Breathing, yoga, and healthy boundaries: Why the Army is taking a new training approach
When Tyler Bergman, a drill sergeant at the base, joined the Army in 2013, training was to help you get ready 'to go to war. That's it. Nothing else.' Now, 'the Army is looking at the bigger picture.'
FORT JACKSON, S.C. – On a rainy Wednesday last month, soldiers shuffled into lecture halls eager for the end of their 10-week introduction to Army life.
The morning’s training wouldn’t be dedicated to firing drills, marksmanship or hand-to-hand combat. Instead, soldiers would be learning healthy coping strategies, texting etiquette and the signs of a toxic relationship.
At the Army base in Columbia, South Carolina, where about half of new U.S. soldiers train for combat, basic training would be unrecognizable to a soldier of a different era. Drill sergeants now minimize their use of profanity, insults and degrading remarks and strive to become support figures for trainees. Soldiers learn breathing exercises and holistic nutrition. They take yoga classes and are encouraged to sleep a full eight hours.
The Army is teaching incoming soldiers social skills and emotional health in a push to tackle problems in the military’s largest branch, such as sexual harassment and poor communication skills among electronics-addicted Gen Z soldiers.
When Tyler Bergman, a drill sergeant at the base, joined the Army in 2013, training was to help you get ready “to go to war."
"That's it. Nothing else,” he said. But "nowadays, the Army is looking at the bigger picture."
Army expands its definition of 'battle readiness'
After years of attacks from some on the right on "woke" policies and programs, President Donald Trump is systematically dismantling federal diversity, equity and inclusion programs from top to bottom.
He has signaled similar intentions for the Pentagon with his new defense secretary, Pete Hegseth. An Army National Guard veteran and former Fox News host, Hegseth spent years accusing the military of abandoning its focus on warfighting to appease cultural sensitivities.
In recent years, some critics − including Hegseth − have skewered the Pentagon over concerns about “wokeness” in the military. Increasing focus on diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and efforts to encourage the recruitment and advancement of women and minorities have dulled the military’s sharp standards for strength and physical fitness, they say.
Lagging standards?
But officials behind the new training initiatives say standards haven’t lagged, the military’s understanding of what battle readiness means has just evolved. They say a competent soldier is an effective communicator as well as a lethal fighter.
“I don't see this training as separate from warfighting,” said Col. David Uthlaut, commander of the 165th Infantry Brigade, which trains at Fort Jackson. “We can't be just focused on the technical and tactical piece. We've got to be focused on the cohesion, the trust, the communication.”
Eliciting jokes from a former drill sergeant
When Joshua Fredericks, 19, of Manhattan, Kansas, told his father about the new training, it elicited some jokes from the former drill sergeant. An Army trainee at Fort Jackson, Fredericks said his experience differs dramatically from his those of his father and of generations of servicemembers in his family.
If his dad “had an open mind,” mental-health-related training could have had untold benefits for his military career, Fredericks said.
“If he started young and got the training, he would absolutely have done better.”
In June, Army officials first incorporated communication and emotional awareness training at three bases. They plan to expand it throughout the Army as part of its initial training and could use it later on for soldiers more advanced in their careers, said Lt. Gen. David Francis, the deputy commanding general for the Army's training.
At Fort Jackson alone, tens of thousands of soldiers have completed the training, said Uthlaut, the infantry commander.
Recruits unprepared for stress of military life
Internal Army feedback indicated recruits weren't as resilient as needed or prepared for the stress of military life or life in general, Francis said. Uthlaut pointed to "corrosive behaviors" among soldiers.
Drill sergeants and soldiers at the base said they experience conflict routinely. When an instructor asked during a recent training session how many soldiers had experienced a fight or conflict, nearly every hand in the room shot up.
Tionna Mack, 21, who's from Philadelphia, said there were “conflicts all the time” in her platoon. But her drill sergeant helped her deal with her emotions.
She said that once she was so angry she told her drill sergeant, "I honestly don't know how to process what I'm feeling."
"He was just like, 'I just need you to breathe,'" she said.
New soldiers struggle with phone addictions, communication
Nearly half of the Army's active-duty enlisted soldiers are 25 or younger and face a 21st-century problem. The Army is struggling to reach incoming soldiers with phone and electronics addictions that impede their capacity for face-to-face communication. New trainees at Fort Jackson are usually allowed phone access only once a week.
“It's been a big change for me, but I think it's for the better,” said Cameron O’Brien, 25, of Frederick, Maryland. “I was probably on my phone way too much before I came here.”
Uthlaut said many soldiers come in with “some level of addiction to their phones” and “don't know how to interact with one another because they're so used to being in digital-type forums.”
The problem extends far beyond the Army. Half of 12- to 17-year-olds spend four or more hours a day on screens, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Of those, a quarter experienced anxiety or depression. Last July, former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for social media platforms to carry warning labels. He cited research that indicates social media has accelerated a mental health "emergency" among young people.
In response, the Army is employing its own tech gadgets. A pilot group of Fort Jackson trainees is trying out virtual reality goggles that simulate tricky social situations.
In a highly realistic 3D view, soldiers pick responses to situations in a choose-your-own-adventure interface.
In one module, a conflict breaks out in a barracks because a soldier is playing music too loud. The soldier must choose between steps that work toward a compromise or rile up the quibbling parties. In another, a soldier goes home from a bar with someone they had been flirting with. Once they arrive, the other person doesn't want to have sex. The soldier can opt to talk it out or react in anger.
As one classroom of soldiers pulled the goggles off their eyes to discuss the scenarios, the occasional giggle broke out. One soldier, asked to describe his experience, said he intentionally chose the wrong answers to see what would happen. The instructor doesn't penalize soldiers for the choices they make; they're just asked to reflect as a group about their impressions.
Pentagon grapples with recent rise of military sexual assault
Before she came to Fort Jackson, people back home warned Gleny Montenegro Herrera, an 18-year-old from Milwaukee, to take every precaution against sexual assault. “Just stay away from everybody and everything,” friends and family told her. “But I can't,” she said.
The 2020 murder of Vanessa Guillén, a 20-year-old Army soldier at Fort Hood who said she was sexually harassed, coupled with a 25% spike in sexual assaults from 2018 to 2021 have forced the military to reckon with a long-standing problem in its ranks. Although reports finally declined for the first time in almost a decade in 2023, one study found sexual assault prevalence could run up to four times higher than the Pentagon's data.
Army leaders also hope emotionally tuned training that teaches about consent, listening and physical boundaries can tackle another part of the problem.
Cases of sexual harassment, like grabbing someone's private areas, continue to occur. “The slow beat of the drum” of these incidents in basic combat training and beyond made the need for the course clear, Uthlaut said.
At Fort Jackson, instructors don't mince words when discussing sexual consent. “You will be kicked out fast” for messing with consent, Bergman told one class of trainees. When a soldier raised his hand to ask whether the rules changed if both, rather than just one person, were intoxicated during a sexual encounter, Bergman raised his arms over his head in an X. “No!” he said.
“A lot of people are used to guys’ locker room talk,” said Fredericks, the 19-year-old trainee. Some soldiers in his sleep bay have had comments reported up the chain of command.
'I wanted to cry every day'
Army trainees say basic combat training is as much an emotional as a physical challenge. For many young recruits, basic training also represents their introduction to adult life and the responsibilities that come with it.
“I thought that I was prepared, and then I got here, and I wanted to cry every day because I just missed my family,” said Cameron O’Brien, 25, of Frederick, Maryland.
Montenegro Herrera joined the Army in part to secure residency status for her parents, who are in Mexico after being deported years ago. Undertaking Army training as she grapples with their absence is “harsh,” she said.
“You need to be really grounded in your emotions and your goals and everything you're here for,” she said. “You need an emotional support system to keep you going so you don't quit.”
“This is all new to me," Montenegro Herrera said, apologizing as she choked up. "But I'm trying, and I think I'm doing pretty good.”