10th Mountain Division battlefield staff ride in Italy serves to inspire

FORT DRUM, N.Y. (Aug. 10, 2023) — In 1945, the 10th Mountain Division carved its legacy into the North Apennine mountains and across the Po Valley in Italy during World War II.

Nearly 80 years later, 10th Mountain Division (LI) leaders conducted a battlefield staff ride through Florence and Verona, Aug. 1-3, to traverse the same terrain as the original Mountain Soldiers.

The staff ride began with a tour of the Florence American Cemetery and Memorial and a wreath ceremony. A representative from the American Battle Monuments Commission said that the grounds and monuments are kept in pristine condition to honor the service members who died in Italy.

“Time will not dim the glory of their deeds,” Chiara Del Turco said.

Flags were placed at the headstones of 10th Mountain Division Soldiers, including Sgt. Maj. John Evans of the 86th Mountain Infantry Regiment – the division’s highest-ranking noncommissioned officer killed in action.

“I think the cemetery was a good place to start because it made you take a solemn moment and think about where you are, what you are doing, the people who came before you,” said Chief Warrant Officer 3 Avery Dyer, 10th Mountain Division air traffic and airspace manager. “It grounded the trip in a way, because it provided a compelling look at the cost of war before we walked the terrain where they fought.”

The cemetery contains 4,392 headstones of military service members – 356 belonging to 10th Mountain Division Soldiers – and the names of 1,409 missing in action inscribed on the Tablets of the Missing.

Maj. Gen. Gregory Anderson, 10th Mountain Division (LI) commander, said the cemetery visit reflected what it means to serve in the profession of arms, and the importance for them to get it right.

“Many of you have served in combat and have lost people you know, comrades killed and wounded,” he said to his team. “It is always tough to come back to the cemeteries and reflect on the cost of what our business is ultimately about. It’s the risk of being in this profession. I thank you all because you know the costs, you know the risks and you are still willing to serve and sacrifice.”

Inspiration was inescapable during the battlefield staff ride, as leaders climbed a steep, narrow route up Riva Ridge, then witnessed firsthand the strategic vantage point that Mount Belvedere afforded in disabling the German defense of the Gothic Line.

“Being able to climb Riva Ridge and set my feet on top of that storied piece of terrain that I’ve heard so much about, now it’s in my heart and it’s in my mind,” Anderson said. “I can visualize it, and I can tell the story with more conviction because it means something to me.”

The nighttime assault on Riva Ridge in February of 1945 and the subsequent attack on Mount Belvedere was the division’s baptism by fire. A campaign that most had thought would take weeks, the 10th Mountain Division accomplished in five days.

“As a 10th Mountain Division Soldier, and walking that same path they did, you just appreciate how much they struggled and what they had to overcome,” said Lt. Col. Christopher Urynowicz, 10th Mountain Division G4, assistant chief of staff for sustainment. “The easy was difficult and, I’m sure, the difficult was impossible.”

After the climb up Riva Ridge, Lt. Col. Chad Corbin, 10th Mountain Division G2, said he gained new perspective of what the Mountain Soldiers had to endure under a full combat load, in the dark of night.

“The great human risk that individual Soldiers put upon themselves to get up that mountain, and then fight the enemy on the top of that mountain, is extremely impressive,” he said. “And it just shows you that when properly motivated and resourced, an American Soldier can do anything they are asked to do.”

Corbin said the staff ride was physically more demanding than any other staff ride he experienced.

“Typically, you do terrain walks that are mostly flat,” he said. “This wasn’t like that at all. And it’s easy to talk about a battle and point to something on a map, but until you have an appreciation for the actual terrain you don’t fully understand how hard it was.”

Sgt. Maj. M. Rhea Grant, 10th Mountain Division (LI) G2 sergeant major, said she watched the “Mission Mount Mangart” documentary on the 10th Mountain Division in WWII last year with her family during Mountainfest.

“You could sit in a theater and watch a film – and it’s a very good one – or you could be here where everything actually happened,” she said. “There’s no comparison. You can’t really get the full grasp of appreciation of what the division was able to do just from looking at it on the screen. Coming here and actually climbing that mountain puts it all in context – having the knowledge of both seeing it and doing it.”

Lt. Col. Andy Harris recalled being a captain with 2nd Battalion, 87th Infantry Regiment, when some of the street signs at Fort Drum changed names to honor the division’s support of current operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“That meant something to me because I had been there, and I could visualize it,” he said. “But as I ran around Riva Ridge and Po Valley and Mount Belvedere, I never knew what that meant. But now I do. So when I go back to (Fort) Drum and run on North Riva Ridge or South Riva Ridge Loop, it will mean something different. And when I feel tired and I don’t want to run as hard as I’d like to, I am going to, because I got to experience what it’s like running up Riva Ridge – or walk up it – and feel my heart explode out of my chest.”

Harris, 10th Mountain Division G3, said he also admired the leadership of the division commander, Lt. Gen. George P. Hays, and his ability to assess risk and know what his Soldiers were capable of doing.

“You have to have the right people to take those risks, and you have to know your people and know the lengths they are willing to go when you ask them to do those hard things,” he said. “That’s what this division was made of and, I think, to this day, is still made of.”