From the first day I arrived here, I worked very hard at earning their trust and confidence in me. I’ve never felt more welcomed and well received than I have been here. And, I think over the last 18 months or so, I have earned commanders’ trust, confidence, and faith. I know that all of them believe they can seek my advice and counsel. There’s a good rapport and a good professional as well as personal relationship between myself and the commanders.
There are also fun aspects to this job. I really enjoy observing training and interacting with all the people, and attending award ceremonies, graduations, and promotions. The best way to describe this job is, just immensely fulfilling. The degree of satisfaction and enjoyment that I get from the job is really exceptional.
There are many sobering days. My office looks out on the USASOC Memorial Plaza, and whenever we have a casualty, a fallen soldier, our flag flies at half-mast. That’s a very sobering reminder to me of the danger that our soldiers face every day, and my obligation to make sure that their legacy is supported by providing those who follow in their footsteps the best support and the best preparation that we possibly can.
What about the bad days when casualties come in, when hardware’s been destroyed, when there are problems and you’re going to be involved in trying to fix those problems down range? What are the hard days like for you? Have you ever had to work in that kind of a dynamic before?
There are many sobering days. My office looks out on the USASOC Memorial Plaza, and whenever we have a casualty, a fallen soldier, our flag flies at half-mast. That’s a very sobering reminder to me of the danger that our soldiers face every day, and my obligation to make sure that their legacy is supported by providing those who follow in their footsteps the best support and the best preparation that we possibly can.
A U.S. Special Forces soldier fires a sniper rifle at enemy insurgents in Shah Wali Kot district, Kandahar province, Afghanistan, March 4, 2014. USSF assisted Afghan National Army Special Forces in creating an insurgent-free zone for newly established Afghan Local Police checkpoints in the district. U.S. Army photo by Pfc. Dacotah Lane
Can you tell us a little bit about some of the initiatives you’re presently working on? Some of the hard programs that you’ve had a chance to get your teeth into and that you’re starting to get some traction with?
First, we’re preparing USASOC for the future, and I’m working hard on that. We just submitted our resource requirements for the future fiscal years 2016 through 2020. So now that we’ve prepared that internally, my job is to go out and work with SOCOM, the Army, and DoD to make sure that we properly defend and justify our future resource requirements. We’re working internally on our future with ARSOF 2022.
We’ve got six priorities for the command between now and 2022, and my role in that is to establish a governance process so that I can look at all six of those priorities on a routine basis and report out to Gen. Cleveland every quarter on the status of our priorities.
Among the six priorities is “Investing in Human Capital.” That’s the one that I’m most excited about. One of the SOF truths is that “people are more important than hardware.” There are about 20 initiatives within that priority that we’re undertaking, either right now or in the future, all of which are designed to help recruit, assess, select, and educate our workforce and soldiers, as well as taking care of our families. A big part of investing in our human capital is the SOCOM program Preservation of the Force and Families.