Force Protection a good job for the reserves?

[John Nayduk]

There has been some talk about using the reserves in theater in roles other than individual augmentation.  What is your thoughts on sending sub-units of reserves Regiments to perform tasks like camp protection/security thus leaving the "gun slinging" to the regular force?  Are there any other tasks that they could be used for?

 

[PPCLI Guy]

They are already being used in that manner - and I agree that this is a useful task.  Gen sp transport comes to mind as well - when it is not being done by a civie contractor.

Dave

 

[GerryCan]

Well like Dave said, they are already employed overseas doing that task and have been for awhile. I personnally have never heard anything going terribly wrong with them in that role either.

Quite frankly, I believe they can do the job just as well as any Reg Force troops, as long as they are properly trained in their job before they deploy and fully understand it once they are on the ground. Although I do honestly believe it should be left for Cbt Arms trades specifically.

 

[DELTADOG13]

Many overseas specific jobs are being farmed out to reserve units. CIMIC, Psy Ops, etc come to mind. Like was said in previous posts as long as they receive training and take the task to heart and put their best foot forward cheers to them. It would probably due the Forces better to start regulating tasks all around so we don't duplicate our resources. Reserves are just as good as regulars they just lack some training and experience. However if they don't get operational experience what good is training them. I read in another post about sending 18 reserve infanteers to each Rifle coy to gain experience and fill up numbers. This sounds like the right start. This would allow regulars to learn to trust and respect reservists but also to mold them for future ops. Just mt two cents. ;D

 

[Lost_Warrior]

This would allow regulars to learn to trust and respect reservists but also to mold them for future ops. Just mt two cents.

Why wouldn't reg force members respect or "trust" reservists?  Do they actually FUBAR up that bad for the regs to have these sentiments, or is it the usual "I'm better than you because i'm reg force" additude?

Besides, trust shouldnt be an issue, unless of course a fellow reservists refers to you as "an infidel" during an operation....

 

[Infanteer]

I think he is referring to "trust" in terms of a professional working relationship.  Trust is based upon cohesion, which comes from working together and knowing each others strengths and weaknesses.  If reservists are dumped into a reg force unit (and vice versa, I'd say) without a fair chance for gauging respective capabilities, there is no chance to build up a level of trust.

 

[PJ D-Dog]

Force protection would be an outstanding job for the reserves and not only on deployment but domestically as well.  My experience has been that reservists are either under utilized or over utilized and under trained.

All militia soldiers should be trained as force protection using a nation-wide standardized curriculum.  Although it is difficult for many rerserve units to even train to their MOS level capabilities, I think it can be done and done effectively.

Currently, my job is to train the Navy Auxiliary Security Forces (ASF).  That is one of the responsibilities of Marines stationed as a MCSF Cadre trainer.  The US Navy has a policy where X per centage of the population of each command will have stand-by sailors trained to stand gate guard and perform other security duties.  The course can range anywhere from two to three weeks and includes weapons training, unarmed self defense, use of deadly force/continum of force and anti-terrorism and some other basic lectures i.e. vehicle/personel search etc.

This program could easily be adapted to militia use.  As opposed to training all the reservists in this, a policy could be elaborated where all units will have a certain percentage of its soldiers trained as ASF or whatever you want to call it.  As a result, there would always be a pool of soldiers who are trained and ready to perform force protection/installation protection for either overseas deployments or domestic duties.  If a soldier wants to volunteer for an overseas mission, he would at least have some basic knowledge and training before going for pre-deployment training with the said reg force unit.  Convsersly, if a need arises to perform domestic security at a local armoury or base, the same pool could be used.

Selected soldiers would be trained in the initial ASF course and then be required to requalify through written exams, practical application testing and weapons qualification shoots semi-annual in order to maintain a current qualification.  Initial training would be the responsibility of the Area Training Center conducted either in the summer or at some point during the year.  Sustainment training would fall under the overall responsibility of each individual brigade.  Each regiment would have an ASF coordinator assigned to manage the ASF pool and would coordinate directly with the brigade ASF coordinator.  Semi-annual sustainment training would be conducted centrally by each bridgade during a pre-designated weekend training session.  Weapons training for the ASF pool would be incorporated into each unit's semi-annual small arms qualifications shoot.

The introduction of such a program would nationally standardize the level of training for these soldiers.  When a soldier volunteers for a mission, his ASF record would follow him to the reg force unit with which he will be attached.  In other words, the reg force would know exactly what they are getting and can then build upon it.

I believe there will come a day when the militia will have to begin to perform local security for their own armories and other military installations.  It is no use to wait for an emergency only to find out that the militia is falling short of the mark for force protection/local security.  At that point, it would become a crisis management situation where there would be chaos and the potential for loss of life would be increase due to poor preparedness.

Each militia unit is responsible for having a unit fan-out ready in the event of an emergency.  Few units ever practice their fan-out plan.  With an ASF program in place, a unit fan-out would ensure that there is a quick reaction force ready to step up to the plate.  How the remainder of the unit is used could be elaborated later.

Last spring, I visited CFB Gagetown during one of their base preparedness exercises.  I was shocked at how soldiers at the vehicle check point had no clue how to check vehicles coming onto the base.  I was dressed in civilian attire and I actually made my way into the base headquarters building by simply showing my US military ID card.  I was never questioned as to what business I had in this building.  Soldiers were guarding the front door, armed with a C7 and a C9 but I doubt that they knew when to begin to use their weapons or what to do when someone became agitated trying to gain entry into a building.

At another check point on base, I was let through after the officer told me that for "all intensive purposes, I have searched your vehicle".  I offered to let him search my vehicle but he said it was ok.  People, this is not how you conduct a base defense exercise.  While trying to come onto the base, I had three soldiers standing in front of my car door arguing about my ID card.  Had I been an insurgent, I could have easily taken them out with a pistol or an IED.  The CF needs ASF training for its troops.

PJ D-Dog

 

[Gunnerlove]

Show me the money. Then show me some high quality training programs for the reserves.

 

[MJP]

Show me the money. Then show me some high quality training programs for the reserves.

I don't think it takes an inordinate amount of money to come up with a realistic airfield/base security training program.  Much of the principles are already inherent in TMST training and the common skills one has as a combat arms soldier.  Simply emphasis the salient points through a series of lectures that lay out the SOPs required, do some practical stands and ensure through exercise with realistic scenarios that the soldiers know and understand their jobs. 

I can think of two examples that show that reserves can do the job with little difficulty.  One being the CRIC Coys in Bosnia and the other is the reserve Pl doing security at Camp Mirage, which is the supply base for Op Athena.  For the latter they did some pretty extensive work-up and had zero problems conducting themselves. 

Why wouldn't reg force members respect or "trust" reservists?

Infanteer hit the nail on the head with his comment.  I know in my Company we are getting 18 reserve soldiers as per the CLS direction regarding units in high readiness.  This means 6 per Pl or two per sect (I don't see any of them going to Coy or Pl HQ's).  I currently have 10 soldiers of which I now have to get rid of 2 to accommodate the reservists coming in.  Take into account that by the time work-up starts, I will have worked with most of my soldiers for 6-8 months and some of them for years.  I know them and their individual strength and weaknesses and they know me and how I operate.  We are a cohesive unit that has a certain level of trust for each other, but it takes time to build this trust.

To rip apart my section to put in two new soldiers rips apart that fabric that we have built up.  It wouldn't be so bad if they came early enough to be able to gauge effectiveness over a few months, but augmentees generally come scant weeks before work-ups begin in earnest.  At that time I don't have the time nor do I want be going over all the little section SOPs that crop up.  I want to go straight into the training at an already high level of cohesiveness and understanding of my soldiers.

To get back to your original comment I respect all pers regardless of where they come from, till they prove themselves useless.  Trust is something that is garnered over time and to tell you the truth I don't want to start trusting someone halfway through a tour I want to do it before I deploy

 

[PJ D-Dog]

Show me the money. Then show me some high quality training programs for the reserves.

Well......here we go:

THE MONEY:

It depends on how you want to conduct training.  The costing model for the CF as to the cost of individual training is rather interesting.  The CF used to use something called ITMIS (Individual Training Management Information System-they have since changed to MITE).  In it, there was a costing model called Instructional Strategy Design.  In this module of ITMIS, one would take the CTS and CTP for a course and lay out everything needed to run the course i.e. pencils, fuel, food, salaries etc.  Once the info was plugged in, the system would generate how much it would cost to run a said course with the staff and number of students entered.  It was a tool used to determine what class size would be the most cost effective.  It was also used for a lot of other cost related things, but this is just an example.

As Chief Instructor for the ITMIS software (1999-2000), I can tell you that the cost of the course would be dependent on where the course is run.  If you run the course at CFB Gagetown in building J-7 then the cost will be greater than if you run the course out of a local armoury in downtown Sussex, NB.

If the course is run from a militia LHQ (local headquarters AKA armoury), then the cost would be greatly reduced.  Your class rooms, power and facilities are already accounted for.  Now, how much would a course for two weeks cost?  Simple, say you need to train 30 reservists and use four course staff, that's 34 man days multiplied by 10 training days.  Cost is dependent on the ranks involved.  There is no TD money involved since they won't be travelling to any far away base.  Chow will be provided by the unit and would only include lunch.  If you use fresh rations with a cook, then you are saving money as MREs cost more per meal than is allocated for a whole day's worth of fresh rations.  Now, your staff has gone up by two since you have a cook and his helper.  Now we're up to 36 man days.

If there is no shooting involved, then there is no cost for ranges or ammo.  If the students need to shoot a course of fire, then there will be obvious additional costs.  But let us suppose, there is no shooting with this course.

Training reservists at the local armory can be as effective as transporting them down to the nearest base.  In this example, you don't need to worry about paying for rations and quarters at base accommodation prices, adding in the travel claim money for two weeks etc...

THE TRAINING:

The training course that I described in my earlier post would be ideal for reservists as it would give them the skills needed to be able to peform security functions.  If you need to see a sample training schedule, just send me a message and I'll show it to you. 

If I could arrange it, I would willingly go up there and train a class of reservists in an ASF academy.  My chain of command would love to conduct that kind of exchange.  I teach this training every day and it rocks.  It's a solid program and our sailors come out being able to go and stand gate guard duty the day after graduation.

D-Dog

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Training reservists at the local armory can be as effective as transporting them down to the nearest base.  In this example, you don't need to worry about paying for rations and quarters at base accommodation prices, adding in the travel claim money for two weeks etc...

In my time as G3 LFCA, I dealt with this issue every year.  Some of the CBGs really pushed for decentralized training - which may, on the face of it, appear cheaper.  The reality is however that there are a number of built in inefficiencies to the LTA decentralized model.  Courses are perenially under-loaded, which is inherently inefficient.  Scarce resources (such as radios) are best managed from a central pool - diluting that pool means less for everyone.  Finally, if reg force augmentation is required, then housing etc becomes problematic.

 

[COBRA-6]

I think it was our bde who caused you most of the decentalized headaches in LFCA sir...  ;D

But, having been a crse O both in Sudbury and Connaught, for the most part I loved it of course, but it didn't have to think about the bigger picture...  I had 48 candidates in Suds for SQ/BIQ, 60! in CRPTC for BMQ, (that's too many for a pl IMHO).

Force protection is an excellent job for the reserves, with a proper training model to work from... we did a great ex in Sudbury a couple of years ago where we secured an industrial site, had a VCP, QRF, roving patrols, op's, and a determined enemy force... however the police were called on time when a civilian saw "guys with guns" dragging someone out of a car at the VCP... I guess they missed the big "military training ex" signs everywhere... good thing the OC was a Sudbury regional cop! lol...

 

[PPCLI Guy]

I think it was our bde who caused you most of the decentalized headaches in LFCA sir...   ;D

No comment. 

 

[DELTADOG13]

The trust aspect was excellently answered by others. You just can't arrive and expect to have that respect from regulars. I did't mean to bash reserves. What I meant is regulars train day in day out regardless of if we are actually training. I assess my troops abilities on everything they do. So when the "two way shooting range" opens they are prepared. I can't do that if I haven't assessed their abilities before the big day. My first tour we were ordered to take 13% reserves with us. They showed up with a Sergeant Major, 2 WO's, numerous Sgt's, Mcpl's and the such. My Platoon was "lucky" to get one of the other WO's and My section got a MCpl and two Pte's. The WO had no Mech background as he was from the Para coy of the QOR. He quickly fell by the way side as non effective. However the damage was done with our regular WO. Lucky for him he got every good go and extra time in Canada on the TAV. Our MCpl even though we had a book full of his ineffectiveness. He was allowed to proceed with us on tour. He was subseqently charged for leaving the scene of an accident even though told by his reg force driver. Lack of respect for his regular driver caused him this agony. The two Pte's quickly melded with the section and had no problems throughout the whole tour. Both were offered to join Direct entry into the regs. Both declined to our loss. The point is you can't have reserves bumping regulars out of their "jobs" but you can have reserves augment them to bring their units up to full strength. Nuff said on that.

 

[COBRA-6]

I think a lot of these problems would disappear if the reserves were given proper warning and preparation/selection time before having their members being thrust into a rifle coy... as many experienced soldiers have said, it takes time to intergrate and build trust... you simply can't expect anyone to fit into a section from day one... but the reserves continue to get relatively short-fuse tours... hopefully this will change!

 

[T.S.Rea]

Has anyone heard any mention in the CF of using the some of the Reserves as virtual sentries or even virtual truck drivers, or are these just American efforts/plans?

 

[pbi]

In my time as G3 LFCA, I dealt with this issue every year.   Some of the CBGs really pushed for decentralized training - which may, on the face of it, appear cheaper.   The reality is however that there are a number of built in inefficiencies to the LTA decentralized model.   Courses are perenially under-loaded, which is inherently inefficient.   Scarce resources (such as radios) are best managed from a central pool - diluting that pool means less for everyone.   Finally, if reg force augmentation is required, then housing etc becomes problematic.

Dave: With all due respect, I think that this is an LFCA take on the issue. I held the same chair as you (as you know...) and I also viewed the CBGs with vigilant skepticism from that vantage point. Now that I are one, in a very geographically dispersed CBG in our most geographically dispersed LFA, facing an IT crisis (admittedly Army-wide..) that the centralized system has thus far been unable to solve, I see great value in decentralized training. As long as it is under Bde control, and has a strong standards presence, it allows us to run serials outside the LFWATC "campaign season" to try to address the gap we face. We have run a BIQ and an Armor Recce Crew Commander with great success, under the eyes of LFDTS and LFWA standards staff. It is a mistake to dismiss decentralized training as long as we are facing an IT system that cannot deliver what is needed.

Cheers.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

PBI, We have disagreed about collective training before - it was inevitable that sooner or later we would disagree about individual training...

I realise that the situation in LFCA is quite different from that of LFWA and LFAA - and to some extent (albeit for different reasons) that of LFQA.  Although I answered the querstion from my Central Area point of view, it is important for me to remember that the Areas are all quite different. 

There is an ecological law (Liepzigs Law of the Minimum IIRC - but don't quote me) that states that growth of a population is limited by the nutrient in the shortest supply.  For low level (ie DP1 and 2) training, that limiting nutrient is radios (and to a lesser extent vehicles and qualified drivers, along with instructors).  Our approach in LFCA (at least on my watch) has been built around maximising the use of the minimizing nutrient.

How have youse guys managed to overcome that problem?

Dave

 

[pbi]

My memory must be worse than I thought: I can't remember ever disagreeing with you about collectivisation, or....whatever that thing was you said.

LFWA seems to complain mainly about instructor availability-this is an area-wide problem, and one that is currently the Area Comd's main effort. I have not heard of too many situations in which they have failed to run IT simply due to a lack of gear, unless it was a very specialized course. Our most crucial limiting factors for IT courses in 38 CBG are instructor availability followed by time. Both of these are in turn aggravated by distance. (IE: the soldiers in Thunder Bay must drive for about ten hours to reach a Canadian range at Shilo...) While occasionally I have been aware of equipment shortages affecting decentralized IT, these are not very common, since we can draw on all the radios in the Bde. As well, if we run the serials in the Sept-Apr period, we avoid conflict with the AC/NC tasking season.

Where this is definitely going to affect us in the near future is in the Armour Recce IT, due to the gap that is rapidly opening between the withdrawal (and de-TCCCS-ing) of the Iltis fleet, and the fielding of the LUVW SMP fleet. Based on what I was briefed on my return from Afgh, the decisive point will probably occur late this fall/early 06. We have already felt it to a degree.

Other than that, I would not say that kit is a big factor for LFWA overall, and certainly not for 38 CBG, when it comes to running Bde-controlled devolved IT courses outside the LFWATC campaign season. Cheers.

 

[Haggis]

Reservists, particularly Infantry soldiers can and have done a magnificent job of Force Protection (FP).   The Reserve Infantry Company from Op Palladium Roto 13 (officially C Coy, RCD Battle Group) took over the gate guard from the NSE and NCE at Camp Black Bear in VK shortly after moving in from their now-closed Camp Courcelette in Bihac.

Once the Battle Group ceased ops, they took over all aspects of FP for the camp except those performed by the MP Det.   This quickly put a stop to NSE/NCE soldiers patrolling the camp with weapons in the alert position and lengthly delays at the gate.   Thankfully the QRF was never called upon to deploy but they rehearsed quite a bit.

C Coy also had a fourth platoon attached to BG HQ and working at BLMF for three months, who were very highly regarded by the camp populace.   They, very capapably, took on the role of camp firefighters. Coincidentally their platoon commander was a civvie Fire Captain.

Roto 14 saw Reservists as the sole providers of FP at the remaining Canadian camps.

The downside is that, if they do thier jobs well, FP can be as boring as watching paint dry so it's imperative that the officers and NCOs be imaginative in keeping the interest of the troops piqued and maintianing a high level of motivation.   A momentary daydream can allow that carload of bomb to get just close enough.

That said, the same would be true of any FP unit, Reg or Res, trade notwithstanding, at any camp in the world.

I would say that Force Protection is an ideal job for Reservists, but it should not be thier ONLY job while deployed.
Siince Roto 11 the Reserve companies in Bosnia have been trained "Warfighter" to at least Level 3 (Level 4 for Roto 13) as well as MSIT and TMST.   This allowed Rotos 12 and 13 to conduct extensive ops "outside the wire" as well as performing FP duties.