In this episode, we discuss:

*Gunner Gilchrist’s advice to his past self, Private First Class Gilchrist

*What Infantry Training Battalion-East was like when Ryan attended as a student in 2003-2004

*What Ryan’s first unit (Fox Company, 2nd Battalion, 2nd Marines) was like

*Ryan’s deployment to Karma, Iraq—what the experience was like and what he learned from it

*How Ryan attempted to get his Marines to adopt a population-focused approach to counter-insurgency when he was a squad leader and platoon sergeant

*Fox 2/2’s operations in Iraq

*Ryan’s experience as a team leader

*What makes a first-rate team leader

*What every team leader should be doing intellectually to get better

*The challenges of leading your peers

*Ryan’s first MEU: his expectations and experiences

*Ryan’s advice on keeping young Marines engaged on a MEU

*What Ryan learned from training with the Kenyan army

*His experience at Corporals Course and Drill Instructor School

*Ryan’s response to my calls to change recruit training

*The one thing Ryan would change about recruit training and why

*Ryan’s thoughts on the 4th Phase of recruit training

*Ryan’s experience at the Infantry Squad Leaders Course

*His deployment to Sangin, Afghanistan, as a squad leader with India Company, Third Battalion, Seventh Marines

*What lessons he took away from the deployment

*Ryan’s second deployment to Afghanistan, this time as a platoon sergeant, and what he took away from it

*What makes a good platoon sergeant

*As a platoon sergeant, what Ryan expected of his squad leaders

*Ryan’s experiences teaching at the Infantry Small Unit Leaders Course (ISULC) at the School of Infantry-West and how these influenced how he understands and practices maneuver warfare

*The challenges associated with running ISULC field exercises

*The intellectual shift Ryan experienced teaching at ISULC

*Ryan’s initial reaction to seeing me (Damien) at ISULC

*Why Ryan finds decision-forcing cases (DFCs) so effective

*Ryan’s favorite DFC and why

*Ryan’s facilitation of The Hornet’s Nest, a DFC that he built for ISULC

*Unexpected themes or uses of DFCs

*Ryan’s experience of having the protagonist of a case in the classroom while he’s teaching and his advice to case facilitators interested to employing this technique

*Ryan’s time as the operations chief for Weapons Company, Third Battalion, 1st Marines, including his deployment with the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit

*His experience working with Italy’s San Marco Marine Brigade

*Ryan’s time as the tactics chief at Officer Candidate School (OCS)

*The one thing Ryan would change about OCS

*Ryan’s experiences as a student at The Basic School and in the Infantry Weapons Officer Course

*Ryan’s work on reshaping recruit training at Parris Island and how he’s integrated DFCs into The Crucible

*The one thing Ryan would change about Marine enlisted professional military education

*The one thing he’d changed about how we train Marines

*The one thing he’d change about Marine infantry

*What maneuver warfare in garrison looks like

*Ryan’s thoughts on Force Design 2030 and what a war with China might look like for Marine infantry

*His reaction to discussed plans to make Marine infantry more like special operations forces

*What concerns Ryan the most about the future direction of the Marine Corps

*What excites Ryan the most about the future direction of the Marine Corps

Links

Tribal Leadership by David Logan et al.: https://amzn.to/3niff9y

Ender’s Game by Orson Scott Card: https://amzn.to/3opXDrw