An Cosantóir

An Cosantóir September / October 2026 www.military.ie/magazine Q 1 2026 saw the launch of the first Reserve Defence Force (RDF) Senior NCO Logistics Course. Prior to 2005 the FCA (along with the Slua Muirí) was the part-time arm of the Defence Forces. When these organisations disbanded in 2005, they were replaced with the RDF, a rebrand that was to see the force professionalise and modernise to better complement our PDF colleagues. As the RDF found its feet a number of logistical courses were run, namely the RDF Junior NCO Logistics/Admin Course under a syllabus designed to provide the foundations of logistical knowledge to RDF NCOs working in stores. Paradoxically however, no Senior Logistic Course followed, and as the RDF had inherited FCA doctrine and regulation there was no requirement to have completed any course to be considered for promotion to Quartermaster within the Reserve. The DF reorg of 2012 greatly cut back the number of Senior NCO appointments within the Reserve nationally, creating a surplus of Quartermasters serving without appointment in many geographic areas. With little chance of promotion and no regulatory requirement for course completion, the RDF Junior Logistics/Admin Course was run just once post-reorg, in 2013. Roll forward to 2022 and to rehash General Bradley and his famous quote 'amateurs talk strategy, professionals talk logistics', it was becoming clear that to ensure the Reserve could "seamlessly train, operate and deploy" with the PDF as mandated, continue to provide its own logistical support when training independently, and to ensure compliance with the 2021 DF Professional Military Education (PME) strategy, that PME opportunities in the area of logistics needed to be afforded to Reserve members. The Working Group With the support of the Office of Reserve Affairs (ORA) a working group (WG) was stood up by D COS (Ops) in 2022. The focus of this WG was to produce a draft syllabus for an RDF Senior NCO Logistics Course, and to make recommendations to J4 & J7 for a course to qualify NCOs for promotion to the rank of CQMS and Naval Service equivalent. The Working Group was led by Comdt (AR) Niall Costello ( J4) and consisted of subject matter expert (SME) officers and NCOs working in the logistics sphere. The WG balanced comprehensive content with the need to ensure a reservist could complete the course without using an unreasonable amount of leave from their full-time employment or studies, while covering both DF policy and day-to-day content pertinent to the reservist's role as CQMS in a reserve context. The WG examined and identified the competencies, skills and knowledge required to fulfil the role and provided content areas, delivery and assessment methods to be utilised to achieve the course objectives, all the while ensuring the alignment of the learning outcomes with PDF equivalent courses. The result was a robust syllabus consisting of content extracted from the PDF Basic Logistician Course, and both PDF Junior and Senior Logs Courses, that affords students the same skill accreditation as their PDF counterparts. The Course - Block 1 The course was conducted between March and September and consisted of three blocks of Full-Time Training (FTT). Initially, twenty-three students presented to the Military Administration School (MAS) for an intense 14-day instruction period on logistics administration and protocol. The students were drawn from all brigades with the usual pre-course qualifying criteria of manual handling, medical, fitness test and personal weapons test as mandatory requirements to be accepted on the course. The instructors, consisting of both RDF and PDF staff, led by BQ McDonald (Maxi), were familiar faces to many. They passed on their knowledge of ration indenting, preparing range documents, the movement of stores and hazardous materials and various logistical and financial regulatory requirements. An intense general test confirmed our newly acquired knowledge on these topics. 12 | THE FIRST RESERVE DEFENCE THE FIRST RESERVE DEFENCE FORCES SENIOR NCO LOGISTICS COURSE FORCES SENIOR NCO LOGISTICS COURSE ARTICLE BY SGT NICHOLA KIERNAN, CAVALRY SCHOOL, DFTC

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