EFD1: Starship Goodwords (EFD Anthology Series from Carrick Publishing)
Page 14
There is a downside to being the enemy force. Exercises are often scripted, and the directing staff (or DS) is usually around to make sure encounters unfold as they should, so that they can judge the results. The blue-side is not so closely supervised -- there might be one DS with a company of infantry. The red-side tends to have many more. My assault troop was saddled with an ex-Regimental Sergeant Major, a man with almost 30 years of soldiering (in another regiment from ours) under his belt. To make things worse, Mr. Lensmen and I did not take to each other from the start. While being civil to each other there was an underlying tension between us.
The exercise got off to an excellent start -- the Blue Force was slow and unwieldy, while the forte of a Reconnaissance squadron is speed and decisiveness. Their logistics train was still moving into place under a weak rearguard when we pounced. Hamish, one of our troop commanders, achieved a measure of distinction when his troop snapped up a medical company commanded by his equally eccentric father. His shout of “Hands up, everybody -- you too, Dad!” was certainly one for the record books.
My part did not go so well... We suspected an anti-tank detachment lay in wait for our scout cars to appear, and I led a fighting patrol out to see if we could snap it up. We were creeping along in fine-style, crawling up ditches, and creeping through the bracken. Mr. Lensmen, possessed of the gravity of a very senior NCO and being 30 years older than us, paced leisurely along beside the patrol. The pair of Jeep-mounted 106mm Recoilless Rifle crews did not see us, but did see a member of the DS walking towards them.
They came to a natural conclusion and called down a mortar shoot on us, whereupon Mr. Lensmen was informed of the shoot over his radio on the DS frequency. He then consulted his map, determined that the rain of imaginary 81mm mortar bombs was coming exactly down on our heads, and informed me that half of my patrol (and me) were now casualties. There was no appeal, and so I settled down to the two-hour nap of the exercise “dead”.
To be perfectly fair to Mr. Lensmen, crawling and creeping about is a very strenuous activity even for 18-year old privates and 21-year-old officers. A fifty-year-old man cannot be expected to keep up. I took him aside and politely suggested that next time he might wish to remain a hundred meters or so behind us or under cover. He said that he would think about it. The next day we all settled into another two hour nap as Mr. Lensmen was disinclined to slither through a swamp; preferring to walk around it in full view of a company of infantry.
Strictly speaking, a senior Chief Warrant Officer doesn’t outrank a newly minted Lieutenant. Practically speaking, the Lieutenant had better not get in a pissing contest with one -- someone is going to lose and it won’t be the NCO. For all practical purposes, I was clearly outranked on those occasions where it was necessary to butt heads.
We were lying up late one afternoon, preparing for a series of patrols and probing attacks on the Blue Force, when Bart approached me. Mr. Lensmen was napping in the back of our truck, but the Directing Staff radio had been left on, and was sitting unattended elsewhere in our Hide. Bart, accidentally and not on purpose, had been eavesdropping and learned that the same Anti-tank detachment we had been after two days earlier was in the neighborhood. Moreover, the DS who was with them was fairly certain that the 106s would bag the first couple of scout-cars to exit our Hide.
Likewise accidentally and not on purpose, I left Mr. Lensmen where he was dozing and meandered over to a spot where it would be hypothetically possible to spot the anti-tank team. Then I called in a Contact Report to Squadron Headquarters and received permission to try and capture them with another fighting patrol. One was swiftly organized, but alas, the napping Mr. Lensman was inadvertently left behind as we departed.
Perhaps this was just as well. In my eagerness to close with the team, I acted with more haste than care and the sortie turned into a debacle. The Blue Force caught us flat-footed and this time it was my fault. At least Mr. Lensmen was not there to witness my humiliation but he did have a lot to say on my return. Moreover, the Chief of the Directing Staff had a few words with my Squadron Commander who also had a few choice words with me.
Accidentally and not on purpose, the Directing Staff decided that it was high time some prisoners were taken in the exercise. Being “killed” meant a two-hour reprise and the quiet shame of knowing that had the exercise been real warfare, you’d have really screwed things up. Being captured meant a night or so in the kind and loving hands of the Intelligence Cell, which had no sense of hospitality but did have a lovely program to induce a one-way flow of information. Mr. Lensmen informed me that I should lead the patrol, and that on no account was I to leave him behind this time.
It was time for the “Oh, Okay” School of obedience.
That evening, we went in by truck to a hide some four kilometers in front of the Blue-Force’s forward infantry companies. I then went ahead to scout out the initial part of the route we would take. As Mr. Lensmen was sticking to me like glue. I took pains to make this a difficult route. When we returned, I announced there would be enough time for a couple of hours of sleep. This was not solicitude so much as it was cruelty. Give a man 30-45 minutes or so to sleep, and it’s a nap. Give him something more than that but wake him up before four hours (and a full sleep cycle) have passed, and he has to fight back to wakefulness and remains much groggier than he normally would.
Mr. Lensmen curled up in a sleeping-bag liner under a ground sheet. So did most of my other lads except for the trio that I selected to come on the patrol. Bart was also going forward with another trio to be a security element for my group as we went in. The rest of the Assault Troop was snoring away. As it came time for my departure, the most Schweikesque portion of my plan was executed.
In any group of soldiers, there will be one dull, lazy and stupid one who thinks he is just clever enough to lie to you. I had ensured that our example would be the sentry in the half-hour before my patrol left. I sent Buggins around to wake up Mr. Lensmen, secure in the knowledge that he would never dare to shake a Chief Warrant Officer awake, but would lie to me about trying to do so. This is exactly what happened -- in front of witnesses too. Being naturally preoccupied with my final preparations, I sent Buggins out to ensure Mr. Lensmen was up three times. Three times Buggins came back and said that he had done so. The minutes ticked by, and there was no sign of our DS.
Then it was time to depart and I cheerfully told Buggins to let Mr. Lensmen know what direction we had departed in. Behaving in this manner can -- deservedly -- land you in very hot water. However, if you pull off a coup, much will be forgiven.
My original intent was to crawl in and drag off an enemy prisoner as fodder for the Intelligence Cell (they were neutral in this exercise and would eagerly interrogate anyone who was delivered to them). Instead, as we crawled towards the selected company, I heard the distant sound of an electrical generator. In a battalion area, generators are usually only found with the Headquarters unit -- which constantly needs power for its radios and work area. There was a quick change of plan and we homed in the sound.
As we neared the HQ area, their sentries made life easy for us. Secure in the knowledge that they were three kilometers to the rear of the line of entrenched infantry companies, one was smoking and chatting to his companion. We easily slid by them, and found ourselves right by the HQ vehicles. I was a bundle of excitement -- there were so many exciting targets at 4:00 AM for a thunderflash (which simulates grenades) and magazine or two of 9mm blank ammunition that I hardly knew where to begin. However, Trooper Read made up my mind for me. I heard a glugging sound, and spotted Read swallowing the better part of a pitcher of lemonade left by the hood of a command post van.
When a Headquarters is laying out refreshments it means that an orders group was imminent. An O-Group is where all the main subordinate commanders and the representatives of the supporting arms are given their instructions. Naturally, there may be printed signal operating instructions (SOI) for the day -- code-words, frequencies, etc. There might be cop
ies of the orders written down, and there certainly will be a trace -- the sketched transparent overlay on the map that details positions, axis of advance, obstacle belts, artillery fire-plans, and much, much more.
I scooped the SOI into my pocket, grabbed the trace and map-board and relieved Read of the rest of the lemonade. We scuttled off into the darkness, slipped by their oblivious sentries again and then ran snickering into the last hour of the night.
About 20 minutes later, a series of parachute flares shot up from the HQ we had just plundered, and from the infantry companies in front of us. We soon found out that the entire enemy force was spitting out improvised patrols in all directions too. Fortunately Bart was in a position to occupy the attention of the company athwart our exit route and we slipped by to a hasty rendezvous with Hamish.
Mr. Lensmen was livid with me in that fire and ice way that Chief Warrant Officers reserve for bouncy young subalterns. However, my stock was suddenly very high with my squadron commander and my whole Regiment, and the DS radio net was too crowded with messages about the sudden accuracy of Red-Force artillery fire for any complaints to be forwarded. As for the Intelligence Cell folks, they had been sitting in with the Battalion Headquarters waiting to receive some prisoners (to wit, me and my patrol) when they saw us sneak into the HQ and steal their maps. This gave them fodder for lectures on security and the threat of Spetsnaz for some years to come. It also gave me a leg-up for an interesting posting when it was time for my staff-tour a few years later.
A couple of years later, Bart and I were discussing a superior officer who neither of us much respected. Bart mentioned that it was time for the “Oh-Okay” school of compliance to come into effect. I told him I had always admired his notion of creative obedience and asked him when he first put it together. Some questions are best left un-asked. “Having to put up with you,” he replied.
John Thompson was born into a Canadian Air Force family in 1959, served in the Canadian Army for 13 years, and was a researcher and commentator with the Canadian Institute of Strategic Studies and Mackenzie Institute from 1985 to the present. He currently still sits on the officer's association of his old regiment and is a member of the Royal Canadian Military Institute.
Look for his critically acclaimed chronology of WWII: Spirit Over Steel
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