I just returned from operation Winter Forge. This was a 24 hour long cold weather force on force patrolling operation. The event was hosted by S&S Training Solutions, Light Fighter Study Group participated as Op For.
While I have done a lot of cold weather camping in primitive conditions, and a lot of force on force patrolling, I wanted the opportunity to put the two together. When I saw that Tyler Jackson’s Light Fighter Study Group was partnering in this, I jumped at the chance to participate. I’ll give a quick overview, and then follow with my key takeaways.
We were issued MILES and Rifles at 0800 on Saturday, and immediately after, were vehicle- inserted to our basecamp in the far south of the area of operation. Our nine man patrol set to work establishing a listening post, setting up a two von- Reck shelters, and cutting fire wood. A five man arctic tent with a wood stove was already set up at the camp. These chores took till a little after noon, when we ate, and then sent out two three man patrols to scout the enemy defenses. By 1700, these patrols had made it back without being shot at, and were able to give us a detailed report. It appeared that the enemy had dug in an area defense on an east- to- west line in a saddle between two hills. We had good intelligence on the eastern end of the enemy line, but still knew little about their west end. After dark, we received a notional (notional is the cool guy military way of saying pretend) reinforcement to pull camp security, while we took the entire patrol to conduct a recon by fire. Each three- man fire team would patrol north on a parallel azimuth until we bumped into the enemy line. By drawing their fire, we hoped to get them to reveal their fighting positions. If things went well, we hoped that the distraction of a fire fight would allow our bravo team, who had scouted the eastern defenses earlier that day, to be able to probe deeper into their lines, and locate the enemy command post, which was our final objective.
My fire team (Charley) had not yet been out of camp, and we would be patrolling over completely unfamiliar ground in the dark, but the recon provided by Bravo earlier that day was excellent, and although they guided us in, I think we could have made it on our own based on their detailed report. Bravo had marked the objective rally point with a cleverly shielded chem light, and from there, we had only to follow their azimuth to the enemy line.
The enemy line proved to be well- situated, as we were forced to assault uphill across a broad area of short grass and sparse trees. Once the enemy opened up, they kept a regular barrage of parachute flares going that forced us to go to ground. We pressed our attack a bit harder than usual for a probing attack, in hopes that it would allow Bravo to infiltrate their lines. We were keeping up a steady fire all along the line, when the enemy surprised us by leaving their positions and assaulting down the hill into us. This sort of counterattack is inherently risky, and usually reserved for desperate times, when the defender is in danger of being overrun. The charge worked for them, pushing us off the hill, but they suffered almost as many casualties as they inflicted. We suffered four casualties in this attack, but each fire team had at least one member surviving to piece together a picture of the enemy defenses. The prospect was not good. Their line was well- situated on ground favorable to them, well tied in to notional minefields on each end. This would be a tough nut to crack. The old Napoleonic math says you need a three- to- one advantage to take a dug- in defensive position, and by that math, we would need 21 instant respawns for our nine man squad to take their ten man defense. We were to have only 8. Moreover, the enemy’s spirited defense had kept Bravo from accomplishing their infiltration, and there was still a lot we didn’t know about the depth of their lines. It was already midnight as we finalized our plans to take their position in the morning. Tyler decided to concentrate our attack on the east end of the line, simply because that was the side we knew the most about. Our morning attack would look much like the night one, only concentrated on the eastern end of the line. Alpha team was stripped down to just two men, who would provide left flank security, and prevent the enemy from swinging their west end down to flank us. Bravo would again attack the easternmost end of the line, and a reinforced Charley would support in the center. We would hit them at stand- to, perhaps the most predictable time to attack. Until then, we would have about five hours to sleep, which turned into four hours when you take account of fire watch duty.
At this point I should probably mention the weather and terrain. The Friday before the exercise began, a thick layer of sleet and freezing rain had coated the ground making footing treacherous. Then the temps had dropped, never getting above the twenties and dropping into the single digits at night. If that weren’t enough, a 10-15 mile per hour wind blew steadily the entire time. We were in northern Missouri on a bluff some two hundred feet above the Missouri river. The ground was everywhere steep, and cut with gullies and draws. During the Civil War, this had been the stomping ground of Confederate guerrillas, and for good reason; there were plenty of places to hide a small army. The cold and terrain wore on everybody. No one wanted to eat or drink, movement was difficult, and we had to move slowly, and be careful to not sweat. When sitting static in overwatch, the cold and wind quickly sapped strength and attention.
When we woke in the morning, I made my cup of coffee, and was ready to be off, but Jackson insisted that each of us eat some hot oatmeal he had made. I was glad he did; as much as we didn’t want to eat, we needed the energy. We made our movement by starlight, and were in place for the assault just as the eastern sky was turning grey. With alpha on the left and bravo on the right, Tyler gave the signal, and we began our push forward. Crouching low, we moved across the field. We reached the enemy wire, and stepped over. Still, they had not fired upon us. There was a crackle of gunfire as bravo took out the enemy listening post. Moving faster, we swept forward on their line, but there was still no resistance. We crested the hill, and found men boiling out of a GP medium tent, only to get shot down as we pushed forward. The OC declared everyone still in the tent dead as we reached the door, so we wheeled to the left, and searched the rest of their defensive line, finding no one. Amazingly, at stand- to, they had only one LPOP manned, and the entire rest of the patrol was in the tent, trying to stay warm.
In the end, we took only three casualties in the attack that we had expected to be so difficult.
Key takeaways: In the cold you have to fight not only the enemy, but the weather; your operational tempo has to slow down, you spend more time just staying alive.
You need more stuff in the cold: more cloths, more food, more shelter, pioneering tools to cut fire wood. Everything is more work, and requires more people to do the same job. Troop care is always important, but becomes doubly so in the cold. Warm food and beverages are a must. Most of our calories were still provided by cold rations, but occasional cups of broth and tea did a lot to keep us warm and hydrated. Also, having the heated tent allowed us to regularly pull guys in from the cold to warm up and rest. In the end, this is what won the fight for us. By the morning, the other team was so worn down by the cold and wind, that they simply did not have enough men to conduct stand- to. We may have not been exactly comfortable, but we still had 100% of our team ready to fight. As Cole, one of the event organizers out it, we didn’t win that battle, the weather did.
Experience and environmental factors matter. Kyle, the other team leader, is an Iraq veteran, and excellent leader. His guys put up and excellent defense against us, but not against the weather. Last spring, when I was in the field with Kyle, I was impressed by his ability to keep his guys in fighting trim in spite of the hot humid weather, but the cold brings different considerations. Tyler’s experience patrolling on the Estonian / Russian border in winter proved invaluable.
Tips: a piece of sleeping pad cut down just big enough to sit on makes time pulling security a lot more comfortable. Sitting on frozen ground saps body heat.
Have both caffeinated and un-caffeinated warm beverages. Sometimes you need to wake up, sometimes you need to sleep, but all the time you need to be warm.
Eat and drink even if you don’t feel like it. You will burn a lot of calories and expire a lot of moisture in the cold. Oddly, nobody wants to eat when they feel this cold.
The little chemical hand warmers stuffed in your socks at night really help to keep your feet warm.
If you ever have the chance to participate in a cold weather exercise, I recommend you give it a try. Cold brings new challenges and opportunities. I know that I learned a lot.
For more information about S&S Training solutions or to attend and event go to https://www.sstrainingsolutions.com/
P.S. After first publishing this I got this comment From Kyle, I was unaware that he had also served a tour in Afghanistan, he had this to say about the differences in the cold weather operations he did there and what we did last weekend:
“I definitely learned a lot about keeping troops taken care of in the cold. Unfortunately even as cold as Afghanistan got, it was a different game than this weekend, as everyone had the optimum cold weather gear and a heated MRAP within 500m at all time. Doing the traditional infantry thing is much more difficult.”
I really appreciate the feedback that came from the many participants who read this post, in the end this is only my perspective based on what I saw, there were eighteen other participants and six people on staff making this happen, each has a unique and valuable perspective. The insight they share increases the learning value for all of us.
american fyrd 