Training "Bandits" for combat

Soldiers Magazine, June, 2005 by Gregory Withrow

THE rattle and pop of small-arms and machine-gun fire shattered the crisp silence of early morning in the foothills of the Taunus Mountains of Hessen, Germany.

Along the former Roman frontier, mounted Soldiers of the 1st Battalion, 37th Armored Regiment, recently trained, adapting lessons learned from combat in the sands of another former Roman frontier--Iraq.

To hone their skills in dismounted operations, some of the Soldiers left the safety of their M1A1 Abrams tanks in the forests of the Friedberg Training Area to "assault" on foot a position held by mock enemy troops.

"Dismounted operations are something new for these tankers," said 1LT Jonathan Villasenor, executive officer of the 1st Bn.'s Company A. Using the military-operations-in-urban-terrain facilities at FTA, the "Bandits," as Soldiers of the unit call themselves, practiced techniques for entering and searching structures in a hostile environment.

Inching slowly forward through the wood line, they prepared to rush a building. A few of them remained hidden in a prone position, providing cover for their comrades, who burst from the relative safety of cover to storm a cinder-block structure.

Shots rang out, and the Soldiers flattened themselves against the muddy earth or the cold stone walls of the structure, taking a moment to collect their wits before entering the building's only doorway.

From the wood line, supporting fire erupted to suppress the waiting enemy and allowed the Bandits to make their move and assault the entrance.

The scene was repeated several times as the Bandits honed skills traditionally associated with infantrymen or combat engineers.

"This training is really intense and fast," said PFC Ellery Majalca, a tank driver. "They should really implement this at one-station unit training."

OSUT combines the basic and advanced individual training tankers receive at Fort Knox, Ky. Infantry Soldiers receive OSUT training at Fort Benning, Ga.

Although the Bandits advanced on the building on foot, they weren't without an intimidating "big brother" as backup. Other members of the team watched over their comrades from the turrets of their 72-ton rolling fortresses, which moved to the outskirts of the mock village.

"Shock effect, that's what it is," LTC Garry Bishop, commander of the 1st Bn., 37th Armd. Regt., told his troops during an after-action review designed to highlight the positives of a particular exercise and examine what could have been done better.

"Tanks surrounding a building, leveling their 120 mm guns on it, give the enemy pause, to decide if he really wants to fight or not," Bishop said.

Integrating and adapting every piece of equipment the Bandit battalion has at its disposal is a key focus of this type of training.

"You have the 240B dismount kits," said Bishop. "Use them."

The 7.62 mm 240B machine gun is mounted atop the Abrams tank at the loader's hatch and can be quickly dismounted and adapted to an infantry-style weapon capable of providing rapid suppressive fire to support troops moving from building to building.

"Don't think this is infantry stuff and you don't have to learn it, because you do," Bishop told his Soldiers.

Even as the Bandits prepared for the possibilities of low-intensity urban combat, they focused on the high-intensity spectrum for which tanks are designed.

Mounting up and rolling out from FTA, the Bandits and their supporting elements from Co. B, 16th Engineer Bn; 501st Forward Support Bn.; and members of the 2nd Bn., 3rd Field Artillery Regt., convoyed about 40 kilometers, tactically, over the Taunus Mountains to the outskirts of a small German village, Wuerges.

Most maneuver training in Europe takes place at the Combat Maneuver Training Center at Hohenfels, Germany, but this sort of exercise has a different flavor than the force-on-force simulations held inside "The Box" at CMTC, Bishop said.

In Wuerges, the maneuver culminated in a breach exercise designed to test the Soldiers' abilities to surmount high-intensity-conflict obstacles. But along the way, tactically navigating the small streets of German villages provided challenges similar to those faced in Iraq.

Maneuvering outside the box provided a realistic challenge of command and control over long distances, said CPT Joseph Albrecht, Co. A's commander. Along with realistic movement was the element of surprise, as the Bandits lead tank was struck by a simulated improvised explosive device.

This type of training is now standard for Army units, because no one is immune to an IED. Reacting to an ambush of this type provides an opportunity for everyone in the unit to train for various contingencies in combat, because the entire unit and its supporting elements move as a whole.

Training everyone on his M113 armored personnel carrier to perform all of the tasks required of its crew members was combat medic SSG Gustavo Hernandez's primary function.

"Everyone needs to know everyone else's job," said Hernandez, adding that the best training is the most realistic training.

When you train, believe it's the real thing, he said. Then, when the real thing happens, your training will allow you to respond without hesitation, and correctly. "That's the way I want my guys to train."