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July 2, 2023 - Stew Peters Show
58:07
The Richard Leonard Show: NEW APFT GETTING AXED?
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Last week on the show, you heard a little bit about the ACFT, the Army Combat Fitness Test, and how it took some units or is taking some units days and even maybe up to a week to get their whole unit through it because this thing is so long.
All six events take forever.
Well, it just so happens that this week I ran across an article that is talking about the Army discussing with the powers that be rolling back to the APFT, the Army Physical Fitness Test.
Today we're going to have a little bit of a discussion about what that might mean for the Army, what that looks like, and what people are saying.
So anyway, stick with us.
Don't go away.
We start now.
Hey, everybody, and welcome here to the next installment of the Richard Leonard Show. and welcome here to the next installment of the Richard I want to thank you, as always, for joining us.
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Okay, so as I was mentioning in the intro, last week we had a pretty intense discussion about a lot of things.
Part of that discussion was very briefly about the new Army Physical Fitness Test, or the ACFT, which is the Army Combat Fitness Test.
This is something that the big brains upstairs thought up to evaluate physical fitness in the United States Army by MOS. So the standards for this test Are different for each job, each MOS within the United States Army, but also standards are different for male and female.
And the way that these are different is the old tests, the APFT, the Army Physical Fitness Test, You did two minutes of push-ups, two minutes of sit-ups, and a two-mile run.
And your standards were based on your gender and your age.
And the age categories were grouped up, you know, and they were...
Like 18 to 21 and 22 to 26, I think, or something like that.
So anyway, there was age blocks.
And so as you grow older, you get more time to do your run.
You have less push-ups to do to receive a passing grade.
But now, the new test that went through a pilot system for quite some time became the standard test of record for active duty soldiers.
I believe it was in October of 2022.
Now, this thing consists of six events.
And real quickly, I'll go through them for you.
It's a three-repetition maximum deadlift.
And so I have it here on my other screen.
Soldiers will lift a maximum weight that they are capable of three times using a 60-pound hex bar and plates.
I assume they're 45-pound plates.
This event assesses the soldier's muscular strength, balance, and flexibility.
The next is a standing power throw.
A soldier will throw a 10-pound medicine ball backwards overhead as far as possible.
This event assesses a soldier's physical power, balance, and flexibility.
The next event is a hand release push-up, which I found this one to be interesting.
Soldiers complete as many hand release push-ups as possible in two minutes using the proper technique.
This event assesses a soldier's muscular endurance.
What is a hand release push-up, you ask?
So a hand release push-up is where the soldier is laying on their belly, completely on their belly with their hands on the ground, You do a full push-up, you go down, and then your hands go out to the side while you're resting on your belly, and then back and push-up.
Once you go down and put your arms out, that is one repetition.
I don't know exactly what the standard is for each age or each job or gender, for that matter.
But those are things that, you know, I think that they're irrelevant for this conversation.
But these are the events.
The next is a sprint, drag, and carry.
Soldiers do 50-meter shuttles, a sprint, a drag, a lateral, a carry, and a sprint as fast as possible using two 40-pound kettlebells, A 90 pound sled, and this event assesses the soldier's muscular endurance.
So, your first part of this shuttle run is a sprint, so you sprint 50 meters.
And then you drag a 90 pound sled backwards.
So it's a sled with straps.
You grab the straps and you go as fast as you can backwards 50 meters.
And then you do 50 meters lateral, so like a basketball shuffle.
You know where you shuffle side to side when your feet don't cross.
And then you carry 40 pound kettlebells 50 meters and then sprint 50 meters and that's it for that event.
The next event is a plank.
We all know what a plank is, I imagine.
During this event, soldiers maintain a plank for as long as possible, and this event assesses a soldier's muscular endurance as well.
And then after all of that, you do a two-mile run.
The soldier will complete a two-mile run as fast as they can, and this event assesses your aerobic endurance.
It's quite a smoker of a physical fitness test, in my opinion.
I don't necessarily think it's bad.
As it relates to the Army physical fitness test, however, much longer.
And so here is the issue, I believe, between the two.
You know, the Army physical fitness test where every soldier does two minutes of push-ups, two minutes of sit-ups, and then a two-mile run, and you get 10 minutes of rest in between each event.
You know, you get the whole unit through a PT test in a morning, a couple hours at the most, depending on the size of your unit.
This thing takes a long time.
It takes a hell of a long time.
And so I think the problem becomes with reserve component units, when you only have your soldiers together for one weekend a month, three days, if you're doing a Friday, Saturday, Sunday drill, You're not getting a whole lot of work done.
And so keep in mind, folks, for those of you who don't know, that like a weekend drill, there's maintenance to be done, there's inventories to be done, sensitive items to be done, sometimes there's weapons qualifications to be done, there's training events, medical events, there's a lot of stuff to get done.
And if you're in a unit that has any kind of moderate to high You don't have time to spend two days on a PT test.
And so, I believe that these types of things are important.
And with the way that things are going in the world today, having a military force that is physically fit, Is of the utmost importance.
And so I think that there is something, a happy medium, maybe, that we can find.
Not we, of course, whatever opinion I have or whatever words I have to say about this probably don't account to a hill of beans to the people that are going to be making these changes or keeping them the same.
But I think that there's probably a happy medium that could be discussed to make this a whole lot more efficient.
And I realize that in the active duty army, when you have soldiers working five, sometimes six days, even probably seven days a week at times, You can dedicate a whole day, maybe two whole days, to doing this.
And they do, you know, two, three of these tests a year.
Maybe one or two for record, depending on what unit you're in and what your job is.
But this is also part of the Army's new holistic health and fitness initiative.
They call it, what do they call it?
H2F, right?
It's the Holistic Health and Fitness Soldier Readiness System.
And so this is this new directive they're taking to try to encompass soldier readiness and well-being into this whole deal that's not just physical fitness.
And they say here, That Holistic Health and Fitness Soldier Readiness System aims to support soldiers in physical, mental, spiritual, sleep, and nutritional readiness.
In pursuit of these goals, soldiers have access to athletic and training facilities for prevention and recovery, counseling and spiritual services, and retreats.
Hmm.
Retreats are offered to ensure soldiers feel good both mentally and spiritually.
Running and biking trails are available on many bases as well as parks, pools, and lakes.
Lastly, proper sleep hygiene is promoted and all nutritional requirements are met to fuel soldiers for training and in maintenance of their daily duties.
So it seems as if the Army has taken this stand that...
We need to take care of our soldiers all the way around the spectrum.
And so I gotta say that I don't necessarily disagree with that.
I think that there was this culture in the Army for a long time that, you know, we just need to be, you just need to lace up your boots, lace them up tight, and you soldier on.
If you're tired, if you're hurt, if you're sick, We'll have to deal with that later, but we have to complete the mission.
I agree with that a lot, a whole lot, because that's the army that I grew up in.
That's the army that I lived in.
But I don't necessarily think that that was always the best approach for us to have as it relates to taking care of soldiers for the long run and for their well-being after the Army.
Because let's remember that there is life after the Army.
There's life after the military.
But the question is, how do we Ensure that our soldiers have a high quality of life when they leave here, but still maintain this extreme badass persona.
And it's not even a persona, right?
Like this is something that we have to live.
We got to live it.
How do we maintain this presentation and this reputation of being the baddest military force in the world, arguably?
Especially nowadays, arguably.
But yet take care of these soldiers because...
Someday, sometime, they're going to leave the uniform.
It's going to go up into a closet somewhere, and soldiers are going to look at it, maybe put it on again at some point, just for nostalgia's sake.
But there is life after the uniform.
And so maybe this is something, it's a good start, but we'll dig into it more later as well as the article that I came across because there's some good stuff in there, I think, from the current Sergeant Major of the Army.
So stick with us.
We'll be right back after the break.
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Hey guys, and welcome back here to the next segment of the show.
So we were discussing just kind of the basics of the new test versus the old test.
I want to get into this article.
It was published earlier this week in the Army Times.
And it kind of talks a little bit at first about kind of what we talked about in the last segment, but then it gets into a little bit of an interview that they did with the current Sergeant Major of the Army.
So let's just go through it quick, and then we'll expound on it, okay?
So here it is.
What's old could soon be once more.
The Senate Armed Services Committee passed the Chamber's fiscal 2024 defense policy bill, which according to an official summary, restores the Army's physical fitness test, the APFT, as the test of record.
Although the bill has a long road ahead before it becomes law, the move signals powerful lawmakers' frustration with The new one, the Army Combat Fitness Test, which became the official test for active duty soldiers on October 1st of 2022, after a year-long pilot and implementation period.
But should the Senate Committee's proposal eventually receive President Biden's signature, which would first require full Senate approval and then agreement from the House of Representatives to include it in the joint version of the bill, the Army couldn't implement a new test without a three-year pilot and waiting period that includes mandatory briefings to Congress.
So what they're saying here is in order to go back to the old one that the Army used for so many years, the House and Senate have to agree on it.
President Biden has to sign off on it.
And then they have to go back and brief it to the powers that be and then go through this whole process again, this three-year pilot and waiting period to implement the old tests back.
And so, like, that's just part of this whole thing that I don't understand.
This political red tape to go back to the old test.
We already know what it is.
We used it for God knows how many years.
We know how to facilitate it.
We know how to score it.
We know how to deal with any deficiencies we have in equipment or facilities to run it, which I think was part of why they used it for so long, because you can conduct a PT test anywhere.
In the National Guard, for example, Especially in the northern states, like here in Minnesota, when you needed to run a PT test in February, and it's 35 below zero outside, and all you had was a gymnasium, well...
I ran a few PT tests doing, what was it, like 32 or 42 laps or whatever it was around a basketball court to get two miles in.
And you can do push-ups and sit-ups anywhere.
This new Army combat fitness test You gotta have a whole facility.
And I found this briefing, this PowerPoint briefing about the new test, and it explains the equipment and the facilities in which you need to run this thing.
And it's quite extensive.
In fact, it'll tell us in here that I believe the United States Army spent about $78 million just on the equipment.
For soldiers to take this physical fitness test.
And so now we're talking about a whole lot of time, a whole lot more money and effort spent to roll back to the old test.
And to be quite honest, folks, I'm not sure that rolling back to the old test is the answer.
I'm also not sure that the new test is the answer because of the The way that it confines your unit and confines your soldier's time, right?
It's not very efficient.
It may be a great way to evaluate the soldier's readiness when it comes to physical fitness as it relates to their job.
Because as we discussed this test, it measures your strength, your endurance, your power.
And your ability to do your job, whatever that is, in the Army.
And it apparently does it pretty well.
Because that test sounds like a smoker.
And it probably very well should be.
If you talk to any soldier that has any experience in combat...
I'm quite sure that they would tell you that there really is not a whole lot that you can do to prepare yourself.
Of course, being physically fit and mentally tough as best as you can be before you get into that situation is going to be helpful.
But there isn't a whole lot that you can do To prepare yourself for that kind of chaos and that kind of, I guess chaos is the best word to use.
But there's no doubt about it.
Being at the best possible physical condition that you can be in.
Before entering that situation is absolutely the best thing for you.
And we all know, we all have either read or heard or talked about the scientific evidence that says being physically fit helps your mental fitness and your mental toughness and helps you to cope with extreme It's a well-known fact, right?
So let's continue down the article here.
The House version of the fiscal 2024 policy bill, which is yet to pass the Chamber's Armed Services Committee, currently would task the Army with creating sex-neutral physical fitness standard for combat jobs On the test, but stopped short of killing it entirely.
Here we go.
Look at that guy.
He is the Sergeant Major of the Army, Michael Grinston.
The Army's top NCO, Sergeant Major of the Army, Michael Grinston, spoke to reporters in the wake of Congress's move.
While he declined to speak in direct response to the bill, He was blunt about the impact reverting to the old fitness test and how it would impact the force.
He argued that the combat fitness test is vastly superior to the old one, which only consisted of two minutes of push-ups, sit-ups, and a two-mile run.
The old APFT measures two components of fitness, muscular endurance and cardio fitness.
But the new test covers 10, including muscular strength, power, speed, agility, and more.
The new combat fitness test also plays a central role in the service's broader efforts to implement its holistic health and fitness program, also known as H2F, which we talked about a little bit earlier, rather than simply counting pushups as it once did.
The Army wants to transform how units collectively approach fitness, sleep, nutrition, mental readiness, and spiritual readiness.
So...
Here we have the top dog, right?
He's the top NCO of the United States Army, talking about how this test just measures more than how many push-ups and sit-ups you can do and how fast you can run two miles.
This test measures your explosive strength, the ability you have to To drag heavy things such as one of your buddies who may be wounded or worse and get yourself through a really shitty situation in combat.
And one thing I want to kind of go back to here is how one of the hurdles is That going back to the old test would require the Army to create sex-neutral physical fitness standards for combat jobs.
Now, in the old test, as we discussed, the standards were different for men and women, and also there were those age blocks in there.
And so I think that this will be a challenge, right?
I mean, but the question I have is, in the current test, are the standards the same for men and women in combat jobs?
Like, is a 41-year-old woman...
Does she have the same standard in the new PT test that I would have if I was still in as an infantryman?
Is her standard the same as mine?
And I think that that is something that really needs to be taken into account because if the test is designed to measure the ability of the soldier to To do everything that that job encompasses in a combat situation, it shouldn't matter what equipment you have attached to your pelvis or what equipment you have had attached to your pelvis.
Nowadays, we need to be inclusive, right?
So are the standards the same now?
And if not, why would it matter if we're gonna roll back to the old system?
So, I don't know man, if the standards aren't the same now, maybe that's the first thing that the Army should think about making equal.
Because as I've said before, I am not against women serving in combat roles.
Because quite frankly, I've met a few women in the Army That can fulfill combat roles better than some men that I've met in the Army who are in combat roles.
So there's nothing that says that women can't do the job.
But I believe that in order to do that job, anybody, no matter of your sex, your race, your gender, whatever, The standard should be the standard.
If you are a human being and you hold a particular MOS, I will speak to infantry because that was my MOS. If you are a human being and you hold an infantry MOS, the standard should be the standard.
And if you don't meet that standard, then you should have to pick another job.
Because it's not just about completing the job at a high level.
It's also about being part of the team and the team completing the job at a high level.
And then the team going home together.
And see, I think that One thing that's missing in all of this, and of course I don't know that the Army will ever talk about this exclusively, but soldiers will.
At the end of the day, the mission is the mission.
But the mission for the soldiers with the boots on ground is to make sure that they all come home together.
At least it was for us.
At any point of our deployment, you could have asked us, so why are you here?
We probably could have come up with some flashy answer or regurgitated what we were told was the reason that we were there.
But the real reason that we were fighting as hard as we were was because we had a job to do.
And we were trying to accomplish whatever mission it was we were given.
But we were fighting really hard for each other.
You see, and I'm sure that we've all heard it in many movies.
We've all heard it in podcasts and radio shows and read it in books and whatever else.
But it rings true all the time.
The real mission of the infantry soldier, or just soldiers in general, At the lowest levels is to make sure their brothers and their sisters come home.
If you put us all together and you say, guys, I need you to go take that hill, or I need you to go take that town, clear all the buildings, Get rid of all the shitheads by any means necessary.
Either take them as detainees.
If a fight ensues and you gotta kill them, then you gotta kill them.
Secure all the non-combatants, make sure that they're safe.
Give them water, give them food if they need it.
And then report to hire when it's done.
All right, roger that, we'll do that.
But what we really hear is, alright, we're going to go take this town, we're going to go take this village, but we need to make sure that we all come out together.
So if everything gets destroyed and everybody dies, okay, as long as we all come out together.
And so I think that that's...
That's kind of the thing that is kind of the unwritten but often talked about rule amongst soldiers.
And not even rule, but it's just kind of this, it's the deal, right?
Soldiers fight hard to complete the mission.
But the real mission is to make sure that we all come home together.
Because we spend all that time You exert all this effort and all this blood, sweat and tears go into this training and this preparing.
And then when you get into it, when you get into the crap of completing this mission and you're fighting and you're doing your thing...
What you really remember after it's over is who made it and who didn't.
And hopefully, you remember that everyone made it.
Because that's what you really remember.
20 years down the road, 30, 40, 50, 60 years down the road, six months down the road, a week.
After that particular mission, you may not even remember what the mission was, but you'll remember who made it and who didn't.
That's what combat really showed me anyway.
That's what I took out of it.
I couldn't even tell you.
If somebody were to ask me, Richard, what was your mission when you were deployed to Iraq?
I don't know.
Running convoys.
I was a scout truck gunner.
Convoys for what?
I don't know.
I have no idea.
All I know is that I was...
In a truck, my job was to try to find IEDs or people that were trying to shoot at us to ensure the safety of the convoy that we were escorting and my brothers and one sister in the back.
That's what I remember.
And so getting back to this physical fitness test, The standards should be the same for men and women.
I went way around the block to go across the street.
But what it really comes down to is we as soldiers want to know that the person to our left and right Has met the same standard that we had to meet because I know that my intention is that these two on either side of me, I will die to ensure that they make it home.
And I want to know that they're going to do the same for me.
It's much like the partnership or the brotherhood.
That Stu Peters and I have still to this day.
But all those years that we sat in that truck chasing fugitives.
The most dangerous fugitives that we could find.
Because it's what earned us the best living.
And they were the ones that really needed to be off the streets and take some time and sit in jail for many years.
Because they allegedly committed the worst crimes.
We developed this brotherhood in a very short time because he put his life in my hands and I put my life in his.
And at the end of the day, when we walk up to a house or we're in an apartment building, knocking or kicking down a door, All we had was each other.
Yeah, we had radios to talk to each other, but unlike the police, there wasn't a whole city or a whole county on the other end of that radio.
When I keyed up my mic to talk, the only person that heard me was Stu Peters.
When he keyed up his mic, the only person that heard him was me.
And so you develop that brotherhood and we knew If you go, I go.
I go, we go.
And so it's much like what combat was like for me.
And I think that that's why maybe our partnership working as bounty hunters was solidified so quickly and became so strong is because for me, it was just another extension of that kind of brotherhood.
I knew what Stu had to lose.
And Stu knew what I had to lose.
And I wasn't going to allow that to happen on my watch by any means necessary.
And same for him.
So, boy, talk about getting off into the weeds, right?
Holy cow.
And, of course, I've lost track of time, but stick with us, man.
We'll be right back.
Hey, folks, and welcome back here for the next segment of the show.
I kind of got into my feelings there a little bit in the last segment, but I think that it's kind of a good thing to talk about, right?
When we talk about standards as it relates to soldier readiness and fitness, it all kind of melds together.
We have to be confident that the people that we serve with are going to be able to To do the job that they're there to do and do it at a high level.
That's what makes America's military great or what used to.
I guess I've been removed from it now for a couple of years, but I would like to think that we still have a strong fighting force despite All of the crap that's going on in our country right now,
I would still like to think that if there was some real issue to break out that our fighting force is still going to open that can of whoop-ass that we did for so many years in Iraq and Afghanistan and all
the years before that in the wars before that I would like to think that we still we could still dominate any other any other Military force,
any other terrorist organization, anybody else that decides they want to F around and find out, I really would like to think that we are still able to just hand out a butt whooping like we have for so many years.
So, Getting back to this whole physical fitness test.
And I chuckle because some people think that this whole issue is just kind of...
that it shouldn't be such a big issue.
And I really got to say that I think that this whole approach that the Army's taking is not horrible.
I think that the biggest problem with it is the amount of time that it takes up and the amount of resources that it's eating up from our budgets and our soldiers' time.
I think that if there's a way to make it more efficient, And not take so long and not eat up so much time for our soldiers because although it's important, it isn't any less important for our soldiers to become masters at their craft.
Whether they're tankers, whether they They're infantrymen, whether they're drivers, whether they're artillerymen or dental assistants or Armors, whatever it is, mechanics, office staff.
I mean, every job in the military would benefit our soldiers all the way around so much more if everybody could become a master at their craft.
And I truly believe that in the not-so-distant past...
That that was really the focus, that we really aimed to become masters in our craft.
At least in the units I was in, that was the focus.
We played hard, but we worked really hard.
We put in some long days training.
I can remember doing, I was a Bradley Gunner for a short amount of time.
But we put in some long days in those Bradley fighting vehicles, learning the weapons systems, learning the computer systems, how to dismantle that 25mm cannon on that Bradley fighting vehicle, and how to operate that turret and do the maintenance.
I mean, man, there's just so much to know and so much to learn.
That becoming a master at that craft, it takes a lot of time and it takes a lot of dedication and a lot of discipline.
And if throughout that process, I believe if I remember right, it was like a 14-month process.
You know, I mean, and for a reserve component...
That's a long time.
Probably something that you could have done in six to eight months, maybe, as an active duty soldier.
I'm not sure what that process takes on the active duty side, but it's a lot of time out of your enlistment, 14 months, to learn one thing.
And we learned that vehicle from the dirt to the very top of the turret.
And it was awesome.
But we put in a lot of time, some very long days and some very long nights.
But it all paid off in the end.
If this whole process could be made more efficient, I believe that it is not a horrible thing for the Army.
Let's finish off this article.
They're going to finish off talking about this H2F, this holistic initiative that they got going on here.
So here we go.
H2F, which provides units with additional resources and facilities, is predicted to service implementing physical fitness standards like the combat fitness test that enforce a comprehensive vision of what it means to be fit.
Service officials have argued It's not clear how much of the Army's investment in H2F would be lost if lawmakers were to roll back the combat fitness test, but the service spent around $78 million on equipment for the test, according to information on its website.
$78 million just on equipment.
So that's the sleds and the kettlebells and all the stuff it takes to To administer this new physical fitness test, but not just on the equipment, but place to store it and, you know, whatever else it takes.
And you got to keep it serviceable.
So extra stuff.
Although physical fitness is only one small part of H2F, we've worked a lot to make sure that we are training differently than how we were in the past, said the Sergeant Major of the Army, Mr.
Greenstead.
Early results indicate that units with H2F teams are experiencing lower rates of substance abuse and suicide in addition to its fitness benefits.
Should Congress move forward with eliminating the combat fitness test, the administrative consequences would be greatly disruptive, he noted.
The Army ties its fitness test to performance evaluations and performance factors into promotion points that the service uses for its semi-centralized junior NCO promotions.
It would just kind of take us into chaos, Grinston said, of a potential elimination of the combat test.
We already changed all of our regulations, so it would be completely confusing.
Ultimately, though, the service's top NCO will retire in August, and maintaining the combat fitness test is about more than just reducing administrative burden.
It's about getting the Army ready for the fight that we're going to have in the future.
We need to move forward, not backwards, he said.
It's what's good for the Army.
I guess I don't disagree with Sergeant Major Grinston here.
I think that this is something that is good for the Army, and as I've said many times now, a broken record, it needs to be more efficient.
The time it takes, I think, is the major hindrance.
But let's touch real quickly on the other aspects of this H2F initiative.
So there's physical readiness, right?
So the test.
It tests muscular strength, muscular endurance, aerobic endurance, anaerobic endurance and power.
So these are all the things that they say are the most important things As it relates to your job.
And so the standards for these tests, as we've discussed, are a whole lot different depending on your job.
If you're an office person, your standards, the requirement for passing is a whole lot lower than someone like me, an infantryman or a scout or something like that.
But there's also mental readiness.
So cognitive and emotional capability and interpersonal and social capability.
I don't know, they mentioned in here that there is a significant reduction in chemical dependency or substance abuse and suicide for units that are using this model and have these H2F teams within the unit and they mentioned in here that there is a significant reduction in chemical dependency And so there's nothing.
There wasn't a whole ton of information about these other initiatives.
There's a lot about the physical test, but there wasn't a whole lot of information that I was able to find about all these other initiatives.
I'm sure it's out there.
So before I get roasted, I'm sure it's out there.
But I think that these are things that are important for the military to...
To identify that soldiers need help with.
But as we've discussed on this show, even a couple weeks ago, when we were talking about security clearances and stigma behind things like mental readiness, these are still things that soldiers are extremely apprehensive with addressing on their own.
And of course, there's soldiers that either one don't really care about the stigma or they have some catastrophic event happen or they have some kind of breakdown and they just, you know, they have something happen and they can't hide it anymore and they can't dodge it.
And so if it affects their career, it affects their career.
If not, then great.
They can continue on and do whatever it is that they do.
But I think that out of all these that we're going to go over, the mental readiness is going to be the toughest one for the Army to have the biggest impact on just because there is a stigma and soldiers who have jobs such as the infantry or intelligence or anything like that that requires a security clearance They're not going to want to take
a whole lot of initiative to take part in that.
But let's continue.
Spiritual readiness, beliefs, principles, and values.
If there's one thing I think that the Army always did pretty well It was allowing soldiers to practice their faith, their spiritual beliefs.
You know, if you needed to take time to go practice whatever religion it is you practice, I always felt like it was something that nobody ever really stopped you from doing, as long as it was something that was not going to Hinder the mission, so to speak.
You know, like if we were out in the field for a week and a half, there would be some religious services conducted in the field.
But if your faith wasn't represented, well, unfortunately, you'd have to miss it that week.
But if we were in Katolman or in Garrison, you were allowed to go to wherever that was that was being held.
So I think that that's a good one.
I mean...
I don't think the Army has ever been identified as an organization that doesn't let people openly practice their faith.
Nutritional readiness.
Boy, the Army...
I was on the Fat Boy program, I'm not going to lie.
I was on the Fat Boy program in basic training, and I was on the Fat Boy program for...
Many years throughout my career.
I've always been a big dude and I struggled to stay within the standard my whole career.
I did it.
Sometimes it was a lot tougher than others.
But again, it's something that needs to be enforced because as we discussed, the people on the left and right of you are depending on you to be present, to be able to fulfill your job and do it to the best of your ability.
And if you are not able to do that, then You shouldn't be there, plain and simple.
There are a couple exceptions.
I think, you know, a friend of mine was telling me a story about he was, I don't know if he was In the field artillery or knew somebody that was but There was the story of this guy who was Apparently he was like this huge obese dude,
and they were gonna kick him out because He was just too big he did he there's no way he was ever gonna meet the standard and and this that and the other thing well For those of you who don't know, in the field artillery, there's a lot of really heavy stuff.
You know, those are big cannons.
The artillery rounds are really big and they're really heavy.
And so, it's not for...
I mean, little guys have quite the issue with grabbing these rounds and loading them into the cannon, let alone cases of them.
You know, because they don't come in just one and so when they're on the truck and you got to take them off and stack them for next to the gun to be used, you know, it takes two, sometimes three people to do that.
So apparently this guy was in and around the armory and he went out to his truck apparently to leave for the day and he bent down and picked up a snowmobile.
And put it in the back of his pickup truck.
Barehanded, picked up a whole snowmobile and just threw it in the back of his truck, tied it down, and off he went.
Well, the company commander and the first sergeant kind of looked at each other and went, well, you know, I mean, I guess I don't care how big he is.
We need this guy.
And they allowed him to stay in.
If this guy can lift a snowmobile by himself into the back of a pickup truck, he could probably, you know, strap a howitzer to him and let him drag it across the field into position to shoot it.
And he was allowed to stay in.
He got a waiver of some sort, I imagine.
And he was allowed to stay in.
The last one here is sleep readiness, which is something that was a surprise to me.
It was always told to us that the Army only had to allow you four hours of sleep in a 24-hour period.
And so it seems that they're kind of changing their tune on that and realizing that sleep is an essential part to your overall well-being.
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