School of War - Ep 201: Zachary Griffiths & McKinsey Harb on the U.S. Army

Episode Date: May 30, 2025

Lt. Col. Zachary Griffiths & Maj. McKinsey Harb joined the show to discuss the U.S. Army’s new Field Manual 1, FM 1 -THE ARMY: A PRIMER TO OUR PROFESSION OF ARMS.  ▪️ Times      •      01:22 Introduction     •      01:51 West Point        •      05:43 Culture shift      •      08:50 FM 1     •      12:00 Ben Salomon           •      18:06 Warrior     •      24:04 Tensions           •      31:05 Recruiting       •      35:18 Leader/follower      •      42:19 Mission command      

What exactly is the U.S. Army for? What is expected of its soldiers and leaders? And what are the elements that make up the profession of arms? And what tensions exist between them? Today, we welcome the authors of the Army's new Field Manual 1 to discuss these issues and more. Let's get into it. It is for a war this Milwaukee invasion of the way. December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infantry.

A bloody experience of Vietnam is to end in a state. We continue to face the grave situation in France. We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the land in the grounds. We shall never surrender. For more, follow School of War on YouTube, Instagram, Substack, and Twitter. And feel free to follow me on Twitter at Aaron B. McLean. Hi, I'm Aaron McLean.

Thanks for joining the School of War. I am delighted to welcome to the show today, Zach Griffiths and McKinsey Harb. Zach is a lieutenant colonel in the United States Army. McKinsey is a major, and they have recently collaborated on the Army's new FM1, Field Manual 1, an introduction to what the Army is and what it expects of its soldiers.

Zach, McKinsey, thank you so much for joining the show. Aaron, thanks so much for having us. This is a great honor. I've really enjoyed your podcast. So I'm Zach Griffith. I'm a special force officer in the United States. Army. Working right now for the chief of staff, direct the Harding Project for him as well, which is an initiative to a new professional writing. And I've had the pleasure of collaborating

with McKinsey, the lead author on FM1. McKinsey, tell us a bit about yourself. Actually, I'm going to go deeper with McKinsey, and then, Zach, I'm going to come back to you because I want more from your story as well. But McKinsey, how did you grow up? How'd you end up in the Army? Well, I'm initially from Columbia, Missouri. No military family. Joined really for free college. I applied to West Point. Was the only school I ended up applying for because I got in as a junior, as they accept early, and was delighted to have a solution for going to school for free. Thought I would do my five years and peace out,

but here I am almost 14 years later and still enjoying it. So, yeah. Yeah, my parents desperately wanted me to apply to either West Point, the Naval Academy or the Air Force Academy. And I was having none of it and ended up applying only to one college, which was the private hippie liberal arts college across the street from the Naval Academy, which went over great. Let me tell you.

I probably couldn't have gotten into the service academies anyway, but that was my version of the story. And Zach, what about you, the Army and the Special Forces? How did that all come to pass? You know, I don't have like a great answer for why the Army or why the Special Forces, I think it, when I was a Boy Scout as a kid, and I just saw a path of my life where I was going to work in an office as some kind of professional, and I wanted to do something different.

And so I applied to West Point, thought I wanted to be an infantry officer, ultimately pursued the Special Forces, But I tell people the jokes on me because as an officer, you primarily work in an office. I don't even have a window. I'm a little cubby that I sit in right now. So it's been great. I'm really happy to be headed back out to the field next year to command a battalion. But that's my path here.

You know, one thing McKinsey didn't tell us was that she's a classically trained ballerina as well. Is that right, McKinsey? That is true. Yes, I was not on any teams growing up, just did ballet. So that made me a bit of a unique one, I guess, going through West Point. Most people were, you know, the star of their whatever teams, but that was not me. Was there any way to continue that at West Point or sort of on the side while you were at West Point? Oh, no, I gave it up.

But that was, you know, it just kind of lingered as part of the personality, but that's it. That's fascinating. Well, what do you mean by that? What lingers from ballet as part of the personality? Sure. You know, ballet is, it's an art. So I think it's influenced me in terms of just remaining a critical thinker and seeing things from a different perspective. I think I enjoy being a bit of an outside thinker in the Army and especially with a project like this where we really were asked to engage it from a completely different lens.

You know, trying to really look at at the problem from, from an artistic perspective was fun. And I think Zach and I really enjoyed approaching it differently than I think others have approached doctrine in the past. And sorry, one last kind of personal question before we move to FM1, but what years were you guys at West Point? So I graduated in 2007, started in 2003. And then I did go back and teach American politics from 2017 to 2019, which is a really awesome opportunity as well. And McKinsey, how about you? I graduated in 2011, so I came in right after Zach. Yeah, so you guys, so the reason I ask, and I'm kind of curious to your response here is you guys are both at a wartime West Point where,

where, you know, I ended up spending time at Annapolis. They're not as a student. And at a wartime, Annapolis, where the students were, you know, very aware that they were going many of them into combat, pretty much, you know, in pretty short order after graduation. Actually, a lot of the students had been in combat, or at least a decent minority as prior enlisted. And I assume that's a bit what West Point was like when you guys were there. The Army has obviously, you know, it's entered a new phase. you know, how do you, how are young officers or officers at West Point or, you know, whatever the commissioning source is, how is the mindset changed, if at all, you know, what are the cultural

changes you see as a consequence of the Army not being actively at war as it was a decade ago? And how is the institution managing those changes? You know, Aaron, I would start and say, I know for both McKinsey and I, you know, lunchtimes frequently would have a moment of silence when cadets were killed. So that was certainly present the whole time I was at the Academy. You know, not every day, but it was certainly not an uncommon occurrence where they would just say, you know, make it from be quiet, have them in a silence. That certainly is much less common now. But I think the Academy still does a fantastic job, readying people for whatever conflict is in front of them.

It's got a broad liberal arts education, though maybe a little bit different than St. John's. Focus a little bit more technically, but a great exposure to a lot of things. I think one difference, you know, when I was a kid at almost everyone was trying to branch infantry. because that's what you saw out there, you know, that that was where the fighting was. Whereas I think you see cadets branch in a more diverse range of MOSs now, just because there's like occupational specialties. Because it's not clear where the challenge may be and being an air defender, you know, is putting you in harm's way right now every day, you know,

in a way that wasn't the case when I was a kidet. Mackenzie, how about you? Yeah, I think, you know, one thing that's shifted in the mindset that I've seen and one thing we actually tried to consider when we were writing this was, you know, we saw the Army's mission differently when we were going through than perhaps people see young people see today. Obviously, looking forward to large-scale combat versus what we were familiar with, which was kind of the coin world. But I think also just being really, you know, involved in the deterrence mission, it has a different impact on young people who are really still

extremely busy. The Army is still extremely busy. But, you know, focused a lot more on training and readiness and it's not necessarily, it's not immediately apparent how all of that training is going to be applied. And I think that's one of the things we thought about as we were working on this project was, you know, what mindset are, does that create in young people? Because it's not something that Zach and I were familiar with. You know, we both kind of knew where we were going to apply ourselves coming out of West Point. And I think that's, that's just something, you know, it means the army is different. It's kind of more open-ended and it maybe requires a little bit more new. And maybe it has more complexity for young leaders who are trying to build teams for the sake of readiness instead of, you know, for something specific, kind of tangible known.

They're not, you know, on a deployment schedule. Yeah, you guys, in the manual itself, you cite Eisenhower. I think it's, was it 27 years? He had been in for 27 years and had risen very rapidly at the end to the rank of Lieutenant General before, I guess, what Torch would have been his first experience. of commanding in combat. That's a long time. That's a long time to go. And he's in during the First World War, right? And he just misses it.

That's right. So let's use that to transition to the document itself, which is obviously part of the project of educating soldiers and officers about what their tasks are today, but what they may be in combat. What is, so the title of FM1 is the Army a primer to our profession of arms. What is this document? How long has the Army had such a document? And why the need for a new version?

So the document, it's actually, it's not replacing anything. There was no FM1 prior to this. There have been FM1s in the past. The initial idea behind this was to do a rewrite of ADP1, which is the Army's kind of foundational document on the, it's called the Army. And it describes a lot of the stuff that's covered in FM1, you know, what the Army does, the mission,

how it plays a role in the joint team. So, you know, that was the initial project, was to do a rewrite of ADP1, but make it something that is more likely to be read that's a little bit more engaging, something that soldiers will pick up as they enter the profession and read it all the way through. This, the project kind of shifted now. It's more of like a companion piece because, you know, a lot of the doctrinal publications that we have established like a professional lexicon for soldiers. This intentionally doesn't. It basically kind of creates a feeling and it creates understanding. without really going to the detail of, you know, definitions or throwing a bunch of terms of people. So it kind of ended up being like a companion piece. But the point is to baseline young leaders, especially, you know, newly minted NCOs or officers, baselining them to the profession so that they understand the essentials of what the Army does,

what's expected of them, how they should be leading. And is the formal expectation that every soldier will read this or just officers and NCOs Or what is the actual formal expectation for a document like this? So the intention, the intended audience was for new NCOs, so E5s and second lieutenants. That was really the target. But we've workshoped it around the Army, and the feedback has been that a lot of people think that it has applicability at a much earlier stage. So, you know, initial entry training cadets, because that's when they can really learn some of the basics of what the Army's about. That wasn't the intended audience, but I think it's sort of.

certainly does have applicability. And we've even had actually feedback from folks that, you know, we can pick it up later in a career and still learn something or revisit old ideas. Yeah. And it's noticeable. I read it over the weekend. And it is noticeable that, and actually, I want to commend you for achieving a style that I think it's not crazy for it to be read by exactly that audience, by E5s and O1s and maybe even a bit beyond. While at the same time not being just stupid. You know, it's hard. And I'm not. trying to be flippant but like it actually is hard as I don't have to tell you because you just worked on it to have something that is readable and engaging and

fairly brisk on the one hand without being substance list I mean if you don't care about substance it's easy but I actually think you you manage to convey a fair amount of you know information doctrine call it what you want here in a way I mean I just I'm struck by the the opening of the of the first chapter which opens with this great patent quote the object of war is not to die for your country but to make the dumb bastard die for his, which has a nice soldierly feel to it that is at the same time attention getting in a way that I imagined. I don't know if you faced any friction on making that the opening of the book.

Did you? I mean, whose decision was it to put this quote first up? Because I loved it. Well, Patton's speech of the Third Army is like one of my favorites. I think it's the best speech ever done just because it is, well, it is so colorful, as Patton always was. But I, luckily the chief staff of the Army thought this was a fantastic quote. We really received no pushback.

So I was super glad to get a quote from that speech in the book, to be honest. That's refreshing and reassuring. And then it leads to this first chapter is just about warriors. I mean, the first part of the book sort of, it's like these three layers. You talk about warriors, then professionals, then leaders. And I guess this is all the cocktail. And there's some obvious tensions there, which we can talk about. But you open with this incredible story, which I did not know of a young officer named Ben Salomon on Saipan in World War II.

Maybe just give us the brief version of that story and speak a bit about why, I mean, of the literally millions and millions, or let's just say of Medal of Honor recipients, hundreds and hundreds of stories you could have chosen from why this one to lead the first chapter. I mean, I'll jump in here. I just don't think there's like a better soldier story than this one that kind of captures the spirit of the army, right? You know, we opened the book with Sal Janta earning his Medal of Honor in the Kornagal during Afghanistan. And that's a pretty standard army story where it's an infantryman, you know, against terrible odds. What's great about Ben Solomon's story, this is he's a dentist, right? And so his story is he is the unit's dentist, the doctor gets hurt. He says, hey, I'll stay.

And I will treat patients, even though I'm just a dentist. And then the battalion is overrun. The Japanese soldiers come into the tent as he's treating patients. He fights them off and then comes outside and sees the whole units being overrun. Man's a heavy machine gun. and kills, I think, 80 some Japanese soldiers that are there. And so, like, this just shows everyone in the army that they need to be ready to be a warrior. And so it was such a great story.

I think McKinsey picked this one out. Such an awesome story. This one was a little bit controversial for us to include because there's some question about the legality of a dentist, a medical professional, manning a heavy machine gun. But ultimately, he receives the Medal of Honor later on, not immediately. So we thought it was, you know, the United States recognizes his incredible act of heroism. And so we should, too, in this book. offer sort of a challenge to all of us. I may be a special forces officer that trains for this,

but, you know, McKinsey was a medical service officer before she became a strategist, right? And so everyone in the Army needs to be ready for these kinds of challenges. McKinsey, how did you pick this story? So I actually read this story in the Army Medicine Museum down at Fort Sam a long time ago as a medical service officer going through. My husband actually picked it out. My husband's a Marine, by the way. Super fun. And he... This has a very marine flavor to it, by the way. Not that we have dentists.

in the Marine Corps, but this whole ethic we're discussing here. I've been restraining myself and not saying that, but you just opened the door right there. I did. Yeah. So he actually found the story on the wall and was like, this is incredible. And I came over and read it and it stuck with me ever since, to be honest. And I think that what Zach just talked about, that, you know, the idea that everybody's a soldier, you know, you might feel like you're a, you know, you might call yourself a technician, EOD technician, but really you're like an EOD soldier. And that's a different flavor to it. Whether if you are a medic, you, you would, you are still a warrior. If you're a nurse, you know, speaking from the, from the medical side,

but a low decision, a finance officer. Everybody is a warrior first. And, you know, when, when push comes to shove, everyone needs to be able to engage the enemy and do the basics. And I think that that's just what I love about this story. I mean, a dentist of, I mean, not to put dentists down. They're great. I had a really actually amazing dentist working for me, who really embodied the warrior ethics. So, but I just think it's, it's so powerful because of where he came from and who he is and what he ended up achieving, which is just, you know. And I think, Aaron, you know, this ties it a little bit back to the experience, McKinsey and I had at West Point where, like, people were getting killed.

Yeah, there was infantry officers, but also folks are more branches. Whereas I think that's a little bit lacking now. And so, you know, now you may only be the infantry company or the field artillery company that's pushed really hard to do this kind of combat training. But we want to show everyone that, like, hey, this really could be anyone who's going to be called upon here. And so I think it, you know, where maybe those minutes at the mess serve that purpose for us as we were coming up.

Like stories like this in FM1 should hopefully do the same thing and provide a challenge for leaders at all levels. How does the Army, which is just a vast organization, what is the strength of the active duty army right now? Is it like 400,000 something? Where are we? I think it's like 450,000. Yeah, 470,000 is the end strength of duty.

Massive worries, so that's not even counting the Guard and Reserves. It's like a million, I think, about if you get the whole organization. It's just a massive, I mean, it's really, it's a slice of American life. in a way that, you know, my organization, a former organization, not that I'm a former Marine, which, as we know, is impossible. The Marine Corps, you know, it's much smaller. And even there, you know, candidly, you know, I would say in the infantry units, which is what my experience was, you know, one rarely had trouble, at least by the time the Marines got to me, one rarely had trouble cultivating the warrior side of things. If anything, as a junior officer, my responsibility

was more on the restraint side of things, maintaining restraint, imposing restraint. But, you know, I think, you know, if you go to, you know, motor tea or supplier, these other units with Marines with different occupational specialties, it had to be a matter of active effort. I mean, you had the marine culture, you had a lot of sort of stuff helping you keep the, what you guys are calling the warrior mindset, you know, central. But it was work. It was work to keep people on their toes and ready to fight, is my impression. And an organ, and that's in a relatively small organization that has this kind of overarching culture that's kind of helping you. In an organization, and an organization as big as the army, you know, beyond obviously talking about it as you're doing in this

chapter, which, which of course is, you know, not not going to get it done in and of itself. Like, how does the army actually pursue this? This is a massive undertaking to have sort of every last man and woman really think of themselves. You put it first in the book, you know, first as a, as a literally a warfighter. Sure, I can try to take a stab at this because it really is very difficult. and, you know, especially to kind of infuse that warrior spirit across the entire enterprise, which is vast, as you've, you know, as you've said. And as a former medical service officer, you know, I can certainly relate to being a platoon leader with a platoon of people that, you know, don't necessarily, my platoon, we went, we went to Afghanistan,

so it might have been a slightly different perspective there. But as a company commander, say, I had a headquarters company out in Hawaii and, you know, really actively had to kind of get people engaged in this warrior. mindset. And that's exactly why we put the chapter first, because it's really at the heart of it, and it takes stewardship from leaders all across the Army to really believe in this and to find ways to inculcate it in their teams. I don't think the Army as an enterprise can do this without the help of leaders at every level really embracing it. So that was part of the reason why, you know, we decided to write a book like this that people would actually read through and

would have kind of elements of rhetoric in it. We really were trying to go for, you know, ethos, logos, and pathos, so that people would really kind of have a connection that would get to the heart of it and allow them to kind of embrace this feeling that would drive them to, you know, to foster it in their teams at every level. And hopefully they pick it up and when they kind of lose side of it and remind themselves of what they're supposed to be doing

and that they're a warrior at heart and, you know, get back at it. That's kind of the goal here and why it's a key chapter. Yeah, and as McKinsey said, it really is incumbent on leaders to cultivate this in their units. And so it's part of why we emphasize it here. Hopefully everyone can see themselves in FM1. Like we were trying to be very deliberate about casting a wide net for the stories we include such that folks can feel themselves as a warrior or in the book. And then part of the idea of this is that it will be people will revisit it through their career

in each level of their professional military education. And so maybe, you know, as a lieutenant, you know, Lieutenant McLean, right, he's just stoked to be there leading his platoon. But by the time you're like maybe a senior captain or you may be a little bit jaded, right? Or you kind of go through these ups and down periods. And so we hope that by revisiting something like FM1, folks that before they go back, how to touch troops, you know, are like, oh, actually, this is a really important mission. We need to stay connected with it.

And so I think this is like a hopeful corrective or tool to keep people on the right path focused on that. Yeah, candidly. I mean, I got as a captain and I had no desire to be a major. I think if the opportunity to go straight to Lieutenant Colonel had been there, that could have been intriguing because those kind of jobs seemed, you know, you get to go back to command. But the long stretch as a major had limited appeal to me. I can't speak for others. But condolences, McKinsey, good for you. You know, one thing, if we could jump in on it.

You know, this actually term was like not without controversy. I mean, McKinsey and I, as we workshoped this, really the junior folks actually loved it or certainly supported. If we talked to sergeants, we talked to lieutenants' captains. It was when we did our kind of expert workshops at West Point and at Carlisle where the war colleges, right, we got some pretty significant pushback on the inclusion of a warrior as a term. And I think for good reasons, but ultimately, you know, McKinsey and I agreed that the warriors is easy for people to understand. Like, I need to be proficient in my battle drills, you know, my warrior tasks and I need to be ready to fight. And then as we build towards subsequent chapters, you know, we layer on the other parts of how we become professional soldiers.

But I don't know, McKinsey, if you want to offer anything else on that. But it was not without controversy. Yes, and that's very true. People either loved it or they hated it. And, you know, we spent a lot of time thinking about whether we should change out the term. One of the suggestions was Soldier, although I think Soldier was, you know, it doesn't quite get at the point we were making, which was that at the bottom of it all is just this kind of grit and determination. Not that soldiers doesn't embrace that, but Soldier has a bit more of a complicated meaning, I think, for people.

whereas Warrior really kind of just gets it like you have to gut it out at some point and you have to, you know, you have to have to have a level of aggression and you have to be willing to go do something. You have to be willing to go kill people on behalf of your country. And that is, and that just has Ben Solomon did. And that really like that kind of just basic role for soldiers, we thought was best embodied by the word warrior. Of course, warrior, you know, like any word, it has a lot of meanings for a lot. lot of people and we've seen, you know, as Zach pointed out, you know, people had had some problems with the term and even some junior folks, I think, are maybe getting a little fatigued of the term because we've used it a lot recently. And that's fair. And but we really, we really couldn't find a better replacement and it kind of, it just got at the heart of it. And we're hoping with, you know, when people read it through that they say, okay, you know, maybe I'm tired of the term, but I get what the point is and it does fit. So. Yeah. Well, let's stick with this because I think

this is really interesting. My next question was kind of being this neighborhood anyway, which is, I don't think it would have made sense at all to call Chapter 1 soldier, because really what you're suggesting through these first three chapters of warrior, professional leader, is that all of these are the things that make up a soldier. So you would have been naming one of the categories, you know, the overarching, the containing category, the genus or whatever. But, you know, you immediately, the layers, you know, it's not without complications and tensions. I mean, something about what you talk about in the professional chapter, Chapter 2, which is about ethics, a code of honor, restraint, et cetera. You know, I can imagine any number of famous warriors from history who were

not particularly troubled by the things that you outline in Chapter 2. And there's something about the contents of Chapter 1, I guess is what you're suggesting, that need to be contained by the contents of Chapter 2. And that's a complicated thing to write about and talk about. No? I definitely think so. you know, being a professional in the Army is definitely with these tensions. You know, you're being asked to deliver violence on behalf of your nation. We also must restrain it by the different rules that we abide by. And so I think, I hope, as folks crack open this book and they read some of the stories that those tensions are built out over time.

And then one of the audiences for this book certainly is, you know, in military education, but also in units, you know, as leaders do different sorts of professional and development. talks or discussions, hopefully they can pull out those threads and then try and help bring it together for their unit at the end to understand, you know, these tensions that are real for all of us. And certainly I feel the longer I'm in the Army, the more, you know, the further I am from Lieutenant Zach, you know, who is an infantry balloon leader who's just going out to try and, you know, crush objectives in Afghanistan towards, you know, now where I see a much more nuanced view of my role. Yeah, I think, I think it is to piggyback on what Zach said. I think it is really complicated.

And that's actually part of why we tried to explain everything like we did without, you know, kind of prescript, not in non-prescriptive terms and without definitions. We wanted to really bring out some of the nuance and in the complexities of, you know, how Warrior fits with professional, fits with leadership and how that all kind of is involved in the mission. And I think, you know, one of the goals is actually not for everybody to agree with the word choice or how we describe everything, even though it is doctrine. and doctrine is authoritative. You know, one of the intentions with this is that people discuss it because that really is kind of how the profession is stewarded from generation to generation as people revisiting some of these actually challenging topics. And instead of seeing, you know, going to this source material for, you know, like kind of a hand receipt of everything you need to know about being a professional is listed here. And as long as you memorize these terms, you're good.

We wanted this to generate discussion because that was going to, that's in our view, is how it's going to actually build good soldiers. Yeah. And, you know, if the warrior chapter is pretty individually focused, you know, the professionalism chapter, the second one, it also explores the roles of a professional in a very large institution that we just talked about, right? So we talked about like Marshall speaking up to Pershing, right? That's a different kind of courage.

It's not this warrior courage where you kill 80 Japanese on a beach in Saipan, but it is to speaking truth to power or representing your organization's interest in a really big organization. How do you advocate for your soldiers and those things? But then we build in the next chapter towards leader. But, you know, I think those aren't exactly intention, but, you know, we have a role as a warrior, but also as a role as like a leader in a big organization. And so I think that's part of what that second chapter helps us think about too. Yeah, it's interesting.

There's like a raw physical courage that's obviously part of, you know, the capacity for violence and then a kind of professional courage or moral courage that you talk about. about in the chat. No, it's interesting and I'm struck by the way in which the critique of the warrior talk kind of, it comes from at least two directions, right? There's, and I've heard it both, as obviously you guys have in the preparation of this, there's the line of critique, which is just a bit uncomfortable with the whole thing. And I've heard this, I mean, I unfortunately, I can't, I can't really tell this full story. I've been in, I've been in a room where somebody wanted to use fairly violent language to describe what the military was going to be up to. in a fairly significant venue and was counseled by other people in the room, like, oh, don't say that, don't say, just say readiness. You don't have to use those violent words. Just say the word readiness.

It's the same thing. And it was clearly like a sense of discomfort in a sense that the principle in question shouldn't, you know, sound, you know, brutish or something like that. And that the whole thing was just to talk in those terms, to use violent terms or terms that directly suggested violence, like Warrior, was somehow unprofessional.

which, you know, in a way, the structure of your book kind of concedes. It concedes that they are at least two different things, and they need to somehow be married in order to produce soldier. And then there's the other line of critique, which you guys alluded to, which is, you know, I guess what you said was that, you know, some soldiers probably at this point roll their eyes, the warfighter talk, you know, over and over again, which if it's not married to, you know,

some sort of, you know, like actual access to realistic training or whatever, becomes just talk. And it's like, we can say we're warfighters always. want, but like in, you know, in this unit, we know it, you know, come on, what are we, what are we talking about here? And I guess there's sort of a broader critique as well that matches onto that, which would run something like, you know, this is sort of tied up with populist critique, not only of the army, but of the military.

It's like, we talk a big game. There's all this, it's all this good talk, but like what's our actual record, you know, in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, which, you know, in my view, is sort of defensible at the battlefield level and then harder to harder defend the further up you go. And so I guess all of which is to say, Kudos to you for sort of like attempting to steer those rapids without getting subsumed by them. I think that was a great kind of breakup of all the different tensions in this word. And so those things, those are the same critiques that came out in some of our workshops.

But, you know, the Army also has a very long history of using the word warrior, right? Like, we may be like burning out a little bit as a term right now. But, I mean, you know, I somebody's check out the Army's archives that are at Carlisle. And, you know, there's stuff that goes way back. Certainly by the 70s it was being used regularly. We have a warrior ethos. We talk about warrior tasks and drills. You know, and so is this, you know, I think you identified lots of reasons why people use it.

But for all those reasons, we picked it because it makes people feel something without question. And so it anchors on that. We open with a story about Ben Solomon, who is unquestion to be a warrior. And I think that sets the tone for what the warrior is. And then hopefully that anchors them enough in their individual identity. We can pull them to professional and mental leader. You know, from a recruiting perspective, too, it seems kind of essential to, leave that kind of language or thinking behind.

I mean, young people, I mean, this is anecdotal. I don't have the data in front of me. Presumably, there's any number of recruiting officers and planners out there that stress over this data all the time. But I've always been perplexed by, it's usually not the Marines, it's usually other services, that run advertising campaigns to recruit that seem to suggest that you're going to be doing something other than super dangerous stuff, kind of violent, maybe really violent, on behalf of your country on a team, which seems to me to be like, you know, exactly what the target audience is looking for.

Otherwise, you know, why, you know, there's a lot of other things to do with your life. This is the military's actual competitive advantage or comparative advantage when it comes to recruiting young people. And so it just seems it's sort of crazy to walk away from it. Also, when we kind of know on some level as difficult to manage as it is, it's actually what's going to be called for on the day. Yeah, this is, this is interesting. So my husband's actually, he does marine recruiting right now. So we have a lot of, he does a lot, we have a lot of conversations about, you know, the differences and how the services kind of brand themselves. And of course, you know, one thing you noted is the Army is huge. And so we really have to be, we have to find a way to get all of those skill sets in. And so we need people from with all sorts of different interests and goals in their life to join the Army. But yeah, we did intentionally still still go back to that work. because no matter who you are, you're still going to have to learn those basic, you know, skills, and you're going to have to have basic warrior competencies, and you're going to

learn them in initial training. And they should stick with you. You're expected to maintain them throughout your career. So having that kind of, at the heart of it, still matters. And I think that the Army has refocused on that a bit, even with recruiting. I can't speak for our marketing enterprise, but, you know, understanding that that is an essential part of not just the Army brand, but the Army being, you know, that's a part of who we are and that has to, will always have to be. And just one more note on the word warrior, Zach mentioned that it was kind of at least since the 70s. But I believe in your research too, Zach, you found that prior to that, like World War II, for instance, the word was fighter. So there's always kind of been this interest in, you know, kind of like

getting at the base level of what is, there's, there's an, there's an, and. essence of soldiering that just requires something kind of a little bit of brutality, a little bit of, you know, aggression and violence, and what word embodies that? And it's warrior now, and it seems like a good one to me, fighter to me, just doesn't cultivate the same emotion. But it's, we've, it's not the first time that the, that the army has tried to find a word to get, to get after that, like, essential element. Yeah. And, you know, I think to both of what you're saying, you know, plain language is also a testament of part of it was a key part of FM1. And so whether it's warrior or, you know, I don't think we use any ambiguous language from we're describing that either HeroX of Ben Salomon

or of Saljanta or any of these folks, that plain language is really important to setting expectations, even for people who might have joined the army just to go to college. You know, like they still need to understand that warrior's part of it by being clear in our language. Like, you can't hide from the example that we gave. Yeah. And it's jarring, I think, to people who have not served in the military, or maybe to young people who are coming into the military without, you know, you know, sort of experience derived from their family or whatever about what they're getting into. You know, come from a society where, you know, by and large and for the whole, like compared to some other societies out there these days, it's not that violent, except you

on video games. But your actual day-to-day lived experience, I mean, I can think of exceptions, but they're exceptions, right? The day-to-day experience of a lot of people growing up is not particularly violent, sort of lucky as a country. Like, people are not out there fighting for their bread, literally, for the most part. And so taking young people and, you know, getting them into a headspace where, you know, they need to realize that actually, no, like doing violence is your job, but also stopping when you need to stop is also your job. And those are kind of two totally different human capacities, but we're going to need you to have both is challenging, especially when you're going to then apply it to a million people.

Yeah, and that's, I mean, why this book is aimed at the sergeant and the lieutenant, right? Because they're the ones who we're going to ask to push forward and pull back. And so I think, you know, hopefully as folks read through, especially the first three chapters, you know, we've given some grounding on examples and what's expected of them to lead in those tough circumstances. Well, let's talk about the last part of the Trinity you've got here for your first two chapters, which is leadership. And it is interesting, I mean, just to step back for a second. And fair enough, your books for sergeants, sergeants and lieutenants.

But it's also just called the Army. And one could imagine writing a book about the Army where it's kind of a given that there will be leaders because any organization has leaders. But like it's not necessarily a theme. You know, like the Army does all kinds of things. It means all kinds of things to be a soldier. And actually what you're saying is one of the foundational things is leader. Why is that important? Why do you guys want to put that, as it were, right at the top of the memo?

about the United States Army? I mean, I think there's nothing more fundamental, especially for the sergeant and the lieutenant, than the leadership that's going to be expected of them. And so as you think about, hey, so we challenge you to be a warrior, we challenge you to be a professional member of this organization. And now we're not just letting you off the hook,

but now empowering you as the one who is going to steward this organization into the future. I always try and cultivate a sense of agency in people. Often folks in a million-person organization feel like I can't change this thing or I don't have the ability to, but in this section on leadership, you know, we want people to feel ownership of the profession and their sense and a requirement to lead.

One thing that's new that's, you know, we sort of added to doctrine here is a section on followership as well. And that's because really every leader in the Army is basically also a follower. And so you need to figure out, you know, you take orders and you give orders. And so as you move up or anywhere you are, that's the case. Even the chief of staff, right, he works for the Secretary of the Army and for Congress and other people. It almost becomes more complicated the higher up you get.

And so being a good follower is just a really important part of being a good leader. And I don't think there's anywhere else we could end this Trinity. But McKinsey, any thoughts on that? No, I mean, you know, the followership piece actually came out of workshops and people started kind of talking about what the obligations are to the profession for followers. And I think sometimes we get in the habit when we're in a large organization of thinking that something is somebody else's problem. and one of the things we were really trying to do, as Zach pointed out, was create agency,

which is why it's all written in second person. You do this, you do this. And, you know, the charge at the beginning and at the end of the book is to essentially like don the mantle of the profession and own it because it's up to you. So, you know, we really started exploring in workshops what the role of follower is. Even if you are a member of a squad, what is your job in stewarding the profession? Do you have a role in making a cohesive team? You know, or is that all up to the leader. And I think that's kind of where that chapter went. And we actually got a lot of input from the sergeant major of the Army on that, actually, who had a lot of really interesting reflections about, especially from like the NCO perspective, how to, how to, how to follow and also

assist and advise leaders, even if you are not the one that is in charge, you still have a really important role in setting leaders up for failure by being, or for success by being a good follower. So I thought that was kind of a, I don't know, it was an interesting section to explore. It is a new thing. But I was really grateful that we got that feedback and decided to include it, to be honest. Yeah. And Aaron, I just build in there. I think we all know, because we've served in service that there's a stereotype of military service as like just taking orders and just marching out, you know, saluting and moving out.

But I think we all know, really at every level, this is like a, there's a little bit of a dialogue. It depends on the circumstance, right? If things are really an emergency, we're just going to issue orders and we're going to move out. but probably, you know, we're going to give instructions and then hope for refinement from those who are below us. And so the section on leadership, I think challenges appropriately folks to give instruction, but also to understand and not to think it's disloyal. If someone offers feedback back, right, because they may just, they're probably just trying to help you realize your objective in the most efficient way or, you know, in a way that accomplishes it most effectively. You know, it's just reading, I want to talk about mission type orders and mission orders in a second because I think that's a really interesting. aspect of things that folks who have not served may not be,

that might be new terms to them. And I think it's important to understand the way the Army works, to understand that. But just in response to what you guys have been saying, you know, the complexity of this stuff, I mean, it's complex when you're junior, but it does seem to get more complex, the bigger the stakes.

And I was just reading an account of the Battle of Midway, not to suddenly switch to a Navy example, but an account of Spruence, Admiral Spruence, and his staff during that battle. And I don't know if there's no reason you guys would necessarily be in the weeds on this. but I wasn't until I read this thing a few days ago. But, you know, Spruance basically spends the whole battle at war with his own staff

because they're not his staff. They're Amel Halsey's staff and Halsey is sick. And Spruance has been subbed in at the last second to go command this, you know, what will be world historical battle. And the staff doesn't really trust him. And as the days go on, he doesn't really trust the staff. And there is real tension. There are not shouting matches exactly,

but there are definitely like veiled threats from the staff to Spruents that like when they get back to port like they are going to settle accounts and Halsey's going to take care of him because they're not doing what the staff suggests. And sort of what the record in the end shows is actually Spruin's, spruin's instincts were all right. And the staff was all jacked up when it comes down to it. And it sort of dawns on Spruence as the days go on. And he's just got a totally different style than Halsey, who's this, you know, kind of buccaneering figure. It sort of evinces the warrior kind of appearance, I guess. He actually is a warrior, but like he also like embodies it in his manner, his affectations, whereas Spruance is this cerebral restrained type. And he's commanding

the battle in this very restrained way for very good reasons, it turns out, because he, well, we won't go do the whole history of the battle. Anyway, it's just fascinating. The point is, it's fascinating to watch this interplay of, you know, a rear admiral and senior staff officers really at loggerheads, all combating, you know, each other over the stakes of these epically important strategic decisions, but also like emotion and passion, you know, pride, playing a role. And like, that's, that's the reality. Like, that's actually how it looks, you know, in the moment,

which is probably not that apparent to people who have not been. I mean, this is a particularly dramatic example I grant, but like it can look like that. And it's not the only time it's ever looked like that on that flag deck. And that's the complicated, messy reality of command and leadership at senior levels. Yeah. I mean, I think we all have. of experiences where, you know, personal emotion, especially, you know, if you're in the height

of battle, you know, there's like real people at stake who you know personally, they may be your friends or your, you know, close colleagues, your classmates. And so those tensions get high. And that's part of, I think, why, you know, we focus so much on leadership and followership. But that's also why the Army takes leadership development, followership so seriously, why we wrote a book like FM1, you know, why units, we try not to create situations where we change the leader at the last minute, but try to build a team over time such that they know what to do, when they get there and there's not a surprise. I mean, obviously there's always situations happen.

Commanders are killed, things happen, but everything we do in the Army, I think, is to try and make sure that a cohesive team goes into battle together. So hopefully we can avoid situations like that. And hopefully FM1 plays a small part going forward to help. So I do wanna talk about mission type orders before we wrap, which is, so, you know,

the stereotype of the Soviet soldier, or even the Soviet officer is, you know, soldier, you stand here next to this rock and you face that way. And anything comes at you from that direction, you shoot it. You understand? And they say, yes, they understand.

And by God, that's what they're going to do. And if they do anything else, they're in deep trouble. That is not how the U.S. Army thinks about this. How does the U.S. Army think about orders and missions? So we call it mission command. And, you know, mission command is essentially not telling subordinate leaders how to do something, but giving them mission to accomplish and allowing them to, you know, apply their judgment and critical thinking to figure out how to accomplish the mission.

And this is kind of what makes, I mean, it's also how the Marine Corps fights. It's just how the American military fights. And it's, I think, what makes us really great because we are capitalizing on individual ingenuity to get the job done, which makes us less predictable, more adaptable, more agile. It's less controlled. You know, the Soviet example, the leaders have control over which direction they're going to shoot in exactly when everyone is going to do each step. But, you know, that's Americans, first of all, we maybe we're not, we're not wired quite that way. You know, we don't, we don't like to listen to authority quite that and quite that well. And I think that's, that's what makes us strong. And so we go into mission command in the

section, but also, you know, highlight in the book that Mission Command is something that is earned. And so it's not an entitlement. So it's based on this trust relationship. And also, you know, your personal competence. So, you know, in order to be a leader who is, is trusted to accomplish the mission, you have to demonstrate that you're trustworthy and that you know what you're doing and that you're an expert. And so it's kind of built on this relationship and it's, it's complex. It's not a given. And yeah, so I think that we kind of go into the nuance there because there certainly is some. Yeah. I totally agree, you know, with McKinsey. I think about when I was deployed as a special forces team leader. One of the things that Jeremy the special

forces was just this opportunity for more mission command, you know, a greater degree of trust and ability to execute missions on my own. But we were given a very broad task, which is sort of like support the special police just to, you know, stabilize Nangar. And I really didn't get that much more oversight than that. I mean, if I was doing major operations, people would want to make sure that I'd plan them and resource them appropriately. But, you know, it was a ton of personal discretion. And so, you know, that's kind of on one end. And the other end, to McKinsey's point, you know, if you're, you know, maybe Lutai McLean, you know, couldn't keep his platoon organized or, you know, whatever, you know, and so that guy, maybe we're going to put

him somewhere where he's got a little bit firmer hand to make sure he's moving in the right direction, not to call you out on that. Marines, I'm sure, are great, that planning their, their tasks. But so there's that tension in mission, command, in mission type orders, but certainly, you know, I think we're maybe putting a little more nuance on it. And to your point, like, I think American soldiers, by and large, are trusted an incredible amount to accomplish the mission, especially when compared to almost any of our peers around the world, and certainly a relative strength, I think, of the U.S. Army that we want to reinforce in this book. McKenzie Harb and Zach Griffith, thank you so much for coming today. Thank you for really,

really interesting conversation. And I hope that all the sergeants and all of the lieutenants who are meant to be reading this will read it. And I will say, I mean, I actually did think that it struck this nice balance between readability and genuine substance and was, you know, thought-provoking, which is for something that has an official field manual designation, a pretty good thing. Well done, guys. Thanks, Erin. We appreciate having us. Folks can find this at Army Pubs, order it through their online pubs, and we hope you'll crack it open. Yep, thank you very much for the conversation. It was great. This is a nebulous media production. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.