ForeverMissed
Large image
Stories

Share a special moment from Dale's life.

Write a story

Short Bio

December 21, 2014

Dale Conrad Eikmeier the son of Ralph Eikmeier of Dodge Nebraska was born in Cody Wyoming but was raised in California. He served as an Army Officer for 30 years of active duty including service in the Gulf War 1990-91, Operation Enduring Freedom, (War on Terrorism) 2004 and the Iraq War 2005 finally retiring at the rank of Colonel.

Awards include; The Defense Superior Service Medal, Legion of Merit (2) Bonze Star (2) Meritorious Service Medal (5) Joint Commendation Medal, Army Commendation Medal (2) Army Achievement Medal, Joint Meritorious Unit Award (2), Army Superior Unit Award (2), National Defense Service medal 2, South West Asia Service Medal with 3 stars, Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal, Global War on Terrorism Service Medal, Korean Defense Service Medal, Iraq Campaign Medal, Army Service Ribbon, Overseas Service Ribbon (3), Military Outstanding Volunteer Service Medal, Kuwait Liberation Medal (Saudi Arabia) Kuwait Liberation Medal (Kuwait)

 Dale started his military service when he attended at San Jose State University where he enrolled in the Army Reserve Officers Training Corps (ROTC) program.  Graduating in May 1978 he was commissioned a Second Lieutenant of Air Defense Artillery, US Army. Following training at Fort Bliss, Texas Dale served with the 6th Battalion 56th Air Defense (Chaparral/Vulcan) at Bitburg and Spangdalem West Germany as a Platoon Leader. In 1982 he was assigned to the 1st Battalion 51st  Air Defense Artillery, 7th Infantry Division at Fort Ord California. At Fort Ord he served as an assistant operations officer and commander of Battery A 1/51 ADA. He then served as a plans and operations staff officer at the US Army Western Command’s Headquarters at Fort Shafter Hawaii 1985-1989.  From there he attended the Command and General Staff Officer’s Course at Fort Leavenworth Kansas graduating in the class of 1990.  His next assignment was to the 2nd Battalion 3rd Air Defense Artillery, 1st Infantry Division, Fort Riley, Kansas where he serves as a plans and operations officer. While with the 1st Infantry Division he deployed in support of Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm where he worked in the division’s G3 plans section. In 1992 Dale became the Senior Air Defense Trainer at the National Training Center in California’s Mohave Desert 1992-1995. Promoted early to Lieutenant Colonel Dale was selected to command the 2d Battalion 44th Air Defense Artillery, 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, 1995-1997.  From 1997-1999 Dale attended a Senior Service College Fellowship, at the Army’s School of Advanced Military Studies, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  He was then promoted to Colonel and assumed duties as the Chief of Air and Missile Defense for US Forces Korea and Combined Forces Command Korea 1999-2001. On his return from Korea Dale joined the faculty at the US Army War College, Carlisle Barracks, 2001-2008. While assigned to the War College Dale deployed twice in support of operations. In 2004 he served as a plans officer with the US Central Command Forward in Qatar and as a strategist with the Multinational Forces Iraq. 2005.  Upon his return from Iraq he resumed his teaching duties at the War College and retiring in March of 2008.

Dale married Barbara Martin of Willows, California and has two children; Eric Conrad b 1986 and Sarah Marie, b 1988.

Interview Oral History with COL Dale Eikmeier

December 17, 2014

UNCLASSIFIED
A project of the Combat Studies Institute, the Operational Leadership Experiences interview collection archives firsthand, multi-service accounts from military personnel who planned, participated in and supported operations in the Global War on Terrorism.
Interview with
COL (RET) Dale Eikmeier
Combat Studies Institute
Fort Leavenworth, Kansas
UNCLASSIFIED
Abstract
In this interview, COL (RET) Dale Eikmeier, US Army, Strategic Plans; discusses his deployment to Iraq as the Strategic Planner for the Strategic Plans and Assessment Division in the U.S. Embassy in 2005 through 2006 in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). COL (RET) Eikmeier discusses his missions and major responsibilities while in country. COL (RET) Eikmeier talks about some difficult challenges he overcame and closes his interview by acknowledging efforts of senior leaders.
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 3
Interview with COL (RET) Dale Eikmeier 10 March 2011
AS: My name is Angie Slattery (AS) and I'm with the Operational Leadership Experiences Project at the Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. I'm interviewing COL (RET) Dale Eikmeier (DE) on his experiences during Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). Today's date is 10 March 2011 and this is an unclassified interview. Before we begin, if you feel at any time that we're entering classified territory, please couch your response in terms that avoid revealing any classified information, and if classification requirements prevent you from responding, simply say that you're not able to answer. Before we talk about your deployment experience I'd like to capture a little bit of your background in the Army. DE: I joined the Army in 1978; I was commissioned through the ROTC program at San Jose State University in California. The Cold War era -- typical assignments. I was an Air Defense Artillery (ADA) officer and served in Germany, the United States, and Hawaii. Once I became a [lieutenant] colonel I switched career fields from ADA to being a strategist. That eventually led me to deployments in support of OIF and Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF). Prior to that, as far as operational deployments, I participated in Desert Shield/Desert Strom as an ADA officer in the 1st Infantry Division (ID). That's a little bit of my background. AS: What inspired you to join the Army? DE: I always felt that it was what I wanted to do. From 11, 12, or 13-years-old I was looking at the potential of going to the service academy and becoming an officer. There was really never any doubt that that was what I wanted to do. I was fortunate in the sense that I knew what I wanted to do from early on and was able to do it. I didn't flounder around trying to figure out different career fields and that sort of thing. AS: You stated prior to the interview that you specialized in Strategic Plans, correct? DE: Yes. AS: What made you decide to specialize in Strategic Plans?
DE: Prior to that I'd been an ADA officer and an ADA battalion commander. Following battalion command -- let me back up a little. As a captain in the mid-1980s we would have alternate career fields and I was designated as a 54 which is the code of operations and plans. My career started to dual track ADA and operations and plans. After battery level command I was a plans officer at US Army Western Command in Hawaii, which is now known as US Army Pacific Command (USAPACCOM). I did major command level planning; I worked with planners at USPACCOM. I started getting this planning background and it was at the operational and strategic levels. Following that in Desert Storm I worked in the division's operation office (G3) primarily as an ADA planner but planning nonetheless. Eventually, after battalion command, I attended the School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS) advanced
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 4
operational arts fellows program which dealt with planning at operational and strategic levels. When the Army instituted the career field designation program I actually saw that my career path in ADA would be limited to strictly ADA staff officer jobs at the colonel level. That wasn't bad but I started to have this interest in strategic planning and not just being limited to ADA. I opted to become a 59 which is Strategic Plans and I was quite pleased with that choice. That led to my deployments as a strategic planner both at US Central Command (CENTCOM) forward in Qatar and Multi-National Forces-Iraq (MNF-I) in Baghdad in 2005. AS: How many deployments in support of Global War on Terror (GWOT) have you had? DE: Two. AS: Can you talk about your first deployment? I know for the remainder of this interview we're going to talk about your second deployment but I would like to capture your first deployment. Can you give me the year you went, your duty position, and a brief overview of your mission while you were on that particular deployment? DE: I deployed January 2004 as a strategic planner to augment the planning staff at US CENTCOM. They had a forward headquarters deployed at Camp Asaliyah at Qatar. I deployed as an augmentee to beef up their planning staff. That deployment came about as a result of general officers in CENTCOM, particularly in the combined joint operations (CJ3) sections deciding they needed experienced SAMS planners or SAMS trained planners to assist their regular staff. A tasking went to the US Army War College where I was on the faculty at the time. There were only eight SAMS trained planners on the faculty and they wanted three to deploy. The numbers worked out that I was selected -- and this is all within a week's notice. Within a week of being notified that we might go we were going a week later. That was the first deployment. I just did general planning, strategy reviews, and helped the CENTCOM staff with various strategic plans in support of operations in both Afghanistan and Iraq. That was the first deployment. It was short notice but it was only a 90-day deployment. AS: For the remainder of this interview 'were going to focus on your second deployment which was in February 2005 through February 2006, correct? DE: Correct. AS: With that deployment, can you state the unit and position you deployed into? DE: I deployed from the US Army War College where I was still on the faculty. I deployed as an individual to fill a position on t he MNF-I headquarters staff, specifically in the strategy, plans, and assessments division. AS: On that deployment, when did you first find out that you would be deploying again? DE: It was November of 2004. I was notified that I would be deploying in late January or February 2005.
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 5
AS: What was your family's reaction to your deployment? DE: It was actually not bad at all. There was naturally some apprehension and concern because I was going to Baghdad and it was a one-year deployment and my previous one was only a 90-day deployment. I explained to my family and a couple of other folks that I'd been in the Army most of my career and I basically had the option where I could turn down the assignment and retire. At that point I had 27 years of service. Or, I could accept the assignment and deploy. The thought process was, and I explained this to my wife who fully understood it, I always wanted to be a career Army officer. Had I turned down the deployment then had to retire that would have been considered a black mark on my career. Why was I serving in the Army for this long? My nation calls in time of war and I say, "No. I'm not going." Had I made that decision it would have haunted me the rest of my life. It would have been dishonorable or shameful or even dishonest. "When we really need you, you say you're not going to and you opt to retire." There was really no choice; I was going to go. I explained that to various people who asked and I had peers who actually opted to retire in lieu of deploying. That's why I went and I explained that to my family but they all understood. Naturally they were a little sad and disappointed; they were going to miss me and there was an element of danger and they weren't sure what was going to happen but the bottom line is you have to go. AS: Here you are at the end of your Army career thinking about retiring and you receive orders. Did you find that your age came into play anywhere and it affected your ability to perform or your success? You were deploying with majors and captains. Did you feel a little bit out of --? DE: Not really. I was going to a higher level headquarters staff where there were lots of colonels. It wasn't a factor. I had to go through all the physicals again to make sure I wasn't going to have a heart attack or anything. The Army keeps you in pretty good physical shape so it wasn't really an issue. AS: How soon after this deployment did you actually retire? DE: I returned in February 2006 and retired in the spring of 2008, so it was a little over two years. AS: Did you go through pre-deployment training?
DE: Yes. I went to the Continental United States (CONUS) Replacement Center (CRC) at Fort Bliss, Texas. I want to say it was two weeks long. They basically did checks to make sure your medical records were straight, your dental records were straight; you had your shots. We went through personal records, finance, and pay -- those sorts of things. We did some very basic type training like basic first aid. We did some land navigation refreshers and chemical warfare refreshers. We did some unique Iraqi specific training, convoy training, how to react to ambushes or improvised explosive devices (IEDs) on convoys; that sort of thing. We went out to the ranges and fire our weapons. That was really it. It was kind of one size fits all because we had civilians, Reservists, National Guardsmen -- all sorts of individuals ranging from junior enlisted to senior colonels.
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 6
AS: What was your view of the situation once you arrived? You'd been to Afghanistan before so -- DE: Not Afghanistan. I'd been to Qatar. AS: Do you remember what the view was when you first got there? Your first impressions when you got into country? DE: I left Fort Bliss on a Friday and I think it was late Sunday night Baghdad time when we finally arrived. We'd been awake pretty much non-stop. I arrived at night at Baghdad International Airport (BIAP) in February; it was winter and it was kind of cool there. You got off the airplane and they divided you into groups depending on where you were going and they arranged for transportation. The transportation was kind of interesting. They have a vehicle they call the Rhino which is basically an armored bus. You're escorted by four high mobility multipurpose wheeled vehicles (HMMWVs) with machine guns and you drive from the airport to the headquarters which was in what they called the Green Zone. Baghdad at night was pretty quiet. There were a few vehicles out, generally police vehicles and that sort of thing. It was actually pretty uneventful although the next day you could hear mortar fire or rockets going off or explosions so that did in fact remind you there was an active war going on. You just settled in [after that]. You found your office, talked to the staff that was working there, and just got yourself organized and situation. AS: What location did you primarily serve out of? DE: The building was known as the Republican Palace but it was the US Embassy in Baghdad. It was actually kind of co-occupied between the embassy staff and portions of the MNF-I staff; we shared the same building. It was a rather large complex. AS: Once you arrived in country, what were your major responsibilities?
DE: I had two positions when I arrived there. I was the deputy chief of strategy for the first 90 to 60 days and later I became what was known as the chief of the secretariat. As the deputy chief of strategy I assisted the chief of strategy who was another colonel (O6). In fact, for a while there I was slated to replace him when he left. I supervised about a dozen majors and lieutenant colonels working various aspects of strategic planning. I use that term broadly because it was often just a series of projects that would come down to study a certain type of situation or to collect data on the economics or politics of something; various projects would come down and we'd assign the majors to gather the information and then we'd package it. I didn't see a lot of strategic planning going on while I was there so the name of the office might have been misleading. They were a series of action officers. Eventually another colonel, who was the chief of the secretariat, left and I was then moved to replace him. That was a much more interesting job because I was no longer a deputy. I was, in fact, the chief of the secretariat although I had maybe two majors of lieutenant colonels who worked for me plus a couple of translators. We would go out and work with the Iraqi National Security Advisor's office and his staff. We were somewhat of a liaison for information sharing between the MNF-I headquarters and the Iraqi
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 7
Security Advisor's office. One of the primary functions I served, and it's why it was called the secretariat, I was the organizer of various meetings. What we called the deputy minister's council for national security which would include the national security advisor, the deputy Minister of Defense (MOD), and various other defense related Iraqi cabinet level ministers, generally their deputies. I would assist the National Security Advisor's office in establishing an agenda for these meetings on various topics. MNF-I would have representatives at this meeting to ensure coordination. I set the meetings up and literally put name tags on the table and made sure there were refreshments and water; very mundane administrative tasks. I was also responsible for recording the minutes, which is why I had translators to do both Arabic and English translations and I disseminated those minutes to the US side. The most important thing was actually sitting down with the deputy National Security Advisor and identifying agenda items that needed to be addressed from the Coalition's perspective and to try and get the Iraqi government to address and work these issues. That was half of the job. The other half of the job involved a daily meeting -- action officer level meeting -- with representatives from these various ministries. My discussions with the deputy National Security Advisor -- we'd come up with issues or agendas relating to security that needed to be addressed across an Iraqi government, an interagency government forum. We would host these meetings and get discussions. Some of these meetings dealt with something as simple as license plates for automobiles. That might seem rather mundane but the fact was that vehicles were coming into Iraq, often stolen vehicles from throughout the Middle East, and going into shops where they were converted into vehicle bombs, parked somewhere, and then detonated. The investigations of where these vehicles came from were seriously handicapped because there was no vehicle identification process. License plates were counterfeited or non-existent. It's not uncommon to see vehicles driving around Baghdad with no license plates so there is no tracking [system]. How do you develop a system to create licensing in the nation of Iraq? We did other more security related [things] like with border security. What do the border enforcement forces need? What's their level of training? What's the Iraqi government's plan to improve that? How did the Coalition assist the government in that? We would have these meetings and identify a problem using almost the standard military decision making process (MDMP). "Okay, if this is the problem, what are some probably courses of action? What do we think is the best course of action?" We make a recommendation to a course of action or solution to this problem and that would be put on the agenda for the meeting I previously discussed, the deputy ministers meeting. They would approve or disapprove or further it for action or take it back and actually implement it. I was also responsible for training the staff of the National Security Advisor's office and he had a mixed staff. When I say 'mixed' I mean Sunni, Shi'a, Kurd -- the ethnic religious diversity in his staff was actually remarkable given the environment. We actually formed a planning group within the Iraqi National Security Advisor's office. I taught them basic strategic planning and when I say basic I mean very fundamental -- the same thing that's taught here at the Command and General Staff School (CGSS). One of the projects from this planning group, which we called the Joint Planning Group, was to draft the Iraqi National Security Strategy, which was eventually accepted. That was after I left but we started the process [while] I was there, trained them, and it was actually written. My goal was basically to get rid of my job; to train the Iraqis in the National Security Advisor's office how to establish these methods and processes; how to take an issue and staff it. How to study the issue, research it, identify the problems, the solutions, what to do with the recommendations and solutions, and then how to staff it through the Iraqi government. I'm pleased to say that when I left my successor who took over the place
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 8
had to find himself a new job very shortly thereafter because the Iraqis became self-capable at this strategic national security analysis process. That's the main thing in Iraq; train these Iraqis and they were civilians, at least most of them were civilians. Most of them had military experience. There was the Ministry of Interior (MOI), MOD, and the Iraqi intelligence agencies -- all these other ministries that dealt with security related issues were able to come together in, what we called, an interagency forum but it was actually a inter-ministerial forum to do cross-government and cross-ministry planning. That's the thing I was most proud of; they were able to do it and eventually produce a national security strategy. AS: How was it to work alongside the Iraqi civilians? DE: It was interesting. The people who directly worked for me were a Navy commander and an Air Force major. The Navy commander was female and she was a helicopter pilot. The Iraqis were all male and they're very polite but you can tell there is this cultural inhibition about taking this female Navy helicopter pilot too seriously. Over time, and it didn't take that long, they realized she was professional -- and most of these Iraqis had military training in their background -- so they could respect the fact she was in the military and she was a professional. The fact that she was a helicopter pilot was a plus because pilots are considered special. "She must be extra special to be a female pilot." They learned over time that she was very competent, smart, and bright. Just because she was a woman was an ancillary issue. That was kind of an interesting aspect. There is always this undertone that -- and they would never express it outwardly but with body language and very subtle things -- they were a nation that for thousands of years had a functioning government prior to the invasion. They could do things and for some of them they didn't need the US Military how to run a country. They knew how to run a country. They knew how to run bureaucracies; they know how to run ministries. They know how to do all the bureaucratic work. In a sense they saw us as occupiers so there was that undercurrent tone. For example, there I was a 48 or 49-year-old colonel advising a retired Iraqi Air Force general officer who was the deputy to the National Security Advisor and a brilliant man but why was I advising him? He could have been my mentor. There was some of that. The other aspect was that we are non-Muslims and western oriented. We have a slightly different value system than what they had so there was that sort of friction. Everybody was able to get around it. We used the pleasantries, the greetings, the drinking tea, and the socialization stuff and we established these personal relationships. Over time those frictions would kind of wither away a bit. The challenge was that by the time we did all that my calendar was down to weeks or months left in Iraq and they knew I was leaving and someone else was coming in and they'd have to start the whole process over again. There is a little friction -- US occupiers, generally non-Muslims, in their country trying to tell them how to do things. Of course, a lot of them recognized they needed the help but they didn't need that much help. AS: What were the most difficult challenges you faced?
DE: They were generally personality challenges, not with the Iraqis but just within the headquarters, and there was the bureaucracy with the headquarters. It would interfere with expeditious actions and that sort of thing but that always exists and probably will always exist when you get larger scale headquarters. Another problem is within the staff a sense of you're going through the motions. You're in Iraq. You're there for a year. You want to make it productive. Staff officers will often see that much of their work is really just 'make work' and
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 9
that's probably more endurable if you're in a headquarters in the US and going home to your family at night. When you're deployed you want the sense that you're doing something productive and every day I'm doing something it gets me a step closer to our ultimate end state. Among myself and others you'd get this, "Why am I doing this? This is a waste of time. It's not doing anything good." That little bit of frustration builds up and a specific example of that is that before I took over as the secretariat I was put on a special team with six other O6s, kind of a high level team, to redesign and reorganize the MNF-I headquarters. We met for two weeks and proposed a redesign for the headquarters. None of us believed the headquarters was going to reorganize or needed to be reorganized but we were told to come up with a course of action so we did and it was briefed. Like predicted nothing came out of it. That's an example of what happens in these big headquarters; silly little taskings that someone thinks is a good idea. AS: Do you think you had adequate logistical support while you were there? DE: More than adequate, of course I was in the US Embassy. You would go to various places -- I went out to Ramadi, which was perhaps the furthest away where the Marines had a headquarters -- and they didn't seem to lack for any of the material goods or food. You'd go to Camp Victory and you'd see Soldiers buying big televisions and you knew they were only going to have it for a couple of months but logistically there weren't any problems. You might even say there was an excess. When I can pick any flavor of ice cream a day -- in a sense that is kind of ridiculous. AS: Being at the embassy what were your living quarters and meals like? DE: We called the living quarters trailers but they were about the size of a small shipping container; a little bit longer than this room. As an O6 I had one to myself everybody else of lower rank below that would have a roommate. They were warm; they were air conditioned, and they were waterproofed. They were actually pretty reasonable. In Desert Storm I spent the whole time in a tent so this was quite a bit better than that. We had showers, running water, and a toilet -- that sort of thing. The food was all contractor provided; buffet, order anything you want. There were almost too many choices. I joke with my wife that when I came back from deployment my lunch was in the refrigerator and it was left overs from the night before or something like that. I said, "In Baghdad I could pick and choose what I wanted to eat." One of the unique things about being in the embassy was that you had a military population and then you had a civilian, State Department, and other government agency (OGA) population. They are distinct cultures and they operate differently. There was a swimming pool at the embassy and people would be out sunbathing. There is no prohibition against alcohol for the State Department folks but there was for the military. You were kind of in the dual world and it's rather bizarre. You're walking around with your weapons and then there are girls lying out in bikinis at the swimming pool drinking wine or beer or whatever. It was just something maybe Hollywood would make up. It was like, "Where am I?" AS: Did you take any rest and recuperation (R&R) while you were on deployment?
DE: Yes. The standard two-week mid-tour R&R and I came back to the States for that. I did it a little bit earlier in my tour. It just fit in with family things a little bit better. There were opportunities to take a short three-day R&R to Qatar where I had deployed before. Most of the
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 10
officers didn't opt to do that. I think the underlying code was that it was more for the enlisted folks. We were living in a rather comfortable place as I described. You really didn't need to go to Qatar to get away where other troops who were closer in combat probably deserve that. It was kind of an underlying code that, "You guys don't need to do this so don't go." I did have a temporary duty (TDY) trip to Romania to attend a conference so that was kind of a R&R thing. You got out of country and stayed at a five-star hotel and that sort of thing. AS: How was communication back home while you were deployed? DE: Phenomenal. When I went to Desert Storm we didn't have email and after the conflict was over and we were still occupying Iraq you could go to an AT&T phone center set up somewhere in the desert and you could get in line and wait maybe two hours to make a 10-minute phone call. I actually did that three times. It was worth waiting in the line; we didn't really have anything else to do. You get there and you call and you're wife is out; no one is there. "Okay, that's two hours wasted in line." Still referring to Desert Storm, mail was extremely slow. Jump ahead 15 years, you're in Iraq and you've got email so you can email multiple times a day if you wanted to. You had telephones right by your desk and you had a calling card and could call home any time you wanted. I actually had a cell phone issued through the staff and my wife had that cell phone number. In an emergency -- in fact she did call me. My father passed away and she called me on the cell phone to tell me about that. We even had video teleconferences (VTCs) set up. I deployed with a group from Carlisle Barracks; there were eight of us on the staff and had a VTC set up and I think we did that once a month. Between emails and snail mail it had improved dramatically. Of course with email people didn't use [snail mail] as much and had access to telephones. It was a tremendous leap in communication capabilities. I was in touch with everything that was going on. AS: Did you have a handoff to a replacement? DE: Yes. I had a colonel [replace me] who was identified fairly early. I had email contact with him regularly. I was able to send him unclassified information or articles or books that might be relevant to his preparation for being in Iraq and specifically for his job. We had about a two-week overlap so he rode with me and went with me to these meetings; saw how they were set up. The transition was pretty smooth and there wasn't really a gap or break in capability. By that point the Iraqis in the National Security Advisor's office were almost at self-sufficiency and like I mentioned, within a few months he had to find a new job because they were up and running. That worked out pretty well. AS: You are on your flight coming back home, what is something you couldn't wait to do aside from see your family?
DE: Of course it was just see the family. I don't know. The flight home wasn't that big of an event because we had to go back to Fort Bliss and the CRC. What was in our minds was how long did we have to stay at Fort Bliss before we got on the ultimate flight back to our homes? Our flight had to make multiple stops to drop off different units and different locations before all of us individuals ended up at Fort Bliss. The flight was a little bit frustrating because you just wanted to get it over with but we had to stop here and let some folks off and then stop here to let other folks off. When we got to Fort Bliss we had to turn equipment in and get out-processed or
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 11
demobilized, depending on the situation, and about two days later I was able to get on an airplane and get home. AS: How did reintegration with your family go? DE: There were really no problems at all. We were counseled on it. A lot of places have programs for spouses and family members on reintegration but I don't thing Carlisle Barracks did because it was such a small group that was gone. Again, this was my second employment and I only had nine months between the two deployments. Years earlier I had deployed and come back from Desert Storm so this reintegration was the third time so it was painless. AS: Based on this deployment, and maybe even the short deployment you had prior to this one, if you could make one recommendation to the Army about how to make future deployments better, what would you recommend? DE: For individuals deploying -- the Army has a one size fits all process, unless they've changed it since I deployed. It may be simple and some might argue efficient, I would suggest it is not efficient. When I deployed to Iraq I was at the CRC for the second time. I'd been in the Army 27 years at that point. I was a senior colonel but I was treated the same way as the doctor, a MD, who was in the Army Reserve who never really served. He was kind of at the low end of the totem pole and didn't know anything. CRC designed this one size fits all course and it was inadequate for this Reservist doctor who didn't know how to put on a uniform; it didn't serve his needs and it was a waste of my time. If the Army could, and maybe they can because they're deploying fewer people, tailor the CRC individual augmentee process. In my case the other colonels that deployed with me -- all our pay, medical records, and powers of attorney were already done. We needed the equipment issue, okay. Going to the range was okay. Maybe two or three days at the CRC and then they could have shipped us off on our way. That would be my recommendation; kind of tailor it. AS: In closing is there any particular observation or lesson learned you want to highlight or capture from your deployment experience? DE: An observation that I came away with, and this is a critique of our general officer leadership at the senior levels -- on both my first deployment in 2004 and in 2005 -- they have somewhat abdicated their role in developing their intent or their guidance; their vision. They've subcontracted that out to staff officers to come up with an intent or guidance for them. They will get it and sometimes they might rubber stamp it and approve it or like a menu they'll pick point A and point C and delete point D. They're not really showing leadership. The action officers on the staff see this and realize this. Their confidence and ability to be led or inspired by the senior officers is somewhat degraded. Why is this happening? Perhaps higher level -- Washington, DC -- is putting too many demands on their time or sending them too many little taskers, some of which we called snowflakes, that the senior leadership is distracted by higher and is always busy answering higher's questions and they don't have the time or have not made the time to devote to thinking about what their situation is in forming their own understanding, their own intent, and their own guidance and they subcontract it out to others. That was a disappointment that I saw.
UNCLASSIFIED
Operational Leadership Experiences Project, Combat Studies Institute, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 12
AS: I want to thank you for coming in and sharing your deployment experience and also for your service. DE: Thank you very much.
END OF INTERVIEW
Transcribed by Jennifer Vedder

Share a story

 
Add a document, picture, song, or video
Add an attachment Add a media attachment to your story
You can illustrate your story with a photo, video, song, or PDF document attachment.