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
She's already on the wayOriginally Posted by slapout9
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 allNo, not the wife, the link
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!
Got IT
Here it is. The German Squad in Combat
http://ahecwebdds.carlisle.army.mil/...AslnIxyQ__.pdf
Last edited by jcustis; 11-03-2007 at 12:34 AM. Reason: fixed the link
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
There was literally a ton of great reading there, then I ran across GORTEX6
EDIT: Honey-Do's are normally rewarded
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
Congratulations on the 100th Post, Rifleman!
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.
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.
Well Stan hate to bring this up but you were the one that was talking to the Fruit From Russia
Much obliged slap!
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.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.
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
You're gonna pay for that one, Slap !Well Stan hate to bring this up but you were the one that was talking to the Fruit From Russia
To whom am I talking to ? Norfolk, is that you
I'm right here Stan, but I don't know who you're trying to refer toYou're gonna pay for that one, Slap !
To whom am I talking to ? Norfolk, is that you
I thin' that I just bin' the butt of sum joke!
Last edited by Norfolk; 11-03-2007 at 01:14 AM.
Heh. Occasionally, a Company may be able
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...
Sorry about that, NorfolkI'm right here Stan, but I don't know who you're trying to refer to
I thin' that I just bin' the butt of sum joke!I was having a moment with Slapout...err, he was having one with me
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.Sorry about that, Norfolk
A bit of American humor, if you will !
Regards, Stan
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).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
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?
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.
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