Medal of Honor Heroes Share Leadership Lessons
Wed, 10/15/2025 - 21:05
In one of the most anticipated panel discussions at the Association of the U.S. Army’s 2025 Annual Meeting and Exposition, three Medal of Honor recipients spoke candidly about their actions in combat and what the Army taught them about leadership.
Retired Capt. Flo Groberg was first to speak about how he responded to an attack on Aug. 8, 2012, when, as he led a security detachment out of Forward Operating Base Fiaz in Afghanistan for a weekly security meeting with the provincial governor, he tackled a suicide bomber to keep the blast away from fellow soldiers.
In an attack that lasted only about eight seconds, he said there was no time to assess the situation and the potential consequences. Rather, Groberg said, “It was the many hours, the months, the training that we've done over and over and over again to become professionals.”
“The Army trains you to be professional, to be a member of a unit. I was the closest one to the suicide bomber, Sgt. [Andrew Mahoney] followed me right into it, every single one of my soldiers did exactly what they were supposed to do,” Groberg said. “To me, it’s about the team, it’s about unity and it’s about doing your job. My team was as perfect as you possibly could be in that situation, and the consequence of war is that you could be perfect and still suffer losses. It is a business where you need to be trained up, you need to pay attention.”
https://www.ausa.org/news/medal-honor-heroes-share-leadership-lessons
