Author: Dennis J. Cahill, Sr.

5-minute read Assessment and selection for Regular Army civil affairs units. CAAS did not exist in 1992 when I was in the Regular Army and chose civil affairs as a…

3-minute read By Major (Retired) Tom Kinton Introductory Note from the CATR Team Leader: The following piece was written by Major (Retired) Tom Kinton, a civil affairs officer and Veteran…

By Colonel (Ret.) Patrick Pascall 7-minute read My background. I was commissioned into Armor in 1993, commanding Abrams M1A1 tanks and learning the fundamentals of maneuver warfare. Three years later,…

5-minute read The Berlin Wall came down. On November 9, 1989, the people of Berlin breached and ultimately tore down the wall that had divided their city since 1961. I…

7-minute read [Updated with Responses from Teammates on 9 October 2025.] Civil affairs in early military training. When I was a cadet at the United States Military Academy, military history…

[Updated with Responses from Teammates on 29 September 2025.] 8-minute read A loaded question. This can be a sensitive subject for some. Being a member of special operations forces (SOF)…

9-minute read The answer to this question is found in U.S. Army regulations (ARs) and Army General Orders (AGOs). However, since few have seen these sources, let’s take a few…

7-minute read I first heard of the idea to redesign the civil affairs branch insignia from the globe, torch, sword, and scroll described in CATR Post #10 to crossed pipehawks…

4-minute read According to the U.S. Army Center of Military History’s Branch Birthday page, the birthday of the Civil Affairs Branch is 17 August 1955.  That means that ten days…

8-minute read On 11 April 2025, MAJ Jake Nyquist, with the 432nd Civil Affairs Battalion in Green Bay, WI, sent a note to the Civil Affairs Team Room asking the…