Battle Drill

[Norfolk]

Hi Norfolk, I also found a manual on the German Rifle Company but for some reason it was never translated. The whole manual was published in German as part of the US Intell special reports project. Not sure of the reasoning behind that but they did it.

Hi slap. Yeah, I found that rather frustrating too. I was even more flustered when I discovered from a specialist source that the traditional German/Prussian script that The German Rifle Company is written in is supposedly almost incomprehensible to most ordinary Germans these days. There is some guy who does translate these things over in Germany or Brit-Land, and he's been swamped by such requests. He tries to get a few manuals translated a year, but it's a really long, tough slog to do so. I've just tried to track him down, but I seem to have lost him.

Here are a few of links to the Evolution of the Section and Battle Drill for whom it may interest:

http://www.canadiansoldiers.com/medi...fantry_Section

http://www.canadiansoldiers.com/medi...fantry_Section

Incidently, the following link comes from the Regiment that introduced British Army Battle Drill to the Canadian Army, and it was the Regiment that was commanded by the author of On Infantry, Lt.Col. John English:

http://www.calgaryhighlanders.com/history/battle.htm

jcustis:

Yeah, blank ammo, never mind live ammo, is almost always grudgingly and stingily doled out. In The RCR, we got around that by loading "Militia Bullets" (shouting "Bang! Bang!" - pathetic isn't it?) when our regular ammo ran out. When we ran out of "Militia Bullets", as the Section Commander would quickly tire of this nonsense, he would issue the order to "Load Insults!", and thereupon, we would continue the notional firefight with unsocial expressions of ill-will towards the Enemy Force.

We were told that the rear Sections and what not would resupply us with ammo and the like during the Firefight; never saw it done, and I have real doubts that it is practical under many conditions. Didn't somebody say something about the Army that wins is the one that is the least disorganized?

[William F. Owen]

Yeah, blank ammo, never mind live ammo, is almost always grudgingly and stingily doled out. In The RCR, we got around that by loading "Militia Bullets" (shouting "Bang! Bang!" - pathetic isn't it?) when our regular ammo ran out.

I have real issues with blank ammunition on field exercises. Blanks, without TESEX kit, or very good umpiring and role players, provide negative reinforcement, - or bad training, - but there doesn't seem to be any other way to get around it. This one really keeps me thinking.

[Ron Humphrey]

I have real issues with blank ammunition on field exercises. Blanks, without TESEX kit, or very good umpiring and role players, provide negative reinforcement, - or bad training, - but there doesn't seem to be any other way to get around it. This one really keeps me thinking.

but I know the groups of soldiers who go paintballing together become very adept at working together, And the sting kinda gets the point across to.

Get guns close enough to familiar feel and you could get great drilling anytime anywhere with just a quick stop at your local wholesaler.

[Penta]

At some point in reading this, I wonder why nobody's ever tried to invent flash suits a la "Ender's Game" for training use - your whole body freezing up when you 'die' would, I think, do much the same as paintball hits, and with less environmental damage.

[Rex Brynen]

but I know the groups of soldiers who go paintballing together become very adept at working together, And the sting kinda gets the point across to.

Get guns close enough to familiar feel and you could get great drilling anytime anywhere with just a quick stop at your local wholesaler.

You do have to be careful with paintball as a form of tactical training--it teaches some lessons well--and others very poorly.

To start with, paintballs are sufficiently inaccurate that rapid movement provides far more protection than it does on a real battlefield against an enemy equipped with automatic weapons. Overwatch is harder because its difficult to hit anything out past 30 meters. Indeed, at ranges much beyond that, the paintball is so slow, and the trajectory so arced, that a good player can often simply dodge the incoming round--assuming that you can put it anywhere near them. Even when they hit, they usually won't break, and you may not even feel them.

That doesn't work with either 5.56 or 7.62

You can compensate for this somewhat with electronic triggers or fully automatic markers, but then you run into another problem: fire discipline and ammunition supply. I can easily go through a couple of thousand rounds of paintballs in a day with a standard unmodified semi-automatic marker. Similar rates of ammunition expenditure in combat conditions could be fatal.

Third, cover works different. With paintball, leaves and small branches are enough to provide semi-hard cover. That's not a lesson you want your soldiers to learn It would better at training for MOUT, where shorter ranges and snap-to-fire times reduce the differences between real weapons and paintball markers a little.

As for the sting, try playing in the winter up here. Paintballs aren't quite so soft then, and its damn hard to run through several feet of snow

[Ron Humphrey]

If you hadn't had to be a realistic about it somebody might have gotten an idea and before it had the opportunity to be intercepted and corrected ;at least some units might have had a little more fun.

Honestly although I understand the limitations with such a thing I gues when I think about what "battle drill" really teaches me as a soldier it would be the teamwork part more so than acurate fires or good concealment practice.

That's why I thought it was worth a try

[Norfolk]

Selected Papers of General William E. DePuy, compiled by Richard M. Swain.

General DePuy was instrumental in the formulation of present-day Battle Drill in the US Army (and the USMC adopted soem elements as well). Being practical-minded, DePuy considered that a Infantryman with perhaps as little as three month's training should neverthless be equipped with simple means to make the most of his potential. One of those simple means was Battle Drill, which DePuy described as being practical techniques that could be automatically applied by any soldier without having to spend time thinking for too long about a given tactical situation.

GEN William E. DePuy (Page 25):

Few squad leaders are Doctors of Philosophy-some are more articulate than others, but prudence suggests that we simplify their tasks as much as possible and this is where the battle drill and the team system relieve the squad leader of at least half of his requirement for battlefield explanation. Those who claim that this deprives him of his prerogatives underestimate the size of the problem which remains to confront him. To decide-under fire-where the enemy is-how to approach him-how to use the terrain-how to control his teams-inspire his men-and how to keep the squad's mental picture alive is challenge enough for any man.

Battle Drill provided the soldier with a simple and effective means to react to given situations now, not after the moment for action had passed; DePuy was a firm subscriber to Patton's dictum on this point.

While I certainly do not agree with Battle Drill, let alone giving an Infantryman only a few months training, DePuy's developments and innovations were genius: "11 Men, 1 Mind" (pp.1-24); "Briefing by LtGen DePuy" (pp.59-66); and "One-Up and Two-Back?" (pp.295-302, not quite about Battle Drill, but gives an idea of the tactical setting it was meant to operate in - one of DePuy's best pieces).

[William F. Owen]

The biggest problem with Battle Drill is the words Battle and Drill.

When you call exactly the same thing an "Immediate Action Drill" or "Contact Drills" no one blinks. - and you can't train infantry without such things.

...and strangely, I note from chatting to my friends in the IDF, that the Israelis intuitively refer to training as "Drills." - which bearing in mind the British Army's part in forming the Palmach and thus the IDF may not be surprising.