3d MRB Interview Series #1, 13 April 17

[GySgt Cole]

3d Marine Raider Battalion Interview Series, Pt. 1
3d MRB Newsletter -- April 13th, 2017

 

As part of the ongoing unit workup, S-5 Public Affairs has conducted interviews with various members of the unit. Some of these interviews were conducted "in character", while others were conducted "out of character".

We hope you enjoy reading, and look for more interviews in the near future.

 

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SgtMaj De Leo
Interview Conducted by: SSgt Oliveira

What is your billet and what do you do in the 3d MRB?

I am the Sergeant Major of the unit. My primary job in the unit is to assist and provide feedback to Commanding Officer, my secondary duties include Command Staff and Awards and Decoration Advisor.

 

What do you do as the Award and Decorations advisor?

I used to be the person in charge but then to make room for other duties in the unit I gave it to HM2 Truscott. My only role is to advise Truscott on things he might need from time to time and anything else that concerns the artistic creation of the ribbon racks, and the ribbons themselves that I've created.

 

How do you feel the FTX Cycle has been, and how you feel it's been perceived by the unit?

It's more about the people understanding and adjusting the new reality we are facing from a conventional approach to a special forces unit. We're still in the process of changing the mindset, it was expected to not change immediately. We knew it was going to take some time and we're still in that process. The FTX cycle has been pretty well welcomed by the unit. Some people may feel like we are not encountering or killing as many bad guys as they would like to see but we are shifting from a conventional approach to a more special forces type approach. So that's gonna take time and we will definitely adjust to that. This is what pretty much is going on now in the FTX cycle.

                     

What are some goals that you want the unit to achieve in the next 6 months?

What I hope the unit to achieve? First of all we need to achieve a better level of cohesion. That's something that's vital when you get a bunch of people on the server to play a game. So we need to improve cohesion, lateral coordination and the working relationships between sections of the unit. That's a very important thing. We all need to be focusing on our jobs and understand other people jobs and make sure we do our best to mix everything together. If we are able to do this, we will do great things in the future.

 

Talking about the future, what is one long term goal for the unit?

The long term goal for the unit is to establish ourselves in the Arma community, to make ourselves known, and to make our unit a reference point when it comes to people wanting to try out special forces type realism units. So we have that type of goal in our minds. Of course it won't be easy, and there are a lot of challenges that are waiting for us, but once again it's just not something that we need to hope for it to happen, we need to work for that to happen. Not only myself as a member of battalion, but we all need to work together to achieve that goal. From the inside, we need work and make sure we have people to step up one day to take up leadership.

 

What would you tell someone he wants to join the 3d MRB?

If you're looking for a good community with a lot of nice people and to share the passion of this game, if you're looking for a special forces type unit: this is the one for you. We have a bunch of people that are very dedicated spending time everyday to make sure everyone, regardless of being a new join or someone who has been in the unit for a while, enjoys themselves everyday and every weekend when we have our operations.

            

Any advice to junior members that are looking to get in a leadership position?

For a CSO: you have to be willing to step up when needed, look for a example and follow that example, learn the job, and try to be involved. Spend time and try showing your leadership that you're are worthy for that position and your chance will come. Everyone has the same type of chance to get a leadership position in the unit.

 

Thank you SgtMaj for your time.

 

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1stLt Ray
Interview Conducted by: Cpl Cole

Sir, what’s your name, and what is your billet within the 3d MRB?

I’m 1stLt Ray, and I’m the Team Leader of MSOT 8310 “Viking”.

 

Give me a general description of your duties.

As team leader, it’s my duty to administer the team and make sure all my guys have what they need and are following instructions and policies from higher up the chain. In field, I generally lay out the strategy for the team and make sure these strategies are executed effectively and efficiently.

 

How do you think your current FTX cycle is going?

I think it’s been really fun and very successful. We’re all building on our experiences as Marines and as Raiders, learning new tactics and getting better at the ones we already know.

What was your personal favorite FTX so far?

03-17! It was planned quickly in field, and it was planned well. We were successful in our mission, holding off a larger force and safely extracting a number of hostages.

 

Would you say that was your most personally successful as well?

Yes, definitely. Especially considering we got to work with 8311 for the first time, I look forward to working with them more in the future.

 

Gotcha. What’s been your biggest challenge during this FTX cycle?

Adjusting to the role of an officer has been challenging for me. I spent a lot of time as a NCO in the fleet, and while it has been difficult to adjust, I feel like I understand the role of an officer much better now.

 

Over the course of the remaining FTXs, what do you want to work on the most with your team? Or rather, what goals do you want to reach by the end of the cycle?

My team has surprised me with how well they’ve been able to adapt to circumstances in the field and the general life of a Marine Raider. I definitely want them to be experienced in as many different scenarios as possible. I want them to recognize a situation in a real combat scenario as something they’ve already trained on, and that they will have enough experience behind them that they can handle any surprises thrown at them.

 

Is there any FTX scenarios you’d like to see before the end of the cycle? It could be fun, or a type of training you think would greatly benefit your Marines.

I think some sort of VIP elimination, preferably through ambush, would be very nice. I also want to put all our different qualifications that we’ve worked hard on to use. Some sort of scenario involving lots of long range engagements, or a vehicle ambush involving mines and antitank weapons would both be fun and useful training.

 

Cool. Say you were tasked with recruiting Marines into the Marine Raider Regiment. What would you say to them that would make them want to join?

I’d say we have a very good community of men and women who are constantly striving to improve themselves. They get along, they’re serious and they want to make sure the mission gets completed correctly.

 

Do you have any advice to junior leaders, or even to senior leaders, that you’ve learned from your time as an NCO and now an officer?

Challenge yourself. Expose yourself to all the interesting opportunities our unit offers, and you’ll be surprised how easily new stuff comes. Even if a new concept or role seems difficult and I might say “I can’t do this”, if I sit down and bear with it usually I can get the hang of things pretty quickly.

 

If you couldn’t do your job in the unit now, what would you want to do?

Team Chief. They are vital to training and unit morale, and I get a lot of enjoyment from watching a new operator learn and grow as a Marine. Since Team Chiefs set training plans, I would be involved in this process.

 

What’s a secondary billet you’re interested in doing?

Immersion specialist. They’re a special type of actor we use on training exercises to make sure Raiders know how to interact with all sorts of live scenarios. They can play civilians, enemy insurgents and VIPs. It’s an incredibly important job that is vital to training success and I’d definitely be interested in helping out.

 

Well that’s it for my questions, thanks for your time.

No problem.

 

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HM2 Anderson
Interview Conducted by: Cpl Melo

What is your name and billet within the 3d MRB?

HM2 M. Anderson (MSOT 8325 Element 2 SARC), has been a SARC for 2 months. I was previously in both Army and Marine units.

Why did you join the 3d MRB?

I would say that say that I am attracted to the blend of special operations and conventional warfare a MRB conducts, and I also followed some of my buddies from other units.
 

Why are you a SARC?

I like being able to help my colleagues when it counts and it is gratifying for me to save lives.
 

How do you think the FTXs have been so far?

So far so good, we have had very interesting missions, a MRB has a wide variety of mission types and recently we have added civilian in our FTXs which helps us deal with people while on mission.
 

What would you say to people thinking about joining the 3d MRB?

We have people who work very hard in this unit and we have been getting better and better at what we do, the 3d MRB has good people and I've made many good friends.


Thanks for your time.
 

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LCpl Bailey
Interview conducted by: Cpl Melo

 

What is your name and billet within the 3d MRB?

I'm LCpl Bailey, currently a Critical skills operator with MSOT 8310 "Viking".
 

Why did you join the 3d MRB?

I like the fast moving hard hitting tactics of a Marine Raider Battalion and we are always on a swivel.
 

What would you say to people thinking about joining the 3d MRB?

You will have many opportunities to grow and lot's of room for moving up in the unit. You are allowed to do a variety of jobs, from specialising with the Carl Gustaf to the Minimi, there is always something new to do. There is never a dull moment.
 

How do you think the FTXs have been so far?

FTXs have been pretty good, definitely touches every possible situation we might encounter and has helped us train ourselves mentally to be able to react to anything that might happen in the field. From being on patrol in a city in the desert to having to fight our way out of an ambush in said city, so far it has been very good for us.
 

What do you think of the people you work with?

We have very competent people who are hard working. We are very tight knit, everyone knows each other. Even if you don't know someone well, it doesn't matter, because everyone knows how to work with other people. We are brothers in arms.
 

What would you like to see in the future of the 3d MRB?

We need more stressful training, we should overwhelm ourselves so we can find out what are our breaking points and work on our problems. Our FTXs are to prepare us for real field action.

Thanks for your time.

Edited April 21, 2017 by Cpl Cole