Audacity. Encouraged or Suppressed by Superiors? Necessary or Antiquated for the Institution?

SSgt Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 19 Mar 2014 10:32:28 -0400

- Audacity -

1. boldness or daring, especially with confident or arrogant disregard for personal safety, conventional thought, or other restrictions.

2. effrontery or insolence; shameless boldness.

My two cents:

Leaders should feel that they have the total support of their chain of command. To often nowadays we see good leaders with unlimited potential getting chewed up and spit out for accomplishing a mission in an outside the box manner. All that this does is make leaders "gun shy" and afraid to take chances, because they know that if they incur the wrath of their superiors their careers are over. At the end of the day all that this does is hurt the service. Instead of breeding carnivorous savages capable of thinking on their toes, we are breeding a generation of domesticated yes men who would rather let someone miles away do their thinking for them so they can avoid trouble.

We are the warriors of America, and the people of America want us to be barrel chested gun fighters not bureaucratic pencil pushers, there are far to many of them as it is. It is our job to deter conflict from ever beginning by projecting ourselves in a manner that is indicative of the Warrior Ethos.

Am I saying that people should not be held accountable for their actions? No I am not. I am merely stating that it would benefit our military as a whole if leaders were not vindictive in their distribution of punishments.

Our military will never be what it is capable of being until our leaders have the ability to make mistakes in order for them to grow and learn from them. That is how experience is gained, that is how audacity is fostered.