Effective training requires readiness mindset

  • Published
  • By Capt. Bruce Hill, Jr.
  • 433rd Airlift Wing
LACKLAND AIR FORCE BASE, Texas --  During the February Unit Training Assembly, a group of insurgents attacked the gate that used to separate Lackland AFB from Kelly AFB. The insurgents were practice. The defenders were real.
"The more you sweat in training, the less you'll bleed in war," said former Navy SEAL Capt. Richard Marcinko in his book, Leadership Secrets of the Rogue Warrior.
"That may be the best quote to describe the way we should perceive training," said Tech. Sgt. Orlando DeLeon, a 433rd Security Forces Squadron Squad Leader.
Sergeant DeLeon has a personal view of training that goes beyond training and into reality.
"Treat your training like it is real world and do your homework because you are ultimately responsible for lives," said Sergeant DeLeon.
The lives are not limited to those of other Airmen. They can also be those of the innocent.
"Knowing when to pull the trigger, or not, is one of the most important things on the job," said Sergeant DeLeon.
As the Air Force increasingly handles jobs traditionally done by soldiers, the importance of that distinction is more relevant today.
"We (Security Forces) are doing more of what the Army does now, which is outside the wire," (beyond the installation perimeter)," said Sergeant DeLeon. "We now do a lot of foot patrols with the Army in cities like Baghdad, Iraq in the real world."
Training for new missions and unfamiliar environments has to be as realistic as possible.
"Its best if the reservist places himself in the real-world mindset during training," said DeLeon. "All reservists should regardless of their job."
Training for the job and training for an Operational Readiness Inspection should both be equally realistic and centered around readiness.
"It is important to remember that training should focus on wartime readiness," said Brig. Gen. Donald Lustig, Inspector General, Air Mobility Command. "Preparation for Operational Readiness Inspections is important; however, the purpose of the ORIs we administer is to validate wartime readiness. We should focus our training on challenging, realistic scenarios so that we achieve our desired effect--operational mission readiness."
Besides training for more difficult than expected conditions, the response to those conditions must be realistic.
As chronicled in IG inspection reports, troops commonly simulate the potentially life-saving Atropine injection by using other objects such as clothes pins or magic markers instead of using provided Atropine training injectors.
The common result is an unfamiliarity with the real-world injector that shoots into the users hand or thumb, instead of where it should have gone, into the person whose life the injection is intended to save.
Basically all levels agree, success in exercises, inspections and deployments, depends on training with as much realism and as few simulations as possible.