RBG - ready for responsibility
T
HE 1RAR Battlegroup continues
to prepare to take on the
responsibility of being the Army’s
Ready Battle Group from July 1.
CO 1RAR LTCOL Ben McLennan
assembled the BG last month on the
Battalion parade ground and COMD 3Bde
BRIG Chris Field addressed them.
LTCOL McLennan said the BG’s
mission was simple: to prepare
soldiers and teams for war.
As the Ready Battle Group designate,
its success in achieving this mission is
routinely tested through its ‘road to Ready’.
This well-trodden path will lead to
certifi cation of the 1RAR Battlegroup
as the nation’s highest readiness, largest,
general purpose contingency force, on
Ex Brolga Strike in June, 2017.
“It will form the core of the nation’s fi rst
response to a range of contingencies, its
‘thin blue line’,” LTCOL McLennan said.
He said there were three focal areas for
the BG which would ensure it’s success.
“The fi rst is our centre of gravity, which
is trust,” LTCOL McLennan said.
“As the next RBG, 1RAR must honour
the trust invested by the nation, the
Army, veterans, families and ourselves.
“We must be trustworthy, in every
respect, all of the time.”
The second was the Battalion’s focus on
being better led, disciplined, trained and
equipped than any potential adversary.
“The third is that we need to train,
physically and mentally, to be faster,
more tenacious, more lethal, harder to
fi nd, more cunning and to ‘own the
night’ better than any enemy,” he said.
APRIL 2017 | 21