A Soldier failed to ensure that he was done with his drilling obligations before he quit going to Battle Assemblies. This Soldier remained on the books while missing months of drill weekends. That soldier risked being removed from the Army with an Other Than Honorable (OT H) discharge.
If that were your son, would you help him achieve a better outcome, or would you seal his fate?
I came up to this woman's house and pushed her doorbell. The purpose? To follow up on our last encounter to see if she had any luck contacting her son. I figured that as his mother, she'd want what's best for her son.
Included in this want would be a desire for her son to complete his military career with honor.
During our last visit, she told me that her son was out of the military. Her son explained to her that he submitted an Individual Ready Reserve (IRR) packet and that he was no longer required to drill.
I responded by telling her that he was still in and that his IRR packet "got lost".
I explained to her that her son was not out of the military as he explained. He submitted a transfer request from the Troop Program Unit (TPU) to the IRR. Unfortunately, those in position to forward this packet "dropped the ball". The packet disappeared into a "black hole" that existed in the bureaucracy.
Consequently, her son remained on the books and continued to have a drilling requirement.
What really happened, based on my talking to soldiers in similar situations, was that her son was originally in as a "Cadet Senior". Since he did not get selected to continue with a commissioning program, he was under the impression that he no longer had to drill.
Regardless of which scenario was applicable to her son, he should have continued to drill. Continuing to show up "once a month", and calling for IRR packet progress every week, are helpful when ensuring that the TPU to IRR transition happens. If he knew he couldn't make it to drill, he would've been able to request rescheduled training.
Between drills, he could've helped change his status by consistently calling the unit to check on his IRR packet progress. He didn't. He moved on with his life assuming that the unit would take care of everything.
That's where I came in.
My unit tasked me to track these Soldiers down. These were Soldiers who stopped participating and stopped responding to our communications. My job was to be the "last ditch effort" to salvage their, and her son's, career.
We had to make on effort to contact them and to try to get them to drill again. We had to exhaust our efforts before we get these soldiers processed out on an OTH discharge. This kind of discharge follows a former service member for life.
Instead of helping me move forward with salvaging her son's career, she got belligerent with me. She refused to open the door; she demanded to know who I was. Never mind that I explained to her who I was when I saw her last.
When I asked if she relayed my message to her son, she demanded that I leave the property. She said something about "this being Easter."
Those actions proved to me that the Woman of the House, at 800 Sheraton Drive, knew nothing of the meaning of Easter.
Specifically, what would Jesus have said in this situation? The Bible gives a hint. In Luke Chapter 14, Paragraph 5 of the New Testament, he says this:
"...And answered them, saying, which of you shall have an *** or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day?"
The people that Jesus was talking to refused to drop what they were doing to help someone. Jesus asked them if it was illegal to heal on the Sabbath. Jesus turned around and healed the guy despite the fact that it was the Sabbath.
I didn't see whether her family was eating or not, but that didn't matter. She dishonored the man whose resurrection she was "celebrating" by being the person that Jesus criticized and called "hypocrite".
The two families that I visited, before talking to this woman, didn't pull the "It's Easter" card. They helped me, as Christians celebrating Easter would.
Perhaps her idea of Easter was sitting around in the quiet of her home, not to have to deal with anybody outside. If that's her idea, and that I should be "sent away" because it was Easter, then she had no moral authority to pull the "it's Easter" card.
Easter celebrates the resurrection of the man whose teachings she failed to follow that day.
Years of missing holidays due to military service trumps nonmilitary tradition preserved by military service.
Building on that concept, since when do we stop the mission during a holiday? Was I to "leave a Soldier behind" because the only day in my schedule to reach out to him happened to be on Easter? In my 23 year military career, I lost count of how many holidays I missed while I was on deployment. I missed a whole slew of holidays during Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Heck, many Soldiers didn't even get a Super Bowl viewing opportunity during that deployment. We went on mission instead.
I also missed numerous holidays, successive holidays, during previous deployments. When I pushed her doorbell that Easter day, I had that mindset.
It's because of generations of our efforts, down to those of us currently serving, that this woman could sit back in the comfort of her home enjoying Easter with her family. The radical elements that America is fighting would execute her for celebrating Easter. Eating that ham might just make things worse in that scenario.
Also, I didn't see if she had any "I support the troops" stickers on her car. If I did, I would've taken a picture of it and posted it with this article.
By refusing to help me help her son conclude his career with honor, she removed any standing she had with bragging that she had a son that served in the military... Or even claim that she supported the troops.
So where does that bring us, more specifically, her son? Her demand that I leave ended my efforts to "recover" her son. I had no choice but to go home and to generate the "attempt to contact" memorandum explaining our inability to recover her son. This was one item needed in the packet application to discharge a Soldier for substandard performance.
Her son is not out of the military as of the generation of this post. That memorandum, as part of a discharge packet, will change that. Granted, her son is accountable for his actions. His mother's actions; however, sealed his fate.
I hope she enjoyed her Easter, her son is about to make a lifelong sacrifice partly because of it.
If that were your son, would you help him achieve a better outcome, or would you seal his fate?
I came up to this woman's house and pushed her doorbell. The purpose? To follow up on our last encounter to see if she had any luck contacting her son. I figured that as his mother, she'd want what's best for her son.
Included in this want would be a desire for her son to complete his military career with honor.
During our last visit, she told me that her son was out of the military. Her son explained to her that he submitted an Individual Ready Reserve (IRR) packet and that he was no longer required to drill.
I responded by telling her that he was still in and that his IRR packet "got lost".
I explained to her that her son was not out of the military as he explained. He submitted a transfer request from the Troop Program Unit (TPU) to the IRR. Unfortunately, those in position to forward this packet "dropped the ball". The packet disappeared into a "black hole" that existed in the bureaucracy.
Consequently, her son remained on the books and continued to have a drilling requirement.
What really happened, based on my talking to soldiers in similar situations, was that her son was originally in as a "Cadet Senior". Since he did not get selected to continue with a commissioning program, he was under the impression that he no longer had to drill.
Regardless of which scenario was applicable to her son, he should have continued to drill. Continuing to show up "once a month", and calling for IRR packet progress every week, are helpful when ensuring that the TPU to IRR transition happens. If he knew he couldn't make it to drill, he would've been able to request rescheduled training.
Between drills, he could've helped change his status by consistently calling the unit to check on his IRR packet progress. He didn't. He moved on with his life assuming that the unit would take care of everything.
That's where I came in.
My unit tasked me to track these Soldiers down. These were Soldiers who stopped participating and stopped responding to our communications. My job was to be the "last ditch effort" to salvage their, and her son's, career.
We had to make on effort to contact them and to try to get them to drill again. We had to exhaust our efforts before we get these soldiers processed out on an OTH discharge. This kind of discharge follows a former service member for life.
Instead of helping me move forward with salvaging her son's career, she got belligerent with me. She refused to open the door; she demanded to know who I was. Never mind that I explained to her who I was when I saw her last.
When I asked if she relayed my message to her son, she demanded that I leave the property. She said something about "this being Easter."
Those actions proved to me that the Woman of the House, at 800 Sheraton Drive, knew nothing of the meaning of Easter.
Specifically, what would Jesus have said in this situation? The Bible gives a hint. In Luke Chapter 14, Paragraph 5 of the New Testament, he says this:
"...And answered them, saying, which of you shall have an *** or an ox fallen into a pit, and will not straightway pull him out on the Sabbath day?"
The people that Jesus was talking to refused to drop what they were doing to help someone. Jesus asked them if it was illegal to heal on the Sabbath. Jesus turned around and healed the guy despite the fact that it was the Sabbath.
I didn't see whether her family was eating or not, but that didn't matter. She dishonored the man whose resurrection she was "celebrating" by being the person that Jesus criticized and called "hypocrite".
The two families that I visited, before talking to this woman, didn't pull the "It's Easter" card. They helped me, as Christians celebrating Easter would.
Perhaps her idea of Easter was sitting around in the quiet of her home, not to have to deal with anybody outside. If that's her idea, and that I should be "sent away" because it was Easter, then she had no moral authority to pull the "it's Easter" card.
Easter celebrates the resurrection of the man whose teachings she failed to follow that day.
Years of missing holidays due to military service trumps nonmilitary tradition preserved by military service.
Building on that concept, since when do we stop the mission during a holiday? Was I to "leave a Soldier behind" because the only day in my schedule to reach out to him happened to be on Easter? In my 23 year military career, I lost count of how many holidays I missed while I was on deployment. I missed a whole slew of holidays during Operation Iraqi Freedom.
Heck, many Soldiers didn't even get a Super Bowl viewing opportunity during that deployment. We went on mission instead.
I also missed numerous holidays, successive holidays, during previous deployments. When I pushed her doorbell that Easter day, I had that mindset.
It's because of generations of our efforts, down to those of us currently serving, that this woman could sit back in the comfort of her home enjoying Easter with her family. The radical elements that America is fighting would execute her for celebrating Easter. Eating that ham might just make things worse in that scenario.
Also, I didn't see if she had any "I support the troops" stickers on her car. If I did, I would've taken a picture of it and posted it with this article.
By refusing to help me help her son conclude his career with honor, she removed any standing she had with bragging that she had a son that served in the military... Or even claim that she supported the troops.
So where does that bring us, more specifically, her son? Her demand that I leave ended my efforts to "recover" her son. I had no choice but to go home and to generate the "attempt to contact" memorandum explaining our inability to recover her son. This was one item needed in the packet application to discharge a Soldier for substandard performance.
Her son is not out of the military as of the generation of this post. That memorandum, as part of a discharge packet, will change that. Granted, her son is accountable for his actions. His mother's actions; however, sealed his fate.
I hope she enjoyed her Easter, her son is about to make a lifelong sacrifice partly because of it.
No comments:
Post a Comment