ARLINGTON, Va. – Basic training. It’s a challenging, often life-changing experience that for some newly enlisted Army National Guard members may also feel like a daunting, larger-than-life task.
Enter the Recruit Sustainment Program, an initiative designed to ensure new Army Guard Soldiers are prepared for the rigors ahead.
“The Recruit Sustainment Program has a three-tenet mission,” said Army Maj. Matt Riley, who oversees the program nationwide. “It’s to make sure the Soldier is physically fit, mentally prepared and administratively correct for basic training and [Advanced Individual Training].”
To do that, new Army Guard Soldiers drill with a Recruit Sustainment Battalion until they ship to basic training. After completing basic, most Soldiers then move directly to AIT to become qualified in their military specialty. For those with a much later AIT date, they return to the RSB until they go to advanced training.
Broken down into five phases – red, white, blue, green and gold – the program all starts with going over the basics: marching, drill and ceremony, rank structure and military customs and courtesies.
“It’s Army and Military 101,” Riley said, of the initial, or Red Phase, portion of the program.
Red Phase typically lasts one drill. Soldiers then move on to White Phase, where they’re introduced to physical readiness training, take the Army Physical Fitness Test and learn other items, such as map reading and land navigation.
“The cadre runs them through the paces,” said Riley. “They administer the APFT. They administer PRT. It’s just a plethora of different training modules and training opportunities.”
White Phase is where Soldiers spend most of their time in the program, said Riley. After that, it’s Blue Phase, meaning basic training is just around the corner.
“Blue Phase is the training that takes place the drill prior to shipping to basic training,” Riley said. “It’s one drill and it’s going over all their records again, making sure they’re ready to ship.”
Those in Green Phase are Soldiers who have graduated basic training and are waiting on a later AIT date, while Gold Phase Soldiers have completed training and are ready to move on to their unit.
“All that’s left in Gold Phase is just making sure all their paperwork is administratively correct and they’re ready for the battle hand off to their first unit of assignment,” said Riley, adding, the first three phases are critical and ensure readiness for basic training.
“It’s making sure they know what to expect when they get there and get off the bus,” said Riley.
That is, perhaps, the most important thing about the program and something the cadre at the Recruit Sustainment Battalions take to heart.
“You come before the drill sergeant,” said Army Master Sgt. Jabin Wade, formerly an instructor with the Texas Army National Guard’s RSB, who now serves as the noncommissioned officer in charge of the overall Recruit Sustainment Program. “You are the first picture of what the Army life is about. You bring them into that and you shape and mold them and send them off to basic training.”
And most who go through the program are successful in basic.
“We do produce a lot of honor graduates,” said Wade. Honor graduates aside, the success rate has shown a continual uptick since the program’s inception in 2005.
“Our training pipeline success rate has risen from 2005 where it was an organizational low of 68 percent,” said Riley. “In 2018 we were at 84.4 percent.”
That directly translates to increased readiness, he said.
“The more people we get through the training pipeline, the higher our end strength is and the greater readiness is,” he said, adding that once a Soldier makes it through training and is handed off to his or her unit, that individual is deployable.
That’s a change from pre-2005, where Soldiers would drill with their unit of assignment until going to training. That meant a unit’s personnel numbers didn’t always match its actual readiness levels, said Riley.
It also meant some Soldiers were ready for basic, while others could have been better prepared.
“The units sometimes weren’t tracking them and the [newly enlisted Soldiers] would get frustrated,” said Wade. “Or, they’re assigned tasks like cleaning latrines or assigned whatever duties just to keep them out of the way.”
That changed with the RSP.
“The inception of the RSP began to give these Soldiers some training before basic training to make them more successful,” said Wade.
Simply put, said Riley, the Soldiers are now better prepared.
“They’re more mentally resilient because they’ve been better prepared for it than some of their counterparts,” he said.
The key, Riley noted, is the Soldiers running the Recruit Sustainment Battalions, located in all 50 states, three territories and the District of Columbia.
“The success is a testimony to those [cadre] who made it what it is today,” said Riley. “The responsibility of the NCOs, the drill sergeants and the recruiters who are working with them is to help [the new Soldiers] formulate the mindset that I can do this. I can get through [basic training], I can get through AIT.”
For Riley, the future of the program is nothing but continued growth and success.
“I don’t see it doing anything other than improving and getting better,” he said.
Wade agreed, adding the RSP represents future Army Guard leadership.
“We form the leaders of tomorrow right here,” he said. “A lot of them go on to go through officer candidate programs or ROTC programs, so we build the force directly from the RSP program.”