The Role of the Infantry in the War of the Snakes

[eyre]

Attached is a paper I've been working on that seeks to modify the traditional 'role of the Infantry.'  I'm looking at starting the debate in the Infantry Corps shortly.  Any comments?

 

[GO!!!]

Overall, an excellent paper, I wish I could write so eloquently!

1. Just an "admin point" but there seems to be enough people lurking in this site who are intent on the discredit of the forces and inaccurate portrayals of soldiers, that someone would cut and paste provocative terms like "close with and engage the population" and use them in an out of context manner. I understand the point, but when viewed by a layman, especially in the context of the infantry's official role "to close with and destroy the enemy" it could be used against us.

2. Do you see a hesitance to kill in the infantry today? This is not the first time that this topic has arisen at your specific urging, and I am quite frankly baffled as to why. In "On Killing", LCol Grossman states that 94% of american infantrymen were willing to fire at the enemy in Vietnam, as a result of improved training techniques and social conditions. Given the most recent incident in Afghanistan in which a C6 gunner fired on a vehicle, is this an issue? In my experience, any hesitance that Canadian troops might have to fire on the enemy would be more based in their fear of their own chain of command, and disciplinary action for a possible or percieved error, than a psychological aversion to taking human life.

Thoughts?

 

[Kat Stevens]

In my experience, any hesitance that Canadian troops might have to fire on the enemy would be more based in their fear of their own chain of command, and disciplinary action for a possible or percieved error, than a psychological aversion to taking human life.

Hole in one!  Shocking that we should be more afraid of our own lynch mobs than the enemy's.

 

[paracowboy]

first, you didn't swear enough. You need a few "fuck's", "shit's" and a "goddamn" thrown in there.

Infantry soldiers must be masters of small arms.  Like a fine craftsman, the tools of the trade must be mastered to a level of unconscious competence.

  Here, I have always felt that the infantry doesn't pay enough attention to other forms of weaponry. While conventional small arms are our bread and butter, I can remember being taught how to prepare explosives, and how to disarm same. I can recall being taught how to utilize other forms of weaponry than firearms, from knives to pointy sticks, to a rock. We don't put near enough focus on unarmed hand-to-hand, either.  I can think of 3 occasions when I needed to employ fisticuffs on operational deployments. If I hadn't had extensive training civvie-side, I would have been at a disadvantage. Granted, you do touch on this same point here:

Close quarter combat skills are vital for closing with and destroying the enemy.  The infantry soldier must master the tactics, techniques, and procedures for combat at close range.  These skills encompass non-lethal techniques and unarmed combat for Aspect Two, and force protection measures for Aspect One tasks.

But, I think direct reference to  the suki-yaki nose-toss would help to hammer home the point that we do still engage in kung-fu-in' it up, and don't receive enough training in how to do so properly. Jap-slappin' is one of the first things to be discarded, and one of the most important to the infantry for a number of reasons.

Furthermore, a high level of physical fitness mitigates the effects of combat stress and other injuries.

Also, it breeds "that infectious optimism and that offensive eagerness which comes from physical well being". Physically fit individuals are more prone to take offensive action, and not to back down from a potentially dangerous situation.

The final core competency is leadership.

And not "man-management" or "supervision".  There is still a disheartening tendency amongst certain groups to lump these phrases together as though they mean the same thing. It's fine for others to take this view, but it bears reminding ourselves that a leader is something altogether different than a manager or a supervisor.

Wavell had it right for his time when he stated that an Infantryman should possess the qualities of a successful poacher, catburgler and gunman.

  That is why I loved this job so. And in my off-time I could be a drunkard, gambler, and perpetual 15-year old.

Just an "admin point" but there seems to be enough people lurking in this site who are intent on the discredit of the forces and inaccurate portrayals of soldiers, that someone would cut and paste provocative terms like "close with and engage the population" and use them in an out of context manner. I understand the point, but when viewed by a layman, especially in the context of the infantry's official role "to close with and destroy the enemy" it could be used against us.

personally, dude, I think we need to get the fact that we are hired killers for the Crown out there more often. We need to take every opportunity to remind the public that we are not flower-carriers, blanket-deliverers, soap-dispensers, or hug-givers. And if the message gets distorted by the weak and whiny, then it gives us more opportunity to set the record straight.

That's about all I got.

 

[eyre]

Some good points.  My comments below:

someone would cut and paste provocative terms like "close with and engage the population" and use them in an out of context manner.

I wrestled with this one for a long time.  Tried 'interact,' 'population interplay,' 'population manipulation,' and others, but none had the same meaning.  The two-way exchange is important, where we can both gain info and shape their support.  In the end, MarkC came up with the idea of 'engage with' to reduce the kinetic connotations.  Other ideas?

Do you see a hesitance to kill in the infantry today? This is not the first time that this topic has arisen at your specific urging, and I am quite frankly baffled as to why. In "On Killing", LCol Grossman states that 94% of american infantrymen were willing to fire at the enemy in Vietnam, as a result of improved training techniques and social conditions. Given the most recent incident in Afghanistan in which a C6 gunner fired on a vehicle, is this an issue? In my experience, any hesitance that Canadian troops might have to fire on the enemy would be more based in their fear of their own chain of command, and disciplinary action for a possible or percieved error, than a psychological aversion to taking human life.

Thoughts?

I have heard anecdotes of hesitation â “ across the Army - not from our guys.  The unfortunate thing is that some (across the CF) may buy into the 'peacekeeping' propaganda and forget what our real job is - the disciplined application of violence.  We have to be honest with ourselves.  Every Infantry soldier must make peace with the fact that his ultimate task is to kill the enemy.  If he can't, he's in the wrong profession.  I strongly believe this is important and has to be continually reinforced.  Grossman also talks about the high incidence of PTSD following combat in Vietnam, and in his "On Combat" he discusses how to prepare for this as well - 'stress inoculation.' This is part of the psychological readiness to kill.  By the way, 'On Combat' is now mandatory reading for section commanders and up in the Battalion - we have about 20 copies floating around if you are interested.

You are right about potential fear of consequences from the chain of command, but it is our job to make sure the right tone is set from the start.  Proper application of force must be praised.  I was very happy to see chain of command support for not just the C6 incident above, but the other ones as well, where the shooters did the right thing.

  Here, I have always felt that the infantry doesn't pay enough attention to other forms of weaponry. While conventional small arms are our bread and butter, I can remember being taught how to prepare explosives, and how to disarm same. I can recall being taught how to utilize other forms of weaponry than firearms, from knives to pointy sticks, to a rock. We don't put near enough focus on unarmed hand-to-hand, either. 

Excellent points.  Perhaps "master of small arms and other personal weaponry, including explosives."  I think back to the training in Heinlein's "Starship Troopers," where Hendrick questions Sgt Zim about the utility of throwing knives in the age of H-bombs.  We are teaching you to be dangerous men - dangerous to the enemy, was his paraphrased reply.  The confidence instilled by this type of training is apparent when confronting a population face-to-face.  Like an animal, the enemy can smell fear.  Likewise, they shy away from the confident, quiet professional whose look scares them and reassures the friendlies.

Also, it breeds "that infectious optimism and that offensive eagerness which comes from physical well being". Physically fit individuals are more prone to take offensive action, and not to back down from a potentially dangerous situation.

I like that and may use it.

Thanks for the comments.

 

[Infanteer]

Good paper - the comments from GO!!! and paracowboy seem to be on target.   I think the piece does a good job in expressing some important ideas that many of us around here feel are central in highlighting where the Infantry will be going.   In general, I think your themes of human networks and complex environments seem pretty sound - the enemy is going to go underground to avoid Western strengths on the field, and so we must insert ourselves into the conflict if we are to be successful.   The traditional dogma of "stay out of other people's fights" doesn't seem to be acceptable in today's political climate; from "R2P" to the fact that we are drawn into these intercine conflicts by terrorist attacks demands we get ready to jump into the fray (York University be damned).

I liked the "close with and engage/close with and destroy" duality of the infantry task - it gets away from saying that we are warfighters only; for almost a generation the Infantry has been integral in operations across the spectrum of conflict, warfighting is just one of them (although the most intense and demanding one, and thus primus inter pares).

I would like to see (and perhaps this serves as a good place to start) more discussion on what niche within the Army the Infantry will hold.   Physical and mental robustness, competency with small-arms and fieldcraft and a "Fuhrerheer" Army (where leadership is stressed at every level) seem to be skills desired of ALL soldiers (the "Soldier First" mentality); I guess the Infantry just take it a step further and make these soldier skills their raison d'etre.   What will be some specific tasks along the spectrum of conflict that the Infantry will be required to master (as opposed to armoured troops, engineers, signalmen or truckers).   How will we be different from CIMIC, Intelligence, Armoured, etc when engaging the enemy, especially in a lower intensity battlefield.   Living in villages?   Local patrols with natives?   Perhaps some discussion on a few tasks that set the infantry apart (asides from the good ole section attack) would be worthwhile in cementing the concept of "To engage with the population and destroy the enemy at close quarters."

LtCol Dave Banks made some keen observations in a recent article in the Army Journal on tactical evolutions in the US Army at the small unit level.   I think that operating in complex conflicts is driving military forces to "diffuse" and/or "harden" their forces both physically and morally.   If the infantry, as you discuss it, are to fight the snakes, then they will most likely be physically diffusing.   An important part of moving the discussion along (and moving the idea into reality) would include discussing how the Infantry will be unique in exploiting this diffusion in order to degrade the enemies ability to act.

Just some thoughts from the peanut gallery,
Infanteer

 

[paracowboy]

"that infectious optimism and that offensive eagerness which comes from physical well being".

I like that and may use it.

feel free, I just that second made that up.  ;D

Now, what about the disappointing lack of cussin'?

 

[Infanteer]

As well, for Paracowboy's sake, add capability 9 into the Infantry tasks; "Must be capable of gelling hair and wearing big belt-buckles into the field."

 

[paracowboy]

As well, for Paracowboy's sake, add capability 9 into the Infantry tasks; "Must be capable of gelling hair and wearing big belt-buckles into the field."

skoal all over the monitor, tea all over the keyboard, wife yelling. Thanks, butt-head.
  ;D

 

[KevinB]

Outstanding paper Sir! 

I can't add much to GO!!!'s or Para's comments.

Grossman's "On Combat" and his Bulletproof Mind stuff should be BattleSchool mandatory.


Cheers

 

[pbi]

eyre: Wow-great paper! I just read this now (sorry...I'm a bit behind on the important things in life). "Right on!"   to all that you have written. When I wrote my piece last year about US Inf Tac Ldrs in Afgh, the qualities that you articulated in your work came to the fore time and again. You are exactly on the mark, if the experiences of the US Army and Marines in Afgh mean anything at all. Here at CFC we recently had a fantastic presentation by MGen Natynczyk on his time in Iraq: he stressed that in order to be ready for modern conflict, very high quality at the lowest levels is paramount. He echoed a number of your points. It was interesting to hear him say that he felt that, on average, our soldiers were quite well-trained as compared to their US brethren, but that we could not get complacent. (This was a key point I tried to get across in my own article.

In particular, I am interested to read your statement:

It is always desirable to kill the enemy at a standoff distance, greatly reducing the risk to friendly troops.   Given that the enemy will adapt to get below the ISTAR threshold, the application of sensor led standoff capabilities often becomes problematic.   We must be prepared to 'fight below the ISTAR threshold' â “ to be robust enough to overcome the shock of surprise contact and engage in successful close combat.   Moreover, given the precision required to discriminate the enemy from non-combatants, population engagement, followed by close combat, will be necessary more often than not.

This parallels very closely comments and observations I gleaned in the interviews I did. It also (in my opinion) throws out a big cast-iron gauntlet of challenge to the crowd that puts all its faith in ISTAR and the belief that we will be able to "Sense" everything through technological means, thus avoiding surprise or close combat. HUMINT, gained right at the coalface, was the watchword of the US tac ldrs I talked to.

Finally, as a CO of an Inf Bn, can you offer your take on just how well we are really doing in the soldier training and preparation department? Are we on the mark? Keen to hear. VP.


Cheers

 

[eyre]

Thanks for the comments above. 

If the infantry, as you discuss it, are to fight the snakes, then they will most likely be physically diffusing.  An important part of moving the discussion along (and moving the idea into reality) would include discussing how the Infantry will be unique in exploiting this diffusion in order to degrade the enemies ability to act.

Infanteer - I agree that operations will be 'physically diffusing' (or dispersed) with small teams operating with a high degree of autonomy.  In this environment the level of combined arms grouping will be reduced to the lowest levels, with individual attachments to the section, as mentioned in LCol Banks' article.  These atts will fulfil their traditional complementary roles, but it will be the Infantry element that will provide the framework for the organization.  The issue of local solutions (discussed in the paper) requires a degree of mass that special ops cannot provide, although with the atts for some missions the section begins to looks somewhat like an SF A-Team.  The issue of specific tasks for each element is a document in itself and warrants further study.

pbi - Great article.  It really reinforces some of the things we need to do.

Here at CFC we recently had a fantastic presentation by MGen Natynczyk on his time in Iraq: he stressed that in order to be ready for modern conflict, very high quality at the lowest levels is paramount.

I just met him for the first time last week when I was in Ottawa for the boards.  A couple of my SAW buddies from Quantico (Marine and Army) worked for him over there and had great things to say - a real warrior who outshone a large number of his US peers.

can you offer your take on just how well we are really doing in the soldier training and preparation department? Are we on the mark? Keen to hear. VP.

Based on my experience alone, we can do better.  We have to tighten up the lessons-learned feedback loop, so that lessons from theatre are rapidly integrated into training.  We've got to stress the 'learned' part and internalize them so they are not simply 'lessons identified.' I saw that with the scenario training we set up for the PRT.  The scenarios did not match exactly with what they ended up doing overseas.  Obviously there was task evolution and the training for subsequent rotos should improve as we have direct Canadian to Canadian feeds between rotos conducting the same mission. 

The other thing we need to do better is training in decision making.  This relates to the diffusion discussion above.  How do we train our junior NCOs to make the types of decisions they will be expected to make overseas, especially when we have a culture of centralization in garrison?  Don't get me wrong, for whatever reason, our young leaders continue to come through and be decisive on operations, despite the lack of practice in Garrison.  Perhaps it is based on deployment experience.

The final piece, strongly related to the paper, is cultural training.  Every soldier must have a deep understanding of the operational environment in order to successfully engage with the population.  We don't spend enough time on this, and when time is our greatest resource shortfall, this frequently tends to be rushed.

That said, I think back to the training we did for overseas in the early 90s.  We are much further ahead now, but with a ways to go.

Thanks again to all for the feedback.

 

[KevinB]

On decentralization of NCO's - the one area where I credit Ian Hope was with the individual PT program in 1VP.

Areas like the Gunfighter program and other small arms issue are areas where junior NCO's can shine -- have local area SME's at the Cpl and M/Cpl rank.

Also kill the current PER promotion setup -- it is a way that seems (IMHO) to promote J NCO's who like to sit back and watch.

 

[pbi]

We have to tighten up the lessons-learned feedback loop, so that lessons from theatre are rapidly integrated into training.  We've got to stress the 'learned' part and internalize them so they are not simply 'lessons identified.'

I wonder if there isn't a "doctrine" filter imposed by LFDTS (after all-they own ALLC) i.e: "that might be what they're doing over there but that isn't doctrine". My impression in Afgh was that the US inf tac ldrs were not too fussed about doctrine-they wanted to get the job done, using what worked. US Army's CALL team (equiv to our ALLC) was in Afgh-I shared an office with them for a while-but even they had a hard time keeping up.

The final piece, strongly related to the paper, is cultural training.  Every soldier must have a deep understanding of the operational environment in order to successfully engage with the population.  We don't spend enough time on this, and when time is our greatest resource shortfall, this frequently tends to be rushed.

I echo this. I compare my deployment to Croatia in 94 when I had little real understanding of the history and culture that underlay the politico-military situation, and my deployment to Afgh in 04 when I read everything I could before I went. I believe we have learned the value of that lesson (although we may need to work on the application)-it was something that was commonly mentioned by the US guys I spoke with.

Cheers.

 

[TangoTwoBravo]

As far as pan-Army doctrine (and TTPs) for the War of the Snakes, I would venture that that still remains to be written (particularly at the small unit level).  Doctrine and TTPs are only a starting point, of course, but we can probably find a 70 percent solution that can modified by the man on the ground based on his experience and appreciation of the situation.  As long as you have an effective feedback loop your doctrine and associated training can evolve in step (somewhat) with the reality of the COE.

As an aside, the ALLC will be embedding an LO with the next Task Force to capture lessons learned in theatre and transmit them to Canada for further analysis by a larger team.  This further analysis could well result in changes to doctrine and training (particularly predeployment training), and at a minimum will give follow-on Task Forces easier access to lessons learned in theatre.

Cheers,

2B

 

[ducimuscapt]

Given the fact that the infantry (army) is the last strong arm called upon in time of conflict I would rather see the role of the infantry be stated as

TO DESTROY THE ENEMY, COMBAT IN CLOSE QUATERS, ENGAGE WITH THE LOCAL POPULATION IN ORDER TO GATHER TIMELY/RELEVANT INTELLIGENCE.

My take on it,

En-lighting article, the thought process is sound, however translated into good old direction, would be nice to hear...Discussion phases are good, however, I really miss hearing clear concise orders, so I know where I am going and what I am supposed to do.

 

[George Wallace]

Given the fact that the infantry (army) is the last strong arm called upon in time of conflict I would rather see the role of the infantry be stated as

TO DESTROY THE ENEMY, COMBAT IN CLOSE QUATERS, ENGAGE WITH THE LOCAL POPULATION IN ORDER TO GATHER TIMELY/RELEVANT INTELLIGENCE.

My take on it,

En-lighting article, the thought process is sound, however translated into good old direction, would be nice to hear...Discussion phases are good, however, I really miss hearing clear concise orders, so I know where I am going and what I am supposed to do.

Do you want to engage the locals in battle to gather info or engage them in conversation?

 

[ducimuscapt]

No the locals are an asset that can properly be used to advantaciously have insight into the current pulse.  They are to be protected.

 

[pbi]

No the locals are an asset that can properly be used to advantaciously have insight into the current pulse.   They are to be protected

I agree fully with this statement and I know personally of its great value, as do most people who have been on a mission.


However,IMHO saying "Close with and destroy the enemy" is fine. Note that it says "enemy", not "close with and indiscriminately destroy friendly locals, thereby ensuring that everybody hates you and the IED attack rate goes up 75%"

All the Inf role statememt does is present the most core part of what we do, in an easily understood manner. It doesn't elaborate, because it's not supposed to: it isn't a shopping list of all the things we do. Nor, does it say "how" we destroy, nor what "destroy" means.

"Destroy" can mean physically killing and smashing, or rendering so ineffective that the target cannot functoin as a threat anymore. As Inf we can "destroy" by putting in an assault or an ambush with our own and supporting fires, or we can "destroy" by interacting closely with the population to gain trust and HUMINT that leads to the neutralization of terrorists and the creation of a environment for secure reconstruction and social recovery. Both of these points on the spectrum (and everything in between) are well within the Infantry's territory, which is what IMHO makes us the most flexible and useful of all arms in the greatest number of situations today (and always, I'd venture...).

Cheers

 

[ducimuscapt]

Yes I agree, we seem to be in a pattern of explanation and always wanting and having to justisfy and qualify our actions and orders.  That is why it was much simpler, to think that I had one role, to close with and destroy the EN - however the long version was then qualifiied in all weather - terrrain.....

Am I missing the point - I wonder

The Role is the ''atout'' the top of the summit.  Therefore, it is in fact to close with and destroy the ennemy not to engage with, this is not a first dance at a wedding reception.

Secondary roles are to interact with the local population IN ORDER TO.....gather info...

That is a task not a role.