82d Airborne division: Maneuver and fires integration program

FA Journal, Jan, 2002 by John P. Drago

The Combat Training Centers (CTCs) have identified many repetitive negative trends within the fire support battlefield operating system (BOS) in support of a brigade combat team (BCT). Foremost for all fire supporters is the trend identifying the failure to support forces in contact with responsive, accurate indirect fires. Many observations indicate that indirect fires often never make it into the fight.

There are many potential causes for these trends, not all of which are attributable solely to fire supporters. In planning, the importance of using indirect fires is seldom grasped. During rehearsals, calls-for-fire (CFFs) are seldom incorporated or their purpose accurately explained. During execution, communications routinely fail, CFFs are not processed or tactical patience is not practiced. Poor situational awareness causes slow clearance of fires in the company sector, and commonly, units become impatient and maneuver against the enemy without employing their indirect assets.

Squad leaders and platoon leaders often are not aware of or comfortable with CFF procedures and their employment. The result is that units fail to integrate indirect fires when in contact, thus reducing the combat power ratio. This allows the enemy to break contact on his terms.

Although most units recognize that in many cases infantry units should employ mortars and artillery before rushing into a direct firefight, they don't always integrate fires into training. Training is often "stove piped," rarely providing the opportunity to fully synchronize and employ all available assets.

Instead of resourcing training to replicate the true capability of the combined arms team, more often than not, fire supporters sit on the observation post (OP) calling for fires, and company commanders and platoon leaders receive occasional instruction on CFF procedures and indirect capabilities. In most units, rarely do these teams train and execute operations using live artillery and mortars in relatively free-play maneuver exercises. In essence, many of our maneuver brethren don't gain a full appreciation of the magnitude of indirect fire effects and what they can do for their fight.

In view of our no-notice contingency mission and the necessity to maintain proficiency in integrating maneuver and fires, the 82d Airborne Division BCTs at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, execute a maneuver and fires integration certification program--the subject of this article. This program is designed to train and certify maneuver-fires teams at the company and platoon levels to plan, coordinate, synchronize and execute integrated maneuver and indirect fires.

Focused on a phased approach to teach fire support fundamentals and tactics, techniques and procedures (TTPs) for execution, an integral part of the program is the Observation Post (OP) 13 fire control exercise (FCX) or combined arms live fire exercise (CALFEX). This realistic live-fire exercise provides an ideal setting for infantry company commanders, platoon leaders and their respective fire support officers (FSOs) and forward observers (FOs) to build trust and confidence within the teams. Ultimately, by executing danger close fires, maneuver units gain an appreciation for the destructiveness of indirect fires and solidify the maneuver-fires relationship in planning and controlling these fires.

Preliminary Training. To ensure all teams are trained to a common level of proficiency before the mission cycle or before a live-fire exercise, units undergo preliminary training to provide the foundation for success and reinforce proper techniques. The first step in this process is instruction on fire support fundamentals.

Classroom Instruction. Brigade and battalion fire supporters provide classroom instruction to maneuver-fires team personnel. It includes fire support asset characteristics and capabilities, munitions characteristics and shell-fuze combinations, fire support coordinating measures (FSCMs), CFF procedures and when to use each mission, techniques for determining target and observer location and range and direction to a target, echelonment of fires, minimum safe distances (MSDs) and risk estimate distances (REDs), company fire support planning and execution procedures, clearance of fires and FO control options.

CFF Training. In this phase, units train the maneuver-fires team on conducting fire missions in the FO trainer simulator (FOTS) or Guard unit armory device full-crew interactive simulation trainer (GUARDFIST). Both infantry and artillery personnel meet minimum mission requirements on the training devices, primarily to reinforce the classroom CFF training and give company commanders and platoon leaders an appreciation for what their FSOs or FOs do to put rounds down range. Having the teams execute the training together also helps build a cohesive team.

If time and scheduling permit, a technique to improve this training is to include mortar and artillery fire direction centers (FDCs) and radios to work the entire fire mission processing chain on the appropriate radio nets.