Rules for Radio coms

a well equipped radio shack

Communications are some of the most difficult task of the light fighter, but they do not have to be complicated, here are twelve rules to help in with radio coms.

1. There are other ways to communicate besides radios, field phones, string, flags, vis panels, semaphore, runners, whistles, horns, drums, pigeons, etc.

We too often become fixated on the radio, but make sure you have other simple means of communication. Some of the simplest methods and devices are the best, such as whistles and vis panels. A piece of paracord tied between two fighting positions can be tugged to alert the team. These light weight reliable tools should not just be brought as a backup to more high tech methods, they should be employed as primary means when appropriate.

2. Check the on- off switch

Stupid, yeah, but the most common problem with radio coms is people turning them off, failing to monitor them, or truing the volume too low.

3. Know your system: Make a trouble shooting list.

What are the trouble shooting steps for your radio? Antenna oriented correctly, connections snug, radio grounded, batteries in place, etc.? Make a list of these, and attach it to each radio issued to your team.

4. Encrypt your transmissions.

Use your SOI, and insist that your team use it too.  There is a time for plain speak, but it is the exception, not the norm.  Use plain speak at times when information is time sensitive and the situation is evolving quickly enough that the enemy is unlikely to benefit from any information they overhear.

5. Be smart about un-encrypted transmissions.

Once, in a fire fight, my team leader asked me over the net, “What is your location?” this was an active fire fight and the information was too time sensitive to encrypt.  I could have said, “In the ditch 50 meters south of the road”, but then anyone listening would know my exact location. Instead I told him , “I am 50 meters directly to your south”. This let him know him what he needed to know, but would be of little value to anyone listening in.

6. Assume unfriendly people are listening / monitor the enemy net.

This cuts both directions.  Even if you don’t crack their code, how much information can be gleaned from transmissions? Who has directional finding capabilities? Hint: Assume the other side does, unless you know otherwise.  Estimating from the number of call signs used you can determine the size and composition of enemy units.  If their chatter goes quiet, they may have pulled into the patrol base for the night, or be moving as a single unit, or massing for an attack.

7. Use on- the- fly authentication.

If you think the SOI may have been compromised, is there special knowledge you have on your teammates that could be used as on- the- fly authentication?  What river did we float last weekend?  What is my second son’s name?

If your enemy is from a different culture, these can be broader: What kind of tree did George Washington chop down?  What league are the Chicago White Socks in?

8. The best radio security is to keep the enemy busy.

If you put constant pressure on the enemy, they won’t have time to spend cracking your radio traffic.

9. Rotate SOI and frequency regularly, especially if compromised.

No explanation needed.

10. Keep transmitting, even if compromised.

The value of information that you are communicating to friendly units may outweigh the risk.  Even if the enemy hears your coms, he will have to react to them. Is his reaction gap short enough to cause you problems? You will have to judge that on a case by case basis.

11. Radio checks need to be a part of every Pre Combat Inspection.

Make sure everybody has an SOI and knows the frequency and the alternate frequency(s), has spare batteries, and check to see that radios will not shift in their pouches and hot mike.

12. Learn and use the standardized report forms. SALUTE and nine line reports exist for a reason.  First, they make sure you don’t forget to send important information; secondly, they make the report easier to understand.  Encrypted messages can be hard to understand (as in, “moving to north”). Is that you or the enemy? The forms help keep this information clear.

What are your thoughts, see a rule here you disagree with? Or one I left out? Please share in the comments.

Even when you have a radio, there is a place for the field phones. Photo by Brent Down

Winter Forge 2020

 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.

Lightfighter’s reading list

A few months ago, I posted my principals of lightfighting. Today, I post my suggested lightfighter’s reading list.

Light Infantry Tactics by Christopher Larsen.  This work is, in my opinion, the entry point to lightfighter understanding.  Critics have pointed out that there is nothing in this book that you wouldn’t learn from reading the Ranger Handbook.  While this may be technically true, this book presents the basics of light fighting in an extremely understandable way, with lots of quality photos and illustrations.  Most of all, Larsen is a storyteller. He includes a valuable lessons learned section for each chapter, with anecdotes that drive home the importance of each technique taught, in an entertaining and memorable way.  Larsen understands, correctly, that the NCO is the linchpin of successful operations, and devotes a significant portion of his book to troop leading procedures.  Wise warriors will take note.

For a bigger picture of light infantry, read A Historical Perspective On Light Infantry by Major Scott R. McMichael.  This may be the single most informative book in this list. I think all of the aspects of leadership, culture, training, tactics, and strategy that make up the lightfighting concept, are covered to some degree in this volume.  I reviewed this book individually in a previous post.

Book review of A Historical Perspective On Light Infantry by Scott R McMichael

The Defense of Duffer’s Drift, by E. D. Swinton, is a classic British work on all things defensive.  This is not your typical military manual; it’s sort of an Aesop’s fable of defensive tactics.  Filled with references to poetry and literature, both English and classical, I found it a joy to read.  This book grew out of the Boer War, where the Brits were facing some of the best maneuver war practitioners to ever take the field.  The Brits had to learn fast to defeat these Dutch farmers, who were experts at marksmanship, horsemanship, and field craft.  It is noteworthy that the British began to call their elite units, “commando” units; “commando” was what the Boers called their regular line units.

 4^th Generation Warfare Handbook, by Gregory A. Thiele and William S. Lind.  If you want to understand what lightfighting looks like on today’s battlefield, and why we need light infantry, this book is a good place to start.  I think the 4 generations of war paradigm is flawed, but it does present a useful construct for understanding military theory.

The Last Hundred yards, H. J. Pool. This is the work that brought small unit tactics back to the front burner.  This book is a back- to- basics approach to patrolling, communications, field craft, and reading terrain. Definitely a must- read.

Scouting and Patrolling, by Rex Applegate. This is similar to Pool’s work, but with an emphasis on reconnaissance.  Written during the Second World War, this book remains fresh today.

War, by Sebastian Junger. This book follows a platoon of 173^rd airborne soldiers through a deployment in the Korengal Mountains of Afghanistan.  This paints a good picture of how a small unit culture works, and how group cohesion creates combat effectiveness.

Gates of Fire, Steven Pressfield’s historical fiction of the battle of Thermopylae.  This work explores what it means to be a warrior and member of a polis as contrast to living in a Hobbesian state of nature, or a subject in an empire of slaves.  This book is usually held up as a more historically accurate depiction of Spartan society, than those that have been recently played in film.  I would have to disagree, to a large degree, about the historical accuracy.  Sparta has come to symbolize the pure warrior society in the western mind, a sort of nation of Siegfrieds.  Pressfield’s book is no exception. It tells us more about what he thinks a warrior society looks like, than what Sparta actually was.  Nevertheless, Pressfield is too honest a man to present his vision as a utopia. His Sparta is rife with cruelty, abuse, and injustice.  He posits that this society, flawed as it is, is still better that living in the anarchy of nature, or the tyranny of empire.

Pressfield gets a second title on this list, with The Lion’s Gate, his history of the Six Day War.  In recent times, the Israelis’ warfighting doctrine has been uninspired at best, but in 1967 they were perhaps the best third- generation/maneuver warfare military in the world.  Not surprisingly, when you consider that their officer corps at the time had been trained by Orde Windgate, who’s work in Burma is featured in A Historical Perspective On Light Infantry.

StarShip Troopers, by Robert H. Heinlein, is last but not least on this list. This classic sci-fi novel explores the obligations of a soldier to society, and society’s obligation to its fighting men.  Written in 1959, when the best and brightest military minds believed that the future of war would be all missiles controlled from blast-proof bunkers, Heinlein was making the argument that even if technology advanced to the point that intergalactic travel became commonplace, we would still need boots on the ground.  It is men who fight wars, not weapons.  My favorite quote: “There are no dangerous weapons, only dangerous men.”

What are your thoughts? Something I left out?  Something in the list that does not belong?  Please comment; I would like to hear.

Only a Game

Competition teaches problem solving under pressure

Competitive shooting isn’t real, it’s only a game.  Combat sports are just that: sports. In a real fight, it will be different.  In a real fight there won’t be boundaries, there won’t be safety officers, judges, and referees.  It won’t be Marquis of Queensbury rules.  Conditions will be austere. The reliability of your equipment will matter more than its accuracy, power, or round capacity.  The light will be too bright, or too dim.  The ground will be uneven, muddy, dusty, or hard.  Most importantly, your opponent will most likely be in the prime of his youth. He will most likely be stronger and faster than you. He probably had a harder childhood than you.  He will likely be under the influence of multiple drugs that will alter his reasoning, motivations, and pain tolerance to a state that you can only imagine.  Even if he is not tripping, he has probably experienced enough physical pain in his short life so as to be unimpressed by anything you can dish out.  He may be unwise, but he will be cunning, and he wants to win.  You have something he wants, and he will marshal all of the above- mentioned advantages to take it from you.  While he is at it, he will think up a couple of new angles that I haven’t thought of, and neither have you.  In order to prevail, you will have to solve problems on the fly, under pressure, and fast.

How do we train for this fight, when it is so different from a competition?

We compete.

Is that a contradiction? Yes and no.

What are the ways that we train?  All training can be grouped into one of three broad categories: Drill, Storytelling, and Play.

Drill is what you do when you practice your draw stroke, when a boxer punches a bag, and when the formation of Greek hoplites learned to march and maneuver around the battle field without breaking ranks.  It is, I suspect, the newest form of training; and aside from target practice with projectile weapons, probably wasn’t practiced until men started fighting in close order formations.  By utilizing drill, we learn to execute that prefect punch, and that precise shot.  We make the correct form a part of our nature, so that it can be executed under pressure, without thinking.  Drill does not teach us how to solve a problem, it simply frees up our mind from the difficulty of the basics, so that we can solve the problem.

Drill is how we practice a particular skill until it can executed without thought, freeing up the mind for other problems

Story telling is much older, and uniquely human.  Around the campfire, old men transmit the lessons from their battles to the young braves.  You carry around the experience of others, and take them into battle with you.  Story telling gives us the framework for solving problems.  If your problem looks like the one described in the story, try a solution that looks like the one from the story.

Consider the story of Mike Rousseau.  Rousseau was fighting in Mozambique when he found himself facing an adversary armed with an AK47. Rousseau drew his pistol, and shot his adversary twice in the chest.  When his enemy did not go down, he took a more careful aim, and shot him in the head.  He later had opportunity to tell the story of this battle to Jeff Cooper, who related it to many more people.  Literally thousands of people have learned from this story, and a great many have used it to their own benefit in combat.

Storytelling is how we learn what skills to apply to a given problem.

Finally, we learn by playing games.  Even animals play games.  Why does the cat give a half- dead mouse to her kittens to play with?  Why do those same kittens chase a ball of yarn, or each other, or even their own tails?  So that they will learn to hunt.  Our oldest sports were training for war.  Track and field, wrestling, and boxing are good examples.  The Nordic sports, especially biathlon, grew up in nations where men fought on skis.  American football, one of the newest sports, is a scale model of Napoleonic warfare.  Hunting and fishing have continued as sports for thousands of years after they were no longer necessary for food.  It is not a coincidence that hunting is always practiced by the societies’ warrior class, be they the impoverished farmers of Appalachia, or the landed gentry of Britain.

Games, sports, and competitions give us practice solving problems on the fly, and under pressure, against able- bodied, living, thinking opponents.  Whether we are calling a coyote into rifle range, stalking a trout, wrestling on the mat, sparring in the ring, or estimating the wind value in a high power match, we are practicing our problems solving skills, and pitting our brains and bodies against the other brains and bodies in the contest.

How does this square with everything I said in the opening paragraph about games, sports, and competitions not being “real”?  Of course they aren’t real, but that does not mean that they are without value.  In order to realize the full value of a game, we need to remember that is just a game.  The game is a problems solving exercise that will differ in multiple key ways from the real fight.  We identify those key differences through storytelling.  We execute the solutions through drill.

 

Do You Really Need That Much Ammunition?

Do you carry a reload?

 Not long ago, nearly all the experts on firearms recommended carrying at least one reload. With the advent of greater magazine capacity and more reliable firearms, the advice on how much ammunition to carry has shifted, some of the current experts don’t recommend carrying a reload at all.  However, an experience I had at a recent force- on- force exercise with One Shepherd made me think of a reason for carrying a reload that I had never heard expounded by the experts.

We were one hour into the three day exercise and we were already locked into an intense and brutal firefight.  With only a five man team, we were outnumbered almost two to one, and defending a front nearly three hundred meters wide.  Fortunately, we had enough depth to fight a delaying action, and that was our patrol leader’s strategy: trade space for time. Our orders were to hold them off for 24 hours.  Unfortunately, the opposition was aggressively driving a hard bargain, and although we inflicted heavy casualties on the enemy, we had to fall back much too quickly, and were completely overrun in six hours’ time.

Falling back to lick our wounds and reassess our readiness for the next mission, we found nearly everyone on our team was amber on ammunition.  We had started the exercise with seven magazines apiece, now we were down to two.  These two magazines per man had to last for the next 42 hours of fighting.

As our team transitioned from the defense to the attack, the entire tempo of the battlefield shifted. We conducted small scale reconnaissance patrols and probing attacks. We waited, gathering intelligence for nearly thirty hours before launching a full assault.

Patrol leader Cole performs an emergency reload behind cover, Photo by Brenda Chaffe

There were multiple considerations that went in to our patrol leader’s decision to proceed with caution, but a large part was our lack of ammunition.  Nothing quite saps confidence like going into a fight with a severely limited supply of ammunition.

The situation reminded me a little bit of my youth hunting deer with a flintlock rifle. I would watch, wait, and stalk deer for hours, waiting for that perfect shot, knowing I would only get one chance.  Now that I hunt with modern rifles, I am more likely to take that chancy shot, knowing that I can drop the quarry with a quick follow-up, if necessary.

Self-defense is not greenside patrolling, neither is it deer hunting, but I think a lesson can be drawn from these two experiences that applies to a CCW situation.

There are lots of good reasons to carry a reload, but one I have never heard discussed is that it can instill confidence to engage a threat.  Most self-defense shootings occur and end very quickly, but some, like active killer and terrorist- type attacks, can last several minutes; moreover, the moment you begin engaging one of these types of murderers, you will draw the attention of a foe who is almost certainly better armed than you will be. Ammunition equals time in a gunfight, and active killers do most of their murdering in the four to five minutes that it takes to mount a police response. Even if you do not manage to kill him, having enough ammunition to keep a villain busy until the police arrive can save lives.

Col. Jeff Cooper was famous for saying: “The only reason for carrying a lot of ammunition is if you plan to miss a lot”.  His point is well taken. We are responsible for every round we fire, and every round that does not hit the bad guy has the possibility of hitting an innocent person. What I am talking about here is not having enough ammunition for indiscriminate firing, but having enough ammunition to give you the confidence that you can finish the fight.

If your everyday carry is a Glock 26 with a 10 round magazine, will you feel more confident knowing you have another ten or twenty more rounds in reserve?  I’m sure I would.

In the training exercise I relate at the beginning of this article, we were granted an unexpected resupply of two magazines per person. After the exercise was ended, and everyone turned in their left over ammunition to supply, the count showed that we had turned in exactly two full magazines per person. In other words, we’d had enough for the fight all along, but we needed the resupply to give us the confidence to attack.

 

For more information about One Shepherd go to:https://1shepherd.com/what-is-one-shepherd/

2018 Homeschool Small Unit Tactics Workshop

 

This is the second year I helped with the Homeschool small unit tactics workshop.  When we were in the planning stages, the learning objectives they wanted to cover spanned most every-thing covered in a One Shepherd Warrior Basic and Situational Training Exercise.  One Shepherd does all of this in a tightly compressed four days, and, in my opinion, only provides an overview of the subject matter. We had only a little more than a day to cover the same.  The emphasis this year was to be the raid.

Most of the students arrived by 19:00 Friday evening, and after and excellent BBQ of Bratwurst and corn on the cob, we covered some of the basics of map reading and land navigation.  Some of the students even brought their own compasses this year, which shows progress.

After that, we had a classroom exercise on radio protocol and radio theory.

After the radio class, there was an unscripted Air-soft brawl in an abandoned farmhouse on the property, which did provide some lessons learned that we could talk about when we discussed raids the next day.  I don’t remember when I crawled in to the barn loft to sleep, but most of the kids continued their gaming into the small hours.

We got them up for 06:30 PT, and then, after breakfast, we began instruction concerning traveling techniques and reaction- to- contact drills.

My son and brother-in-law arrived to help out. They provided our op-for, along with one of the dads.  In working with inexperienced students, I consider having an experienced, dedicated op-for to be essential. The quality of our training this year was much improved by their presence.

The students ranged from 12 years to 20, and were mostly boys that play a lot of airsoft, but there were also three girls in attendance who had never done anything like this before, and wanted to see what it was all about.  The experienced students were aggressive fighters, but were unaccustomed to fighting as a team, and certainly were not accustomed to leading one.  I appointed three of the most experienced as fire team leaders, and jumped back and forth alternately between leading the patrol, instructing, and operating as O.C.  This was less than ideal, and I think it may have been confusing to some of the students for me to bounce back and forth in so many different roles, but we made it work.

The property were were on was especially well suited to the airsoft platform, with thick cedar woods crisscrossed with logging trails, and lots and lots of micro terrain.  We were able to get a lot of patrolling practice in.  We hadn’t planned to practice ambushes, but the land lent itself to that technique so well that we ran several iterations.  It was really fun to watch how quickly they improved. The first couple of times our twelve student squad was ambushed by the three man op-for, they suffered heavy casualties; somewhere north of 70%.  By the later iterations, they were beginning to call out targets, and work together to maneuver on their enemy. They then were able to take out the op-for with the loss of only one man.  This also provided a good teaching point as to why, in a near ambush, the ambusher must outnumber the quarry.

During lunch, we had a classroom explanation of the raid, then we practiced a couple of ROC drills.

The students were hankering for some more evenly divided engagements, so we split one fire team off to work with the op-for, guarding a communications node.

The Blue team was to raid the node, tape a block of “C4” to the radio, and light a fire cracker fuse attached to it.

The Blue team had three key tasks:

Call in to higher to notify them that the raid was a go,

Destroy the radio,

Call in to higher to report the success or failure of the raid.

For this exercise, after guiding multiple rehearsals, I handed over leadership of the patrol to one of my fire team leaders, and acted as OC.  When the patrols/ reconnaissance teams were unable to locate the communications node after two hours of searching (op-for decide last minute to move the location; according to the scenario I had written we had triangulated on their signal, and therefore knew approximately where they were),  I suggested a plan B wherein they ran this raid as a movement- to- contact.  Counter- doctrinal, I know, but the kids, by that time, were spoiling for a fight.  The only problem was they had never learned that battle drill, so I constructed a quick sand table with some sticks and pebbles (sorry, Brent, I did not and never will carry a bag of green plastic army guys in the field with me).  With only that rudimentary explanation, they stepped off.

After a bit of marching, the left vanguard element made contact. The rear and right elements maneuvered to the flanks, and swept the enemy position. It was classic, albeit with high casualties.  Two of our new girls were the only survivors; but still, they had thought to pull the C4 brick off of their patrol leader’s body and blow the radio.  My primary regret of the event was that I did not get a picture of these two girls, the sole survivors of their patrol, blowing the radio, all while wearing faux pearls.

I didn’t adequately communicate the key task to them, however. The communication to higher was neglected, and somehow they believed that they couldn’t complete the mission until they hunted down and killed every member of the op-for.  I have seen the focus shift from the stated mission to killing the enemy multiple times in mil- sim events.  I think special precaution needs to be taken to prevent this mission creep.

All in all, the mission was a success. By the time it was over, they had really internalized the principles of communicating to maneuver as a team on an enemy position, and all the rehearsals played off, even though the battle they ended up fighting was much different from the one they rehearsed for.

For the final exercise, we switched things up, and had the Blue-for guard the radio while the Op-for staged the raid.

This one went quite differently. The Blue team patrol leader did a great job of reading the terrain, and using his OCCA to place his guys in all the right spots.  When Op-for attacked, they put up a fierce defense.  Op-for was also handicapped by the loss of one of their fire team leaders, who had to leave early, and without two strong fire team leaders, they bogged down. The raid began to feel more like a traditional, deliberate attack than a raid.  Even with multiple re-spawns, they never generated enough momentum to break though the enemy perimeter.

I think this event went better than last year, mostly due to lessons learned on my part.  I still am figuring out the strengths and weaknesses of the Airsoft platform. The lack of a longer range of fire is obvious, but this platform also lacks the noise that adds so much violence of action to a blank fire engagement.  It is simply hard to overwhelm your opponent with the hum of a little whirring battery motor.  Furthermore, there is no “near miss” indication, and on several occasions, I saw pellets streaming quietly by players who were unaware that someone was bracketing them.

By and large, the students did not take advantage of the micro terrain, and we definitely need to work on camouflage.

We would also be well served to spend a few hours on a stand- alone leadership class. I think most of my fire team leaders saw themselves as being saddled with a responsibility, rather than as a weapons guidance system for a four man rifle team.  Then again, I think everyone who has led a fire team or squad has felt like a bit of a babysitter from time to time. I know I have in the past.

We had students who brought in varying degrees of commitment. Some of the kids were really enthusiastic about learning tactics, and others were just out to play; though there’s nothing wrong with that, learning should be fun.  Even the enthusiastic students had many other conflicting commitments; these are farm kids, who had chores to do, and family businesses to help with. There was so much coming and going, that I was not sure on several occasions exactly how many people we were supposed to have on the field. This made constructing a logical progression of instruction difficult, but also reminded me of the farmers of Lexington and Concord who had to train around the requirements of their farms and shops.  If they made it work, we can, too.

For all that, the kids were outstanding; great attitudes and good sportsmen.  I repeatedly saw older ones stopping to help out the younger kids, even when it slowed them down or made the mission more difficult.  That is the kernel of real leadership right there.  I find myself wanting to emulate my students in these aspects.

All in all, I learned a lot and had a great deal of fun, and I think the students did, too.

As a post script, every meal was excellent, these people know how to feed teenage boys!

Force on Force Training II Systems: You are Only Limited by Your Imagination

It is hard to codify what makes good Force on Force training, but in attempts to define such a system, the word most commonly used is “realistic”. The instructors at One Shepherd prefer the word “authentic”; you can read an excellent article about the subject here.  http://warnerds.com/?p=385  In my mind, authentic FOF simulation is realistic enough that the student can visualize the elements of success in a real fight.

One friend of mine, Mike, who is a serious competitive shooter, told me once he used the time on airplanes and in waiting rooms to train.  He simply closes his eyes, and imagines every element of firing a perfect shot. He imagines himself on the rifle range. He thinks of what the wind might be, and how much elevation to dial for the distance. He imagines his perfect firing position, the sight picture, and the perfect trigger break.  He simulates his training entirely in his mind.  Obviously, this would do no good, had he not put in thousands of hours on an actual range, learning what the elements of success are; but having done so, he augments his training with imaginary simulation.

The whole point of this anecdote is that my definition of “authentic” as “realistic enough”, is an elastic one, depending on the intelligence, creativity, motivation, and prior experience of the student.  My friend Mike, possessing those four qualities in abundance, can simulate marksmanship training while waiting in the DMV. A less experienced person might need to dry-fire their rifle in their living room to get the same benefit, and a novice would have to actually fire live rounds in order to know what success looks like. He needs to have a number of experiences along the lines of: “See that, you hit the target, so whatever you did then, do it again.”

In my last article on this subject, I did not mention anything about the various types of simulation systems. This was on purpose, as I believe a system’s hardware is the least important element of any FOF training.  The basic principles of combat are broadly applicable, and can be simulated with systems very different from the one that will be used in combat.  During WWII, for instance, fighter pilots spent time shooting clay pigeons with shotguns as a way to learn aerial gunnery.  In the martial arts club where I train, we practice a “stacking drill” for fighting multiple opponents, which is similar to the “react to near ambush” drill you would use in a dismounted patrol, which is similar to the “crossing the line” naval maneuver Nelson used at Trafalgar.  Open hand fighting, coordinating a small team with rifles, or a fight between wooden ships with cannons, while utilizing very different systems, also employ strikingly similar tactics.

A perfect simulations system would:

1. Imitate exactly the operation and capabilities of the actual weapon that it is meant to simulate,
2. Require no training to operate (“Sarge, how do I turn this thing on?”),
3. Have no special gear (as in: “wear this motorcycle helmet and strap these sensors on”),
4. It could be maintained inexpensively by a company level supply sergeant,
5. It would be 100% safe.

Nothing fits this description. In fact, every system I am aware of fails, to some degree, every one of these points, with some failing more decisively than others.

Projectile systems like paintball, air soft, and Simunition® lack the range of actual, live ammunition. Laser based MILES- type systems work well at distances beyond 10 meters, but not so well at closer ranges. None of them penetrate cover well. All require special training just to operate the system. Some of these require elaborate safety gear, and some require a skilled technician to do routine maintenance.

 

No perfect system exists, but even if a perfect system did exist, it would still be possible, even easy, to craft really bad training using it.  In my next post, I will discuss the marks of a good or bad force on force training scenario.

Force on Force Training Part 1 of 3

(The lessons of the square range still apply)

Martial training, whether with open hands, edged, or blunt weapons, has always consisted of three elements: Shadow boxing, bag work, and sparring.  These elements are given different names depending on the style of fighting and type of weapon, but they are nearly universal.  Movements are practiced in the air, on a target, and finally, against a live opponent, with the first two perfecting technique until it is habit, and the third teaching problem solving.

Sparring has been a part of open handed and edged weapon training for as long as we have written records.  Martialist have sparred with fist, sword, and bayonet.  In the realm of firearms instruction; however, opportunities for sparring against a live opponent have always been rare.

The reason for this is for obvious, as two boxers can spar at reduced power without hurting each other, or scabbards can be placed over the bayonet, and blunted foils used for fencing, but until recently, there was no good way to safely stage a friendly gunfight.  Those who would train with firearms were restricted to dry fire, target practice, and hunting of animals.  It was as if a boxer was restricted to bag work and shadow boxing, and never got to face a live opponent until he stepped into the ring to fight for the title.

Sure, in the old days soldiers trained with blanks, but the lessons were more about patrolling and maneuver than gun fighting.  Observer Controllers would follow the patrols and assess casualties: “Judging from the way your patrol walked into that ambush and failed to react when it was sprung, I’m going to judge that 50% of your men are casualties.”  (The HBO series Band of Brothers depicts some of this type of blank fire training.)

Eventually, when systems to simulate a live fire gunfight became available, they were so expensive and rare that, if a trainee got to use them at all, they were used as a sort of doctoral thesis at the end of a long and extensive training career.  This is still the way most schools operate; making their students an offer such as: “Take all twenty- six of our classes, and you can participate in the force on force lane.”  However, as the cost of these systems has come down, a new school of thought has emerged that puts the student into force on force very early, sometimes only taking time to brief them on the safety rules, and no more.  These systems operate with the basic notion that best way to teach someone to fight with a gun, is to have them fight with a gun.  To extend the boxer analogy, it is as if someone whose only training is what he gleaned from numerous bar fights stepped into the prize ring.  How a boxer who had trained only on a bag fare against the bar fighter is anybody’s guess; for what it’s worth, I would lay a slight odds on the bar fighter.  However, neither of them would stand a chance against a fighter who had trained in both technique and sparring.

The first time you participate in force on force firearms training, it will completely rearrange every idea you ever had about gun fighting (at least it did mine). Gun fighting is a complex art that comprises a great many diverse skill sets.  I don’t think there is any way to describe how fast the situation changes, how fleetingly the targets align with one’s point if aim, or the effect of the adrenalin dump that accompanies good FOF.   To be successful, you must use stealth in combination with explosive movement, and be able to transition back and forth between the two instantaneously as the situation demands.  The man who uses cover, concealment, and movement well, will usually defeat the opponent whose only skill is shooting.

When a student first experiences all of this, there is a tendency to abandon everything ever learned on the square range.  Marksmanship tends to go to Hades, and students try to make up for it with volume of fire.  Rather than deciding that he has not learned the lessons of the square range well enough, a student will decide that square range lessons have “no real world application”.   This is a little bit like the first year philosophy student who abandons his belief in God.  As the saying goes “A little philosophy inclines one to atheism, but much philosophy turns his heart back to the Almighty.”  So it is with FOF training. The lessons of the square range still apply, but the student who cannot utilize them in a firefight, never really learned them in the first place.  Extensive experience in FOF training will eventually reinforce the need for square range time, just as extensive study of philosophy reinforces a belief in God.Photo by Ian Griffiths/MOD