Modern warfare demands that company commanders like King be thinkers and planners as well as leaders. Companies that used to fight in formations that packed soldiers in shoulder to shoulder now fought over frontages that extend up to a thousand meters, sometimes more. Even platoon leaders, the officers who serve as the links between the company commander and the rifleman on the killing edge, seldom find themselves in a position where they can physically see more than a handful of their own men. Under such circumstances it is critical that every soldier in the company understand that Captain Andrew King is there, directing their efforts, if not in body, then in spirit. So it was important for Captain King and his peers to seize every opportunity to physically lead in order to firmly establish that idea in their soldiers’ minds.

Andrew King, nicknamed King Andrew by friends and detractors alike, didn’t much mind the isolation that comes with commanding a company. As the oldest of four, he had learned at an early age to give orders and assume a responsible role over his younger, less capable siblings. When his mother, a woman who had found herself abandoned by every man she ever thought she loved, gave up her attempts to find security in marriage, she allowed Andrew to became the “man” of the house.

This sad state of affairs probably saved King from a fate many of his peers shared. Like them he lived in a household run by a mother who worked at two, and sometimes three, menial jobs in order to eke out a substandard living on the edge of Kansas City’s own unique version of an urban ghetto. Unlike his own father, he did not abandon his family. Nor did he join a gang as his boyhood friends urged. Instead he threw himself into the task of caring for his two brothers and one sister while applying himself academically in the hope of securing a scholarship to a college that was far from the mean streets of home.

This course of action, one which seemed so wise for one so young, was not without its price. As with too many African-American youths who apply themselves academically, this decision cost him dearly. Without the relative protection of a gang, Andrew found himself in a strange middle ground, a no-man’s land, alone. There he lived by his wits, sustained by the slim hope that somewhere, up ahead, in the hazy and uncertain future, his efforts would be rewarded.

In his senior year, they were. Almost by chance he received an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point. While the Army had never really figured into his plans as a child, the opportunity to attend college absolutely free was too good to pass up. So he grabbed the brass ring when it came his way and never looked back.