#3--Ray Smith Controversy & Clarity

The topics we discussed in this episode include:

-Smith’s thoughts on professional military education (PME) and training

-What good PME and training look like

-The best PME experience Smith ever had

-Major General O.K. Steele’s approach to training and PME

-The effect that bootcamp had on Smith’s development as a person

-How to get young Marines interested in learning

-The value of getting to know your Marines

-Why squad leaders are the most important people in a unit

-The key role of trust in maneuver warfare

-Smith’s thoughts on leaders being teacher-scholars

-What gets in the way of building trust in a unit

-Responding to when Marines make honest mistakes (“sins of commission”)

-The zero-defect mentality and the value of second chances

-The responsibility of a commander to protect their Marines

-The “colonel syndrome” and becoming self-interested

-Why it’s tough to be a major in the Marine Corps

-What it was like serving with Tony Zinni

-Smith’s battlefield “sixth sense”

-How the North Vietnamese Army (NVA) fought

-Comparing how Marine and NVA units fought

-The role that Vietnam played on Ray Smith’s journey to maneuver warfare

-Smith’s destruction of an NVA battalion in Aug 1968

-Working with a company of tanks as a rifle company commander

-Smith’s experience in Operation Urgent Fury, the invasion of Grenada

-The need to know your enemy in maneuver warfare

-What surprised Smith the most about Grenada

-Smith on the fog of war

-The biggest maneuver warfare lesson Smith took away from Grenada

Links

“Commemoration of Grenada with MajGen Ray Smith, USMC (Ret) at Marines' Memorial 10-23-2019”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SzSi_5ZvJ7Q


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