Bragg Barracks Scandal

Posted By Blackfive

I arrived home from China on Monday to hear about and see the YouTube video of the barracks in horrendous condition awaiting the paratroopers of Charlie Company, 2/508th Airborne returning from a 15-month deployment to  Afghanistan.

There is no excuse for this kind of treatment of our troops.  Peeling paint is one thing, the other items like raw sewage and mold, however, are unconscionable.

Those who wish to lay these issues at the feet of our President are wrong.  This is an Army problem and has nothing to do with the Bush Administration or even the DoD (no matter what the Presidential candidates are saying about it).  It has everything to do with the chain of command, and, most likely, a rear detachment that wasn't aware of what they should be doing to ensure that the barracks was in working order.  You can look at a drain to make sure it's there physically, but you won't know if it works until someone actually uses it.

The bottom-line is that the chain of command failed in this instance. 

So, on Tuesday, I attended a blogger conference call with Brigadier General Dennis Rogers, Deputy Director of Installation Management Command (IMC), and CSM Deborah Strickland, Command Sergeant Major of IMC.  Both the BG and CSM took full responsibility for the problem.  In fact, I sensed that CSM Strickland was not exactly happy with BG Rogers taking responsibility as she believed this to be an NCO leadership issue.  CSM Strickland instituted an NCO forum on barracks issues Army-wide in order to find out if this is systemic, and, if it is, fix it.

My pal CJ at a Soldier's Perspective, who was also on the call, agrees completely:

...NCOs need to get off their asses and take an interest in their Soldiers' lives. If they can't do that, they need to get out of my Army. I have no use for them. A Sergeant is not just a promotion and extra money. It's responsibility and forward thinking!! I'm glad the leadership is addressing this issue directly, but they need to realize that they have a lot of catching up to do (when I say leadership, NCOs, I'm talking to you too!). The worst thing they can is try to white wash this problem - especially to a group of active, retired, and former military bloggers!!

It was refreshing to hear BG Roger and CSM Strickland take the responsibility for this. It is their ultimate responsibility, but the failings happened well below them at the installation and rear detachment level. I sure hope some OERs and NCOERs accurately reflect what happened at Fort Bragg. I hope that Officers and NCOs have been officially reprimanded and relieved of command or responsibility where necessary. We can move past this and learn from it, but I'm a bit skeptical. You'd think we had already learned something after the Walter Reed issue. NCOs, take heed! Wake up now! Do your jobs or the officers are going to do it for us. Where do we stand then?...

Be sure to read the whole post - CJ nails the issue.

BG Rogers thought that it was obvious that the paratroopers didn't trust their chain of command to fix the barracks.  That might be the case.  Or they might have gone to the chain and had not gotten the response that they should have received.  And it is too easy these days to ignore the chain and post grievances to YouTube or MySpace in order to make a point.

This link is to the DoD post on the subject.  An Army-wide inspection of all barracks has occurred. 

...Meanwhile, Army garrison commanders and command sergeants major have made an assessment that soldiers are housed in accordance with Army standards, Rogers said. On-the-spot corrections have been made to bring unsatisfactory barracks living conditions into compliance with Army standards, he noted...

So, my question for BG Rogers was aimed to clarify his point that on-the-spot corrections were made:

...when General Rogers had mentioned that repairs were made on the spot, I think a lot of folks are going to want to know who made those repairs.  Was it the soldiers themselves that were responsible for it?  Or did we have contractors come in and do it?

I asked that question because I felt that the soldiers would have done a bit on their own to improve their living conditions. I asked that question because Private Blackfive and Sergeant Blackfive had lived in some pretty crappy barracks.  Luckily, I was a member of some really great units that took care of things.  In fact, once our officers found out about some problems we were having, they took up a collection to help pay to fix it.  But, in those instances, we didn't just return from a 15-month combat tour in Afghanistan.

BG Rogers responded, after discussing some of the issues around the problems with fixing the barracks, that when Director of Public Works people were not available, contractors were hired out to finish the repairs.

While I respect CJ's opinion above, I believe that the buck stops with the unit officers.  If those were my paratroopers' barracks, there would be a lot of paratroopers staying over at Casa de CPT Blackfive and Casa de 1SG Uncle Jimbo until this all got sorted out.

Military bloggers will be watching this issue closely.  The very least that we, as an Army, as a Nation, can do is ensure that the soldiers returning from combat have a habitable place to live.  That's the LEAST we can do.  We must do more.

McQ from QandO agrees (and he used to live in those very barracks) about the responsibility and wasn't as satisfied as I was about the responses (like the rest of us, he was pissed off).  I'll close with his very appropriate comments (read the whole articulate post here - this is just a taste):

...Now I wasn't completely satisfied at all with some of the answers given. Unfortunately we were running out of time and you have to give the other folks a chance to participate and ask their questions. And I did, in fact, appreciate both of them coming on and talking to us about this.

But, for instance, when CSM Strickland answered my question about "new processes" in place to preclude this sort of thing happening again I didn't get a warm fuzzy.

She said:

We have reenergized, I believe, the leadership's responsibility, and their role in ensuring that our soldiers are treated appropriately, and that we - that we stay engaged in the barracks.

Now this is just me talking, but leadership shouldn't have to be "reenergized" in this regard. Maybe I'm old school, but ensuring my soldiers "are treated appropriately" was never something I or any of my peers needed 'reenergizing' about. This shouldn't be something that requires increased command visibility, this is something that should always be of the highest visibility to all commanders all the time.
<...>
As I told BG Rogers and CSM Strickland, it isn't the combat or the long tours that run most of our soldiers off, it is things like those barracks that do it better than anything. More than anything I appreciated to opportunity to get across to them the outrage of the citizenry as to how our troops had been treated. And I got the feeling they understood that completely.

The Army is involved in a huge facilities upgrading project just about everywhere, and I appreciate the heck out of that and believe the soldiers deserve the best when it comes to their living conditions back here in the states. But as my Battalion commander with the 82nd used to say, "it only takes one 'aw, sh!t' to wipe out a 'hundred attaboys'". Let's hope this puts the IMC and everyone else involved back on the "attaboy" trail.

[The transcript of the entire conference call is here (PDF file).]

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Comments

Bragg Barracks Scandal

I arrived home from China on Monday to hear about and see the YouTube video of the barracks in horrendous condition awaiting the paratroopers of Charlie Company, 2/508th Airborne returning from a 15-month deployment to  Afghanistan.

There is no excuse for this kind of treatment of our troops.  Peeling paint is one thing, the other items like raw sewage and mold, however, are unconscionable.

Those who wish to lay these issues at the feet of our President are wrong.  This is an Army problem and has nothing to do with the Bush Administration or even the DoD (no matter what the Presidential candidates are saying about it).  It has everything to do with the chain of command, and, most likely, a rear detachment that wasn't aware of what they should be doing to ensure that the barracks was in working order.  You can look at a drain to make sure it's there physically, but you won't know if it works until someone actually uses it.

The bottom-line is that the chain of command failed in this instance. 

So, on Tuesday, I attended a blogger conference call with Brigadier General Dennis Rogers, Deputy Director of Installation Management Command (IMC), and CSM Deborah Strickland, Command Sergeant Major of IMC.  Both the BG and CSM took full responsibility for the problem.  In fact, I sensed that CSM Strickland was not exactly happy with BG Rogers taking responsibility as she believed this to be an NCO leadership issue.  CSM Strickland instituted an NCO forum on barracks issues Army-wide in order to find out if this is systemic, and, if it is, fix it.

My pal CJ at a Soldier's Perspective, who was also on the call, agrees completely:

...NCOs need to get off their asses and take an interest in their Soldiers' lives. If they can't do that, they need to get out of my Army. I have no use for them. A Sergeant is not just a promotion and extra money. It's responsibility and forward thinking!! I'm glad the leadership is addressing this issue directly, but they need to realize that they have a lot of catching up to do (when I say leadership, NCOs, I'm talking to you too!). The worst thing they can is try to white wash this problem - especially to a group of active, retired, and former military bloggers!!

It was refreshing to hear BG Roger and CSM Strickland take the responsibility for this. It is their ultimate responsibility, but the failings happened well below them at the installation and rear detachment level. I sure hope some OERs and NCOERs accurately reflect what happened at Fort Bragg. I hope that Officers and NCOs have been officially reprimanded and relieved of command or responsibility where necessary. We can move past this and learn from it, but I'm a bit skeptical. You'd think we had already learned something after the Walter Reed issue. NCOs, take heed! Wake up now! Do your jobs or the officers are going to do it for us. Where do we stand then?...

Be sure to read the whole post - CJ nails the issue.

BG Rogers thought that it was obvious that the paratroopers didn't trust their chain of command to fix the barracks.  That might be the case.  Or they might have gone to the chain and had not gotten the response that they should have received.  And it is too easy these days to ignore the chain and post grievances to YouTube or MySpace in order to make a point.

This link is to the DoD post on the subject.  An Army-wide inspection of all barracks has occurred. 

...Meanwhile, Army garrison commanders and command sergeants major have made an assessment that soldiers are housed in accordance with Army standards, Rogers said. On-the-spot corrections have been made to bring unsatisfactory barracks living conditions into compliance with Army standards, he noted...

So, my question for BG Rogers was aimed to clarify his point that on-the-spot corrections were made:

...when General Rogers had mentioned that repairs were made on the spot, I think a lot of folks are going to want to know who made those repairs.  Was it the soldiers themselves that were responsible for it?  Or did we have contractors come in and do it?

I asked that question because I felt that the soldiers would have done a bit on their own to improve their living conditions. I asked that question because Private Blackfive and Sergeant Blackfive had lived in some pretty crappy barracks.  Luckily, I was a member of some really great units that took care of things.  In fact, once our officers found out about some problems we were having, they took up a collection to help pay to fix it.  But, in those instances, we didn't just return from a 15-month combat tour in Afghanistan.

BG Rogers responded, after discussing some of the issues around the problems with fixing the barracks, that when Director of Public Works people were not available, contractors were hired out to finish the repairs.

While I respect CJ's opinion above, I believe that the buck stops with the unit officers.  If those were my paratroopers' barracks, there would be a lot of paratroopers staying over at Casa de CPT Blackfive and Casa de 1SG Uncle Jimbo until this all got sorted out.

Military bloggers will be watching this issue closely.  The very least that we, as an Army, as a Nation, can do is ensure that the soldiers returning from combat have a habitable place to live.  That's the LEAST we can do.  We must do more.

McQ from QandO agrees (and he used to live in those very barracks) about the responsibility and wasn't as satisfied as I was about the responses (like the rest of us, he was pissed off).  I'll close with his very appropriate comments (read the whole articulate post here - this is just a taste):

...Now I wasn't completely satisfied at all with some of the answers given. Unfortunately we were running out of time and you have to give the other folks a chance to participate and ask their questions. And I did, in fact, appreciate both of them coming on and talking to us about this.

But, for instance, when CSM Strickland answered my question about "new processes" in place to preclude this sort of thing happening again I didn't get a warm fuzzy.

She said:

We have reenergized, I believe, the leadership's responsibility, and their role in ensuring that our soldiers are treated appropriately, and that we - that we stay engaged in the barracks.

Now this is just me talking, but leadership shouldn't have to be "reenergized" in this regard. Maybe I'm old school, but ensuring my soldiers "are treated appropriately" was never something I or any of my peers needed 'reenergizing' about. This shouldn't be something that requires increased command visibility, this is something that should always be of the highest visibility to all commanders all the time.
<...>
As I told BG Rogers and CSM Strickland, it isn't the combat or the long tours that run most of our soldiers off, it is things like those barracks that do it better than anything. More than anything I appreciated to opportunity to get across to them the outrage of the citizenry as to how our troops had been treated. And I got the feeling they understood that completely.

The Army is involved in a huge facilities upgrading project just about everywhere, and I appreciate the heck out of that and believe the soldiers deserve the best when it comes to their living conditions back here in the states. But as my Battalion commander with the 82nd used to say, "it only takes one 'aw, sh!t' to wipe out a 'hundred attaboys'". Let's hope this puts the IMC and everyone else involved back on the "attaboy" trail.

[The transcript of the entire conference call is here (PDF file).]

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