Drill and Ceremonial

RMT 130 · Recruit and Military Training · Level 100

A Royal Army College course in discipline, bearing, and the honours of the Crown.

Course length: 10 hours, studied online and asynchronously at the student's own pace, together with any in-person practical instruction and assessment the course requires.

Foreword

To the outsider, drill can look like an empty relic: soldiers marching in straight lines for no reason a battle would recognise. It is nothing of the kind. Drill is the oldest and most reliable school of the one quality on which an army most depends, discipline, the instant, collective, willing obedience that turns a crowd of individuals into a body that acts as one. A soldier learns on the drill square to control the body, to respond at once to a word of command, to subordinate self to the whole, and to carry themselves with the bearing of a soldier, and they carry those things off the square into everything else they do.

Ceremonial is drill raised to the service of honour. When the Royal Kaharagian Army parades, troops the Colour, mounts a guard for the Sovereign, or renders the last honours to a fallen comrade, it makes visible, in disciplined and dignified form, its loyalty to the Crown, its pride in itself, and its respect for those it honours. For a principality whose Army is young but whose tradition is borrowed from the long Commonwealth line, ceremonial is among the most frequent and most public things the Army ever does, and the standard it shows on parade is the standard by which the nation judges it.

Who this course is for

Every member of the Royal Kaharagian Army, of every rank. Drill and bearing are taught from a soldier's first day and are the foundation of military discipline, so this course belongs to all. It expands the Basic Training Manual's modules on discipline and drill and on parade and collective movement, and it draws the meaning of the Army's Colours, flags, and symbols from the Army's own foundation. It assumes the leadership course, with which it shares its concern for bearing and example.

What you will be able to do

By the end you will be able to:

• explain the purpose of drill and why it remains the foundation of military discipline;
• describe the foundations of foot drill, the words of command, and the standard expected;
• describe marching, the slow and quick march, turns, and movement on parade;
• pay compliments and marks of respect correctly, and explain what the salute means;
• describe the structure of a parade and the ceremonial occasions the Army performs;
• explain the meaning and sanctity of the Colours and the conventions that govern them;
• describe the guard of honour, the state occasion, and the honours rendered at a military funeral; and
• meet the standard of turnout and bearing that the Army and the Crown require.

How the course works

The course is self-paced and studied online, lesson by lesson, with a reflection at the end of each. But drill is a physical discipline, learned on the square, by the body, under the eye of a drill instructor, and certified in person; it cannot be learned from a screen. This course gives you the part that the square does not teach by itself: the purpose of drill, the meaning of the movements and the ceremonial, the words of command, the conventions of the Colours and compliments, and the bearing that all of it builds. Learn the why here; earn the standard on the square.

A note on tradition, honestly kept

The Royal Kaharagian Army is young, founded in 2010, and it does not pretend otherwise. Its ceremonial forms are drawn from the long British and Commonwealth tradition, observed with care and precision, but the Army's own history is short and its honour is still being earned. This course therefore teaches the forms the Army keeps and the meaning behind them; it does not invent a past the Army has not lived. Battle honours, in particular, are earned in real operations and granted by the Crown, never designed for effect, and this course treats the honours of the Crown with the seriousness that truth requires.

Structure

A note on terms

This course follows the Army's own conventions exactly. Colours are the consecrated ceremonial flags of a unit, carried in pairs and dipped only to the Sovereign; flags, including the National Flag and the Army Ensign, are not consecrated and are never dipped. The British spellings Colour, honour, and defence are used, and the Commonwealth terms half-mast and the bugle calls Last Post and Rouse are observed throughout.

A note on sources

This is the College's own course. It is built on the Army's own foundation (the chapter on its symbols, flags, and Colours, granted and regulated by the Institute of Heraldry) and the Basic Training Manual, and on the British and Commonwealth drill and ceremonial tradition the Army observes, written fresh in Kaharagian terms rather than reproduced.

Crown Copyright © 2026 | Published by Authority of H.R.H. The Prince of Kaharagia