Quote Originally Posted by Schmedlap View Post
I don't think it's a matter of "getting soft" or forgetting anything.
Wrong issue, I think -- soft isn't the question. The issue should be what works best for that AO and that mission. One does not have to practice to be miserable -- but one, if a soldier, should be prepared to do what it takes to get the job done. I'm sure you always did and always would. Most guys and gals do. Only a few will try to sluff for various reasons. Today, many are not inclined to take risks or to commit people to the boonies without eleventy gallons of water each even if that makes mission sense. Each theater, each AO, each individual mission deserves a clean sheet look. Preconcieved ideas of what's needed or best get people killed. Every situation differs.
What takes more time?
a) Locating, procuring, filtering, and chlorinating water
b) Bringing water with you
Answer: depends on the mission. I would argue that for the overwhelming majority of missions - your specific cases perhaps being the exception - the answer is (b). That's not "getting soft" or forgetting. That's doing what makes more sense.
True -- based on your experience in Iraq. What is the mission of the average rifle company in Afghanistan? How many Platoons are out there, scuffling around away from the Flag Pole. How many even smaller elements are out there. Different AO, different everything. Carrying water may be necessary, may not be.
...Their response was, "back in my day, we drank water from our canteens and we filled our helmets with water to shave." That's nice. And that was better for what reason? I respect their nostalgia. I don't understand how it makes us more effective.
It wasn't better, it was the best that could be done at the time -- the point is not that it's better, it obviously is not -- point is simply it was done when it was necessary and could be again; METT dependent. Lacking a steel helmet to shave in, why not just go a couple of weeks without shaving? Quelle Horreur...

My personal best is 94 days without a shower and fourteen days on the button without shaving or brushing my teeth. That was then, this is now -- but I have no doubt that any number of troops today can do that without falling apart. I also have no doubt that whole units can do that and still be combat effective. The body will take a lot of abuse -- it'll pay you back later but why worry...
...Add to that mix specific missions to go out and cache supplies? Time and troops available are already tapped out. Joe is going to need to carry his ammo and water.
Make no sense in Iraq or for some in Afghanistan, it all depends, as you said, on the mission. For SF and for light infantry distributed patrols in Platoon or smaller size, caches can makes sense or not -- it all depends on the mission, routes, time, intel -- all those things. Caches can also be planted by Unit A in January for Unit E to use a year later. I don't think he means it should always be done, just citing it as a technique. So is a rendezvous with a wheeled or tracked resupply effort or routing a patrol to a friendly outpost for resupply. All sorts of options.

My point and that of ODB (I think. He can speak for himself but I think I know where he's coming from...) and those old dudes is just that you do what needs to be done and preconceived notions about what is good may need to be relooked. Proper training would enable more people to do that, partly by letting them know what's possible and how to do some things if they become necessary, partly by letting them know it's not only alright to think differently, it is in fact, in combat a really good idea to do so. Such training would also teach people that they could shave with less than a Porta Cabin sink or an electric razor, that you can find and drink local water and get by on a canteen a day for a week or two with no great harm if that enhances mission accomplishment and that you don't need ten magazines and any more clothing changes than three pair of socks fo a couple of weeks or month on extended operations.

Soldiering is not as nice as life can be elsewhere, discomfort is not really necessary in many cases but where it is probably necessary to do some things like that, one should be able to order it done or to do it knowing that it's temporary and it can be done.

It's a lot easier to do -- and to order it done -- if folks know how to do it and the one ordering it knows they know how. That's where we've erred...