The senior enlisted advisor to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, U.S. Marine Sgt. Maj. Bryan Battaglia, visited Fort Leavenworth this week on a tour to speak with service members, veterans and their family members across Kansas and Missouri.
"Visiting troops and their families is vital because it allows me to collect input and feedback from them," Battaglia said. "We discover how they're doing, challenges they may have completing their mission, and deployments they are about to be going out on or are just coming back from. Additionally, there are things they may want to know that are happening on a Department of Defense level. It's a true information-sharing trip."
His visit included tours of the United States Disciplinary Barracks, the Joint Regional Correctional Facility and the SHARP Academy. Battaglia also visited to the Kansas City Military Entrance Processing Station, as well as the Kansas City and Leavenworth Veteran's Administration hospitals during the three-day tour.
"That's very important to us because the Military Entrance Processioning Station is the very beginning -- even the premature beginning -- of military members' life cycle," Battaglia said. "On the back-end of a military lifecycle when you turn into a veteran, you belong to the VA and are still part of the military family. Obviously veterans need to be taken care of, because not only are they are family but they are recruiters for the future of our all-volunteer force."
Battaglia spoke highly of the Solders he interacted with during his tour of the two military correctional facilities on Fort Leavenworth.
"I was extremely impressed," Battaglia said. "The self-discipline, patience, professionalism, restraint and respect of the 31E -- the corrections officers inside the facility -- is really a model to set for the rest of the Armed forces. When we think of professional ethics, professionalism, dependability and reliability … they really bring their A game each and every day. And you have to appreciate that because they do it day after day after day, and there are some long hours."
During the course of the visit, Battaglia hoped to identify some small personnel short falls to take back to Washington D.C. and help them fill that gap.
"That may relieve some of the added stress over the course of time that these 31E feel, because while they perform this mission, they also have other things they have to do," Battaglia said. "There are Army standards to meet, there are deployments that they have to obviously execute and that all adds up. The 12 hours on and 12 hours off becomes shorter and shorter, and over the course of time really stats to take its toll."
Battaglia was accompanied by Command Sgt. Maj. James Moberly of the Kansas Army National Guard, and the visit was hosted by Command Sgt. Maj. David Turnbull, command sergeant major of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center and Fort Leavenworth. Battaglia's visit to the SHARP Academy allowed him to gather ideas to share with the other services in their fight against harassment in the Armed Forces and sexual assault.
"This is not just a Combined Arms Center, this is a Center of Excellence as well," Battaglia said. "(The visit to the SHARP Academy) will allow me to see how the Army trains its Soldiers in sexual assault response and take some things to other service branches. That's the collaborative effort. Sexual assault is a universal problem, so it deserves a universal solution."
Turnbull hopes the key takeaway of the visit is the key role the Combined Arms Center plays in the Armed Forces and that all organizations, public and private, will look to them for solutions.
"I've been here about five months and I'm still amazed that every day I learn something new that we're doing," Turnbull said. "We wrote the Army Ethics, which has never been done. We rewrote the Professional Development field manual, and created Army University, just to name a few of the many initiatives we are working on. Every aspect of what we do affects every part of the Army, and we want to share information with everyone who wants to know. It does it no good if we keep it to ourselves. We are here as a resource."
Moberly was impressed by the work the Combined Arms Center has done and attributes it partially to the success his organization has had training leaders.
"What CAC briefed us on gave me a relevant, real time tie-in to the most recent headquarters, DA EXORD on NCO development system," Moberly said. "It all ties together. It will help me and my peers throughout the 54 states, territories and the district work to properly develop our NCO corps and maintain that it is the top professional NCO in the world.
"Over the period of this visit, we've all been impressed with our junior enlisted," Moberly added. "It's reaffirmed that the future of our forces are in great hands."
Overall, the visit was really about the troops and their family members, and to let them know how much their sacrifice means to the country they serve.
"It's always a great opportunity to thank all the men and women, not just here at Fort Leavenworth and all its tenet commands, but throughout both Kansas and Missouri," Battaglia said. "I've seen a plethora of activity throughout various missions, goals and objectives, and I'm very impressed."
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