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Thread: OIF/OEF Veterans. Technical Lessons Learned wanted

  1. #111
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scuba22Steve View Post
    This is my second deployment to Afghanistan. My first deployment could be considered a joke. All that we ran into was IED's. My second deployment they sent us to a hornets nest. I am still in Afghanistan and that being the case I will not say where I am or what unit I am in. I will say this.
    In regards to the M4.
    I know that there are many options out there that are field proven to be more reliable than the current direct impingement system we are using. I have been in more firefights than I can count, and I am also guilty of not cleaning my M4 everyday, or even every week for that matter. Much to the credit of this great gun, I have never had a malfunction of any kind. I would like to have suppressors as standard issue for every infantryman but that is just out of the cards with our current budget.
    Optics.
    The only units that deploy with M68's are supports units. Every Infantry unit that I have seen in sector has ACOG's. Granted I know that the occasional less fortunate National Guard unit has to make due with CCO's, I would say the majority of the ground pounders have ACOG's. I opted out of the ACOG for a personal optic. I put an EOTech EXPS3-1 w/3x Magnifier. I am still able to engage targets within the weapons effective ranges, but I feel much more comfortable with the speed of target acquisition during CQB. I do think that the EOTech and magnifier combination is something that the Army should look into.

    Weapons Training.
    I was able to do a Close range marksmanship training class prior to deployment. Though it was not the most thorough class I have ever taken it definitely opened the door to many different ideas and schools of thought. Most of which I have in turn passed down to my soldiers. The army needs to broaden its horizons as far as the marksmanship training is concerned. Stop the cookie cutter mold for marksmanship and just send the men to the range with as many rounds as they can use. I promise they will come away better shots than if you simply get them to shoot 40/40.
    Every guy is getting an ACOG now?

    I concur on the marksmanship training.

  2. #112
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    Two deployments to iraq have tought me take care of your weapon and it will take care of you. I have been in four years on the line and keeping my weapon clean resulted in not a single malfunction. While deployed I would wipe down my weapon every day and every 3-4 days a good phase 3 then once a month a solid break down of everything including the trigger essembly and thoroughly clean it. Keep it lubed as well and it will never let you down. Keep everything properly tied down as well. The only thing you need to clean your weapon with is a barbers brush, soft and hard nylon brush, dental pick, a hoppes boresnake and some clp. I can clean every inch of a m4, 249, 240, and 50 with those simple items. Get some graphite lube for the belt fed weapons as well.

    When it comes to weapon accessories a good foregrip was a great thing to have. Slings are whatever fits the user best. As long as he can properly manipulate his weapon for any drills and training. A good magpul stock is a nice thing to have as well. Much more comfortable than the one that comes with the m4. Our 249s had the collapsable stock but those are heavy. Most people don't know you can put a stock for an m4 on it and cut some weight.

    We had aimpoint ccos and acogs. I like both optics a lot. They can take a beating and you can still rely on them when the shtf. Our 249s & 240s had 145s and I hated those damn things. Too heavy and bulky. I would rather them have eotechs, atleast the 249s and kept the pigs with the 145.

    Issue gear was just garbage. Uncomfortable and made it a pain in the ass to set up your kit in a way that makes any damn sense. RFI kits were meant for rifleman so that left our gunners shit out of luck. When I was a saw gunner I had to scramble together pouches and "nutsacks" to set my kit up. I was constantly changing it around as it was so uncomfortable. I dropped the 200 round pouches and drums and used all 100 round ones. Was easier to distribute the weight and 100 sacks were easier to draw and load than the 200 were. Also much easier to manipulate the weapon in mout scenerios. As a rifleman I bought my own kit and set it up to fit all missions. If I drove I could take it off but keep it in reach if I ever needed to don it. As a gunner I could have it off and slung on the gunners door for easy access and be able to don it if needed but drivers and gunners didn't dismount but shit does happen. For dismount I had a duty belt with a dump pouch which I believe they should issue. If shit hits the fan there isn't time when changing mags to stuff the empty one back in its pouch. Issue boots are also junk. I stuck with blackhawk boots and they lasted one and a half deployments. After that I got rocky c4s and those were great but either of those boots wouldn't last in the stan.

    Combat shirts were a great addition until you saw fat ass pogs wearing them around the fob when we spent our small amount of time there until we went back to our patrol base. Issue helmet pads sucked as well, they gave me headches from hell no matter how I had them positioned. So I bought some skydex pads and never looked back. Don't get me started on the iotv, I could start a whole thread on that pos.

    I had a good pltsgt so we were always training in garrison and deployed. Glass houses, using the barracks to train on stairway formations. We also used the pillars in the barracks to run weapon transition drills. We used our pt field to run through different battle drills. We also had battle drills for mounted ops. We'd go out to the field and do land nav quite a bit as well. When we could we would ruck to mout sites and train there as well as shoot houses. It wasn't often but it helped. I am in 1st cav so getting good ranges was far and few inbetween. We would get a lot of trigger time in as well. Doing dry fire and ready up drills before reflexive fire ranges. While deployed at our patrol base we built a mout house out of hescos and would train daily in it. When we stayed at a jss the iraqis had a mout village built out of conexes and we would go do full scale mout ops on it with vehicles and everything. I hated it and loved it at the same time but now that I look back after reading some of what others unit did I am glad my pltsgt was ocd about things as he was. I never felt I wasn't trained adequetly for the mission. Shit we even trained on combat "clits" and orps for afghanistan.
    Last edited by Endur; 02-13-12 at 16:21.

  3. #113
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    Quote Originally Posted by Endur View Post
    Shit we even trained on combat "clits" and orps for afghanistan.
    I've got to ask, what is a "combat clit?" Do you mean CLP (Combat Logistics Patrol)?

  4. #114
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    Well my .02 cent worth. What I have learned from the sandbox...

    We need to go from 5.56 to 6.8 SPC..

    And I couldn't tell my guys enough to CLEAN and LUBRICATE, then do it again...

    Cut the amount of gear carried DOWN, 95+ pounds of gear is stupid....
    "IF YOU WON'T DEFEND YOUR RIGHTS, DON'T COMPLAIN WHEN YOU LOSE THEM."

  5. #115
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    Quote Originally Posted by a0cake View Post
    I've got to ask, what is a "combat clit?" Do you mean CLP (Combat Logistics Patrol)?
    Umm no. It is a type of formarion that looks like ( l )

    One of our squadleaders was tought it at ranger school. There is a technical name for it but I don't remember.

  6. #116
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    Quote Originally Posted by Endur View Post
    Umm no. It is a type of formarion that looks like ( l )

    One of our squadleaders was tought it at ranger school. There is a technical name for it but I don't remember.
    Also called a Ranger File.
    Todd
    Colt/BCM

  7. #117
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    The biggest thing that I've taught my Soldiers is to make everything happen in the 'workspace' as I've learned. (Magpul DVD + video taping myself + lots of rounds = not as good as getting to a class, but something is better than nothing.) Changing this ONE thing has really opened my Soldiers' eyes to their world.

    Again, it's getting the Soldiers out of their comfort zone.

    We had a compressed training timeline, so that made the priority of my Company shift from the tactical side to the technical side (I'm a CSS Commander.... Loggie is the term used most often). Everyone wants to hone their abilities to get a load of supplies from here to there, or to fix a truck, or to track a shipment of stuff. The tactical side shifts to the back burner.

    The part that's difficult is that when a CSS Soldier needs to use their carbine, the poop has probably REALLY hit the fan. Their need to manipulate the gun becomes the most important thing that they've ever done in their entire life.

    This will be my 3rd trip to the 'Stan, in addition to 17 months spent in Iraq.

  8. #118
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    Quote Originally Posted by Todd00000 View Post
    Also called a Ranger File.
    No that is something completely different..

  9. #119
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    Quote Originally Posted by TheBelly View Post

    This will be my 3rd trip to the 'Stan, in addition to 17 months spent in Iraq.
    Stay sharp and good luck.
    Quote Originally Posted by Endur View Post
    No that is something completely different..
    Can you describe it?
    Todd
    Colt/BCM

  10. #120
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    Quote Originally Posted by Todd00000 View Post
    Stay sharp and good luck.
    Can you describe it?
    A ranger file is just that a file. This formation is (l) <--- parantheses included. It's not a moving formation. We rarely used it so I don't remember much about it.

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