Inf Cbt Sp - Which Capability is MOST needed again (split from CASW)

[vonGarvin]

The question was raised earlier about anti-armour platoon/company and whether it was a brigade asset, etc.  I attach the following from "Infantry Battalion in Battle", available at http://armyapp.dnd.ca/ael/pubs/B-GL-392-001-FP-001.PDF.

Section 5
Anti-Armour Company
General
31.  This company provides the medium range anti-armour support to the battalion.  It is commanded by an infantry major and consists of:
a.  a headquarters; and
b.  four anti-armour platoons each of three sections (6 detachments)
32.  The company is located entirely in F echelon, except for the 2IC, CQMS, storeman and ammunition resupply vehicles which are held in A echelon.
Organization
33.  See Annex B.  Certain battalions may only have one anti-armour platoon.

The first key take-away is that the Anti Armour company was doctrinally NOT part of Combat Support Company: rather it was the sixth (of seven) companies in a battalion: four rifle, one combat support, one anti-armour and one administration company.  It does mention that the company may only be a platoon.  Having said that, "Anti Armour" in 4 CMBG was company sized.  I'm not sure how it was manned or commanded.  Given the threat of Soviet tanks and APCs, I'm not sure if all those detachments would have been sufficient, but I digress.

 

[daftandbarmy]

He could be talking about me:

Though the helm I know control is but a tiny fraction of the army's effort, I did join the army at the height of the Cold War, and within weeks of me transferring to the Regular Force, Gorbachev must have been informed, because he got Honecker to finally tear down that wall.  >

You youngsters... sheesh

What was in the plastic container under your helmet bungee? A pack of Lucky Strikes?  ;D

 

[Webgear]

Notwithstanding OC ASIC's main effort being outflanking the J2 in order to get face time with c/s 9, and six month rotos/HLTA precluding the development of any great competence, especially amongst the HUMINT people and analysts in general....but those are separate rants discussions.

You have just described every junior officer in the presence of a senior officer in the CF.

It is all about face time in front of the command....  look at me "I am important and I am doing something special".

This is not just an Int O issue.

 

[Infanteer]

Our force packaging and performance in the next theatre of ops will be telling.  I have a sinking feeling that we will immediately dust off "Conplan AStan", irrespective of the mission, roles, tasks, or, dare I say it, the enemy.  If we find ourselves on a Chapter 7 mission in the Sudan(s), or in a "stability op" in the Congo, or even  COIN in Yemen, we will be tied to TI and unable to have the sort of effect that will be required - but at least we can console ourselves with the fact that we will have the Mother of all ASICs...

Absolutely, and the "Joint Interagency Task Forces" being used for planning purposes and consisting of (surprise) an OMLT, a PRT and a BG are testament to this fact.  What I don't get is why we feel this is -the- model considering the results are not yet in from Kandahar Province.

Agree, and I find the whole idea that is pushed from above of 'Afghanistan is over, we need to be ready to do xxxxx' sounding dangerously like throwing the baby out with the bathwater. Some very valuable and hard lessons have been learned over the last decade, lessons which we may need more than what some of the cold war warriors at the helm may think. Also, as you say, being tied to TI, FP is now seemingly as much as a priority as the mission itself.

Odd - you state you "agree" and then you disagree with what is being said.

Not being able to figure out what is baby and what is bathwater is just as bad as throwing them all out.  We all know what lessons and experiences are important, but we must be careful to sift them from the Afghan-specific context that may not really be applicable outside of the Arghandab Rivershed.

Finally, I'll also pick at your derision of 'Cold Warriors'.  Are these people who think we need to consider more than just some 15 year old in flip-flops as a potential foe?  4 CMBG was a formation that fought as a whole and routinely performed quite well on Formation level exercises - except for some flirting at the TFK level, this isn't something we've done for years, it is something that is more demanding than knocking out a few hillbilly's with AKs, and is something where, if you are not proficient, you will pay dearly.

Now, sliding back over to Combat Support Company, we shouldn't necessarily assume that "Infantry Battalion 1982" is the answer.  The Cold War Infantry Battalions evolved in a very specific manner to address the Most Likely COA of a Covering Force Battle of mobile forces followed by a Main Defensive Battle prosecuted by anti-armour rich infantry battalions.  I'm not sure if that is the conventional model we should be preparing for, so simply pulling out the old infantry PAM org charts isn't enough.  That being said, I've fiddled around enough on a CAX to know that anything better than a T-54/55 will f**k up our infantry battalions, the primary job of tanks is not to kill other tanks, and that you don't always have artillery when you need it so that should tell us something about requirements.

 

[Infanteer]

You have just described every junior officer in the presence of a senior officer in the CF.

It is all about face time in front of the command....  look at me "I am important and I am doing something special".

Too bad you see it that way.  I always treated my superior as someone there to help me finish my mission so I could help him finish his.  I air legitimate complaints, talk about potential problems, and point out what is going right.

Despite what you may think, we aren't all suckholing for the next rank.

 

[Webgear]

We need to take a balance approached to the post Afghanistan reorganization. We should prepare for the next war based of past experiences, doctrine and tactics.

We need to think about the issues we have faced over the last few years, and how it mitigate this issues for the next war.

I believe we have rushed into this new 2012/13 concept to fast, we have not put serious though or planning into the upcoming changes.

 

[Webgear]

Despite what you may think, we aren't all suckholing for the next rank.

You are correct, not every officer is suckholding to the next rank.

 

[Infanteer]

At the risk of getting away from Combat Support Coy.

We need to take a balance approached to the post Afghanistan reorganization. We should prepare for the next war based of past experiences, doctrine and tactics.

The Afghanistan experiences that are "universal" and of real value will, generally, have to be learned again anyways.  Young soldiers and leaders will have to learn how to act when getting shot at, gut checks in the face of dead/dieing soldiers will have to be remade, and a feel for the enemy (whomever it is) will have to be reacquired.  Despite all the carping about "lessons relearned", I've come to the belief that there are some things that people just don't learn until they do it.  We are blessed with the fact that we have a training system that reduces the learning curve and that we have a crop of leadership that will be able to fall back on things like those mentioned above to make learning next time that much faster.

The unique Afghanistan experiences which are context specific - shrinking AO, low-level, latent insurgency, relatively free lines-of-communication, total air supremacy, xenophobic population, relatively slow tempo of operations, more assets in the air then we know what to do with - may or may not appear in the next conflict we find ourselves in, but they will likely manifest themselves in completely different ways dependant upon the political context of the mission.

I can guarantee you that the next serious mission we are in, we will need Medevacs, indirect fires and left flankings.  I can not guarantee you that we'll need PRT's to dig wells, IA Task Forces to try and find out what women think of the economy, and ASICs to send out Gigabites of Int products that are out of date by the time the platoon commander on the ground mounts up for the next patrol, so why cough up PYs from the former stuff for the latter stuff?

Again, this is all my opinion and I am likely the prisoner of my own experiences, so fire away.

We need to think about the issues we have faced over the last few years, and how it mitigate this issues for the next war.

I believe we have rushed into this new 2012/13 concept to fast, we have not put serious though or planning into the upcoming changes.

My belief is that if we train for the worst possible scenario - a peer running us over with all the assets of modern war - then we'll do fine the next time anything involving shooting and killing rolls along.

 

[Webgear]

 
I agree that inexperience soldiers and officers will have to relearn those universal lessons again however there are some very key lessons learnt from Afghanistan and previous operations that need to be addressed because they have not looked at before.

I do not believe our training system is not as great as we make ourselves believe. But that is another topic.

We need to cut positions from one branch to another because we have limited resources and will likely for the long term. We need to have a well balance military with the ability to adapt, with skill sets and organizations to deal with certain realities.

All current organizations need to adapt and change, this requires forethought and leadership. We need create to be able to adapt correctly to future threats and operations in order to do this need a force that is capable of multi-tasking in different environments.

I am speculating you do not care for the ASIC based off your experiences, ever wonder about the reasons way ASIC did not work the way you believe it should? Were they incorporated into pre-deployment training? Do you understand their capabilities and limits? Who were they responsible to? What were their mandates and orders?

As for training against 1st rate military force in exercise scenario it will likely never happen. For the last two weeks (and likely the next two weeks) I have, I have listed to exercise planners turn down these types of scenarios because key leadership is scared to face this type of scenario. I guess it looks bad when officers fail at their tasks because they failed to plan properly (again this is a topic for another thread).

Thanks for the interesting discussion.

 

[Infanteer]

however there are some very key lessons learnt from Afghanistan and previous operations that need to be addressed because they have not looked at before.

What are they?

We need to have a well balance military with the ability to adapt, with skill sets and organizations to deal with certain realities.

What is "well-balanced" defined as?  Call be old fashioned, but well-balanced for me is infantry, armour, engineers, artillery and a robust A/B ech.

I do not want to pick soley on the ASIC, but when I see the post-Afghan ASIC'ing going on, they become the targets.  As a Platoon Commander, I never really saw any of these enablers - who knows, perhaps my CO had a use for them.

As for training against 1st rate military force in exercise scenario it will likely never happen.

Either we make it happen it or comes to us.  I know future Maple Guardian scenarios are looking for a Cbt Team as a COEFOR, so that's a start.

 

[vonGarvin]

My belief is that if we train for the worst possible scenario - a peer running us over with all the assets of modern war - then we'll do fine the next time anything involving shooting and killing rolls along.

Best line in this thread. Bar none.


(FWIW, I put the info on the Anti Armour company, not to suggest that we resurrect it, but to answer a previous question about it)

Cheers

 

[Webgear]

From my experience, joint air-land integration, medical, logistics and convoy ops to name a few.

It depends on when you were in Afghanistan, over the last 10 years a lot has changed and lessons we take for granted in 2009/10 were not there in 2002.

There has to be a balance between the different arms and services and how that is defined depends on what the CFs and our political master's objectives are.

Just because at the platoon level you did not experience enablers does not mean they did not provided services at the Battalion and Brigade level. I find this is the case with a lot of people, sometimes we don't see the bigger picture.

How the ASIC is deployed in Afghanistan will likely be different in the next conflict. If it is a big shooting war like you believe it is, it will not be held at the Brigade level.

 

[vonGarvin]

From my experience, joint air-land integration, medical, logistics and convoy ops to name a few.

Oh, totally different from our experiences in years previous.....  :

 

[Webgear]

What are your experiences? Were have we improved at? What have we failed at to learn?

 

[OldSolduer]

My belief is that if we train for the worst possible scenario - a peer running us over with all the assets of modern war - then we'll do fine the next time anything involving shooting and killing rolls along.

And FWIW I agree as well. We, the Canadian Forces, are good at what we do because we train for the worst.

 

[Infanteer]

From my experience, joint air-land integration, medical, logistics and convoy ops to name a few.

We were doing the essential aspects of all of those in 1944 in Normandy.  There is nothing there that we didn't know going in.

The unique aspects of these, however, were unique to Afghanistan - on call aero-medevac, on call CAS/Avn, logistics that were almost untouchable and secure LOC.  It's great to be familiar with them (as anyone practicing a 9-Liner knows) but they won't necessarily carry over to the next battlefield.  We need to be able to live without all these...but I digress.

Just because at the platoon level you did not experience enablers does not mean they did not provided services at the Battalion and Brigade level. I find this is the case with a lot of people, sometimes we don't see the bigger picture.

How the ASIC is deployed in Afghanistan will likely be different in the next conflict. If it is a big shooting war like you believe it is, it will not be held at the Brigade level.

Well, if I saw something spectacular out of brigade level, then I'd believe it.  In a counter-insurgency, if you ain't servicing the platoons and companies and supporting their fight, then you're likely looking too high.

Since we are sitting on ASIC still, if it comes to a "big shooting war", would an ASIC be capable of dealing with such a highly fluid situation?  Considering it is plugged into doctrine that sees formation HQs with more TV screens than a sports bar that take 24 hours to set up/tear down, would it be a smoking crater on day 2 (along with the brigade main)?

I know 50 PYs in a "Indirect Fires Platoon" would be extremely useful in that context, but 50 PYs locked away in a secure facility, I can't say for certain.

 

[OldSolduer]

Old timer here

Got your helmets on? Back in the early 90s, I was Acting IO for RV 92. We ran C/S 0 out of two x M577 (C/S 0 and C/S 51), 1 x M113 (C/S 93)and a few other vehicles (9 Tac, incl the BC). We had an Ops O, and SDO and a few DOs (me as a Sgt being one and a WO as another one). We had no TV screens, no power point (TV will love that), no huge displays. We had ONE computer for the Ops Clerk. We did most of our comms by radio (secure) , LL and DR/SDS.  We had the Cpls/Ptes of Sigs and my Int guys (all infantry trained as Cbt Int Ops) stand sentry when required. The Sigs Pl could tear that CP down and be ready to roll in 30 minutes or less. Not only that, we used 1:50,000 maps pretty much exclusively, with the odd 1:250,000 for the bigger picture.
In a big shooting war, we can't afford to take a platoon and make it "C/S 0 Protection Pl" . You have to do it yourself.

A small HQ with a well trained staff, and good cpls/ptes is, IMO, better than the palaces people think they need. Am I on track or should I just join the other dinosaurs and blouse my pants?

 

[Webgear]

I would guess this discussion has likely happen after every conflict and will continue to do so after the next conflict.

Yes on a micro level, we were essential doing the same aspects of operations in Normandy compared Kandahar but were we doing them as well as we should have?

I am not saying we have to model ourselves based off the Afghan mission for future operations however we should integrate the lessons learned for future operations and create a balanced force.

Does the military need an ASIC at every level? Does every battalion need to standardized with the same number of companies and capabilities? We should build a force based off of desired and likely need capabilities to be successful.

The ASIC is based off the old Intelligence Company at the Divisional Headquarters, in the current construct of the army is the Divisional Headquarters mobile enough to keep moving on a fluid battlefield? Are Battalion and Brigade Headquarters mobile enough to keep up with the companies?

Did the ASIC fail at times? It sure did, however I know of battalions and companies that failed just as equally in their mission. There are lesson to be learned from our mistakes however we are not good at admitting our mistakes.

 

[Webgear]

Old timer here

A small HQ with a well trained staff, and good cpls/ptes is, IMO, better than the palaces people think they need. Am I on track or should I just join the other dinosaurs and blouse my pants?

I agree, I have been there in the past. The ASIC does not have to be a grand palace located 30kms behind the front lines.

However the capabilities of the current ASIC construct needs to exist, we just need to correct the known issues with it. Making it mobile maybe just as simple as placing the personnel inside some armour vehicles and making the whole system mobile like any other command post.

 

[Good2Golf]

...From my experience, joint air-land integration, medical, logistics and convoy ops to name a few...

How far back does your experience go?  If it goes back as far as mine, you have ignored air-land in Kosovo, Bosnia and on the domestic side, Oka.  Others can probably comment similarly on the other aspects that you believe (incorrectly IMO) "haven't been looked at before" [Afghanistan].