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Assault Pioneers & Assault Troopers (engineer light of the Inf & Armd)

BulletMagnet,

I had thought it did.  It may be my mistake and I apologize.  The training material I was pulling for them to learn is from old Infantry Pioneer Troop manuals and those about obsticles/demolition.  It's just in the trial stages.  I know the Pioneer Platoon is usually run within the Infantry.
 
Assault Troop (Correct term is actually Trooper)- Armoured Corps
Assault Pioneer - Infantry

Anyways they have only the basic knowledge of demolitions, their demolition knowledge is limited to tabular data only IIRC. I think anything above that they needed to have an engineer with them to do the demo calcs.
 
Wynne said:
BulletMagnet,

I had thought it did.  It may be my mistake and I apologize.  The training material I was pulling for them to learn is from old Infantry Pioneer Troop manuals and those about obsticles/demolition.  It's just in the trial stages.  I know the Pioneer Platoon is usually run within the Infantry.

Do you have the qualified people to teach said material? If not IMHO you should not teach it.
 
NFLD Sapper,

Haha yes of course we do!  I'm just the poor clerk pte that got to search in the dusty corners for old training manuals LOL.
 
In case anyone is curious here is a list of the PO’s from the Basic Assault Pioneer Crse TP dated 2000-02-05
401: Employ common pioneer hand tools
401.01: Role and organization of a pioneer platoon
401.02: Use of hand tools
402: Employ common pioneer mechanical tools
402.01: Use the chainsaw
402.02: Use pionjar and equipment
402.03: Use hydraulic equipment
403: Perform rigging tasks
403.01: Use cordage
403.02: Use steel wire rope
403.03: Use block and tackle
403.04: Construct holdfasts and anchorages
403.05: Construct field machines
403.06: Construct aerial ropeway
403.07: Construct rope bridges
403.08: Measure a gap
404: Perform road maintenance
404.01: State the parts of a NSB and Piers
404.02: Maintain roads
404.03: Construct corduroy roads and timber wheel track
404.04: Construct road drainage
404.05: Construction techniques for roads and ice bridges
405: Perform field fortification
405.01: Construct revetment and drainage for trenches
405.02: Construct timber frame shelter and bunkers
406: Perform field obstacles construction tasks
406.01: Construct obstacles
407: Perform watermanship tasks
407.01: State definitions and principles of watermanship
407.02: State safety precautions of watermanship
407.03: React to boat orders
407.04: Maintain pneumatic boats
407.05: Operate recce and assault boats
407.06: Operate outboard motors
407.07: Construct and operates improvised rafts for personnel and light vehicles
408: Perform mine warfare tasks
408.01: State mine warfare safety
408.02: Identify and operate current NATO mines and fuses
408.03: Lay a minefield
408.04: Use mine detection equipment
408.05: Breach minefields
408.06: Identify foreign mines and fuses
409: Employ booby-traps
409.01: State booby trap rules and safety
409.02: Identify and operates NATO switches
409.03: Set booby traps
409.04: Identifies foreign booby trap switches
409.05: Detects booby traps
409.06: Search for booby traps
409.07: Mark booby traps
409.08: Neutralize and clears booby traps
409.09: Construct improvised booby traps
410: Perform demolition tasks
410.01: Identify current service explosives and accessories
410.02: Adhere to general demolition safety regulations
410.03: Prepare and fire basic charge
410.04: Prepare and initiate a simple firing circuit
410.05: Prepare and initiate a maximum firing circuit
410.06: Use basic calculations & tabular data
410.07: Prepare improvised charges
410.08: Prepare battle simulation
411: Perform NBCD tasks
411.01: Operate and maintain current unit nuclear and chemical detection and monitoring equipment
411.02: Operate and maintain current unit decontamination equipment
411.03: Construct an improvised unit decontamination center
411.04: Perform duties in an improvised decontamination center

I would echo what has been said before, I would be very leery about teaching some information without fully qualified current instructors.
 
dangerboy said:
In case anyone is curious here is a list of the PO’s from the Basic Assault Pioneer Crse TP dated 2000-02-05
401: Employ common pioneer hand tools
401.01: Role and organization of a pioneer platoon
401.02: Use of hand tools
402: Employ common pioneer mechanical tools
402.01: Use the chainsaw
402.02: Use pionjar and equipment
402.03: Use hydraulic equipment
403: Perform rigging tasks
403.01: Use cordage
403.02: Use steel wire rope
403.03: Use block and tackle
403.04: Construct holdfasts and anchorages
403.05: Construct field machines
403.06: Construct aerial ropeway
403.07: Construct rope bridges
403.08: Measure a gap
404: Perform road maintenance
404.01: State the parts of a NSB and Piers
404.02: Maintain roads
404.03: Construct corduroy roads and timber wheel track
404.04: Construct road drainage
404.05: Construction techniques for roads and ice bridges
405: Perform field fortification
405.01: Construct revetment and drainage for trenches
405.02: Construct timber frame shelter and bunkers
406: Perform field obstacles construction tasks
406.01: Construct obstacles
407: Perform watermanship tasks
407.01: State definitions and principles of watermanship
407.02: State safety precautions of watermanship
407.03: React to boat orders
407.04: Maintain pneumatic boats
407.05: Operate recce and assault boats
407.06: Operate outboard motors
407.07: Construct and operates improvised rafts for personnel and light vehicles
408: Perform mine warfare tasks
408.01: State mine warfare safety
408.02: Identify and operate current NATO mines and fuses
408.03: Lay a minefield
408.04: Use mine detection equipment
408.05: Breach minefields
408.06: Identify foreign mines and fuses
409: Employ booby-traps
409.01: State booby trap rules and safety
409.02: Identify and operates NATO switches
409.03: Set booby traps
409.04: Identifies foreign booby trap switches
409.05: Detects booby traps
409.06: Search for booby traps
409.07: Mark booby traps
409.08: Neutralize and clears booby traps
409.09: Construct improvised booby traps
410: Perform demolition tasks
410.01: Identify current service explosives and accessories
410.02: Adhere to general demolition safety regulations
410.03: Prepare and fire basic charge
410.04: Prepare and initiate a simple firing circuit
410.05: Prepare and initiate a maximum firing circuit
410.06: Use basic calculations & tabular data
410.07: Prepare improvised charges
410.08: Prepare battle simulation
411: Perform NBCD tasks
411.01: Operate and maintain current unit nuclear and chemical detection and monitoring equipment
411.02: Operate and maintain current unit decontamination equipment
411.03: Construct an improvised unit decontamination center
411.04: Perform duties in an improvised decontamination center

I would echo what has been said before, I would be very leery about teaching some information without fully qualified current instructors.

Especially since some items are not even taught to the current generation of engineers.

Some items haven't been taught to the engineers since about 2004

 
The Pioneers will come back on line.

Maybe one day the infantry will see the return of the 81 mm Mortar.
 
From what I have gathered on the Inf net, the pioneer is returning to the Infantry battalions, albeit as individual skillsets within rifle companies. The creature we will call "pioneer" will not be the all-singing, all-dancing wonder we had back in the early 1990s: instead they will be more focused on the use of basic demolitions and some field construction tasks. Not as good as what we had, but a good start.

My fond hope is that once we've got the pioneers back as individuals, we'll realize we need a WO/Senior NCO to keep an eye on their training and skills. Then, we'll need somebody (MCpl) to look after their kit. Then, after a while, somebody will realize it might be more effective if these soldiers trained together as a group, to keep their specialist skills up. And, maybe, somebody will figure that it would be a good thing if we had a junior officer who undersood the unique skill set and how to best employ it to support te CO's concept of operations. Sound familiar?

(Oh, yeah...then somebody will want them to make drill canes and picture frames...forgot about that..)

The argument that the Sappers (God bless them...) would seriously be able to replace the Pioneer capability was always a pipedream. Not for any lack of capability on the part of our very fine combat engineers, but simply because they were not going to get (and never did get) any manning offsets to allow them to generate equivalents for the nine assault pioneer platoons that vanished. They still had to do all their usual Sapper stuff as directed by the Bde HQ, but now they had a whole new task. The BG cO who received a Sapper organization in support didn't "own" it: he borrowed it, and could lose it at any time.

The loss of the Pioneers was part of an institutionally-driven dismantling of the Inf Battalion capabilities that, IMHO, did terrible damage. Previous to this debacle, the TOE of a Canadian mech infantry battalion was, arguably, one the very most comprehensive and capable in the world. If all the people and the kit were there (rare), the integral assets of our Inf Bn covered all the Operational Functions very nicely. Seeing that all operations (especially those conducted in COIN) depend in the end on an effective Infantry, and that we were overwhelming an Infantry-centric Army, the butchery of the capabilities looks even harder to understand today than it did then.

Quite apart from the loss of the integral capabilities to the battalion was the damage done to the professional development of our WOs/Snr NCOs, who no longer had the opportunity to broaden and deepen their skill sets by serving in Pioneers, Mortars or Anti-Armour. These skills were not just confined to the time that an NCO was serving in Combat Support Company: when they rotated back to the rifle companies you got the benefit of their skills and knowledge for your company operations. Typically, by the time a WO became a CQMS or CSM, he had served in several cbt sp platoons, taken at least one advanced course in one of the specialties, and had probably taught the skill set several times either at the unit or at the School. All that was, to a great extent, lost when we lost those platoons.

IMHO, in 29 years of service in the RegF Inf, it was the worst mistake I have ever seen. My feeling is that, from the current CLS down, there is an understanding in the Army (largely as a result of the war in Afgh) that we have to fix what is broke. The question is, as always, how?

Cheers
 
PBI,

You are correct in that if the command decision comes through to carry-on with the (re)adoption of the capability, it will be done through courses resulting in integral qualifications of a platoon, not extra platoons.

It will be treated like Urban Ops where you have some SMEs in a platoon who can conduct training and adds to the overall skillset of the platoon, but a separate "Urban Ops Platoon" doesn't need to exist.  Same here with Pioneers, as the theaory goes.

As for the Engineers having the task for the last decade, it was based on sound logic.  The powers that be decided that it was a waste of resource to teach the same things at two different places.  That system works if the Engineers are always co-located with Infantry (and the rest of the combat team), but yes things are going back to enhanced qualification soldiers which is a sign that only the Engineers having those skills may not have been ideal.
 
[As for the Engineers having the task for the last decade, it was based on sound logic.

I'm sure it probably was based on some sort of logic: I don't know exactly how "sound" it was because I wasn't directly party to the decision process. My understanding is that operational considerations were actually secondary: it was about preserving the overall manning capability of the Institutional Army vs the Field Army.

Regardless, logic or not, the resources needed to ensure that the capability provided by integral pioneers was maintained by the Sappers were never provided. I am very sure that the Engineers, great people that they are, have made it work, but that isn't the point. We always make everything "work", quite often in the aftermath of  bad decisions.

We didn't always have assault pioneer platoons: pioneers in the British system (and thus in ours) began as individuals in companies, with a battalion Pioneer Sgt to oversee them if they worked as a group. Royal Engineers did all the rest. As warfare evolved, the need for a light engineering capability to be resident in Inf Bns became clear, and by WWII we had pioneer platoons.

To sum up, while the dismembering of the Inf battalions may have seemed a "necessary" decision at the time, I could never accept that it was a good one.

Cheers


Fixed quote box,
Bruce
 
I am certainly not defending it happening, only suggesting that's how the CF sold it (1 COE is better than 2).
 
Petamocto said:
PBI]
As for the Engineers having the task for the last decade, it was based on sound logic.  The powers that be decided that it was a waste of resource to teach the same things at two different places.  That system works if the Engineers are always co-located with Infantry (and the rest of the combat team), ....

Actually, the only "logical" part of the process was the requirement to reduce the Infantry by an ordered number of PYs.  That is what predicated the decision to remove the Mortar and Pioneer Platoons.  There was no formal capability analysis beyond the "the guns can fill the fire support gap" and "the engineers will be there for pioneer type tasks." (A few years ago I had the opportunity to chat about the process with one of the two Inf LCols (both of whom I knew) who were involved in the "estimate" to identify which positions could go to meet directed decreases.)

 
Ahh the memories...

13z25wp.jpg
 
I have 2 copies,  ;)

Held onto them in case they ever came back but now I am not in the BN anymore, or the trade for that matter
 
WHAT IS A PIONEER

He is an infantryman with specialist training.
His Trade lineage goes back 2000 years when a Roman General described him as one of a body of foot soldiers, marching in advance with a spade to prepare the road for the main body.
He still uses a shovel or an axe or more sophisticated tools like power saws or gamma survey meters.
He can build a bridge, a house, or a latrine.
He can blow up the same bridge, booby trap the house or the latrine with fiendish skill.
He lives with danger but works with caution.
He can operate the latest assault boats or build a raft from logs.
He can lead an attack with a Bangalore Torpedo or be the last man out in a withdrawal while blowing a crater.
He can smoke out an entrenched enemy with a flamethrower or a pole charge.  All of these things her can do, or he can lay down his tools and fight as an infantryman.

This is a Pioneer

CB WARE
Colonel of the Regiment
 
Petamocto said:
As for the Engineers having the task for the last decade, it was based on sound logic.  The powers that be decided that it was a waste of resource to teach the same things at two different places.  That system works if the Engineers are always co-located with Infantry (and the rest of the combat team), but yes things are going back to enhanced qualification soldiers which is a sign that only the Engineers having those skills may not have been ideal.
Actually, the logic was faulty.  Engineers and Pioneers performed similar tasks, not the same ones.  For example, Engineers would construct deliberate obstacles, or do deliberate and hasty breaches for things like combat teams, etc.  Let us not forget that even in our doctrine of the time, the Engineer Regiment was a divisional asset.  That's why the brigades were called "brigade groups", because they had divisional assets in them (Engr Regt, Arty Regt, etc).  Our combat teams got used to having a troop or more of Engineers near by; however, it wasn't the norm. 

Pioneers could perform things such as protective minefields, construction of some bunkers, do some close-support breaching, etc.  Just think of the engineer sections in the Task Force Kandahar BG line companies (1 per), and that's what pioneers did.  It's also why there were times when the Engineers were unable to perform some TFK tasks: they were busy being pioneers. 
 
Technoviking said:
Actually, the logic was faulty...(break)...Just think of the engineer sections in the Task Force Kandahar BG line companies (1 per), and that's what pioneers did.

Techno,

I am not defending the logic, but what you have written supports the theory behind it.  If Engineers are attached at low enough levels, they can provide the capability.  In that if future deployed forces always have beefed up Combat Teams that include an Engineer Tp, in fact now you have even more capability than you would have with only one Pioneer Platoon per battalion.

To support your side though, I think a big lesson learned is that if the CF was going to that route it needed a hell of a lot more Engineers, because if you always have the Squadron split in three, you can't do any big picture concentration-of-force Engineer tasks.

I think a lot of the sour taste that developed from the decision to cut Pioneers was that nothing was immediately done to fill the gap; they were just cut. 
 
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