Should Army Infantry......

[100_Percent_HOOAH]

With all of these guerilla attacks on coalition infantry units, perhaps it would be in the best interest of the US to start training units at home (those with the possibility of deployment to Iraq) for counter-guerilla warfare? Some of the troops that were killed did not have to die if they were properly trained to combat guerilla warfare. If we instill some of these warfare tactics into our infantry, maybe it will make the guerillas think twice before they pop their heads up knowing a bullet could hollow it out. I think it would be smart to start getting units ready to deal with this unconventional threat.

I read an article the other day where a guerilla warfare expert pointed out some weakness in the attacks that have happened and they made a lot of sense and pointed out how specalized training to combat these enemys will make life much easier for the serving men of our country. Any thoughts or comments?

[Merik]

Release more Spec Ops/Forces on them. They are the unconvential forces of our military.

[BMF]

unfortunately the army is rather under-funded at the moment. the ideal move would be to send more people through ranger school, more mout training, more rotations through JRTC (which emphasizes dealing with civilians, civil-unrest, etc) but we just plain dont have that kind of budget at the moment. the last few years the military has fought for more training money, but congress shut them down

[Grimjack]

The best way to combat what's going on in Iraq would be to: Enforce the frigging curfew,meaning this.Put sniper/scout teams on roofs at night,anyone out after dark gets put to bed.Harsh but effective.Believe me it works,we did the same thing in Panama.But you never heard about it.

[Smintjes]

The best way to combat what's going on in Iraq would be to: Enforce the frigging curfew,meaning this.Put sniper/scout teams on roofs at night,anyone out after dark gets put to bed.Harsh but effective.Believe me it works,we did the same thing in Panama.But you never heard about it.

That ought to make US Forces more popular with Iraqis, that's true. US Forces will certainly feel safer during the day!

:cantbeli:

[Kriz]

The best way to combat what's going on in Iraq would be to: Enforce the frigging curfew,meaning this.Put sniper/scout teams on roofs at night,anyone out after dark gets put to bed.Harsh but effective.Believe me it works,we did the same thing in Panama.But you never heard about it.

Ow yes and this also solves the problems caused by the total lack of electricty, water, fuel, ... in some areas of Iraq :cantbeli:

[Seiyuuki]

It is my understanding that Iraq never had a powerful enough power grid to support the entire country and that power from other cities are regular siphon just to keep Badghad lit at night.

[Pakrat]

yep..tis true.The power grid in Iraq was over taxed...they never had power everywhere..just key places..I have some engineer buddies that were working on it with the army trying to fix it..that was before I left back at the end of April..it's easy to bitch about not having power when you know the people in charge aren't going to blow your brains out!!..and damn grimjack sniping people after dark??.things would really heat up then!!I hated patrolling at night..scary..never know when someones going to take a shot at you or throw a grenade..it will take TIME before things settle down..and all we can do is wait..SEMPER FI!!

[Grimjack]

Didn't say it would be make anyone happy,but it would cut down on incidents.

[usa320]

I think our best bet is to stay sharp, maintain a good defensive perimiter around key targets, and do our best to take their guns away... And keep whackos from other less than friendly nations from setting up shop in IRaq.

[Zach R.]

We deffinately need more Special Forces guys in there. I'm not sure what the official count is but I'm sure it's not enough.

[Ngati Tumatauenga]

Is it a case of deploying more asset's ?, or a matter of using whats already there in a better way, ie changing tactics.

Saying 'send more special forces' is pointless if you don't know the situation. How about doing an appreciation of the situation first before you start assigning troops to task.

[SABER 2-3]

Is it a case of deploying more asset's ?, or a matter of using whats already there in a better way, ie changing tactics.

Saying 'send more special forces' is pointless if you don't know the situation. How about doing an appreciation of the situation first before you start assigning troops to task.

Agree 100% and then some...just because we are taking KIA/WIA on a weekly basis does not mean that we are not closing on our objective. I don't like troops dying but, some will. The real question should be: What is the max. acceptable loss (manpower, equipment & cash) allowed to consider this war a sucess?

[Royal]

The forces on the ground are geared to war fighting, not CI and are certainly not trained for CI.

At this point someone will raise the UK experience in Northern Ireland.

Fortunatley, with the 'cease fire' there experiences are not as they were 10 years ago. The UK forces have plenty of 'corporate knowledge' but little real experience of 'proper' CI Ops such as Aden, Radfan/Dhofar, Borneo and so on... The bulk of guys on the ground (junior NCO's and junior officers) have plenty of PSO experience and some war fighting experience, but no real CI experience.

Don't get me wrong, the knowledge is there but it needs to be diseminated downwards. That means a change in emphasis in pre-deployment training/in theatre training. Int and SF have a very important part of this process, but the grunt on the ground is the one that interacts day in day out with CivPop - he's the man that will bring results in the end.

For those of you at USMA (and any others with delusions of command :lol: ) can I recomend a book - Bunch of Fives by General Frank Kitson - essentialy the manual for the string of sucessfull CI Ops carried out by the British Army (mostly, I'll give them most of the credit, though of course Royal did his bit) from the mid 50's to the mid 70's.