even through our technological superiority because they know our personnel is mostly comprised of immature 18 to 24 year olds.

Of course your correct though, even if we got our wish and the force was comprised of all college grads, all it would take would be another event similar to this for standards to be lowered and put us back to square one.

TOM, I ran across a few SEAL YouTube videos teaching "muzzle awareness." When discharging a weapon in combat is constant, it may be hard to get some airhead's attention to the danger he has put a fellow soldier in. In that context, a muzzle under this asshole's chin is appropriate. Of course, our LT was very angry because he had just gotten a haircut. In that context, a dramatic point had to be made. In 1965, the Marines went through a short period of men shooting the guy in front of them while on patrol. I met the relieved regimental commander. Maybe some NCOs didn't make their points strongly enough.

I have no idea how something like this might go over in our PC Army today. Probably not very well. FWIW, I did it to one CIDG truck driver who stopped in the middle of an ambush (stuck the muzzle in his ear and we resumed moving) and to one bus driver using his air horn to signal the VC (it did no good as he knew I wouldn't shoot him but they would.)

The good news is that in 1965 we modified the M-79 round's warhead so that it didn't arm until it was safely away from the firer. We had guys in elephant grass blowing themselves up. Another weapon rushed into combat, although it was tested in Central American jungles - but not in combat. The bad news is that surgeons have had to remove unexploded M-79 rounds from soldier's torsos. So they have enough energy to penetrate.

Not a fan of the otherworldly justice aspect of this, but Henry V at least gets at your point:

"Besides, there is no
king, be his cause never so spotless, if it come to
the arbitrement of swords, can try it out with all
unspotted soldiers: some peradventure have on them
the guilt of premeditated and contrived murder;
some, of beguiling virgins with the broken seals of
perjury; some, making the wars their bulwark, that
have before gored the gentle bosom of peace with
pillage and robbery. Now, if these men have
defeated the law and outrun native punishment,
though they can outstrip men, they have no wings to
fly from God: war is his beadle, war is vengeance;
so that here men are punished for before-breach of
the king's laws in now the king's quarrel: where
they feared the death, they have borne life away;
and where they would be safe, they perish: then if
they die unprovided, no more is the king guilty of
their damnation than he was before guilty of those
impieties for the which they are now visited. Every
subject's duty is the king's; but every subject's
soul is his own."

After all, this was the same guy who told his skeptical would-be best gal that "Nice customs curtsy to great kings..."

Shakespeare's Hank was what I'd call a situational moralist. The long disquisition he offers, which you quote above, comes only after he has his conscience pricked/feelings hurt by one of his unwitting foot soldiers. So much for a little touch of Harry in the night.

Never mind the threats he hurls at the poor mayor of Harfleur a few acts earlier...

Part of the point is that these true words came from the master dissembler that Harry is, off on his chevauchee. It's a black thing for the king . . .

To think, the neo-cons really never got this play, as they pushed allusions to the St. Crispin's Day speech!

Mr. HOKIE, don't anthropomorphize about the behavior of EM 42 years ago. As we "progressed" from 1964 to 1972, the mores and quality of our EM varied widely by unit and by time. In the beginning, we did not have REMF EM fragging officers and NCOs. We did not have guys shooting at people because they were wearing black pajamas and running away.Some of it was ignorance, some of it was low IQ (like Calley) and some of it was the times and drugs.

But, in Vietnam, some units and some EM required a strong guiding hand to prevent egregious behavior. Word.

We should just pass out this passage from Henry V to every soldier and have them memorize it. And, Bob's your uncle! Much easier I'm sure than anything HUNTER has authored on that farm in Pennsylvania.

But I also thought we were friends. LOL. I ain't no Bill Shakespeare, but I do alright. Let me get back to my farming.

Not being in Vietnam (missed the mandatory draft age by about 30 years) I can't speak for what servicemembers did during that war. All I know is that if you apply that logic about leaders to the current crop of wars you're going to come up empty handed.

We can all claim war blurs the morality line, but that's complete BS in some cases. Even if the commander was a moral and ethical person, he is not in all places at all times. At some point the Soldier needs to distinguish the morality of his actions by himself. If we can't build our military around that ideal, you will always have SSG Bales and his like, running around mucking things up.

Having strong handed leadership to correct people's morale compass is like applying a band-aid to a bullet wound. Yeah it does something, but the person is still going to die.

I'm glad someone on this blog that Mr. Ricks is so proud of, acknowledged the importance of thinking about how you think. The reactions of people to IRR's valid comparison are instructive. These crusty old salts are too jaded to think straight. If the kind of thought process exhibited here is prevalent in the active Army, then a repeat of the 70's-80's miltary nadir of despair is unavoidable.

Great post--and Hunter is absolutely right.

I don't mean to smear Don Snider in criticising the PoA campaing. He has done great work for our Army. It's the way I see the senior people address the issue--it's all about staying on message instead of having an intelligent conversation.

I'm not a jaded old salt or crusty veteran--I'm still young (at least in my head) and idealistic about making the Army a more morally focused institution. I think the cultural change that the Army needs will be one that gives attention to a well-thought-out ethic to set the conditions, regardless if it leads to a "professional" status in its self-image.

ES III is right to condemn the way the services deal in platitudes--it's not serious; it just makes matters worse. We need a no-shit ethic and an attitude adjustment about its seriousness and importance.

Right on. I hope that class was at West Point.

I got a feeling we already know each other. But in any case it seems time to say hello. I'll send a note to Tom to effect an email link up if you are amenable.

That I can forward to Hunter, who wants to talk to you.

Address is over on the right just above the postage stamp foto of me.

Best,
Tom