FORT BENNING, Ga. (Sept. 23, 2015) -- The first day of the Maneuver Warfighter Conference included an update on the current state of Infantry. The discussion centered around changes to the Expert Infantryman Badge, or EIB, test and the emergence of the Lethality Battalion.
Brig. Gen. Peter Jones, chief of Infantry, said the conversation was meant to explore how to build those leaders and Infantrymen that are smart, fast, lethal and precise.
"The ability to build a smarter Soldier is key," Jones said.
CHANGES TO EIB
Command Sgt. Maj. Wilbert Engram, Infantry School command sergeant major, spoke about changes to the EIB test currently being tested in pilots.
"One of the things that we are looking at is how do we promote and certify expert Infantrymen and also promote the individual Soldier skills, which is the bedrock of our whole profession," Jones said.
Engram highlighted the major changes to the EIB as Soldiers must receive at least an 80-percent score on the Army Physical Fitness Test, or APFT, a standardized manual for the entire Army force online and the addition of Objective Bull to the test.
The current test is an outcomes-based test, Engram said, but the proposed test would be performance-based.
In one of the first pilots of the test, Engram said only 22 Soldiers out of 760 earned the EIB. Most failed to meet the 80-percent APFT score requirement.
The importance of the EIB was emphasized, and one attendee said it was the greatest individual tasks that a Soldier will ever execute. "When it comes to a centralized promotion board, having the EIB makes a difference," Engram said.
LETHALITY BATTALION
"How do we improve lethality at the Maneuver Center of Excellence across all of our weapon systems, ranging from the M4 Carbine (and M9) to the main battle tank - the Abrams system?" Col. William Thigpen, commander of 316th Cavalry Brigade asked.
The answer is the Lethality Battalion.
The battalion is meant to standardize training on the weapon systems, create consistency across the board and build efficiencies within the Master Gunner population.
Thigpen introduced the new Master Gunner program with a phase one and a phase two.
A Common Core Master Gunner program will be validated in January of 2016 with the Bradley and Abrams Master Gunner course, Thigpen said.
The force challenged: Why does Fort Benning not have a stabilized Master Gunner program to answer the unstabilized gunnery challenges in the Infantry Basic Combat Team and the legacy motorized Infantry formations in the National Guard units? The answer is Common Core.
As a result, Thigpen said the lessons relevant to any Master Gunner program were pulled out from the existing programs and used to ignite the Master Gunner Common Core Course - phase one. In the following phase, Soldiers take platform-specific Master Gunner courses on focused on either Stryker, Bradley or Abrams vehicles.
During the discussion Maj. Gen. Scott Miller, commanding general of the Maneuver Center of Excellence, said marksmen ought to be shooting 36 to 40 out of 40 every single time - "Every round counts," he said.
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