AUGUST 13, 2025 – Cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, recently received hands-on basic rifle marksmanship training from the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit’s Instructor Training Group, aimed at strengthening their shooting skills and preparing them to be lethal, combat-ready soldiers in the future.
Army Sgt. 1st Class Juan Pena, instructor, said the training focused on building proficiency in the fundamentals of basic rifle marksmanship, weapon safety and manipulation and the principles of BRM.
“These cadets are going to be future leaders in the Army,” Pena said. “We want them to understand how to develop and use the Integrated Weapons Training Strategy and apply what they’ve learned here when they train their own platoons.”
While the group follows the Army’s Integrated Weapons Training Strategy, Pena said their approach places special emphasis on two key firing tasks.
“We focus on pointing the weapon at what you want to hit and pulling the trigger without putting any movement into the gun,” he said. “The two key firing tasks include all the fundamentals of marksmanship, which are steady position, aiming and trigger control, but we don’t harp on breathing.”
Pena said many cadets are new to shooting and marksmanship.
“We are ensuring they understand the importance of weapon safety and the dangers of becoming complacent,” he said. “Every weapon needs to be treated as if it was loaded, along with all the rest of the safety considerations that come with that, while also ensuring that they understand all the fundamentals and their importance.”
Pena added that the purpose of the training is to prepare cadets to apply these skills when leading soldiers.
“They have to understand how to develop and run marksmanship training,” he said. “That includes the fundamentals, positions, working around barriers and the other elements needed to make their soldiers effective on the range and in combat.”
He also stressed that lethality begins with mastering the basics.
“It’s important to teach these cadets the fundamentals of basic rifle marksmanship early in their career so they have a good foundation for marksmanship,” Pena said. “As they progress in the military, they can just continue to add to that.”
Army Maj. James Fiser, who teaches in the Department of Military Instruction at West Point, said the partnership with the U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit gives cadets more time to develop essential skills.
“It gives us another opportunity to give cadets additional proficiency in military-specific tasks,” Fiser said. “This is something that is touched on as part of every officer’s developmental pipeline and the required pre-commissioning training requirements, but we rarely get down into the details — that is where we really develop excellence.”
Fiser said the training helps cadets understand and replicate “what right looks like” when they become officers.
“Competence is a prerequisite to wisdom,” he said. “If they don’t know what right looks like, what right feels like, it’s going to be unlikely that they can see it and enforce it and inculcate it into their soldiers in the future.”
He added that officers must be able to perform the same skills they ask of their soldiers.
“We need to have individuals that are competent in those tasks themselves or at least familiarized with those tasks to a higher standard,” he said. “Building that level of proficiency and developing it over time is going to make our training all across the Army better.”
Fiser said the marksmanship unit’s experience brings an additional level of value.
“Having the ability of the [unit’s] instructors that have so much direct experience and subject matter expertise … being able to speak directly to the cadets and provide them individualized feedback is giving them an opportunity to get much more into the details,” he said. “It helps them understand the level of professionalism and attention to detail that they need to attack just what may seem like a simple thing, but you can spend an entire lifetime improving upon.”
The U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit, based at Fort Benning, Georgia, is tasked with improving Army marksmanship proficiency, supporting recruiting efforts, and advancing small arms research and development. Its Instructor Training Group specializes in teaching marksmanship skills to soldiers and leaders across the Army.
By Army Sgt. 1st Class Timothy Hamlin
U.S. Army Marksmanship Unit