for my unit. “About 2,400 soldiers total for the infantry regiment.”
“I only have 800 soldiers now. Where are the rest?”
Jane responded, “The soldiers will finish training in six months. Right now, they are in the infantry training program. Then airborne training in Fort Benning, Georgia, is next. After which, several mobile training teams will teach soldiers in intelligence, operations, administration, and logistics.”
“Jane, can I check out the soldiers during training?”
“Sure, not a problem. I will contact COL Carlisle, commander of the training program.”
“Good, now why pick me to train these soldiers?”
Jane smiled. “I was hoping you would get the regiment.”
“How many were selected for the unit?”
Reuben answered, “You were picked from a dozen officers.”
“Why do you want me to train and lead this unit?”
Jane responded, “Because we wanted someone who would train and lead the soldiers. You have been training soldiers your whole career. You care about the soldiers under your command.”
“Why classify the information top secret/eyes only?”
Jane looked at me. “I didn’t know it was classified.”
Reuben spoke, “I wanted to limit access to the information.”
“Fair enough. What can you tell me about the soldiers?”
Reuben replied, “What’s there to tell? They were appointed to this unit.”
“Where were they born, grew up, go to school?”
“Well, that’s not the important thing. It’s important that you see they get trained.”
Chapter 2
Wednesday afternoon found 2LT Karen Rivera standing in front of LTC Steven Reynolds in his small barren office. She listened to the ranting of the old dinosaur.
“You just don’t listen to instructions. You think you can do anything you want.”
“Sir, I just…”
“I don’t want to hear it. You think you’re better than me, that you can do what you want, when you want. Well, you’ll be restricted to the barracks until Monday. Officer training was wasted on you. If I could kick you out, you’d be gone yesterday. Now get out.”
As Karen walked to the barracks, Adam Palomalu caught up with her.
“What did the old man say?”
“That we didn’t follow our orders—we cheated to beat the other team.”
“That’s crazy. We found a problem with the tactics that we could exploit.”
“Well, I’m restricted to the barracks until Monday.”
“Maybe you should bend over backward and kiss his butt.”
“No, I won’t do that. I can’t help it if he is so stuck on these old tactics that a baby could beat him.”
“No, but if he doesn’t pass you, what will happen?”
“He told me he can’t kick us out. Maybe I can show someone how inept the old man is.”
“Who would that be.”
“I don’t know. I’m going back to the barracks to study.”
With the exercise cut short, Adam went to a small clear area to work with rest of the company. The area had no trees or bushes, but they worked on fire and movement drills. After twenty minutes, the soldiers became bored. Adam opened a book of infantry company tactics to see what they could do. Adam started with some advanced assault tactics with different formations. After two hours of practice, they stopped.
Betty-Jo asked Adam, “Can we get Karen to come with us?”
“Not likely. Reynolds was mad at getting beat by her again.”
Betty-Jo countered, “But we can go to Karen’s room to study advanced tactics. Race you back to the barracks.”
I returned to Fort Benning early Wednesday morning to a confused and frantic Katie. She had a clipboard, fifteen semitrucks parked on every street, and all the drivers talking at once.
“Katie, staff meeting in thirty minutes in the S3 conference room.”
Katie returned with the staff as I closed the conference room door.
I looked at Katie. “I thought you were to call me if there were problems.”
“Not a problem from my point of view.”
I looked to address my staff.
“We have about 1600 troopers in training. They say training will be about six months. But I think they will be here sooner.”
Pam asked, “Where do we put them all, sir?”
Candice remarked, “We need more barracks space.”
“I’ll have to contact the post commander.”
A tall young African-American girl knocked on the door and entered.
“Sir, there is a COL Jeffries on the phone.”
I picked up the call in the conference room on the monitor. “Good morning, Bob, what do you have for me?”
“Jimmy, how are you?”
“Doing fine, how is Paula doing?”
“She’s in college now.”
“That’s great, but I don’t think this is a social call.”
“That’s right, The four buildings you have now will be the center of the regiment. You will get four buildings east and four buildings west and a smaller three-story building north for the regimental command. Major Endicott will bring papers and tour the buildings with you.”
“Thanks, Bob, we’ll have to try to get together later.”
“That would be great. After things settle down, call me.” After the call, I looked at everyone. “Pam, call formation. We have to inform the troopers we have work to do.”
“What do you mean?”
“We have to get the buildings ready for the troops. Beds, wall lockers, chests of drawers, bedding. It all has to be set up before they get here.
I heard Pam call, “Attention,” to the formation. I marched out to Pam. Pam turned about, saluted, and reported, “Sir,
