Upon his assumption of command, LT McDonough wanted to establish his leadership. He established his SOP’s and a level of rapport and wanted the soldiers to know that he would be better than their last Platoon Leader. Using all his military prowess, training and knowledge, he does successfully establish this. Though, he did so without confidence in his decisions. LT McDonough, early on, set up a patrol for his platoon to do regularly and by using his knowledge was able to do everything by the book. He told his subordinate leaders to use the 5 paragraph OPORD and the given SOP’s he laid out to them – everything by the book. At first, he was hesitant to ask his leaders for advice because he was afraid on how it would make him seem in front of the men – indecisive. Gradually, as patrols went on, he started feeling confident in his leadership skills when the patrols became more frequent. Though, he still wanted to make sure that he was doing everything right.

Later on, while conducting a patrol on the nearby village, Donne saw two possible VC and LT McDonough ordered not to open fire because they showed no weapons or signs of hostile acts. Donne did not like this. This event stood out the most to me because LT McDonough wanted to establish his leadership so quickly that he forgot that he was still inexperienced within this environment and did not utilize his NCO’s knowledge of the enemy. For that, they chased down the possible two VC’s and ran into a booby trap that ended up injuring LT McDonough’s legs and had to be medevac.

The decision to not fire upon the possible VC was a good one even though Donne did not agree with it. He felt a level of responsibility regardless of whomever took action. This was the right call. Though, I question his motivation to pursue and capture the enemy. He knew from his assumption of command that his mission was to control the countryside by sending patrols. The risk associated with the capture objection was not well thought out. He ended up getting injured and possibly injuring his other soldiers. He was already well on his way to establishing himself as a leader amongst his platoon.