Major Joel Gleason served as a logistics advisor to an Iraqi Police (IP) battalion as part of a military transition team (MiTT) in Baghdad, Iraq during 2007 and 2008. In this August 2012 interview, MAJ Gleason discusses his time in Korea before his deployment, some of the challenges of working on a MiTT with no previous deployment experience, and the several lessons he took for this deployment. MAJ Gleason concludes his interview with the observation, "I'm grateful for that experience. I wouldn't want to do another transition team but if I had to do it over again, I would. . . If the Army had the time and resources I would say that every leader needs to not just go to the range and qualify with their weapon. They need to go through the next step, which is consolidated live fire exercises which involved more than just you. Is there a legitimate reason for every logistics officer in the Army to go do room clearing? Maybe not, but as we move towards a counterinsurgency (COIN) war again we need to remember that that's something our rear echelon forces weren't trained on."

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