________________________________________________________________________Richard S. Kem
From left to right, Lieutenant General Elvin R. Heiberg III,
Chief of Engineers and Colonel of the Engineer Regiment;
Lieutenant General Frederick J. Clarke, Honorary Colonel
of the Regiment and former Chief of Engineers; and
General Kem at the ceremony establishing the regiment.
We wanted our engineer battalion commanders to stay concentrated on leading, maintaining,
training--those things he's got to do--without having this as a burden. So, we asked the
Chief's historical folks to put together a package that will assist these battalion commanders
in doing that sort of thing. That package is a short history, some capability to provide a card
of basic highlights of the battalion's heritage to give the individual soldiers, and some kind of
a thing to put beside a plate at a soldier dinner or a dining-in or something like that. We got a
lot of good support from you in the Corps' Historical Office in putting that prototype
together.
Q:
We'll give you a running account of how well we did; keep you informed on that one.
A:
I knew you knew all that; I just thought I'd put it on the tape, though.
Q:
Good to have for the record. [Laughter] That's something we still have to work out. Probably
I was remiss in not working with you more on that.
A:
I told Paul Chinen, as the new assistant commandant, that he is to step in where Bob Whitley
took off. Bob ought to debrief him on what his jobs are as part of this committee so he can
take over, so there'll be some opportunities.
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