"Joe Osman" wrote in message
...
[ SNIP ]
When I was in the Medical Rehabilitation Platoon in USMC boot camp in 1970
I
was "guarding" a parking lot one day and overheard two officers talking
about how much harder it was going to be to properly instill leadership in
Lance Corporals (E-3s) now that the Viet Nam war was winding down and they
weren't going to have any with combat experience.

I think perhaps they were misusing the term "leadership", since that doesn't
equate to combat experience. I suspect it was the latter they meant, and
just used the wrong word. If they actually did mean exactly what they said,
I don't agree with them, because combat experience doesn't teach leadership
anymore than being in a peacetime garrison environment. Leaders can be
either trained and/or just naturally have the gift, but you don't need
combat to bring it out. In some ways you had to be a better leader as an NCO
or Staff NCO, especially when the Corps still had squadbays, in garrison,
then you did on floats or out in the field. People would go absolutely nuts
in the squadbay environment sometimes, and the only officer you'd ever
occasionally see after hours would be the duty officer. It was pretty much
up to the live-in junior NCO's to step up to the plate and make stuff happen
or not happen. On field day nights, who do you think was supervising? Junior
NCO's, that's who...and you can get some disgruntled people when it's coming
on midnight and you're still scrubbing shower walls and moving wall lockers.
Taking care of 0530 reveille, especially when you have some intoxicated
lads, can be a challenge too.

As I say, if those two officers thought that combat experience is required
to develop leadership skills, they were sadly mistaken. I had a much easier
time in GW1 being a NGLO and leading 12 people than in some of the squadbay
situations. And most of the lance corporals were top-notch - they were
bucking for corporal. I helped a lot of them study for meritorious boards.

AHS