Key Resolve 2014

Today marks the end of my battalion's role in this year's Key Resolve exercise. For the past two weeks, we've been running 24-hour operations to simulate what the U.S. and Korean forces would do in the event of a North Korean attack.

My role in this year's Key Resolve was a bit different than in past exercises. Whereas before I served as the night shift battle captain (the guy who directs operations within the headquarters), this time I was the S-4.

Because the S-4 is mostly concerned with internal, day-to-day matters, my part role in Key Resolve was a small one, made even smaller by the fact that nothing really happened.

I can think of three reasons for this: first, as a support battalion we're not the training priority; second, we had a whole bunch of other things to worry about; and third, as the S-4 we focus more on day-to-day operations anyway.

During this past week we had our monthly DRRS-A readiness reporting, our Quarterly Training Brief, and recovery from our field exercise the previous week, in addition to our weekly headquarters meeting. Compared with these activities, the Key Resolve requirements seemed liked background noise.

I'm glad it's over. Now we can get back to focusing on our regular business of supply discipline, maintenance oversight, and financial budgets.

Oh goody.