385th Military Police Battalion wins 16th Military Police Brigade Best Squad Competition

The 16th Military Police Brigade hosted a Best Squad Competition on Fort Stewart, Georgia, Jan. 23-26, 2023, meant to assess each squad on its technical and tactical proficiency, as well as its ability to work as a cohesive team. The winning team was the 385th Military Police Battalion, 16th MP BDE, based out of Fort Stewart.

“The most influential part of the Army starts with a squad,” said Command Sgt. Maj. David Astorga, the senior enlisted advisor for the 385th MP Bn. “Squad leaders have a lot of influence within their squad. How that squad leader influences are going to determine how far they can push their squad through rigorous events, and this competition was rigorous.”

Squads consisted of five Soldiers: the squad leader, a staff sergeant; a team leader, a sergeant or corporal; and three squad members in the ranks of specialist or below.

“One word that I would use to describe our squad is well-rounded,” said Spc. Colton Beeson, member of the 385th MP Bn. “Everyone in the squad had something to bring to the table that helped complete the mission. Staff Sgt.Brent Grafmuller is very knowledgeable and has a lot of experience forming plans and executing the mission. Sergeant Xavier Melendez is extremely fast, physically fit, and was able to pick up the slack of anyone that might have been struggling. Specialist Jonathan Bramblett has strength that came in handy when things needed to be moved such as ammo cans and casualties in the medical lanes. I have a lot of field knowledge that helped us find the best routes to take when moving between events or points during the land navigation course. Private Alli McCreery has heart. Even when she was hurting, she never gave up or complained, and [she] performed to the best of her ability.”

The three-day competition included various warrior tasks and battle drills, an obstacle course, a ruck march, a land navigation course, marksmanship events, a combatives tournament, an Army Combat Fitness Test, and a formal board.

“One moment when I knew I was glad to be a part of the squad was definitely during the land navigation event,” said Beeson. “We had been moving around finding the points and had just got our last point and decided to take a short break to sit down and get some food and water in our system before we started rucking back to the end point that was a few clicks away through the swamp. During that break, despite how tired we were, we were all still finding the energy to laugh and crack jokes to keep the morale up. We all knew how much pain each person was in and all did our best to keep everyone distracted from that pain. Then after we were rehydrated and had some calories in our system, we strapped the rucks back up and started dead reckoning through the brush and no one ever complained about it.”

Competition events are a test of grit and toughness, foster readiness and esprit de corps, and are a fundamental part of building lethal, cohesive teams and expert leaders.

“This definitely exceeded my expectations and motivated me,” said Astorga. “It's giving me new life and new energy to see the competitive spirit of our Soldiers here in a unit like this.”

“I have a renewed confidence in the future army because those are our future leaders, " said Master Sgt. Mylls Cheffey, the senior enlisted advisor for operations and training for the 385th MP Bn. “They will fight and win our nation's war if called upon.”