Lethal Minds Special Edition
After Action Report - Dark Rifle 6
Preface:
This piece is the first of hopefully many After Action Reports and Lessons Learned from tactical level leaders that Lethal Minds will bring you as solitary Special Edition releases. The Army’s Task Force Dark Rifle faced and overcame a series of complex tactical challenges, requiring great flexibility, adaptability, initiative at all levels of leadership, and most of all tactical restraint.
We’ve chosen to release these reports separately from the monthly Journal in order to give them the undivided attention we believe they deserve.
The Lethal Minds team hopes all find this After Action highly informative. Reach out to Lethal Minds via our Instagram or email with any questions.
Dedicated to those who serve, those who have served, and those who paid the final price for their country.
Lessons Learned from Dark Rifle 6
Craig Broyles
“A man cannot learn what he thinks he already knows.”
– Epictetus
“Seattle is erupting into chaos. Get down there as fast as you can. Oh, by the way, you are in charge.” As my Brigade Commander hung up the phone, I had no idea what he was talking about. In June 2020, COVID fears were high, and after George Floyd died, it sent downtown Seattle into total anarchy. I grabbed my “go bag” and two hours later found myself organizing and leading the Dark Rifles into the thick of the Seattle riots with the only words of guidance given to me by a Lieutenant from the Seattle Police Department who said, “Don’t let any of your Soldiers get taken dude. We have no one that can help you. You guys are on your own.”
During those days of the Seattle Riots and subsequent months leading Task Force Dark Rifles at the National Training Center and NATO’s Battle Group Poland, the words and examples of great leaders I have read about and served with, has filled my mind so that I really never was “on my own.” For example, when I encounter a really stressful situation, I put into practice MSG Paul Howe’s advice. He wrote, “When life gets tough, and it looks like the gators are going to get you, step back, take a deep breath, and start killing them one at a time, preferably the closest one first.” In a like manner, I offer you these lessons “earned” as my contribution to help you in your own journey to “always be ready to give battle for the liberty of our own country.”
Know Your Purpose
Most people are like Alice in Wonderland, not knowing where they want to go. For example, ask them what they do, and they will rattle off a long list of tasks. Ask what they are for, and they will look at you stumped. So, what are you for? What is the purpose of your life? As Mark Twain said, “The two most important days of your life is the day you were born, and the day you figure out why.”
Figuring this out with certainty gives you your first known point before you set your compass and move out toward your intended destination. When you get lost (and you will), return to this known point, correct your azimuth, and move out again.
Likewise, members of organizations can fire off what they do but will struggle to answer what they are for. So, before all else, you must be certain and confident about what the organization you lead is for. You must know and clearly state why your organization exists. For example, the purpose of my organization, the Dark Rifles, is to win at war. That is what they are for. That is it. That is our purpose.
Emphasize Your Mission and Don’t Stray from It
Focus on what we are for rather than what we do. This is your point of aim, “Aim small, miss small.” An organization that drifts far from its purpose is lost. They do things for the sake of just doing things. They are all busy but don’t know what for. You will hear them say (as they grind on doing seemingly insignificant tasks), “This is not what I joined for.” That organization will have low morale, poor discipline, and be miserable.
Determine your purpose. Make your purpose clear to your team. Then always align your actions to meet that purpose. This means constantly reminding folks of what is their purpose. If you haven’t said it in three days, you haven’t said it at all. If you consistently do what you are for, you and your unit/organization/ family will have peace, fulfillment, and progression, and the score will take care of itself.
Focus on Your People
Once your actions are aligned with your purpose, focus on your people. There is a tendency to focus on machines, processes, and other stuff. As a leader in a combat unit, your main purpose is to inspire, persuade, motivate, discipline, educate, toughen, and honor the soldiers in your formations. In the infantry, people are the weapon.
Be Inspirational
Being inspirational is the capstone characteristic of leadership. Robert Rogers, who formed and led the first American Rangers against the French and Indians, exemplified inspirational leadership. His Rangers repeatedly did missions impossible and set the standard for the Army Rangers today. How did he get his Rangers to consistently follow him on missions where starvation, capture, and death by torture was likely? He inspired them. John Ross in his book War on the Run described what made Robert Rogers so inspirational.
He would risk his life for any man in trouble and not leave anyone behind when remotely possible. Correspondingly, he expected everyone in the outfit to go beyond what they believed themselves capable of. Always taking the hardest jobs for himself and pledging he would bring all his powers, strength, and cunning to get the outfit back safely.
People respond best to inspirational leadership. History is full of examples of soldiers overcoming all odds because of the mere presence of their inspirational leader. Alexander the Great, Robert E. Lee, Crazy Horse, George Washington, Hal Moore, Davy Crockett, and Robert Rogers, to name but a few.
Being authentic and knowing what you are for makes you rare and valuable.
It makes you confident, and your confidence inspires others. This can often lead to the question, how do you develop confidence?
First, speak it. Tell yourself, “I am an inspirational leader others choose to follow,” and then act like it. Do what inspirational leaders do. Take the hardest jobs for yourself. Train to be ready to risk your life for anyone in trouble and not to leave anyone behind if at all possible. Pledge to use all your powers, strength, and cunning to get those entrusted to you back home safely.
Practice winning. Build within you that ‘it’ factor where others look to you when the chips are down. Your team members want to believe you are a winner. They want to believe it will always work out because you are there. I call that the John Elway effect.
John Elway was quarterback for the Denver Broncos from 1983-1998. John Elway was a comeback master. No matter how bad it was or how far behind the Broncos were, the Broncos, the crowd, and even their opponent knew they would come back to win because they had Elway. His teammates often spoke of how they felt when John Elway walked into the huddle. The natural result of his presence in the huddle was confidence.
Consider what is the natural result of your presence when you enter the room. Do you instill confidence or indifference? Do you energize or deplete your teammates based on your demeanor, comments, or body language? Build that John Elway effect into yourself. Confidence is contagious. Calm is contagious. Positivity is contagious. A winning attitude is contagious. It builds momentum, and momentum wins games and battles.
Use the Indirect Approach
Leadership is essentially overcoming obstacles through the power of teamwork to reach a desired outcome. There are two methods to overcome obstacles, the direct and indirect approaches. It is imperative for you to know when to use which.
The human tendency is to take the direct approach or the most direct route to overcome the obstacles we encounter. The direct approach has its place. Go directly at a problem in times of crisis, when immediate action is needed, to fix your opponent’s attention (induce tunnel vision), or when giving Commander’s intent, guidance, or instructions. The job of a commander is to “understand, visualize, describe, direct, lead and assess operations.”
Being direct lubricates friction. Simplicity and clarity best ensure shared understanding and gives traction and velocity to the team. However, the direct approach is always mined literally and figuratively. Enemies block, set ambushes and kill boxes on the most likely/ direct avenue of approach. Forcibly trying to break through these obstacles most often ends up in disruption, discouragement, discord, disaster, and, ultimately, defeat.
Rarely does directly attacking a problem, enemy, boss, difficult colleague, or underperforming subordinate achieve your desired outcome. The opposite more often occurs. Resistance is strengthened, opinions harden, obstacles are reinforced, resolve is fortified, and the enemy becomes even more entrenched. As Dale Carnegie said, “ A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still.”
The indirect approach is most often your path to victory. This is true with warfare, systems, and with people. The indirect approach means taking the long way around to attack your opponent from behind his carefully laid obstacles. It is the hard way rather than the easy way.
The indirect approach means using the hard Socratic method of asking questions to guide your listener to grasp your intended conclusion rather than the easy one-way lecture. It is the difficult, selfless path of giving others the credit to liberate their individual initiative and achieve victory. It is the hard wargaming mentality with its action, counteraction, and reaction anticipation rather than the easy ‘let’s just do it the way it has always been done before’ mindset. The indirect approach seeks decisive results rather than worrying over perfection in method. Simply, the indirect approach is maneuver warfare.
A Master of Maneuver
Being a master of Maneuver Warfare is understanding and being able to apply both direct and indirect methods. It is Sun Tzu’s combination warfare. For example, you fix and envelop using the direct and indirect approaches. However, many do not know this. They don’t look for the indirect approach. They see an enemy, obstacle, or problem and go directly to it. Bashing their heads like two rams, over and over, in hopes exhaustion will bring submission. They do almost everything directly in a one size fits all approach for reasons ranging from emotional reactions to a lack of effort, from mental models to or poor habits. Maneuver warfare is a style, a philosophy, and an ambush mentality taking a lifetime to master. Maneuver warfare is centered on the idea of trust and initiative. It was the original “American way of war” before firepower became our bias
Understand the OODA Loop
“Reconnaissance is how we win.” DR Standing Order #2
The Boyd Cycle (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) is Maneuver Warfare’s fundamental concept. Using the Boyd Cycle (OODA Loop) to beat your opponent hinges on seeing the enemy first and then rapidly making sense of it. That is why reconnaissance and reporting are so crucial. Remember, your sensemaking and reporting to your higher commander is his Boyd Cycle. I found the “SO WHAT, THEREFORE, I RECOMMEND” construct is a powerful method to do this.
When reporting or briefing information, give the data, then say, “THE SO WHAT IS” … then follow that up with,
“THEREFORE” … then finally say,
“I RECOMMEND.” …
Using this tool will accelerate you and the organization's Boyd Cycle to be faster than your sluggish opponent, and thus you decide and act faster than him. Using this tool will enable subordinates to stop harassing their bosses and start helping them.
Think Decisive Points
The focus of all effort at the decisive point is the richest of all concepts in maneuver warfare. Simply stated, the goal of maneuver warfare is:
“to hit the guy, as quick as you can, as hard as you can, where it hurts him the most, when he ain’t looking.”
– William Slim
This is called the decisive point or, to put it another way, the thrust point. The decisive point is your opponent’s weakness and what you attack through. However, your enemy will not leave the path to his critical vulnerability undefended. But there will be a place, a time, or a unit that, if you focus all your effort, will shatter these defenses. Sometimes the decisive point is behind you. That is called the “Lure and Trap,” and it is a proven maneuver and the pinnacle of an ambush mindset. You direct your main effort at the decisive point, and everyone else supports that effort.
Determining the decisive point means having the ability to prioritize. This is why few use this method. Prioritizing is hard and risky. It is far easier to be vague and safe, but that is not taking the hardest jobs for yourself.
Talent Wins
Maneuver warfare requires talented, teachable, and confident leaders. There is an old football saying that “It’s not about the X’s and O’s, it is about the Jimmies and Joes.” This means the most skillful, clever, and synchronized plan won’t survive incompetence. However, a poor plan will win if executed by talented people. Therefore, it should be our #1 priority to recruit, retain, and build talent. Leader development should be the main effort in all considerations because identifying and securing the decisive point can only be done through talented leaders. Talented leaders are lasting; readiness is not.
Traits of a Leader
I wholeheartedly buy into Coach Bill Walsh’s five characteristics he valued most highly in his leaders. I adopted them with slight variations. They are:
#1 Talent – (natural aptitude or skill) this means not only being talented but eagerly pursuing to make your talents better.
#2 Teachable – “Exhibiting a ferocious and intelligently applied work ethic directed at continual improvement.” Once you become a “know it all,” you are no longer relevant or useful and should retire.
#3 Character – This means a “Firm adherence to one’s own convictions.” Having a vast amount of self-confidence and the ability to withstand wave after wave of self-doubt crashed upon you by others and yourself. A man who continually changes his mind does not have character.
#4 Functional Intelligence – beyond I.Q., the ability to think on your feet and to react quickly and spontaneously.
#5 “Eagerness to adopt my way of doing things and my philosophy.”
Perspective
“Are you just stacking bricks or building a cathedral?”
A Catholic Cardinal once visited a cathedral under construction. The Cardinal noticed three workers stacking bricks, and he asked the first worker, “What are you doing?” The worker replied miserably; he was just stacking bricks. The Cardinal asked the second worker, “What are you doing?” The second worker replied just as miserable that he was stacking bricks to build this wall. The Cardinal finally asked the last worker, who surprisingly seemed enthusiastic and eager to finish the job. “What are you doing?” The third worker replied with an infectious smile, “I’m building a Cathedral!”
What is the cathedral you are trying to build? If you can’t see it and are not excited about it, no one else will be.
Visualize the cathedral you are building. Visualize what is winning. You must see it in your mind’s eye. This is important because your visualization becomes your “why.” To put it another way, understand what you are for. Here is where you build your force of will. The stronger your visualization, the better you are able to withstand resistance, accept criticism, and overcome self-doubt.
People will test your character and attack your will to build your cathedral. Everything happens by the sheer force of will. Physics dictates that a stationary force will remain stationary unless acted upon by another force. What is that force? It is your will to make it happen. Don’t get discouraged or disillusioned. As a great leader once told me, “If you haven’t said it in three days, you haven’t said it all.”
“If you could kick the person most responsible for your troubles, you wouldn’t be able to sit down for six months.”
– My Grandpa, Elwin Sowards
One of the best lessons I learned is that everyone operates with mental models in his or her head. These mental models provide a picture of what an event looks like. The person then acts to create the mental image.
For example, ask an officer to put together a squad live fire training event, and instantly a picture flashes into his head of what a squad live fire training event looks like. He will then plan the live fire to match his mental picture.
Now, what chance is there that everyone shares the same mental picture? Unless they have worked together, there is little to no chance. Here is the danger. Leaders unwittingly expect their subordinates to share their own mental picture. Thus, they fail to describe it to their teammates adequately. The results are unmet expectations.
Unmet expectations create anger, frustration, resentment, and a false belief that others are incompetent or, worse, that they are disobedient. The subordinates are not terrorists; they don’t visualize their boss’s mental picture. There was no shared understanding. Most individuals want to excel, want to contribute, want to do what their boss asks, and they want to win. Unmet expectations come from differing mental models.
Therefore, effectively describing your visualization is crucial, but it is not easy. The sketch and statements method seems to work best. (FM 6-0).
Start with a draft mission statement. Then clearly write what we are doing the training for (purpose). Next, write the mission statement two levels above to “liberate initiative,” which is the hallmark of the Mission Command Philosophy. Then, most importantly, define what is winning or your desired outcome and identify the main effort (ME). Precisely describe training objectives and list the key tasks that must be met. Address risk to force and risk to mission and how you think it would best be mitigated. Finally, sketch the picture in your head of what the training or operation should look like. Basically, you need to sketch your cathedral so your followers aren’t just stacking bricks.
Create With Language
Language is the birthplace of creation. If you write it or speak it, it becomes real, just as real as anything. This truth continually amazes me. You can create yourself, your unit, your future, your problems, your fears, and your success by speaking/writing them into existence! This is the most powerful idea I know of.
We proved this over and over again with Battle Group Poland. We spoke things into existence. Once we gave it a name, it became real, just as real as anything.
However, it can also be a curse. You can destroy people, units, confidence, and self-esteem with language. You can create monsters that take years – if ever – to kill. This is why it is so harmful when we say, “Well, they are just soldiers,” “f-ing Joe,” or “stupid Lieutenants.” We create it when we say it.
Remember the Looking Glass Theory, which states people see themselves as they think or perceive key people in their lives perceive them. In other words, “Who I am is what I think my boss thinks of me.” Consider what you create when you compliment a subordinate. Consider what you create when you talk about them in front of a formation and give them credit for a job well done.
Yet, consider what you create when publicly scolding a subordinate. Consider what you create when you talk about your organization to others. The atmosphere I wanted to create is one of trust, mutual respect, and resembling a family. That is why I choose to call everyone brother. If I spoke it, it would be.
Clarity Over Accuracy
“Never sacrifice clarity for accuracy.” – General Perkins
A common source of complexity and confusion is our cultural instance on accuracy at the expense of clarity. Communication is hard because people’s attention has become a scarce resource rather than access to information. We are constantly blasted by informational clutter and noise. Therefore, people’s attention is difficult to gain and maintain. Clear and precise messages delivered repeatedly with passion and authenticity best penetrate the informational clutter and stick to the listener.
“Unfortunately, modern military terms tend to define concepts to the point of being meaningless, and so one must look elsewhere for clarity.” Be that clarity. Remember, it is easy and safe to be vague, but it is hard and risky to be precise. If you are truly committed to taking the hardest jobs for yourself, then have the courage, decisiveness, and character to clearly and precisely author and deliver your commander’s intent, your desired outcome, and your theory of winning. Never forget, “those who feel insecure about their background in tactics seek refuge in the criticism of words.
“Simplicity is the ultimate form of sophistication.”
– Leonardo Da Vinci
A simple, well-rehearsed, violently executed plan will win. Find every way to simplify. Avoid complicated planning products masquerading as professionalism but mystifying everyone except its creator. Solve for clarity rather than impressing your audience with inconsequential accuracy. Below is an example of a method I learned from my predecessor Jason Adler to clearly communicate my training guidance and priorities to Battle Group Poland.
Fight Using Combined Arms
there is still a tendency in each separate unit to be a one-handed puncher. I mean, the rifleman wants to shoot. The tanker to charge; the artilleryman to fire…That is not the way to win battles. If the band played a piece first with the piccolo, then the brass horn, then the clarinet, and then with the trumpet, there would be a hell of a lot of noise but no music. To get music, each instrument must support the others. To get harmony in battle, each weapon must support the other. Team play wins. You Musicians from Mars must come into the concert at the proper place at the proper time.
General George Patton
As a director of a “symphony of destruction,” getting everyone to play music rather than make noise is hard. It is very hard! If team play wins, then how do you get team play when time is so scarce? The answer is having a team playbook that is understood, followed, and mastered by all. Similar to a football team, the playbook is the Bible. It has to be read and practiced over and over again until it becomes second nature. Such shared understanding gives you the speed and acceleration needed to out-race your enemy. Such shared understanding liberates initiative to allow decisions to be made at the point of action, which is the gold standard in maneuver warfare. Such shared understanding increases safety because we all know where others should be in an operation. Thus, it reduces the likelihood of fratricide. Unfortunately, it is embedded deep in our culture not to read or follow unit SOPs.
We should not think we can go into the championship game, having only practiced blocking and tackling and expect to win. We go to war with what and who we have right now. Remember, folks won’t rise to the occasion; they sink to the level of their training.
Therefore, our training must replicate battle. Ask any athlete, and they will tell you that practice rarely replicates the speed and intensity of the game. Since battle is the ultimate competition or “the ultimate trade awaiting its ultimate practitioner,” We need to replicate this competition.
Competition Drives Excellence
We have to scrimmage, compete, race, and do force-on-force training more. We must practice playing as a team. Leaders need to practice leading troops. It is a skill. They need a laboratory for them to test their theories, make mistakes, and watch other leaders in action so they can build their own mental models. Leaders need to practice initiative and audacity. You don’t just wake up one day audacious. Only through practice and in the laboratory of experimentation will they develop an ambush mentality needed to outfight the enemy. Now, the good news is if we develop our leaders, it will compensate for the lack of practice because talent wins. See priority #1.
“If there is one assertion that my whole experience, research, and reason tells me that is beyond dispute, it is that maneuver theory can only be exploited to the full by the practice of Auftragstaktik (Mission Command) in the full German meaning of the word.”
– Richard Simpkin
The essence of the Dark Rifles was the “liberation of individual energies to ensure victory.” Creating that atmosphere was an aggregation of countless small actions directed at the same goal… to create trust. You cannot surge trust. Like honor and chastity, once wounded, trust can never really be restored. You create trust by shared suffering, gratitude, and by strictly following Bear Bryant’s advice. “If something goes great, you did it. If something goes well, we did it. If something goes wrong, I did it.”
These principles, if adhered to consistently, create mutual trust and build cohesive teams better than anything I have seen. Want to build a close-knit unit? Give away the credit and express authentic gratitude. Creating mutual trust, and shared understanding takes time, patience, consistency, and character. But the reward is a team that takes initiative, “solves for yes,” and overcomes all obstacles.
However, Beware of the Disease of Me
Success brings recognition and rewards. Recognition and rewards can inject jealousy into your team. It is hard because all of us crave attention and recognition to gratify our pride.
Pat Riley, Coach of the Los Angeles Lakers in the 1980s asserted that the “disease of me” caused the downfall of the Laker dynasty. They became jealous of one another and started playing individually instead of as a team. Then the losing started, which then metastasized the “disease of me” into an atmosphere of criticism, blame, and punishment. This further accelerated the loss of team play which snowballed into further losses.
The talent hadn’t changed, what did change was trust. This all occurred because each player craved individual recognition for the achievements of the team. This sickness was contagious and before long the Laker dynasty was no more.
The antidote for the “disease of me” is believing the other person on your team just might know something you don’t. When you listen to one another and I mean really listen, with a teachable attitude, it builds mutual respect and cures the disease.
When I first went to work for the 7th Infantry Division, I initially despised my boss. I thought him petty, toxic, and egotistical. I dreaded work every day. Yet, as time went by, I found he had the annoying habit of really listening to me. Not only listening, but he actually respected my opinion. As this went on, I wanted to continue to dislike him, but I just couldn’t. I realized then I was the petty, toxic, and egotistical one. I had become sick with the “disease of me.” I changed my attitude and corrected my course. I resolved to become his student and believe he just might know things I didn’t. That was the game changer.
He became one of the best mentors I ever had. He taught me to “solve for yes.” He helped author the Task Force Dark Rifles Playbook. He taught me how to plan large-scale exercises, how to plan force-on-force maneuvers. I will be eternally grateful for my time at 7th Infantry Division because of him and we remain lifelong friends. Listening to one another and believing that the other person might know something you don’t can reverse the effects of the “disease of me.”
Remember, change is usually evolutionary instead of revolutionary. Expecting the latter is frustrating because soldiers hate two things: change, and the way it is. You overcome this through consistency, enthusiasm, the force of will, and winning. Find a way to win in everything you do. Then give everyone else the honor. People love to win, to be around winners, and to display their trophies for all to see. Vince Lombardi asserted that “Winning is a habit, but unfortunately, so is losing.” Small victories with tangible authentic awards and badges accelerate evolutionary change. “Leaders change culture while managers merely act within it.”
Finally, “YOU CAN DO NO WRONG IF YOU ARE ATTACKING YOUR ENEMY FROM BEHIND” Dark Rifle 61
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