The 4 Types of Military Orders

Many orders in the military simply make you say WTF?
December 25, 2018  
|  7 Comments
Categories: Op-Eds

There are just 4 Types of Orders 

The 4 Types of Military Orders are – good, bad, ugly, and WTAF?

This article originally ran waaaay back in May of 2014

Among people who have never served, the military often seems to be a place where mindless drones follow any and all orders without question. But we veterans know how untrue that is, and how difficult it can be to make troops do what they’re told. But more importantly, those of us who’ve had long careers in the military have learned which orders can be dodged, and how to do it.

Yes, nonveterans, you heard that right. Soldiers don’t always follow orders. Because sometimes they shouldn’t.

No, military guys, I’m not advocating insubordination or suggesting service members should ignore their chains of command. But I’m all for dealing with realities. For example, let’s say you’re deployed to Afghanistan, chronically short of sleep, responsible for twenty soldiers’ lives and under constant threat of death. In that situation, it might be understandable for you to respond to a constant deluge of emailed orders like “Brigade needs to know everyone’s boot sizes by tomorrow or we’re all going to die!” by clicking “delete, delete, delete”.

In my 25 years of military service, I’ve received many orders that made perfect sense. I’ve received others that didn’t. And without consciously realizing it, I’ve been classifying those orders, breaking them into types. After I came home from my second deployment, it suddenly hit me: every order can be placed into one of four categories, and treated accordingly.

For the benefit of almost everyone in the military, I’m going to explain those four categories. Please keep the information at the utmost, MK Ultra-Secret level; this might not be the kind of thing E-9s and O-6s should hear. Or maybe it’s exactly what they should hear. I’m really not sure. Anyway, here goes.

TYPE 1: THE ORDER YOU IMMEDIATELY FOLLOW BECAUSE IT ACTUALLY MAKES SENSE.

As you might have guessed, this is a rare breed of order and is most common in combat. If you’re on patrol and someone shoots at you, you don’t argue when your fire team leader yells, “Shoot back!” In garrison you don’t argue against additional first aid training, call-for-fire training, even extra PT or vehicle maintenance (even though it sucks and you don’t want to do it). You’re a soldier and those are things you should do. E-4 Mafia members might whine and make smartass comments when you make them ruck up at 5 am, but they still do it because it makes sense. Any reasonable, logical order, even if it sucks, is a Type 1.

“Okay guys, I want you to jump into France, shoot Germans and blow shit up.” Makes sense, right? That’s a Type 1.

“Okay guys, I want you to jump into France, shoot Germans and blow shit up.” Makes sense, right? Type 1.

When we join the military, we think all orders are going to be Type 1s. But alas, there is also,

TYPE 2: THE ORDER THAT DOESN’T MAKE SENSE, BUT IF YOU DON’T DO IT, YOU’LL IMMEDIATELY GET IN TROUBLE.

We’re all intimately familiar with this type of order. My first experience with one was even before I joined the military, when I was a 14-year-old at ROTC summer camp on an Army base. A few of us were detailed to unload hundreds of pounds of frozen meat from a delivery truck at the chow hall. Two Army privates supervised us. It was typical south Texas summer, 100 degrees and humid. The packages of meat were heavy and we cadets were all 98-pound weaklings (I was actually more like 80). After we unloaded half the truck, one of the privates got a sudden look of despair and stopped us.

“Wait…uh…the food inspector is supposed to be here watching us unload the meat.”

“Okay,” I said. “So we’ll stop and wait for him.”

“No,” he mumbled. “He’s supposed to watch us unload all of it. So we have to load the meat back in the truck, then unload it again when he gets here.”

Meat was stacked all over the loading dock. Our skinny little arms were sore, ill-fitting uniforms drenched in sweat from the manual labor. So we had unloaded the meat, just to put it back in, just to bring it back out? This is freaking stupid, I thought. But what choice did I have? If I refused to do it, I’d get a C-minus or demerit or something.

The other ROTC cadets and I looked at each other. Then we shrugged, made a chain and started loading the meat back into the truck. As I handed over the heavy packages, I thought, “This crap must only happen to ROTC cadets. I can hardly wait until I’m in the real military, where there’s no stupid stuff like this.”

Of course, once I was in the real military, I learned the painful truth. Stupid, nonsensical orders are everywhere. I remember a sergeant rushing into my room, early in my first enlistment, to order me and my roommate to put our mattress covers on for room inspection, then rushing back in a few minutes later to order us to tear them off, then coming back, throwing the covers at us and blurting “Put them on, quick! Get creative!” before sprinting to the next room. One morning a Sergeant Major at my old unit yelled at us to roll our sleeves down, then as soon as he left the room a different Sergeant Major walked in and yelled at us to roll them up. In Iraq, I was sternly ordered to mount a weapon on my Humvee that neither I nor my crew knew how to operate, and then told I couldn’t fire it to make sure it worked.

The 4 types of military orders.

Famous Type 2 Orders in history: “You want me to fly my airplane into a ship? Even though we’re going to lose the war anyway? And if I don’t, you’ll kill me? Looks like I’m flying my airplane into a ship.”

All of those were stupid orders, but if I hadn’t followed them, on-the-spot punishment would have followed. Type 2 orders are killers; they make you hate both the military and your decision to join it. A stupid, nonsensical order you’re forced to follow is by far the worst kind, much worse than order Type 3.

TYPE 3: THE ORDER YOU CAN PRETEND TO FOLLOW UNTIL THE PERSON WHO GAVE IT GETS DISTRACTED BY SOMETHING ELSE, AND FORGETS ABOUT IT.

In our modern “good idea fairy” military, I think most orders fall into this category. And that’s a good thing because these easy to duck without getting in trouble or starting a fight. If you work on a staff, probably 70% of your orders are Type 3s, and at least 20% Type 2s. Most staff-related Type 3s can be dodged by throwing out phrases like “We’re nearing full implementation of the synergistic integration phasedown timeline,” then leaving the room while your boss marvels at your amazing skills.

But if you’re not on a staff, you have to approach Type 3s differently. Hypothetical situation: you’re in Iraq, on a convoy escort team. You’ve never really trained for this mission, and neither have your men. Your team is a hodgepodge mix of soldiers from different units who don’t know each other well. Your command doesn’t know any more about running convoys or countering IEDs than you do. You and your fellow NCOs are justifiably worried about making a mistake and getting soldiers killed. Midway through your deployment, after soldiers in your unit have been ambushed, you’ve barely missed being blown up and a few guys on other teams have been wounded, your First Sergeant calls you into the TOC. When you get there, he has an important order to issue.

“Every team must appoint a historian. And turn in a paper listing their team motto and team goals.”

What’s the right thing to do? Without question, a historian, motto, and goals are crucial. What team has survived intact without a list of goals? I’ve lost count of the times I’ve heard platoon leaders say, “It’s a miracle we survived that ambush. Thank God we had a motto.” So of course, the proper thing to do is say “Roger”, appoint a historian and write up goals and a motto, right?

The soldier in this hypothetical situation listened to this order in amazement. Then he nodded emphatically, answered, “Roger that, I’m on it,” walked away and forgot about it. The soldier knew the First Sergeant would eventually lose interest. And anyway, if anyone ever asked the soldier who the team historian was, he could make it up on the spot. If asked for the team goals and motto, the soldier could say, “Crap, I thought I turned that in. I’ll have it there next week,” and ignore it again. Or he could throw out any motto with “Hooah” in it, and drop a list of generic goals. “Our motto is ‘Team Apache, Hooah!’ Goal one, don’t get killed. Two, don’t get wounded. Three, don’t get herpes…”

With a minimum of effort, the soldier could gaff the order off while still appearing to follow it. And let’s face it, that made everybody happy. The First Sergeant was happy his order was being “followed” (wink wink nudge nudge), the soldier who received the order was happy he could blow it off, and his Joes were happy they didn’t have to deal with it.

 

Leader: “Men, I want you to advance toward the enemy machine gun position. But don’t worry, a 90-year-old lady with a sniper rifle is covering you.” Sergeant: “Uh, sure thing sir. We’ll get right on that.”

Leader: “Men, I want you to advance toward the enemy machine gun position. But don’t worry, a 90-year-old lady with a sniper rifle is covering you.” Sergeant: “Uh, sure thing sir. We’ll get right on that.”

When you receive a type 3 order, relax. Don’t fight it, don’t throw down the gauntlet and scream “That’s stupid and I won’t do it!” Hey man, live and let live. When you’re ordered to, for instance, generate an “email tracker spreadsheet” to list every single email your team receives, the time and date it arrived, what it was about, how you responded, and the date and time you responded, just say, “Hey sir, that’s a great idea. I’m all over it.” Then walk away with a smile on your face, and go about your day devoid of any worry about email tracking. On the off chance you’re asked about it later, just say you’re working on it, or you’ve been having technical problems, or a higher priority task got in the way. Eventually the person who gave the order will see something shiny, or get caught up in his favorite episode of Glee, and forget all about it.

Type 3 orders are great, but they’re not the best. That honor falls to the elusive,

TYPE 4: THE ORDER THAT’S SO STUPID, YOU CAN IMMEDIATELY IGNORE IT AND NOBODY CARES.

These orders are highly prized.

I met a few in Afghanistan, but my favorite one came from a, uh, “story I heard” during my Iraq deployment. On a nighttime convoy, a Humvee commander ordered his gunner to fire on a suspected car bomb, seconds before it would have rammed them. The gunner hit the car, and it stopped. A few seconds later it started following again, fell back, and eventually disappeared from view. Then something exploded near where the soldiers last saw it. They didn’t know if the explosion was from the possible car bomb or not.

They reported the incident minutes afterward. When they got back to the FOB the vehicle commander briefed an officer on it. He made it clear he didn’t know if his gunner shot the driver, although he thought the gunner had.

The officer said, “If our guys kill someone, we have to wake up the Colonel and tell him. So if this happens again, and you think you killed the driver, you have to go to the car to see if he’s really dead.”

The Humvee commander answered, “No.”

The officer was taken aback. There was a moment of awkward silence. The officer gave the vehicle commander a serious look and said, “You have to. We need to know if we have to wake up the Colonel.”

“Nope,” the Humvee commander said. “If we shoot a car bomb and think we killed the driver, I’d be a total moron to walk up to the car. If the driver’s alive, he’ll blow me up. We have EOD with robots and cameras, I’ll call them to do it.”

The officer tried one more time. “Well, the order is, you have to check.”

“Roger sir. And my answer is, I won’t do it.”

The officer thought about it, then dropped the subject. He wasn’t stupid and wasn’t a bad officer. He followed his first instinct, “Pass on the order from above”, but then realized how stupid it was and let it go. And the Humvee commander didn’t get in the slightest bit of trouble for refusing it.

Type 4 in the Middle East: “You want me to turn in a CONOP before my next terrorist attack? HAHAHAHA! Whatever!”

Type 4 in the Middle East: “You want me to turn in a CONOP before my next terrorist attack? HAHAHAHA! Whatever!”

These are the 4 kinds of military orders we must live with.

There you have it. From now on, every time you receive an order, evaluate it. Find out which type of order it is, and handle it accordingly. If you’re a leader, please, for the love of God, try to only issue Type 1 orders. Type 2s will make your troops hate you, Type 3 will make them dismiss you, and Type 4 will make you a laughing stock.

Trust me on this. My insight has been paid for with painful experience. I like to think I’ve only issued type 1 orders, but the truth is, at times I’ve given 2s, 3s and maybe even 4s.

Before I went to Iraq, I really thought I was supposed to pass along and take responsibility for orders from above even if I disagreed with them. As a Sergeant Major told us, “It doesn’t matter what you think of the order from higher. When you give it to your soldiers, you tell them the order is coming from YOU.” So I tried to follow that wisdom.

Then one day in Iraq a senior NCO gave me an order. He told me to have my crew report to the motor pool to unload CONEX boxes in the pouring rain. I pointed out that we could wait until the rain stopped. He didn’t care; my crew had to be out there, and he promised he’d be right there with us. So I gave the order as if it was my own, and made my soldiers slosh through mud and freezing rain to the CONEX boxes at the appointed time.

Nobody had keys to the CONEXs. And the Senior NCO who gave me the order didn’t bother to show up (I found him in his room later, nice and dry in bed). So I was standing in the rain with pissed-off Joes, looking like a total moron. At that moment, as far as my Joes knew, I had given a type 2 order. They’re probably still mad at me about it. And I don’t blame them.

Never again, guys. Let’s pledge to only issue Type 1s from now on. Because that’s what our soldiers deserve.

Please sound off in the comments with examples of these 4 types of order as you’ve encountered them during your service.

 


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Chris Hernandez

Chris Hernandez

About the Author

Chris Hernandez may just be the crustiest member of the eeeee-LITE writin' team here at Breach-Bang-Clear. He is a veteran of both the Marine Corps and the Army National Guard who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He is also a veteran police officer of two decades who spent a long (and eye-opening) deployment as part of a UN police mission in Kosovo. He is the author of White Flags & Dropped Rifles - the Real Truth About Working With the French Army and The Military Within the Military as well as the modern military fiction novels Line in the Valley, Proof of Our Resolve and Safe From the War. When he isn't groaning about a change in the weather and snacking on Osteo Bi-Flex he writes on his own blog. You can find his author page here on Tactical 16.

7 Comments

  1. Max H

    Second deployment to Iraq, a freshly minted NCO was I, but I was not without experience. I was a C-IED guy, coordinating coverage for a group of engineers (God love them) because no one as USF-I cared about them in the least, and I was bored. I joined during a time of war to do war stuff, not to play XBox and sham, having re-enlisted specifically to go back.

    The engineer officer that I had built significant rapport with was an OIF I senior-NCO who went OCS after and was now an LT…a damned good one at that. Well, we had several assets available to provide coverage for these guys getting hit in ad-Dawr and around Hawijah. We had our asset info all over the place where the engineers could see it, it wasn’t just “trust us, we can do X, Y & Z”. One day LT calls up and requests coverage using a certain asset. I tell him I dig it, I’ll just check to make sure someone else hasn’t requested it for the same time.

    In doing so, this Napoleonic Major, with whom I also have good rapport (ever though he’s insufferable) says that that asset is available but it doesn’t have the requested capability. I tell him yes it does and that it says so on our site which is regularly updated and that the LT had previously used the same asset in the same capacity. He looks at me with what was supposed to be an intimidating glare and tells me it doesn’t have the capability. I reply Roger and type up an email to the engineer LT that is written in such a way so as to let him know WTAF was going on without being insubordinate, the LT had earned it…his guys were tired of getting blown up. He in turn replies one word also: Roger. He later gives me a call and we exchange personal emails so we can communicate a little more openly.

    Thirty six hours later my team leader pulls me aside and asks me “what did you do?!” I had no idea what he was talking about and said so. He tells me that my email to the LT got forwarded up to USF-I and they had ordered us to provide the coverage for the engineers (the one time they cared about their route clearance guys, I guess). There was talk over the next week as to whether I would be demoted, but I never even got a negative counseling. In fact, Napoleon and I even remained cordial, but he never tried to get me to lie for him again.

    I also have an open invitation for room, board, and drink to be provided if I ever make it up to Sturgis with that LT.

    Reply
  2. Clint D.

    I have to say, as an LE, I get a lot of type 3 orders on a regular basis. Only issue is I’m piss poor about taking dumb orders without comment and they soon turn into type 2.

    For example, election time is in the air for local officials. Some prankster went and removed all of politician A’s signs and replaced them with politician B’s signs. I scoffed at the call, thinking no harm was done why investigate, idiots that vote because of the number of signs they see are just that, idiots. Well I was later informed that we have laws in our great southern state against political treachery and i needed to solve this. So for half an hour i finger printed these replacement signs, getting covered in black ash (finger print dust). I looked like a damn coal miner after it all was over.

    These signs had been out in rain and near a busy, dust kicking up roadway. So anyone familiar with processing will know that prints are a no go.

    Did i catch the devious fiends you ask? That’s a big hell no. But I made commissioner asshole and mayor dick fat send letters of thanks to the chief for “his” good work for trying to catch these “criminals and malfeasants”. If i just said Yeah I’ll look into it, I wouldn’t have had Sgt Micromanager force me to do it after such a big scene was made in our office.

    Lesson? Fuck if I know.

    Reply
    • Chris Hernandez author

      I think that was a well-described lesson. Next time. I’m sure you’ll handle it differently.

      Reply
  3. Chuck Wood

    When working in the S3 shop in 7th Infantry Division, I heard the Captain answer a phone call. He said “Yes Sir, I will send someone right away. One of the other Sargeants asked him if we needed to tell one of the companies to send some troops and he replied “No, they wanted someone to pick up cigarettee butts around the small theater. It’s BS and our people are too busy at training. Forget it.” (or words to that effect). We all laughed and I learned a valuable lesson.

    Reply
    • Chris Hernandez author

      Type 3 orders are great. And officers who understand them are usually damn good leaders. 🙂

      Reply
  4. Frank

    OMG! This is the same thing a do at work! I just never thought it through to classify the type.

    Reply
    • Chris Hernandez author

      Apparently, my classification system has application outside the military. That’s good to know for when I’m out of the military and law enforcement.

      Reply

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