Ah yes, I remember the days when the Rooskies were 10 feet tall and coming to get us tomorrow.
Trained as a DAT but got put in the Scout platoon (You can drive a track? Good, now you're a 19D!). I was in the 3/33 AR, 1st Bde, 3rd AD and we went through a similiar upgrade process from '80-'82.
From A2s that had to be dragged to the range and fired by all NCO/officer crews (one company had 15 of 17 A2s deadlined) the BN went to A1s and then A3s the next year and by '84 or '85 (after I left) had been reflagged as a Cav sqdn and issued M1s.
Then they won the Canadian Army Tank Gunnery competition!
Thank God for Reagan. I saw the Army go from ragbag troopers going through the motions of training, maintaining and soldiering in those years to a serious fighting force.
Trained as a DAT but got put in the Scout platoon (You can drive a track? Good, now you're a 19D!). I was in the 3/33 AR, 1st Bde, 3rd AD and we went through a similiar upgrade process from '80-'82. From A2s that had to be dragged to the range and fired by all NCO/officer crews (one company had 15 of 17 A2s deadlined) the BN went to A1s and then A3s the next year and by '84 or '85 (after I left) had been reflagged as a Cav sqdn and issued M1s.
You should have tried life in one one of the armor battalions within Infantry divisions. In '67 I was a young crewdog in the 2/70 Armor, expecting to get a loader's job since I was so recently out of AIT. Nope. You're a school-trained gunner? Cool! You can be the XO's gunner....
Our line companies had M60s, the 3-tank HQ tank section had M60A1s. And off to Table VIII at Graf we headed....
And came back as the highest-scoring tank battalion in USAREUR that year. There was weeping and gnashing of teeth in the battalions in the tank divisions in Germany that year....
