Accountability of Gear

Since day one someone enters the Army they are accountable of their gear and sensitive items. They are taught the seven army values that define the soldier. The seven army values include: Loyalty, Duty, Respect, Selfless Service, Honor, Integrity, and Personal Courage. A lot of these values, in some kind of aspect relate to having maintain accountability of their gear. The United States Army issues thousands and thousands of gear to the soldiers. The soldiers are then trusted by the United States Army to be responsible for the gear and items issued them to day one. Many items included are: M4 Carbine, NODS, IBA, and other miscellaneous equipment. There are many young people that enter the Army, and have never had so much money in gear placed in their hands at one time so they think it’s okay to just throw their gear around like it’s a football. They don’t grasp the concept of keeping their gear well maintained and accountable for it. Responsibility is the obligation of an individual to ensure government property and funds entrusted to her possession are properly used, maintained and accounted for. Responsibility doesn’t start at the individual level it starts at the highest level and makes it way down through all the units and finally to the platoon and individual. When someone misplaces a particular sensitive item, the accountability process starts at the individual, then makes its way up through the chain of command. Starting at the individual it goes up to the team leader, squad leader, section sergeant, platoon sergeant, first sergeant, company commander, executive officer of the company, and so on to the battalion level. Having accountability is also important because it is part of OPSEC (operational security). Operational security is a process of identifying critical information and subsequently analyzing friendly actions attendant to military operations. Accountability of your sensitive items can relate to OPSEC in numerous ways. If someone loses their ID...