Just a thought about the wars we've been in....
We've had it easy.
We've fought in the deserts...and we excel at fighting in deserts. Think about it. Ft. Irwin for the Army. 29 Palms for the Marine Corps. Red Flag for the Air Force.
All wide open spaces that bring our full technological might to bear on an unsuspecting enemy. We've trained to fight in those conditions for years and simply modified our way of war to meet some local variations on the theme.
Other than that, we've been fighting in our area of strength.
But what happens when those conditions flip? What happens when we have to fight in jungles, or the arctic?
We better hope that we're still friends with the Royal Marines and the Australian Army. Our experience in those places of warfare has waned.
We have an excellent mountain warfare course in Bridgeport and the winter package is a nice primer on arctic warfare. The Northern Training Area in Okinawa was/is a great introduction to the jungle.
But we need to do more. Both the Army and Marines.
Time to stick our heads up out of the sands and get ready for warfare worldwide. That means jungle and arctic training. Copying the Brits by establishing Mountain Leaders in every Battalion would be a good start for taking care of the cold part of the equation and going back in history and re-developing a Jungle Expert Course would take care of the warm part.
We can and should do this ricky tick quick.
We've had it easy.
We've fought in the deserts...and we excel at fighting in deserts. Think about it. Ft. Irwin for the Army. 29 Palms for the Marine Corps. Red Flag for the Air Force.
All wide open spaces that bring our full technological might to bear on an unsuspecting enemy. We've trained to fight in those conditions for years and simply modified our way of war to meet some local variations on the theme.
To be quite honest the only thing that caught us by surprise in the last 10 years of warfare has been the enemies use of IED's.
Other than that, we've been fighting in our area of strength.
But what happens when those conditions flip? What happens when we have to fight in jungles, or the arctic?
We better hope that we're still friends with the Royal Marines and the Australian Army. Our experience in those places of warfare has waned.
We have an excellent mountain warfare course in Bridgeport and the winter package is a nice primer on arctic warfare. The Northern Training Area in Okinawa was/is a great introduction to the jungle.
But we need to do more. Both the Army and Marines.
Time to stick our heads up out of the sands and get ready for warfare worldwide. That means jungle and arctic training. Copying the Brits by establishing Mountain Leaders in every Battalion would be a good start for taking care of the cold part of the equation and going back in history and re-developing a Jungle Expert Course would take care of the warm part.
We can and should do this ricky tick quick.
Sol, the British tracking school in Brunei is meant to be top quality as well. A lot of gurkhas involved with it and apparently a massive help in Afghan as well. If you can track something through a jungle, apparently a desert is no problem in comparison.
ReplyDeleteJust incidentally, mountain leader training is seen as a bit of a jaunt for us, a bit of adventure training, I often forget how useful it could be in certain types of combat.
yeah i can see ML training as being adventurous but the US Army and Marine Corps needs to leverage that type of training for action in the Pacific...where everyone is seemingly waiting for stuff to pop off and in my opinion in the arctic where you can really see an arms race heating up.
ReplyDeleteRoyal Marines and the British Army have a great and continuing track record in the jungle. we need to climb onboard that type training.