Ranger School: The Compass Course Story

Planning ought to be an integral part of any new venture. This experience from my days in the military shows how a little time spent planning on the front end brought us in first that day!

Ranger School Benning Phase

In Ranger School, during the Benning Phase (the first phase of Ranger School) there is a mandatory compass course that each Ranger must pass to move on in Ranger School.  This course (I did this in April 1978 so the format may have changed some) requires that pairs of students (a Ranger always has a Ranger Buddy) be given a map coordinate, once arriving at that coordinate they would find their next “target” and so on through, I believe, four target locations. The last target takes them into base camp, for check-in and then waiting for the rest of the teams to arrive.  (You would not want to be the last team to arrive at the base camp – not good; however, not arriving at all is even worse!!)

You guys are never going to finish!

We’ve been given the rules for the course and handed our first coordinates; my Ranger buddy and I pull out our map (we each carry a map, but we need only one for this course) lay it carefully on the ground, and orient it with our compass to align north.  We check our first coordinate and locate it on the map.  We determine that it is about a mile, or so, away as the crow flies from where we are in that direction, I point.

By this time other Ranger pairs are leaving the start point for their first “targets.”  However, my Ranger buddy and I continue to study the map and the terrain between us and our first target.  More Rangers are leaving to chase after their coordinates.  This is a timed event – the first Rangers to complete the course are rewarded.  My buddy and I are still reviewing our map when one of the Ranger Instructors approaches and says, “You guys are never going to finish!”  I looked up, somewhat startled, and noted that we are now the last team and still reviewing our strategy to make it to our first target.

Taking a less direct route.

We had all been doing patrols (little graded mini-missions) in this terrain and knew that this terrain was a series of gullies and in the gullies with very dense vegetation that is difficult to get through.  The terrain above the gullies was fairly open and clear of vegetation.  Our strategy became to take a less direct route to our first target and not fight what would have been a direct route through two of these gullies with deep thickets.  Instead, we stayed high on the rim and maneuvered to a point where we could make one decent down through and up again to the rim and on around to the first coordinate.

We trotted along at a leisurely pace (this is an all-day event and several miles to complete the course) to our cross-over point, quickly down through the gully and thicket, back to the rim on the other side, and on around to our first coordinates.  As I recall we found a large live oat tree and a box with our next set of coordinates – and the process was repeated.  We laid out the map carefully aligned it with the compass, located our next target, selected our best route (not necessarily the most direct), and trotted on out to find our second target, and on it went all day, through four different sets of coordinates.

Base Camp - First!?

The fourth target is where we were given the coordinates to the base camp and a hot meal and rest.  It was beginning to get dark now and we were trotting down the road towards the base camp when along comes a pair of Ranger students, still looking for a set of coordinates. One of them asked us if we were finished.  We indicated we were indeed going in and they told us that they had just moments ago passed the base and there were no Rangers there yet who had completed the course! If we hurried we could be first!  We did indeed quicken our pace and arrived at the base camp to complete the course – first!

The Ranger Instructor who had barked at us in the morning about not finishing the course was astounded by our arrival and proclaimed that we had surely missed one of our coordinates.  But, of course, it wasn’t true.  Once all of our tickets had been checked, it was clear that we had definitely been to each of our checkpoints and arrived just at dusk – First!!

Best use of time and effort.

Here is the point of this story.  My Ranger buddy and I had the same chance for success as all of the rest of the teams that left that morning on that compass course.  They were given the same equipment, the same rules, the same terrain, the same weather an equal amount of daytime (this gets extremely more difficult at night), and approximately the same distance. 

What was different? 

We stopped and thought about how to make the best use of our time and effort!  Our goal was not to finish first!  Our goal was to finish the course as quickly as possible without making any mistakes.  In Ranger School it is Pass or Fail – so even though getting in first was a bonus – it doesn’t do any good if you fail the course.  We carefully maneuvered to each target coordinate and then stopped and carefully planned our route to the next target, before taking the first step.

Stop, turn your brain on, think about what lies before you, and create a plan that will provide the best chance for success with the information you have available. We never have all of the information, but we adapt well and can correct course quickly. Do not concern yourself about always being first – consider completing the course.

Good Luck and Have Fun.