A Soldier Supporting Soldiers

A Soldier Supporting Soldiers is the second in a series of works by distinguished U.S. Army logisticians that focus on firsthand experience in the organization of combat service support. These studies seek to describe and analyze problems still familiar to those who provide the materials and other support required by today's Army. Their authors also clearly underscore the challenges that their successors will face in an era of limited resources. With active careers that span the last half century of Army history General Carter B. Magruder, in the recently published Recurring Logistic Problems As I Have Observed Them and Lt. Gen. Joseph M. Heiser, Jr., in the pages that follow, have much to say to the student of military operations about what constitutes efficiency and effectiveness in military logistics. General Heiser's study marks a clear departure from the Center of Military History's policy of refraining from publishing biographies or memoirs. Although we believe that the compelling reasons for establishing such a policy fifty years ago still pertain, we also think an exception should be made in this case. General Heiser has a unique skill in conveying important logistical lessons through personal anecdotes. Especially in his early chapters, he uses specific incidents from his own career to illuminate for his reader larger principles of logistics. Thus in this special instance our audience is treated to an extended, personal account that in some ways has just as much to say about military leadership and ethic as it does about logistics. The logistical principles discussed in this study appear especially vital to today's military students, given the recent massive challenges tologisticians posed by operations in the Persian Gulf and possible future contingency operations. I urge them to study and reflect on the insights provided in the engaging chapters that follow. Harold W. Nelson Washington, D.C.Brigadier General, USA December 1990Chief of Milit

This a reprint of 1991 study published by the United States Army Center of Military History. "A Soldier Supporting Soldiers" represents the collective insights of distinguished U.S. Army logistician Joseph M. Heiser Jr. He infuses his narrative with specific firsthand experiences in the organization of combat service support, thus illuminating larger principles of not only logistics but also military leadership and ethics. Heiser describes and analyzes problems still familiar to those who provide the materials and other support required by today's Army, especially in an environment of limited resources and challenging contingency operations. Military logisticians and military policymakers will benefit greatly from the logistics lessons.

A Soldier Supporting Soldiers represents the collective insights of distinguished U.S. Army logistician Joseph M. Heiser Jr. He infuses his narrative with specific firsthand experiences in the organization of combat service support, thus illuminating larger principles of not only logistics but also military leadership and ethics. Heiser describes and analyzes problems still familiar to those who provide the materials and other support required by today's Army, especially in an environment of limited resources and challenging contingency operations. Military logisticians and military policymakers will benefit greatly from the logistics lessons.

This a reprint of 1991 study published by the United States Army Center of Military History. "A Soldier Supporting Soldiers" represents the collective insights of distinguished U.S. Army logistician Joseph M. Heiser Jr. He infuses his narrative with specific firsthand experiences in the organization of combat service support, thus illuminating larger principles of not only logistics but also military leadership and ethics. Heiser describes and analyzes problems still familiar to those who provide the materials and other support required by today's Army, especially in an environment of limited resources and challenging contingency operations. Military logisticians and military policymakers will benefit greatly from the logistics lessons.

When Canadian soldier Fred Doucette went to Bosnia-Herzegovina as a peacekeeper in 1995, he had a premonition that this tour of duty would be different from anything he had previously experienced. And it was. Doucette's tour quickly became an impossible task that took a huge toll on both the residents and his fellow peacekeepers. Trapped in thier beloved city, thousands of Sarajevans, perished, and yet, Doucette found a home in the midst of this hell. Billeted with a Bosnian family, he was offered a window into a Sarajevo that few outsiders saw. When the war ended, Doucette returned to Canada to face another battle, this one characterized by nightmares and brutal flashbacks. Traumatized, he had to face himself, his family, and his army once again, but now there was no turning away, no diversion in another foreign posting. Empty Casing is the riveting story of the making and unmaking of a soldier, and the growth of a man.