Half Full....Or Half Empty?

Some months ago, we published SFC Stephen A. Krivitsky’s handy chart that helps crewmen report how much fuel is still on board in the M1’s three fuel tanks. (See “Driver, How Much Fuel Do We Have?,” Back Cover, Sept-Oct ’96 ARMOR.) Some of his colleagues complained that it is not as important to know how much you have as how much you’ll need to fill the fuel tanks again, so he recently created a new chart, reproduced here, that calculates how much fuel your tank will require to top up. The method is the same: The driver reports the status of the right front tank, then the left front tank, and then the rear tank, as: “Right front....one half. Left front....three quarters....Rear.... one half.” The TC starts in the left column, moving down to one-half, then moves right to the next column, going to the three quarter fill line, and then moves to the right to the one half fill column, where he reads the result. In that case, 225 gallons will be needed to completely fill all three tanks. pared for platoon training meetings, and platoon sergeants for the company training meetings. Don’t make the company commander or platoon leader base training plans on guesses! First sergeants must help the company commanders conduct useful training meetings by making sure meetings take place on schedule, and that everyone required to attend is there. First sergeants are also the “reality check” to make sure that training planned is completely planned, and that the training is doable with time and resources available. Plan every training event as a mu lti-echelon training event. FM 25-100 states “To use available time and resources most effectively, commanders must simultaneously train individuals, leaders, and units at each level in the organization during training events.” At company level, make sure that the training plan includes platoon, crew, and individual tasks to be trained and assessed. Select a limited number of tasks to be formally assessed during each event, prepare and rehearse to conduct and assess each of these tasks, and review these preparations carefully in your pre-execution checks. Only a few individual tasks should be assessed during each collective task (try to train and check everything, and you will train and check nothing), but each must be assessed against the formal standard (often written in bullets on three-by-five cards in the tank commander’s pocket). Train to standard and AAR to standard. Be rigorous in executing the tasks, and in assessing how effectively you executed the tasks. Each leader should conduct his own informal AAR of his soldier’s individual or crew tasks, and also bring those tasks into the formal collective AAR. Individual and leader task weaknesses are often at the bottom of collective task weaknesses. If the collective task did not go well, do it again. If the individual tasks were not executed to standard, retrain the soldiers and or leaders, and practice them again. None of these steps is too hard, but none of them is “too easy.” All of us are painfully aware of the distractors which work against effective training (certainly our senior leaders are; they are even aware that they themselves are sometimes the training distractors!). Let’s stay in our lane, and fix what is within our reach. We can’t fix the budget, or DA assignment policies. We can know what must be trained, track what must be trained, plan what must be trained. We can prepare to train, train to standard, and assess what must be retrained.

“SERGEANT, TAKE THE LEAD”

SEAT (Continued from Page 7)