What is a leader

While reading the book One Bullet Away by Nathaniel Fick, a force-recon marine LT. It is funny to see the parallels between his experience and my own. Most people who join the armed forces do it for selfish reasons, for money, adventure, or whatever it might be. I remember sitting in the barracks listening to the conversations of the others, reasons varied from looking for away out of going to jail to the common "I just wanna kill someone" which oddly enough were the ones most prone to panic when people started shooting at them. No matter what the reason may be those that do well and stay for awhile are the ones that understand that their part of a kick-butt team that if well trained can go and do just about any task assigned to them, and the more training you get the more you can feel like the guy next to you is more your brother than anything. As a leader many fail to see the fact that they can't manage but need to inspire their subordinates. Managers would think that a 10% loss is acceptable but a leader would be devastated. A leader cares for his men while a manager cares for numbers