Infanteer said:
Well put. People seem to think I'm nuts when I say I personally like the current CDS better than the old one. I met both while deployed and while General Hillier was charismatic, approachable, and seemed to solve our minor, immediate in theatre requests (nails, hammers, etc) General Natynczyk exuded quiet, confident competence. Not to say General Hillier didn't/doesn't have those qualities, but Natynczyk spent more time talking with the officers and senior NCOs and less time posing for photos. That is my personal opinion, based on my limited exposure to the two men.
Back on topic.
This thread seems polarized into two camps on HLTA, it is clearly a divisive topic. I appreciated my HLTA, that is for sure, but I could have survived without it. For me, I caught a ride on a British chopper out for HLTA (and sat around for a bit because we arrived early), and wound up sitting around a KAF for a bit to catch a CLP back out. From my observations from my tour, folks at KAF can get out of country for HLTA with no trouble, FOBs and Patrol bases can get back to KAF for HLTA with some degree of difficulty, and in my case this also involved unnecessary downtime as soldiers from adjacent leave blocks might be lumped together for transport, or left off ops for fear that timings might creep right and jeopardize HLTA. The guys at the COPs would have to endure extreme difficulty getting out of country and of course might have to endure pers shortages. An ironic inverse trend presents itself: The folks who (arguably) need HLTA the least have the least difficulty in achieving it and the folks who need a break the most have the greatest difficulty, and incur the greatest individual and collective risk in achieving it.
My personal opinion would be to scrap HLTA as to get the most out of the pers on the ground, and to mitigate the risks associated with shuffling troops around to fill blanks and moving people in and out of KAF.
