Reserve-Stalwart Guardian 05

[Steel Badger]

My comment on the great "Water Can Crisis" of 05....

There were sufficient cans (30 plus if memory serves) on hand with the CQ of the Company in question.

The problem was that issufficent vehicles were downloaded to the COYs and Bns.....(31 LIB at least)

The shortage of vehicles meant that Coy vehicles and pers were regulary pressed into service on tasks normally fulfilled by the RQ and his troops. For a short while we were able to press the FOO milcot into service for supply and rover duties....though even that was perilous as at one point the Coy 2IC went up to a Ops  co-ord at C/S 0 only to find the FOO-mobile (and himself) pressed into service on a DP.

In short, shortage of vehicles lead to some delays in resupp.......


Interesting point: during the space of two hours one morining I counted 12 odd milcots in the coy area occupied
by one or two EXCON / interested observer types......


Interesting

 

[Jarnhamar]

Hands down that is my biggest dislike/complaint about these types of excersises.

Way too many excon-observer controller-spectator types.
The companies had serious vehicle and driver shortages but it seemed like every out of play guy had his own milcot and driver. 

If the CF wants to save money I can think of an easy way to accomplish that.

 

[Danjanou]

Ghost778, that one is never going to change. it existed in my time, it exists now and most likely will in the future until the Reserves undergo a radical change.

If you got rid of it what would you do with all those surplus to need Lt.Cols/Majors and/or CWOs/MWOs  after their "battalion" has deployed their comopany of platoon to the composite unit.  :

 

[Matt_Fisher]

3. The battle procedure time cycle was too compressed for COY level operations to allow for proper battle procedure. At 48 hours per task, recce did not have sufficient time to deploy, execute their mission and report back. As a result battle procedure for the COY had to start with minimal info, and then in some cases be reworked entirely when information began to filter back to the OC. Given the exercise planners are keen on having three objectives per week there must be a change in the warning order and recce process to permit proper recce which will assist in planning rather than cause rewrites at the last minute. Although there was sufficient time for rest (which the troops loved), weapons maintenance, rehearsals, and coord with FEOs and other COYs, the essential portions of battle procedure revolving around recce were having to be cut short or aborted entirely. This made the plan less sound, and as a result meant that order for the troops and rehearsals which they conducted were less meaningful than they should have been. If the point of these exercises is to test skills and teach from lessons learned, then we should make sure to have all good lessons being taught each time, not half-assed ones.

Would you say that this impacted negatively more the AAR and lessons learned side of things, or the battle procedure?  On the battle procedure side, if a force is so limited by its NEED to go through a detailed planning process in which it cannot respond to a tactical situation in less than 48 hours, something drastically needs to change, as in the real world, operations must shift on the fly to adapt to changes in a non-static environment.

IRT water, from what I remember on the Stalwat Guardian '04 thread from last year, this issue was identified as well.  Resupply is always an issue.  One possible expedient fix is to field a portable water purification device (MSR Miox) at the section level to allow units a greater ability to 'self-sustain'.

If you got rid of it what would you do with all those surplus to need Lt.Cols/Majors and/or CWOs/MWOs   after their "battalion" has deployed their comopany of platoon to the composite unit.   :

IRT the regimental COs and other 'non-players', wouldn't it make sense to put these types on some sort of 'battlefield tour' in a Suburban or panel van and have them involved in structured observational/TEWT/something that would reduce the strain on units having to provide each CO with a vehicle?

 

[brin11]

Any comments from the maintenance side?  I'd be interested in hearing how the ex went for them.

 

[JBP]

The trench system was a good go but not to many people were excited about it being filmed.

Speaking of that, where can I see it/get a copy, or what news station covered it if you have the info?

Joe

 

[jmorische]

A few more pennies to throw into the ring...

On the point of armoured recce. In our case armoured recce was across the river and in place to establish a fiegn for the attck. The unfortunate event however was that they (two patrols, including the patrol commander) were captured by the EN force. What made matters worse was the fact that they were captured with marked maps and written orders. This was not so hot. After being released (which in the real world I'm not so convinced would occur) the patrol engaged an OP rather than the main position. Poop happens as has been said. Pointing the finger at the infantry and saying they don't know how to properly employ such assets may in this case may not be quite accurate.

On the point of flexibility and compressed time cycles. I would agree that in the real world you work with what you have and get 'er done as it were. But there are some observations that I have on this point. One, combining units, with over 60% new recruits with between 3-5 days of actual field work would not happen in the real world. Units deployed overseas now have considerable work-up training and work together for long periods even before that pre-training even begins. The reality of reservist exercises like this does impose serious constraints. In orders, there is no 'As per SOP' because most of these troops have never assaulted a significant trench system, or in-depth obstacle plan. For that matter as I understand it, few go beyond section training in the field to conduct platoon sized fighting patrols. That reality requires far more significant planning and rehearsing than the real world would tolerate or necessitate because of the work that troops would already see prior to encountering real situations. Two, these exercises are, or should be, puposeful teaching tools. This is what the AAR process in predicated upon.  The idea that one would squander the opportunity to show brand new troops the proper way to complete any of these past objectives seems ridiculous. Particularly when many of these lost opportunities appear to be a result of higher commencing their battle procedure at a fairly late point in the game.

I hope that this doesn't sound like pointless bitching. The problem that I really have is that these same issues were identified last year, and it appears that little thought was given to possible remedies. Showing troops the quick fix rather than the right one seems like a poor way to start their tactical minds working.

Dileas.

 

[TCBF]

How were the After Action Reviews?

Tom

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

Really good points all, with some excellent feedback from the enemy force.  As much as large scale exercises can suck, they are important to conduct.  You learn a lot about soldiering and the business of sustaining soldiers when you exercise for more than a weekend and enforce the use of the echelon system.  Water and food are combat commodities and you have to get it right.

Things go wrong both tactically and administratively, and to pick up on TCBF's question on the AARs, as long as Lessons Learned come out we are doing well and the exercise is serving its purpose.  I can see several lessons learned coming out in in this thread.  AARs kill battle procedure (I lived that on the BTE), but if they are done right they work wonders.   

My last reserve concentration as a participant was TRILLIUM GUARD in 1994 as a Recce Tp Leader.  It was a two week exercise and I learned bags (we were all Cougar guys, so the learning curve was steep).  What is funny is that we had the same hurdles that I read here.  The only Sr NCO in my Troop was a Marine (infantry) who we brought along as an exchange.  Thank god he was there, even if my Tp started saying "Roger That" on the radio a lot.  He protected me from myself on various occasions and helped the MCpls and untrained 2Lts who were Patrol Commanding rise to the occasion.  He also made sure that we stopped every now and then during training and talked about what was going right or wrong.  We also had coordination problems between arms.  My Tp was tasked to secure an LD for an infantry company.  The first company to arrive was the wrong one (they had misread their map).  After guiding them the right way the second coy came up.  The OC was quite irate that a bunch of Iltis were sitting on his LD and asked why I was there.  Suprise is a priciple of war I suppose, but it sucks to suprise your own side.

As long as you all have some "takeaways" from the exercise then it was a success.  Please keep on posting your own lessons learned (I have a professional interest in my new posting).

Cheers,

2B

 

[Spanky]

The AARs for my troop were pretty useless.  We had one at the Sqn level after the screen, (don't get me started on THAT topic), none after the heliborne task, and one after the convoy escort.  The convoy escort AAR was conducted at the troop level without the troop officer.  He was required at SHQ to wait around for the OC.  As far as we were concerned the AAR process was there in name only, and was just a checkmark made on a list of things to do.

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

Spanky,

What went wrong with the screen? 

2B

 

[Yeoman]

Speaking of that, where can I see it/get a copy, or what news station covered it if you have the info?

Joe

after talking to one of the cameramen that was doing this, they said they were contracted to work for the army to film it for the army as some type of video they'll be making for the end of the year.
so that's what could be happening.
Greg

 

[career_radio-checker]

After reading these posts about how coms suck it kinda makes me want to cover my cap badge in this thread.   But then again I am only now starting to realize the frustrations other units have with comms. You see, In the glorious circus that is the communication reserve our exercises consist of a bunch of CP LSVWs; 20 meters apart with brigadier-general sigpig in the back of the pod trying desperately to make up interesting traffic to be sent over the airwaves. We rarely get a chance to tackle real problem-solving like NS kit and communicating over long distances. I thoroughly enjoyed myself out with the RTR boys in Beachburg. Catered meals and daily showers aside they were an extremely professional bunch and were positive almost all the time. They even gave me a PDR which I rarely ever receive.

Some things I took in from the ex:
1.    Patience is a virtue. Just because you're up at 00:00 for the hourly R/C doesn't mean SQ pte stuck on radio shift is.
2.    Legacy sets and 77 sets rule. TCCCS should be tossed to the lions.
3.    When you're at the RRB site by yourself for 4 1/2 hours remember to bring something to cover the radios.
4.    Being RRB rocks.
5.    Helicopter rides are cool.
6.    Remember to bring your camera with you on the helicopter.
7.    Modern comms kit sucks (i.e the vixam mast that never could be fully extended; the lack of co-ax cable, the lack of 522's) Vietnam era  
      masts rule.
8.    Modern kit should be disposed of in similar method to TCCCS.
9.    Armour guys treat you like gold.

With all misgivings about the Comm Reserve aside I take my trade very seriously. When you guys say "Comms sucked golf balls through a gardenhose" I take that as a failure on my part. Certain things I can't help and feel the same frustration i.e limited supply of radios, batteries and callsigns. Then again kit is a reoccurring issue. What I would have like to have done is gotten the comms all sorted out in the first couple of days. Something you guys could pass on to higher when comms are difficult is to get one of the sigs guys down there and look at it. I have only been in for a couple of years and acknowledge my experience is still in its infancy but I do know our main job is to 'provide and maintain comms, and to me, going to the problem source is alot more productive than me sitting in a CP repeating myself or getting someone to relay a message.
    I know recce guys know their radios well but here are a couple of reminders.
1.   The radios you used were VHF which is 'line of sight'. One antenna has to be able to see the other; the higher your antenna is comms are better.   You'd be surprised at the distance you could use with just an iltis mount, just as long as your antenna is erected and not obstructed.
2.   If using the manpack (522), loose that 1.2 meter whip and go to the 3 m one. much better comms.
3.   Also when using the 522 as a manpack and you hear a 'bee boo bee boo' means batteries are low. change them if you got 'em. If not  
go to a lower power setting.
4.   Avoid those Gawd awful 521s, useless useless useless. You might as well be talking into a brick.

That's all. Thanks alot for the fun times
Zero out.

 

[Jarnhamar]

Good post career_radio-checker.

I'm pretty sure when people say comms sucked it's at the 521/522 level.
Well it is as far as Ic an see.

I've found in the Canadian Forces the comms situation is getting pretty bad.  I've been assigned as a signaller a few times and also just been in charge of raidos a lot and it's near criminal what we have to work with.

I'm not sure the wisdom behind the 521s. I've had some guys preach to me about how they are infact useful for their intended job and such. (Probably from the same guys who sware by the LSVW). You can't program the 521s unless you have the elusive Jbox or laptop or whatever. Combine that with their near baseballs throw range and it's near useless.
522s are a shade better. Apparently they are lighter than the 77 sets but i never noticed. The biggest problem with the 522s IMHO is the batteries.  Your suposed to go through 2 every 24 hours or something but all our batteries are beaten up, cracked and often NS.  Over the summer out of about 80 522 batteries atleast 50 to 60 were NS. You can never change them around in the field fast enough and for anything longer than a 3 day excersise raido operators need atleast 6 to 8 batteries on hand just for a fudge factor.

In the end we all just end up using army and personal cell phones and little FRS's that we always get in shit for using but we use them anyways because they work.

 

[chrisf]

The usual batteries used for the 522 during training exercises are Nickle Cadmium. And they're used again and again and again. Unforunately, they're generally not cared for in between use. Two factors which combine to produce an extremely poor end product. If they're not properly charged, it produces memory effects within the battery, if they're charged and stored for any more then 30 days, you're going to get barely any charge off them without recharging.

The 521s? Garbage. Plain and simple. Oversized, underpowered, dificult to program. Virtually indestructible though.

 

[Pte. Bloggins]

Just thought I'd throw in my two cents in here too.

-Ditto on the asking us sigs types for help when comms don't work. The ARR, who I was with, were pretty good with doing that. Alot of reoccuring radio problems, however, can usually be troubleshooted relatively easily. 80% of the time, it's either a crypto error (meaning that there's no crypto in the radio, and most of the time there's not supposed to be any), and the beeping goes away by holding down the pretzel switch for a few seconds. Either that, or the battery's low. Check to make sure your antenna's screwed on, your headset works, and you're on the right frequency (you'd be surprised) and Presto! Your radio should now have turned from a useless paperweight into a hopefully functional piece of communications equipment.  If it's still not working, talk to one of us sigs types (we're more then happy to help) but we may have to tell you that we can't do anything, as there's something else wrong with your radio that you'll need a tech for. And this should be done while you can still exchange your radio for a new one, not 10 minutes before you're supposed to go out on patrol.

-As for comms difficulties after units have been deployed, where possible, again, get one of the sigs to come have a look if you're having comms problems. I admit that I'm still pretty fresh at the game, but ensuring that you can talk to whoever you need to is my job.

- A note to all the Niners out there who were on the net: as much as we at Zero understand your message was very important and needed to be relayed NOW, the reason that it might take me a half hour to deal with your RRR request or Supreq is because something of a higher priority may have come up, for example another callsign may be sending me contact reports that need to be dealt with first. The Duty O's just as busy as the operators are, so please bear with us, we'll pass on your message as soon as we can.

- As for the comms gear itself, I'll admit that it has plenty to be improved on, like whoever came up with the idea to only be able to load the 521 with a J-box or laptop should be tarred and feathered, but it's often too easy to blame the equipment. It's what we're stuck with, and it ain't being replaced anytime soon, so we may as well adapt and overcome, right? Switching to cell phones and Motorolas works fine for exercise, but what are you going to do if you need comms on operations? Can't very well use cell phones and Motorolas there can you.

Rant over. Overall, good ex, learned loads.

 

[Eowyn]

- A note to all the Niners out there who were on the net: as much as we at Zero understand your message was very important and needed to be relayed NOW, the reason that it might take me a half hour to deal with your RRR request or Supreq is because something of a higher priority may have come up, for example another callsign may be sending me contact reports that need to be dealt with first. The Duty O's just as busy as the operators are, so please bear with us, we'll pass on your message as soon as we can.

Depending on the level of the net, Coy, Bn or Bde, having RRRs or SupReqs on the same net as Contact reports isn't a good thing.  The RRRs and SupReqs should be passed on the Admin net, not the Command net.

 

[Gayson]

I found this SG had a much better training value for me than last years, despite the horid lack of vehicles and comms.

I absolutely loved the mine field placed south of one of the bridges, we got quit a surprise when we drove into it (after my crew commander finally agreed with me that it was marking a mine field not a uxo).

 

[chrisf]

Depending on the level of the net, Coy, Bn or Bde, having RRRs or SupReqs on the same net as Contact reports isn't a good thing.   The RRRs and SupReqs should be passed on the Admin net, not the Command net.

Assuming that the admin net is available.

Beyond that, what drove me nuts is the fact that we (ARCON) had perfectly good land lines in place, and the radios were still used for administrative tasks.

 

[Spanky]

"Catered meals and daily showers aside they were an extremely professional bunch and were positive almost all the time."  No wonder they were positive all the time!!!!!  It would be hard NOT to be positive with catered meals, daily showers, and rentals.  I was wondering why few (if any) of those pers were posting regarding SG05.