STAFF: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.
I am Army Colonel Sunset Belinsky. Today, we will have a press event with General Paul Funk, the commanding general of Training and Doctrine Command. Joining him is command sergeant major, Command Sergeant Major Guden. We will also have Major General Frank Muth and his command sergeant major, Command Sergeant Major Gavia; Major General Hibbard, commander -- commanding general for the Center of Initial Military Training; and Command Sergeant Major Edward Mitchell, the command sergeant major for the Center for Initial Military Training.
Gentlemen, on the line, we have 11 news outlets and two represented in the room. Major -- or, I'm sorry, General Funk -- sir, I apologize, you can take it out on me later -- General Funk will provide a few minutes of opening comments. Then we will go to two questions on the line, question in the room, two questions on the line, until we get to the magic 30-minute mark.
General Funk, over to you.
GENERAL PAUL E. FUNK II: OK, thanks, Sunset.
Good afternoon everyone, and welcome, I’m General Paul Funk, commander of the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command. With me on the net is (Major General) Frank Muth, commander of U.S. Army Recruiting Command and (Major General) Lonnie Hibbard, commander of Initial Military Training. In addition we are joined by our command sergeant majors. We represent 46,000 permanent party and over 54,000 soldiers currently in the training base.
And As the TRADOC Commander, my job is to develop leaders, and assess, train and educate the Army within the training base. This COVID 19 virus is a new condition in our training environment. Commanders and leaders are trained to assess risks, then mitigate those risks. We are taking prudent measures to recognize need and develop procedures and limit risk.
America has some of the greatest medical minds in the world working on this virus response so as new techniques and procedures emerge we must train, educate, adapt, and implement those new procedures. Army leaders in Korea and Italy have already seen success in the fight against this virus. The Army thrives as a learning organization, sharing lessons learned from across the force. Early on, the Chief of Staff of the Army and the Secretary of the Army directed us to reach out to General Abrams’ team in Korea and Major General Roger Cloutier’s team in Italy. And we’ve taken their lessons learned from establishing a bubble around their forces and adjusted them to our particular circumstances. We’ve applied the security bubble approach throughout the training base and conducted multiple movement rehearsals for several of our training centers to follow on training locations.
In order to expand on these measures, and in concert with guidance from the Department of the Army along with expert assessments from the COVID-19 threat, decisions have been made to pause the shipment of trainees to Basic Combat Training. This conditions-based pause allows leaders to further focus on setting conditions to restart movement in a safer manner.
I want to be clear that this is not a pause in training for the Soldiers currently at our training centers. Our Drill Sergeants, the best in the world, will continue to socially distance enabled training and conduct regular screening to identify Soldiers that need to be treated. We are still training every day to fight and win our nation’s wars as our Nation expects us to do.
During the pause, our Commanders will ensure we have the right, most current procedures and capabilities in place to screen and test our recruits. Those measures start with Major General Muth’s team identifying recruits for shipment, focusing on reduced risk areas. The pause ensures appropriate procedures, processes, materials, and personnel are in place to thicken the medical capabilities at each of our training centers. Next we will implement a two-week period of controlled monitoring for each basic combat training cycle before beginning their eight-week training program of instruction, referred to as the 2+8 training model. Throughout the process, we will refine our cadre and support staff monitoring and screening processes. We hold the safety of our force and our communities in the highest regard. We will move soldiers from our training centers onto follow-on training locations or their first units of assignment with a strictly controlled and rehearsed movement. You have seen evidence of those procedures most recently in pictures from Fort Sill, OK, and Fort Jackson, SC.
Most importantly, I could not be more proud of the undaunted resolve of our Army team and our communities rallying together to battle this common enemy. This uniform, the cloth our nation, represents hope for all around the world. We will continue to fight until this threat is defeated, just like every threat before it.
With that, we are prepared to answer any questions you may have? Back to you, Sunset.
STAFF: Thank you, sir. At this point, we'll go to the line. If you could tell us your name and your outlet and we'll go from there. We'll start with Reginald, please? Hearing nothing, we'll work -- we'll move to Carl. Sir, I'm striking out here. Let's try Ellen.
Q: Sorry, I had to take myself off mute. What are you doing to screen the recruits medically?
GEN. FUNK: I'm sorry, say it -- did you say what are we doing to screen the recruits medically?
Q: Yes. I mean, is it just a temperature screen or are you actually testing and is there testing and screening going on throughout training or just before and after?
GEN. FUNK: It'll -- it'll actually be a combination of all of the things you just said. And it starts with screening and I'll let Frank Muth talk a little bit about how you do it before you bring someone into the training base and then I'll let General Hibbard pick that up on what happens in the training base. Go ahead, Frank.
MAJOR GENERAL FRANK M. MUTH: Yes, sir, thank you for the opportunity. So what we do is our recruiters start to -- they contact the future soldier that is waiting to ship 14 days out and just ask the very basic questions about – have you been around any -- how do you feel personally, do you -- are you running a temperature and if you've been sick, have you been around anybody sick, are you sheltering in place in your house, have you been out? Things like that. That's 14 days.
But then once you get closer, 72 hours out, we do the same thing again. 48 hours out, we do the same thing again. These are phone calls with the future soldier -- and 24 hours out. And then when our recruiter will meet the -- the future soldier to take them to the MEPS site, they again screen them or ask them questions, and at this point they can see them virt-- , you know, visually.
And by the way, sometimes they'll call them or sometimes they'll Facetime them in advance. It's just -- our recruiters use both techniques now, because we’ve done a lot of virtual stuff. They take them to the MEPS and then the MEPS will further screen them with taking their temperature and asking those series of questions.
Once they get through the MEPS, I'll hand it over to General Hibbard to take it from there from training. Lonnie, over to you.
MAJOR GENERAL LONNIE HIBBARD: Thanks, Frank. I guess I'll -- when they get to us, when they get off the bus from the MEPS, we again continue the same process as -- so we'll do the screening questions and the temperature when they arrive in the MEPS for the ones that are -- correction, when they arrive in the reception battalion for one to two days. And then as they come out of the reception battalion, we minimally in process them and move them into controlled monitoring.
And so for two weeks, they're executed in a platoon-sized element, doing controlled monitoring every day, which we're asking the questions and taking their temperature while they continue to do limited training for two weeks, prior to -- prior to moving from there to our basic training.
And so once they get out of that 14 days of controlled monitoring and they're now -- no symptoms and COVID-negative, we move them into what we call our controlled bubble where we begin to now do collective training.
GEN. FUNK: Thanks for that question. Back to you, Sunset.
STAFF: Next, I'll ask Hailey Britzky.
Q: Yes, thank you and thank you all for doing this. One quick clarification, how long is this pause for basic training expected to last?
GEN. FUNK: Well it's -- it's actually going to be conditions-based. The first set of -- is a -- is two weeks and then we're going to -- we're going to continue to assess the environment and go from there. Over.
Q: And so my -- my other question is, General Muth, maybe if you could speak about this a little bit – you’ve recently announced that the Army would be moving to virtual recruiting. I was wondering if you could speak a little bit about how that's been going, any stumbling blocks that you may have had to work around, and sort of what you've seen as that process has carried out over the last couple of weeks?
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: Hey, great question. So we actually positioned ourselves -- you know, you guys remember last -- you know, in 2018, I mean, I'm sure you can't forget, that we didn't make mission. And so the first changes we made is we went heavily into social media cause that's what the recruiters were telling us, where the Z generation were -- where they're hanging out and no, they're just -- they're just digitally innate folks.
So anyway, we have been positioning ourselves in this world -- in the world of digital markets for about 20 months. So we made the call very early to transition from being physically in the recruiting stations to going 100 percent virtual. We made the call on the 15th of March.
And so there haven't -- there's been some minor stumbling blocks within a couple of days and that was really just getting the authorities to do more of what we call processing of applicants over Facetime. And that's the ability to get -- use Facetime and instead of physically being in the same room for them to sign a document, we can watch them do it over the phone now and then we can swear in that that was the -- that person signed the document.
So what we're finding is there -- there – if the youth were on the social media before there moreso now because they're not in school. So we're out there, whether, you know -- one battalion did a dance -- live -- a live dance party, another one did a hangman game, another one did a lot of E-Sports-- a lot of E-Sports and we're heavily into Indeed and the other work sites and Google advertisements. Very, very powerful.
And so we can get an applicant the contract 90 percent complete virtual and they only have to do three things when we end up taking them through the MEPS for us to get them to ships. Over.
Q: General, if I could, I'm sorry, just one more follow up on this. You -- you said a few weeks ago that some, you know, new soldiers were maybe -- had filled out their paperwork but were on a delay to ship out, that you were going to start getting them to help the -- their local recruiting battalions so that they were kind of able to start getting paid.
Could you talk about how -- how many new soldiers are doing that and what that would look like?
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: Right, again -- again, great question. So we talked about that two weeks ago and you're right. And so the numbers right now are very low but if you could think about it -- and I'll walk you through that in a sec -- but you have to -- you have to preface it with this -- we've never done that before.
So we had to get everything lined up, both policy, regulation, and then also the how do you actually physically doing that, especially in this environment, and it -- we did this in two weeks. So last Friday, we brought the first two onboard.
And so, you know, we roughly have about 4,000 soldiers that need to ship. Now not all of those folks are going to be brought onto the rolls. What we're doing is specifically looking at each case and we're looking at the hardships that they may be under, whether they've quit their job, whether they don't have an apartment now because they've let their lease go, they've got family members, all of that. And we're screening them right now.
If they don't have that, what we're doing is, depending on how much they're going to be delayed in their shipping, they are going to be authorized to get either a 2,000, 4,000 or a 6,000 shipping bonus when their ship date eventually comes around.
And so we're trying to do something for all of these delayed shippers to ensure that based on this unexpected national emergency, that they are still committed to the Army and that we're going to take care of them and it's the right thing to do. Over.
Q: Thank you.
STAFF: Thank you, sir. We'll go to Matthew Cox now.
Q: Hi, thank you for doing this. So I did -- OK, I did just have two questions. One of them, just to clarify, so right now, we're on a -- the Army is on a two-week hold or pause, so no recruits are shipping to basic training. That's correct?
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, that's -- that's right. April and this time in April and May are our lowest shipping months anyway. And because of some of the great things that Frank put into place early on, we only had about 219 left to ship between now and the 19th of April. So we're in a good spot in the Army in terms of getting the conditions set to really be ready for the summer surge.
Q: OK, thank you.
And then also, so over the weekend, DOD put out a face covering -- face covering guidelines. So is that going on? Can you talk about, a little bit, in the training base. And what recruits or trainees are being advised to do? Are they wearing face coverings everywhere, then?
GEN. FUNK: The answer to your question is, we're looking at each one of those. As I said earlier, though, we're put in place social distancing as a matter of our training environment anyway. So there will be very few areas where we have to use the face coverings as a routine -- and it's kind of where you tend to bunch up a bit, and we're trying to prevent bunching up. So we're -- we've learned some of those social distancing lessons.
Will we be perfect everywhere? No, but where we can, we're going to continue to do what it is we're doing, which is stay social-distance safe, focused on what it is we've got to get done. And if we have to put the mask on, we can do that as well. We're trained to fight in every environment.
STAFF: And now we'll go to Mike in the room.
Q: Yeah, hi, General Funk, it's Mike Glenn with The Washington Times, Brave Rifles! I've got just a quick question. You say this -- you're on this two-week break now -- or a two-week pause now. How long can you hold onto this before it starts impacting those units downstream that are really desperate to get those -- those young privates?
GEN. FUNK: Well, we're -- actually, we're in great shape. If you're talking readiness, you know, we -- like I said, we have about 54,000 in some form or fashion in the training base now, so those were the recruits that were going to come for the next couple of months anyway.
So as we start to fill the units, and generate some space, we'll be able to then bring in more folks. You know, it's -- the social distancing has caused us to have to actually re-look at every bit of our capacity to be able to bring in as many people as we can and still maintain social distancing. So we're working through all that.
Right now, it's not impacting readiness so we'll be able to continue with those that we have in the base now. It's really about getting the -- the transportation in place to move them, which we'd been rehearsing for a number of weeks now and I think we've got pretty good procedures in place. Over.
Q: OK.
STAFF: We'll go back to the phones. Corey?
Q: Yes, thank you. General Funk, can I ask you, you know, specifically why -- the message has been that shipping recruits is mission-essential, so why is this decision coming down today specifically?
And then can you update us on how many recruits in the Army pipeline have tested positive and how many cadre tested positive?
GEN. FUNK: I -- I can -- here's what I'll -- I will do for you. Let me answer the first part of your question first -- or the second part of your question first.
The -- today -- the training -- trainees have been -- the numbers have been very low. I'd prefer not to push out the total number and just let DOD update you guys on the numbers as they come out. But across the enterprise, across the -- as I described, 54,000 in the training base, 46,000 permanent party, across that, we have somewhere in the neighborhood of 102 total cases, 12 of which have already recovered and we're continuing to recover more every day. So the numbers are low. Over.
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: Hey, sir, can I jump in on that...
GEN. FUNK: Yeah.
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: ... first part of that question a little bit, about...
(CROSSTALK)
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, you take the first part, I was going to push it to you anyway.
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: Yeah. Thank you, sir.
Hey, so here's what we did. Again, starting pretty early, we stood up an internal team -- that was our doctor, and we have operational research/support analysis, ORSA folks, that really just work in the world of numbers. Because, I mean, recruiting comes down to a lot with numbers.
So we have an ideal group to be able to bring together and run models internally. This was just for USAREC to inform us by county throughout the United States, as certain areas went red, we reduced our shipping numbers from those MEPS those counties fed into.
And the model was based on, of course, CDC, the other piece of the model, it was a combination. It was the CDC, the Washington -- University of Washington and Gates model, and then our doc came up with what he calls a doubling model, and it really just looks at the doubling rate.
And this had to go -- this was based on parts -- you know, numbers per 100,000 cases that would open up. Then we included -- because this didn't -- we didn't have a model built to run the numbers, we were doing it kind of by like, you know, it was manual. We also included the government, the local government's shelter-in-place.
And so as each county -- we would call red almost every day, it started to automatically slow down the shipping because we would adjust our shipping dates based on an area going red. Now, that's -- we just went and build the model over the weekend, to where now we can just -- we can run the program. And we're doing that today.
And actually, what we think that's going to cause is some of those counties to go back to an amber status. And that'll be good enough to start setting the conditions, in two weeks, when we -- when they -- the Department of the Army re-looks on opening it again, we will be able to give them a lot more informed data based on per -- based on the county, whether it's a green, amber, or red. Over.
STAFF: Great. Now we'll go to Sydney.
Q: Hello, thank you all very much. Let me ask -- I want to make sure I understand this -- you have the standard eight-week basic training course, but tacked on the front of that is two weeks of controlled status.
You know, obviously, a lot of Army life is about standing around, waiting for generals to do something with you. But what are people doing in those two weeks? Are they being told to stand at attention, stare at the wall for two weeks? Or are they actually conducting some kind of training activity even though that's not part of the regular basic curriculum?
GEN. FUNK: Hey, Sydney I will push the -- first of all, very few privates are commanded around by generals, but there are some great command sergeant majors in here, and that's what they do every day. So that's what they're paid to do.
On the -- on the end of the of your question is, I think General Hibbard can explain to you that -- what they'll be doing for the controlled monitoring part of this, but they'll be doing fitness activities -- so I'll just pass it over to -- to Lonnie.
MAJ. GEN. HIBBARD: Hey, Sydney, it's Major General Lonnie Hibbard.
What we did is, we pulled almost all of the academics that those trainees would have done over the 10 weeks, and we moved that to the first two weeks. And so what we tried to do is, we looked at all those activities that we could do in controlled monitoring that maintains social distancing. So it's those academics we could either do in a classroom or outdoors, maintaining social distancing, and then they also do PRT in the morning.
So they'll get up, they'll do PRT -- physical readiness training -- in the morning, so it's the introduction to how the Army does its physical training -- so we do that in the morning, and then the rest of the day is the academics. So it keeps them physically and mentally engaged in that 14 weeks.
And what that enables us, once they get out of the controlled monitoring and they're now COVID-free, is we can now move into the -- you know, from a walk phase of the academics to the run phase of the collective training and -- and the -- the team-building aspect of basic combat training.
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, let me just clarify. Lonnie said 14 weeks, he meant 14 days. OK.
Did that answer your question?
Q: Yes, sir. I understand. So all the -- basically the classroom work, and it serves -- and that would have been spread throughout the 10-week course, has been moved to this two weeks?
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, that -- that's right. Yeah, that -- I wouldn't say all, but the vast majority of it is.
Q: Understood. And -- now, are people in classrooms -- I guess they're -- are they six feet apart? And, you know, are they wearing cloth masks? I know that, you know, the DOD guidance says you can do the cloth masks when you can't maintain six feet, but you know, everything we're hearing about aerosolization, you know, and you know, how this spreads through, you know, some very light droplets, suggesting you probably want to have both of those things, at least if you're indoors where the air is constantly circulating.
MAJ. GEN. HIBBARD: Yeah, Sydney. What we've directed is, is all classes that can be executed outdoors will be executed outdoors. That's the first priority. So we want to move things outdoors first.
For those days that we can't execute outdoors due to weather, based on how we're filling right now at 50 percent, is we can maintain the social distancing in the classrooms to maintain the six feet between trainees and between instructors and the trainees. And then when they can't, then as General Funk mentioned earlier, we'll look at how we're using the gaiters or other cloth-type face masks.
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, and on the other side of that, if you're displaying any symptoms, you're going to be isolated further from the group anyway. So that -- that's a third check in that system.
Q: Of course, you don't have any of the actual antibody tests. And we know this -- as -- those are in scarce supply, I presume we don't have that as part of your process because nobody does. And that -- and of course, we have a lot of asymptomatic cases, it looks like, in the -- around the world as well, so that's an issue, I don't know how one addresses that.
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, that's why we're using the two-week controlled monitoring.
STAFF: OK, we'll move to Ryan in the room.
Q: Thank you, ma'am. Ryan Browne with CNN.
General, the decision to pause the shipping of new recruits, was that made because of an outbreak at one of the locations? And was that decision technically come into force today, or did that come into force yesterday or the day before?
GEN. FUNK: No, it actually came in today, but it really became because this was the prime time, as I described, to how low you had of shipping numbers anyway. It would just made sense to do that so we could thicken our capabilities and make sure we got all the good processes in place, coordinate for -- for patient elements and -- and check their processes, too, so that we can move folks as we need to. So it was really just happened to be that this is the -- the lowest time for shipping in the Army, and this is the right time to do it.
Q: And then has there been any other pauses or -- in terms of onward training? So once they've completed basic, are you kind of slowing down them going into the specialization training or any other -- is there any similar pauses, kind of -- to prevent folks moving around and possibly spreading the pandemic?
GEN. FUNK: No, we -- once we have them in safety bubble and then we put them into clean transportation, we take them on to their advanced individual training. And then from there, we're doing the same thing to take them to their first unit of assignment, so we're actually coordinating for organizations to be able to help us in those regards.
Q: Has that been challenging to kind of -- is that requiring a lot more resourcing to kind of maintain these bubbles? You know, we -- we heard one example of no more contractor feeding for some units being trained. I mean, how difficult is that transition?
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, well, it certainly puts an increased load on us, that -- that's for sure. But you know, the Army -- we're designed to adapt and overcome these kinds of obstacles so that -- we're just doing it. That's what we have to do, and so the bottom line is in order to maintain the readiness of the Army, we've got to figure out these processes and procedures, get them in place, and give us the best chance of making sure we're ready for any contingency.
Q: Thank you.
STAFF: We'll go back to the phone lines. Jaspreet?
Q: Thank you. General Funk, there was a guidance put out April 3rd authorizing the use of virtual battle assemblies for all Army Reserve troop program unit commands. Can you speak a little bit about that, and what potential impacts on readiness this may have?
GEN. FUNK: Well, I think that first of all, that -- that decision for the Guard and the Reserve, I would have to let the commanders of both the Guard and the Reserve give you specifics about that. But I do think it's a prudent decision to be able to do that, and I do believe that those commanders have put in place the proper procedures in order to do the virtual battle assemblies. But you know, our Guard and Reserve have been critical in the call-up of this. They are wearing the uniform of the great nation out there in the public eye and right in the storm, so to speak, as -- they are in the fight with us. This is a total Army effort.
STAFF: We've got time for one more question. Terese?
Q: Yes, hi. This is Terese Garnier with Newsy. Thank you so much. One of the reporters actually asked the question I was going to ask earlier, but I do have a question about those who enlisted under signing bonuses. How has the pandemic impacted how and when they will get those signing bonuses?
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: So, sir, do you want me to jump on this one?
GEN. FUNK: Yeah, go ahead, Frank.
MAJ. GEN. MUTH: Thank you, sir. Hey, so here's the deal, is it's not going to be impacted at all. Their signing bonus actually -- they don't get it until they finish their training. So all the bonuses that they've signed up for, even though their contract has been renegotiated and -- and the date has been pushed a little bit farther down the road, we will still honor all their -- their bonuses. Over.
Q: Thank you.
STAFF: All right, General Funk, over to you for any closing comments.
GEN. FUNK: I don't have any real closing comments other than to say, you know, to the American people, your Army's equal to this challenge. It is a total Army effort. It is a total Army force taking after this, and we at Army Training and Doctrine Command are -- will ensure that we -- we do the best we can to ensure that the nation's treasure, it's sons and daughters, are better -- are better trained and ready to do anything anywhere at any time. Thank you for your time today. I really appreciate it.
STAFF: Thank you, sir. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.