Posted on 08/26/2004 5:26:10 PM PDT by blam
US goes back to basics in its war on terrorism
By David Rennie in Norfolk, Virginia
(Filed: 27/08/2004)
Commander David Somers, an 18-year veteran of the US navy, has just taken charge of the most modern - even radical - squadron in his country's fleet.
Cdr Somers has served aboard some of the most powerful warships in the world, built and armed to take on the full might of the Soviet navy. Yet the vessels in his new command are only 25 feet long.
The soldiers are kept ready for almost immediate deployment
He served in the Cold War as a missiles officer, trained to destroy targets many miles away with the help of radar and satellites. But his new squadron boasts no missiles. The men and women under his command watch for the enemy with the naked eye.
Cdr Somers heads a squadron of the navy's new mobile security force, an elite counter-terrorist unit of sailors, heavily armed and clad in camouflage fatigues.
They are kept ready to load their speedboats on to transport planes at as little as four hours' notice.
His new fighting unit is built around the humble rifle and the bullet - a historic reversal to basic weaponry brought about by America's requirements in fighting terrorism. The facts are simple: the US military has almost quadrupled small-arms ammunition production since September 11, 2001 - from about 350 million rounds a year to more than 1.2 billion - yet it is still running short.
The lone plant that makes such ammunition for the US military, the Lake City factory in Missouri, has increased its workforce from 650 employees to nearly 2,000, and taken Vietnam-era equipment out of mothballs. The army-owned factory is planning to increase production to 1.5 billion rounds a year.
In the meantime, to ease shortages, the Pentagon purchased 130 million rounds from Britain in June, and awarded a contract for 70 million more to an Israeli firm.
Among Pentagon planners, the shift is called the "Jessica Lynch effect", in honour of the US army clerk whose supply unit was ambushed during the Iraq invasion, leading to her capture and rescue.
In the 1990s, outsiders watched the US military fighting wars from the skies, with high-tech air strikes and cruise missiles, and wondered aloud if the Americans would ever place infantry boots on the ground again.
Times have changed and senior commanders have now ordered a huge increase in rifle and pistol training - even for cooks, mechanics and clerks such as Pte Lynch.
In the new era, all are being trained to fight for their lives, said Bryce Hallowell, a spokesman for Alliant Techsystems, the company that runs the Lake City ammunition plant.
"In a traditional war, you have a front line and a rearguard. Well, the rearguard has been wiped away. Everything in Iraq and Afghanistan is front line," he said.
At their base at the vast Norfolk naval shipyard on the coast of Virginia, Cdr Somers and his crews in MSF Squadron Two recalled the minor role small arms used to play in naval life.
As a young officer, Cdr Somers would practise his "familiarisation firing", with a pistol and shotgun, perhaps twice a year.
He would probably never have seen his enemy. "Ideally, in the Cold War, you wanted to shoot someone beyond the horizon. Now we may end up determining someone's hostile intent 50 feet away."
The enemy could come on land or sea. It could be a single terrorist or a small boat packed with explosives - as in the suicide attack on the USS Cole in Aden in October 2000 that killed 17 sailors and changed the US navy for ever.
One of the MSF petty officers, Master at Arms 2nd class Demetrius Vaultz, previously served aboard a warship as a dental technician. In that time, he spent one day on a gun range, qualifying with a pistol. "I probably fired off 70 rounds - that was my one experience with a weapon in three years," he said.
Now, as a sailor-soldier, during his four weeks of annual weapons training he might fire off 7,000 to 8,000 rounds.
Even on ordinary warships, the number of armed sailors mounting watch has been increased two or three times.
Master at Arms 1st Class Eric Schotter said: "When I joined the navy, I didn't believe I would ever be in any type of infantry. Just watch the History Channel: the navy's been 15 or 20 miles offshore, lobbing bombs. We had a certain comfort of distance from the enemy.
"The Cole taught us to be ready," he added sombrely. "They taught us a valuable lesson."
Bump!
Oooh... pretty gray lawn dart about to land on that building. :o
HEY! You could put someones eye out with that thing!!
The Cole taught us nothing, an enemy determined to kill you by any means is going to win this battle. The only way to survive this is to remove the threat, it is fatal to try and co-exist.
Someone in Najaf was ready, had a fast shutter speed set, and was waiting for that moment. The next 1/10th of a sec might not have been captured on film as the photogrpher was likely knocked on his arse!
Oh, and pretty soon, artillery shells will be that accurate as well.
buh bye!
Back To Basics
Here I thought the article was about closing the borders. You know, protecting the fenceline.
Well, if they don't close the borders, they will need this training!
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