HAMMER: Korea was the first war where the US Army rotated Soldiers in and out of theatre in significant numbers, a practice that has continued ever since. In doing practical and instructional knowledge is lost and lessons have to be re-learned, sometimes at great cost. How would you change the manner in which we now rotate Soldiers into different conflicts across the globe? Are the benefits worth the cost, when our enemies remain in place and continue to learn? What are the pros and cons of each system?

The rotation system has both Pros and Cons in terms of effectiveness and readiness, same goes to the permanent unit concept. In my opinion, the permanent unit concept is better in terms of effectiveness and readiness. If a unit was permanently station in the ROK there would be a greater level of readiness, because lessons learned would not be lost with each rotation. Moreover, in terms of equipment the equipment would be better off since Soldiers would take more care of it since they know it is ultimately theirs as opposed to a lease for nine months.

However, the permanent unit does have some cons. For instance, the biggest one would be complacency. After being in country for an extended period of time, things could get start to get repetitive and complacency would start to settle in. It could get to the point that the hard lessons learned would be lost. For example, in the OC academy the instructor told us that decontamination was simple “you just need enough space and the just follow the flow chart”. When in reality this is not the case, especially when you’re going eight hours wearing MOPP 4. So are the benefits worth the cost? In my opinion I would say yes but only if the permeant unit can refrain from becoming complacent.