WALL-TO-WALL
COUNSELING
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FIELD
MANUALHeadquarters Department of
the Army
22-1021
April 1999
FIELD
MANUALHeadquarters Department of
the Army
22-1021
April 1999
Military leadership is the process of influencing others in gaining respect and confidence in order to accomplish the mission. Leaders have many tools available to them to assist them in accomplishing this mission, and one of the most important is counseling. Effective counseling will help make poor soldiers into good ones and good ones even better. It can correct marginal performance, and it can be used to convince soldiers to make the Army their career.
However, there are some soldiers who will not respond to counseling. Perhaps the soldier is incapable of learning the simplest of tasks. The soldier may be rebellious, challenging authority just to see if he can “get away” with it. He may have been raised in a neighborhood where the fist was mightier than the word; where fighting was the only way to survive. In any case, there are some circumstances where a good kick in the pants is just what the doctor ordered to bring the soldier back in earth.
That’s what this manual is all about.
Although the teaching of a good solid knock upside the head in military academies ceased long ago, the need for it has only intensified in recent years. The influx of large numbers of college-trained soldiers has brought with it not only more-intelligent soldiers, but also soldiers who need to know “why” they have been sent to do something. The leader, upon being asked “why” he has sent a soldier on police call, may feel the need to just haul off and hit the soldier upside the head.
The leader will learn all the minutiae of wall-to-wall counseling, such as when it is appropriate, when it is inappropriate, how to prepare for the counseling session, how to conduct the session, follow-up actions, staying out of jail, and circumstances in which wall-to-wall counseling may be indicated but in which special techniques are called for.
The proponent of this publication is the U.S. Army Combined Arms Center, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 66027. Submit changes for improving this publication on DA Form 2028 (Recommended Changes to Publications and Blank Forms) and forward to Commander, U.S. Army Combined Arms Center, ATTN: ATZI-SWA-DL, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas 66027.
Use of specific gender in this publication is for ease of reading. Whenever the masculine or feminine gender is used, either gender is intended.
This publication supersedes FM 22-102, 1 April 1989.
Wall-to-wall counseling has been around longer than the American military.
Many famed units used it as their primary motivational tool, and some used nothing else. It’s still prevalent in many hardened military units.
The citizens of the city-state of Sparta, Greece, didn’t mess around. Wall-to-wall counseling was the order of the day among the Spartans. The Spartans believed in hard training and hard discipline, and wall-to-wall counseling is about the hardest kind of discipline there is. The Spartans were feared both in war and at peace, and they worked hard to maintain their image. Babies were quality-controlled at the time of their birth, and any not meeting the standards were put on the sides of mountains to die. Needless to say, until the day when wall-to-wall counseling completely erased the desire of the citizens of Sparta to perpetuate the race, nobody screwed with these people.
General George S. Patton, the famed World War II tank corps commander, was a great fan of wall-to-wall counseling. It showed in the way he led his troops. He never used a kind word when a foul one would do just as well. One of his most famous wall-to-wall counseling sessions occurred in a field hospital. Patton believed that combat fatigue was cowardice, and promised to shoot anyone exhibiting it. On a trip through a field hospital, he ran across a shell-shocked private. When the private claimed that he could “hear the shells flying overhead but not exploding,” Patton became furious. He slapped the soldier in the head, waved a loaded pistol in his face and called him a pussy. Then he ordered him to the front to fight “so the brave soldiers in this hospital won’t be contaminated by this coward.” That Patton was not punished as severely as he should have been for this deed shows that wall-to-wall counseling has a place in the US Army.
The Army of the Republic of Korea uses wall-to wall counseling in its daily operations. It is sanctioned and approved by the Ministry of Defense. South Koreans feel that the harsher peacetime is, the less the soldier will notice the hardships of combat with North Korea. Wall-to-wall counseling rises to its zenith with the ROK discipline board. This group wall-to-wall counseling session is convened for offenses that would result in punishment by court-martial in the US Army. The soldier walks into the discipline board, wall-to-wall counseled, and is carried out on a board, either on a stretcher or on ice. While US Army wall-to-wall counseling is not likely to result in serious death to the soldier, the Korean discipline board is a model to be emulated by all US Army units.
You should wall-to-wall counsel a soldier when he needs it. And all soldiers occasionally need wall-to-wall counseling.
Determining when this most severe of leadership techniques is warranted requires the leader to intimately know his soldiers and be aware of when a soldier it far enough gone that a swat is the head is the only thing that will adjust his behavior.
Simple infractions can be dealt with quickly by a simple ass-beating. Soldiers appreciate this, as it saves them the hassle of having to visit the commander for UCMJ action.
Soldiers found guilty of major transgressions will be punished by the military authorities.
A soldier who kills another soldier will probably be shot However, long wall-to-wall counseling sessions prior to the arrival of the military police are appropriate in cases where the transgression was against another soldier, and are best conducted in the presence of the wronged soldier. If the wronged soldier is still alive, he or she should be invited to join into the session, as he a she will feel that revenge is called for and participating in the session will help to heal mental wounds caused by the perpetrator.
There are many serious
offenses that require only moderate amounts of wall?to?wall counseling.
These as normally simple offenses, but an compounded by their circumstances. Wall?to?wall counseling is demanded before these things get out of hand.
The leader has no one to blame but himself if he does not use wall?to?wall counseling to correct this problem. A quick knock in the head will straighten out this bullshit before it gets any worse.
Although an effective technique when properly used, there are some places where wall-to-wall counseling is the wrong thing to do.
Conducting a wall-to-wall counseling session in front of tie 7th Army commander, for instance, would probably not be the wise decision, as it would probably lead to the initiation of a relief-for-cause NCOER. However, the presence of high-level VIPs should not be the only determinant in the decision to delay or withhold a wall-to-wall counseling session.
•The soldier will not realize the purpose of the session. He will instead believe that you got wasted and beat the shit out of him for no reason whatsoever. You will lose respect in the soldiers eyes as well as in the eyes of the rest of your unit. The soldier may decide to reciprocate and wall-to-wall counsel you at a later time on your transgression. Since wall-to-wall counseling is a tool only the wise leader who knows his troops intimately can properly use, its use by subordinates who may decide to rashly apply it is inadvisable.
•The soldier may decide he has been assaulted and call the military police. Since the MPs take a dim view of leaders who get drunk off their asses and beat up on subordinates, you may find yourself facing a court-martial you never intended to face.
•Perhaps most importantly, the leader may have gotten so drunk that the subordinate is able to turn the counseling session into a first-rate ass-beating directed against the leader.
Since the hospital will treat your injuries as an "alcohol-related incident" they well call your commander (who may have never read this field manual) who will enroll you in the detox program. The detox program, especially if they put you on Track III (residential treatment facility) rates in the entertainment department right up there with getting checked for the clap.
More counseling sessions have been ruined by poor preparation than by anything else.
Wall-to-wall counseling is no different than any other counseling in this respect. However, wall-to?wall counseling imposes its own special considerations due to its violent nature.
A military uniform is very much the wrong garment to wear to a wall?to?wall counseling session, though. More radical dress is called for. A stop by a clothing store catering to members of the Hell's Angels Motorcycle Club is in order. Basically, you want to look like Attila the Hun. Full leathers are good for extra protection should the soldier attempt to fight back.
Proper jewelry is important. Spiked wristlets not only enhance the terror you want to instill in the soldier, but if properly weighted can increase the pain and damage that a sidearm blow to the solar plexus can cause. Wearing a large Eric the Red biker's ring will not only make you look tough, but the half pound of metal it contains will increase the effectiveness of punches. Wearing a Hell's Angels' deaths?head earring, though, isn't such a good idea. Although it's an intimidating item, the counselee may grab it and pull, and then you are in a world of hurt.
If you plan to conduct many wall?to?wall counseling sessions, investing is some large tattoos of Vikings beheading people with blood?covered swards would be a good idea. Additionally, the pain endured while they are being done willtoughen you up and make you a more effective counselor. Watching films like The Rood Warrior, The Lost Boys and Conan the Barbarian will give you more apparel ideas.
Modern construction standards, in which large amounts of sheetrock are used, have changed the face of wall-to-wall counseling. When walls were built of plaster and lath, you could bounce the soldier off the walls a few times, kick him is the nuts once or twice, swat him is the head and that would be the end of it. There were no worries that the room would survive the counseling session, because you knew that it would. However, you can easily throw a soldier through a sheetrock wall. The Army will make you pay for any walls you damage during counseling. Therefore, you want a large, strong room to conduct your counseling sessions in.
Before calling the soldier in for his wall?to?wall counseling session, inspect the room thoroughly. Make sure the door is of good quality and is equipped with a working door lock. The lock is important not only to keep the session from being interrupted prior to its conclusion but also to hinder the soldier from leaving prior to having received the full impact of the lessons you are teaching him. Try to find a room without any windows.
If this cannot be attained, windows placed high on the wall are acceptable. Not only will the lack of windows prevent others from looking in and observing the wall?to?wall counseling session, but if the session gets really intense, the soldier could accidentally push you into the window, breaking it and injuring you. The purpose of a wall-to-wall counseling session is to impart the maximum learning and pain upon the counselee with the least amount of damage to the counselor's body, and a glass shard in your ass is a poor reason to prematurely end a session.
However, in a windowless room lighting takes on prime importance. You need to see the soldier so that you know where to hit him next, and the soldier needs to see you hitting him. Make sure the lights work and that the light switch is covered with a piece of green tape to prevent the soldier from easily turning the lights off.
It is simple to find them. Visit the gymnasium and go to the weight room. If you see someone in there putting many fifty?pound plates on a bar and then doing 35 curls and 20 bench presses with it, you've found your man. It's even better if he is in your unit and hasn't yet been investigated in an assault.
If you can't find anyone like that, though, look for boxers, wrestlers, or anyone else who fights for fun. The ideal wall-to-wall counselor has a six?foot reach, fists the size of volleyballs, can bench 350 pounds, runs ten miles a day and has over 20 knockouts.
If you can't get Mike Tyson to assist you in your counseling session, though, anyone who maxes his PT test would be good too.
Although many successful wall-to?wall counselors have conducted sessions using nothing but their bare hands, a small toolkit will ease your job, especially in those critical first few sessions.
A wall?to?wall counseling toolkit does not have to be elaborate or expensive. In fact, you probably have all the materials in your unit right now, and all that it takes to use them is a little imagination.
If a baseball bat is also available, have your assistant grab the counselee's arms and pull them behind his back. Place the board even with the elbows, pull the arms down to the body and secure with green tape. This prevents the soldier from attempting to assault his leaders.
If two?by-twelves can be obtained, get one about six feet long. While it is not suitable for swinging, the counselee can be secured to it with green tape, lifted high is the air with the aid of your assistant and dropped.
The pool cue sits in a strange and unenviable position among weapons: If held so that it an do some good it is easily broken; if it is held so that it will not break during blows, it is not long enough to do much good. It is also more expensive than either a two?by?four or a baseball bat. In all, the baseball bat is a much most satisfying tool than the pool cue.
FM 22-102 / April 1999
12
Although wall?to?wall counseling is much more challenging and rewarding when a soldier is free to move and fight back, many counselors prefer the expediency of beating someone's ass while he is tied up.
By taping the arms to the sides as detailed is the Dimension Lumber section; counseling may be accomplished quicker and with less hassle. Many items may be used for restraints; here we list but a few.
14
Wall?to?wall counseling can be conducted in many ways.
For on?the?spot counseling, a quick swat across the back of the head with a closed fist or a slap in the face will probably be sufficient. For prolonged period of misconduct by the soldier, prolonged periods of wall?to?wall counseling are is order. All wall-to-wall counseling sessions, though, are notable for their intensity and aggressiveness.
The counselor should have a broad range of counseling methods available to him. He would be wise to study boxing manuals for additional suggestions. Enrolling is a martial arts class would also be a good idea, if he has the time to spare. In addition to improving counseling skills, the martial arts teach patience, discipline and self?control...all desirable traits for any leader.
Advanced blows include the Jap slap, boot to the head and tool techniques. These are effective but more limited, counseling techniques.
The ideal object to practice with is the heavy punching bag found is all Army gymnasiums. On any given day, you will find many wall?to?wall counselors practicing their Jap slaps against this bag, so you may need to wait in line. Rest assured that the wait is well worth it.
If your unit's leaders embrace wall?to?wall counseling as a common leadership technique, you may be able to convince the Unit Fund Council to install its own heavy bag. If you are in an infantry unit or are is charge of many 98Ks, though, the sheer number of counselees will provide sufficient opportunity to practice and hone your technique. Still, there is no substitute to the heavy bag. Not even an 98K can replace it, though some of the new ones come close.
Wall?to?wall counseling is much like any other counseling.
You choose the place, inform the counselee, meet him there, counsel him until his problem is solved and conduct follow?up actions. In wall?to?wall counseling, though, how you determine when his problem is solved is when he screams for mercy. Then you hit him once or twice more to reinforce the counseling session and make sure the problem stays solved, then and only then, end the counseling session
Of course, if the soldier is a rapist robber or murderer, just start your wall-to-wall counseling session and continue until the military police arrive.
The counselor should be prepared to wash his hands of the whole matter, especially if the session drew blood. The counselor should, therefore, place a bar of Lava soap in the latrine prior to the session. Its gritty consistency will remove all traces of blood from your fingers, and it will help to clean off your baseball bat, too.
The
soldier may need immediate medical attention following a wall?to?wall counseling
session, especially if you used a baseball bat during it.
If the soldier is a true fuckup, broken bones, internal injuries and hemorrhaging may have occurred. Inspect the soldier to make sure he is still conscious, still breathing and does not appear to have any external damage or signs of internal damage (blood or cranial fluid leaking from the ears is generally a sign that the counseling session was a little too thorough...) One of the three is generally sufficient. If the soldier can still move following the session, immediately restrict him to his room. If he is not breathing and will not obey a direct order to resume breathing, perform rescue breathing and then beat his ass some more after you revive him. If his heart stops, apply CPR and then recounsel him for inability to remain alive during a counseling session. Not hitting the soldier right over the heart or the top of the head may cut down on the frequency and severity of death among your counselees.
If the soldier beats your ass during counseling, though, there is little you can do. If you aren't fucked up too bad, you can just lick your wounds and hope the bruises heal before your wife sees you. If you need to be ambulanced off to the hospital, though, you can tell the judge that the soldier hit you first. If the judge believes your integrity (and he should...after all, you outrank the soldier who kicked your ass. It you don't, you may be in deep kimchi...) you should be all right, especially if the soldier actually did hit you first. It you hit the counselee first and he still beat you up, then you need to spend more time is the gym.
Some unenlightened legal personnel, including the MPs and JAG may not have read this manual.
Therefore, they might not recognize the corrective nature of your actions and instead term them “brutal, heartless assault," which is also true. The solution to this problem is preparedness. Requisition sufficient copies of this manual so that everyone on post that can legally fuck you over can have one. Once these people have read this manual, they will respect you for having made the wise and just decision to wall-to-wall counsel.
If, on the other hand, you are dumb or overanxious and hold a wall?to?wall counseling session without having made the proper preparations, you need to be prepared for the worst. Simply bring this manual to your court?martial. After the judge reads it, you are certain to be acquitted.
There is one very large proviso, though: if you have to bring the soldier back from the dead as a result of your wall?to?wall counseling session, however, you are up shit creek and have no paddle. If you succeed in killing the soldier and he stays dead no matter how strict your order to resume living is then you may be certain that you are going to jail. In this case, you will not get fucked with too badly. Just inform all the inmates that you are in jail because you beat another man to death with your bare hands and no one will even think about touching or going near you. No one likes the idea of being the next in line.
Wall?to?wall counseling
is an effective leadership technique
when it is properly applied.
Unfortunately, not every situation is the same. What works well in one instance may get you killed under other circumstances. We present some sample situations for your perusal and study.
A big secondary problem is that some civilians carry guns and/or do drugs. People carrying guns fall into two categories: those who are members of the police and those who are not. Those who are police are generally more disciplined but are better trained in the use of their guns. This means that they might not shoot at you but will definitely hit you if they do. Drug pushers, bank robbers, murderers and other common rabble will probably shoot at you but may not hit you. Unfortunately, some well-heeled cruds are buying black-market submachine guns and carrying them under their jackets. These guns, whose ranks include the Uzi and the Ingram MAC?10, are equipped with large?capacity magazines and can pump out more lead per minute than an M?60 machine gun. When the criminal pulls one of these, he will use it to hose down targets of opportunity, which in this case means you.
If you feel the urge to wall-to-wall counsel a drug dealer, use a shotgun. It’s easer and faster. It does make a mess, but you can console yourself with the fact that you are helping to make America a safer place.
This is what you do and what you say. When the soldier makes the eighteenth decision on the same day, you take him behind the racks, grab his collar, slam him into a rack door, and yell in his face, "What the fuck are you doing? Make up your God?damned mind what you want to do! Now!” In those words, and at the top of your voice. Swat him twice across the head for GP and put him back to work. I can more than guarantee he will decide to stay in the Army within ten minutes and figure out what be wants to do within twenty minutes, especially if you inform him you am going to kick his ass some more in an hour if he does not.
However, there is an easy, quick way to deal with your frustrations and anxieties caused by the upbringing of undisciplined brats. Needless to say, it involves wall?to?wall counseling. First, leave this manual on the coffee table so that they can read it and learn what you will do to them the next time they fuck up. Then, next time they make even the slightest slip, let them have it with both barrels. Baseball bats, dimension lumber, hundred?mile?an?hour tape, bare fists, anything you can think of is good. The only thing you need to be aware of is that wall-to-wall counseling a child to death is quite a bit easier than with that private you hit in the privates this morning. So go a little easy as them. But just a little.
"It shouldn't hurt to be a child,” the AFN commercial admonishes. Well, it shouldn't hurt to be a parent either! After you wall?to?wall counsel your children two or three times, your life will become much easier. And if you counsel your little girl on top of the head enough times, her head will become flat, and she will be able too get a lot more boyfriends. So it works out better for everyone.
FM
22-102 / April 1999
The
following is a true story. Only the names have been changed to protect
the guilty.
SGT Joe Snuffy was out with his friends across from a small Army base in a foreign country. After having a few beers, but not enough to cloud his judgment, he observed a soldier in the small restaurant who was is acting like a fool. The soldier was being obnoxious, yelling at the top of his lungs, embarrassing the women in the restaurant, and generally degrading the image of the Army. SGT Snuffy decided to take action.
SGT Snuffy had SPC John Holmes summon the obnoxious soldier to come outside the restaurant for a simple talk. The soldier, SPC Jack Meoff, came outside in a very belligerent manner. SPC Meoff took off his jacket in a threatening manner and unprofessionally swore at SGT Snuffy. SPC Meoff was rip?roaring drunk. He hit and pushed SGT Snuffy, SPC Holmes, and several of their friends. He even hit two of them with a plastic chair. SGT Snuffy took action. He wall?to?wall counseled SPC Meoff striking him with two punches. SPC Meoff fell to the ground. The MPs came and took the unrestrained SGT Snuffy to the MP station in a squad car. SPC Meoff had to be placed into hand and leg irons for his trip to the MP Station.
Lessons learned by this wall?to?wall co0unseling session:
1) Never conduct a wall?to?wall counseling session when you are drunk, unless you have to.
2) Never conduct one in plain sight of the front gate of a military installation.
3) And, most importantly, when wall?to?wall counseling is called for, DO IT.
You have learned to effectively wall?to?wall counsel an errant soldier.
We have described all the things that can go wrong during a wall?to?wall counseling session, discussed how to prepare for it and how to give it, and what to do if you get arrested for doing it.
Leaders at all levels have looked for an effective way to let their soldiers know where they stand. If they don't know after an ass?beating, they are some dumb motherfuckers. Leaders who set clear standards of what always rates a wall?to?wall counseling session and then fairly enforce those standards (in other words, beating up everyone who fucks up in a certain way, not beating some and writing up others) will not only raise the morale of the troops, but also find them much easier to control.
And what a difference! After you club the shit out of someone for missing one PT session, you will never again have anyone miss PT. Units with motor pools will see the deadline rate drop after you beat the mechanics for leaving trucks that can be fixed on the deadline list "because we didn't feel like fixing them." And all armorers will appreciate the leader who kicks the asses of soldiers who attempt to turn in dirty weapons.
We have given you the tools. Use them.