Sir,

After checking into your web-site for the first time in a while, I was glad to see that you addressed some of the issues facing initial entry training for cadets/junior officers.

I have had the peculiar experience of being a cadet both at West Point and in ROTC. I received my commission through ROTC and am presently an infantry officer at Fort Hood en route to Iraq.

In my experience, the best training that I ever received was during my second summer as a West Point cadet - Cadet Field Training as it is officially known or Camp Buckner as the cadets refer to it. During those eight weeks, we reviewed and developed basic soldier skills (BRM, land nav, first aid, commo, camo, etc.) and we learned light infantry tactics (both offensive and defensive). Additionally, we were exposed to armor, artillery, engineer and air defense tactics and given hands on exercises with each.

After experiencing that training, I hoped to see many of the same things at ROTC Advanced Camp. I was greatly disappointed. Realism was traded in for cadet evaluations. Checklists were used during the evaluations, rather than actual reflection upon the effects of decisions and actions made by leadership. I have been told that some of this has changed, yet I remain skeptical.

Following that, I expected that IOBC would be the culmination of all my training and that I would get a much more realistic/hands-on opportunity to test my knowledge and abilities. I was greatly mistaken. IOBC was, by and large, a disaster. Frankly, I felt that maybe 3-5 total days out of the 17 weeks were eye-opening for teaching me something that I hadn't already been taught or read about.

Fortunately, I can say that the Mechanized Leaders Course and the M2A3 Leaders Course served as a good familiarization with the technical side of the mechanized world.

When it comes to basic tactics, I believe that the West Point model ought to be replicated for both ROTC and OCS. Doing this would eliminate the "need" for BOLC, which in my view only offers an easy way out for the pre-commisioning trainers and undermines the potential value of OBC for new officers.

Thank you for your time and consideration, as always...We've corresponded before.

AN INFANTRY LEADER