Rifle squad composition [Archive]

Bill Moore

01-13-2007, 02:32 AM

Rifleman

01-13-2007, 02:43 AM

O.K., I got that off my chest, so back to the ideal squad (presumably for combat maneuver). I think it is 12 men. A four man assault/manuever force, a four man support section, and a four man C2/floater section (sqd ldr, medic, two rifle men) that not only direct the effort, but can weight the effort either towards maneuver or support element, depending on where the squad leader places this section.

So, am I safe to assume that your assault team would be a light team and your support would be a heavy team, sort of like I described in my original post?

Uboat509

01-13-2007, 04:57 AM

No I didn't base this off an ODA, a perfect ODA should probably be around 15 men, and they shouldn't be maneuvering like a squad.

So who are the other three guys? When I was in ANCOC last year they were kicking around the idea of a jr. 18F.

SFC W

Bill Moore

01-13-2007, 08:38 AM

Rifleman, I allowing one element to be a floater that can either work in the assault or in support situation dependent. Obviously being dual hatted doesn't allow you to arm ideally for both options, but flexibility is more important in most cases. There are definitely times when the support element would serve to be reinforced. Tom mentioned a breacher element, but I'm not sure what context he was making reference to: a breacher element to push bangalore torpedo's through concertina wire obstacles, or a breacher element for a urban environment. If we're talking urban, I think each section needs it own breaching capability, once you enter the structure, it is controlled chaos, and you need the flexibility to operate in separate four teams (another reason for the four man section, closer to ideal for room clearing). If you're breaching a flintstone house in Afghanistan, you may only need one breach, but if you're going into an apartment building or other structure, there may be a requirement for several breaches, thus the requirement for every team to have some breaching capability.

For the ODA, I recommend a MAJ as a Team Leader (CPTs need more grooming time) due to the amount of responsibility. We simply more gray hair at the tip of the spear. UW isn't a kid's a game. The WO will remain the Ast Det Cdr, who most likely will lead specially task organized elements on the from the ODA on speciality missions ranging from intelligence collection to civil military operations. For the additional three pax I would add another intelligence specialist and two additional weapons Sgts.

Justification: The 12 man team is frequently tasked to execute combat missions (hopefully the majority of the missions are through, by and with indigenous forces, instead of unilaterally), which means all MOS's are busy preparing for the next mission, conducting rehearsals, planning, getting kit ready etc. Unless there is a high degree of trust of in the indigenous forces, you want U.S. personnel in all the key positions. The problem this creates is the intelligence Sgt rarely has time to do his job, and his job is absolutely critical. Having a two man 18F (intell cell) could produce volumes of value added intelligence at the ODA level (for ODA use and for higher, which then goes laterally, etc.). The additional 18Bs, gives the team command the addtional bodies needed to combat advise without disrupting the 18F's work.

We have the right MOSs, the ODA has proven to be a versatile organization, but that doesn't mean we can't make improvements on it.

Rifleman

01-13-2007, 01:18 PM

Bill,

If I understand you right your 12 man squad has: an assault fire team, which I'm assuming to be riflemen and grenadiers; a support fire team, which would probably be MG based; and a C&C fire team that can go either way. That's an interesting take on it and one I've never heard before. It occurs to me that a designated marksman would combine well with an MG team to make up the support fire team.

It also occurs to me that we could have this squad now by breaking up the current weapons squad and distributing them into the three rifle squads. It's still 36 men either way.

About your proposed 15 man ODA. I think a WWII era OSS Operational Group was 15 men.

Bill Moore

01-13-2007, 03:26 PM

Rifleman,

You captured my thoughts on the squad correctly, but that task organization is for fighting. For stability operations it may need to be tweeked, not sure we need MG'ers (always situation dependent) patrolling the streets in a town that somewhat secure, because every soldier needs the ability to respond with the appropriate level of force to insurgent attacks. The last thing we want is collateral damage, because it could push the citizens into the insurgent camp. We must avoid to the extent possible creating PSYOP opportunities for our enemy, or we'll risk pulling defeat out of the jaws of victory.

Actually I there is a point in a conflict where you shift from infantry formations to constabulary formations. I don't know if the Army can afford to stand up full time constabulary units, so more likely it will be the next unit in line designates so many Bns to train as constabularies during their pre-mission train up. Task organization for a constabulary? Like many I hate breaking our infantry formations, for fear that once it happens, it will happen frequently, and we'll start eroding our combat capacity. If you buy into 4GW 100% (I'm not convinced that we can afford to lose our conventional combat capability, but we also can't afford to build different type of units in the depth that we would need them).

You're right, the OSS Ops Det's were 15 men, but the task organization I'm proposing for the ODA isn't based on that. I need to go back and take a look at it, thanks for the reminder.

Chris Albon

01-14-2007, 02:54 AM

Rifleman,
Actually I there is a point in a conflict where you shift from infantry formations to constabulary formations. I don't know if the Army can afford to stand up full time constabulary units, so more likely it will be the next unit in line designates so many Bns to train as constabularies during their pre-mission train up.

Are there any case studies of this type of dual formation unit?

jonSlack

01-15-2007, 09:44 PM

Speaking strickly of "leg" infantry.

In my mind, the foundation should be a 3 man buddy team. Fire team is two 3 man teams. One 3 Soldier element is lead by the SGT team leader and the 3 Soldier element is lead by a competent E-4 or junior SGT, preferably a CPL instead of a SPC. A squad is 13: Two six Soldier fire teams and a squad leader. Platoon is 3 squads and then the platoon headquarters with Signal MOS RTO, 13F forward observer, and medic, all organic to the platoon, as well as 2 three man M240B machine gun teams.

Three Soldier buddy team weapons: One M203, one SAW, and the SPC/CPL leader in every other buddy team carries an M4/M16/M14 as the situation requires. Team leaders, squad leaders, platoon leader, and platoon sergaent carry M4/M16 with optics and IR/laser designators. Machine gun team: gunner carries a M240B and an M4 and the AG and the ammunition bearer in the team both carry M4/M16s. The AG would double as the spotter and group leader and would carry an optic and IR/laser designator on his weapon to help the gunner put rounds on target.

For wheeled and mechanized forces, the platoon described above would also have a vehicle section lead by a SSG. The SSG is responsible for the vehicle crews and once the "crunchies" are dismounted he is also responsible for getting the vehicles where they are best able provide supporting fires. I do not understand the value in having 11B (and 21Bs) driving Bradleys, perhaps a return of the 11M (and 12F, respectively) MOS? Also, if fighting in a linear conflict environment, the PSG could take control of the vehicle section, or a part of it, for logistics runs while the rest of the platoon digs in or otherwise remains in a stationary position as the situation mandates.

As the fight changes you change the weapons mix based on the mission.

For breaching: Infantry squads/platoons can handle their own manual, mechanical, and ballistic breaching with the issuing and training on shotguns and "SWAT style" battering rams and other speciality tools. For explosive breaching, you task organize an element from the Sapper company, "Echo" company, now organic at the battalion level. You build in redunancy by having the 11Bs learn about demolitions by training and qualifying with explosives with the Engineers and by sending them to advanced course like the Urban Breacher course.

I do not think that platoons need to be lead by CPTs. Platoons should be lead by a 1LT while a 2LT shadows/learns and is there to assume leadership of the platoon if needed. I was a "platoon XO" of a combat engineer platoon for a couple months and I learned an immense amount from the 1LT I worked with/for, more than I learned from the company commander honestly.

I think that the Army should lengthen LT time to atleast 4 years and keep 2LT time to 18 months. I also think that the "day count" for TIG should start when the officer hits a platoon and begins his/her shadow time while TIS would continue to be counted the way it is now.

And, while I am on my soapbox: All newly commissioned 2LTs should go through the following prior to attending OBC: CLS, Level 1 Combatives, a week to two week long hands-on course covering BFT, FBCB2, and current radio systems (SINCGARS, ANCDs, MBITRs, ICOMs, satellite phones, TACSAT...), a week to two weeks of weapons (Mk19 on down to include hand grenades and perhaps the bayonet assault course) PMI and standard qualification along with an introduction, with familiarzation fire, with optics and the various designators, and an introductory weeklong classroom symposium, with assigned reading, covering the history and basics of COIN and also "cultural awareness" courses on the current relevant culture(s) (New 2LTs will get firehose fed 3rd generation/"march-up" tactics at their OBC). Also, the new 2LTs should get option of attending airborne and/or air assault prior to OBC. However, they should wait until after their OBC to attend schools like Ranger or Sapper Leader.

This block of instruction could easily be given at any of the major TRADOC basic training posts like Benning or Leonard Wood.

I get the impression the new BOLC was supposed to do something like that, but it mutated into what the new ROTC graduates call "Camp 2."

Rifleman

01-16-2007, 01:05 AM

I do not think that platoons need to be lead by CPTs. Platoons should be lead by a 1LT while a 2LT shadows/learns and is there to assume leadership of the platoon if needed. I was a "platoon XO" of a combat engineer platoon for a couple months and I learned an immense amount from the 1LT I worked with/for, more than I learned from the company commander honestly.

If there really is an advantage to having an assistant platoon leader, what would be the matter with making him the RTO also? Well, other than the obvious jokes that will ensue about how many officers it takes to operate a radio. :D He can learn quite a bit from following the platoon leader around. He can also learn quite a bit by always monitoring the net. It also keeps an enlisted man available for duties within a squad.

jonSlack

01-16-2007, 01:27 AM

If there really is an advantage to having an assistant platoon leader, what would be the matter with making him the RTO also? Well, other than the obvious jokes that will ensue about how many officers it takes to operate a radio. He can learn quite a bit from following the platoon leader around. He can also learn quite a bit by always monitoring the net. It also keeps an enlisted man available for duties within a squad.

The purpose of the A/PL for a new 2LT to learn "the ropes." Initially, that may be following the PL everywhere they go. However, as the 2LT develops, the PL would hopefully begin to entrust him/her with leading sections of the platoon, like leading the outer cordon on a small platoon level cordon and knock.

With "vehicle-centric" operations and with the miniturization of electronics leading to the smaller "brick" SINCGARs and now the MBITRs, I do know if there is a need for the traditional radio humping RTO. However, with all the digital systems organic within a platoon now other than the radio, a Signal MOS Soldier adds value as being the hands down SME on those systems.

I described the Signal MOS Soldier as an RTO. A better duty description would be something like "Digital and Communications Systems Specialist" and his realm would encompass radios, FBCB2/BFT, PLGRs/DAGRs, and any other mission related communications or computer equipment is carrying like toughbooks and digital cameras.

When talking about the small radios like the MBITR, I do not see a reason why both the PL and A/PL would not both carry and monitor them, even if the A/PL is still in the "follow the PL" everywhere stage.

Rifleman

01-17-2007, 03:54 AM

TROUFION

01-28-2007, 05:12 PM

Rifleman,

Back in 2000-2001 the Battalion I was part of was tasked with this very same question you ask. The three line companies each redesigned the basic squad organization from the standard 3, 4xman teams. We had to form two 5 man teams with a squad leader (11 man squads). While this was mainly a reaction to the under manning of the battalion at the time we did get the opportunity to try different squad design.

My rifle company reset the squad to have a heavy squad and a light squad. I spent a great deal of time researching different organizations from history to find the best design I could. What I found was that basing the squad on the light machine gun or SAW was still the best approach. The design I put in place massed two SAW/LMG in the heavy or support team. The team had two assistant automatic riflemen armed with M16A2's and a team leader armed with a 203.

The other team was the scout/assault team and had a team ldr (M16A2), a grenadier (203), a designated marksman (M16A2 with ACOG), and 2 rifleman/scouts.

We tested this formation for a period of 7 months mostly on UDP to Okinawa (to include in the NTA), on Guam and Camp Fuji on mainland Japan.

The company operated mainly as a helicopter borne unit and spent most exercises as footmobile light infantry.

That said the experiment worked fairly well when we could keep our manning level up. That was a difficulty that caused our AAR to carry the load of two men and to support two SAW's. However, that aside the massed firepower and 'talking guns' capability of massed SAW's was excellent for covering the assault team as it manueverd onto objectives. The downside was that the squad would split and the potentiality of the a team becoming isolated was a reality.

-T

SWJED

01-28-2007, 05:20 PM

Here's a link to a pdf document about Marine Corps distributed operations. It sort of goes along with what we've been talking about here in that the Marine Corps DO squad design is very similar to the one Bill Long advocated.

http://www.mcwl.usmc.mil/SV/DO%20CapEnhncRpt_19%20Jan%2005.pdf

Evidently this platoon/squad organization was tested. I've never heard anything about it being adopted.

Former Marine Westhawk has a post about DO experimentation at the Marine Corps Warfighting Lab and in Afghanistan (http://westhawk.blogspot.com/2006/11/distributed-operations-mean-fewer-but.html)...

... The Marine Corps is actively experimenting with distributed operations concepts. The latest issue of Proceedings (http://www.usni.org/Proceedings/procurrenttoc.htm), the professional journal of the U. S. Naval Institute, described the training and employment of a Marine Corps DO-capable rifle platoon in northeast Afghanistan earlier in 2006. Prior to its deployment to Afghanistan, 1st Platoon, Company B, 1st Battalion, 3rd Marines was sent to two training bases in California. There, it was given special attention by a training team from the MCWL, joined by teams from the British Royal Marines and the Australian army. The results from the platoon’s subsequent experience in Afghanistan are classified. But as a result of that experience, a Marine Corps battalion is now undergoing an upgrade to DO status and will deploy to combat next year...

Bill Moore

02-03-2007, 09:17 PM

Quote:
Originally Posted by Bill Moore
Rifleman,
Actually I there is a point in a conflict where you shift from infantry formations to constabulary formations. I don't know if the Army can afford to stand up full time constabulary units, so more likely it will be the next unit in line designates so many Bns to train as constabularies during their pre-mission train up.

Are there any case studies of this type of dual formation unit?

Chris,

Please see responses to my RFI for PRC measures for links to this. Go to Small Wars Communities of Interests, then RFI's and Member's Projects, then see my RFI for Popualtion and Resource Control Measures. The Council provided numerous references. I tried to paste the link here, but couldn't get it to take. Bill

SGTMILLS

02-09-2007, 03:09 PM

You needn't coach me on our personnel system, I am painfully familiar with it, but this is the essence of the majority of our problems, and why I think we'll more outsourcing of security in the future (see John Robb's blog for details on outsourcing). Our military organization does not adapt quickly, so we're forced to fight with inefficiently designed organizations. Our non-state enemy on the other hand can adapt overnight. We're forced to some extent (though commanders can task organize the forces they have within limits) to fight with what we have, and a squad and platoon, and company and so forth we're designed to fight a major land battle in the Fulda Gap (and we're not ideally organized for that). The danger is we design tactics based on the design of our organizations, thus in reality we define the tactical problem to fit our preconceived solution. What is a particular mission called for a 15 man squad, and another called for a 6 man squad? Of course we can do it, but how often do we? Buddy you can't grab my people, stay out of my rice bowl.

METT-TC should drive task organization, not just we need two squad here, a platoon there, but we need two squads that look like this, and a platoon with this capability.

Obviously our MTOE system doesn't allow us to simply have a pool of bodies that we can plug and play with. Furthermore unit adhesion is a combat multiplier, so the risk of too much flexibility is limited cohersion. I think our enemy gets past that with a powerful ideology.

O.K., I got that off my chest, so back to the ideal squad (presumably for combat maneuver). I think it is 12 men. A four man assault/manuever force, a four man support section, and a four man C2/floater section (sqd ldr, medic, two rifle men) that not only direct the effort, but can weight the effort either towards maneuver or support element, depending on where the squad leader places this section. I went with four per section instead of three to facilitate maintaining a viable force even with a certain % of casualties. No I didn't base this off an ODA, a perfect ODA should probably be around 15 men, and they shouldn't be maneuvering like a squad.

Bill,
In the new era of fighting, i think our MTO & E is just as pliable as our units. I am not educated, per-se in the arts of warfare (or typing, for that matter) but I DO have BOG insight. Our unit was a horizontal construction unit (read: CSE) and transformed into a trailblazer (21B) unit. By the end of our tour, the BCSM wished he had a whole battalion of units like us. Our unit was adaptive, and flexible. Yes, we all have our PMOS's, but that doesn't mean we have to stick to that MTO & E doctrine.
IDEALLY, you are correct, a 12 man movement team works. But, isn't that too big for command/control? If the whole squad is BOG in an AO, and a squad leader is trying to keep tabs on an escalated situation, seperate from any higher for days at a time, there has to be a limit on the number of personnel. Isn't 12 too many for one leader to work with?
Are there any squad leaders out there with first hand knowledge? I would be interested to hear their points of view. :)

jcustis

02-09-2007, 03:33 PM

And, while I am on my soapbox: All newly commissioned 2LTs should go through the following prior to attending OBC: CLS, Level 1 Combatives, a week to two week long hands-on course covering BFT, FBCB2, and current radio systems (SINCGARS, ANCDs, MBITRs, ICOMs, satellite phones, TACSAT...), a week to two weeks of weapons (Mk19 on down to include hand grenades and perhaps the bayonet assault course) PMI and standard qualification along with an introduction, with familiarzation fire, with optics and the various designators, and an introductory weeklong classroom symposium, with assigned reading, covering the history and basics of COIN and also "cultural awareness" courses on the current relevant culture(s) (New 2LTs will get firehose fed 3rd generation/"march-up" tactics at their OBC). Also, the new 2LTs should get option of attending airborne and/or air assault prior to OBC. However, they should wait until after their OBC to attend schools like Ranger or Sapper Leader.

Jonslack, the Marine Corps already gets that with its Basic School (6 months) period of instruction for all newly minted 2ndLts before they go to their MOS school. The thrust of it is to get them basically trained to operate at the level of a rifle platoon commander. I've always wondered why the Army didn't have a similar system.

SGTMILLS, pls define what BOG means. I think I know but want to make certain, because I want to delve deeper into this subject.

Aside from having been both a rifle platoon and weapons platoon commander, I was also a troop once, and had the opportunity to attend the Corps' squad leader course. I've also had some very interesting self-education in vintage distributed operations, from the Long Range Desert Group and the Rhodesian Light Infantry/Rhodesian African Rifles. To that end, I've done a lot of reading on how the Rhodesians organized for COIN ops, and the tactical scenarios they faced are very interesting. Much of it is anectdotal, but illuminating nonetheless.

I'm going to chew on this and try to push out a cogent reply over the weekend. The following are my notes to pull initial thoughts back together again:

-current communication capabilities PRR/MBITR
-SAW vs. GPMG
-Permanent structure and task designations vs. basic units that can perform all tasks
-How the mobility platform changes the dynamic
-Rhodesian distributed operations (time/space, communications, fire force ops, etc.)
-Support weapons (SMAW/AT-4/SMAW-D: whatever happened to that?)
do we need new ones to reflect the threat
-Common operational picture tools (e.g. urban warrior, the now-defunct Land Warrior)
-Calkie White input if applicable
-DMR vs. ACOG in application
-fighter leader concept
-being at the point of decision vs. point of friction

SGTMILLS

02-09-2007, 03:53 PM

BOG = Boots On Ground. Sorry for the mix up.

jonSlack

02-12-2007, 05:20 AM

Jonslack, the Marine Corps already gets that with its Basic School (6 months) period of instruction for all newly minted 2ndLts before they go to their MOS school. The thrust of it is to get them basically trained to operate at the level of a rifle platoon commander. I've always wondered why the Army didn't have a similar system.

Well, I figure for the CS and CSS 2LTs it is because the system needs to crank them out ASAP because they have got CPTs slots to fill. For the Combat Arms 2LTs, for those that don't get put on staff for the duration of their LT years, I think the assumption is they'll earn it through OJT. Or perhaps the reason is because there is some question of which part of the institutional army should be responsible for it, TRADOC or Accessions/Cadet Command.

Who knows, it is echleons above me.

Wildcat

02-14-2007, 01:44 AM

Jonslack, the Marine Corps already gets that with its Basic School (6 months) period of instruction for all newly minted 2ndLts before they go to their MOS school. The thrust of it is to get them basically trained to operate at the level of a rifle platoon commander. I've always wondered why the Army didn't have a similar system.

I was under the impression that the purpose of the Army's new BOLC I and BOLC II for newly commissioned 2LTs was to provide them with the skills necessary to lead a provisional rifle platoon. Friends of mine who were funneled through the AROTC pipeline last year were among the first crop of 2LTs to go to BOLC.

RTK

02-14-2007, 01:54 AM

I was under the impression that the purpose of the Army's new BOLC I and BOLC II for newly commissioned 2LTs was to provide them with the skills necessary to lead a provisional rifle platoon. Friends of mine who were funneled through the AROTC pipeline last year were among the first crop of 2LTs to go to BOLC.

As a primary BOLC III Recon Tactics SGI, I'll tell you this:

BOLC I is the precommissioning source,
BOLC II is the standard "common core" training subjects. Depending on where they go (Sill or Benning), to quote Animal Farm "All LTs are equal, some are more equal than others"

By the time they get to us they're about 5 months after commissioning. I get them in tactics for about 30 of the 86 days they're in BOLC III. The school is ever changing as we're constantly revising and improving the system. Total training days is a moving target but we're beginning to get a handle on it. LTs are getting to the point where they can intelligently talk and apply tactics, in some cases better than the career course students. At the final FTX, where CCC students play company commanders, this is sometiems strangely and sadly apparent. We've got a little way to go, but we're getting better every day.

Rifleman

06-11-2007, 08:52 AM

Lastdingo

06-11-2007, 01:33 PM

I've seen elsewhere that the Marine Corps is looking to adopt a true automatic rifle; heavy barrel, magazine fed, firing from an open bolt. This is partly because the M249 SAWs are wearing out and partly because they've never truly been comfortable with a belt fed light machine gun in the AR role at fire team level.

However, it seems they want to keep a light machine gun at some level in addition to adopting an AR. They evaluated two alternate platoon and squad organizations for AR and SAW employment. The traditional 13 man squad was used in both test organizations.

The first test organization kept the SAW at squad level but moved them all to one fire team. The squad's two remaining fire teams each had an AR.

The second test organization consolidated all the platoon's SAWs into an LMG squad. The remaining two rifle squads had one AR in each fire team.

The Marine Corps felt the first organization evaluated better overall but the second organization proved better at MOUT. The AR equipped rifle squads were able to gain entry to a building easier under the massed suppressive fire put out by an LMG squad. Once inside, the squads with only ARs were more effective at room clearing.

Since a platoon might go from urban to rural - and back again - within a short period of time which would you prefer? A SAW heavy team in each squad or a SAW heavy squad in the platoon?

How did they test what's better at MOUT? Did they do some MILES-based simulations in those tiny one block-sized training sites? I remember only such training sites with quite large fields of fire and distances between buldings. Nothing like Arab or South American slum urban environments.

About your question; according to your description, the difference is primarily a question of what's the minimum size for independent missions.
Does the MC want to have squads to do missions independently using their better stealth by exploitin micro terrain than a platoon would have or do they want to have a force consisting of many platoons as smallest maneuver element?
As far as I know it's the trend since WW2 that squads should if possible (depends on training quality and length) be the smallest maneuver unit. Platoon sized units have more trouble with unetected flanking and so on.
The overall trend to dispersion adds to this.
So I'd say that a relatively large squad like a 13 man squad should be the smallest maneuver element and not the platoon. This requires (combined) arms integration at squad level. Version 1 would be preferrable.

If version 2 is superior in a specific environment, the PltLdr could still concentrate the LMG fireteams and let the squads maneuver without their organic SAWs.

Norfolk

10-02-2007, 02:00 AM

I wrote an article for Military Review (with a retired Sergeant Major of the Army and a former CSM of Ops Grp) on the subject of small units. We started at the company and went down to squad.

We argued for a larger squad built on 3's and providing a maneuver, support, and a breach element. We wanted to make the squad as much a combined arms element as we could and we also sought to make it more self-sustaining. I advocated 3 man versus buddy teams; 3s provide greater duration and depth.

My argument also looked at tests run by GEN DePuy as the 1st TRADOC commander. DePuy tested everything; in this case, he tested the various combinations of support and maneuver ; by a clear margin the best ratio of support to maneuver was 2 to 1. A balanced squad cannot do that as it is organized; it must reorganize and/or be reinforced.

Gen. DePuy's tests were certainly rigorous, and as shown in Gen. Gorman's book as well as Gen. DePuy's own papers those tests arrived at what were considered surprising, even shocking results at the time. It's too bad that some of DePuy's innovations were either stillborn or faded out over the years.

The 3-man team, as Tom Odom said, offers greater depth than the traditional buddy team. If one man goes down in a firefight, there still two more to carry one, rather than a lone rifleman left stuck looking for someone to watch his back. And it's a lot easier to construct, man, fight, and maintain a battle trench/foxhole with three guys than just two. The PLA, the PAVN/NVA, and the VC amongst others all insisted on the 3-man cell as the ideal building block of the infantry squad (squad leader and 3 cells). Besides providing either a full crew for a machine gun or rocket launcher, or an assault team for breaking into trenches or clearing rooms, it provides moral (and morale) support in a way that you just can't get with a buddy team. As the saying goes, 'Three's Company". Less isolation and loneliness and more hands to do the work. Except during battle or on patrol, one guy on the parapet, one guy cooking, cleaning, or working, and one guy sleeping.

Of course, there are some issues to deal with. As the Marines found in 1944 after converting to the 10-man squad with three 3-man fire teams, battle losses compelled them to add a fourth man to each team. Gen. DePuy remarked at least a few times that a squad would often routinely operate with only 4, 5, or 6 guys (out of what was in his TRADOC days an 11-man squad). That adds up to two 3 man teams at most; a 13-man Marine squad might make 6 men more or less consistently under conditions of heavy battle attrition. I see Tom Odom's article recommends a 14-man squad for most battle functions.

You've also got to have enough men, for enough teams, to avoid having to constantly reorganize the squad for each task that come up, even after suffering battle losses. Frequent reorganization disrupts and even breaks down working relationships between individuals, and this loss of cohesion is felt afterwards until everyone settles down and gets to know how each person works. And of course, battle attrition lends itself to the need for frequent enough reorganization as it is.

But DePuy (as both Gen. Gorman and Col. Odom point out) had an answer (actually two) to this battle attrition problem, the "One Up, Two Back" formation in the attack, and the PARFOX in the defence. DePuy himself of course tested this using the squads in the platoon, and when platoons used one squad to first make contact while keeping the other two in reserve, then suppressing the enemy with two squads and assaulting with the third, something like 88% of these "One Up, Two Back" platoon attacks were successful. Attacker losses were reduced by something like half if I remember correctly. None of the other platoon attack tactical formations even come close (even the one with attached AT team). Now, given that the squads themselves just had two fire teams each, it's not necessarily proven, but certainly logical that the same tactics would work for a squad with 3 fire teams if it was detached on an independent mission. And in the defence, the innovative Parapet Foxhole (mind you, with 2 guys in the hole) also reduced losses by about half compared to the ordinary foxhole, and led to a much greater rate of success in the defence.

A counter-argument to this might be that, well, the squad is just a fire unit and it's the platoon that is the basic manoeuvre unit, so it's not necessary for the squad to have more than two teams; it just has to alternate fire and movement between teams until one is close enough to assault, and that the other squads in the platoon can provide suppression throughout. Well, suppose that's so. With apologies to the late Gen. DePuy, how are any of those squads supposed to maintain at least 6 men (in two 3 man teams) in order to keep fighting out of just a 9 man squad (which was forced upon DePuy and his successors due to manning restrictions)? And this is assuming a full-strength 9-man squad to begin with, quite an assumption to make. And of course, a two-team squad renders it incapable of using the "One-Up, Two-Back" attack formation that is so crucial to both a successful attack and cutting you losses by up to half compared to other tactics.

I think that when all is said and done, the 13-man USMC rifle squad, for most conventional infantry operations, is the best bet overall (notwithstanding the Marine's 15-man CAP squads in Vietnam, mind you, but that was still unconventional warfare): leadership and supervision (4 NCOs per squad - ideally); tactical flexibility (3 teams and a squad leader free to move where he needs to go, and not have to fight a team of his own); staying power (4 man teams to absorb losses); firepower (3 LMGs, 3 underslung grenade launchers); and enough straight rifleman (6) to clear trenches and rooms while sustaining losses.

As for Col. Odom's making a permanent distinction between breach squads and assault squads, I have to say that each rifle squad should be trained to make the breach even if one squad is already designated as and kitted out for, that task in say, a deliberate attack. Something might happen to that squad or it may become so depleted by losses that another squad may have to make the breach instead. Granted, I'm coming from a Commonwealth Army background, and circumstances in the US Army (or USMC for that matter) may be substantially different, but we certainly trained to make the breach, and doctrinally we were to have an assault pioneer platoon (from battalion) and possibly a field engineer troop (from brigade) in support of an infantry battalion for that purpose. But we weren't allowed to think for a moment that we weren't expected to do that ourselves, with or without the help of the pioneers or the engineers. We had the training and the equipment, all of us in the rifle platoon.

I'd feel a lot better though, if having to do that for real, I had a 13-man squad, and not an 8-man section to do the job.

Ken White

10-02-2007, 04:40 AM

13 man Marine rifle squad (prior to the M-79) and the old 11 man Army Rifle Squad (too old to have suffered the current very, very dumb 9 man Squad) in peacetime and combat, I have absolutely no doubt that the 13 man is the best solution. By a very significant margin.

Also agree that a well trained rifle Squad can do all it's jobs; that one going in -- preferably by infiltration -- and two in support is vastly preferable to the old 'two up and one back' routine.

I think that Platoon operations should be the norm but that independent squad action in a great many situations is desirable (particularly in COIN). Such independence is, I think limited by two factors; most commonly fear of loss of oversight and thus being blamed if something goes wrong; and a failure to understand that the average unit can be trained to do far more than we normally allow them to do.

I'm not sure we can afford that hesitation and lack of faith given todays costs in dollars and difficulties in recruiting for other than combat jobs -- the latter meaning that the CSS tail has to be cut because the sharp aggressive kids will not serve there by choice.

Lot of wasted potential...

Norfolk

10-11-2007, 11:08 PM

It seems someone in Britain has been testing much the same sort of infantry tactics as Rommel and DePuy were into. David Kilcullen found that the Brits were doing heavy suppression work back in the '90s (I seem to remember that the Brits were somewhat unsettled by the infantry losses they suffered at the hands of poorly-led Argentinian, and must have pondered what would have happened if they'd had to face a rather more competent enemy. Apparently, British Army experiments came to the conclusion that a ratio of 3 suppression elements to 1 assault element produced a successful "repeatable formula" (I cringe when I hear that sort of langauge) to be used in the infantry attack.

Kilcullen subsequently tested this "formula" out on the Indonesians in East Timor in 1999, and he recalls that it worked like a charm. Here's the article he wrote on this whole matter:

http://www.defence.gov.au/army/lwsc/AAJ_I1.asp

It's less comprehensive than DePuy's studies, and more or less follows Rommels' and DePuy's own observations, as it offers much the same sort of tactical "solution" to the infantry attack but from a different perspective. but I think that it's still worth a look. Particularly interesting are his observations on how infantry actually move in contacy; autonomously and without orders, yet doing so fully in accordance with the tactical situation in mind - what he calls "Flocking".

Ken White

10-12-2007, 01:19 AM

Norfolk

10-15-2007, 04:58 PM

Most of our minor tactics are marginal to poor. He mentions in there that the lead element often got pinned down and could do nothing. Our doctrine says that the lead element 'returns fire, suppresses enemy fire and develops the situation.' I saw that done repeatedly in Korea -- and I saw that it flat did not work. :(

Speaking of poor minor unit tactics, the reason why I even became interested in the subject in the first place and not just mindlessly accept "the Doctrine" was when my section commander told us that an 8-man rifle section would lose 60% of its strength in the first 24 hours of offensive operations. Well, that got my attention. Here's an article that gives an idea of just how bad the supposedly very "professional" Canadian Army's basic infantry tactics had become when I was in - this was written some years ago by Captain Mike O'Leary, the current Regimental Adjutant of the RCR:

http://members.tripod.com/RegimentalRogue/papers/sect_atk_part2.htm

From this article, you can see that there is some substance to my concerns over the state of minor unit tactics, especially at squad/section level.

At first, I thought that the "solution" so to speak, was simply to increase squad size, and that's when the USMC rifle squad really caught my attention. But I really didn't understand the tactical significance of having 3 rather than just 2 fire teams. It wasn't until I read an article on an RPA rifle squad (organized into 3 teams) attack on a Rwandan Government rifle squad in a house, and win without real loss to itself, that I began to appreciate the virtues of a 3-fire team squad. Go figure; a rebel army from the African-country-in-chaos pick of the year demonstrated what proper infantry tactics were, while the Canadian officer (from a modern, Western, "professional" Army) watching the fight was left scratching his head so to speak and call into serious question the stuff his own army had taught him.

As such, I do rather think that the USMC rifle squad is probably about the best rifle squad organization overall, and when it uses DePuy-type "1 Up, and 2 or 3 Back" formations during offensive operations, then that's proper infantry tactics too. The only major modifcation I would like seen made to the Marine rifle squad would be to do what Tom proposed in his "Transformation: Victory Begins With Small Units" article, and have two NCOs in the Squad HQ; the Squad Leader to fight the squad (while listening in to the Platoon/Company net), and the Assistant Squad Leader to handle squad administration/logistics and to handle sitreps for platoon/company and send in resupply requests, etc., so the squad leader doesn't have to be doing two separate jobs at the same time.

jcustis

10-15-2007, 10:54 PM

Your thoughts about a squad 2i/c are interesting Norfolk, especially when one considers the volume of information a squad leader would have to absorb with a future integrated tactical information system.

Given the power of communications, it really only makes sense, but the force structure required to make that happen will pose an uphill battle.

Dave, has the Corps performed any wargames utilizing a SL and ASL construct? I imagine that it could be extremely appropriate in an urbanized environment, thus someone could have looked at it before.

Norfolk

10-16-2007, 02:41 AM

Rifleman

10-16-2007, 04:06 AM

jcustis

10-16-2007, 02:46 PM

Some random thoughts:

The two fire team Army squad can't deploy one up, two back as is; however, the lead squad in a platoon movement to contact usually has a machine gun team directly attached, making it a defacto three team squad.

A two team squad alone will often still be suppressing with about 2/3, even though it's not configured in thirds. Often, out of an entire squad, only two or three men are moving at once. One fire team suppressing and one assaulting or bounding forward, of course, but not everyone in the assault team is moving at once. Part of the assault team is suppressing too.

I can see how the 13 man Marine squad is advantageous; however, is the advantage so great that it's worth the doctrinal change? The two team squad Army squad has been doctrine since about 1957. How long does it usually take for new doctrinal thinking to permeate a service culture at the tactical level?

All things considered, maybe the best thing for the Army to do would be to keep the two team squad but go back to larger fire teams.

What am I not seeing clearly?

I think you're seeing everything clearly, as yours are very reasonable questions. Deciphering possible advantages has its difficulties though, as we might be hard pressed to find a full-up platoon of complete 2-team or 3-team squads that has fought in either OIF or OEF. There are always the ones and twos who are on light duty, detailed elsewhere, etc. The evidence of any advantage may be anecdotal as best, and we'd be faced with the claims of if it ain't broke don't fix it.

As for doctrinal change, well that's a tough one. We may be driven to doctrinal change through the future platforms that provide mobility on the battlefield.

I'd like to see a reference to the Corps' scaling back to a 12 man squad, because this is the first place I've heard of it. Does it have to do with the incessant search for a true automatic rifle perhaps?

Norfolk

10-16-2007, 02:54 PM

All things considered, maybe the best thing for the Army to do would be to keep the two team squad but go back to larger fire teams.

What am I not seeing clearly?

I don't think you're seeing any less clearly than most of the rest of us Rifleman. As is, we're bothing coming from the same worm's eye-view: you were a fire team leader, and I was an acting section 2i/c (and therefore automatically commander of one of my section's two 4-man assault groups as well). And this, IMO, is not necessarily a disadvantage, especially given that a lot of infantry officers (curiously) tend to be less than well-aware of, and properly-trained in, squad/section-level tactics and conditions. The whole business of minor infantry units and tactics is ambiguous at times. Hey, if even General DePuy himself, a master tactician, found himself having to settle for a two-team squad (as much out of manpower limitations as anything else), then clarity just isn't going to come easy.

Putting a pair of MG teams at platoon as US army and British Army does detract somewhat from their effectiveness; attaching one out to two of the three squads/sections, can considerably reduce their overall effectiveness, even if the particular squad/section they're attached to isn't exactly complaining. The USMC holds those same MGs at company level, where their fires can be massed and controlled for maximum suppression of the company objective. They only detach MGs out to platoons (and sometimes thence to squads) when cover or terrain makes massing and coordination of fires at company level practically impossible or not worth the effort. In WWII, the Germans were famous for their ability to win the firefight quickly through the use of an MG platoon either attached or organic to each rifle company that suppressed the company objective with the massed fires of 4 MG-34s or MG-42s.

Also, I think someone earlier on this thread mentioned that the USMC found that removing one of the 3 LMGs from each rifle squad could not be compensated for in practice even with MMGs at higher levels. An LMG can is easier to keep supplied with ammo under fire (no-one has to get up and run off to a vehicle or to company HQ to get more MMG ammo in the midst of a squad/section fire-fight, not unless the entire squad is running out,and then elements behind should be bringing that ammo up), and an LMG is rather easier to handle in an assault than an MMG. If one of your fire teams is wiped out, the MG Team may be hard pressed to provide suppressive fire and ammo resupply and its own local security while the other goes into the assault.

Then there's the squad detached out on an independent mission. With only two fire teams, it'll need one of the platoons's MG teams. That leaves the platoon commander with only two squads and an MG team to handle the enemy should contact occurr. Not a good position to be in to begin with, even worse when half your MG's are gone. USMC rifle squad can handle this task without reinforcement, and leaves all MMG teams intact.

In short, the USMC rifle squad can pretty much cover all its own bases (with occasional exceptions) organically, and leaves the MMGs most of the time up at company, where they can have the most effect, most of the time.

Larger fire teams, admittedly, would let a fire team continue to clear trenches and rooms, etc., after losing a rifleman; the 4-man fire team/assault group has something of a weakness in that regard, although for room-clearing the squad reorganizes anyway and this is less of a problem.

Once a squad gets much over a dozen men though, you start to have second thoughts. And this is where it really starts to get murky for me. The USMC 13-man rifle squad is based on the Chinese 10-man rifle squad, that Evans Carlson personally observed in the 8th Route Army's operations against the Japanese in northern China during 1937. The Chinese organized the squad with three 3-man "Cells" and a squad leader. Their tactics (based upon suppresion provided by a single LMG) so impressed Carlson, that when he formed the 1st Raider Battalion in WWII, he used the same organization. After the Raiders were disbanded, the USMC as a whole adopted the same rifle squad organization in early 1944; in late 1944, a fourth man was added to each Fire Team to allow it to sustain the level of losses that came with frontal attacks on Japanese positions.

There is an argument to be made that if "1 Up, 2 Back" type suppression-heavy/assault-light attack formations were used for squad-level offesnive operations, that perhaps the 4-man fire team could be reduced back to 3, returning to the 10-man squad. But with both the LMG and the M203 in each fire team, that would leave only one rifleman per fire team to clear trenches, rooms, etc. The four-man fire team has to stand for the time being.

Yep, things are still kind of murky.

Cavguy

10-16-2007, 03:18 PM

Reminds me of Churchill's quote (paraphrase/adapted below) -

"It's the worst possible solution, except for all the others"

jcustis

10-16-2007, 04:07 PM

Also, I think someone earlier on this thread mentioned that the USMC found that removing one of the 3 LMGs from each rifle squad could not be compensated for in practice even with MMGs at higher levels. An LMG can is easier to keep supplied with ammo under fire (no-one has to get up and run off to a vehicle or to company HQ to get more MMG ammo in the midst of a squad/section fire-fight, not unless the entire squad is running out,and then elements behind should be bringing that ammo up), and an LMG is rather easier to handle in an assault than an MMG. If one of your fire teams is wiped out, the MG Team may be hard pressed to provide suppressive fire and ammo resupply and its own local security while the other goes into the assault.

Hmmm, an interesting point. Where does it leave us when we consider this type of "team" organization? It was definitely a different type of fight, but a COIN/small wars type of fight nonetheless:

Each stop had four soldiers. One was the commander, with a radio, a FN FAL, 100 rounds (7.62 × 51 mm NATO), several types of grenade. One was the machine gunner, with a FN MAG machine-gun and carrying 400 rounds. The other two were riflemen with a FN and 100 rounds, grenades, rifle grenades and medical equipment. By 1979 one of these two was issued a radio.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodesian_Light_Infantry

Norfolk

10-16-2007, 05:02 PM

I'd like to see a reference to the Corps' scaling back to a 12 man squad, because this is the first place I've heard of it. Does it have to do with the incessant search for a true automatic rifle perhaps?

jcustis, here it is:

http://hqinet001.hqmc.usmc.mil/i&L/v2/L/Doc/SES.pdf

It's a schematic on page 22 showing the proposed new Distributed Operations platoon structure that's being tested at MCWL at the Sea Viking Division.

I don't like it already.

Norfolk

10-16-2007, 05:40 PM

Hmmm, an interesting point. Where does it leave us when we consider this type of "team" organization? It was definitely a different type of fight, but a COIN/small wars type of fight nonetheless:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhodesian_Light_Infantry

Actually jcustis, I rather like that team organization. This is very similar to what a lot of SAS patrols used in the Falklands (exchanging SLRs for M-16s mind you). With 3 riflemen (granted, armed with SLR battle rifles rather than assault rifles, but the Rhodesians sure knew how to use them), that team was fully prepared for close-combat; if it had a grenade launcher though, that would clearly be reduced. Also, the FN rifle isn't exactly ideal for said because of its length, but still doable. The only big problem is ammo resupply for the MAG; well, that, and the lack of a grenade launcher, although I believe the Rhodesians still carried the requisite cups for rifle grenade (indirect to 150m). The Rhodesians (I think) tended to fight very light, so carrying a lot of MAG ammo might have been rather less of a problem, especially given that the Bush War was not over-all a high-intensity one, like NATO Armies have to prepare for (theoretically at least). That said, there's an important counter-example to that.

The WWII panzergrenadier squad (initially 12 men, plus 2 drivers, eventually 9 men with 1 driver) carried a pair of MG-34s or (later on) MG-42s. The Germans emphasized "effect over cover". Well, with two MG-42s per squad, you pretty much had all the cover you could ever want. In the attack, the Sqaud Leader would control both GPMG teams while the Assistant Squad Leader would lead the assault. The Germans did not use Fire Teams per se, nor even Battle Drills. Granted, the panzergrenadiers (theroretically) had either half-tracks or trucks with them, but ammo resupply must have been quite the challenge. So far as I know, there's not a standard rifle squad on earth that surpasses the firepower of the WWII panzergrenadier squad. But in its days of offensive successes, it doctrinally had 12 men; during the later defensive portions of the war, it was doctrinally down to 8-9 men.

There's a part of me that would very much prefer to have at least a pair of MAGS (maybe 3) per squad, and be done with the Minimi or any future AR. But I'm not sure that the ammo carry/resupply situation, never mind the unwieldiness of the MAG in CQB, could be satisfactorily overcome. Yet the Germans appear to have done so (from what info is available anyway). I think MCWL should maybe ditch MERS and test out a Rifle Squad with M-240s instead of M-249s. That would be interesting.

jcustis

10-16-2007, 09:33 PM

Norfolk

10-16-2007, 10:16 PM

The interesting this about firepower in a future distributed operations squad is that it does rely on fighting light, as the Rhodesians did. Lightening the load is one of the objectives clearly laid out on the document you graciously provided Norfolk (I had not seen that one before).

At 700 rds carried across a stick, that's close to what you might get out of an attached MG team anyway, and if the riflemen of a current squad are carrying extra belts, it's the age old problem of getting it to the team(s) or moving it once it's been dropped off. Similar issue with mortar rounds.

If I remember correctly, indirect firepower was achieved by the Rhodies through the use of rifle grenades, and Marine Gunner Eby wrote an excellent piece for the Marine Corps Gazette some years back that pushed for a rifle grenade capability. They've got bulk to them, but you're talking about a capability for all of the riflemen, not just you're M203 owners. I think better range and casualty radius were touted in the article as well. I don't believe accuracy is comparable though, but I'd have to research that a bit.

What really bothers me most about the DO platoon organization isn't just cutting the USMC rifle squad back to 12 men; it's all the "C2":mad:. Out of the 12 man squad, there are just two 4-man Fire Teams, and an entire 4-man Command and Control Team (albeit fully-armed). And if that's not sick enough, then the Rifle Platoon HQ has no less than eight men in it, in two 4-man C2 Teams, one led by the Platoon Leader, and the other led by the Platoon Sergeant.:confused:

As for the matter of grenade launchers and rifle grenades, I wonder if bringing rifle grenades back and replacing the actual grenade launchers with an RPG-type rocket launcher wouldn't be a better way to go; but then that would make it that much more difficult to mark targets and lay smoke...hmmm.

jcustis

10-16-2007, 11:10 PM

After acratching my head, it looks like the three additions to the Plt HQ (riflemen) came from cutting them out of the squad organization. While this is a doctrinal change that cements things, it reflects the likely reality of having a highly-trained linguist handler, data communications Marine, and even perhaps a mini-UAV operator.

These types of personnel are a personnel tax out of the organization, and in current operations there could be considerable shuffling going on to deal with the added equipment/roles.

I think "Squad C2" is a misnomer, because each of those fireteams are likely to be in a solid fight during distributed operations. The squad leader essentially becomes the TL for a team as well, so that sort of makes sense.

If the Corps continues to follow the fighter-leader concept as well as guiding/flowing off of the base unit in assaults, then it also makes some sense to simply incorporate the SL into a team structure. That is, so long as the SL is unot encumbered with a heavy reporting requirement to adjacent or higher headquarters. Who fights that team them? Does it fight as a 3-man element?

As peculiar as this all seems, I suspect it reflects the reality of what is happening in Iraq right now. There are probably a number of troops who are not stepping across the line of departure as straight trigger pullers, but rather as what I call enablers (like an RTO or UAV operator). This doctrinal structure seems to address this reality and make it a standing organization. It is still peculiar though without knowing all the brainstorming that went on behind the scenes.

jcustis

10-17-2007, 12:47 AM

I just clipped back through an earlier post and MCWL document provided by Rifleman, and it made me sit back and ponder these "Specific (additive) capabilities of a DO Platoon":

-Conduct mounted and dismounted combat patrols at extended ranges

-Interdict and/or destroy enemy forces
•Direction of Fire Support Assets
•Direct assault (greater lethality -increased ranges and close assault)

-Secure and Hold Key Terrain (at extended ranges)
•LZ, Bridge, Road Junction, Hill top, etc.

-Conduct ITG and provide guides to the Main Force

--Conduct tactical preparations in support of the Main Force
•Provide a “skeleton”to fall in on (i.e. SBF position)
•Provide an in-position Fire Support Team to assault elements

-Conduct zone reconnaissance patrols in greater depth and breadth

-Control or Influence key avenues of approach (isolate target area)

Mixed with mobility upgrades, we would have a force that remarkably looks a lot like a Long Range Desert Group patrol (mixed with a small band of Stirling's merry men).

It makes me ask the question of how well a DO platoon would do in the littorals and inherently built-up areas, because if you read the LRDG/SAS history closely, they almost always got into trouble behind enemy lines when they came across locals who weren't necessarily on their side.

The same thing holds true for the SF team that had a running gunfight after becoming compromised during roadwatch duty during the Gulf War, as well as the SAS patrol of McNabb notoriety. Now it seems that the team led by Lt Murphy, USN (and Medal of Honor recepient come 22 Oct) in Afghanistan ran into the exact same problems.

I think we tend to forget that when dealing with an even remotely organized enemy, it's not necessarily that he will find you and kill you, but rather one of the locals will find you...and then the enemy will come and kill you.

There is a lot of fieldcraft to snooping and pooping around the battlefield, and as with other skills, we are losing this in our current endeavours.

Anyone know if the DO folks are reading about the LRDG? I've got a whole shelf of books they are welcome to browse. They may learn some minor tactics that have always been known. ;)

Norfolk

10-17-2007, 12:55 AM

Anyone know if the DO folks are reading about the LRDG? I've got a whole shelf of books they are welcome to browse. They may learn some minor tactics that have always been known. ;)

Them thar' smart folk gots themselfs commmpuuuters to do that.:wry:

ROKMAN

10-22-2007, 03:15 AM

with all this deliberation, what is the ideal rifle squad and platoon organization, in all of yall's opinion.

Norfolk

10-22-2007, 03:24 AM

with all this deliberation, what is the ideal rifle squad and platoon organization, in all of yall's opinion.

ROKMAN, were you in the infantry, and if so, what rifle squad composition did you find yourself either favouring, or just simply having to make the best of while over in the Sandbox? Your platoon or company - mech, air asslt? Your command - Plt, Coy?

ROKMAN

10-22-2007, 04:26 AM

ROKMAN, were you in the infantry, and if so, what rifle squad composition did you find yourself either favouring, or just simply having to make the best of while over in the Sandbox? Your platoon or company - mech, air asslt? Your command - Plt, Coy?

No, I spent all my time with tanks. I lack the experience of small unit tactics since the use of tanks is inherently for large scale battle and often employed as a battalion. I know that the future wars most of the conflict will involve small units. Which I don't really have experience but do read quite a lot of.

There are four general options that I am currently studying, which led me to this forum.

The Commando 21 organization used by the British Royal Marines. On a large unit viewpoint I like it. Basically it is a battalion sized unit, consisting of a logistics company, a C4ISR company, 2 firepower support companies that "shoots in" the 2 close combat companies. Each close combat company has a dedicated firepower support company. Hence this battalion generally has two field commands mimicking the "Combat Command A/B" system used by the US in WWII. However the close combat company is based on the 8-man squad. Is this squad too light or does it matter at all, since they have the support of a firepower support company. Should or shouldn't such firepower assets be allocated at lower echelons, like Tom Odom's idea.

The US Marines Distributed Ops is another candidate, based on experience in Iraq and Afghanistan but are they too focused on COIN? What about the case for conventional wars where the enemy is not an insurgent?

Tom Odom's idea, tested in experiments but creates a rather large platoon of over 60 soldiers and a company of over 300 soldiers, do we have the manpower for this? Or is it the case where the brigade treats these units more like mini-battalions and thus will be employed as such? Also there seems to be a lot of specialization, wouldn't it be better to arrange for general purpose unit organization.

German Panzergrenadiers a squad of 10 soldiers, a Squad Leader and Assistant Squad Leader, 2 Machine Guns, 2 Assistant Machine Gunners, 4 Rifleman. The squad can be split into two just like how the British do with their 8 man squads. However this seems that the squad can only operate as part of a platoon. (They basically operate like typical platoon of 3 squads.)

Another question is which performs best in terms of Squad organization the ones in current usage that I have are these:

The old 11 man Army squad of 2 teams plus Squad Leader.

The Marine squad of 13 man of three teams plus Squad Leader.

The DO Marine squad of 12 man of three teams with the Squad Leader embedded in a team.

The Army mechanized infantry platoon of two 9 man squads plus a five man machine gun team of two machine guns (the 2 X 9 plus 5).

The German 10 man squad of two teams with a Squad Leader and Assistant Squad Leader.

The British 8 man squad operating (similarly to the German squad) within the British Commando 21 system in all its entirety.

Gotta ask.... and appreciate the responses.

Schmedlap

10-22-2007, 09:50 AM

I've read some articles that advocate a squad design made up of a light fire team and a heavy fire team. This is somewhat closer to the WWII squad design of scout group, rifle group, and gun group. The light fire team is usually envisioned as riflemen and grenadiers, with the heavy fire team as some combination of belt fed weapons, rocket launchers, and designated riflemen (squad sharpshooters).

...

I want to know what folks think about the current doctrinal principal of balanced fire teams v. light and heavy teams in the same squad.

...

What say you?

From a practical standpoint, I'm just envisioning a 4-man fire team and a 3 to 5 man "heavy" team, bounding by team. One element is significantly slower than the other. Throw in a third team - you've still got a slow team. Task organize in a way to disperses the heavy weapons guys among the squad - now you've split up fire teams.

From a training perspective, how many skill sets is the squad leader going to be responsible for training and tactically employing? I already see this problem at the BN level, let alone company, platoon, or squad. Now that we've created heavy maneuver battalions composed of engineer, armor, and infantry, the battalion commander is no longer the guy blessing off on platoons. He handles the company of his branch. Hopefully the S-3 is another branch, so that he can take those companies. And then you've got one more branch. With an Armor BC and an Infantry S-3, who blesses off on the Engineer platoons? Delegate down from O-5 to O-3? Find an O-5 Engineer?

The heavy concept might make sense for a mech infantry unit where the vehicles are the designated SBF and provide an array of other benefits (most notably transportation for all of that heavy stuff). My old mech platoon dismounted with M240B's, Javelins, AT-4's - we were ALL heavy in one way or another.

From the standpoint of a light/aaslt/abn platoon, why so many tasks and so much equipment for one squad? Someone mentioned assault and breach - shouldn't this be a platoon effort? We've gone so far as to push out 3-man teams to operate independently for up to 72 hours, but those guys aren't doing raids - and they were not alone when moving into their hide sites. If you're doing an assault that requires a breach, I'm not comfortable sending a squad - not even if it is a 12-man squad. That is especially so if we're talking urban terrain. And as for better maneuver afforded by 3 teams or a heavy team, I again would ask where the rest of the platoon is. If the firepower and maneuverability afforded by 3 teams is necessary, then you might want to reconsider whether the men are embarking upon a mission appropriate for a squad. More often than not, I think the answer would be no. For that less frequent occasion when the answer is yes, a temporary task organization to plus up the squad seems more prudent than changing the MTOE for the less frequent occasions.

I'm just a fan of simplicity for the squad leader and two similar teams seems a good mix of simple and appropriate. He has enough weight upon his shoulders already.

goesh

10-22-2007, 12:18 PM

I'd want at least one kid who raised himself up and out of a ghetto carrying a Thompson if it's an urban environment and a hillbilly carrying the Thompson in a heavy bush environment. Heavy lead and the distinct bark of a Thompson can really anchor and center a crew with killing on their mind.

Norfolk

10-22-2007, 04:07 PM

Gotta ask.... and appreciate the responses.

ROKMAN - very good questions to ask, but I don't think you're as out of your league as you seem to think. General William E. DePuy, who gave the US Army much of its present tactical doctrine, obeserved that there was quite a striking correlation between infantry and armour small-unit tactics; the principles of movement, suppression, assault, and security were the same.

The RM Commando 21 organization is remininiscent of that of the Bundesheer's Mountain and Parachute Battalions (at least until recent years - they've reorganized, I'm not clear on their present composition): Two Rifle Companies and two Anti-Tank Companies, plus HQ and other CS and CSS elements. I'm not completely sold on it, but it offers intriguing possibilities.

The 8-man Rifle Section is a personal peeve of mine. That's what I had to use in the RCR (most Commonwealth Armies use an 8- or 9-man Rifle Section, the difference between 8 or 9 being dependent upon funds for troops slots, and when the 9th man is authorized, he's stuck carrying a Carl Gustav. The 8-man Rifle Section is easy to control, and responsive, but vulnerable. Having 8 men gives you almost no capacity to sustain battle losses, and as I was told in the RCR, such a Section would lose 60% of its strength in the first 24 hours of offensive operations (while attacking a dug-in Soviet Motorized Rifle unit, I presumed - and after attacking such a position on ex, I can see why). Clearly, there's a problem there.

The other problem with the 8-man Section is that the Section Commander and the Section 2i/c are not free to move about as necessary within the Section. The 8-man Section is divided into two 4-man Fire Teams (Australian, British, and New Zealand Armies) or Assault Groups (Canadian Army). The Section Commander personally leads one fire team/assault group, and the Section 2i/c the other. While discipline is certainly tight and control good (and the NCOs are practically indistinguishable from the other soldiers of the section - a good thing), the NCOs are necessarily divided in their attentions by fighting the section as a whole, fighting their own fire teams/assault groups, staying alive themselves, and handling commiunications and sitreps, etc., with platoon, company, etc. That's a lot of burden and a lot of potential distraction.

The final problem with the 8-man Section is its tactical use in offensive operations. It does not typically use the US technique of sending a fire team forward a safe distance with the other (or in USMC others) following, thus potentially avoiding the total destruction of a squad in the first bursts of enemy machine gun/mortar fire. The entire section, both fire teams/assault groups advance like an over-sized US fire team, while the rest of the platoon supports; the advantage of this is that, coming under fire, the entire section instantly responds, bringing its entire firepower to bear on the source of enemy fire; the disadvantage of this is as I described immediately above - the section might not survive the initial enemy fire to respond in kind.

Yeah, ROKMAN, I agree that the Marines' DO Squad is hardly ideal for non-COIN ops. This is a reconaissance/forward observer/raid element, not really a line squad.

I like Tom's ideas for a squad (except for the breech specialization by just one element). As for whether it and higher units are too large and too demanding upon manpower, I'll put it this way: using the present US Army organization and tactical concepts, you'll suffer up to twice the losses while having only 2/3rds of the manpower to begin with, compared to Tom's organization and the tactical concepts it uses. When the shooting starts in a high-intensity war, no one is going to like the fact that the infantry battalions are running out of rifleman at least a few times faster than the Army can train replacements for them - that's a real manpower problem. Tom's way goes a long way to avoiding that.

The German panzergrenadier sqaud was similar to British Commonwealth section with the following differences:

1. Used GPMGs/MMGs instead of LMGs - YEAH!:cool:
2. The Squad Leader had control over the Squads' machine guns, while ASL led assault:); in Commonwealth Section, the Section commander "leads" the assault, while the Section 2i/c "controls" the cover fire:mad:.
3. The Germans did not use Battle Drill or Fire Teams; once the fire fight was won, the machine gun teams simply stayed with the SL, and the riflemen went with the ASL into the assault. But as the Squad reduced in size from an authorized 12 men and finally down to 8-9 men, it lost its offensive power. In the defence, the machine gun teams nominally remained under the control of the SL; in practice, the machine gun teams were the defensive line, as there were so few riflemen left by late in the war - so an NCO per machine gun team was not exactly unheard of.

The Germans, like the Commonwealth, held that the squad was not independent, but just a part of the platoon. But like the Commonwealth, the Germans found that independent squad/section operations were necessary.

As to your last question ROKMAN, the answer requires some explanation. The USMC Rifle Squad is best (but not quite ideal) in and of itself, provided that it has machine guns, rather than automatic rifles. But the RM Commando 21 organization follows the German Mountain/Parachute Battalion organization, which provides for the best minor-unit level suppression. In WWII, German infantry battalions either had a full machine-gun company, or each rifle company had a full machine-gun platoon (depending on circumstances), plus either a separate Heavy Company (mortar, pioneer, AT, AA platoons, etc) or elements of those attached from Regimental companies. With 4-6 MGs per platoon, and 2-3 platoons per machine gun company (plus mortar fire), German rifle companies were often able to more or less walk to their objectives (yes, I said walk, not pepper-pot/bound) with such fire support coordinated at either company- or even battalion-level.

The more recent German organizations are developments of this, and with the Royal Marines also adopting this organization, having 8-man Rifle Sections is only a problem when:

1. Either the terrain or cover masks the Fire Support Companies' fires.
2. Coordination with the Fire Support Companies breaks down or said companies come under serious attack.
3. When 8-man Rifle Sections are detached on independent missions by as a result of tactical circumstances.

In these circumstances, the 13-man USMC Rifle Squad is much better suited. It can provide its own heavy suppressive fires using two of its three fire teams while the other assaults; it can take heavy losses and still remain effective; the squad as a whole does not have to reorganize to accomodate unfamiliar and newly attached strangers who themselves are unfamiliar with this particular squad; and you don't have to take fire support (platoon weapons sqaud or heavy weapons attached from company) away from the parent platoon or company which is already having to deal with the loss of an entire squad while still facing the potential for contact with the enemy.

Finally, with the Squad Leader free to fight the squad and not have to fight a fire team as well, the USMC Rifle Squad's only major problem is that it does not have a dedicated ASL likewise free from fighting his own fire team in order to handle communications/sitreps/adminstration/logistics and the like in order to free the SL from having to deal with platoon/company when ever they get on the horn; and the ASL can deal with platoon/company over all the beans n' bullets matters while the SL deals with the enemy. I think Tom had that idea.

Sorry for the long response ROKMAN.

ROKMAN

10-22-2007, 05:40 PM

Sorry for the long response ROKMAN.

It's all good. Your explanation is helpful.

So basically having an independent Squad Leader (SL) and an Assistant Squad Leader (ASL) to make up a squad of 3 teams each with 4 troops centered around a machine gun (GPMG) is the ideal? Then wouldn't that make the team too small, wouldn't there be a need for an additional ammo carrier? Essentially making it a 5 man team? If this is the case then that would make the squad have 17 troops. Also how would they be able to assault with the GPMG? Should the assaulters then be equipped with LMG (SAWs in fact) to make them effective assaulters?

Recently a friend of mine proposes that the Marines and Army should use a 20 man squad (more like section) built up of 3 teams and a HQ team. The HQ team has the SL, an ASL (communicating with the Company), 2 Sharpshooters, and a medic. Each line team has a fireteam leader, GPMG, 2 GPMG Assistants/Ammo carriers, and an assaulter/grenadier. Basically it seems like a heavier version of Tom Odom's idea. I argued that this itself is more like a section rather than a squad and can act independently from a platoon. Hence a company should be made up of 4 of these sections plus a CO HQ section or squad. He still insists on having platoon organizations to make this up. Resulting in a 300 man plus company. Which I think is too big.

This leads me to a another question. How is the modern German Bundeswehr organize their squad/platoon/companies. From what I can tell the Germans still use a derivative of their MG42 but now chambered for 7.62, which make it so that they are using a GPMG in their squads. Do they still fight in the same way that did since WWII or do they break it down into fire teams now? If so how many fire teams to a squad and how many troops in a fire team?

Lastly the Royal Marines use of the Commando 21 organization for a battalion sized force is a good system but the 8 man squad needs to be ditched for something more robust. Is that right?

Thanks

10-22-2007, 05:51 PM

Recently a friend of mine proposes that the Marines and Army should use a 20 man squad (more like section) built up of 3 teams and a HQ team. The HQ team has the SL, an ASL (communicating with the Company), 2 Sharpshooters, and a medic. Each line team has a fireteam leader, GPMG, 2 GPMG Assistants/Ammo carriers, and an assaulter/grenadier. Basically it seems like a heavier version of Tom Odom's idea. I argued that this itself is more like a section rather than a squad and can act independently from a platoon. Hence a company should be made up of 4 of these sections plus a CO HQ section or squad. He still insists on having platoon organizations to make this up. Resulting in a 300 man plus company. Which I think is too big.

This sounds like the same kind of thinking that brought the US Army the current Brigade Combat Teams that are supposed to be capable of extended independent action. I shudder to think about the sustainment tail needed for this "squad" and its associated platoon, company, and higher echelons.

Norfolk

10-22-2007, 07:31 PM

This sounds like the same kind of thinking that brought the US Army the current Brigade Combat Teams that are supposed to be capable of extended independent action. I shudder to think about the sustainment tail needed for this "squad" and its associated platoon, company, and higher echelons.

wm's right to be nervous, and that's just with the existing new BCT structure, never mind something else.

ROKMAN, Senator and former SecNav James Webb proposed something not too different in his "Flexibility and the Fire Team" article in 1972 in the Marine Corps Gazette - minus machine guns - and an 19-man Rifle Squad with three 6-man Fire Teams:

http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/variouspubs/usmcgazetteflexfire.htm

Well, here's another long-winded post.:wry:

Your observation about requiring 5-men in a fire team equipped with a GPMG is good, the role of the Machine-Gun in the Rifle Squad/Section is disputed. What I have to say is this: the current small-calibre Light Machine Guns lack sufficient firepower and reliability compared to the medium-calibre MMGs/GPMGs. The WWII Germans never complained about having two MG-34s or 42s in Panzer-Grenadier and certain other Rifle Squads, other Rifle Squads making do with just one. Until recently, the Bundesheer Rifle Squads carried a single MG-3 in 7.62mm in a 10-man squad (I think); this is now being replaced by two small-calibre (5.56mm) MG-4s in a 10-man squad of 2 fire teams.

The thing is, in order to get the same suppression as an FN MAG 58 (never mind an MG-3), a Minimi or other LMG in 5.56mm or some such requires about twice the ammo to do the same job. A good example of this is jcustis' description of the Rhodesian 4-man teams in the Bush War - 3 men with FN rifles and a GPMG gunner with about 400 rounds of ammo - sweet.:cool: A team with a 5.56mm LMG on the same op should carry about 800 rounds. When I was an LMG gunner, I carried a box mag (in bandolier) on each leg, one on my webbing, and another one the gun (of course). When I was a GPMG gunner, I carried no more than 3 belts, preferably 2 (I seem to remeber carrying 4 belts once, and I loathed the experience), with the one in the gun quartered into 55-round lengths (one in the gun, one in each leg-pocket, and the fourth in a shirt pocket with the other 220-round belt over my shoulders. The Germans got around this with those nice 50-round belt drum magazines

Effective suppression isn't just about the highest rate of fire - it's about keeping the enemy's head down, and killing whoever pops up - and the 7.62mm is much better at this than 5.56mm - not least because the GPMG has a larger cone of fire than the LMG, but about the same rate of fire with more destructive rounds - less ammo needed to do the same job. The GPMG in the light role is good to 800m - LMG is rather ambiguous at this range, and more or less useless beyond it - little point in putting it on a tripod. And that's another thing: with GPMGs/MMGs, each Squad/Section can have its own SF (Sustained Fire) capability if provided with SF Kit and Tripods. GPMG is also much more reliable than LMG, for technical reasons.

But as you point out ROKMAN, a GPMG in close-quarter battle is not fun; the LMG is somewhat better, but isn't of much use as an assault weapon either. Carbines and rifles are needed for trench- and room-clearing; machine guns just get you there. And this is where the GPMG/MMG runs into real difficulties. In a 4-man team, the GPMG gunner has to carry the ammo himself, which with 2 belts is fine, but an SF Kit and 6 more belts of ammo requires three more men to carry on the march; a five-man team just spreads this out a little better, and even six-men is nothing more than a full-strength foot-infantry MG crew. An LMG just requires the gunner, although preferably a second man to carry a little more ammo as well. But, with that 250-round belt rattling away inside the box magazine, don't expect to sneek up on someone.

The problem here is that the LMG is not quite IMO up to the job, but the GPMG may be a little much for the job. What is required is an LMG (not an Automatic Rifle as some maintain) that has a changeable barrel (unlike AR) with the gunner carrrying 2 spare barrels, is magazine-, not belt-fed (50 round drum would be ideal), bipod, and is of about 7 mm/.280 calibre, effective to over 600m, and weighs not more than 20 pounds loaded - quite a bill to fill. Then the 4-man fire team is in pretty good shape; otherwise, the GPMG should be used instead of the existing LMG, but the SF capability foregone (just as the Germans did) at squad/section level.

ROKMAN, I agree about the RM 8-man section, it should be changed to USMC-ish; Commando 21 otherwise sounds pretty good.

As for the Squad/Section argument, you're right about that. The "Fire Team" is more or less the Squad of old, but reorganizations over the years have confused terminologies, and thus, the existing US "Squad" is already really a "Section". The USMC Rifle "Squad" with its three 4-man "Fire Teams" is the archetypal Rifle "Section", never mind proposed larger organizations. But wm is right about the dangers of too large "squads" and "sections". Personally, I think that the USMC Rifle Squad, provided that it received a dedicated ASL free from any of the fire teams, to assist the SL, especially with communications, sitreps, resupply. etc., would be about the best you can expect to get, although at the risk of expanding too large, a 5th man per fire team would be doable, and perhaps advisable. A 17-man rifle "Section", with 2 NCOs in the Section HQ and 3x5-man "Squads" each led by an NCO (doubling as Grenadier) and composed of an MGnr and 3 Carbineers/Riflemen would be interesting. But I'd like to have it proven first.

As for higher-level fire support, I tend toward the USMC and German models: centralize MMGs, light mortars, and light ATGM at Company, detaching them to platoons only when cover and terrain compell it; and HMGs, AGLs/GMGs, medium/heavy mortars, medium ATGM, etc. at battalion, detached to companies when tactical circumstances warrant. Some people like heavy weapons assigned more or less permanently down to the lowest level possible; this reduces their overall effectiveness, except when terrain and cover mask their fires at battalion or company level. And it can be deceptive to think that it's an improvement having an organic weapons squad/section at platoon level; while the platoon (and a squad with such firepower attached) may enjoy the additional firepower under its own control, the rest of the company (or platoon) suffers its loss.

A platoon normally should have no more than a handful of riflemen IMO (equipped with bipods and scopes on their rifles - Designated Marksmen if you will) and a handful of light ATGM men - a lot to be sure, and these can be attached out to squads as tactically necessary, but while company and battalion suppress the main enemy positions, the Platoon HQ's Riflemen and light ATGM gunners take out enemy crew-served weapons and fighting positions/vehicles while the squads suppress the enemy positions on their own objective and try to break-in with one of them. With 3 fire teams, the squad can both rotate between fire teams clearing ahead in trenches and stil cover the break-in point, and while sustaining losses that would stop a two fire team squad. In room-clearing, the squad reorganizes its three teams, puts two of its three MGs on a roof with the security element, puts one with the support element, and leads with the assault element composed of a handful or so carbineers/riflemen.

I still suspect that the USMC and Tom Odom are on to something very good; for all practical purposes, the best.:cool: Thus endeth the lecture. Time for a beer... or two... or...;)

jcustis

10-22-2007, 08:04 PM

ROKMAN,

I'd offer that the ideal rifle squad configuration remains the 13-man Marine Corps rifle squad (though it could stand the 14th man addition as Norfolk mentioned) because of a number of factors.

1) In the USMC, infantry is infantry. We do not differentiate between heavy and light. The only real difference is the manner of tactical mobility to the fight (boats, AAVs, helos, etc.)

2) The USMC Rifle Squad benefits from the larger MTOE of the Rifle Company, and its structure of 3x Rifle Platoons and a Weapons Platoon of 6x M240G teams, 3 LWCM (3x 60mm tubes) sqds, and 6x MK-153 armed asslt teams. The weapons platoon can be tasked out in a mind-numbing number of ways, and that includes teams/sqds attached to any or all of the rifle platoons. even in the context of a meeting engagement, it is not far-fetched to see a 60mm sqd attached to the lead platoon/advance guard for imediate suppression support in a direct lay mode.

3) In the patrolling context, it allows for simple organization and tasking into Assault, Security, and Support teams and facilitates the accomplishment of ambush, security, etc. patrols

Earlier questions of where the remainder of the platoon is when the battle is joined with either a 9-man or 13-man squad are terribly appropriate to this discussion. The Marine Corps does have a mindset of "biting off" all that it can chew, in a sense. It's evident in some of our doctrine on satellite patrolling in an urban environment.

It is interesting to note that in terms of heliborne lift planning, it is not doctrinally correct to plan for a CH-46 to lift a full-strength rifle squad. We're fortunate that manning levels often mean we don't have to come to slicing and dicing the number too much, but adding a 14th squad member would pose greater difficulty in heliborne assault planning until our medium lift platforms transition to pure MV-22s (and assuming floor loading is a possible flight profile).

ROKMAN

10-22-2007, 08:32 PM

wm's right to be nervous, and that's just with the existing new BCT structure, never mind something else.

ROKMAN, Senator and former SecNav James Webb proposed something not too different in his "Flexibility and the Fire Team" article in 1972 in the Marine Corps Gazette - minus machine guns - and an 19-man Rifle Squad with three 6-man Fire Teams:

http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/variouspubs/usmcgazetteflexfire.htm

Well, here's another long-winded post.:wry:

.....

I still suspect that the USMC and Tom Odom are on to something very good; for all practical purposes, the best.:cool: Thus endeth the lecture. Time for a beer... or two... or...;)

Last thing so basically an infantry company is best organized with 4 17-20 man sections divided into "teams". Because these enlarged squads don't need to be organized into platoons. Right?

Norfolk

10-22-2007, 11:02 PM

Last thing so basically an infantry company is best organized with 4 17-20 man sections divided into "teams". Because these enlarged squads don't need to be organized into platoons. Right?

No, I wouldn't go that far. For a rifle company to use an organization of four sections of 17-20 men each wouldn't provide enough troops to take and hold ground, let alone after taking losses. Without all these squads/sections being part of platoons, they still don't have enough suppression or manpower to attack, or even to defend. Even with a squad or section of 13-14 men each, with three of these per platoon, and three platoons per company, there are going to be times when serious manpower shortages occur in high-intensity warfare. Take the authorized strength of a rifle company, and cut it in half, and that's what it will actually be operating with a great deal of the time, sometimes even less than that. Every single attempt that has ever been made to reduce the need for infantry in the line companies has failed come wartime, or been made necessary out of sheer lack of manpower.

The USMC Rifle Squad in WWII began with 8 men, was increased to 10 men in early 1944, and in late 1944 was authorized 13 men, which has stuck ever since - 63 years unchanged - the US Army meanwhile has gone from 12 men in WWII to 9 men since the 1980's, with at least half a dozen reorganizations, many more studies and tests, and is still no happier than they were in WWII. The German Army started WWII with 12 men auhtorized in each squad, but was forced by manpower constraints, and then manpower losses to reduce to 8-9 authorized, and they lost much of their offensive capacity doing so. As the USMC found, wartime loss rates made the large squad necessary. And going from 9 such squads/section per company down to 4 by removing the platoon from the equation, even with 17-20 man "sections" in their place, still leaves those companies with too little in the way of manpower (and firepower) to do their jobs and take losses doing so.

jcustis has it about right; the USMC Rifle Company has about the best organization there is, although I would make a few changes personally. Personally, I think that 4 GPMGs at Company level are quite good enough, along with 4 60mm light mortars and 4 light anti-tank missile launchers; in addition, I would like 4 light automatic grenade launchers to complement the GPMGs (a la the Chinese Type 87 35mm, with bipod range of 600m, on tripod 1,750m, 11m blast radius, 80mm armour penetration, 6 round drum mag in light role, 15 round drum mag in SF role, 45 rds/min practical rate of fire - very nice piece of kit - 12kg in light role, 20 kg in SF role - about the same as GPMG).

In the RCR, each Rifle Platoon and Company HQ included a Weapons Detachment with 1 GPMG, 1 60mm mortar, and 1 Carl Gustav 84mm, for a total of 4 of each per Rifle Company. I didn't like the dispersion, and often commanders would place all or some of them under centralized command when posible (with manpower constraints, it was not really possible to have a dedicated Weapons Platoon at Company, even though that was favoured by many). The point of having equal proportions of each heavy weapon was to provide the ability to place the enemy under "Triple Jeopardy".

The enemy had to duck to avoid GPMG fire, then they had to go into fortified postions to escape mortar fire, then they have to leave the bunkers when the Carl Gustavs took them out, and then they would die in their trenches as our infantry assaulted. If the Weapons Dets were operating in the Light Role, the SF Kits and Bipods for the GPMGs, 60mm Mortars and Carl Gustavs would be left at Company HQ, and each Weapons Det would accompany a Rifle Platoon (with one at Company HQ) and be used in the hand-held roles. If the Weapons Dets were centralized at Company (especially in defence), and used in the SF Role, then the SF Kits and Bipods would be used for the GPMGs, 60mm mortars and Carl Gustavs. Light Automatic Grenade Launchers would have complemented this arrangment perfectly.

So, side from adding a 14th man to each Marine squad, this is how I'd like the
weapons platoon at company organized - similar, but not quite identical to the Marines' version.

Rifleman

10-23-2007, 03:48 AM

I can see the advantages to the 13 man Marine Corps squad. Since I think that won't happen in the Army I would at least like to see the Army return to the old 11 man squad of two five man fire teams and the squad leader.

Organize the 11 man squads into big platoons of 50 soldiers: three 11 man rifle squads, one 11 man weapons squad, and two three man command cells. I wouldn't even mind seeing a platoon zeroed out of each company, if necessary, to fill up two big 50 man platoons. How many two up/one back company attacks are we doing these days anyway?

11 men is a bigger than usual weapons squad but I think it makes sense. Base each five man team around a GPMG gunner and his assistant. Now add in a grenadier to cover the gunner's dead space, a sharpshooter/DM (might as well put all the 7.62 weapons in the same squad), and maybe rocket launcher. It would probably be best to have the grenadier be the team leader.

The old 11 man squad isn't as flexible as the Marine Corps three team squad but it's more robust and sustainable than what we have now.

Norfolk

10-24-2007, 01:48 AM

I can see the advantages to the 13 man Marine Corps squad. Since I think that won't happen in the Army I would at least like to see the Army return to the old 11 man squad of two five man fire teams and the squad leader.

The old 11 man squad isn't as flexible as the Marine Corps three team squad but it's more robust and sustainable than what we have now.

And sad to say Rifleman, the Army will not get even that.:(

CPT Holzbach

10-24-2007, 05:58 PM

Take a look at this article (http://www.hackworth.com/guerrilla.html), written by COL Hackworth. It's about how he re-organized one of his battalions to fight the VC in Vietnam. Fascinating look at adapting to circumstances on the ground in terms of MTOE and a guerrilla enemy. Oh, and Norfolk, I think you'll like the picture at the top...

Norfolk

10-24-2007, 10:11 PM

Duke Togo

10-25-2007, 02:19 AM

This thread is why I joined the forum.

Wow it has so much information I have to take a few days to absorb it. Timing is every thing as I’m actually researching a similar topic for an article I’m writing for Special Warfare magazine on the restructuring of ODAs to adopt a more modular flexibility.

Many of my resources have been quoted here already but there are so many additional points brought up in this thread that I have to reconsider some of my points. I understand that the topic was more based on an Infantry Squad but IMO base building blocks of “what works” in small unit tactics..well…works. The enemy doesn’t know he’s facing Infantry or Rangers or SF (maybe we’re older) so I feel the points brought up are definitely applicable to my article.

However I try to look at the structural needs for the full range of SF core mission sets ie. What is needed for FID (re JCETs), UW, COIN, SR, DA etc. I try to use historical examples and show there is precedence to a smaller sub structure that can be managed within the ODA construct. (ie 3 X 4 Man “stacks” or “cells”). This will allow for adaptation WITHOUT any serious MTOE changes that will shake up the old hands resistant to change. A 12 man ODA can still exist but instead of breaking down into a MOS driven split team (current not practiced TTP) it would be able to split into the 3 MOS immaterial cells. Of course mission to mission the MOS factor may come into play as needed but in the middle of a firefight is not the time to have to think the junior Bravo is supposed to be the number one man and the senior Charlie is the number two man. Assault stacks are kept generic because each man may/will have to fill each position based on area coverage. The same for fire and maneuver, MOS is really not an issue at that point.

The 4 man element also works well in our current mobility tactics as 2 cells can fully man a two vehicle element.

Again I need to read and look closely at the great points made about heavy vs light etc and the types of fire power a single stack/cell realistically would have. I truthfully approached this from the generic modularity stand point thinking we should better suborganized to be better suited for the full range of missions and didn’t look at it from a straight tactical/Infantry POV.

Any/all ideas of course are welcome. Thanks again for this post.

Duke

Norfolk

10-25-2007, 02:25 AM

This thread is why I joined the forum. Duke

Glad you enjoy the thread; kind of fond of it myself.

Ken White

10-25-2007, 03:45 AM

FWIW, long ago in another lifetime (and before "The A-Team" caused an A team to become an ODA) while prowling around rice paddies and through elephant grass and sleeping in bamboo clumps, the usual mode was to just break into four man teams that fell out sort of by default without regard to grade or MOS. Worked for most Teams most of the time. Every now and then a team would have a difficult to like personality and someone would have to be ordered to use him but that usually worked out okay as well.

Back in the day with a bunch of iconoclasts there was strong aversion to top down doctrine so Group just said do it and most C teams just let the teams work out the TTP. Had the added advantage of encouraging initiative -- and bouncing different ideas around helped everyone develop better approaches. People are pretty quick to sense what will work best and adopt it but, conversely, regardless of what Building 4 says, one size doesn't fit all in the realm of minor tactics... ;)

There was always a battle between the UW versus ID versus DA crowds, fans for all three approaches could be found. My observation was the DA guys didn't like indig work (and that varied by country or area), the UW guys didn't like the extra and repetitious work that went with training for DA and the ID folks were in between and mostly were in the "whatever it takes" mode. I mention that only because it affected the way the 4 man teams shook out, they tended to be different for each mission. ;)

Duke Togo

10-26-2007, 01:46 AM

Ken

That’s exactly what I’m talking about. With a more modular MOS immaterial force structure comes better mission flexibility and the ability to task organize based on the mission or the over quoted and seldom used “Troop to Task” concept.

This smaller MOS immaterial structure also builds leaders as NCOs will lead their cells at a far more junior rank then when they traditionally become the Detachment team sergeant. With the high OPTEMPO and commitment to CENTCOM can we not better divide and conquer on the force commitment to FID missions in other theaters world wide? I’ve been on many JCET with one or two guys on the platform and the rest of the team either prepping the material for the next day or sitting in the back of the class.

At the more advisory type LCE roles (re JSOTF-P) are 12 advisors needed at the Battalion level? Can a four man element form the advisory LCE while the remainder of the ODA breaks down into a intell/targeting cell and maybe another out doing village assessments? Or can we cover down on 3 Battalions with a four man cell at each, thus spreading our unit coverage and not committing more forces?

Here’s some of the Pros and Cons I’ve come up with, of course as I mentioned this is BEFORE I discovered this site and thread so this weekend I’m going to print off the entire thread and comb over it with a fine tooth comb.

Pros
• Flexible
• Modular
• MOS immaterial-troops to task
• Fits most current TTPs (CQB stack, 4 man recce team, 4 man Mobility, etc)
• Allows for force multiplication (re more missions): 12 divided by 3 equals three times the amount of useable “teams” for many missions.
• Reinforces the “thru-by-with” mentality: Hard to take a target down with four guys, becomes doable with 12 or even more 15 or 20, the larger we make ODAs the more we promote unilateral mission mindset.
• Develops tactical leaders at the lower levels
• Smaller profile/footprint element
• MOS immaterial- Promotes Generalization of Operators: DA centric operations have forced SF to become more and more specialized (shooters/assaulters) and less and less generalized.
• Smaller units (not always four I know) have some historical precedence in SOF units: ie recce teams, OSS jedbugs, etc

Cons
• Smaller package=weaker force pro posture: Will higher fear deploying 4 operators without the safety in number (albeit only 12 normally)
• MOS immaterial force structure downplays MOS technical expertise
• Breaks from SF centric historical ODA/split team concept
• Less control of smaller teams: Will higher allow 4 man teams led by a senior NCO deploy on missions with no officer?

Feedback is appreciated. And all good ideas/quotes will be credited in the article. Paul Howe (Leadership and Training for the Fight) sent me some great ideas about this stuff I’ll pull out of my notes and post later this weekend.

Thanks again for the feedback and great stuff.

VR

Duke

jcustis

10-26-2007, 02:02 AM

Paul Howe (Leadership and Training for the Fight) sent me some great ideas about this stuff I’ll pull out of my notes and post later this weekend.

Definitely on the same wavelength there. That is one of the best books I have read in a long time. I passed it off to a stud of a sergeant I know and he took a lot of the gouge on board easily.

Ken White

10-26-2007, 03:23 AM

Ken

That’s exactly what I’m talking about. With a more modular MOS immaterial force structure comes better mission flexibility and the ability to task organize based on the mission or the over quoted and seldom used “Troop to Task” concept.

I think the teams will surprise folks with some of the good ideas they'll develop if allowed to do so.

This smaller MOS immaterial structure also builds leaders as NCOs will lead their cells at a far more junior rank then when they traditionally become the Detachment team sergeant. . . I’ve been on many JCET with one or two guys on the platform and the rest of the team either prepping the material for the next day or sitting in the back of the class.

Used to be the norm. Most missions require multi tasking unless they're specifically designed not to. In my observation, such a design is forced by commanders or staffs lacking in self confidence and / or the ability to trust anyone subordinate. 'course, that was all years ago and I'm sure things aren't like that today... :wry:

At the more advisory type LCE roles (re JSOTF-P) are 12 advisors needed at the Battalion level? Can a four man element form the advisory LCE while the remainder of the ODA breaks down into a intell/targeting cell and maybe another out doing village assessments? Or can we cover down on 3 Battalions with a four man cell at each, thus spreading our unit coverage and not committing more forces?

I firmly believe a four man cell is capable of doing the job. The problem you'll be occasionally confronted with is the SF vs. conventional disconnect and food fight. Sporadically, the fact the cell that has an NCO boss will run across a bias objection. Key to that is to win over the Bn CSM. Usually you can do that.

Here’s some of the Pros and Cons I’ve come up with, of course as I mentioned this is BEFORE I discovered this site and thread so this weekend I’m going to print off the entire thread and comb over it with a fine tooth comb.

Pros

I agree with all your 'Pros.'

Cons
• Smaller package=weaker force pro posture: Will higher fear deploying 4 operators without the safety in number (albeit only 12 normally)
• MOS immaterial force structure downplays MOS technical expertise
• Breaks from SF centric historical ODA/split team concept
• Less control of smaller teams: Will higher allow 4 man teams led by a senior NCO deploy on missions with no officer?

Four cons, four quick thoughts.

The attitude of the commander of the moment -- and, unfortunately, his Boss as well -- will likely be the operating determinant. Good planning can lessen the impact of the small number on force survival.

A little thought can make that MOS expertise disparity into a plus in many cases. I also suspect teams are similar to those of more years ago than I can recall, the cross training factor is lower due to buildup but in any event is a characteristic that varies from team to team and that has to be taken into account. On balance, I think it's a minor con.

That SF centric split team concept must be a post Viet Nam thing. Way bacl when an amazing number of 91B and 05C led teams of three or four were to be found. In any event, as I used to make myself immensely popular repeating to sundry bosses, "We used to ride to work on elephants until the parking lot attendants rebelled." that and the Bull Halsey quote, "Regulations were meant to be intelligently disregarded." (I'm certainly not recommending saying those things in this day and age -- but it's the thought that counts. ;) ). The key is what it takes to do the job and what works. Most commanders will accept that, I think. Particularly now that most have combat experience and the peacetime turf protection and fear of annoying higher is parked for a while... :cool:

Last item, again, the Boss and his Bosses attitude are likely to be the determinant. It truly should not be an issue but we both know it will be one. I have several nefarious ways of getting around that but maybe some of the Field Grades who post here might comment? Comment on their willingness to turn four NCOs loose on an independent mission and, further, as Bn Cdrs, their attitude on accepting such a team in an assistance capacity?

jcustis

10-26-2007, 08:38 PM

Duke Togo

10-26-2007, 10:56 PM

jcustis

Fantastic article on cover shooting and good points on command and control issues with the increased modernization of our coms. Between watching a TIC on "kill TV" /ISR and the ability to have real time coms reach out higher and higher levels of command are able to second guess tactical level leaders.

Good stuff

Duke

Norfolk

10-27-2007, 02:01 AM

First off, I offer this product which has been here with the SWJ for some time now. Its origin is with a former member of 2 Commando, Rhodesian Light Infantry, and is an excellent primer on minor team tactics that were employed by 4-man teams often fighting across dispersed areas.

Drake shooting (http://smallwarsjournal.com/documents/rhodesian-cover-or-drake-shooting.pdf)

Now back to the thread.

Ken brings up a very salient point, especially when we start to talk about truf fights and such. Take for example this bit from a May, 2006 article in the Marine Times recounting actions of an experimental DO platoon:

"However, DeSantis did point out that his ability to operate in a more "distributed" manner was hampered by higher commanders in Afghanistan who were loath to separate units into groups smaller than a platoon after a four-man SEAL team was compromised last June.

[Throughout our deployment, we ran against our willingness to be employed in distributed operations like we wanted to, with the higher-level commanders being risk-averse,] DeSantis said."

Being risk-averse certainly runs counter to having any ability to seize the day and prosecute the fight well, but I catch myself wondering what truly defines such aversion.

I've worked within a TF COC/TOC, and while slaving away to meet HHQ information requirements, I came to the conclusion that if headquarters didn't have an established and reliable way to talk to us, they might not care much unless we were forceably displaced from our position. I lean back on my knowledge of the LRDG and SAS in N. Africa when making this statement, because those guys were definitely DO operators, and there are very few reports of the Brit high command becoming all too concerned when a patrol couldn't establish communications over its wireless set during a comm window.

Can force structure at the tactical level be associated with risk-averse mindsets, and can those mindsets in turn be associated with our appetite for real-time information about our forces; an appetite that becomes greater with every leap in C2 capability?

Outstanding piece on team TTP's, jcustis. The more I read of the lessons of the Bush War (and which you kindly provide for our edification), the more I am not only confirmed in my suspicions of some of our peacetime doctrine, but the clearer my mind becomes on what simply works, and what simply doesn't. And as Ken says, that's what counts.:cool:

I see the field-grade officers aren't exactly breaking down the door just yet to comment on cooperation with 4-man SF Teams in general, and the dynamics involved with a major or colonel having to deal with a SF NCOs in one-on-one terms.

What I have to say on this matter is this: when you put someone from a conventional unit or HQ who may well be unfamiliar with SF, their capabilities, and their "style", their will almost certainly be some friction, some misunderstanding. Provided both sides are reasonably accomodating an open-minded (ie., willing to learn), they can usually work that sort of thing out. A willingness to learn is a strong marker of someone who is passionate and conscientous about their profession, even when such learning runs counter to much of what one has already learned and experienced. Usually (but not always), the problem lies more with the regular than with SF. SF itself is typically composed of such learners - true professionals; in fact, it is that quality which is one of the most outstanding marks of what makes an SF soldier.

Perhaps above everything else, both the willingness and the ability to think critically, to learn and to seek to learn, on one's own intiative, and an unwillingness to accept unclear/unverified/untested/rote prescriptions or common assumptions are what set the SF soldier apart from most other soldiers. This independence of thought and mind - what I would say is the very basis for professionalism - is strictly necessary for SF, where there is little room for error, and few scapegoats available to toss to the wolves.

This, as we can all personally attest to, is not quite the case in regular units. We have all seen good men, professionals - dedicated to learning their profession in order to improve themselves and their units, and on their own initiative - either leave or be driven out of conventional units, by those whose "careers", and the accompanying demands of self-promotion, either distract them from or render them indifferent to, such learning (and therefore professionalism) and the independence of thought and mind that is required - even if they have nothing to do with SF. This then, is the person that the Senior NCO of a 4-man SF Team may be compelled to deal with.

Coupled with both continuing improvements in communications and the never-ending expansion of C4IR elements at practically every level - the USMC's proposed 8-man HQ for a new Rifle Platoon structure, in addition to a 4-man C2 Team in each proposed reduced 12-man Rifle Squad being an example, however imperfect, of these developments - makes the "careerist's" need for micro-managment (to "avoid" mistakes that might endanger the progression of his career) much more easily fulfilled, whilst at the same time greatly impeding the discretion left to, and required by, the "professional" to get the job done right.

I think that a 4-man Team, even an ordinary infantry fire team led by a competent junior NCO, should have no trouble most of the time doing whatever job it has to do, never mind an SF Team stacked with senior NCOs -provided that these people are professionals, and left to carry out their assigned tasks as they see fit. Thus, I see little real difficulty, given a short period of learning and adjustment, for regular officers at unit-level and SF NCOs leading 4-man teams to work together, provided that they are all professionals. If they are professionals, they will work things out soon enough.

But if the regular unit-level officer is a careerist, the only thing the SF NCO Team Leader can do is to try to avoid contact as much as possible, and given the extensive C2 suite that even a 4-man team may find itself carrying, obviously this may prove practically impossible. Little good is likely to come of such a situation. Given the Army's present Officer Retention issues, and especially the incentives being offered to stay ("corporate" bonuses and the like), it doesn't require terribly impressive mental powers to imagine just what sort of officer the Army is most likely to retain.

Rifleman

10-28-2007, 09:48 PM

For those of us who just can't get enough of this thread (or who just suffer from insomnia) :rolleyes: :

The concern over the infantry squad's effectiveness has focused on its size. A review of the historical data suggests that the squad's organization is the critical facet in the effectiveness of an infantry squad. As a result, the author suggests the current squad can be made more effective if its organization is changed to reflect the lessons of three wars and decades of peacetime testing. Specifically, the squad should not be organized around fire teams, nor around more than one light machinegun and grenade launcher. Concurrently, the squad should be used as either a base of fire or maneuver element; the squad should not be expected to fire and maneuver simultaneously.

Link: http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA225438

And yet another one:

This study analyzes the organization of the US Army infantry rifle squad since the end of World War II, focusing on the attempt to gain and then maintain the capability of fire and maneuver at the squad level. Since the end of World War II, the US Army has conducted or commissioned at least nine studies, aimed at determining the optimum organization of the infantry rifle squad. Common trends affect all recent attempts at transforming the US Army and become evident when studying the evolution of the squad, but the goal must remain developing a combat effective unit. Combat effectiveness is determined by applying the evaluative criteria of control, sustainability, flexibility, and lethality. By applying these four criteria to analyze various squad organizations, one can determine the strengths and weaknesses inherent to these organizations, thereby recommending the most combat effective rifle squad organization. The US Army's current focus on strategic deployability and emerging weapons capabilities is not a new phenomenon, but potentially could cloud the essential issue, developing a military force for optimum combat effectiveness. This study concludes by recommending the optimum squad-level organization for the Objective Force.

Link: http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA407058

The first author belives the squad should fire or manuever but not both. So he thinks nine men is plenty for that purpose and that battle drill begins at platoon level, not squad. I suppose that has proven to work for more open combat but I think it limits the options, especially for MOUT.

The second author believes the squad should fire and manuever but sticks with the idea of two big fire teams. I think that's a step in the right direction but still not as good as the USMC squad.

These are lengthy PDF documents, so don't start reading until you've set aside some time. Or, print them out and analize them later. Enjoy.....er, uh, or not. :wry:

jcustis

10-29-2007, 12:24 AM

I'll post more if I have anything to comment on regarding the two longer articles Rifleman posted, but until then I'll just leave this for folks to ponder. In the context of the first article, which references SLA Marshall, perhaps Dick Winters influenced the transition to an 11-man squad?

For those soldiers, sailors and airmen who participated in D-Day, June 6 was unlike any day in history. And it was on D-Day that Dick Winters had his rendezvous with destiny. Easy Company's mission, as with the other units within the 101st Airborne Division, was to seize the causeways behind Utah Beach to facilitate the expansion of the beachhead. Jumping from a C-47 Dakota at 150 miles per hour and at 500 feet and less, the Division's drop was scattered across the Cotentin Peninsula. Winters came down near the town of Ste. Mere-Eglise, several kilometers from the intended drop zone. Rallying a couple of troopers, he soon was en route to Ste. Marie-du-Mont, destined to be the Division's headquarters for most of D-Day. En route, Winters stumbled across the battalion staff and 40 men of D Company. By 7:00 a.m., E Company consisted of two light machine guns, one bazooka with no ammunition, one 60 mm mortar, nine riflemen and two officers. No one knew the whereabouts of the company commander, so Winters took command.

Three kilometers from Ste. Marie-du-Mont, the column encountered sustained enemy fire, and Winters was summoned to the front. The battalion commander informed Winters that there was a four-gun battery of German 105 mm cannons, a few hundred meters to the front across an open field opposite a French farmhouse called Brécourt Manor. The battery was set up in a hedgerow and defended by a 50-man German platoon. The guns were firing directly down a causeway leading to Utah Beach. The battalion operations officer directed Winters to take the battery. Taking his company, Winters made a careful reconnaissance and then issued orders for an assault. The attack would consist of a frontal assault led by Winters with covering fire from several directions to pin down the Germans. Winters selected three soldiers for the assault: Pvt. Gerald Lorraine, Pvt. Popeye Wynn and Cpl. Joe Toye. Asked later why he selected these three, Winters recalled, "In combat you look for killers.' Many thought they were killers and wanted to prove it. They are, however, few and far between."

Winters saw the impending attack as a "high risk opportunity." The key was "initiative, an immediate appraisal of situation, the use of terrain to get into the connecting trench and taking one gun at a time." Crawling on their bellies, Winters and his men got close enough and knocked out the first gun. Mowing down the retreating Germans, Winters then placed a machine gun to fire down the trench. He had also noticed that as soon as he got close enough to assault the first gun, the Germans in an adjacent hedgerow temporary lifted their fire so that they would not inflict friendly casualties. That was enough for Winters, who had a "sixth sense" that such a respite shifted the advantage to him.

With the first gun out of action, Winters grabbed two other soldiers and charged the second gun. Throwing hand grenades and firing their rifles, they took the second howitzer. Next to the gun was a case with a map that showed all the German artillery in the Cotentin Peninsula. Winters sent the map back to battalion headquarters and then directed another assault which rapidly captured the third gun. Reinforcements led by an officer from D Company soon arrived. Winters briefly outlined the situation and then watched D Company capture the last gun. With the mission complete, Winters ordered a withdrawal. It was 11:30 a.m., roughly three hours since Winters had received the order to take the battery. In summarizing Easy's action, historian Stephen Ambrose notes that with 12 men, what amounted to a squad, later reinforced by elements of D Company, Winters had destroyed a German battery, killed 15 Germans, wounded many more, and taken 12 prisoners. It would be a gross exaggeration to say that Easy Company saved the day at Utah Beach, but reasonable to say that it had made an important contribution to the success of the invasion.

Winters' action at Brécourt Manor was a textbook infantry assault, frequently studied at the U.S. Military Academy. Ever the self-effacing leader, Winters described the action to combat historian S.L.A. Marshall simply as laying down a base of fire to cover the assault. Left unsaid was his leadership by example. At every turn he had made the correct decision, from selecting the right men for each task, to making an accurate reconnaissance of the enemy position, to leading the maneuver element in person. In his own analysis, Winters credited his training and preparing for D-Day, his "apogee" in command. When the day was finally over, he wrote in his diary that if he survived the war, he would find an isolated farm somewhere and spend the rest of his life in peace.

Norfolk

10-29-2007, 02:35 AM

I suspect, jcustis, that Winter's exploits didn't exactly have a negative influence on Marshall's own thinking about infantry combat and tactics - you might be hitting very close there. And considering Slam's impact on the thinking of the top brass (now where can we find a latter-day Slam of our own by which to insinuate our own nefarious agenda into the minds of the real decision-makers?...hmm:rolleyes:), Slam's interest in what Winters did, and how he did it...jcustis, you are a sly dawg.;)

Those are some very thought-provoking articles you've got there Rifleman. I've got these, and a few others besides, myself, and I suppose that I am even more struck by the first than the second, and the second's pretty good. Yeah, when all is said and done, the infantry has got to have the bayonet strength to dig out and kill the (remaining) enemy, while the machine guns (and grenade launchers too) are what get you to that point.

And given that point, I think that the first article, proposing a squad with a single LMG and grenade launcher and no fire teams actually has a stronger case for itself than the second articles recommended 11-man squad with two fire teams and two LMGs. The second article even goes so far as to state that the Army's own tests demonstrated the necessity of having not less than 13 men in the 2-fire team squad in order to ensure that it could continue to use fire-and-movement after suffering heavy battle losses, whereas the recommended 11-man squad could only suffer modest losses before it lost that capability. I think that the Marine Rifle Squad is about right, but this still requires some more thought. Good post Rifleman.:)

Norfolk

10-29-2007, 02:38 AM

For those of us who just can't get enough of this thread (or who just suffer from insomnia) :rolleyes: :

Are you actually saying, openly, Rifleman, that my posts are insufficiently long, ponderous, and pedantic to cure your (and others') insomnia?:D Well...wait for it...;)

And a word about what one of the articles also mentioned: that the whole Squad - Section concept needs to be looked at again and seriously considered; just as the articles says, the Fire Teams of today really are, more or less, the Squads of old, and present-day Squads really are closer to the Sections of old than they are actually to being Squads. But just a matter of terminology.

ROKMAN

10-29-2007, 07:52 PM

Norfolk

10-29-2007, 08:09 PM

So in essence it is not the squad or the squad size but rather how they are trained? If that is the case then why are some Marine squad leaders in Iraq are splitting their squads into two teams of 6 Marines each?

Is this the case that the squad should not have permanent teams but rather be flexible for the situation? That the Squad leader can reorganize his fire teams into two teams or three teams so long as he has sufficient personnel to do it?

That's a good question ROKMAN, although it does seem that 1 element of a squad assaulting while 2 other elements of the same squad suppress the enemy with fire still seems to stand (I think). But what should the size, weapons, and composition of each of these elements be? And should they all be the same? Personally I think they should probably be all the same, but I'm open to better ideas. I'm not completely opposed to 6 men in each element, but I'm not convinced either; I think 4-5 is probably best. Let's see what others think.

Cavguy

10-29-2007, 08:31 PM

That's a good question ROKMAN, although it does seem that 1 element of a squad assaulting while 2 other elements of the same squad suppress the enemy with fire still seems to stand (I think). But what should the size, weapons, and composition of each of these elements be? And should they all be the same? Personally I think they should probably be all the same, but I'm open to better ideas. I'm not completely opposed to 6 men in each element, but I'm not convinced either; I think 4-5 is probably best. Let's see what others think.

I'd say any discussion focusing on current operational experience with squad configs his highly subjective - rarely is any squad at full strength in OIF - R&R leave, injuries, details, and other factors ensure that any unit will be operating at about 80% strength on a given day. Therefore, your fire team can be 3-6 people depending on the place and time.

When I commanded, I found the best platoon organization to be a mech-motorized/infantry hybrid. Two armored vehicles (tanks/brads/113's - not HMMWV's) carrying two teams of infantry had the firepower and flexibility to accomplish almost any task in the *OIF* enviornment. For that reason I task organized to where each platoon consisted of an armored section and an infantry section, with enough transport to go around. It had the ability to maneuver and to dismount for tasks such as building clearing or hasty maneuver on an enemy.

Pitched battles lasting more than 5-10 minutes and involving more than 10 AIF are extremely rare. The enemy knows that if he stays around longer than about 10 minutes our reinforcements, air. and other firepower assets will quickly reduce his lifespan. Massing more than 10 provides us a big target. Therefore, preferred enemy ttp is a violent, rapid ambush by a small force and a quick withdrawal into the urban jungle after hopefully creating casualties and provoking the soldiers into incurring some non-combatant damage.

Norfolk

10-29-2007, 08:45 PM

I'd say any discussion focusing on current operational experience with squad configs his highly subjective - rarely is any squad at full strength in OIF - R&R leave, injuries, details, and other factors ensure that any unit will be operating at about 80% strength on a given day. Therefore, your fire team can be 3-6 people depending on the place and time.

When I commanded, I found the best platoon organization to be a mech-motorized/infantry hybrid. Two armored vehicles (tanks/brads/113's - not HMMWV's) carrying two teams of infantry had the firepower and flexibility to accomplish almost any task in the *OIF* enviornment. For that reason I task organized to where each platoon consisted of an armored section and an infantry section, with enough transport to go around. It had the ability to maneuver and to dismount for tasks such as building clearing or hasty maneuver on an enemy.

Cavguy, if you can give an estimate here, what do you think is a good proportion of infantry to armour in urban fighting? Did you find that you'd have liked to have some more infantry, or did you have what you felt you needed?

Ken White

10-29-2007, 08:50 PM

... If that is the case then why are some Marine squad leaders in Iraq are splitting their squads into two teams of 6 Marines each?
. . .

One of my best Marine Platoon Sergeants told me he did it on Okinawa because he had no faith in his youngest Team Leader. I saw people who had done that in Korea, generally for the same reason. I also saw those who refused to do it and either made the weak guy perform or made him a BAR man and put a sharp Private in as the Team Leader.

The latter would seem to me to be the better solution from the standpoint of accountability and leader selection and training. The former will work; the Squad Leader has -- or should have -- the flexibility to organize within reason the way he wishes.

I also saw a guy in Korea who had three fire teams; one with a really good shooter and one BAR; one with two BARs. Those two were his split base of fire. The third Fire Team was the assault element of five Riflemen (including one de jure Team Leader as a Snuffy) under his best Corporal. His rationale was that accurate and automatic fire kept the bad guys down and the BAR Men weren't as mobile and flexible as riflemen. He went where he thought he needed to be at the time.

Wouldn't have done it that way myself but whatever works.

Cavguy

10-29-2007, 08:56 PM

The former will work; the Squad Leader has -- or should have -- the flexibility to organize within reason the way he wishes .... His rationale was that accurate and automatic fire kept the bad guys down and the BAR Men weren't as mobile and flexible as riflemen. He went where he thought he needed to be at the time.

Wouldn't have done it that way myself but whatever works.

Amazing how we're having this big debate on proper squad/team tactics.

Seems to me that the NCO SL's and TL's through the wars have pretty quickly adapted "standard" techniques to whatever works best for their particular areas and leadership compentencies - and perhaps there isn't a "right" solution. Hmmmm .... amazing discovery!

Debating how many MG's in a squad can be enlightening, but the real question is whether you're keeping the organization flexible enough to adapt to the enviornment.

Ken White

10-29-2007, 09:19 PM

Amazing how we're having this big debate on proper squad/team tactics.

Seems to me that the NCO SL's and TL's through the wars have pretty quickly adapted "standard" techniques to whatever works best for their particular areas and leadership compentencies - and perhaps there isn't a "right" solution. Hmmmm .... amazing discovery!

Debating how many MG's in a squad can be enlightening, but the real question is whether you're keeping the organization flexible enough to adapt to the enviornment.

Or, far more importantly, training the NCOS and the troops as best we can to do their jobs...:(

Norfolk

10-29-2007, 11:53 PM

[QUOTE=Ken White;29680]Or, far more importantly, training the NCOS and the troops as best we can to do their jobs...:([/QUOTE

Yes, the single best solution of all.:)

Unfortunately that would mean the Army having to pull more or less a Vandergriff; how can you get Congress and the top brass to go to a 6-month infantry syllabus, just for an ordinary rifleman, let alone for the NCO's and officers, when you've got people like the unidentified 3-Star spouting off about how firepower completely dispenses with the need for any but the most rudimentary training? As Patton himself said, poor-quality infantry depends on firepower, and the American infantry needs all it can get.

With the Army haemoraging so much of its junior officers and NCO's and recruiting standards falling considerably, any future attempts to improve quality and training are rendered much less effective. And this shows up most clearly at the minor-unit level, where the real fighting is done.

This isn't a deliberate slight to the US Army, which is certainly better now than in any previous war with the possible exception of the Army that fought Desert Storm. And the other English-speaking Armies (never mind others) aren't nearly as well off in that regard as they could be (or even were until recent years) either, but it just goes to show how entrenched the mentality against really comprehensive training and the development of thinking and initiative in all ranks and grades is.

And that of course, was why the German Rifle Squad was so successful. Whether it was the Panzer-Grenadier Squad with a dozen men and two GPMGs, or the Infanterie Squad with ten men and one GPMG, the mental agility and personal initiative of all ranks, from ordinary rifleman to squad leader, gave the German Squad a tactical edge over its opponents that it never really quite lost. The squad leader knew what had to be done, he task-organized his squad to fit the tactical situation using what he had, and just did it. Other than that the Squad Leader controlled the fire of whatever machine guns the squad had, and that the Assistant Squad Leader led whatever assault the squad made, the squad was wonderfully fluid; a sort of tactical chameleon that assumed whatever form that suited the situation best. And it worked.

Cavguy's right; some of us have been looking at the wrong things when thinking about the rifle squad. I still like the USMC Squad though...:)

Rifleman

10-30-2007, 02:45 AM

I found an article and thought it fit well with this thread. It's about African soldiers from the Tutsi tribe in Rwanda and the way they conduct a double envelopment at the squad level.

The key to Tutsi's (Rwandese Patriotic Army) tactics was the double envelopment; a tactic which embraces the fundamentals of manoeuvre warfare. The double envelopment is seldom used in warfare, but when it has been successfully executed, the enemy force is ultimately annihilated. The use of manoeuvre, speed, surprise and the application and concentration of firepower enables a force to:

- Surround An Opponent

- Attack Simultaneously From All Sides

- Cut Off Any Escape Routes

- Prevent Reinforcement, and

- Demoralize the Enemy

History offers several examples of successful double envelopment attacks like the Carthaginians over the Romans at Cannae, the Zulus over the British at Isandlawana, and the Russians over the Germans at Stalingrad. A key feature of these battles was that in most cases the victor attacked with equal and sometimes with inferior strength or equipment to ultimately destroy the defending enemy forces. The double envelopment, properly executed, can succeed without the benefit of a traditional three to one superiority deemed essential for the more conventional and attritional attack we have adhered to in our doctrine in the recent past.

Article here: http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a397a16354784.htm

Ken White

10-30-2007, 03:39 AM

With very strong emphasis on the second 'T' (quality of own troops) and the 'E' (quantity of bad guys) in that order. The first 'T' is also a determinant; Regardless, I wouldn't advise that on plains, desert or anywhere with more than a 30-50m line of fire...

(The subject line converts my all caps to upper and lower??? I hate smart A%$ programs... :) )

jcustis

10-30-2007, 12:57 PM

...and Norfolk and others are hitting it on the head. Regardless of a whether one has a 9-man, 11-man, or 13-man squad, the SL will have more in the way of plays (instead of up the middle) when he has good-caliber training.

Once you couple training with the appropriate number of exercises and scenarios, the SL can recognize the pattern of what he sees before him, or at least what he is about to face, then task organize appropriately before he crosses the line of departure.

This business of C2 over a large squad can be an easily managed tasked considering the current range of comm sets available to a SL and his TLs. I think we've satisfactorily moved out of the experimentation stage with sets like the Marconi Personal Role Radio and it is being employed with great effect on the battlefield. It takes comm discipline, no doubt, but I think on the whole a SL can control a patrol, attack, and defense with greater ease.

In my humble analysis, the A76 radio carried by Rhodesian teams went a long way towards reducing fratricide because the commander in the circling K-Car had contact with the moving parts on the ground below, and those parts could talk between themselves.

The Marine Corps just recently broke out of the hamstringing effect from having only 1 VHF radio at the platoon level around the 2002-2003 timeframe. Anyone remember the piece of #### PRC-68? Now I can watch a scout section leader (running four 3-4 man teams) maneuver from a movement to contact formation and transition into a hasty attack without raising his voice save to control the rate of fire of the SBF's weapons. We were relegated to the use of hand-held ground or aerial pyrotechnic signals, whistles, etc., back in the day, so yes, squad level fire and maneuver was a dangerous proposition.

Perhaps the best way to resolve the winner in this discussion would be to instrument a light infantry squad each from the Army and Marine Corps and run them through a series of experiments. After the first round, shake things up and have the Army squad run through in a 13-man configuration, and the Marine Corps shrinks down to the Army size. Are we going to get any empirical evidence out of it? Most likely not, but I suspect that comparably trained SLs will be able to achieve certain results based on a wide-range of variables that include a little bit training, a bit flexibility to task-organize on the fly, and a bit doctrine.

I need to sit down tonight and finish that second, more lengthy article.

10-30-2007, 02:03 PM

I found an article and thought it fit well with this thread. It's about African soldiers from the Tutsi tribe in Rwanda and the way they conduct a double envelopment at the squad level.
The bottom line from where I sit is that a double envelopment works because the losing side commits some major errors in deploying its forces. And that would be the case whether we are talking about squad tactics or operational deployments at the level of an Army Group. Create a salient or leave a flank unguarded and you are just asking to be taken in defilade from the flank or rear.

The better lesson to learn is that to be successful in any level of engagement, quality, timely reconnaissance is a must. As Ken White noted, it is a question of METT-TC (even though Ken left off the C), with everything after Mission (including that pesky Civilian situation) being a very important factor in deciding how to achieve that mission.

I suspect that for every successful double envelopment, there are probably a host of failed attempts, often with disasterous results for the attacker. The Zulus were successsful once against the British and failed noticeably at least two other times in large combat efforts--Ulundi and Rorke's Drift.

Allegedly, the German General Staff was enamored of Cannae from the time it was the Prussian Staff. Attempts to use double envelopments caused more losses than vistories in both World Wars. While the Russians were successful at Stalingrad, in the Battle of Berlin they tried another double envelopment without success. In fact, their casualties were phenomenal. I suspect the oly reason they succeded was because FM Schoerner, the German Army Group Center Commander, failed to commit his reserve in a timely way, which allowed Konev to turn the flank of Heinrici's position on the Seelow Heights.
(Sorry for dragging big battles into a discussion of squad tactics, but the principles are the same IMO)

Norfolk

10-30-2007, 03:38 PM

rather than purely the tactical genius of the Cannae'r. Both Ken and wm are right about this. The PLA Rifle Squad (3 "Cells", with 1 AR and 2 RPGs in the Squad) also tends to favour the double-envelopment (as well as some other similar East Asian Squads); the RPA Squad is very similar (minus one RPG, and with the Squad Leader integrated into one of the teams). But this is usually made possible by the close (often very close) terrain that tends to mask heavy automatic weapons fire from more than one element (much of East Asia is rather tight terrain). Otherwise, the double-envelopment is useful on a cut-off, rather incompetent enemy who has no place to go, and no reasonable prospect of relief.

Rifleman, I first read this article about ten years ago in the Infantry Journal, and this is where I first began to comprehend how a 3-team Squad could operate. The original article had nice illustrations, but the Infantry Journal (along with a whole lot else) was removed from public Internet access a few years ago. The author, B.P. Beardsley, went to NDHQ and then NATO HQ not long after this. Tom asked for this article on the "Who Are the Great Generals?" Thread a few weeks ago, given his Africa background. I find this to be, nevertheless, a fascinating article.

Anyone remembering carrying the PRC-25 (I prefer not to, myself)?

The WWII German Rifle Squad never used Fire Teams or Battle Drill; instead it cultivated the independence of mind and ability to learn of its troops (eveyone trained to think and to assume leadership two levels above their own). The Deutchesheer didn't have the minor-unit tactical problems (or controversies) that other Armies have had all along (barring the PLA and USMC and a couple of others). If we're going to look at the Rifle Squad/Section clearly, we have to start with the human factors, then move on to the organization and the shiny kit.

That does not mean that we will be giving up on a 3-team squad for example; just that it means we have to take a long hard look at the kind of man making up that squad, and what he's expected to do and what he's expected to face - then deal with the rest. Thinking about the "German Way" - amongst others - may be a good way to approach this.

Rank amateur

10-30-2007, 03:45 PM

The bottom line from where I sit is that a double envelopment works because the losing side commits some major errors in deploying its forces.

Often true, but not necessarily: cavalry, mechanized units, and even the youngest, fastest Zulus, can encircle slow moving "grunts."
Second, all warfare is based upon deception, so the mistake can be forced.
Third, the Zulus were armed primarily with swords and spears, so they deserve major props for their victory. Everyone who says "we can't be defeated because of our superior training and weapons" should be forced to read about Isandlawana.

Ken White

10-30-2007, 04:55 PM

...
. . .
As Ken White noted, it is a question of METT-TC (even though Ken left off the C), with everything after Mission (including that pesky Civilian situation) being a very important factor in deciding how to achieve that mission.
. . .
(Sorry for dragging big battles into a discussion of squad tactics, but the principles are the same IMO)

Anyone who thinks a Squad Leader in combat is going to devote much attention to that newly added 'C' is perhaps an optimist... :(

(Aside from the fact that I thought the populace was a part of the 'terrain' ;) )

Remember I'm a Neanderthal. I am very firmly convinced that a lot of todays terminology and acronyms are short sighted, cheesy and unhelpful; unhelpful to the extent they're going to get people killed unnecessarily in rare cases and are going to send very bad messages in many cases.

I agree with you that the principles used in big battles equate to those at Squad (or Platoon) level but the practice is vastly different and one must be very careful not to try conflating the two. Been my observation that such conflation in discussion can lead some to believe that a minor Cannae is possible with a nine man squad... :wry:

jcustis

10-30-2007, 05:21 PM

I posted this on another board and didn't get much response. I'm curious to know what people here might think of it.

Well rifleman, if the number of responses here is any measure of success, I guess this proves many of us really miss our younger years. :D

Rifleman

10-30-2007, 05:23 PM

Ken White

10-30-2007, 06:55 PM

Ken White,

A curiosity question: if you had to pick just one confict, between WWI and today, to study the rifle squad in combat for lessons learned which one would it be?

I was thinking Korea might provide the broadest range of examples.

Your thoughts, please?

Korea had it all. Full bore conventional war engaging in both defense and offense; in both cases with both very rapid long range attacking elements on both sides and with agonizingly slow frontal attack slogging and including night and day attacks by both forces. There were COIN ops, static warfare and extensive patrolling (both combat and reconnaissance, short and long range). It included raids and prisoner snatch missions, combat outposts, economy of force ops, trench clearing, urban warfare, phib landings, heliborne assualts; the full range of missions.

Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq and other operations all have some of those things but not at the extent, length and intensity that prevailed in Korea. There's also more specialization in VN and today, taking units out of some mission sets.

Far more importantly, there is a very significant difference then and now -- then sending a squad on a totally independent mission and trusting the Squad Leader to make decisions was the norm. I know that by the late 60s for a variety of reasons (mostly very flawed personnel policy) such independence was not acceptable to many in senior positions in the Army.

My perception today is that such independence is actively and strongly discouraged if not explicitly forbidden. That IMO is criminal malfeasance. I cannot in good conscience blame the Bn and below commanders, they grew up in a system that discourages that -- I can and do blame their Bosses who inherited that tendency but fail to see the errors in the approach. Before someone flames me for that and points out that Squads are patrolling in both theater (finally... :wry: ), ask the question; "Would I agree to sending a Squad on a three day mission in the other guys territory out of artillery range and with possibly spotty communication?" If the answer is 'no,' don't flame. :)

It is also tacit acknowledgment that our 'doctrine' is flawed and our training is not adequate. That is really criminal... :mad:

10-31-2007, 12:54 AM

Anyone who thinks a Squad Leader in combat is going to devote much attention to that newly added 'C' is perhaps an optimist... :(

(Aside from the fact that I thought the populace was a part of the 'terrain' ;) )

Remember I'm a Neanderthal. I am very firmly convinced that a lot of todays terminology and acronyms are short sighted, cheesy and unhelpful; unhelpful to the extent they're going to get people killed unnecessarily in rare cases and are going to send very bad messages in many cases.

I agree with you that the principles used in big battles equate to those at Squad (or Platoon) level but the practice is vastly different and one must be very careful not to try conflating the two. Been my observation that such conflation in discussion can lead some to believe that a minor Cannae is possible with a nine man squad... :wry:

In a COIN fight, I suspect that every swingin' Richard out there ought to be thinking about the C in METT-TC a whole lot and their squad leaders,PSGs, and 1SGs better be making sure they do. The NCO chain is about making sure troops do the right things and not get put in jail for letting their "testosterone" do the thinking for them.

I agree that practical application of the principles vary with the size of the organization and the size of the fight, but you can't train folks without some basic set of principles to apply situationally. "Alfa Fire Team lays down a base of fire while Bravo maneuvers right to take the high ground" is just as much an application of mass, maneuver, and economy of force as is "1 ID makes the main effort on the left with 3ACR screening to the right. 2ID and 1AD follow and support to exploit the penetration by 1 ID. 210 FA BDE is DS to 1ID, o/o DS to 1AD."

Ken White

10-31-2007, 01:43 AM

In a COIN fight, I suspect that every swingin' Richard out there ought to be thinking about the C in METT-TC a whole lot and their squad leaders,PSGs, and 1SGs better be making sure they do. The NCO chain is about making sure troops do the right things and not get put in jail for letting their "testosterone" do the thinking for them.

I agree that practical application of the principles vary with the size of the organization and the size of the fight, but you can't train folks without some basic set of principles to apply situationally. "Alfa Fire Team lays down a base of fire while Bravo maneuvers right to take the high ground" is just as much an application of mass, maneuver, and economy of force as is "1 ID makes the main effort on the left with 3ACR screening to the right. 2ID and 1AD follow and support to exploit the penetration by 1 ID. 210 FA BDE is DS to 1ID, o/o DS to 1AD."

Huh? Not just restricted to COIN, watching out for civilians applies to all levels of war, I'd think. ;)

They do. Think about civilians, that is. But at Squad level, it's an individual thing -- I mean the civilians in view on one hand and the individual actions of Joe on the other hand. If Joe and his boss are well trained, it will all go well. It's an action thing, not a planning parameter. Wheras at higher echelons it's a group and planning thing, a thinking thing...

If the kids are trained well, they'll do well. If they are not -- or if someone blows it and flips out (and anyone can flip out given the wrong triggers at the right time) then all the harrumphing about the chain of command -- officer and NCO -- "not doing their job" is immaterial and is nothing but, in all too many cases, after the fact CYA.

If they're trained well, they're less likely to err and they'll also spot and the chain will remove the likely weak links. Sadly my son tried to do that to two kids who worked for him in Afghanistan last year, his CO agreed -- Bn overruled and the kids stayed until one got hurt and got some others hurt by failing to react in time while the other wigged out.

That strikes me as a case where the NCOs were doing their job and so were the Company Grades but they ran into a Field Grade let down...

I've seen that too many places and too times over too many years. It is simply not smart. :(

Moving right along,

Unfortunately, what you find out at Squad level is that those doctrinal principles sound fine and work well on paper -- or even in a MILES engagement. OTOH, when there are a lot of real caps popping, that goes by the wayside. Really. It becomes a rock to rock or tree to tree or room to room effort in disjointed gaggles and Team members get mixed up, the SAW gunner gets hit, Murphy is everywhere. Just isn't as neat and pretty as it is in the book.

Yet, the Company can still say, honestly, that "First Platoon executed fire and maneuver and cleared the objective at 1545Z."

Consider also that if you are a Division OpO, Drowning Creek at Camp McKall you will not even notice in your planning; at Bde level you may or may not notice it, probably not but you almost certainly will not think of it as an obstacle. Nor, likely, will the Bn S3.

As a Company Commander, you'll note that it IS an obstacle and as a Platoon Leader, you will flat know it's an obstacle -- and a significant one.

Echelons matter. Significantly. Your stated tenet is one of the major flaws in our doctrine today; all people of the same rank and specialty are interchangeable (they aren't) and all doctrine is echelon immaterial -- it flat is not.

Ron has asked several times about factors at the Operational level. We don't do it well because we try to stretch tactical doctrine upward and strategic thought (we have no strategic doctrine) down.

As the Actress said to the Bishop, size matters... :wry:

10-31-2007, 11:56 AM

Unfortunately, what you find out at Squad level is that those doctrinal principles sound fine and work well on paper -- or even in a MILES engagement. OTOH, when there are a lot of real caps popping, that goes by the wayside. Really. It becomes a rock to rock or tree to tree or room to room effort in disjointed gaggles and Team members get mixed up, the SAW gunner gets hit, Murphy is everywhere. Just isn't as neat and pretty as it is in the book.This is true at all levels. I suspect we would all agree to the old saw that no plan survives first contact. My point was that some things are, or should be, pretty much second nature: things like performing immediate action on a jammed weapon, assaulting directly into an ambush, getting fuel, ammunition resupply, and fire support well forward but still in a position to be coverd and able to una$$ the AO quickly all apply as basic principles that get tailored continuously as the situation unfolds.

Consider also that if you are a Division OpO, Drowning Creek at Camp McKall you will not even notice in your planning; at Bde level you may or may not notice it, probably not but you almost certainly will not think of it as an obstacle. Nor, likely, will the Bn S3.

As a Company Commander, you'll note that it IS an obstacle and as a Platoon Leader, you will flat know it's an obstacle -- and a significant one. Fact of the matter is that Drowning Creek ought to be significant to all levels of the command. How siginificant varies by echelon, but if the Division is dependent on 1-A/1-509 crossing it to seize an objective that is the lynchpin to the division's plan (and the Div 2/3 planners need to look at that level quite often), it needs to loom much larger at higher echelons. I remember having signifcant discussions with my ADC (M) about the terrain in the North German plain--we actually grappled for hours with 1:50,000 map sheets of most of the area, debating such things as how easy it would be to execute a division level or higher delaying action against the Group of Soviet Forces, Germany. Streams that didn't look like obstacles to a Bde-sized force turned out to be significant issues when we started talking about getting an M-88 across them to recover mobility kills or a HEMMT fueler forward to the tank company task organized to a mech bn Task Force. Failure by senior planners to view the problems that could be caused by using one narrow road and a blown bridge (things a good company plan would have noted as issues) had a lot to do with the Arnhem debacle in WWII.

Echelons matter. Significantly. Your stated tenet is one of the major flaws in our doctrine today; all people of the same rank and specialty are interchangeable (they aren't) and all doctrine is echelon immaterial -- it flat is not. Agree conmpletely. I think you missed my point. I never argued that all people of a given grade and/or speciality are interchangeable. Rather I urged us to start with some common basis of training that could be expanded and modified--a building block approach. We don't start our kids out reading War and Peace nor do we expect our budding linguists to be able to explain the grammar of Farsi after a week at DLI. We build to those capabilities through a series of steps.

As the Actress said to the Bishop, size matters... :wry:

As the poet Andrew Marvell said "To his Coy Mistress"

Had we but world enough, and time,
This coyness, lady, were no crime.
We would sit down and think which way
To walk, and pass our long love's day
But we have not enough of either so we need some shortcuts to get us trained to do what needs to be done a little faster.

Ken White

10-31-2007, 06:10 PM

This is true at all levels... all apply as basic principles that get tailored continuously as the situation unfolds.

Agreed.

Fact of the matter is that Drowning Creek ought to be significant to all levels of the command. How siginificant varies by echelon, but if the Division is dependent on 1-A/1-509 crossing it to seize an objective that is the lynchpin to the division's plan (and the Div 2/3 planners need to look at that level quite often), it needs to loom much larger at higher echelons. I remember having signifcant discussions with my ADC (M) about the terrain in the North German plain--we actually grappled for hours with 1:50,000 map sheets of most of the area, debating such things as how easy it would be to execute a division level or higher delaying action against the Group of Soviet Forces, Germany. Streams that didn't look like obstacles to a Bde-sized force turned out to be significant issues when we started talking about getting an M-88 across them to recover mobility kills or a HEMMT fueler forward to the tank company task organized to a mech bn Task Force. Failure by senior planners to view the problems that could be caused by using one narrow road and a blown bridge (things a good company plan would have noted as issues) had a lot to do with the Arnhem debacle in WWII.

Strongly disagree. I'd suggest a Div planning for ops on the north German plain should be using a 1:100K map or even a 1:250K-- we have a bad tendency to over control and over interfere. Why would a Div staff O be worried about an M-88? Three echelons, max. That means the Div should be pondering affairs at no lower than Bn level. We fought WW II failrly successfully that way, did reasonably well in Korea that way and then in Viet Nam learned to over control simply because the Staffs were too big and the Helicopter provided the capability. Capability does not provide a need. We have picked up a lot of bad habits in the last 40 years.

On Arnhem, I'll bet you money that the Guards Armored Brigade surfaced that problem to XXX Corps and was told to press on. That mindset, that the senior Hq planners know best is a killer, pure and simple.

Agree conmpletely. I think you missed my point. I never argued that all people of a given grade and/or speciality are interchangeable...

I know, I was referring to our archaic personnel system and tying that to our equally archaic doctrine and only slightly less archaic training institutions and dogma.

Not least the fallacy that "we cannot afford to train a person for other than their next job." Ludicrous. When I worked at the Armor School, I used to ask the AOAC students how many of them had been either a Bn/Bde Staff principal or a Co/Trp Cdr before they came to the Advanced Course. Seven years, two classes a year and the average was over 80%... :(

If we're going to send people into combat, we need to train them to two levels above their current job because the probability -- if not certainty -- is that they will rise to that level in combat without benefit of further training. The Army knows this but refuses to decrease hardware emphasis because in our flawed system, hardware means flags and space...

Rather I urged us to start with some common basis of training that could be expanded and modified--a building block approach. We don't start our kids out reading War and Peace nor do we expect our budding linguists to be able to explain the grammar of Farsi after a week at DLI. We build to those capabilities through a series of steps.

Agree -- with the caveat that my contention is that our current doctrine does not do that. It takes Div practices and tries to scale them down and that does not work.

Divisions are not good creatures, they probably should be consigned to history. Consider that we have not truly fought Divisions in all our history other than in the North African and SW Asia deserts -- the terrain lends itself to Divisions. Even in NW Europe in WW II, it was an RCT War, so was the Pacific theater and so was Korea. Viet Nam was a Battalion war and, in good units, a Company war (that should have been a Platoon war but our Platoons were not well enough trained to be allowed to do that...).

Read Charles MacDonald's "A Time for Trumpets" and discover that in the Battle of the Bulge, most all the LTC and below organizations did the best they could with the situation; it was at at the upper echelons that the majority of screwups occurred.

Building blocks are needed, no question -- we just do not do it well. :o

But we have not enough of either so we need some shortcuts to get us trained to do what needs to be done a little faster.

Strongly disagree. I heard that for 45 years in and around the Army and for that same 45 years I watched a lot of time and effort wasted on sometimes gross stupidity and on over educating senior people and undertraining the folks who get M88s across creeks.

The Armed Forces of the US still manage all too often to cram two hours worth of instruction into eight hours, have grown unwilling in may cases to trust subordinates (because said subordinates are inadequately trained??? :wry:), are massively into micromanagement and are too frequently terrified that something will go wrong. Risk avoidance and combat are mutually incompatible. Risk and 'shortcuts' are not the same thing. Shortcuts get people killed. Risk does not -- it just harms careers.

In reviewing this, it sounds churlish. Isn't meant to be and I'm certainly not attacking you or your thoughts. It's just that this is a long term sore subject with me. We waste a lot of potential and the bureaucratic and sclerotic approach seems to be getting worse instead of better. I've watched micro management and poor training kill too many people to accept either gracefully. Sorry and sincerely, no offense intended.

11-01-2007, 02:16 PM

The Armed Forces of the US still manage all too often to cram two hours worth of instruction into eight hours, have grown unwilling in may cases to trust subordinates (because said subordinates are inadequately trained??? :wry:), are massively into micromanagement and are too frequently terrified that something will go wrong. Risk avoidance and combat are mutually incompatible. Risk and 'shortcuts' are not the same thing. Shortcuts get people killed. Risk does not -- it just harms careers.

In reviewing this, it sounds churlish. Isn't meant to be and I'm certainly not attacking you or your thoughts. It's just that this is a long term sore subject with me. We waste a lot of potential and the bureaucratic and sclerotic approach seems to be getting worse instead of better. I've watched micro management and poor training kill too many people to accept either gracefully. Sorry and sincerely, no offense intended.
Ken,
Agree. I did not mean to propose that we cut training short, Because other funding priorities (which we both seem to agree are misplaced) have mandated curtailled training, we need a risk management strategy. This strategy must mitigate as much as possible of the risk that results from cutting training. Rather than sidetrack this thread on squad org, tactics, and tng, I sent you a PM on other issues from your reply to my post.

Rifleman

11-02-2007, 04:45 PM

Okay, we seem to be agreed that big squads/sections are the best option, and some good ideas about how to best organize them have been advanced. We know that we would like big squads or three team squads to be TOE but here's the reality: the Army light infantry units can't do that. They're going to be stuck with nine men (on paper) in two balanced fire teams. That won't change anytime soon, so, what to do, what to do..... :confused:

I think three options exist for the squad and platoon leader: 1) leave things as is, try to employ two balanced fire teams as much as possible; 2) reorganize the squads by placing both SAWS in one fire team, or removing one SAW if the squad is understrength, leaving a suppression team and a clearing team; 3) break up the fourth (weapons) squad and feed the men into the three rifle squads in an attempt to achieve something close to the three team Marine Corps squad, or, at least the old Army squad with two big fire teams.

I like option three the best. I'd bet that a machine gun team is usually attached directly to the lead squad for most operations now, making it, defacto, a three team squad anyway.

If it really is a "Three block war" in built up areas, then squads are probably the key level. Organizing for the platoon leader to employ a weapons squad of machine gun and rocket teams seems to be planning for a more open style of combat with conventional attacks in a German forest, grazing fire in the defense, etc.

And yes, I just had to be the 100th poster on this thread. ;)

slapout9

11-02-2007, 11:56 PM

Hi Folks, I found a WW2 US Intell translation of a German rifle squad tactics manual. I lost the link but if Stan reads his PM I may be able to get it back, needless to say it is very interesting, for one the squad works as a unit no concept of fireteams at all:eek:

Stan

11-03-2007, 12:08 AM

jcustis

11-03-2007, 12:09 AM

If the Army had to work within the manning constraints, I'd go for option #3 as well. Build the habitual relationship with those heavier weapons elements in the first three squads, and roll with it!

slapout9

11-03-2007, 12:17 AM

Here it is. The German Squad in Combat

http://ahecwebdds.carlisle.army.mil/Data/tmp/linearize_objYAsFmXks3WgmXh9DXXTYBjpHeRrj04STIHw+H aHE8CGo5E3lnZvi8WV+Sih0SjGTtvtfEgO60_sLHep+SQTTvQC FAsLTddoGimPjBj9mK09PAslnIxyQ__.pdf

jcustis

11-03-2007, 12:36 AM

Stan and slapout, thanks for digging that up. I have a little light reading over the weekend. As if I don't have enough honey do stuff in the queue.

Stan

11-03-2007, 12:39 AM

Stan and slapout, thanks for digging that up. I have a little light reading over the weekend. As if I don't have enough honey do stuff in the queue.

Hmmm, how did you fix Slap's link :cool:

There was literally a ton of great reading there, then I ran across GORTEX6 :eek:

EDIT: Honey-Do's are normally rewarded ;)

slapout9

11-03-2007, 12:43 AM

Stan

11-03-2007, 12:47 AM

Stan, I fixed it while I was out there in cyber-space.
jcustis,Norfolk,Rifleman,Ken White you guys will love the manual. You might not agree with it but it is interesting stuff especially the part where they tell them yell HuuRah!! no I ain't kidding the Germans thought this up...I couldn't believe when I read that.

Are you tryin' to say that JC and the rest are your sock puppets :eek: You know that's a really big No-No on forums and it also gets confusing talking to yourself :D

Norfolk

11-03-2007, 12:49 AM

If this thread was a TV series, there'd be a big do and probably syndication. And as the creator of this long-running piece, you'd probably be up for some sort of award.:D

But this is Small Wars Council, where we have to think small (and dream big).

Before I say what should be done with the existing 9-man Rifle Squad in the US Army, I'll just say that there's only so much you can do with what you actually have. If you're not given more to work with, then past a certain point, there's nothing more that you can do to improve what you can do. Quality can only take you so far; sufficient quantity is necessary too.

As far as the existing 9-man Squad goes, I say get rid of the Fire Teams and maybe even drop Battle Drill altogether.

First, the Fire Teams. Since the 9-man Squad isn't going to get any bigger, go the German way and put both LMGs under the Squad Leader's control,
and give both him and the Assistant Squad Leader the Underslung Grenade Launchers. In the attack, the Squad Leader will decide on the spot whether it's better to mass both LMGs under his control and let the ASL lead most of the riflemen, or give one LMG to the ASL and split the squad into two balanced teams, or however the SL sees fit.

With only 9 men, don't tie his hands behind his back with doctrine that may not fit the tactical situtation he's facing. Even when he sees fit to use two balanced teams in the attack, it may only be to get the Squad close enough to get proper suppressive fires down on the enemy, and then he releases the ASL and the riflemen to get to the assault position while he and the machine gunners keep the enenmy's heads down.

Second, the two-Fire Team organization coupled with Battle Drill can lead to problems. On the one hand, taken together, they can provide basic TTP's for the conduct of infantry minor unit actions, making it easier for Squad Leader and Squaddie alike to figure out what should be done and what their personal role in that is. On the other hand, rote memorization and indoctrination in Battle Drill coupled to a rigid two-Fire Team organization institutionalizes mediocrity in general and predictable, unimaginative, and not necessarily fully responsive actions or reactions in tactical situations.

In other words, the plodders who otherwise wouldn't be able to figure out what to do can just follow a checklist so to speak, a generic prescription for a generic siutation, and thus can appear to be tactically effective (until the shooting really starts). Conversely, truly effective, thinking, and capable persons find themselves not helped but hindered by doctrine that in practice unnecessarily constrains their options and compells them to take actions that may not be genuinely appropriate to the situation.

When the British Army introduced Battle Drill early in WWII, the same Field Service Regulations that described them also carried the warning that they were not intended to be a substitute for the tactical judgement of battlefield leaders and soldiers; they were simply intended to be training aids from which soldiers and leaders would have weaned themselves off of towards the end of their basic trade training. Of course, what has in fact occurred in practice is the replacement of tactical judgement by rote drill. The US Army formally adopted Battle Drill in the mid-1950's, and at the same time it formally adopted the Fire Team, with two per Rifle Squad.

Thus all the funny business ever since. The Commonwealth Armies only began to adopt the two-Fire Team Rifle Section starting in the late 1970's, and by the 1980's it was the standard. The German Army has recently adopted the two Fire-Team Rifle Squad as well, with 10 men per squad and 1 MG-4 5.56mm LMG per Fire Team. I haven't heard so far, but I suspect that may adopt Battle Drill now too.

The aforementioned is one of the reasons the offensive tactics of the present-day Rifle Squad are so fixated on the Frontal Attack; it requires a minimum of brainpower and a maximum of firepower to undertake. That said, there are a lot of reasons that the Frontal Attack is more often than not necessary: the ground doesn't provide enough cover and concealment; you're conducting mechanized ops and it's pretty obvious to both you and the enemy that you're coming and they're just waiting for you to pile out of your tracks; there's just not the time to perform a slower but less costly other-than-Frontal attack and you have to attack now, otherwise the enemy will have reinforced his position making it harder to attack a little later; etc.

But in those cases when the Frontal Attack can be foregone, the two-Fire Team Squad and Battle Drill shouldn't be allowed to conspire against alternatives to the Frontal Attack. The German Army in WWII, as I have already mentioned before in this thread, never adopted Battle Drill and never formally adopted Fire Teams; if a Squad at any time split into two balanced teams, it was only because the tactical situation at that place and time made it appropriate to do so. The Squad Leader was free to develop and use his best tactical judgment to fight the Squad as best as he saw fit.

The Fire Team concept and Battle Drill have become crutches with which to prop up weak leaders and weak soldiers who otherwise would be clearly seen to be unable to adapt to the tactical situation at hand; at the same time, by tying capable leader's and soldier's hands with doctrine that has morphed into rigid practice, it serves to obscure those whose tactical judgement is otherwise sound.

And so, I say that, given all this and the small size of the 9-man Rifle Squad, get rid of fixed Fire Teams, retain the general rule of thumb that the Squad Leader controls the machine gun fires and the Assistant Squad Leader controls the riflemen, kit out both the SL and ASL with the Grenade Launchers so that they can mark targets and use them against point and area targets as they see fit, and make sure that everyone is trained to think and act two levels above their own and have plenty of field training and practice in realistic conditions so that they all can properly develop and apply their best tactical judgement.

As far as the Rifle Platoon goes, I think the Army should adopt the Marine way of handling heavy weapons, and bring back the Rifle Company Weapons Platoons. The only time Platoons should have MMGs, light mortars, and light ATGMs is when the tactical situation (usually close terrain or very limited visibility in such cases) render Company control of heavy weapons more or less useless; then such weapons may be attached out directly to Platoons, and very rarely to Squads, IMO. Otherwise a good deal of the combined suppressive effects of the heavy weapons are lost or reduced. I'm not in favour of permanent organic heavy weapons at Platoon, let alone attached out to Squads.

I still don't see any substitute for 13-14 man Squads though, with 3 per Platoon.

slapout9

11-03-2007, 12:50 AM

Well Stan hate to bring this up but you were the one that was talking to the Fruit From Russia:D

Norfolk

11-03-2007, 12:53 AM

Stan, I fixed it while I was out there in cyber-space.
jcustis,Norfolk,Rifleman,Ken White you guys will love the manual. You might not agree with it but it is interesting stuff especially the part where they tell them yell HuuRah!! no I ain't kidding the Germans thought this up...I couldn't believe when I read that.

Much obliged slap!:D I've been searching for a piece like this for a long time, and the best I've come up with so far is the 1943 edition of TM-E 30-451 from the CMH. The rest of my knowledge on German infantry tactics has been gleaned from hither and thither. I'm going to have a good read now.:)

jcustis

11-03-2007, 12:56 AM

The aforementioned is one of the reasons the offensive tactics of the present-day Rifle Squad are so fixated on the Frontal Attack; it requires a minimum of brainpower and a maximum of firepower to undertake. That said, there are a lot of reasons that the Frontal Attack is more often than not necessary: the ground doesn't provide enough cover and concealment; you're conducting mechanized ops and it's pretty obvious to both you and the enemy that you're coming and they're just waiting for you to pile out of your tracks; there's just not the time to perform a slower but less costly other-than-Frontal attack and you have to attack now, otherwise the enemy will have reinforced his position making it harder to attack a little later; etc.

An officer whom I consider relatively wise once told me that "at the company level and below, everything is really just a damn frontal attack!" He was making the remark during the garrison years pre-9/11, but his comment still sticks with me to this day.

Rob Thornton

11-03-2007, 12:59 AM

Our BN CDR gave us allot of free reign when we were looking at how to change from being a light BN to Stryker BN - we were encouraged to see what worked from load plans to small unit task organization. I read allot of stuff on the Chindits, the Raider BNs (interesting given they each CDR had his own philosophy), and some other refs like how CAV organizations operated in Vietnam. Within the company we had allot of different capabilities to choose from - I might pair up a rifle platoon with a 60mm mortar team (at the company level you have 60s and 120s) and an MGS vehicle - this was not for a mounted operation, but for a dismounted one where vehicles could not operate - the MGS crew would leave their stryker in a TAA with a cross leveled crew - on the dismounted operation - they were operating as the AT / hardened position team. I might also attach the Sniper team out of an Admin element we created called the Fire Support Platoon consisting of the Company FiST, the Mortar Section and the Sniper Team with the FSO as the PL - sometimes the FS platoon might be assigned and economy of force mission where the FS PL would pair the Sniper team with a couple of FOs and have POF with the 120mm mortars. The mortar section even developed the ability to set up and lay both the 120s and the 60s with some minor cross training and augmentation during the defense.

The PLs picked up on my desire to have them devise solutions to fit the tactical problems based on me giving them the tools, and as such they did the same with their Squad leaders - A rifle squad leader might lead a composite squad that had looked more like a section, but had wider ranging capabilities - I assigned the Platoon to be the company SBF on one mission where the route in was heavily obstacled by the OPFOR and to gain surprise while our ENG attachment cleared the route under my XO we conducted a dismounted infiltration - the SBF platoon wanted additional fire power and dismounted 2 x M2s and carried in about 500rds apiece at night over 1500 meters of ugly, uneven, wet wooded terrain under NVDs in addition to their 6 x M240s using SKEDCOS - whatever the mission - the SSG SLs made it happen - they were the backbone.

I guess the so what to all this is organizations with expanded capabilities and flexible leadership can assess the tactical problem and make it work - the key though is to have those assets available and a willingness to empower the lower tactical echelons to do their job. If you have that, where the capability is resident matters more in regards to ensuring there is enough cross training, personal relationships built on experience in training and trust between small unit leaders. Because of that the company did well - it was built on the shoulders of team and squad leaders. As Ken mentioned on the airborne expeditionary post - given the resources, regular INF BNs and their subordinate organizations can accomplish more then most will give them credit for. A key for our folks was not to let the hardware define what we could and could not do - let the quality of the leadership.

Best, Rob

Stan

11-03-2007, 01:00 AM

Well Stan hate to bring this up but you were the one that was talking to the Fruit From Russia:D

You're gonna pay for that one, Slap !

To whom am I talking to ? Norfolk, is that you :confused:

Norfolk

11-03-2007, 01:05 AM

You're gonna pay for that one, Slap !

To whom am I talking to ? Norfolk, is that you :confused:

I'm right here Stan, but I don't know who you're trying to refer to:confused:, and I sure ain't no Fruit, or even Russian (but I do eat a fair amount of Russian and Ukrainian food). What were you going to say anyway?

I thin' that I just bin' the butt of sum joke!:wry:

Ken White

11-03-2007, 01:11 AM

An officer whom I consider relatively wise once told me that "at the company level and below, everything is really just a damn frontal attack!" He was making the remark during the garrison years pre-9/11, but his comment still sticks with me to this day.

to maneuver, rarely will a Platoon be able to do so and a Squad will almost never be able to do so; so he was a wise man.

That could be changed with better training -- and it is changing to a degree. Without even better training and more trusting of subordinates it'll be a while before we really get there. Possible, though... :cool:

Stan

11-03-2007, 01:31 AM

I'm right here Stan, but I don't know who you're trying to refer to:confused:, and I sure ain't no Fruit, or even Russian (but I do eat a fair amount of Russian and Ukrainian food). What were you going to say anyway?

I thin' that I just bin' the butt of sum joke!:wry:

Sorry about that, Norfolk :o I was having a moment with Slapout...err, he was having one with me ;) These things tend to happen when one is on mids or night shift (both of us are tonite).

A bit of American humor, if you will !

Regards, Stan

Norfolk

11-03-2007, 01:37 AM

Sorry about that, Norfolk :o I was having a moment with Slapout...err, he was having one with me ;) These things tend to happen when one is on mids or night shift (both of us are tonite).

A bit of American humor, if you will !

Regards, Stan

Well Stan, I guess I'll get sufficient revenge by being able to sleep curled up in a warm, soft bed with a cold beer (or two, one for each of you!) to hand while the two of you are slaving away on the graveyard shift.:D

Norfolk

11-10-2007, 01:06 AM

Hi Folks, I found a WW2 US Intell translation of a German rifle squad tactics manual...needless to say it is very interesting, for one the squad works as a unit no concept of fireteams at all:eek:

Amongst other things, the German Squad still used the old "Indian File" (Column/Single File) formation of World War I and besides that, only the Extended Line. Very interesting. I know that the reason why we don't use single file except in very close country is its supposed susceptibility to enfilade fire from machine guns. But the Germans obviously didn't seem to agree there (and they knew as much about machine guns as anyone).

I wonder what this says about our preferred wedge formations and the like when advancing/moving-to-contact? Does the wedge (or other present-day) formation(s) provide real advantages over the old single file? Or is the single file formation used by the German squad in advance-to-contact a better means of approaching the enemy, by placing just a single man in view at the head of each squad while allowing heavy weapons to fire through the gaps between squads to suppress the enemy positions as long as possible, actually superior to how we do things now?

slapout9

11-10-2007, 01:27 AM

The squad leader was issued binoculars to. When I was a squad leader in the 82nd 72-75 never would have happened unless you bought them. We did not use the wedge back then it was squad column fire teams in column or squad column fire teams abreast. Abreast was 2 fire teams side by side in column meant alpha fire team was in front of bravo fire team but still basically abreast per the manual anyway. What we really did was alpha fire team in a file in front of bravo fire team also in a file, distance between teams was terrain and squad leader dependant. I like the German system....simple is better.

Rifleman

11-10-2007, 03:29 PM

I thought it was a great article and enjoyed it a lot.

I always liked the fire team wedge, though, since it put the fire team halfway between column and line. The fire team could go either way quickly from the wedge.

Norfolk

11-11-2007, 02:55 AM

I suppose a question that can be raised at this point, is the reaction to effective enemy fire better handled by a squad moving into line from fire teams in wedge formation with all men firing back, or from a squad or even fire teams in file responding with just one or two 7.62mm (not 5.56mm) LMGs or even GPMGs?

Granted, the Germans weren't using assault rifles until late in the war, and only then in limited quantities, but perhaps a pair of 7.62mm LMGs (I'm not sure one would cut it, but the Bundesheer used only one MG-3 GPMG per Infanterie Gruppe until just recently) would be just as effective for winning the firefight and suppressing the enemy as a pair of 5.56mm LMGs and the squad's assault rifles?

Most of the squad would be under cover while the MGs won the firefight and then suppressed the enemy (unless the SL ordered otherwise or the squaddies spotted enemy close at hand). Ideally, this would lead to lower losses and a better chance of success in the assault. Or is this just plain wishful (and obsolete) thinking?

ROKMAN

11-27-2007, 06:36 PM

Norfolk

11-27-2007, 07:58 PM

So basically a two team squad would work. Each team has a machine gun.

However from two studies conducted in 1946 and during the Vietnam war, they concluded that two machine guns only resulted in most of the fires being misdirected. Also the squad ceased to function as a separate fire/maneuver teams when the squad size fell to 9 soldiers and below. This finding seems contradictory to me.

Hi ROKMAN,

I seem to remember that one of those studies was by either Paul Melody or Timothy Karcher - anyway, there's been no shortage of studies, let alone papers written on those studies. Yeah, I read that too, but I seem to recall (correct me on this if my memory if faulty here or I'm not thinking straight about it) that one of those officers wrote that the second MG not only led to wasteful use, but that the combined suppressive effect was actually lower than that of just one MG properly employed. I gotta tell ya, I still haven't quite been able to wrap my mind around that.

I will try to offer two qualifications to those tests results: 1. First, that the U.S. Army provided relatively little to no formal NCO training until recent decades, and in Vietnam especially, the availability of experienced NCOs who had learned on-the-job how to do things properly was low; as such, a lot of NCOs at the times those tests were conducted may not have been capable of properly directing the fires of the weapons they had. 2. Second, one of the studies you mentioned noted how a second MG could act as a sort of dead weight; while useful in the defence, it tended to destroy the offensive capacity of the Squad because even as the squad lost rifleman due to battle attrition, the same number of MGs still had to be manned and supplied, leaving few riflemen to actually close with and destroy the enemy in the assault. It was either Melody or Karcher I think that mentioned that no more than about 30% of a Squad's strength should be used to carry Automatic Rifles/Machine Guns - to this I would add Grenade Launchers as well.

I think that the Germans had developed something of a way of dealing with this in their Panzergrenadier Gruppes. Originally, the Armoured Infantry Group had 12-men (with 2 SPW APC drivers if Armoured) or 14-men (with 2 truck drivers if Motorized) divided into identical two Trupps (Troops). The Armoured Infantry Troop would have 5 men with a GPMG and the Motorized Infantry Troop (having more space on the truck to carry more members of a Group/Squad) would have 6 men with a GPMG. I don't have the link to this, but it comes from "The Regimental Officer's Handbook of the Germany Army, 1943" published by the British War Office: apparently the Panzer-Grenadier Group would advance/move-to-contact in two separate Troops about 80 yards apart, each with its own GPMG, and each would act as a sort of mini-Squad, except in coordination with one another.

I'm not quite confident in saying this, but I would suggest that although the two 5-or 6-man Troops in a German Armoured Infantry Group certainly used Fire-and-Movement like our Fire Teams do, I would not necessarily describe what they did as Fire Team Tactics, but someone else may know more about this. For one, I suspect that the Germans were much more prone to use the single file, and use the Machine Gun in each Troop of the Infantry Group to win the Firefight while keeping the Riflemen under cover until it was time for the Assault. If this is a more or less correct interpretation of what they did, then this should affect our thinking about a Two-Team Squad. I think the critical thing about a 2-Team Squad is the number of men in each Fire Team; 4 men maybe doesn't cut it and maybe even 5 won't. It seems that the Squads in the studies and in Vietnam functioned well as large Fire Teams after they had gone below 8 or 9 men and had to reorganize from two to one Team. Maybe that's a guide for the effective size of a Fire-Team.

I still very much think that a Three-Team Squad offers crucially greater capacity to win the Firefight quickly and suppress the enemy thoroughly, leading to lighter friendly losses, not to mention a much greater capacity to absorb battle losses.

If you really, really, have hankering for some more info I've got some links posted to more sources on some pages here:

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/blogs/norfolk/

If you're looking for all sort of sources, not just U.S., just click on each "Infantry Section" post (so far there's about eight I think) and go down to the "Selected Sources" at the bottom of the page. Read my own spiel if you like, but the Sources are what's important, the rest is just commentary.

Rifleman

11-29-2007, 10:21 PM

Norfolk,

Thanks for the link. I read your posts there and quite a few of your other links. I found the links interesting and I'm still reading through them.

It seems like the USMC might be the only organization since WWII that has remained satisfied with their squad structure. A lesson for everyone else?

Although I come from the two team, nine man squad background I always liked things better when we had a MG crew directly attached, making us, defacto, a squad similar in size and design to the USMC squad.

I spite of all the interesting studies it seems like it always boils down to this: the USMC squad has withstood the test of time and conflict the best; if you don't want (or can't have?) a squad that big then dispense with fire teams altogether and organize along German WWII lines. Most Army units in Vietnam sort of defaulted into that anyway: an MG crew, a grenadier, and a handful of riflemen seems to be the squad remembered by most Vietnam infantry vets. This is depicted pretty accurately in the film Hamburger Hill.

On a related note: if the USMC eventually adopts a true AR - heavy barrel, magazine fed, open bolt - it will be interesting to see if the Army also does and how that might change their squad structure. Hopefully they won't try to put both an AR and an LMG in the same fire team!

Norfolk

11-29-2007, 10:44 PM

Thanks Rifleman. Yeah, when you pore over what everyone else has written, and then take a look at the Marines and see how happy they've been for over 60 years (and consider how all the Other Armies look at the Marines and just wish they had that king of Squad), its seems pretty clear that the Marines are either right, or as close as anyone has ever come to it. And taking from Tom Odom's proposal for a Marine-like Squad for the Army, I'd be pretty satisfied with just adding a second NCO to handle most of the admin and comms with higher echelons so that the Squad Leader can be left alone to fight his Squad, and only talk to the higher echelons when he really needs to.

I think you summed up the dilemma really well, Rifleman; if you have the means, get a Marine Squad, and if you don't, get a German Group. And to add Cavguy's point about all this, you have to have good Squad leaders who know what to do and how to make it happen with what they've got. Finally, Ken kept beating it into everyone's skulls that the Leaders have to be free to do what they see they have to do, and have very well trained troops to do it with.

I hope the Automatic Rifle push to replace the Light Machine Gun/SAW dies a rapid death - no AR can provide Squad-level suppression like an LMG can. An AR with a good heavy barrel, bipod, and scope is great for long-distance single shots or short bursts of 2 or 3 rounds to take out important or distant enemy point targets like Heavy Weapons crews; 3 or 4 Designated Marksmen at Platoon level armed with these ARs could be very useful in a firefight I suspect.

slapout9

11-30-2007, 12:48 AM

Norfolk

11-30-2007, 01:42 AM

Don't forget Rob Thornton's comments about 60mm mortars being attached if possible. Nothing like being able to put direct and indirect fire on a target. in Vietnam Charlie was bad news with a 60mm mortar.

Perfectly right Slap.:) In my old Platoon, we had a Weapons Det with an FN MAG GPMG, a Carl Gustav, and a 60 mm Mortar in the hand-held role. "Triple Jeopardy" was the tactical term we used for it.

ROKMAN

11-30-2007, 04:45 AM

This whole thing leads me to my own conclusions.

The literature that I am reading has the Marine squad doing the three teams bit. However as James Webb wrote once the team takes two casualties then if effectively ceases to be a maneuver element. I read that Marines in Iraq are naturally reverting to two 6 man teams, in order to sustain casualties and still keep at least a fire and maneuver capability. So we increase the fire team to 6 troops as James Webb advocates. However at that point it looks more like a mini-platoon than anything else. Each team becomes a squad and the squad into a platoon. This is the result of a squad focused organization. I noticed that Marine field manuals go like this. SQUAD, PLATOON/COMPANY while the Army goes SQUAD/PLATOON, COMPANY. If the squad increases in size anyways then why not simply operate as a Germans did. Each squad focused on a machine gun and some rifleman. Since the US Army's own studies conclude that once the squad fell down to just 9 men it ceased to function as separate fire and maneuver elements anyways. Hence another squad had to support the squad. Thus it makes more sense to use the German Army methodology anyways because it is has in itself an ability to absorb casualties. The primary tactical unit is thus the platoon not the squad.

Also the issue with two machine guns used in world war 2 was where panzergrenadiers took the other machine gun mounted on the halftrack. Even then the machine gun is an auxiliary to the squad. Regular infantry squads used 2 assistant machine guns, but once the panzergrendiers carried two machine guns then one of the assistants is assigned to the other machine gunner. Even then both machine guns were being directed by the Squad Leader and turns out not simultaneously. But lets say that we give the assistant squad leader his own machine gun. Two teams would then benefit with the squad leader separate to conduct the battle. But then we see the creeping of focusing on platoon again. Hence we should start with the focus on the platoon anyways. Finally with regards to SAWs. The Marine squad seems to be ideal for the SAW. If each team upgraded to a machine gun, then the team must be enlarged. Again going to the whole platoon focus.

Since attrition will happen it is better to allow a organization to absorb attrition at the lower levels than at the higher levels. In other words larger squads, resulting in larger battalions instead of more battalions. If the squad after some attrition can operate, it would still be better than to place fresh replacements into the squad. The German replacement system seems to be built upon this idea.

I guess what I am trying to say is that I want to thank everyone here on this forum but the conclusion that I ended up based on the historical trends of the documents and application in current combat seems to lead me to this principle on small unit organization.

A unit of certain size must have a machine gun, grenadier, and enough troops to provide pinpoint suppression, carry and assist the machine gun, and take a certain amount of attrition. Hence rather than a fireteam the squad should be this unit. The squad does not operate independently but always as part of a platoon with other squads to provide for the fire and maneuver capability. There is one thing that I definitely advocate here is that an NCO should be leading platoons.

Again thank you all for your input, yall were most helpful.

Norfolk

11-30-2007, 02:17 PM

Very thorough analysis, Rokman!:) Ever thought of remustering from Armor to the Infantry?;)

ROKMAN

11-30-2007, 10:30 PM

Well though they say that the King of Battle is Artillery and the Queen of Battle is the Infantry.

I have this input..... the God of Battle is Armor.

Muahahahahahahahah

selil

12-01-2007, 05:16 AM

Well though they say that the King of Battle is Artillery and the Queen of Battle is the Infantry.

I have this input..... the God of Battle is Armor.

Muahahahahahahahah

It's like rock, paper, scissors....

The clay feet of armor is close air support.

ROKMAN

12-02-2007, 06:06 AM

It's like rock, paper, scissors....

The clay feet of armor is close air support.

I know it was just a joke.:D

selil

12-02-2007, 07:03 AM

I know it was just a joke.:D

Yeah I know.. But, I was hoping somebody would say that the bane of CAS is infantry with shoulder fired missiles.

Distiller

12-12-2007, 01:41 PM

Hello, my first posting here.
My background is quite diverse, but aerial forces heavy, so to speak.

Nice discussion and an old problem.
But I think there is an answer: 9 and the German system.
The reason for 9 are APC/IFV and helicopters.
Nine soldiers fit in just nicely, more are getting complicated.
And then if your enemy is lucky, 9 wounded/dead (plus 2-3-4 from the vehicle) are bad enough.

And I think it is also important NOT to rip appart the squad or Gruppe, if you want to use a German word.
Of course, more would be fine, and in a pure infantry war 14 or 18 would be better.
But with 9 they get out/off the vehicle in one sweep and don't have to wait for the other half to arrive (like when you have 13 in one squad).

I also think that even if you are talking light infantry, the basic squad size should not differ from mechanized or airborne squads. Because of flexibility. Light might become airborne tomorrow, and airborne might find itself inside an APC.

And the thing about the German Schuetzengruppe: Probably it's right not to view the squad as an "independent" unit.
If you do so you ahve to answer the questions about direct fire support, indirect fire support, anti-tank/structure capability, flame throwers, &c.
The thing I would do is substitute "MG" by "multi crew served weapon".
Can be a MG, but can as well be a mortar, or some ATGMs or MANPADS. I know, such equipment resides "higher up" - but the basic crew size to operate them is not too bad with 9 either.

But basically I think the best reason for 9 these days are ground and aerial transport vehicles.

Penta

12-12-2007, 06:23 PM

But basically I think the best reason for 9 these days are ground and aerial transport vehicles.

...Shouldn't we be designing the vehicles around the unit, not the unit around the vehicle?

Distiller

12-12-2007, 08:38 PM

...Shouldn't we be designing the vehicles around the unit, not the unit around the vehicle?

In principal, yes. But since you are limited in vehicle width by public roads, you can only do two rows of seats vis-á-vis, and since you don't want to build the vehicle too long you end up with 2x4 + 1 troops and 2/3 drivers/gunners for an APC. And that is already quite a lot, since there are enough APCs out there that can't accomodate that number.
Same goes for helicopters (thinking about the UH-60 here, as the prototypical air assault helicopter). Two rows with 4 seats each, the squad leader between or besides the gunner(s), plus two pilots.
Only a irregular force can assume it never has to fit into any of these. For such units 18 on a open truck is not a problem, there you can go for large squads.

Norfolk

12-13-2007, 02:42 AM

In principal, yes. But since you are limited in vehicle width by public roads, you can only do two rows of seats vis-á-vis, and since you don't want to build the vehicle too long you end up with 2x4 + 1 troops and 2/3 drivers/gunners for an APC. And that is already quite a lot, since there are enough APCs out there that can't accomodate that number.
Same goes for helicopters (thinking about the UH-60 here, as the prototypical air assault helicopter). Two rows with 4 seats each, the squad leader between or besides the gunner(s), plus two pilots.
Only a irregular force can assume it never has to fit into any of these. For such units 18 on a open truck is not a problem, there you can go for large squads.

Hello, Distiller. Welcome to Small Wars. When you have some time, formally introduce yourself on the Introduction Thread ("Tell Us Who You Are").

A 9-man Squad as you propose is certainly doable, if, as you suggest, the German Gruppe composition is followed. Now, since my own experience of helicopters and Airmobile/Air Assault Operations has been with Twin Hueys and Chinooks, I can only say that while the Blackhawk's troop-carrying capacity may afford that, but the Huey unfortunately does not, unless there are no door gunners or unless you rip out the benches and have every sit on the floor (or their helmets). Likewise, while the M-113 of unhappy memory (and continued and surprising longevity) could carry a 9-man Squad (11 men was perhaps a stretch), there is no IFV in Western service that can carry a 9-man Squad, unless of course all the seats are ripped out, or, failing that, the troops are stacked in the back like cordwood. The Bradley, for example, was originally intended to accomodate a full 11-man Rifle Squad, the Army-wide standard when the MICV was first planned in the early 1970's. Well, the plan didn't quite turn out and it can only accomodate 6, maybe 7 men.

Same with many other Western IFVs. But you are quite correct, Distiller, that the Rifle Squad should be the same throughout the Army; and in recent years, it has (more or less). Penta is also quite right that the vehicles should be designed around the Squad, rather than its weapons fit, or whatever. But the Army is stuck with the Bradley (and now the Stryker) unless and until the FCS comes on-line in the next decade or so, if that in fact does occur. Hopefully any Infantry Carrier that may come out of it will fully accomodate a properly-sized and full-strength Squad.

Bear in mind though, if the German Gruppe model were to be adopted, hypothetically speaking, it would be necessary to have four full Squads per Platoon. For the Mechanized Infantry, that would at the very least require a restoration of the Weapons Squad in each Platoon. The Germans discovered during WWII that 3 Infanterie Gruppe and a Granatewerfer Trupp (Light Mortar "Troop" - Squad) per Infanterie Zug ("Train" or Platoon) was insufficient to win the firefight quickly, and a fourth Gruppe was added. Later, a "Reserve" LMG was added to the Platoon HQ when the fourth Gruppe was formally disbanded due to manpower shortages. Each Infantry Carrier or Assault Helicopter would therefore need to have a capacity of 10-11 men at least; more if the full 10-man strength of the German Gruppe were to be adopted as well (and given Infantry battle losses, that would be advisable). Given the possibility that entire Squads may be lost when their Carrier or Helicopter is destroyed, it may well be advisable to lean towards larger Platoons with the tried-and-true 3-1-1 composition.

The SAMS Monograph by Paul E. Melody that Rifleman posted on this thread (Post #73) a little while ago laid out many of the basic requirements when determining the composition of a Rifle Squad; the 10-man German Gruppe fits them perfectly.

William F. Owen

12-14-2007, 03:23 AM

Well here’s where I am currently coming from (should anyone care!)

1. The obsession with squad/section organisation is essentially pointless. There are few agreed definitions, and almost all discussions lack them. Contrary to popular belief very few of the things that people say squads/sections should be capable of doing have been subjected to much rigor or analysis.
2. What is needed is a discussion as to how to develop some principles of organisation that will enable any number of men with almost any variety of weapons and equipment to operate successfully.
3. We need to recognise that there are emotional, organisational, economic and even cultural human needs that people want to maintain and address. Cost is by far the biggest driver in the so-called experiments and decisions taken to support various squad and section organisations.

…And at the risk on being very contentious, my opinion is that words and phrases like “Assault” and “Fire and Manoeuvre” have actually become blockers to useful discussion. Most discussion on infantry doctrine is hampered by a lack of widely agreed definitions and understandings. How can we sensibly discuss any organisation issues or TOE, when we probably all have different ideas of what it is infantry actually do, or should be doing.

My current “opinions” can be very briefly summarised as follows.

1. Platoon organisation is far more important than squad or section
2. The Platoon should be configured to generate 2-3 task organised dismounted patrols that can either co-operate or achieve certain tasks independently – Why differentiate in terms of training and doctrine between a 30 man fighting patrol and what a platoon aims to achieve in a

slapout9

12-14-2007, 03:45 AM

For William Owen. What do you think of each squad member having a radio that he can talk to everyother squad member like Police Officers ro SWAT teams have?

William F. Owen

12-14-2007, 03:58 AM

For William Owen. What do you think of each squad member having a radio that he can talk to everyother squad member like Police Officers ro SWAT teams have?

The British Army has PRR, (as does the USMC?) and it is, by all accounts excellent. The critical issue is that the PRRs are kept as low cost items for low powered voice communications. - so better than shouting. No data, or streaming video or other silliness. The other important issue is that there is a time to use them and there is a time not to. Sometimes they need to be switched off and everyone has to know when to switch them on.

I should add, that I have never used PRR, so best get the opinion of those that have. I have only ever come across 1 man who thought the idea was rubbish and he a full Colonel who had never used it either!

Cavguy

12-14-2007, 05:56 AM

The British Army has PRR, (as does the USMC?) and it is, by all accounts excellent. The critical issue is that the PRRs are kept as low cost items for low powered voice communications. - so better than shouting. No data, or streaming video or other silliness. The other important issue is that there is a time to use them and there is a time not to. Sometimes they need to be switched off and everyone has to know when to switch them on.

I should add, that I have never used PRR, so best get the opinion of those that have. I have only ever come across 1 man who thought the idea was rubbish and he a full Colonel who had never used it either!

Almost all Army ground team leaders/NCO's in Iraq now have PRR equivilant. We actually bought (or were loaned) a lot of the actual UKo nes in OIF 1 due to our shortages.

I never understood why it took a war and tons of soldiers buying motorola radios out of pocket to figure out the obvious - urban combat requires a lot of radios due to the terrain if you want to operate effectively. The US Army saw the light in early 2004 and by 2006 when I returned they were densly fielded.

Distiller

12-14-2007, 08:35 AM

jcustis

12-25-2007, 10:00 PM

What about such a setup?

SQUAD (9 men)
- 1 Ldr (assault carbine, NavCom-equipment)
- 2/3-men serving 1 GPMG 7.62 (MG42-esque weapon, high volume of fire more important than high precision)
- 1 bipoded marksman-capable Automatic Rifle 7.62 (FG42-esque weapon, like HK417 with heavy barrel)
- 4/5 men Assault Carbine (short barrel HK416 with integrated UGL40, or MP7 plus AT4)

PLATOON
3x SQUAD
+ Mortar Team(s) 60mm
+ RPG Team(s), if not integrated into the squad

COMPANY/BATTALION/REGIMENT
Xx PLATOON
+ heavy indirect fire, snipers, ATGM teams, MANPADS teams, other toys, CS/CSS, &c

About the logistics side of two calibers in a squad: Belts and mags for 5.56 have the same effect. If you really need it there is no time to strip a belt.
A GPMG would give reach and volume (question is if you take 2- or 3-man crews), a FG42/L86 type would give reach and precision, and for the rest of the squad MP7 (would it have enough fire power further out? would you need it if you have a GPMG?) or short barrel 5.56 (with truely integrated UGL, not just a bolt-on solution with another grip). In case RPGs are prefered, MP7s plus RPGs might be a way.

Taking the means of conveyance out of the picture, a squad of only 9 men barely allows you to post security to the four corners of a structure, and doesn't allow for much coverage of urban deadspace surrounding that same structure. It also makes setting an inner cordon somewhat awkward because those 2-man buddy teams are doing nothing but pulling 100% security the entire time. I think every organic member of the squad needs to be capable of the assault.

Perhaps (1) 60mm mortar team utlizing a PDA-sized ballistic computer would fair well in providing indirect supporting fires. Ammo supply would be contentious, but there are a number of ways to work around that through smart load-outs and march planning.

Considering the flexibility of the RPG, I'm actually surprised we haven't transitioned to a similar system. AT4s may be one trick ponies and the SMAW is a beast (albeit an effective one)...and neither have a comparable range.

And on the note of automatic fire, nothing in my mind is more important than accurate, reliable, ease-of-humping fire that allows the rifleman to close to within hand grenade range.

Rifleman

12-25-2007, 11:49 PM

Taking the means of conveyance out of the picture, a squad of only 9 men barely allows you to post security to the four corners of a structure, and doesn't allow for much coverage of urban deadspace surrounding that same structure. It also makes setting an inner cordon somewhat awkward because those 2-man buddy teams are doing nothing but pulling 100% security the entire time. I think every organic member of the squad needs to be capable of the assault.

I think what you say is true. Several people here have convinced me that the 13 man USMC squad is best overall, and a USMC squad with attachments would be really close to what Wilf Owens believes a platoon should be.

But I think the Army is stuck with 9 man squads for the foreseeable future. Put more men in a squad? Fantasyland. Most soldiers are yearning for another battalion for each brigade. Reinforcing the squad would seem to be way down the list of concerns, if it's on the list of concerns at all. So the question for the Army is how to best use the nine men they have.

All things considered I believe Paul Melody's idea to reorganize the squad without fire teams and to plan on using it for fire or maneuver instead of fire and maneuver makes the most sense for the Army. Really, it would just be standardizing the approach, since it's something that's often ended up happening anyway.

Norfolk articulated this idea pretty well on the sino defense forum:

http://www.sinodefenceforum.com/blogs/norfolk/32-infantry-section-part-xvi.html

jcustis

12-26-2007, 12:08 AM

All things considered I believe Paul Melody's idea to reorganize the squad without fire teams and to plan on using it for fire or maneuver instead of fire and maneuver makes the most sense for the Army. Really, it would just be standardizing the approach, since it's something that's often ended up happening anyway.

I hear ya, but something about unity of command bugs me. If we have squads that are used for either fire or maneuver, then who is in overall change of the attack/asslt?

Are we talking about three 9-man sqds or four 9-man sqds in an Army platoon? I have to admit ignorance of T/O sturcture in an infantry platoon, but my question remains. Who is in charge if you have two squads taking down a small objective? Does this require the platoon commander or platoon sergeant to be on scene, or is the senior of the two SLs the defacto honcho?

Rifleman

12-26-2007, 12:17 AM

I can only answer for how it was in my unit in the '80s. The platoon leader is in charge of platoon fire and maneuver unless he delegates it to someone else for some reason. It was more of an SOP than a requirement.

During my time the platoon was three rifle squads, nine men each at full strength (rarely), and a weapons squad. The weapons squad was seven men then but I think it might be nine men (on paper) these days also.

jcustis

12-26-2007, 12:21 AM

During my time the platoon was three rifle squads, nine men each at full strength (rarely), and a weapons squad. The weapons squad was seven men then but I think it might be nine men (on paper) these days also.

That's right, I forgot the weapons squad. Remembering that that asset is available, the support-by-fire element is more tenable with one or two of the squads (if we follow Kilcullen's recommendations) attaching MG teams to provide suppressive fires. That makes sense. I was thinking in terms of just three squads and that was making me cringe somewhat.

jcustis

12-26-2007, 01:11 AM

jcustis

12-26-2007, 01:16 AM

The literature that I am reading has the Marine squad doing the three teams bit. However as James Webb wrote once the team takes two casualties then if effectively ceases to be a maneuver element. I read that Marines in Iraq are naturally reverting to two 6 man teams, in order to sustain casualties and still keep at least a fire and maneuver capability. So we increase the fire team to 6 troops as James Webb advocates.

For those who may have been too lazy to run a google string on it, here's the article ROKMAN referenced: http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/variouspubs/usmcgazetteflexfire.htm

I ran across it while looking for articles on the Corps' search for a true automatic rifle. Which makes me remember that I need to get down to a neighboring command and invite Gunner Eby to join in here if he finds himself so inclined. He's a good mofo when it comes to understanding the voodoo involved here.

Uboat509

12-26-2007, 06:19 AM

I honestly like the setup the way it is now.

1 X fire team =
-1 x Teamleader w/M4 (though I wouldn't hate to see 417s)
-1 x Grenedier w/M4 and M203 (when I was a teamleader I carried the 203 and had two riflemen)
-1 x Automatic Rifleman w/M2498 SAW
-1 x Rfleman w/M4

Squad = 2 x fireteam + squadleader w/M4

Platoon = 3 x squads + weapons squad and Hq

Weapons squad =

-2 x M240 gunners
-2 x assisantgunners w/M4
-1 x squadleader w/M4
I believe that some MTOEs still have one ammo bearer per gun but I have never seen that position manned.

HQ =

-1 x Pl w/M4 (if he is allowed a gun :D)
-1 x PSG w/M4
-1 x RTO w M4
-attachments (usually a medic and a forward observer)

Company =
-3 x Platoons
-1 x mortar section
-2 x 60MM mortars
- 2 x gunners
- 2 x assistant gunners
- 2 x ammo bearers
- 1 x section leader
- 1 x FDC
-HQ
-Commander
-1SG
-XO
-Supply
-Admin

-I am not a huge fan of the M249 but I have not seen any other belt fed guns that can still be carried into a house during CQC or can be maneuvered with the moving element during fire and maneuver.

-The Army will never allow the mortar to go below company level. indirect fire requires a significant amount of coordination and the PL (never mind the squadleader) is too far into the fight to deal with that. Often, even the company commander is too involved to deal with fires coordination which is why the mortars have their own section with a section leader and an FDC. Furthermore mortar ammo is heavy and a squad isn't going to be able to carry a hell of a lot of it along with all the other crap they carry. On top of all that you don't want your mortars with any element that you expect to make contact. They need to be back behind the squads with the company headquarters.

-The rifleman position would be where I would put the DM. I might also add two DMs with the weapons squad. The DMs in the fireteams would have additional training for longer range engagements but not special weapons which do not fair well in CQC or fire and maneuver. The DMs in the weapons squad would postentally have some type of special weapon ie. SPR(5.56MM).

-The four man fireteam is the smallest element that is used as a maneuver element and is also the basic element for CQC. I believe that nine man squad is based on ensuring that the entire squad can be transported togother.

-I am not a fan of non-standard ammo. Sure the ballistics may be slightly better but it will complicate the logistics and experience tells me that the platoon will get shorted anything out of the ordinary. In any case the ammo that we have is sufficient for its purpose. If you are looking at angaging targets past 600 meters or so then you have left the realm of the DM and moved into the realm of the Sniper which is a battalion asset. If you are going to have an odd caliber weapon then that is where it would be.

SFC W

William F. Owen

12-26-2007, 07:15 AM

-The Army will never allow the mortar to go below company level. indirect fire requires a significant amount of coordination and the PL (never mind the squadleader) is too far into the fight to deal with that. Often, even the company commander is too involved to deal with fires coordination which is why the mortars have their own section with a section leader and an FDC.

No one is talking about platoons having mortars for indirect fire (at least I never would) We are talking about ligth mortars for direct fire like the UK's 51mm and a whole bunch of other light 60mm mortars there are out there.

They are superb weapons and highly effective. The only thing putting a shadow on them is the advent of medium velocity 40mm, which means a UGL can shoot to 800m, with 30% more effect, but they still can't compete with a well used light mortar in the direct fire role

The UK got rid of 51mm platoon mortars, after 66 years, only to discover that they still needed them and are now out looking for 60mm to replace them

USSF RTs of old often carried 60mm mortars. They cut down the old M19s.

Uboat509

12-26-2007, 08:02 AM

The 60MMs that we have in our inventory would still require coordination at the very least at company level. They have a range of around 3000 or 3500 meters. The Army is not going to give control of any indirect fire assets to any element that is not tied into the indirect fires system. That is not going to happen below company level unless you are thinking of putting an FDC at platoon level and then the question would be why. The platoon can only really deal with direct fire weapons anyway. A good FO can have indirect fires inbound in a matter of minutes with the added advantage that the mortar team is not trying to put rounds down range while under fire. When I was OPFOR at JRTC we ran into mortar team on occasion and my experience was that in a direct fire engagement the mortar crews were dead before they could put any kind of accurate fire on us even with a hip shot. It is best to keep them out of the platoons where they will likely end up in direct fire engagements.

SFC W

William F. Owen

12-26-2007, 09:43 AM

... my experience was that in a direct fire engagement the mortar crews were dead before they could put any kind of accurate fire on us even with a hip shot. It is best to keep them out of the platoons where they will likely end up in direct fire engagements.

Having carried a 51mm mortar and used it, I would disagree. I had a whole platoon infront of me who were going to make contact first, so I was never in a 'hip shoot.' If you know what you are doing you are no more exposed than a standard MG team. One man can used a light mortar as long as it is trigger fired.

..plus the danger close template for a hand held 60 or 51 is vastly smaller than for indirect 60mm.

Wigram, Jary, and Foreman -all WW2 UK infantry officers all state how effective the old 2-inch was and the 51mm was developed based on Falklands war experience, were everyone wanted an effective HE projector at the platoon level that weighed less than the 84mm, and which you could fire from behind cover and with no back blast.

All the guys out in Helmand and Basra used them to very good effect till the UK ran out of ammo - which is no longer made, so we go for a 60mm.

US MACV-SOG RTs used direct fire 60mm to great effect albeit in Jungle. The South Africans carry a 60mm at the platoon level.

Uboat509

12-26-2007, 11:18 AM

I will admit to knowing absolutely nothing about the 51MM mortar. We don't have them in our inventory. But the 60s we have do leave you more exposed than a MG team. I am not saying that we don't use 60s in a direct fire mode but those are generally for specific missions such as defense or deliberate assault, in which case they can be attached to the support by fire element as needed.

SFC W

Norfolk

12-26-2007, 04:54 PM

We used the Korean-War vintage M-19 60mm, one per Rifle Platoon and Rifle Coy HQ Weapons Det in the hand-held role with the light baseplate, with 2-man crew. Worked great and you could load, aim, and fire lying down if you had to.

jcustis said:

For those who may have been too lazy to run a google string on it, here's the article ROKMAN referenced: http://www.jameswebb.com/articles/va...teflexfire.htm

I ran across it while looking for articles on the Corps' search for a true automatic rifle. Which makes me remember that I need to get down to a neighboring command and invite Gunner Eby to join in here if he finds himself so inclined. He's a good mofo when it comes to understanding the voodoo involved here.

I have to admit, when I first read this piece by Webb back in the summer, I was both shocked and amazed. The idea of a 19-man Squad running around seemed grossly excessive at first, but then I though about it for a while, and it makes some sense, in an intereting way. I considered it this way: What about a 20-man Rifle Section, with a 2-man HQ, and three 6-man Rifle Squads
each based upon an LMG and with the Squad Leader doubling as the Grenadier, leaving four Riflemen for CQB. I agree with Webb that it could take battle losses, and there would be no lack of either Firepower for Winning the Firefight and Suppressing the Enemy, nor any lack of Riflemen for the Assult and Fighting Through and Clearing the Objective. I believe that Melody did identify an optimum Leader-to-Led ratio of 1 to 5 - a 6-man Squad would fit this perfectly.

Furthermore, for Mechanized Infantry such an organization would allow for the Section to be split into two halves (in cases of APCS and the odd MICV/IFV that can accomodate 10-men at a time), given that many Squads are dispersed amongst two or more tracks anyway these days. As long as the 2-man Section HQ splits, with the Section Cmdr going with 9 men and the Section 2i/c going with the remaining 9 to another track, if one track is lost, you still have a 10-man Squad/Section to fight with.

I just thought this interesting; I am rather unsure that it would be useful in practice, but fun to contemplate.

Steve Blair

12-26-2007, 04:58 PM

US MACV-SOG RTs used direct fire 60mm to great effect albeit in Jungle. The South Africans carry a 60mm at the platoon level.

Glad to see someone else remembered SOG using the 60mm, though they were slightly more common with the Hatchet Force companies than they were the RTs.

William F. Owen

12-27-2007, 01:23 AM

Glad to see someone else remembered SOG using the 60mm, though they were slightly more common with the Hatchet Force companies than they were the RTs.

Very true. I stand corrected, though I believe RT California ran as a heavy team, as did New Hampshire and I think both carried a 60mm at one time or another.

as I have said before, I think SOG Detachments are a very powerful infantry model.

slapout9

12-27-2007, 01:35 AM

Norfolk

12-27-2007, 02:14 AM

Title: Optimum Composition of the Rifle Squad and Platoon.Here is a link to this study done in the early 1960's but it is not on line. Does anyone know how to access this so it could be put online?

http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=AD0815038

I'm searching too, slap. I thought I had saved this one when I came across it a few weeks ago, but I guess I didn't.

This piece by Ahmed Hashim and LtGEN Paul VanRiper (yep, that GEN VanRiper), covers the Navy/Marine Corps view of the Squad, and covers the 1961 Army OCRSP Tests on Pages 32-34:

http://www.cna.org/documents/D0002705.A1.pdf

Norfolk

12-27-2007, 04:42 AM

slap, I think that the OCRSP study may have appeared in this form:

http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADA074296

slapout9

12-27-2007, 11:18 AM

Norfolk,I do believe you have found it:) Some interesting stuff in there.

Ratzel

12-27-2007, 12:36 PM

The way we configured our mech squad was as follows:

Team A
1 TL
2 SAW
3 Grenadier
4 Riflemen/AT
Team B
5 TL
6 SAW
7 Grenadier
8 Riflemen/AT
HQ
9 Squad leader
10 240B
11 AG
12 Extra person sometimes used RTO, or placed in team, or carried Javelin, or shotgun and breach person.

There are two squads and two Bradly sections in each platoon.

The question that always perplexes mech squads is "To 240 or not to 240?"
In the 7-7 there was no slot for a 240 gunner/team. Mech units followed the "arms room concept" that allowed us to decide whether to bring one or not. The 7-7 said the Bradly was our MG support so it wasn't needed. The extra 4 slots were supposed to be manned by 1 RTO, 1 medic, 1FO, and the LT's track had an extra gunner for when he dismounted. Our second squad, used their extra man for this function (Lt's gunner). After the LT left the track, he would jump up into the BC hatch. Sometimes, if the LT wanted to stay with the track, he would dismount with a shotgun or Rifle.

I've heard arguments for and against the 240 but we usually brought them with us. I will say however, that the extra utility man did come in handy. He could carry everything from a folding latter, shotgun, to a breach ax, which gave us more room to operate. This person could also be used as a sharpshooter.

Six people would ride on each Bradly and don't let anyone tell you that more than this can fit! I had a Battalion commander that swore, that 9 people could fit in one Bradly?

If anyone knows how mech infantry is doing it now, please let me know?

Ratzel

12-28-2007, 06:10 AM

Timothy OConnor

12-28-2007, 04:23 PM

The new Bradley organization seems to define "square peg in a round hole". I suppose they're trying to maintain a consistent squad-level organization regardless of transport (ie Bradely v Stryker v Blackhawk).

Does anyone know how this has worked out in practice?

Norfolk

12-28-2007, 04:28 PM

Ratzel, Tim:

The Brad Squads are split between (at least) two different tracks, 4 tracks of course per Platoon, with the Platoon HQ thrown in. Very messy.

Sabre

01-07-2008, 02:45 AM

One thing that always makes me chuckle a little in discussions of squad size is thinking about how human nature impacts the opinions expressed.

What leader, considering the missions he is tasked with, the often brutal optempo, and the chronic shortfalls in personnel manning, will form the opinion that the problem that he really has too many folks?
Of course everyone wants more personnel assigned to them.

(Heh, two exceptions do come to mind: Saturday night, being called by the CQ desk for the 4th or 5th time, and learning "who is drunk and in trouble now???"
The other case being any higher headquarters that I have ever seen. More bodies there = more demands on me for information. Often in triplicate. I've been a part of enough HQ's to see that you can add more folks, and everyone will still be (or at least seem) quite busy in the TOC, but it doesn't result in any greater effectiveness or efficiency...)

Personally, I do see the merit of the USMC 13-man squad, although I would vote for the 4 squads of 8-9 men each (but, I was mostly in the mech world, so I am naturally predisposed to the number "4" - heh, that's on the list of "how to tell if you are a tanker: you have a barbecue on the weekend, and all three of your friends show up). While the Marines have, noticeably, insisted on tactical transports that can accommodate the larger squad (with attachments), i.e., the the AAV7, CH-46, and now the AAAV and the Osprey, the rest of the world is stuck with less space in their transports. While many armies haven't managed it so far, I think that it isn't too much to ask a designer for an IFV or APC to stretch just a little, and fit at least 8 or 9 dismounts (I just don't think that it was considered important enough, back in the 60's when dismounted squad sizes shrank). I also don't think that a Heavy APC, a la the Israeli Nammer (the Merkava APC variant), could have room for more than 2 crew and 8-10 dismounts, after you account for the large engine needed to power such a heavy vehicle, etc. I think that the Heavy APC idea has merit, in some (but not all) applications, and I can only drool at the thought of a combined-arms battalion that had a common chassis across the tanks and APCs... heck, there is even an SP How on a Merkava chassis - maintenance headaches would certainly be reduced.

I don't think that a 300-man company is the answer (of course, it seems most contributers to this forum don't consider that to be a realistic proposal) - I'm a pretty big believer in Dunbar's number (148, or the "rule of 150", if you prefer) being the limit to a social group size, as a rifle company certainly is. At one point, when my unit was brought to full strength, it was weighing in at a little over 150 (with attachments) and I had an odd feeling that the social framework was slipping a bit (this was long before I heard of that number). Sure, make the company a bit larger, to account for casualties and folks away for school, on leave, etc... I just wouldn't go much past 180.

Whoever said that it is better to consider the squad as part of a company organization, rather than in isolation, made a great point.
I would be very interested in some head-to-head study, of a standard Marine Rifle Company TO (including wpns platoon, of course) going against a company composed along Army lines, only with 4 platoons (e.g., company mortar section, and 4 platoons, each with three 9-man squads and a full weapons squad of 9 men). Doing the rough calculations in my head, the personnel total is about the same, and the number of leaders (starting with Fire Team leaders) is roughly the same. There would be nine large Marine squads, with MG and SMAW teams running around, maneuvering against what could be thought of as eight pairs of 9-man squads (and each pair of squads would have a M240 and a SMAW-analog). I'm guessing that training and leadership would play a much, much larger factor in success or failure, but it would be interesting.

selil

04-22-2008, 07:34 PM

Kiwigrunt

04-23-2008, 03:02 AM

While looking for that article I found another intersting one.

http://qspace.library.queensu.ca/handle/1974/1081?mode=full&submit_simple=Show+full+item+record

selil

04-23-2008, 03:17 AM

Excellent Kiwi, I read the synopsis I'll have to put some more time into it.

William F. Owen

04-23-2008, 11:08 AM

I don't know if it will help anybody or not, but in looking at other issues I found this paper that looks extensively on how composition of the squad and platoon (infantry) and the weapons effect ratio's of fire.

Jordan, K. C., Right for the wrong reasons: S.L.A. Marshall and the ratio of fire in Korea, The Journal of Military History; Jan 2002; 66, 1; Pg 135

Sounds excellent, but all my reading of Marshall, is that he was mostly wrong. Roger Spiller shot down his research methods and a lot of his theories and ideas have since been disproved. IMO, Ardant Du Picq did all before Marshall and did it better.

Steve Blair

04-23-2008, 12:35 PM

Sounds excellent, but all my reading of Marshall, is that he was mostly wrong. Roger Spiller shot down his research methods and a lot of his theories and ideas have since been disproved. IMO, Ardant Du Picq did all before Marshall and did it better.

Read the article first. The author isn't defending Marshall. He points out that Marshall's conclusions about rates of firing in Korea may have been correct, but not for the reasons that he (Marshall) used to defend that conclusion. Jordan traces the higher rate of fire back to the reorganization of the infantry squad that took place before Korea, not the training method Marshall claimed was responsible (and actually didn't come into use until after the conflict was over).

selil

04-23-2008, 12:36 PM

Sounds excellent, but all my reading of Marshall, is that he was mostly wrong. Roger Spiller shot down his research methods and a lot of his theories and ideas have since been disproved. IMO, Ardant Du Picq did all before Marshall and did it better.

Actually Spiller said a Brit Captain William Siborne predated Du Picq by about 50 years, and that Marshall appeared to be pretty violently opposed to the idea that any work on soldiers came before him. Facts not being that important I guess (page 65-66).

Spiller, Roger J., S.L.A. Marshall and the Ratio of Fire, RUSI Journal, 133:4 (1988: Winter) p.63-71

Cavguy

04-23-2008, 02:53 PM

Actually Spiller said a Brit Captain William Siborne predated Du Picq by about 50 years, and that Marshall appeared to be pretty violently opposed to the idea that any work on soldiers came before him. Facts not being that important I guess (page 65-66).

Spiller, Roger J., S.L.A. Marshall and the Ratio of Fire, RUSI Journal, 133:4 (1988: Winter) p.63-71

I never really have trusted Marshall's work after reading Hackworth's disturbing account of his research methods during Vietnam while acting as his assistant in "About Face". He was literally making stuff up.

selil

04-23-2008, 03:59 PM

I never really have trusted Marshall's work after reading Hackworth's disturbing account of his research methods during Vietnam while acting as his assistant in "About Face". He was literally making stuff up.

Thanks to several people here on SWC/J I have a fairly substantial body of literature that says SLA Marshall was a journalist in the finest tradition of them. The story had to be good, but it got appropriated for policy and not even looked at fully. That is according to his supporters...

William F. Owen

04-25-2008, 11:30 AM

Read the article first. The author isn't defending Marshall. He points out that Marshall's conclusions about rates of firing in Korea may have been correct, but not for the reasons that he (Marshall) used to defend that conclusion. Jordan traces the higher rate of fire back to the reorganization of the infantry squad that took place before Korea, not the training method Marshall claimed was responsible (and actually didn't come into use until after the conflict was over).

I didn't think he was. Few people who study Marshall find anything positive. That's why I never understood Grossman's work. I find his contention that soldiers don't like killing, utterly unsupported by the evidence - that and heavily dependant on a reading of Marshall.

IMO, and others, Marshall confused a lack of aggression with the effects of suppression and low combat participation.

Wigram (1943-44) and Fitz-Gibbons observations (1982) tend to support Marshal's figures - but Wigram was not aware of Marshall - he was KIA in 1944, and having spoken to Fitz-Gibbon, I know he was also unaware of Marshall's observations. The weight of fire that Platoons and sections produce is effected by a vast number of variables, but the key is the number of men who are not suppressed, when they can successfully and effectively engage.

The other damage done by Marshall was the 2 x BARs in Korea and the loss of the .30 M1/M2 Carbine.

Ken White

04-25-2008, 04:07 PM

...The other damage done by Marshall was the 2 x BARs in Korea and the loss of the .30 M1/M2 Carbine.I agree with the rest of your comment but am curious about these two...

selil

04-25-2008, 05:30 PM

Ken White

04-25-2008, 05:42 PM

Ken in the previous article the author discusses the addition of a BAR to each squad and the removal of the carbine. The idea appears to make a squad with heavier weapons and more fire power, but remove the flexibility.in his rationale. The BAR was not an ideal solution to the problem but it was what was available at the time due to Ordnance corps failures to push the envelope. It worked and adding one to the squad was beneficial.

The Carbine was a good and reliable weapon, functionally and it was light and handy -- unfortunately, it was not a man stopper due to an inadequate cartridge. Shame, really but it did need to go on that basis. Those comments are based on using both weapons at one time or another.

I'll forego comment on the 5.56... :mad:

selil

04-25-2008, 06:29 PM

Ken White

04-25-2008, 08:31 PM

Then we're likely in fair agreement then Ken. An Army Major told me something the other night and that was that the BAR actually took three to run. One to pull the trigger, one to load, and one to carry/replenish ammo. Hope I haven't mangled that. Seems like the squad automatic weapon was an attempt to reach the ultimate of having BAR/M60 like capability with a single troop carrying/deploying it. My preference though is for flexibility and sustainability with standardized ammunition, weapons in the squad reinforced as needed by other heavier weapons.The BAR used 20 rd magazines, the BAR man needed no help in loading. No one routinely carried extra ammunition for the BAR though it was done on rare occasions (METT-TC again). The BAR Man had a BAR Belt. One model that carried 20 magazines, 400 rounds plus one in the weapon for 21 mags / 420 rounds, more than enough for most situations, another that carried 12 mags but that was issued with two six mag bandoliers for a total of 24 mags / 480 rds -- the idea was that the bandoliers could be carried by Riflemen in the squad; said Riflemen quickly figured out the solution to that was to lose their bandolier.... Links:

LINK (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Browning_Automatic_Rifle).
LINK (http://www.omahas.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=4&products_id=22&osCsid2=vcn19o8cm2c24mqel1e7cdqam2)

The two imperatives were that the BAR Man be a little guy (harder to hit) and that if he got hit, the nearest man took the weapon and ammo to keep the weapon in play.

Agree with the rest of your comment.

Norfolk

04-25-2008, 11:16 PM

Ken White

04-26-2008, 01:09 AM

For the Infantry platoon, the negatives are bothersome, not least that the weapons are heavy and unwieldy -- and they fire up too much Ammo in different packaging (the two biggest problems). The Model 1944 Johnson was a good compromise in all directions but was doomed by politics. Having worked with everything from the BAR through the M1919A6, the M14E2, M60 (several variants), M240, an experimental M16 w/ heavy barrel and the MG 3 and a couple of exotics, a heavy barrel AR that has adequate mag capacity would be ideal. The 249 is not great but slides by.

The Ultimax has merit, so does this LINK (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ravWDN2OcwE) -- it fires semi-auto from a closed bolt and full auto from an open bolt, ala the FG42 and the Johnsons.

Norfolk

04-26-2008, 01:32 AM

The Ultimax has merit, so does this LINK (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ravWDN2OcwE) -- it fires semi-auto from a closed bolt and full auto from an open bolt, ala the FG42 and the Johnsons.

Nice piece of kit, Ken.:D A few of those in each Squad or Section conceivably could resolve certain nagging matters.

The more I used the M-249, the less I was impressed with it. Besides jamming more often than I cared it to, I hated the sound of the link swishing and even rattling around inside the box.

Tom Odom

04-26-2008, 01:34 AM

T...

The two imperatives were that the BAR Man be a little guy (harder to hit) and that if he got hit, the nearest man took the weapon and ammo to keep the weapon in play.

Agree with the rest of your comment.

I just remember that Kirby (http://www.jodavidsmeyer.com/combat/personnel/Jack_Hogan_menu.html) on Combat! was always gettin shot and never ever used the sight on his BAR...

Ratzel

04-26-2008, 05:23 AM

The two imperatives were that the BAR Man be a little guy (harder to hit) and that if he got hit, the nearest man took the weapon and ammo to keep the weapon in play.

This is excellent point that I used to try to make. Since I'm 6'4 it was always assumed that I (or anyone else who was big) should carry the 240 or 249. I used to bring up this very point about being harder to hit. The argument against my argument is that I could carry it longer. Anyway, I always ended up carrying it. :(

William F. Owen

04-26-2008, 08:18 AM

I agree with the rest of your comment but am curious about these two...

RE:
Originally Posted by William F. Owen
...The other damage done by Marshall was the 2 x BARs in Korea and the loss of the .30 M1/M2 Carbine.

I think adding the two BARs to the Squad to create two fire teams was a huge mistake. "Huge" as in it perpetuated the problem it was supposed to solve in terms of creating effective fire and manoeuvre for the squad and not the platoon.

I am a fan of the M1/M2 Carbine. (you can carry 90 rounds on the weapon) It was a superbly designed military weapon (albeit by a convicted felon), far superior to 9mm SMGs, that were also in widespread use at the time, and far lighter, and more controllable than .45 SMGs.

Marshall recommended ditching it, just on hearsay, and did not do any empirical testing. While the .30 Carbine was denigrated in US service, it was successful elsewhere - UK, France and Israel. Like 5.56mm, the issue of "stopping power" did not arise.

Kiwigrunt

04-26-2008, 09:00 AM

I am a fan of the M1/M2 Carbine. (you can carry 90 rounds on the weapon) It was a superbly designed military weapon (albeit by a convicted felon), far superior to 9mm SMGs, that were also in widespread use at the time, and far lighter, and more controllable than .45 SMGs.

Indeed, if the M1/M2 carbine (I have no experience with it) is anywhere near as simple, reliable and user-friendly as my 5.56 Mini 14, then certainly the older dime a dozen SMGs like Sten and M3 grease gun would be hard pushed to beat it.

Kiwigrunt

04-26-2008, 10:14 AM

It's interesting how US Army and USMC tactical thought has been so powerfully influenced by an AR that was competing against LMGs back in the World Wars, and still exerts such force that neither the Army nor the Marines seem to be able to dispense with the "Automatic Rifleman" role and transition to the Light Machine Gunner at Squad level in doctrine as well as equipment. Even two generations after most other Western Armies did so. Very curious; not sure what to make of this situation.:confused:

Fully agree. The Brits tried it with their L86 and went to beltfed.

The USMC are currently again looking at introducing a ‘true’ AR, in addition to keeping the Minimi’s at …squad level? Yet another class of weapons! Like the UK section where only the section commander and the 2ic carry an IW. The other 6 all carry some form of support weapon. To support what exactly? As there are no riflemen to support, the support weapons, by default, become IWs. How effective are they then as support weapons with their high ammo expenditure and the section commanders’ relative lack of control. I would suggest that they are not effective to their full potential as support weapons. And by the way, who carries the additional handouts like tank and bunker teasers, claymore’s, etc?

So how many different classes of weapons do we justifiably maintain and how minor can the distinctions between those classes be before the differentiation becomes muddled and therefore possibly defeats the purpose.
The difference between a rifle and an MG is clear.
The difference between a 5.56 MG and a 7.62 MG is a little bit less clear.
The difference between an M4 and an M16 gets petty foggy (unless maybe if it’s got a good scope on it).
I would suggest that the difference between a SAW and an AR and from there to an IW becomes a smudge and therefore a waste of time. Every individual holding a slightly different weapon becomes a specialist at nothing clearly distinguishable. It’s a good way to confuse the section commander/squad leader and get his concentration from ensuring everyone is shooting at the enemy, to pin picking on which specialist should shoot at which target in particular, with associated rates of fire.
When GPMG’s are brought down to section level, the 5.56 Minimi becomes little more than an AR. Without the GPMG there, the 5.56 Minimi is THE section machine gun.
An AR at fire team level? How about riflemen (when needed) switching their IWs to full auto during the final stages of the assault, when the supporting guns have to switch their fire? Isn’t that what assault rifles were designed for? During the final stages of an assault I deem it unlikely that the fire team will be ‘manoeuvring around the AR’.

Originally Posted by Ken White
The Ultimax has merit, so does this LINK -- it fires semi-auto from a closed bolt and full auto from an open bolt, ala the FG42 and the Johnsons.
Indeed a very nice piece of equipment, I want one! :)
Instead of calling it an AR and issuing it to one person in the fireteam, why not call it something like a product improved assault rifle and give it to all riflemen? It does not look like it weighs much more than a rifle.

William F. Owen

04-26-2008, 12:46 PM

@ The Brits tried it with their L86 and went to beltfed.

@ The USMC are currently again looking at introducing a ‘true’ AR, in addition to keeping the Minimi’s at …squad level? Yet another class of weapons! Like the UK section where only the section commander and the 2ic carry an IW.

@ The difference between a rifle and an MG is clear.
The difference between a 5.56 MG and a 7.62 MG is a little bit less clear.
The difference between an M4 and an M16 gets petty foggy (unless maybe if it’s got a good scope on it).

@ The officer primarily responsible for that decision is a friend and we have had long and frank exchange of views on the merits 5.56mm belt fed weapons. I disagree with the introduction of the Minimi, because the advantages are not measurable and it adds carried weight. 1 round per second suppresses just as well as 5 rounds per second.

@ This is all because the fixation with the section/Squad, which has now become overloaded with capability. You are exactly right to point out that the proliferation of differing systems is a problem.

@ In terms of terminal effect, there is no difference between a 3-5 round burst from a 5.56mm AR, and an LMG, given the same length of barrel, sighting system and use of a bipod or similar device.

Ken White

04-26-2008, 04:26 PM

...I think adding the two BARs to the Squad to create two fire teams was a huge mistake. "Huge" as in it perpetuated the problem it was supposed to solve in terms of creating effective fire and manoeuvre for the squad and not the platoon.We can disagree on that. While I agree with you that the Squad is essentially not a maneuver element, adding additional automatic fire capability to the Platoon was a net benefit; where it's located is a continuing quibble...
I am a fan of the M1/M2 Carbine. (you can carry 90 rounds on the weapon) It was a superbly designed military weapon (albeit by a convicted felon), far superior to 9mm SMGs, that were also in widespread use at the time, and far lighter, and more controllable than .45 SMGs.As I said, it was a really good weapon afflicted with a very bad cartridge.
Marshall recommended ditching it, just on hearsay, and did not do any empirical testing. While the .30 Carbine was denigrated in US service, it was successful elsewhere - UK, France and Israel. Like 5.56mm, the issue of "stopping power" did not arise. I have personal and empirical experience -- and not in any dumb test -- that it was not an effective man stopper. The UK, France and Israel used it only because it was readily and cheaply available and disposed of it fairly quickly when they could afford to do so. Those nations also used and do use the 9mm pistol cartridge *, a pathetic and underpowered creation so not sure that's any recommendation. The Hospitals in South Africa receive a number of walking wounded and note that many patients have multiple gunshot wounds, the majority -- 9mm pistol.

* In a neat ### for tat, note that for forcing first the 7.62 (A good move) on NATO -- and later the 5.56mm (a bad move) -- NATO got even by forcing us to use the 9mm Parabellum cartridge. Fair's fair, I guess... :D

I'll add that I agree with your responses to kiwigrunt just above.

I disagree with him on equipping every man with an automatic weapon. Uses too much ammo for no good reason; as Wilf says, one round per second is as effective as five -- and is a whole lot better for staying power in the fight and for resupply. In a number of years as a Platoon sergeant, I was adamant that no one would fire on full automatic (yes, even in reaction to an ambush) and I've bounced a steel pot off more than one troop for ignoring that hard and fast rule of mine. I never had cause to regret that and did have cause -- as did some of the kids -- to be thankful for it.

I agree with kiwigrunt that putting the GPMG in the squad is a mistake for a number of reasons but I also believe that a couple of fully automatic weapons in the squad or section are advisable. I put them there instead of consolidating simply because it forces them to be spread out (and thus no group target or loss) normally but available for concentration if required.

Complaints of the M240 / FN Mag under its various guises being 'too heavy' are mostly due to that misuse. For its designed role and intent, the gun is an ideal mix of weight and of reliability. Reliability I suspect a much lighter weapon ala the Mk 48 will not achieve; nor, given its role and users does that weapon need to have the reliability of an infantry GPMG. Different strokes.

I remain convinced that belt fed weapons below company level are not a good idea. Yes, that means I support the concept of a Machine gun Platoon and disagree with the US Army concept of a Weapons Squad

AGBrina

04-26-2008, 06:40 PM

I began re-thinking the way infantrymen should be organized to fight and which battle drill techniques should be used in various combat situations a little over 12 years ago, when one of my colleagues -a LtC at the time- sent me a report prepared for the U.S.Army's Command and General Staff College on the Russian-Chechnya War (about 1994).

The Russians were tied to their vehicles. They rode those vehicles until they triggered an ambush by the Chechnyas. The Chechnyas did not have the weapons to match the Russians of course; but they deployed a mix of semi-automatic riflemen and rocket-propelled grenadiers quite effectively.

The Chechnyas used the RPGs to frighten and disrupt the Russians. They didn't seem as concerned with scoring direct hits on the vehicles (once first and last had been immobilized), as they were with making noise and spreading shrapnel. The riflemen took careful aim to shoot the leaders and soldiers as they tried to move. Apparently, the ambushes were set up so that the kill zones were more than 200 meters away from the positions taken up by the Chechnyas. This meant that the Russians could not easily "assault" their way out of the kill zone to break up the ambush; and their "5.something" ammunition could do no more than "spray and pray" in the general direction of where the fire was coming from.

This got me thinking that infantry units must be able to pour intense effective and well-aimed fire on positions 400 meters or more away; and at the same time infantry must be able to assault positions with high intensity short-range automatic weapons as well. I eventually came up with a 48-man platoon, divided into a 22-man "firing squad" with 7.62mm MGs and semi-automatic rifles, a 22-man "assault squad" with 5.56mm assault rifles and 40mm grenade launchers, and a HQ unit of 4 (PLdr, PSgt, 2 RTOs). (I realize now that these would be more properly called "sections" rather than "squads".) On the move and in firing positions, the teams within these squads (sections) would be blended by the PL, just as MGs were blended into the infantry squads by PLs in days gone by.

The "firing squad", equivalent to 2 German infantry squads of the 1940-43 era, would be capable of all the tasks traditionally assigned to infantrymen over the past 70 years, including the assault. But the weapons mix would be more effective at 200+ meters than the small caliber weapons which became standard in the post-Korean War era. I have read that some U.S. infantrymen in Iraq have used heavier caliber weapons when clearing buildings, because 5.56mm ammunition cannot penetrate doors or ceilings. So, even at close quarters larger caliber rifles can give the infantryman some advantages.

I realize that this discussion is intended to focus on the composition of the squad. But, after reading the reports from places like the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan, the city of Falluja in Iraq, and many other places, it is hard to look at the squad of 8-13 men as capable of winning any of these confrontations alone, without incorporating more soldiers and more weapons in the fight. And I still cannot figure out how anyone gets out of a HUMVEE under fire without getting hit by fire.

Viewpoints and criticisms welcome!

Ken White

04-26-2008, 08:48 PM

...I realize that this discussion is intended to focus on the composition of the squad. But, after reading the reports from places like the Korengal Valley in Afghanistan, the city of Falluja in Iraq, and many other places, it is hard to look at the squad of 8-13 men as capable of winning any of these confrontations alone, without incorporating more soldiers and more weapons in the fight. And I still cannot figure out how anyone gets out of a HUMVEE under fire without getting hit by fire.One could organize any echelon from the Squad upward to best accommodate the fight of the moment and the terrain and enemy at hand. However, doing so significantly complicates equipping and training the force to a possibly unacceptable degree. Not least due to the fact (present today in both theaters) that a low intensity fight can turn high intensity in a few minutes with disastrous consequences unless units are flexible enough to cope.

Better therefor to have a fixed organization that offers flexibility to adapt to circumstances and most current organizations do that well enough. Not perfectly -- well enough. and that's okay.

Multiple weapon calibers at Platoon level can be accommodated but are a burden. That burden is sustainable in the current two major theaters at current conflict levels but would not be supportable in a major war or even a short but high intensity conflict. Even four calibers (9mm, 5.56mm, 7.62mm, 40mm) push the envelope; for Afghanistan and Iraq add two more (.50 cal, 40mm High Velocity) and it's still bearable due to the low intensity but in a big moving war, it would be a tremendous burden and the likelihood of shortfalls in supply could be potentially disastrous. A far better solution would be to minimize caliber proliferation by a better multi-purpose round plus a grenade of >25mm.

On the HMMWV question, depends on the type. If it's an open truck, just hop out (not getting hit probability 65:35 * ); if it's Armored, it'll take longer to get out and you're more likely to get hit but the same technique is used after opening the door; just hop out (not getting hit probability 55:45). A better solution is to not get caught under fire (not getting hit probability 95:5). Not always easy but doable more often than not if one knows what one is doing and trusts one's instincts.

Best not to hold our breath on a single effective caliber...

* All probabilitiy estimates by author, YMMV.

Norfolk

04-26-2008, 09:05 PM

I remain convinced that belt fed weapons below company level are not a good idea. Yes, that means I support the concept of a Machine gun Platoon and disagree with the US Army concept of a Weapons Squad

Yes, even setting aside all the other arguments vis-a-vis magazine- versus belt-fed weapons, the best use of GPMGs/MMGs is usually made at Company level. The Germans were frequently able to suppress the enemy so effectively with the four or six guns at Company level that the Platoons sometimes did little more than walk to their objectives in some attacks. The USMC, likewise, uses much the same approach.

Conversely, holding the guns, even in pairs, at Platoon level, reduces their overall effect, even if the same number of guns as what the Germans or the Marines had are present. Not to mention that they are under the control of less experienced officers and NCOs, and have less ability to train more specifically in their roles; machine gun crews often find themselves training as riflemen instead of as machine gunners in such situations. More than one company comander has had cause to regret this arrangment anyway, and such unfortunates who have not pulled their guns in under company control in the defense have sometimes paid the price. The Germans and the Marines usually avoided this with their arrangement, while still retaining the ability to attach said guns (and other company weapons) out to individual platoons as circumstances warranted.

As for Marshall's advocacy of the fire team, each with a BAR, in order to improve the aggression and firepower of the Squad, the error was probably less in adding what it did, than in failing to add what was really necessary under the circumstances - the adoption of a USMC-pattern Squad with a full three fire teams, each with a BAR, thus allowing for not only independent Squad action when necessary, but above all for the weight of suppressive firepower necessary to enable effective Platoon fire-and-movement without encumbering Platoons with unnecessarily heavy weapons. And in those cases where independent Squad action is necessary, the Marine Squad allows for the "magic" "one-up, two-back" attack formation that is so often the most successfull, and least costly.

In this case, the two fire team Squad not only encouraged the devolution of fire and movement down to Squad level when not tactically justified - that being most of the time - but additionally led to a burden being placed upon the Platoon as a pair of MGs had to be added in order to provide for effective suppression. Thus, Company in effect lost direct control of its most important weapons in order to bolster weak Platoons, who in turn tended to detach their guns directly to the firepower-deficient Squads. A result of this, in Korea and especially Vietnam, was the phenomenon of Squads more or less routinely having to be reinforced with one of the Platoon's pair of MGs in order to provide for effective suppression of Squad objectives; Platoon and especially Company objectives required either Battalion or even Formation-level fire support for the effective suppression of their own objectives, or in those cases where such support was unavailable, simply had to go without.

Of all existing compositions at Minor-Unit and Sub-Unit level, the Marines remain the best, and the most adaptable.:cool::D

William F. Owen

04-27-2008, 06:36 AM

We can disagree on that. While I agree with you that the Squad is essentially not a maneuver element, adding additional automatic fire capability to the Platoon was a net benefit; where it's located is a continuing quibble...

As an ad hoc measure, I can see the sense, but I submit it compounded the problem in the long run because Marshall's reasoning was faulty.

. I have personal and empirical experience -- and not in any dumb test -- that it was not an effective man stopper. The UK, France and Israel used it only because it was readily and cheaply available and disposed of it fairly quickly when they could afford to do so. Those nations also used and do use the 9mm pistol cartridge *, a pathetic and underpowered creation so not sure that's any recommendation. The Hospitals in South Africa receive a number of walking wounded and note that many patients have multiple gunshot wounds, the majority -- 9mm pistol.

...and here lies the problem! People tend to listen to highly respected and experienced old war horses such as yourself, and this is a problem for chaps such as myself, (never been in a serious war) when it comes to tracking down the source of your dissatisfaction, or attempting to apply method and logic to platoon doctrine. If decisions are based on observation and anecdote, then there is no chain of evidence or discovery to track and error check. Almost always there is a disconnect between the observation and what testing shows. This is the problem.

I agree with kiwigrunt that putting the GPMG in the squad is a mistake for a number of reasons but I also believe that a couple of fully automatic weapons in the squad or section are advisable.

so would it be a mistake to have a GPMG squad? In a 30 man platoon you might have 4 x 5 man "Rifle Teams" and 2 x 5 man "GPMG Teams".

Complaints of the M240 / FN Mag under its various guises being 'too heavy' are mostly due to that misuse. For its designed role and intent, the gun is an ideal mix of weight and of reliability. Reliability I suspect a much lighter weapon ala the Mk 48 will not achieve; nor, given its role and users does that weapon need to have the reliability of an infantry GPMG. Different strokes.

Mk48 is now the 7.62mm Minimi, and very promising. Of course you could just go and get the HK 21E for about half the price!!

I remain convinced that belt fed weapons below company level are not a good idea. Yes, that means I support the concept of a Machine gun Platoon and disagree with the US Army concept of a Weapons Squad

Care to add detail? This is intriguing and if you have spoken to this before, then it passed under my radar.

I see a role for belt fed 7.62mm GPMGs in the platoon, but only one or two. I still see no role of a 5.56mm belt fed weapon.

Kiwigrunt

04-27-2008, 12:28 PM

I disagree with him on equipping every man with an automatic weapon. Uses too much ammo for no good reason; as Wilf says, one round per second is as effective as five -- and is a whole lot better for staying power in the fight and for resupply.

I agree with kiwigrunt that putting the GPMG in the squad is a mistake for a number of reasons but I also believe that a couple of fully automatic weapons in the squad or section are advisable. I put them there instead of consolidating simply because it forces them to be spread out (and thus no group target or loss) normally but available for concentration if required.

I remain convinced that belt fed weapons below company level are not a good idea.

Just upgrading assault rifles to the point where they are better capable of firing full auto reliably (AR role) without adding too much weight to the system, does not mean that they must always be used on ‘rock ‘n roll’. I fully agree with you, Ken, that aimed single shots should be the norm. Full auto must be carefully managed and controlled. However, any ‘decent’ assault rifle is capable of it. Adding a single AR ( beefed up assault rifle) to a fire team invites for that weapon to be fired on full auto most of the time, whereas the team leader ordering one, or a few, riflemen to fire a few bursts when the situation demands it, eliminates the perceived need for an AR. And that does of course mean, fire burst “at my command”, not willy nilly.

I always used to be very keen myself on the idea of adding a bit of everything to the mix, but now believe that it utterly disturbs the balance. A rifle is a rifle, a gun is a gun, an UGL is an UGL, go to it! I see no need to fill every perceived gap with a ‘halfway, neither this nor that’ system.

I do however believe that there is still a place for a beltfed (lighter then GPMG) at section level, with the option of grouping them at platoon level. (not the other way around, with a gun squad at platoon level, agree with you there Ken). With greater quantities of ammo, as required for MGs, belt can actually be lighter and less bulky (volume) than magazines; certainly high capacity mags like Beta at 1 kg empty.
6.5 Grendel........keep on dreaming!:p

Kiwigrunt

04-27-2008, 12:43 PM

...This got me thinking that infantry units must be able to pour intense effective and well-aimed fire on positions 400 meters or more away; and at the same time infantry must be able to assault positions with high intensity short-range automatic weapons as well. I eventually came up with a 48-man platoon, divided into a 22-man "firing squad" with 7.62mm MGs and semi-automatic rifles, a 22-man "assault squad" with 5.56mm assault rifles and 40mm grenade launchers, and a HQ unit of 4 (PLdr, PSgt, 2 RTOs). (I realize now that these would be more properly called "sections" rather than "squads".) On the move and in firing positions, the teams within these squads (sections) would be blended by the PL, just as MGs were blended into the infantry squads by PLs in days gone by.

Cool. I would however do it the other way around. Have the 2 sections balanced as they spend most of their time on the move and in firing positions etc. When one needs to be light for assaulting purposes, attach its heavy weapons to the supporting section. When they are balanced they can work independently as well.

jcustis

04-27-2008, 01:56 PM

whereas the team leader ordering one, or a few, riflemen to fire a few bursts when the situation demands it, eliminates the perceived need for an AR. And that does of course mean, fire burst “at my command”, not willy nilly.

Oh c'mon kiwi...:D The matter of issuing an ADDRAC is a basic task, and we do not do those well.

Ken White

04-27-2008, 05:59 PM

......and here lies the problem! People tend to listen to highly respected and experienced old war horses such as yourself, and this is a problem for chaps such as myself, (never been in a serious war) when it comes to tracking down the source of your dissatisfaction, or attempting to apply method and logic to platoon doctrine. If decisions are based on observation and anecdote, then there is no chain of evidence or discovery to track and error check. Almost always there is a disconnect between the observation and what testing shows. This is the problem.experienced training developer that the most dangerous thing in the world was "an old sweat..." True and your comment illustrates why. I would submit however, that in the case of the M1/M2 .30 cal Carbine cartridge there's enough anecdotal evidence of multiple round hits that did not stop a charging pumped-up adversary to show validity. Admittedly, a much large number were stopped by the Carbine. Whether the issue becomes critical thus, I submit, depends upon whether your Carbine shots were successful or not...

I swapped your second paragraph and the first:
As an ad hoc measure, I can see the sense, but I submit it compounded the problem in the long run because Marshall's reasoning was faulty.All war is ad hocery to the tenth power...
so would it be a mistake to have a GPMG squad? In a 30 man platoon you might have 4 x 5 man "Rifle Teams" and 2 x 5 man "GPMG Teams".In my opinion, yes. Machine guns work best when controlled by experienced leaders and crews, in pairs and in laying down a heavy volume of long range (on occasion), accurate suppressive fire. To get there requires training and a separate regimen and even mental outlook form the "Go get 'em" attitude required in an Infantry Squad / Section or Platoon.
Mk48 is now the 7.62mm Minimi, and very promising. Of course you could just go and get the HK 21E for about half the price!!Problem with both those weapons is overall reliability in an infantry at war environment -- that is a very harsh environment in a great many respects, unlike the SOF DA envirionment with a far higher standard of training and a far smaller exposure to constant rugged conditions over extended periods. I submit that both are too lightly constructed to endure in an infantry at war environment; they were purposely lightened to save weight and the flaw, for the infantry GPMG role, is that such lightening encourages the use of the MG as an AR substitute. My belief is that neither is rugged enough to survive proper usage in the infantry.
Care to add detail? This is intriguing and if you have spoken to this before, then it passed under my radar.See the comment above re: training and employment; add supply / resupply of ammo; the need for a heavier caliber / more range than is required for assault elements; and the predilection of humans to misemploy things unless structural bars are emplaced to preclude or at least impede such misuse.
I see a role for belt fed 7.62mm GPMGs in the platoon, but only one or two. I still see no role of a 5.56mm belt fed weapon.OTOH, I see a role for two GPMG (.338??? ;) to go with the Co Sniper section...) per platoon held and trained in a Company level MG platoon with adequate ammo bearers but agree totally on no 5.56 belt fed for the infantry. SOF and some mech / MP uses for such a weapon possibly exist though perhaps not enough IMO to justify the logistic problems of another weapon system.

jcustis

04-27-2008, 06:08 PM

unlike the SOF DA envirionment with a far higher standard of training and a far smaller exposure to constant rugged conditions over extended periods.

Once again you bring up an excellent point Ken. A lot of folks would love to say, "But hey, it worked wonders for the team guys," and they fail to realize that the degree of abuse (either intended or not) between a SOF element and a straight leg infantry platoon are on two totally different levels.

Ken White

04-27-2008, 06:27 PM

Just upgrading assault rifles to the point where they are better capable of firing full auto reliably (AR role) without adding too much weight to the system, does not mean that they must always be used on ‘rock ‘n roll’. I fully agree with you, Ken, that aimed single shots should be the norm. Full auto must be carefully managed and controlled...That's fairly easy to do in peacetime and in training; it is extremely difficult to do in combat and particularly so as the war goes on a new intake training declines in time and quality and expereinced leaders are killed and replaced by inexperienced folks. It is not that easy to control even with combat experienced troops as my multiple thrown helmets testify. Better to remove the temptation; it is not really necessary.
...However, any ‘decent’ assault rifle is capable of it...Does it not then become and Automatic Rifle (AR2) instead of an Assault Rifle (AR1) leading to --
...Adding a single AR ( beefed up assault rifle) to a fire team invites for that weapon to be fired on full auto most of the time...just that?
...whereas the team leader ordering one, or a few, riflemen to fire a few bursts when the situation demands it, eliminates the perceived need for an AR. And that does of course mean, fire burst “at my command”, not willy nilly.Works in peacetime and in training; sometimes in combat but it isn't reliable.

As to an AR in the Team / Squad / Section, it is far simpler to train one man than a few and it is quite possible for a junior leader to control the fire of one man who is directed to remain as close as feasible to said leader just as it is extremely difficult for him to control the fire of several. In the desert, separation between men should be on the order of fifty meters or even more; no way to control fire at that optimum distance and to close that distance for control purposes (as is now generally done; that plus the herd instinct) is to create a lucrative target that extended order doesn't provide. Even in rolling temperate terrain, distances of fifteen to twenty meters between men should be the norm. In the jungle, the distance is not a problem but the vegetation is. Fire control is just very difficult and your people have to know what to do -- and have temptations to err removed from their grasp.
...I do however believe that there is still a place for a beltfed (lighter then GPMG) at section level, with the option of grouping them at platoon level. (not the other way around, with a gun squad at platoon level, agree with you there Ken). With greater quantities of ammo, as required for MGs, belt can actually be lighter and less bulky (volume) than magazines; certainly high capacity mags like Beta at 1 kg empty.
6.5 Grendel........keep on dreaming!:pDisagree on belt fed (on grounds of complexity and reliability; several levels) and weight is vastly overstated as a problem; mostly because many insist on carrying too much ammo. The Beta Mag is too complex to survive in the infantry and serves mostly, while it works, to encourage excessive full auto firing.

Kiwigrunt

04-27-2008, 09:35 PM

As usual, you make some very clear points, Ken. Your 'been there done that' experience is hard to ignore.
Not sure about that helmet throwing thing though, what if it breaks?

Schmedlap

04-27-2008, 11:58 PM

I disagree with him on equipping every man with an automatic weapon. Uses too much ammo for no good reason; as Wilf says, one round per second is as effective as five -- and is a whole lot better for staying power in the fight and for resupply.

I think a good consideration is that with the urban combat that we are engaged in, and likely to engage in the future, there is a significant need for every fire team or vehicle crew to have the capability to quickly suppress multiple rows of windows in multiple buildings. This requires an automatic weapon with a large ammo capacity. Even vehicle crews must have this dismounted capability. If a vehicle is ambushed, the turret weapon is often put out of commission due to a catastrophic malfunction, enemy suppressive fire that precludes the gunner from correcting a minor malfunction or laying down effective fire, or some circumstance that precludes any effort - such as the gunner being killed or the weapon being destroyed. The crew must often dismount immediately to avoid being burned alive in the vehicle. In the following minute, there is a dire need for the ability to put suppressive fire upon multiple rows of windows in multiple buildings, as most of those windows are in hand grenade range and the crew has little to no available cover as it egresses the vehicle. Likewise, fire teams operating independently (as they often must do, due to manpower being stretched thin) have an even greater need for a light, fully automatic weapon with a large ammo capacity due to the tight confines and numerous suspected enemy positions (windows and rooftops) that must be suppressed if ambushed. Even when operating at the squad, platoon, or company level, the compartmentalized nature of urban terrain can quickly degenerate into a series of isolated fire team battles. It was for that reason that we often pushed a M240B down to each squad and kept an M249 in each team, even if manpower dipped down to 3-man teams or 6- to 7-man squads. Even at the platoon level, an M240B could often not be brought to bear in any way to support a fire team in contact due to the compartmentalized nature of the terrain. Keeping an M249 in each team and pushing an M240B to the squad level - in dense urban terrain - was the happy medium that we found worked best.

I remain convinced that belt fed weapons below company level are not a good idea. Yes, that means I support the concept of a Machine gun Platoon and disagree with the US Army concept of a Weapons Squad

I think the M249, as we now configure it, is priceless. With a shorter, heavier barrel, collapsible buttstock, rail system with pistol grip attachment, and a 100-round pouch, it makes for a compact, reasonably light means of suppressing large swaths in confined spaces, such as narrow streets, while also being small enough to move quickly through doors, windows, halls, etc. The only drawback is that changing out an ammo pouch on a belt-fed weapon is not as smooth or quick as a magazine change for a carbine (that was the first time in my life when I was actually cognizant of the "pucker factor." While flailing about with the feed tray cover of an M249 and a string of ammo to do a "pouch change" while lying 10 feet from a burning HMMWV, I actually felt tension in muscles that I did not know existed). But the positives outweigh the negatives.

04-28-2008, 12:33 AM

Ken,

Know that feeling. It tends to focus one on the task at hand. :)

Question for the board. It has been a long time since I ran a 13 man Marine Rifle Squad. 1961 or there abouts. After reading this long and insightful discussion on the Rifle Squad, I haven't seen a word about inter squad comm equipment.

Coming from the old school of "Follow Me" and pride in my ability to "BELLOW" orders and a great command of hand and arm signals, I knew the first time I was trying to run a squad through a life fire exercise that voice, and hand signals were not an efficient way to do the job. Standing up and yelling and standing up and making eye contact to pass on hand signals got many a man shot.

Is there a tactical inter Squad comm net available for rifle squads to use to improve efficiencya nd surivability?

This question is an obvious one and I'm curious why we are not talking about communications down to the rifle man.

3 four man fire teams to a squad gives great manueverbility and a lot of fire power. In my day the B.A.R. was the base of fire volume for assualting fixed positions if we didn't have a brace of LMG 30 assigned to our rifle platoon for that coverage.

Wouldn't a comm connect between the SL and all the squads troops be a necessary enhancement.

I realize that there are multiple radio security issues, but in todays electronic wizard era a simple, and safe commo connection should be do able.

Ken White

04-28-2008, 12:43 AM

I have no problem with specific weapon fits for a given situation. to the extent of issuing additional or alternate weapons to units, situation dependent -- my perception is that is happening in both theaters now. I could quibble on the need for or desirability of automatic fire in the suppression role you cite and have seen a slew of folks with only M1s do that quite effectively (an amplification of my point that any provided capability will be used, needed or not). Understand on the vehicle bit.

I totally agree with the need for a light fully automatic weapon with large ammo capacity for each Fire Team -- just don't think it should be belt fed -- and I think the Ultimax is a solution; it's ultra reliable and its magazine is also (unlike the Beta Mag). There could be others but no one has particularly pushed the idea though I understand the Marines are looking at a non-belt fed at Squad level so no development work has really been done until the last few years. Ideally, it would be a version of the standard long arm like the LWRC Infantry Automatic Rifle I linked above with a big magazine.

Believe me when I say I have no intention to be a smart ass or be snarky when I repeat what I said earlier -- "A better solution is to not get caught under fire (not getting hit probability 95:5). Not always easy but doable more often than not if one knows what one is doing and trusts one's instincts." I really mean that and yes, I know that is difficult. My very strong belief is that knowing what one is doing is very much training based and we simply do not train people well upon entry (or later for that matter). Our training is better now that it has ever been in my overlong life but it's still got a long way to go compared to what we could and should do. If the other guys is initiating more than 50% of the contacts, we're simply wrong and I know that his initiations can be reduced to less than 25% with good techniques and aggressive dismounted patrolling...

An additional facor is that given our current state of training, automatic fire is pushed in suppression; I submit that's a relic of WW I and WW II experience with large conscript armies when it was easier and quicker to let people spray than to train good shooters. We have a professional Army now and the time now to train good shooters. We ought to take it, if we have to restart the Draft, we can always go back to spraying.

I have no experience at all with the M249. What little I know of the weapon I base on my son who's spent quite a few years running light infantry rifle and scout platoons and has recent experience in both current large theaters; he despises the weapon. Most other folks I've talked to who have used the M249 are at best lukewarm on it. That said, my objection is not to that specific weapon but to belt fed weapons at that level. I base that on overall logistic and compatability problems plus weight, reliability and excessive ammunition usage factors, not mention your cited reload problem -- and that is a large problem...

We all have different experiences; what matters is that whatever we do works; there is no one best answer in combat.

Norfolk

04-28-2008, 02:00 AM

Coming from the old school of "Follow Me" and pride in my ability to "BELLOW" orders and a great command of hand and arm signals, I knew the first time I was trying to run a squad through a life fire exercise that voice, and hand signals were not an efficient way to do the job. Standing up and yelling and standing up and making eye contact to pass on hand signals got many a man shot.

Is there a tactical inter Squad comm net available for rifle squads to use to improve efficiencya nd surivability?

This question is an obvious one and I'm curious why we are not talking about communications down to the rifle man.

3 four man fire teams to a squad gives great manueverbility and a lot of fire power. In my day the B.A.R. was the base of fire volume for assualting fixed positions if we didn't have a brace of LMG 30 assigned to our rifle platoon for that coverage.

Wouldn't a comm connect between the SL and all the squads troops be a necessary enhancement.

I realize that there are multiple radio security issues, but in todays electronic wizard era a simple, and safe commo connection should be do able.

Hello RJ,

Great point. I think jcustis and a few others have used the new squad-level radios that each soldier carries - great piece of kit, apparently.

Yes, using these radios enables the Squad to move in very different ways potentially, than with the old spoken orders and visual signals. When rounds are going downrange, orders can't be heard, and hand signals are, obviously, rather attractive to enemy bullets. Not to mention that men have to be bunched up to within 5-10 m of each other in order to "retain" (and I use that term advisedly) control.

The distances that Ken described are only sensible, and intra-squad comms allow not only for greater dispersion whilst improving control, they also permit the Squad to break down into its constituent Fire Teams. The Fire Teams can then move semi-autonomously and take full advantage of available cover and concealment in order to minimize their visibility and sign. Basically, it allows them to seek and find the enemy without being themselves seen as easily as if advancing in the formally taught field formations. In that respect, the Fire Teams may sort of take on an SF-patrol type mode of movement, but with an obvious difference being that the Infantry are still going out of their way to look for trouble, while the SF are usually (not always of course) trying to avoid it.

The essential criteria of what makes for a Squad is "the smallest unit commanded by a single man". Clearly, the "Squad" as it presently exists doesn't really fit into that definition; the Fire Team is the "Squad", and the "Squad" has become a "Section" since the introduction of the Fire Team - the true Squad. Intra-Squad/Section radio communications are more and more making this so, and Squaddies in the future may increasingly come to both operate as and identify with, their "Squad"/Fire Team than their Squad/Section. Especially as Fire Teams disperse over ever-wider areas of the battlefield; the Squad/Section, as we know it, is in danger of becoming the Platoon of the future in that sense. At this point, Wigram's and Wilf's ideas on Platoon organization are brought increasingly into consideration.

KiwiGrunt, even if belt-fed guns are not the way to go below Company-level (normally, but with exceptions), I still share your view that something along the lines of the 6.5mm Grendel should be the common cartridge of the Squad/Section. The 5.56mm is not fully adequate, and as the 6.5mm gives something close to 7.62mm performance at typical infantry engagement ranges and at a substantial reduction in weight, it's probably most suitable for Platoon needs.

A belt-fed weapon, especially if the belt is contained in a box like on the Minimi LMG/M-249 SAW, can make a terrible racket when a few guys are trying to avoid being heard by the enemy in the bush or during the night. Magazine-fed is definitely preferable here, particularly if Infantry Squads/Sections are going to spend a lot more of their time on the battlefield moving from cover-to-cover, firing position-to-firing position as semi-autonomous Fire Teams in order to minimize detection and losses, and to maximize surprise and shock effect. The big guns, like the MAG/M-240 were used with good effect in Rhodesia and the Falklands, amongst others, in four-man teams, but again that was mostly with SF and Commando Forces. When the big guns are attached to regular Squads/Sections, as Ken says, it's usually in order to make up for inadequate individual and sub-unit training standards - but not always.

In any case, while "small wars" may allow for the comparative luxury of attaching heavy weapon to minor- and sub-units, "big wars" rarely do, and the German and USMC Machine Gun/Weapons Platoons at Company level were the products of wartime experience; in the former case, drawing on the lessons of WWI as well as WWII, and in the latter, as a result of the experiences of fighting in the Pacific. Taking together, the German and USMC experiences (which included far more close-quarter fighting than almost anything since then) arrived at pretty similar conclusions despite very different experiences, of what worked, in most places, most of the time. And of course both were readily able and willing to adapt to the circumstances at hand.

William F. Owen

04-28-2008, 05:37 AM

The big guns, like the MAG/M-240 were used with good effect in Rhodesia and the Falklands, amongst others, in four-man teams, but again that was mostly with SF and Commando Forces. When the big guns are attached to regular Squads/Sections, as Ken says, it's usually in order to make up for inadequate individual and sub-unit training standards - but not always.
.

Uniquely, in 1982 2 PARA, arbitrarily, and for reasons I am still researching added a GPMG to each section, thus giving them two. This is exactly what Marshall had done with the BARs.

I have yet to find any written or oral evidence that it made them any more effective than Battalions who did not do the same thing.

Kiwigrunt

04-28-2008, 12:38 PM

Uniquely, in 1982 2 PARA, arbitrarily, and for reasons I am still researching added a GPMG to each section, thus giving them two. This is exactly what Marshall had done with the BARs.

I have yet to find any written or oral evidence that it made them any more effective than Battalions who did not do the same thing.

Indeed, other than the odd noncommittal one-liner in a few books and magazines, any substantial feedback and after-action reports are severely lacking.
It would be equally interesting to get same info on marines experience with L7 gimpy alongside L4 Bren in the Falklands.

And along those lines, and in line with Ken’s concerns on ammo expenditure, it has been stated that US troops in Vietnam expanded an average of some 50,000 rounds of small arms ammunition per confirmed kill.
The UK forces in the Falklands found that they were going through their ammo allocation much faster than anyone could have imagined.
It would be interesting to see rounds fired per kill statistics on the Falklands and now in Iraqastan.

Schmedlap

04-29-2008, 04:04 AM

I could quibble on the need for or desirability of automatic fire in the suppression role you cite and have seen a slew of folks with only M1s do that quite effectively

I'm speaking more to the occasion when it is 3 or 4 guys responsible for their own 360/4D security and they're outnumbered. While it is fleeting in nature, it does happen often enough to consider it, and that small team generally needs to fend for itself for a few minutes. There needs to be a capability to suppress 2 or 3 floors of doors, windows, and rooftops in a 90 to 100 degree horizontal field of fire and 30 to 45 degree vertical field of fire. Either that, or we need to find a way to accomplish our mission without spreading our fire teams so thin across a compartmented battlefield.

What little I know of the weapon I base on my son who's spent quite a few years running light infantry rifle and scout platoons and has recent experience in both current large theaters; he despises the weapon. Most other folks I've talked to who have used the M249 are at best lukewarm on it. That said, my objection is not to that specific weapon but to belt fed weapons at that level.

Yes, I am definitely among the minority of people who tout the virtues of the M249. My observation is that most of these weapons are reaching the point in their life cycle where they are in dire need of depot-level maintenance. In OIF I, one of my SAW gunners was known as THE guy in the company whose SAW was not deadlined. 17 out of 18 were paperweights for the entire deployment. When we got home and I became XO, my armorer and I made dozens of trips to the 40 level repair folks who did the mother of all technical inspections on every weapon in our arms room. They must have done over a million dollars in parts and labor. It was incredible. After that, we were 18 of 18 FMC SAWs for the next 18 months. I think people are too quick to assume the SAW is unreliable and too hesitant to hold their XO's feet to the fire. Any weapon will become unreliable if beaten, not maintained, and abused for a decade.

That is in no way intended as a rebuttal to your point. A magazine-fed, high capacity, full-auto weapon in the hands of each fire team would be gold.

Schmedlap

04-29-2008, 04:13 AM

The 5.56mm is not fully adequate.

The 5.56mm round for the Squad Designated Marksmen rifles is fully adequate. It is 72 grains and has a (lawfully) hollowed tip. Whereas the tracer and 68-grain ball often only resulted in blood trails, the 72-grain 5.56mm scored first-round kills or sufficient trauma to foil the evil-doer's plot almost without exception. As noted, the round was for the SDM rifles, but we started requesting these rounds on our LOGSTAT in lieu of the regular 5.56mm ball. We never got enough of it, so we started loading it in a 3:1 ratio or however best we could mix it into our magazines.

Cure projectile dysfunction: replace the 68-grain ball with the 72-grain hollow tip.

Ken White

04-29-2008, 05:02 AM

I'm speaking more to the occasion when it is 3 or 4 guys responsible for their own 360/4D security and they're outnumbered. While it is fleeting in nature, it does happen often enough to consider it, and that small team generally needs to fend for itself for a few minutes. There needs to be a capability to suppress 2 or 3 floors of doors, windows, and rooftops in a 90 to 100 degree horizontal field of fire and 30 to 45 degree vertical field of fire. Either that, or we need to find a way to accomplish our mission without spreading our fire teams so thin across a compartmented battlefield.The quick response to that would be that what you say cannot be done even if every one of those four men had an MG. However, you were there and I was not so I'll defer to you on that. I will point out that my "...slew of folks with only M1s do that quite effectively" was citing just such situations, Marine four man fire teams, in an urban environment, Seoul, much like Baghdad (I didn't make DS/DS or OIF, too old for both but was there almost 40 years ago; from the pictures, the infrastructure hasn't changed that much, just gotten bigger) but with real and good reinforced concrete instead of poor cinder block and mud bricks. We can differ on the fire volume required.

I would point out that receiving a large volume of automatic fire most of which cracks overhead or is obviously high is not nearly as a good a suppressant as a far lower volume of effective fire wherein he who exposes himself gets hit...

Honest. At least, I always looked at it that way. :wry:

Edited to add: We have become too risk averse. Force protection is IMO overdone. Patrolling is at the same time poorly trained, inadequately performed and arguably one of the -- if not the most -- important missions of the Infantry. That is true in COIN and in full scale high intensity war. Regrettably, it is dangerous and that is true in any environment, urban, desert, woods, jungle -- everywhere. It's got to be done, heavily and repeatedly and Fire Teams can and should do it regardless of terrain. It's the job, just goes with the territory. There may be another way to accomplish some missions but most are going to require patrols; the more, the better and, generally, smaller is better; what's lost in firepower and mass is offset by a huge gain in overall coverage and agility.

Yes, I am definitely among the minority of people who tout the virtues of the M249. My observation is that most of these weapons are reaching the point in their life cycle where they are in dire need of depot-level maintenance. In OIF I, one of my SAW gunners was known as THE guy in the company whose SAW was not deadlined. 17 out of 18 were paperweights for the entire deployment. When we got home and I became XO, my armorer and I made dozens of trips to the 40 level repair folks who did the mother of all technical inspections on every weapon in our arms room. They must have done over a million dollars in parts and labor. It was incredible. After that, we were 18 of 18 FMC SAWs for the next 18 months. I think people are too quick to assume the SAW is unreliable and too hesitant to hold their XO's feet to the fire. Any weapon will become unreliable if beaten, not maintained, and abused for a decade.I think you just made my kids point and one I made about the Mk 48 (the '7.62 SAW') -- in attempt to lighten the weapon, they adversely impacted the sturdiness and ruggedness needed for an Infantry platoon full auto weapon. What you did was exemplary, and you deserve kudos for it -- but IMO, you shouldn't have to do that. If the weapon were rugged enough, you wouldn't have had to. However, all belt feds need tender treatment, that's why I don't believe they belong below Company level. Maybe the PKM might work -- it's pretty Joe-proof... :)

Re: your response to Norfolk, agreed. Using the Mk 262 also works -- in the M16 and the SDM; in the M4 you still have the problem that the short barrel won't give even the heavier bullets enough push. The 5.56 is just an inadequate cartridge, always has been. Unit I was in ran the Troop Test on the then AR 15 back in '64. We killed a lot of pigs for the local Oscar Myer plant -- with the control weapon, the M14; not so many with the AR 15s. We recommended keeping the M14 and 7.62. McNamara disagreed...:rolleyes:

I note that SOCOM has ordered beaucoup SCAR Heavies in 7.62 and fewer SCAR Lights in 5.56 than originally contemplated. :cool:

William F. Owen

04-29-2008, 05:52 AM

That is in no way intended as a rebuttal to your point. A magazine-fed, high capacity, full-auto weapon in the hands of each fire team would be gold.

I used to think the same, but having laid around on the floor and swapped out a few C-Mags on the G-36 LMG, it is far from easy. Same is true of the Ultimax. Those big box magazines are heavy and bulky, plus someone needs to re-fill them!! I think 30 round boxes actually regulate rates of fire very well, and for speed of change they can't be beat.

There is a new CL-Mag around now, supposedly for the USMC AR.

Sabre

05-01-2008, 05:03 PM

That's fairly easy to do in peacetime and in training; it is extremely difficult to do in combat and particularly so as the war goes on a new intake training declines in time and quality and expereinced leaders are killed and replaced by inexperienced folks. It is not that easy to control even with combat experienced troops as my multiple thrown helmets testify. Better to remove the temptation...

While I definitely see the point, the US Army is historically *terrible* at "drawing the line" between putting capability in the hands of the troops vs. worrying that they will abuse it and create logistical problems, perhaps starting with repeating rifles in the Civil War...

Why is it so completely impossible to teach fire discipline?
We always sell ourselves so short, living too much in fear of logistics (something that the US Army is better at than most) and our perceived inability to train our own troops. I submit that it *is* something that can be taught.

Heh, what the government should really do is require video game developers to include strict ammunition limits in their games (with the realistic consequences of running dry in the middle of a fight), since that is the "earliest training" that so many potential recruits receive.
It sounds silly, I know, but I'd bet that would yield surprisingly good results.

Ken White

05-01-2008, 06:05 PM

fire discipline (among other things...) is not due to the American psyche, it's due to poor training. The troops have always been more capable than they're allowed to be. These kids today are particularly good and deserve better, they'll do what they're trained to do.

The abysmally stupid Standards based training and the equivalent ARTEP were both disasters. The current too tentative switch to outcome based training needs to be accelerated and adopted Army wide ASAP.

selil

05-01-2008, 07:46 PM

The abysmally stupid Standards based training and the equivalent ARTEP were both disasters. The current too tentative switch to outcome based training needs to be accelerated and adopted Army wide ASAP.

Seconded..... all in favor?

Sabre

05-02-2008, 03:10 PM

However, all belt feds need tender treatment, that's why I don't believe they belong below Company level. Maybe the PKM might work -- it's pretty Joe-proof... :)

I note that SOCOM has ordered beaucoup SCAR Heavies in 7.62 and fewer SCAR Lights in 5.56 than originally contemplated. :cool:

So, let me make sure that I have this straight: the big problems with having MG's down in the platoons is that the platoon-level leaders don't have the experience to handle them, there is no depth of experience among the machine-gunner crews (no slots in the TOE for machinegun NCO's), and there are many tactical situations where the Company CO needs 3 or 4 guns to shoot the rest of the company onto the obj.

*If* I were in charge, the company commander would have a heavy weapons group of say, 3 GPMG's (heck, you can even say they are in the "sustained fire role") and 3 60mm Mortars. Each platoon still gets their 2 or 3 MGs. Thus a support by fire position could have the 3 company GPMGs, plus a rifle platoon with 2 or 3 more, for a total of 5 or 6.

The company commander has his own machineguns, there are slots in the TOE for NCO's that are machinegun specialists (who back in garrison can ensure the gunners in the platoons are well trained, and the weapons are well cared for), and platoons get some tactical flexibility if, in the chaos of combat, they end up needing that firepower.
...and if our infantry platoon leaders don't know how to employ belt-fed MGs, then we had better'd teach them, because they are about one sniper's bullet away from company command.

Oh, and on the last note, I have been quite disappointed to see how the "great rifle caliber debate" has panned out. The competition between 6.8 and 6.5 only served to stall the process long enough for the "5.56 is good enough" idea to find a voice, and Lord knows, it only takes the tiniest obstacle to stop a change from occuring. The salient point, I would think, is that no one has touted the 5.56 round as being *better* than the other calibers, merely that it is "OK". We pay top dollar for this stuff - we can do a little better than just "OK"?

Ken White

05-02-2008, 04:37 PM

So, let me make sure that I have this straight: the big problems with having MG's down in the platoons is that the platoon-level leaders don't have the experience to handle them, there is no depth of experience among the machine-gunner crews (no slots in the TOE for machinegun NCO's), and there are many tactical situations where the Company CO needs 3 or 4 guns to shoot the rest of the company onto the obj.The major issues are that the GPMG is a tad tempermental mechanically and people who handle it exclusively do a better job than those to whom it is part time effort, it's too heavy to function well in an Infantry platoon, it complicates ammo resupply and that added firepower is only rarely needed at that level.
*If* I were in charge, the company commander would have a heavy weapons group of say, 3 GPMG's (heck, you can even say they are in the "sustained fire role") and 3 60mm Mortars. Each platoon still gets their 2 or 3 MGs. Thus a support by fire position could have the 3 company GPMGs, plus a rifle platoon with 2 or 3 more, for a total of 5 or 6.Only Ranger platoons have three guns; whether one has two or three, the issues at platoon level remain. I'd also note that your solution would significantly increase ammo usage which is far from an unalloyed good thing.
...and if our infantry platoon leaders don't know how to employ belt-fed MGs, then we had better'd teach them, because they are about one sniper's bullet away from company command.That's not the issue, knowing how to employ them is easy, it's the actual employment that is the issue. * The Platoon leader isn't the problem, the weapons squad leader and the vagaries of reassignment within the platoon are a part of the problem, finicky belt feds, massed fires, ammo resupply and coherent training are some other parts. It is easier to train a MG platoon to use their guns effectively en masse and to farm the Squads to rifle platoons as needed than it is to centralize fragmented and not trained together squads when that is required -- and in a high intensity conflict that will be the norm. At the risk of cycling Gian here, let me point out that we HAVE to organize and train to do high intensity combat, we can always scale down to do the easier COIN stuff when it's required.

I'd also suggest that the use of automatic weapons fire in the suppressive mode in urban COIN situations is not always advisable.
Oh, and on the last note, I have been quite disappointed to see how the "great rifle caliber debate" has panned out. The competition between 6.8 and 6.5 only served to stall the process long enough for the "5.56 is good enough" idea to find a voice...We pay top dollar for this stuff - we can do a little better than just "OK"?No argument from me -- I voted against the 5.56 over 44 years ago. You need to talk to PM Soldier and BG R. Mark Brown.

P.S.

When you talk to Brown, don't forget to tell him you're fully aware that we forced the 5.56 on a reluctant NATO and then signed a STANAG saying we'd stick with it, that we've sold a lot of weapons and ammo worldwide, that you know how many millions of rounds are in Depots in Europe, Okinawa and Korea as well as on the PrePo ships at Diego Garcia, Guam and elsewhere and that you fully understand the costs involved in a switch as well as the length of time and the training penalty it would take to do that.

P.P.S

* Our training of new entries, officer and enlisted is better than it's ever been but it still isn't good enough. However, as I said, employment is the problem. Next time you see a platoon running a live fire, try this; listen to the two guns, do they fire alternately; does one pick up the rate of fire while the other reloads, all automatically and without command? Then, ask them to place their beaten zone on a reverse slope as you would have to do if attacking a defender who used a reverse slope defense. After that, ask them to do a set up for night final protective fires. If they can do all that, you have just seen an unusually good Weapons Squad leader's product...

05-02-2008, 09:57 PM

Thanks for the PPS, Ken!

P.P.S

* Our training of new entries, officer and enlisted is better than it's ever been but it still isn't good enough. However, as I said, employment is the problem. Next time you see a platoon running a live fire, try this; listen to the two guns, do they fire alternately; does one pick up the rate of fire while the other reloads, all automatically and without command?

Then, ask them to place their beaten zone on a reverse slope as you would have to do if attacking a defender who used a reverse slope defense. After that, ask them to do a set up for night final protective fires. If they can do all that, you have just seen an unusually good Weapons Squad leader's product...

Memories from the San Margarita Hills - 1959

Guns Up!

Ken White

05-03-2008, 12:54 AM

earlier. ;)

I don't guess I should even mention a Clinometer (LINK) (http://browningmgs.com/Clinometer/Clinometer.htm) should I? :D

ODB

05-03-2008, 04:40 AM

My bread and butter at one point in life. Yes this is a lost art, depending on the unit. I will be the first to admit sometime around 10 years ago the Army shifted focus from individual tasks to collective tasks, one of the biggest misakes we have ever made. A few of us old dinosars who grew up under good leaders know the importance of individual tasks, afterall last time I looked collective tasks are nothing more than individual tasks put together. Basics, basics, basics.

I remember my first few years in the Army if the company had a M60 range the entire company was out there. There would be concurrent training stations set up, conducting training on every aspect of the weapons systems, and everyone in the company was trained. The same would take place on M249, M203, M16, Claymore, etc... ranges. We shot Laws, AT-4, threw frags, if it was in the inventory we trained with it, from Pvt E-1 to 1SG.

I'm sorry all that high speed sh*t is cool but it doesn't get the job done. Need to learn and execute elementary level before graduating. Show me a unit that can execute the basics at near perfect execution and they will look "high speed". Now taking all of this into account when looking at rifle squad composition. What is the proficientcey level of (automatically promoted) squad leaders? Can they handle emplacing machine guns in an effective SBF? C2 the SBF and the maneuver element? IMHO they cannot unless they have effectively trained their team leaders.

There is so many factors involved in figuring squad compostion. Personally I believe in weapons squad not weapon platoon. Being a bit aged I don't believe in a platoon having to carry MG ammo, if you want the gun man up and take the gun, have pride in carrying it. Sorry my rule as weapons squad leader is you simply did not give up the gun, if you did you'd no longer be in my weapons squad. We did not put subpar performers on our guns, weapons squads were the best a platoon had to offer and we carried our own ammo, many times with two man teams.

To comment on a previous post about leadership not knowing how to employ the guns, had a PL one time shut down my SBF about 400 rounds into it, I had 1500 rounds per gun. Guess who carried the ammo back, the PL. He needed to learn what it felt like. Never again did he shut me down early, he learned to control his maneuver element, to allow his guns to do the work. I know many who want MG in their squads but can't handle tem, sorry easiest way to misuse them and to get someone killed.

Another heartache of mine is the designated marksmans concept, not buying it. Everyone should be proficient with their weapon. Additionally without a spotter and some serious optics(spotting scope) how far out can you obtain positive ID of a threat? Just food for thought. M249, finda better weapon, they are out there or can be developed, we have people living in a space station, yet our squad automatic rifleman is using junk.

The most underutilized weapon in our inventory is the M203, so do we go back to the M-79? Use it as a secondary weapon? I am also a fan of every combat arms soldier having a secondary weapon, no matter the terrain. Sorry for the jumbled thought process on this post, my mind is going a 100 different directions.

William F. Owen

05-03-2008, 12:48 PM

My bread and butter at one point in life. Yes this is a lost art, depending on the unit. I will be the first to admit sometime around 10 years ago the Army shifted focus from individual tasks to collective tasks, one of the biggest misakes we have ever made.

Well I can die happy knowing that at least one other man out there agrees with me! If everyone has high individual skills levels, the rest follows.

Ken White

05-03-2008, 04:09 PM

May be a few more out there... :wry:

Norfolk

05-03-2008, 07:09 PM

Count me in, too.

And on the art of machine-gunning, there have been various attempts to revive it for the last 20 years in various Armies. AFAIK, the only comprehensive indirect-fire tables for the FN MAG/M-240 are maintained by the British Army and the USMC; the Canadian table which I used only extends out to the publicly stated range of the gun - and this table was part of the effort to "revive the lost art of machine-gunning".:wry: I can only hope that the Brit Bn-level Machine Gun Platoons and the USMC Coy-level Weapons Platoons actually (and can) use their complete tables for said gun.

jcustis

05-03-2008, 11:41 PM

I can only hope that the Brit Bn-level Machine Gun Platoons and the USMC Coy-level Weapons Platoons actually (and can) use their complete tables for said gun.

Although I'd need a quick re-fresh Norfolk, I learned to employ defilade/indirect fire during the period of instruction at the Infantry Officer's Course. I believe that our advanced MG leader's course does the same.

When I was a young weapons platoon commander, employment from defilade was a collective task that our battalion commander tested during a Wpns Plt competition overseas. I still stay in touch with the section leader who won scored highest during that phase (mine :D).

Norfolk

05-04-2008, 12:09 AM

When I was a young weapons platoon commander, employment from defilade was a collective task that our battalion commander tested during a Wpns Plt competition overseas. I still stay in touch with the section leader who won scored highest during that phase (mine :D).

A very good man to keep in touch with.;) Might need him some day.

William F. Owen

05-04-2008, 04:36 AM

AFAIK, the only comprehensive indirect-fire tables for the FN MAG/M-240 are maintained by the British Army and the USMC; the Canadian table which I used only extends out to the publicly stated range of the gun - .

We might need to be a bit careful here. A lot of what it taught about MGs comes from WW1 - as does a heck of a lot else.

I see the main application of weapons like FN MAG/M240/GPMG et al, to be direct fire out to 1,800-2000m (observed fall of shot). I learned indirect, map predicted and pre-registered firing techniques for the SF Role - and I'd be happy to drop them from training. In the days of NI and TI sights, ROE and all else, I just don't see a role for those skills. YES, we can all come up with examples, but I don't see current ops providing any good data.

Ken White

05-04-2008, 05:05 AM

We might need to be a bit careful here. A lot of what it taught about MGs comes from WW1 - as does a heck of a lot else.Some of what's taught even comes from the Legions of Rome...

I've repeatedly denounced our refusal to dump many bad habits acquired in WW II -- and to a lesser extent WW I, Korea and Viet Nam -- all have lent some clutter. However, everything from any one of those is not bad; need to be careful what's retained and what's thrown out.
I see the main application of weapons like FN MAG/M240/GPMG et al, to be direct fire out to 1,800-2000m (observed fall of shot)...we can all come up with examples, but I don't see current ops providing any good data.I do agree -- with the emphasis on 'current' and the added caveat 'extremely rarely in Iraq, unusually but sporadically in Afghanistan' (Hills, reverse slope users, n9o dense urbanizations, set piece firefights). Plus, tomorrow's another day and things can change; wars can differ drastically and ROE for major conflict don't resemble those for COIN Ops at all...

It could be eliminated as rarely used today in any force that has it's GPMGs at Platoon level -- if they're at company or higher, it doesn't need to be trained in one sense but in another, it makes for a better, more competent gunner, doesn't take long and isn't at all difficult to train. It's an asset, often a necessity in conventional war, not much required in COIN. The ability should not be lost.

William F. Owen

05-04-2008, 09:14 AM

Some of what's taught even comes from the Legions of Rome...

I've repeatedly denounced our refusal to dump many bad habits acquired in WW II -- and to a lesser extent WW I, Korea and Viet Nam -- all have lent some clutter. However, everything from any one of those is not bad; need to be careful what's retained and what's thrown out.

I concur. I am even moved to say that the best modern Army that ever existed, was the British Army of 1918-28. It could war fight and do pretty good COIN as well.

It could be eliminated as rarely used today in any force that has it's GPMGs at Platoon level -- if they're at company or higher, it doesn't need to be trained in one sense but in another, it makes for a better, more competent gunner, doesn't take long and isn't at all difficult to train. It's an asset, often a necessity in conventional war, not much required in COIN. The ability should not be lost.

I agree in that I think someone has to know how to do it, as per a support weapons specialisation, but I'd drop it from all but the Instructors courses.

What I am really talking about is the emphasis on the application and not the process. - Like Sniping. What you need are excellent shooters, not a bunch of Hiawatha wannabe Ninjas.

We can always make the arguments to retain and acquire skills, but training time and budget is finite, so cutting out those things that are not currently done on operations, may have merit.

davidbfpo

05-04-2008, 10:42 AM

I concur. I am even moved to say that the best modern Army that ever existed, was the British Army of 1918-28. It could war fight and do pretty good COIN as well.

Wilf makes a good point and so moved to a new thread under History and called Armies decline after winning a war?

I have read about The Hundred Days campaign in 1918, by the Allied armies on the Western Front (including Australia, British, Canadian, French, Belgian and American). Plus a few wars afterwards, not always succesful e.g. Russain Civil War intervention and not to overlook a war with Afghanistan (The Third Afghan War).

What is interesting is why this prowess disappears. Personnel changes I'd expect to be the key and declining political understanding of waging war second. Logistically, war stocks will have run down and new supplies are required.

davidbfpo

jcustis

05-04-2008, 01:04 PM

NI and TI sights

I don't know what those acronyms are, but even though they are around and we aren't facing anyone at near-peer competitor level, I think we'd be ignorant to discard the techniques.

Don't forget how long the Ma Deuce has been in service.:D

William F. Owen

05-04-2008, 04:25 PM

I don't know what those acronyms are, but even though they are around and we aren't facing anyone at near-peer competitor level, I think we'd be ignorant to discard the techniques.

Acronyms = Night and Thermal imagery. I wouldn't bet on not facing peer competitors at the tactical level, or at least those who can compensate for tactical shortcomings in other ways, eg: The Chechens in Fallujah.

I am not saying discard the the techniques. I am saying that there has to be a judgement made as to the cost and training debt, versus their actual operational applications, which seems to be very rare.

I don't have a syllabus to hand but my guess is that Pre-registered and map predicted fire accounts for 60-70% of the time taken to complete a full Sustained Fire Machine Gun course. - or Manoeuvre Support Gun Controllers Course

Ken White

05-04-2008, 05:00 PM

...I don't have a syllabus to hand but my guess is that Pre-registered and map predicted fire accounts for 60-70% of the time taken to complete a full Sustained Fire Machine Gun course. - or Manoeuvre Support Gun Controllers CourseHowever, I've long noted the ability of armed forces all over the world to cram two weeks of instruction into six weeks...

Syllabi exist all to often simply to justify the number of instructors and administrators; what needs to be taught anf how much of it is seldom a major issue.

A decent course for gunners should be about two weeks, a MG Leaders course one week. In both cases, more than four hours each on pre registered and indirect fires, to include firing, is wasted time.

William F. Owen

05-05-2008, 06:06 AM

However, I've long noted the ability of armed forces all over the world to cram two weeks of instruction into six weeks...

YES! - exactly. This is something I have never understood, and it points to process over end state.

To engage over open/optic sights out to 2,000m, I can't see needing more than 2 days and that's with live firing. If the guys already know the M240 from the light role, then 1 day is all it would take.

selil

05-05-2008, 12:37 PM

To engage over open/optic sights out to 2,000m, I can't see needing more than 2 days and that's with live firing.

2000 meters in 2 days? With standard platoon/squad equipment?

William F. Owen

05-05-2008, 12:45 PM

2000 meters in 2 days? With standard platoon/squad equipment?

M240/GPMG, plus tripod and buffer mount. Plus you'll need a pair of binoculars to spot the fall of shot. At night this drops off to tracer burn out. Thermal Imager may help, but I've never done it with TI.

Ken White

05-05-2008, 02:47 PM

Rifleman

05-05-2008, 03:37 PM

However, I've long noted the ability of armed forces all over the world to cram two weeks of instruction into six weeks...

That's a good point. I don't know about machine gun leadership courses but I thought we could have done jump school in about a week, two at the most.

Of course, it depends on the nature of the subject being taught.

Shortened sniper courses? Maybe, but I tend to think not. You can teach someone the principals of wind and range estimation fairly fast but it requires a lot of practice to really get good at things like that. And that practice is probably best done under an experienced long range shooting instructor. Passing some basic tests on the formulas at school and taking it back to your home unit to hone.....I'm not sure that would be the best approach for something like sniping.

I've gone off topic, I know, but I just wanted to point out that we probably spend too much time on some things but not enough on others.

jcustis

05-05-2008, 04:11 PM

We often expand a course or two due to course-critiques from the students, or round-tables where the operating forces address the training shortfalls of the troops in their charge.

In the current Marine Corps, I think we may be more disposed towards cutting the curriculum down, but that is more a function of our push to get to 202K. Many Marines are geting backed up in the tranining/transient elbow of the pipeline.

Ken White

05-05-2008, 04:35 PM

That's a good point. I don't know about machine gun leadership courses but I thought we could have done jump school in about a week, two at the most.A week is almost certainly overkill for the training, three weeks is barely adequate for the 'self selection' and culling of the less than dedicated to see who can cope -- that could be better, cheaper and less expensively done about as well with a a good psych battery.
Shortened sniper courses? Maybe, but I tend to think not...I'm not sure that would be the best approach for something like sniping.

I've gone off topic, I know, but I just wanted to point out that we probably spend too much time on some things but not enough on others.Agreed. We do better now than ever but still have too many old habits that won't die. Training needs to be outcome based, everyone above the grade of Corporal need to know they are trainers and they need to work at it -- to include while in the combat zone. Everything is training is everything...

JCustis said:
We often expand a course or two due to course-critiques from the students, or round-tables where the operating forces address the training shortfalls of the troops in their charge.The Army does the same thing. In my experience at a TRADOC post there were some flies in the ointment. First, critiques were often based on poor performance by an instructor and rather than just fire the incompetent, they tried to fix the symptom. Second, a lot of critiques were whines at 'too tough standards' or simply too much work and those should have been ignored, they too often were not.

The Schools tend to select tasks to train wherein they can get a high instructor count and / or a good looking pass/fail rate rather than selecting the tasks that need institutional training -- that's what causes the operating force to complain about poor training.

The entire system is too bureaucratic and needs a long hard look IMO -- and we need to get to outcome based training across the force.

Norfolk

05-05-2008, 08:46 PM

M240/GPMG, plus tripod and buffer mount. Plus you'll need a pair of binoculars to spot the fall of shot. At night this drops off to tracer burn out. Thermal Imager may help, but I've never done it with TI.

Don't forget to teach them how to dig a proper MG trench either (that's worth the better part of a day). And for those not using the old Browning .30 cal tripod (the US still does) but the full 6400-mil traverse tripod and gun cradle that comes with a Tritium lamp (Canadian have that) for the aiming stakes, all the joys that come with using the Mortar sight for registering targets and laying the gun.

Ken White

05-05-2008, 09:46 PM

Don't forget to teach them how to dig a proper MG trench either (that's worth the better part of a day). And for those not using the old Browning .30 cal tripod (the US still does) but the full 6400-mil traverse tripod and gun cradle that comes with a Tritium lamp (Canadian have that) for the aiming stakes, all the joys that come with using the Mortar sight for registering targets and laying the gun.The quest for quality does complicate life, does it not. Lights are for wimps. ;)

We gots a new tripod on the way -- still no 6400 mil but note the weight! :D

Sabre

05-05-2008, 10:40 PM

The major issues are that the GPMG is a tad tempermental mechanically and people who handle it exclusively do a better job than those to whom it is part time effort...
The Platoon leader isn't the problem, the weapons squad leader and the vagaries of reassignment within the platoon are a part of the problem, finicky belt feds, massed fires, ammo resupply and coherent training are some other parts.
At the risk of cycling Gian here, let me point out that we HAVE to organize and train to do high intensity combat, we can always scale down to do the easier COIN stuff when it's required.

Next time you see a platoon running a live fire, try this; listen to the two guns, do they fire alternately; does one pick up the rate of fire while the other reloads, all automatically and without command? Then, ask them to place their beaten zone on a reverse slope as you would have to do if attacking a defender who used a reverse slope defense. After that, ask them to do a set up for night final protective fires. If they can do all that, you have just seen an unusually good Weapons Squad leader's product...

Well, I would argue that instituting a specialty for machine-gunners (a la the USMC 0331, and for some reason I recall that the Army did have one, eons ago - my memory is no longer to 10/20 standards), and having NCOs in that specialty within the rifle company MTOE would do more to ensure a high level of training for gun crews than just grouping them at company level and not having a specialty, or specialist NCOs (I can recall 1SGs that would swap people around just as much between platoons as the PSGs did within platoons). Given the sheer number of MOS in the Army, I can't imagine that one more would destroy the system.
Machineguns "talking" to each other, and setting up for an FPL, that I saw, but I recall that knowledge about the beaten zone and indirect fire for an MG often didn't make it out of the FM.

No argument about the absolute NECESSITY to continue to train for high-intensity combat. Given the budgets for the relevant parts of PEO Soldier/Natick, PEO Ammo, et al., compared to other programs in the military, it makes one wonder if the infantryman is the most important weapons system...

Ken White

05-06-2008, 12:33 AM

Well, I would argue that instituting a specialty for machine-gunners (a la the USMC 0331, and for some reason I recall that the Army did have one, eons ago - my memory is no longer to 10/20 standards), and having NCOs in that specialty within the rifle company MTOE would do more to ensure a high level of training for gun crews than just grouping them at company level and not having a specialty, or specialist NCOs (I can recall 1SGs that would swap people around just as much between platoons as the PSGs did within platoons). Given the sheer number of MOS in the Army, I can't imagine that one more would destroy the system.The Machine Gunner MOS left in 1954 to become just another 11B. Now they've foolishly done away with the 11M and said Bradley riders are 11Bs. They aren't, totally different mentality. Agree the MOS would help but disagree that a MG platoon would not be an added improvement.

Yes, idiot 1SGs used to do stuff like that, fortunately most of 'em are now gone.
Machineguns "talking" to each other, and setting up for an FPL, that I saw, but I recall that knowledge about the beaten zone and indirect fire for an MG often didn't make it out of the FM.Heh. I rest my case; really competent people not only train to but actually use every trick in the book because for them, it's easy and second nature. OTOH, the barely competent get by with the minimum they have to learn, do and teach...

The weapons Squad in a Rifle Platoon will rarely if ever take time to train separately and will not have time to get into the finer details of the art of machine gunnery *; a MG Platoon will because that's the reason it exists. That simple.

Ala my Brad / 11M comment above, obviously with repect to a MG Platoon we're talking only walking infantry; it's not appropriate for a Stryker or Mech platoon, they can put 'em where ever they wish.
No argument about the absolute NECESSITY to continue to train for high-intensity combat. Given the budgets for the relevant parts of PEO Soldier/Natick, PEO Ammo, et al., compared to other programs in the military, it makes one wonder if the infantryman is the most important weapons system...Getting better all the time, still needs to be carried further but it's a whole lot better than it was 30-40 years or even seven years ago.

* Unless they happen to have a really super Weapons Squad Leader or PSG. Not just good ones, super ones. Not too many of them around so better to design the system to cope with what the pipeline provides...

selil

05-06-2008, 01:49 AM

Ken W.,

Would non-unit operator training allow for the flexibility of having equipment tasked to a company level unit full time, but still allow for transfer of information between trainers and soldiers? The machine gunner in this case needs to be training with the infantry unit they will support, but also with other machine gun operators that use the same weapons systems. If you imposed that would it work or would operational tempo and mixed unit needs destroy any hope of it working?

Ken White

05-06-2008, 03:10 AM

Used to work in the Army...

It's not a problem; with a MG Platoon, 1st Sqd generally goes with 1st Platoon, 2d with the 2d, etc. if it's decided to put the guns with Platoons, thus there is a habitual working relationship (though one could obviously put four or even all six guns with one Platoon if that seemed necessary) -- just as there is with Corpsmen / Medics. That's a simple METT-TC decision. My personal preference would be to avoid that unless it was really necessary; in Viet Nam it got to be done habitually even though it didn't do anything but add mostly noise and ammo problems to Marine rifle Platoons, smart Co Cdrs didn't do it unless there was a need. As to OpTempo impinging, it obviously does sometimes impact the organizational sanctity of the MG Platoon but that's quickly counterbalanced when the Platoon reassembles.

The major benefit of a MG Platoon as opposed to the Army system of two guns per Weapons Squad is in training and competence of the gunners and crews and thus overall capability to get the full benefit of the weapon. either way obviously works; just in my experience and I've been in both types at one time or another and have employed both, the MG Platoon produces a far better product.

William F. Owen

05-06-2008, 05:43 AM

Don't forget to teach them how to dig a proper MG trench either (that's worth the better part of a day). And for those not using the old Browning .30 cal tripod (the US still does) but the full 6400-mil traverse tripod and gun cradle that comes with a Tritium lamp (Canadian have that) for the aiming stakes, all the joys that come with using the Mortar sight for registering targets and laying the gun.

That was all the stuff I was trying to avoid! Direct fire only.

...and in "Dicta Wilf" there are no trenches. There are hides and fire positions.

Norfolk

05-06-2008, 08:52 PM

Ken White wrote:

The quest for quality does complicate life, does it not. Lights are for wimps. ;)

The entire body of Machine-Gunners of the Royal Canadian Infantry Corps is crestfallen at this statement, Ken [Norfolk proceeds to sob uncontrollably].

That tritium lamp sitting on top of that aiming stake is, frankly, creepy, a dull green eye staring back at you in the distance. And if it ever blinked back at me, I'd be out of my trench so fast no tracer could catch me.

and:

We gots a new tripod on the way -- still no 6400 mil but note the weight! :D

I sees that - nice piece of kit; GPMG gunners the world over are drooling over it (I must admit to having been so afflicted myself, a little). But really, would't the Airborne and the Marines be better off it they shed that much weight themselves before they demanded it of an inanimate object that has no control over its BMI? (Reference Ken W.'s first comment;)).

Wilf wrote:

That was all the stuff I was trying to avoid! Direct fire only.

...and in "Dicta Wilf" there are no trenches. There are hides and fire positions.

I think Wilf's really an ex-Para masquerading as an ex-Royal Green Jacket. Only the Paras possess this level of phobia regarding trenches, shovels, and anything that requires digging.:eek:

Ken White

05-06-2008, 09:26 PM

Shovels? DIGGING? Yeck... :D

Rifleman

05-06-2008, 10:31 PM

I think Wilf's really an ex-Para masquerading as an ex-Royal Green Jacket. Only the Paras possess this level of phobia regarding trenches, shovels, and anything that requires digging.:eek:

Norfolk,

You sure the Green Jackets don't have the same phobia? I don't remember Sharpe and Harper ever digging in. ;)

"Rifles forward! Form skirmish line (or whatever command they used to give)!" :wry:

ODB

05-06-2008, 10:52 PM

How many remember that shaving a chunk of bark off a tree makes a great aimimg stake? What about the good ole' notched log? Amazing in an urban environment what you can do with a little chalk or chemlight juice in a bottle. The key here is imagination that makes tactical sense day and night. One of the best FMs I use to this day is an old one FM 21-75 Combat Skills of the Soldier, 1984, they don't make em' like this anymore. I seem to remember some where along the way adding an additional guide rod spring to the M60 gave you a far better rate of fire for those times when you needed it most. Just to add I LOVE THE M60 you can keep the M240 give me back my PIG!!!!!

Many have done posts in regards to MG courses, unfortunately as usual in the Army many who instruct only know what is written in the POI. As nature of the beast most are there hiding out, riding out their time. Until the Army looks at this and makes the school house a choice assignment and gives instructors flexibility, the ones who need to be there teaching will stay as far away from TDA asignments as possible (including me). Many of us do not want to get stuck into the system where it takes your full three years to change it and by then it is out dated. I'm sorry but IMO everything weapons related should be a big part of basic training for every soldier. The fine tunning comes when you get to your unit. Today's soldiers will continue to decline in basic and advanced individual skills as the years progress due to OUR (I'll claim responsibility as well) to not call " a turd a turd", (I call em' just can't get rid of them). As soon as we stop advancing people up the rank structure just because they have stuck it out long enough the sooner we will get back on track, and then you have the "Well it is an E-6 position, but we don't have any then let's just make one to fill position thought as well." Bottom line we are killing ourselves.

Sorry kinda went on a tangent one of those days dealing with exactly the above. Now back to topic. Another unfortunate problem is the way we man the guns. Ammo bearers least experienced, they move up to become the gunner, and the gunner moves up to be the AG. Flat out the AG needs to be the most experienced guy. He controls the gunner!!!! A good AG can make any gunner excell. At one point in my career back around 97-98 I was a part of a once in a lifetime occurance. Myself and another E-5 in weapons squad as AGs with good E-4 gunners......squad leader only had to sit around and drink coffee. Lasted about 6 months but was a dream squad, the way it should be.

I'll end this with an example of inexperienced gun teams. A few years back while in an O/C role for our sister battalion conducting platoon live fires. We had to evac an AG and gunner because the gunner shot a tree in half in front of him that fell back on him and his gunner. Come to find out neither had been in weapons squad before and only had qualified with the gun. I went straight for the squad leader, not joe's fault when he hasn't been trained!!!!