RecceDG

I love the idea of no map updates at all, everybody working off paper maps, TeamSpeak radio SITREPS and contact reports only. The down side is that to pull this off, you really need somebody in the Battle Captain (if recce) or Coy 2IC (if inf or combat team) seat to pull this off - meaning a guy with no units who just runs the radio net and manages the battlespace. That's a pretty specialized skillset and a tough sell - no shooting for you! Plus radio procedure and drills become paramount. It's crazy how much the F5 map changes things. Radio traffic drops to nothing when you can just see the whole battle at a glance. Maybe the Yank BFT works this well for Blue SA. But Red SA I doubt very very much. DG

Here's a student learning what "tracks up to the world" means, as seen through the daysight of the 1m turret on a TLAV. Camera phone picture through the sight so not super high quality, but enough to get the idea. DG

Amen, brother. You have not felt fear until you feel your track slowing down, tell the driver to step on it, he says he has it boarded - and you look over the side and see a bow wave.... (about a km SW of Monument Woods) Not to mention broken headsets, mismarked maps, a driver insisting that "I can make it".... The AI does plenty of unrealistic and frustrating things, but driving into the water and getting stuck is not that unrealistic. DG

Adding to this is the fact that most of your subordinates have a functioning brain and can be counted on to react to situations intelligently. If you are a new troop leader, you probably aren't the smartest crew commander in the troop either. A SB troop with one human and two to three AI doesn't act like an actual troop; it is more like a single callsign with a local reserve - more like being a cav trooper leading a string of remounts. The AI gunners can be deadly if faced head-on, but the AI just doesn't react well to flank attacks. It can be very frustrating troop leading that gang of idiots. DG

Having subsequently been an instructor, I guarantee that's the case. A Gagetown fog is unreal. 75m visibility, full stop. You can see the bushes immediately next to you, and everything else is a sea of grey. I can also say this - after phase training, a number of exercises in the training area, and having been an instructor, I now have 80% of the training area memorized. I don't need the map any more. Wainwright, Meaford - same deal. DG

No stab, power traverse (but it is kinda coarse - it's a toggle switch) manual elevation/traverse. I'd use the power traverse to scan and to slew onto target, but actual shooting used the hand cranks. It's a good turret for recce because the highest part of the vehicle is the sight box. A proper turret-down exposes a shoebox-sized box and that's it. And the optics are nice and clear. But shoot on the move? Hells no. DG

Everybody put your helmets on: war story time: On my Phase 4 (the course that teaches patrol commanding and troop leading) my confirmation trace for patrol commanding in the defensive. I have to take a two-car recce troop and establish an OP (plus all the associated battle procedure - get orders, issue orders, etc etc) and being a "confirmation trace", this is my final exam to see if I get to continue to the next portion of training. There are any number of ways for this to go pear-shaped, but there are two "instant fails". The first is not having eyes on the objective by the time specified in orders; the second, not knowing where your position was within 100m without reference to GPS. These traces are set up so there is just enough time - barely - to get all the steps done on time. There just isn't enough wiggle room in the schedule to soak up Murphy's Law. I have received orders, and per the drill, my patrol is going to do a preliminary move to a hide near where I expect to establish my OP. Once in the hide, I'll do a recce, find a place for the OP and alternate, mark them, and return to the hide to write and issue orders. Then the patrol will occupy the OP, and with the OP established, the trace ends and I get my assessment. But the second the patrol leaves the hide for the preliminary move, a thick Gagetown fog drops on us, and visibility drops to maybe 75m Our movement speed plummets, and I can no longer see any terrain features by which to navigate. Even the sun is hidden so I don't have an east/west reference, and we are traveling cross-country and along Gagetown's unmappable network of blacktracks so I can't even use "take the second left". We plod along like this for a while, and the little nagging voice in my head starts saying that something isn't right. What terrain I should be seeing - as much as I can see in fog this thick - doesn't look right. That voice gets louder and louder, and finally I pull out the compass and have a look. It says that the nose of the track - which I know is facing due north - is facing east. And I distinctly remember looking at the compass and thinking "wow, my compass is broken". No, no, that's not right. Compasses don't break. It must be all the metal in the M113 that I'm in throwing off the compass. So I have the driver stop the track, I dismount, and I walk a few steps away, watching the compass all the while. I fully expect to see the compass swing away from the track and start pointing in the direction I know is north. It doesn't. Oh shit - I really was going east. I somehow got turned around in the fog, and I have absolutely no idea where I am. All the instructor needs to do is ask "where are you?" and I fail the trace. On top of that, I somehow need to figure out a plan to unfuck myself and get back on my route, because precious time is bleeding away and if I don't get to that hide soon, I'll be late for observation established and that's a fail too. OK, so where was the point I last knew exactly where I was? Assume I turned east there. Now assume that I only turned east a moment ago. I'm somewhere in that pie piece of ground between those two points - and there's a major orange route running east/west just north of this bit of space. If I drive due north, I'll hit this route eventually, then I can turn left and follow it until I encounter something that pinpoints my location. Back to the track. Turn north. Drive. Keep a firm eye on the compass and ensure we stay pointing north. There's the orange route! Turn left. And after a km or so, I encounter a Gagetown graveyard and now I know EXACTLY where I am. And at that exact point, the instructor taps me on the shoulder and asks me where I am. Here. Very well, carry on. From there, I work out a new route sticking to major orange tracks, and just as I arrive at my hide location, the fog lifts. Sprint to the recce, find a spot, sprint back, issue orders off the top of my head, drive like madmen to the OP, and I get someone in the OP with 30 seconds to spare. Trace passed. Map and compass FTW. DG

It isn't an emphasized as much as it was back in the day before GPS, but we teach navigation via spacial recognition of key features on the map. The ability to look at a topo map and then understand what that looks like on the ground is invaluable. The standard once was "lacking GPS, when questioned, provide grid of own position to within 100m" - and getting it wrong was an instant fail on the trace. That doesn't help you in the open desert as much as it does in Gagetown or Wainwright, but it is a very useful skill to have. I had no problems navigating in Ft Irwin day or night. DG

Yes. The "by the book" square combat team is an infantry coy, a tank sqn, a FOO, and an engineer field section. The tank sqn brings its echelon, the inf coy brings its CP (Queen Mary) This is one of those formations developed the hard way during WW2. It allows cycling though fresh coys and sqns and keeping up the momentum depending on how the situation is developing. We kept it through the Cold War and it is still the primary combined arms building block. In theory. In practice you do what you need to do (for example, the three car recce patrols used in Afghanistan vice the doctrinal two-car patrols) to get the job done. But the basic construct is the square combat team. The book says either the inf coy OC or the tank sqn OC can be in charge. The way we were taught and practiced was with the inf coy OC as the combat team commander. My Corps prejudices notwithstanding, this is probably the right choice: the actual quick attack tends to have two phases to it (not in terms of orders phases, but in the way it plays out) You have the tank fight, which starts with the initial contact and plays through the establishment of the firebase, the obstacle line breach, and the assault, and then you have the infantry fight, which starts with the dismount and ends with the objective secure and the position consolidated. You can lead the tank fight from a LAV, but you can't lead the dismounted infantry fight from a tank. That being said, much depends on the personalities and skill levels of the two majors involved, plus the nature of the enemy and ground. And nothing is graven in stone either. If the attack was on a prepared position with a particularly tricky obstacle belt to breach, it is conceivable that the engineer resources would be beefed up and maybe an engineer major takes command of the combat team for that specific assault (to ensure the engineer bits come off correctly). Combat Teams are not fixed formations; they are functional groupings. By the book, a Canadian Armoured Regiment has 4 tank squadrons and a regimental recce troop (C/S 60) In the 80s and 90s (maybe even earlier) partially because there weren't enough tanks to go around, and partially because there weren't any Div recce regiments to keep the recce skillset and personnel deep enough, an armoured regiment had 3 tank squadrons (A-C) and a recce sqn (D) plus the regimental recce troop (60) Then as we thought we were going to phase out the tanks, all regiments converted to recce entire less the Strats who kept a rump tank sqn, and 60 was converted to zero strength. And now the tanks are coming back on, and the plan for how they are going to be distributed is still in the works. So we've gone from tank heavy, to recce heavy, and we're moving to something in-between. So where the recce force comes from that screens the square combat team is anybodies guess. A reasonable assumption is that you have a battle group consisting of an infantry Bn and an armoured regt with 3 tank sqns and a recce sqn, plus a battery of guns and an engineer troop. That gives you enough moving parts to have a combat team in the fight and two in reserve, plus enough recce resources to screen everything. DG

*snort* those are great. I feel your pain - I'm at (what is effectively) a Div HQ. In the 7 shop at that. Nobody is ever happy to see me. DG

Here's some pics: 3 views of the new Leo2 in green (shame about the one idiot blocking the view). A troop of Coyotes on the pad (note field-expedient callsign markers on the turrets) and a close-up of 23, my TLAV "BETHANY". Once upon a time, we had enough vehicles and the VOR rate was low enough that a crew would be assigned one vehicle and you could paint the callsign on. Nowadays, vehicles get rotated around and it is more common to see removable placards, callsigns marked out with gun tape, chalk, or even scratched into the dirt. Vehicle naming is kinda old school and doesn't always happen. If it does though, 99% of the time the name starts with the first letter of the sqn. I have had ARRAS in A Sqn PEIR (and again in A Sqn Armd School) BETHANY in B Sqn Armd School, DASTARD in D Sqn WR, and THUNDERBUS in D Sqn WR (the driver knocked the exhaust system off and it was very distinctive) If you want to make my wife over the moon, make the Leo2 be a B Sqn tank (21, 22, 23, or 29) and name it BETHANY. And if you want to make it really cool, stick one of these on the front fender: http://www.veteran-graphics.com/images/image_canadian_military/royal_canadian_dragoons_s_small.jpg DG

There aren't a lot of Leo2s in Canada yet. The ones we had in Afghanistan were lend-lease from Germany. I've seen the new ones - I was in Gagetown for the official rollout (and have a picture somewhere). It is basically the same paint scheme as the Leo1 (solid green), but the leaf on the turret doesn't have the white outline. You can use whatever font you want for the callsign, because I don't think anybody has painted them on yet. Too bad you can't alter the model itself; the big Afghan-era Canadian vehicle feature is the water bottles taped to the antennas. DG

Ohhhhh... now I get where the confusion is coming from - your picture is a monument. A portion of our retired vehicle fleet are converted to monuments and delivered to whatever units have space to host them. These vehicles are stripped down, welded shut, and then the gaining unit can do whatever they want with them. I have seen any number of monument vehicles painted very strangely. Sometimes because somebody had a Good Idea; sometimes because the RSM got tired of how shabby the thing looked and sent some privates out with some paint and instructions to make it look presentable. And monuments lack things like the CFR plates and whatnot because they are decommissioned. This is more typical: http://i698.photobucket.com/albums/vv345/Alf-Adams/Lahr%20Germany%20vehicle%20display%201978/M113withTOW.jpg This one I note has the leaf on the front... I've never seen that before on an operational M113; it must have been a 5 Bde (Germany) thing or maybe it was phased out before I got around (1987 onward). Same with the painted-on CFR on the hull. I see too that this picture (1978) has the red/white flag... again, all I've ever seen is subdued flags. This one here is more recent: http://www.ipmstoronto.com/articles/military-vehicles/M113/M113s%20At%20St%20Remy%2012.jpg It has the grouser rack on the outside that was added in the early 90s - see the paint? Another angle: http://www.ipmstoronto.com/articles/military-vehicles/M113/M113s%20At%20St%20Remy%2006.jpg I note this one doesn't have the rubber side skirts... those are always being scraped off on trees, buildings, other tracks... Note CFR plate and yellow bridge classification circle (I've seen both yellow and subdued here) Rear view - note callsign and NO giant yellow triangle. http://www.ipmstoronto.com/articles/military-vehicles/M113/M113s%20At%20St%20Remy%2013.jpg This one is an MRT - note callsign 88B and the EME flag on the front of the hull (maintainers paint that flag on everything) http://www.ipmstoronto.com/articles/military-vehicles/M113/M113s%20At%20St%20Remy%2016.jpg And just to muddy the waters, this one has the callsign in a completely different font. http://www.ipmstoronto.com/articles/military-vehicles/M113/M-113%20Fitter%27s%20Vehicle%2004.jpg That's nontypical though - the usual callsign font I always saw was that square-ish stencil. DG

Can you post the picture? DG

Like the Col. said, tac sign is wrong. It needs the CFR licence plate - examples on Armoured Acorn are generally correct. One front, one rear, and if you are going to keep the CFR painted on the hull they should match. Font on callsign is wrong; it is a stencil and it tends to be tall and narrow. But you are getting close. DG

Yeah, I've got a bunch of his stuff, including some of his books. The issue with his stuff is that he researches specific vehicles in specific timeframes and specific places, so you don't get the general rule, but whatever Weird Harold he chose to document. So that "10" M113 that has been duplicated for the skin - that's a Weird Harold. It's a gunner track, so who knows what they were doing with it. The overall camo pattern is right (those black arches near the back of the track are pretty distinctive and very common) The callsign is in the right place, but "10" is weird. And that big triangle on the ramp? I've never seen one of those before. That might be an arty thing, or a Germany thing, or maybe it was carrying something strange like fuzes... who knows? The more typical late 80s through the 90's is that camo pattern, no triangle, Canadian Flag in "subdued" black. Callsign can be almost anything, but to serve as a "generic" track something like 11, 11A, 11B 'cause "10" is weird. CFR on the licence plate. CFR painted on the hull is weird, but may be unit specific. The big leaf on the side of the track is also weird; that might be a Germany thing. Normally M113s didn't have the big leaf (although the tanks did - at first with the white outline, but now just solid black) DG

Gettysburg isn't really a meeting battle per sae; it was a triumph of coup d'oueil from the Union recce commander, followed by a hasty attack on a hasty defense, followed by attacks on a semi-prepared position. In a nutshell: 1. Rebel recce (Stuart) is off on a tear instead of screening his own forces, leaving Lee blind; 2. Union recce comes off the high ground and encounters the Rebel infantry vanguard; 3. Union recce commander realizes that he has just come forward of the best piece of ground for miles around, and if he forces Lee to deploy in the low ground, the follow-on Union forces will have no choice but to deploy on the high ground - meaning that not even the worst Union general can fuck it up. Accordingly, he has his men dismount and act like infantry; 4. The Rebel Vanguard engages the Union recce, and lacking their own recce to tell them otherwise, assumes they have encountered the Union van and start deploying for battle. Meanwhile, the Union troops start deploying on the high ground. Once they are in place, the Union recce withdraws; 5. You now have the Union in a hasty defense and the Rebels in an assembly area ready for a hasty attack. No engagement has taken place between primary fighting forces. What happens next is a series of assaults up the hill - first a left flank (that nearly works) then a right flank (stalled due to shitty ground and a spirited defense) and finally the frontal (Pickett's Charge) that is a bloody slaughter. At no time does the Union consider assaulting down the hill. For it to be a true meeting engagement, both sides have to consider themselves on the offense and have to maneuver offensively. Gettysburg fails that test. As far as the battle itself went, the Union recce won the day. I use this battle all the time to teach troop leaders how understanding ground, time, and space, plus the careful use of initiative, can make recce into a force multiplier - and how NOT doing the mission and running around like an idiot can blind your commander and place him in an untenable situation. DG

Yes, kinda-sorta. The LAV Capt commands the LAVs once they have dismounted the troops. In terms of planning and daily admin, the BC is very much the Sqn OpsO (and the disciplinarian of the Tp Ldrs) where the 2IC is more CSS/Pers Admin. From what I have seen of line infantry coys, the 2IC does all the 1/3/4 functions and the LAV Capt is more an assistant... but that's not authoritative; my experience with line infantry is more at the battalion level and the platoon level so I don't have a good handle on the daily operations of the coy. I did a stint as a coy 2IC at Meaford (in a training coy) and lord knows I did all the 1/3 functions. The CQ was a sharp cat and he handled all the 4 stuff - thank the FSM. Because a training coy generates an astounding amount of pers adm.... Those are bivoac sites; basically woods with a circular track and vehicle parking spots carved out of them. Each is big enough to hide a battalion, plus they are equipped with serviced Blue Rockets. You can sign them out from Range Control so you have a place to stay for the night. DG

Yes, that is correct. We learned in WW2 to keep the 2IC well back so that if the HQ took casualties you had a commander in your back pocket ready to take over. If the OC is killed, the BC takes command until such time as the 2IC can move up to take over. And it gives you a senior guy to deal with all the administration that needs to happen. Armour is a voracious consumer of supplies and it takes some horsepower to keep the goodies flowing. So you have the F Echelon - this is the fighting vehicles. The A1 Ech (normally just "the Echelon") is commanded by the SSM and is all the tactical resupply vehicles. The A2 Ech is a spare set of POL and ammo trucks. They cycle in and out of the A1 Ech as they bring supplies forward (a full truck replaces an empty one) The B Ech is back at the Bde admin area, and is the interface between the Service Battalion (or the FSE or the NSE or the ASG or whatever the hell the wogs are calling themselves this week) and the Sqn. Supplies, parts, vehicles, and pers flow through the CSS unit, to the B Ech, to the A2 Ech, to the A Ech, and ultimately to the F Ech. All this doctrine is more-or-less common to Commonwealth countries. There are small differences (for example, infantry gets an "India" arm indicator in Canada, not "Foxtrot") but the broad concepts are the same. It may seem complex at first, but there is a real symmetry to it and it makes it very easy (once you wrap your head around it) to figure out callsigns from orbats and vice versa. Compare to the Americans where you had to know that "Warhog 6" was the LCol but "Katana 6" was a captain. And God save me from the CTC menagerie.... Whereas with us, when you hear "99" on the net, you know that big things are afoot.... (My favourite American callsign was "Tortoise 6" - he was the environmental guy at CTC. Anyone who has been to Ft Irwin will know why. That same exercise, I was "Warrior Niner Echo Xray" which was a mix between Yank and Canadian C/S) DG

Note that a recce BC runs the CP, but a tank BC has a tank and is a fighting element of the Sqn. (The 2IC is always with the B Ech so that you can't wipe out the Sqn leadership in one go) Never done a trace with 8 cars? Where have you been? I've done dozens of exercises with 8 car troops in them. Mind you, the number of cars in a troop can change. I've done 7 car (no G) and 5 car (no G or E Ptl). Recce Sqn on my tour did 6 car Tps with 3 car Ptls to accommodate the theatre directive of 3 A vehicles minimum in any convoy so I did a MAPLE DEFENDER at CTC using a 6 car, 2 patrol format to duplicate that. Flexibility is a principle of recce after all. Assault Tp (44) has fallen by the wayside for a number of years, but it is (supposedly) coming back. Some assault troopers courses were recently run.... OK: 1. OK... but I think 3 Pl of infantry is more doctrinally correct 2. OK - so long as the firebase can actually see the target 3. I'm not up to speed on all the differences between the various Leo2 models. I generally use Leo2A5 to or 2A4 to sub in for a Canadian Leo2 4. Effectively, yes. There will be a target handover between the recce and the tanks, and then the recce will move on. Recce should be two vehs max - the rest of the recce top will have continued up the trace ("piquet and bypass") looking for more bad guys 5. "Battle Captain" - see above 6. The FOO is not an integral part of the sqn nor the coy - he (or she) is an attachment. Depending on which battery the FOO comes from, C/S will be (1-3)(1-3) so 11, 23, 32 are all legit. Because they are attached, the "Golf" arm indicator is used, so G12 While we're on the topic of arm indicators, the combat team net controlling station is probably the Coy CP, so all the Sqn callsigns will be prefixed with the "Tango" arm indicator - unless the Tank Sqn comes from a different Sqn letter than the Coy. If the callsigns don't step on each other, sometimes they'll get lazy and drop the arm indicator. So if the tank sqn is "A" and the inf coy is the first in the battalion (would normally be "A" but the coys are lettered sequentially in the regiment - don't ask) then both would be C/S "1" and life gets confusing fast. The arm indicator deconflicts. If the tank sqn is "B" and the inf coy is the first in the battalion, then the tanks are "2" and the coy is "1" and you can get away without using the arm indicator. DG

Hells no; it is barely adequate. Platoons attack sections. Combat teams attack platoons. We aren't in this to make a fair fight. If a combat team attack is done properly, there should be very little for the pongoes to do save clear a few trenches and the buildings. Between the the firebase direct fire, the firebase-observed indirect fire, and the assault tanks all the enemy AFVs should be knocked out before anybody dismounts. The idea is that the infantry fight is between fresh troops (ours) and the shellshocked remnants (theirs) If you want to give the player something to do, give him the assault tank troop and task him with the countermoves (blocking) force with a counterattack. When the Leo2 first showed up there wasn't enough to go around, and I don't think the Leo2 had mine plows. So the Tp was 3 x Leo 2 and a Leo1 plow tank. The intent now is to go all Leo2 Note that we had Leo2A6 in Afghanistan, but the new tanks being bought are Leo2A4 based with newer FCS and some other bits - sort of a "super A4" or an A6 without the wedge. DG

I continue to be amazed by the Aussie penchant to classify everything. ACP125 is explicitly UNCLASS and is allowed to be redistributed without auth from NDHQ - it says so on the first page. Table 4B-2-1 Fixed callsigns for an Armoured Regiment CP Stations: 0A, 0B (live CP is 0) A Sqn CPs: 1A, 1B (live CP is 1) B Sqn CPs: 2A, 2B (live CP is 2) C Sqn CPs: 3A, 3B (Live CP is 3) D Sqn (Recce) CPs: 4A, 4B (Live CP is 4) OPCOM subunit CPs (if any) 7A, 7B HQ Sqn CPs: 8A, 8B (live CP is 8) RHQ CO: 9 DCO: 9A OpsO: 9B RSM: 9C LO: 9E SigO: 91 Sig Sgt: 91A RRBs: 91B, 91C etc Adjt: 92 IntO: 93 MP O: 96 MP Dets: 96A, 96B etc FAC: 97 HQ Sqn OC Hq Sqn: 89 2IC: 89A Adm O: 89B SSM: 89C Umpires: 80A, 80B etc QM: 81 RQMS: 81A MedO: 93 Ambs: 83A, 83B etc TptO: 84 Cargo (Tracked): 85, 85A, 85B etc Cargo (Wheeled): 86, 86A, 86B etc Spare Vehs: 87, 87A, 87B etc Maint Tp Ldr: 88 ETSM: 88A MRT: 88B, 88C etc Recovery (Wrecker, ARV): 88E RHQ Recce Tp Ldr: 60 (all other callsigns follow recce standard with prefix 60 - see below) A Sqn (Tank) (note - all applies to B, C change prefix from "1" to 2, 3 as applicable) OC: 19 2IC: 19A BC: 19B SSM: 19C SQMS: 19D LO: 19E 1 Tp (Tank) Ldr: 11 (all applies to 2 Tp, 3 Tp, 4 Tp; just change suffix) 1 Tp WO: 11A 1 Tp Sgt: 11B 1 Tp Mine Plow: 11C Dozer Tank (OC's Wingman): 16 Echelon Ammo Trucks: 15, 15A POL Turcks: 15B, 15C FAC/DZ/LZ: 17-17D Maint WO, Sgt: 18, 18A MRT (Wpn): 18B MRT (Veh): 18C ARVs: 18D, 18E Rad Tech: 18F Ambs: 19F, 19G D Sqn (Recce) - as per tank Sqns except: OC's Rover: 49H 1 Tp (Recce) (also applies to 2, 3 Tp - change suffix) Tp Ldr (T Ptl or Tp HQ): 41 Tp Ldr's Wingman: 41G Tp WO (A Ptl): 41A Tp WO's Junior: 41B Tp Sgt (C Ptl): 41C Tp Sgt's Junior: 41D E Patrol: 41E E Ptl Junior: 41F Tp Ldr Assault Tp: 44 Tp WO: 44A Section Comd: 44B Section Comd: 44C DG

I have my copy of ACP 125 CANSUPP 1B (Radiotelephone Procedures) which contains the full list of all callsigns in various units. I'll post a table later. DG

Well there's some memories. The "10" callsign on the M113 is a little weird. I've never heard of that being used and my copy of ACP125 CANSUPP1B doesn't have it. If you want the first platoon commander's track, it should be 11 If you do a Leo2A4 in the same livery as the Leo1, you've pretty much hit what the new 2A4 looks like. DG

Heh, you're attacking Petersville. That's a VERY sound idea; I know lots of guys who would like to see it erased from the face of the earth. (Petersville is the staging area for all Armour School courses. It's where the students live while on course. Everybody in the Corps has bad memories of Petersville. I know that ground very well) You've got the firebase in a weird spot - it will take longer for them to get into position than the main assault force, and you want the firebase shooting up the objective while the assault forces is moving to the LD - partially to attrit the target, and partially to fix the en attention on the firebase so the assault comes as a surprise. The blocking force for the counterattack is in a good spot, but those tanks go in on the assault and then move to that position after they have fought through the objective. If you put them there on their own, they are ass-end to a known threat and you lack their firepower on the assault. Or I'm just suffering from rectal-cranial inversion. It's 3 Pl in the Coy, normally. But doctrine is a guideline, right? So it may be more if the situation dictates. The ATOC "by the book" Coy is 3 Pl. G Coy 2 RCR on my tour was 3 Pl. But that doesn't preclude a larger Coy. DG