Stryker collection (merged thread)

[jcustis]

LAVs fight as LAV battalions do they not? That means they can mass and move rapidly in roles suitable for light armor. Neither system, however, was built to attack and breach a defensive line as 1st ID did in 1991 or to hit Iraqi armor as 2ACR did at 73 Easting (with then Captain H.R. McMasters as the lead troop commander).

Tom,

Yes, the battalion is the primary tactical formation for ops. We in the USMC LAR community adhere to a hodgepodge of cav/recce and in-house doctrine, but (and I say this hesitantly) I think that as a community, we also believe that we would fight against anything in order to gain the information.

It's funny that you mention the 73 Easting and 1st ID's breach. I was assigned to be the breach force commander for the breach, marking, and improvements of lanes astride Hwy 80 into Safwan. Although 3d LAR was a supporting effort and I totally expect a DAG's worth of artillery to come raining down on us in the process, my company secured five breach lanes that were cut with, would you believe it, a commercial Caterpillar dozer. There wasn't much reconnaissance involved, just a plan for plain smashmouth tactics. Maybe it's the 25mm that provides the confidence to accomplish any task.

What's even more interesting is the background of Task Force Tripoli. LAR Bns were not employed in the Diyala crossing and Baghdad push in a very significant way, and most LAR guys believed because it simply wasn't our true role. Then came the tasker to ATK to SZ Tikrit. Three LAR Bns with an attached infantry force (can't remember if it was a Co or Bn(-)). Now that was interesting to say the least...We didn't face much resistance, and I shudder to think what would have happened if all the fighting positions, RPG cache sites, and Roland launchers had been manned. We still worked the planning process and looked at combat power, then launched forward.

I think a historian would have the guts of a good book if he were to look at all of the TF's actions as Phase III ops wound down.

[Tom Odom]

That dozer operator was either very nervous or nerveless. Light armor does great things when used correctly and I suspect the same will hold true with MGS and Stryker. Too often, units get misused because their role is not understood or the fickle finger of fate means they are available when a more suitable unit is not. That is of course not just limited to light armor; it is a recurrent problem in all specialty units, especially SOF.

A long time ago (in a galaxy nearby) I was a young 1LT S2 and just retired BG Jim Warner was the 1LT S3Air in 2-505. Jim and I were RANGER buddies and had ended up in the same battalion. Anyway we were the chief planners for the Airborne Anti-Armor Defense (AAAD); every battalion got a 10km by 10km square to establish an attrition-based anti armor defense. Jim and I did the grunt work in picking out kill zones and such. Our problem was our battalion commander; he saw TOW jeeps (not HMMWVs but M151A2s) as mobile gun platforms--just as they were when we had 106 RRs on the things. He insisted that such gun jeeps could survive a fight inside 500 meters with a T62 and forced us to plot kill zones that way. Naturally our TOW platoon leaders thought we were crazy until they learned the real score and just adjusted their kill zones accordingly. Still a TOW vehicle did look sort of like a 106 just like a LAV sorta looks like a tank...


Best
Tomo