Prologue

Independent Command (Being part three of the memoirs of the Respected Thomas Williams, Imperator and Caesar) by Zen Master - Seeking Enlightenment through Bondage

... A soldier fights. When under effective command he will fight those enemies assigned to him, and in the absence of effective command he will fight those enemies who choose to engage him. Depending upon his situation and previous orders, he may or may not initiate combat on his own.

An officer, on the other hand, is not a soldier. He is a military manager; he manages the soldiers who fight. An officer's primary function is to manage the resources under his command in such a way to maximize the combat performance of the soldiers under his command. This function can be divided into two parts: preparation before combat and leadership during combat. The primary function of a junior officer is to lead his troops, with this gradually changing to managing his units as he gains authority, responsibility, and rank. An officer can almost always contribute more by leading effectively than by participating directly in the fighting.

That doesn't mean there can never be situations where he joins directly in the fighting. It means that, unless he is desperately fighting for his own life, his primary focus must be on coordinating the efforts of his unit in order to maximize its effectiveness and avoid unnecessary losses. An officer should participate in the fighting himself in two theoretical conditions, which are A) that his men are so good they don't need him, or B) that the battle is so badly lost that doing his job will make no difference. Generally, neither theoretical condition applies...

... We define "Military" as anything that supports our twin goals of defeating the Sa'arm and protecting the Confederacy. "Non-Military" is everything else. When an exhausted, dirty rifleman in a foxhole reports to his sergeant that he has more enemies in range than he has bullets, giving him more bullets, telling him to retreat, or calling in an air strike are all useful responses. Complaining -at that time- that the soldier's boots are not polished is "Non-Military". Complain before the battle begins, or after we have won. During the battle itself the soldier has better things to worry about than his appearance.

- excerpts from a widely-viewed CNN interview with Lt Colonel Kenneth Montgomery, US Army (retired), soon after the existence of the Confederacy and the Sa'arm became public. LtCol Montgomery was himself later picked up and joined the Confederacy Marine Corps and was serving as a District Commander as of the events in this memoir.

In combat, an officer's only critical task is to manage the current battle in such a way as to win with the least loss of resources. "Manpower" is only one of the resources that he is responsible for, but it is usually the most valuable and most scarce resource, as well as the resource that responds the best to good management.

The decision that "manpower" is a low-value resource to be expended in order to protect a more valuable resource is usually made in desperation. Arriving at this decision when the situation is not yet desperate is a sure sign that something is horribly wrong, and in almost every case that "something" is inside the officer's head. As a general rule, those officers who make this decision also do not anticipate the significant loss in combat-effectiveness that will follow immediately after, when the men realize that their commander is not worthy of their trust.

When not actually in combat, an officer is responsible for the training and readiness of his subordinates, not only towards greater combat effectiveness but also as a step towards future growth. Every member of the force should be constantly working towards two separate but related goals. First, he or she should strive to be the best at their current task as they possibly can be. Second, he or she should also be learning how to do their supervisor's job, as at any time their supervisor can be killed, disabled, promoted out of position, or otherwise out of reach.

One corollary is that a soldier should not be promoted from one job to a larger job if they have failed to prepare a subordinate to step into their own shoes. Indeed, this failure to prepare for replacement demonstrates that the soldier has already been promoted beyond his capability. - excerpt from "The Perfect Officer", an officer candidate training essay.

Chapter 1 »