Week 8: Squad Lanes and Patrols

So first of all this was by far the hardest week thus far. You get out to the field pretty dang quick, by 1000, and its go time. We had the squad live fire first. This is similar to the team live fire from week 3 except now youll need to shift and cease fire. They are incredibly strict on safety and if you do anything unsafe in the practice fire with blanks beforehand you will be crushed. Also make sure to conduct good PCC's/PCI's. One of our squad leaders got fired and got a major minus because the M249's jammed because they didnt have any CLP. This was also the first time we used the two different military radios. Out platoon did some extra practice and while one squad was conducting the practice on the live fire with blanks the other three squads were assaulting the trench. The squad leaders got the opportunity to rotate as PL's and control all four squads. The hardest part was communicating on the radios. As the PL I had three seperate radios, and literally had conversations with 9 different people. My PSG, 4 SL's, then four other cadre who take the role of Company Commander, 1SG, Fires, or other assets. I admit I had a blast and it was fun, but it is really hard to keep track of everything. Thank goodness they keep repeating themselves but I did completely miss CAS. Practice makes perfect. Anyways after everyone goes through the live fire (which is a smoker) we began  our squad lanes. The rest of this week is almost the same as week 4, except this time each squad will teach classes and conduct lanes instead of the cadre. They are basically evaluating our ability to train soldiers. NOTE: You will not sleep this week until Thursday night! At least our platoon didnt. We stayed up for somewhere around 82 hours. It was basically LDAC on crack. I have learned that its only really hard to stay awake between 0100 and 0500. During daytime hours its not too bad and you are so dang busy you simply dont have time to sleep, or think about sleeping. A lot of guys dip to stay awake. I use BBQ sunflower seeds and bring out four or five bags when we go into the field. Anyways, as SL I was OIC for my squad's portion of training. We had nine hours to conduct training and lanes for the other three squads for nine hours From 2000 to 0500 until we had PT. We had react to contact and had four different lanes with different OPFOR. But I have to admit it was some of the hardest training we had done. First of all guys had already been up for like 50 hours when we started and their motivation wasnt at its peak. Then the terrain was rugged and using NVG's in rugged terrain is one of two things--hilarious or deadly. Or both. People fall all the time, usually not too bad but we did have one guy go down a ravine. He wasnt seriously injured but was a little woozy for a while. Anyways there were plenty of times when people zoned out. We had people falling asleep standing up. When I was evaluated a late, sometime around 0300 I was standing behind the SBF with the machine guns blazing. I leaned on a tree and the next thing I knew I faceplanted right between the two M240B's because I had fallen asleep. Like I said, less than five feet away from two machine guns. Its a difficult couple of nights. Thursday night we FINALLY got to sleep, and we got 5 hours! We were so jacked before going to bed you would have thought we had won a the collective lottery. Bad news is that Friday morning is the 8 mile ruck march. We had 35 lbs dry and then we carried an additional 8 quarts of water so your ruck wasnt the normal 80 lbs it had been during the week. They let us leave an assault pack with stuff in it so our rucks weighted roughly the same. You have two hours. The fastest did it in under an hour and twenty minutes. Most of our platoon was exhausted so a bunch of us just did the first mile in 13 minutes and the next seven miles in 15 minute miles. Not super hooah hooah high speed. But I didnt give a rats ass and we came in at an hour and fifty seven minutes. Once youre done with that in the morning you load buses and go back to the company to clean weapons! It wasnt too bad, but we got out a little late at about 1800. I crashed immediately when I got home and slept a ton.

Week 7: Machine Guns and Rockets

Well let me tell you, if you every wanted to fire a machine gun a lot, this is certainly the week for you. But before you get to do all that awesome stuff you need to take your first RPFT at the one mile track! They do grade pretty tough and try to recreate Ranger School, but its not to hard. I'm not sure about the company but no one in our platoon failed. The toughest part for people was the 5 mile run, but even the slowest came it with a minute to spare. Also if you can do any of the following you will get a major positive (100 push ups, 100 sit ups, 5 mile in less than 32:00, and 20 pull ups) so in theory you could get 20 extra points if you were a super stud. No one in the company got more than two. Anyways the sucky part is the RPFT starts at 0400. And I mean people are doing push ups at 0400 so we had to be there at 0330. Not the coolest way to start the week. After the RPFT Monday morning is mostly in the classroom and a little preparation for the week. Our platoon checked out eight 240B's, twelve M249's,  two .50 cal's, and two MK-19's. Suffice to say if we went to combat like that... it would suck carrying everything. Monday afternoon is a familiarization fire on the crew served weapons which is pretty cool if you've never fired them before, and a few more in depth classes on the machine guns. That evening we had classes on the different rockets and missiles used by the infantry. Not too exciting, but most of the instructors were pretty good so the time went by fast. Tuesday was an awesome day. Basically we got to blow stuff up. For whatever reason our class was the first IBOLC class to get to shoot AT-4's and boy did we shoot a lot of them. I think the whole company shot somewhere around 80 (There are about 120 in the whole company), and it did look pretty cool to see eight or nine rockets hit the same target at once. On the other hand a few of my classmates really struggled and probably couldnt hit the broad side of a barn with those things. Until I fired a live one I had no idea how much of a "whoosh" there really was. They also let us shoot live rounds out of the M203's, which was a lot more fun than I anticipated to be honest. I should have mentioned that before you fired anything that blew up you did a whole lot of either dry firing or firing with some sort of non lethal ammunition (chalk or balls or something). That afternoon the assigned gunners from each squad zeroed on their weapons. I had been assigned as a main gunner for the 240 and zeroing was a lot easier than I expected. For those that did it, it went faster than when we did the M4's. The next two days and nights were spent qualifying on the weapons systems. Kind of life qualifying with the M4's except the closest target is at 400 meters and the farthest was at 1000 meters. To be honest I couldnt even see anything past 800 and neither could my assistant gunner so I never even tried to shoot at them. But its not too difficult and most people qualified after their second try. Then on Wednesday night the entire company will do a familiarization fire with all tracers in the M249. It flies through and we were changing barrels every minute and they were still getting super hot. Oh and dont be a dumb ass and touch the hot barrels. They say it a million times but someone always gets a pretty nasty burn. Then Thursday morning is spent making sure all those that still need to qualify are, and other tasks. You return back to the company Thursday afternoon, but youll be cleaning all night. Literally. We had a rotation with the squads, but you only had an hour to go home. Not really to sleep, just to drop your gear and take a shower, and grab a bite. Friday all day is just cleaning. Youll get released when you finish. It took us until 1800.

Week 6: Land Nav

So this week is land navigation. If that's one of your strengths, then this will be a pretty easy week for you. If you struggle it will be a living hell. Monday was actually spent in the classroom with a few classes and a couple of teams briefing their OPORD's that werent able to go last week. The classes were mostly on risk management and CRM's. Then at about 1700 you load the buses and drive out to the land nav site, which is huge.

Things to make sure you have for land nav:

-Map markers and erasers
-Protactors (they dont provide them for you)
-Compass
-Pace count beads (have them!)
-Map case or zip lock bag
-Red light flashlight or head lamp

Anyways, Monday night you go over a few things, have a quick land nav class in case you forgot the basics and then go to bed. Tuesday you start the day going out as a fire team with a cadre member to practice land nav. The points they give you make you feel really good about yourself until you go out on the real course. All of these points on the practice are right off the road less than 100 meters and very close to the start points. This practice is really only good for guys who are really struggling. If nothing else practice your pace count, because God knows youre going to need it the next couple of days.

Then after lunch you basically do the same thing, but this time you are all by yourself. You only do four points for both of these practices. They dont mean anything, some guys just went out and took naps, I went and found my points, figured I might as well practice while I'm out there. That evening youll have classes on crew served weapons and how to use them. Its basic, and the most important part is how to put them on the tripods.

Wednesday starts bright and early. Unlike LDAC or ROTC there is no "Day" and "Night" Landnav, they simply start you out at 0400 and you have until 1000 to get all 8 points. Sounds easy right? Maybe... Ok, Ive always been good at landnav, and ended up getting 8/8 on this course, but it was way harder than any course I'd ever done before. First of all the start point is at least 4 km away from your first point--guaranteed. So you need to go quick to get to all of your points. You dont have to run, but unless you can go directly to your points with ease, I would at least run every other point or something. Wednesday is technically a practice day, but if you get 8/8 then you dont have to go again the next day and youll get a major positive, so for the week youll get 45/40 points, which is pretty damn awesome. So I would try as hard as I could to get all 8 the first day and rest (more or less) on Thursday when everyone else goes out.

What makes this course so hard is the utter lack of attack points. They are few and far between to say the least. Mostly you need to be exact on your pace count, shoot a perpendicular azimuth and go. The point I had that was closest to the road was about 450 meters. So your dead reckoning needs to be pretty damn good. Most points are about 600 meters away from any roads or trails. Also, unlike LDAC there are no "Cadet Trails" or rather, there are tons, but most of them dont go anywhere and I wouldnt trust them at all. But like I said, the course is really long. One decision I had to make was to go and extra 2.5 km by road and then dead reckon 500 m, or go from the road I was on and dead reckon 1100 meters. I gambled and did the 1100 meter dead reckon, and by the grace of all that is holy I found my point.

Anyways, I think 12 out of the 150ish in the company got 8/8 so we were tasked with helping those that had done really bad (4/8 or less) and help them. By the way you need an 6/8 to pass. This afternoons practice was just like the day before. Four points in four hours. Then youll come back and have some sort of platoon training. We actually had the Brigade Commander come out and he spoke to us about ethics.

You will also to PT around dusk, its pretty chill, nothing intense. We did a lot of stretch, a light jog, and push ups. Then they actually let us have almost 6 hours of sleep (minus fire guard of course) so people would have a better chance to pass.

If you go out again the next day, its the exact same thing. Its long, its a damn swamp, youll get soaked, and then youll run back. Make sure to bring a change of boots and extra clothes, especially socks, youll want them. If you stick around, like I did. You pretty much do nothing, maybe a few small details. But youre not allowed to sleep, which sounds easy but kinda hard at 5 am when youre not doing anything. We had about 20-25 in the company fail. (I think the average is about a 1/3 of each company fails, so we did pretty good). Then those that failed will go out again with those that did well. Then more classes on machine guns, then youre back to PT then bed.

Friday morning is a retest day for those that failed (FML if youre one of those poor guys) and the rest of you will land nav using the daggers. Or whatever the acronym is for the army GPS. Basically its a good GPS that takes you from point A to point B. But the good thing about it is that it can connect to other military electronics and you can do all sorts of things like CFF or place TRP's. Anyways the sucky thing is that it dead reckons, so youll get soaked in the swamps. Then at each point you go to there is a cadre member with some sort of test. AT-4, Crew served weapons, CFF, etc. Not really graded, but good practice. Then youll head back, get on the buses, and head back home. If you failed again (and some do) then you will keep going back to pass land nav every Thursday or Friday until you do. So just get it done and knock it out.

On a side note watch out for the wildlife. I personally ran into a cotton mouth in a tree and about crapped my pants and slowly backed away. Luckily it was in the tree, because on the ground those bastards chase you. We also had a wild hog go into out patrol base, that was interesting... Not much you can really do, except dont be stupid, and avoid where possible.

Week 5: Team OPORD, kind of...

So during week five you actually get taught on how to do a real army OPORDs, at least in the infantry. But the main thing is that no matter what commissioning source you had, these OPORDs are nothing like the ones you did in school. The detail is much much greater. Literally paragraph one is longer than any five paragraph OPORD I wrote in ROTC. You will also have your first exam on TLP's and Military Terms and Symbols.

Ok as far as the OPORD goes the first three days in the class they teach you how to write them. As you can imagine its three days of death by Power Point. But ironic part is that you really need to know and understand those power point presentations in order to actually pass and graduate IBOLC. I dont really know exactly what to write about what they teach you other than that none of it is actually hard, just detail oriented. The last couple days of the week we briefed our OPORD's, and everyone did really bad. Or should I say they got blown up by our CPT. I think the highest grade given out was 40/100. And that was by a direct commission captain who is actually in Civil Affairs (long story), and he has a PhD. If I can Ill try to put up a good example of what is expected at week five. Or you could just email me at tanner.j.meloy@us.army.mil and Ill send you mine. The meat of the presentation is your obviously your scheme of maneuver. Be prepared to spend a lot of $$$ on ink, lots of ink. For the scheme of maneuver you're going to need at least 25 steps, each with its own map and overlay. Plus each step like terrain analysis and enemy situation is all going to be on a overlay over a map.

What I found is the easiest way to do everything is to go step by step over the grade sheet and ensure you have everything. Better to have bad or weak material than nothing at all. Also the UPS stores on post also have shells for the OPORDS--BUY ONE!! It makes presentations so much easier! If you dont use a shell you're an idiot, simple as that. The Platoon Trainers have also told us that you will pass if you write out exactly what you will say and simply read it and point at your trifold board. Your presentation will be as boring as hell, but you will pass. Over all the point is however you end up presenting its up to you, just make sure you have everything and use it. A lot of guys made great boards with lots of good stuff, but never referred to anything on the board, and that really hurt them.

I do admit this week is kind of boring, especially listening to the same OPORD over and over. But I would still try to take notes and pay attention to what people do good and bad. With the two quizzes and test the week is worth a total of 70 points, 7% of the course. So make sure and study. Tests arent really hard, but they are very detail oriented and silly mistakes will cause you to fail.

Week 4: Lots of Battle Drills, No Sleep

So this week was our first official week in the field, and it was our true (at least in my opinion) "Welcome to the Infantry" week. Monday morning started off pretty normal. We had PT then afterwards a quick class on Call for Fire, which was basically the same slide deck they show you in your commissioning source, but this time from an FA officer. Then a quick class on demo because you will go to a demo range at the end of the week and they have to show you some stuff before they let you blow stuff up, more on that later though. Then they let you quickly change, you grab your ruck which now weighs about 65-75 lbs with the full load, they issue you a weeks worth of MRE's to smash in there and then you get on an overcrowded bus and you drive out to the range. You get classes and instruction on four basic battle drills, all at the squad level. The only new one for me was attacking a trench. That, gentlemen, is something I will never want to do in real life, so here is me hoping we never go to war with North Korea. But if you have had any urban combat training its very similar. They also issue you a breach kit for the platoon, which is basically 30 lbs of axes, and other tools to get you through all sorts of crap. One guy has to carry it for the rest of the course. Anyways, you get plenty of instruction and practice. Monday itself though is classes and then Tuesday and Wednesday you actually get to practice. But the nights are the hard part. We started working on patrol bases at night. It takes a loooooong time. Someday when we get more practice I'm sure it will go faster. Anyways, we started the patrol bases operations with the ORP when full night fell, around 930. I had the unfortunate luck to not be in leadership so all I did was security, and staying awake was incredibly difficult. But if you fall asleep and get caught its an automatic major minus. So the only advise I would give is on range cards, make sure you have them, and people do them right because that is what takes forever. The individuals do it, then buddy teams, then squads, then the whole platoon. I know it sounds really easy, but its not, and we didn't finish until after 0400 and wake up was 0500. Then we got up and ran 5 miles at a 7:30 pace. At least that was the goal, I think we did it at about 8:00 though. But the fact that I ran 5 miles after 45 minutes of sleep was a miracle in and of itself. But then we got back and as I said before we actually practiced the Battle Drills. Then the day basically repeated itself on Wednesday. You will do field PT and it was sprints for us on Wednesday, that didn't feel very good haha. Then that night we got hot a's which was awesome and our captain gave us a surprise, we wont have PT tomorrow so we were going on a ruck march tonight! We waited for it to get dark again, rucked up and went. The first three miles there were at a good 14 minute pace, but it was really really warm and humid. Then we took a break at three miles, cooled down, and then got "hit" with artillery simulators. We took four "casualties" which made our night a living hell. We had to pick them up and carry them, I got to carry an extra ruck, which felt like it weighted a ton, and then i realized it had the breach kit on it as well. Woo hoo! So I was carrying the two, when we got another round of artillery. It tried to run as fast as I could the called out three hundred meters, but as I was doing so the breach kit fell off the ruck, flew down, and whacked me straight in the back of the knees. Suffice to say I went flying and face planted into the dirt. As I rolled over onto my ass cursing the damn casualties, the captain walked by, looked at me and said "Hey LT, dont be a pussy. Get up." My only thought at this point was "Welcome to the infantry." We eventually got back from that three miles back exhausted. But then we had to make a new patrol base. We got done, and then had a whopping 15 minutes before wake up. I still managed to sleep. Thursday was an awesome day though. We had the demo range. The first part was the best. They let us blow up four claymores, which was kinda cool, then they blew up over 100 lbs of C4. They put most of us in these little bunkers and it sucked the air right out of us. It also knocked the cadre on their ass. It was epic. If they let us have a copy of the video Ill post it. The second half of the day was less exciting. It was the grenade range. Where they treat you like privates. But eventually it was over and they let us back to the company. We had to clean our weapons and all the platoon equipment, but we released around 2100. It may seem kinda late but even five hours of sleep felt like 12 after a combined total of two all week. Friday was then a relaxing day. We went to the Call for Fire simulator, then had  a quick class and were released at 1500. Quick note, we got three new LT's who just recycled from week 13 for failing OPORD's, made it a little more real for us

Week 3: Shooting, shooting, and more shooting

So if you didn't get it from the title of the post, this week is based on shooting. Monday starts with the 4 mile ruck march. We did it at a 13 minute pace which is pretty fast. especially if you haven't rucked much in the past. For those of you that are rucking machines, it will probably be boring. But We had quite a few guys fall out, and if you do fall out you get a major minus and it goes against your leader presence attributes. Anyways, the whole point of the round about ruck is to get to the BRM range that you'll drive past all the time on Ft. Benning. Monday you get a safety brief and begin zeroing. Its not very exciting but if you've ever been to basic its way better than that. Things are much more laid back and you're treated better. Once about twenty people have zeroed they will take you to the range next door and you begin qualifying. I think most people only attempted to qualify once, but during the rest of the week you'll get plenty of opportunities. They will take your best score during the week and use that, and if any time you score 36+ (expert) you don't have to go again. Monday night you also zero using NVG's and IR lights. Which is kind of cool as a novelty but is mostly a pain in the ass. You get home around midnight and first formation is 0530 the next day. Tuesday starts off with a 5 mile run at a 7:30 pace to ensure you can do it under 40:00 minutes, everyone in my platoon made it. After that its is more of the same and they take you to the EST 3000 or whatever its called. Its a video game that replicates zeroing and qualifying, then they take you to this cool range that tracks your bullets and tells you where exactly you're shooting, where you hit the targets and such. Mostly if helps with the little things like if your breathing is off or your trigger squeeze. Tuesday is the only day that you'll get off at a decent hour. Wednesday is the official qualifying day supposedly, but like I said before if you already qualified then you're good. If you do qualify expert you get a major positive and most likely a challenge coin from the Battalion Commander. After that you "qualify" at night using the NVG's. No one came even close. Someone hit like 13 out of 40 and that was the best. I'm sure with some practice people could do better, but half the time I couldn't even see the targets. Anyways, home by midnight again and the next day you got formation at 0500. We loaded the buses immediately with the rucks, which is a pain. My advice is to have a plan with your platoon on how you will load up beforehand or its gonna be a painful 45 minute drive. We did field PT then went to another live fire range and did a whole lot of reflexive fire. Like a ton. I think we shot like 200 live rounds each after all the practice. I was smoked from all of it to be honest. Then you take another bus ride to where you'll be doing your team live fire the next day. You'll do a few dry run through's that night and then you'll make a patrol base and with bivoac shelters. Then that night we had our first infantry moment. Holy hell can a storm come out of no where in this place. One moment I'm digging a slit trench and the next moment we are all soaked. But then there was a giant blaze and lightning hit less than a mile away and all hell broke loose. Cadre ran up like chickens with their heads cut off and told everyone to drop everything and get in the buses. So then we spent the next five hours soaked in a bus, unable to move. That sucked worse than being under the rain would I'm pretty sure. Then finally at 0200 they told us we could go back to our sites and go to bed, wake up at 0500. Came back and by buddy had his sleeping bag literally filled with water. Had he stood up in it the water would have gone up to his knees. Luckily for me mine was fine, but it was warm outside so no one suffered too bad. Then Friday was all Team Live Fire. Each team of four has a team leader, which I was, and its cool to lead everyone but it is a smoker. You have to run (well IMT) to everyone and get LACE reports all the time and its rough. You are in full armor by the way. But everyone has to get a GO with blanks before you go with live rounds. About half the groups will go again so it takes a while. Then the live fire round is up. For the love of all that is holy do not flag anyone. First of all it is stupid and dangerous, and second the cadre will hurt you, like literally. Once youre done with all of that you go back to the company and begin cleaning weapons. We got done at about 2200 which is about average and then it was release, sweet release. Next week is right back to the field though for Patrol Base operations, should be interesting.

Week 2 Powerpoints and an Obstacle course

So this week started with our first official PT led by cadre, you start and end everyday with the PRT, which is army-wide. On Monday we did the SEAL circuit three times, which is basically a smoke session, kudos to you if you can actually do it all without rest. The idea is cross fit upper body on Mondays, ability group run on Tuesdays, cross fit lower body on Wednesday, ruck march/run  on Thursday, and Friday for our platoon is supposed to be focused on our weaknesses. For us it was a pull up workout with rope climbs. One word-smoked. We also had a piss test on Monday, so make sure to drink a lot of water the night before. As I said on Tuesday we had a run, which was a five mile at a 7:30 minute pace over cardiac hill a couple of times. It was rough for some of us, but it was a mental boost to know you're already set for the run on the RFPT. Then we finished that and went straight to the obstacle course. If you're and ROTC guy it is the exact same one as LDAC at Ft. Lewis. It wasn't too hard the only ones that are truly important are the Big One, where you climb up a rope, walk across some planks, climb up a ladder and then go down a big ass cargo net. The other one, I cant remember what its called, you climb up a ladder and then go down a loooong rope. You must be on top of the rope when you go down and be face forward. If you get a no-go on either of these two (you get three attempts) you will get a major minus (-5 points) and lose out on one of the ten points of leadership presence. Basically you must complete nine of the ten options of on the leaders presence portion or they can theoretically fail you out of IBOLC. Case and point, learn how to climb a damn rope.

The rest of the week was spent in various classes on a variety of subjects. Everything from BRM and Health and Nutrition to how different infantry units are organized. A big focus of the week was also on counselings. The homework for the week was to write four different counselings. One as an initial counseling for your PSG, another for your weapons squad leader, a third that would be an initial counseling for your three rifle squad leaders, and last a discipline counseling. Our Platoon Trainer gave us a scenario about your best SL who recently had a newborn and has been late four times in the last two weeks. Interesting case. But dont wait until the night before to do them, a couple guys in my platoon did and they didnt sleep at all.

Caveat on that, even though this is a Basic course it is nothing like basic training where you start from scratch and they teach you everything you need to know. They expect that you have actually learned something from your commissioning source. You will have some sort of homework every night so if you are banking on eight hours of sleep every night you are wrong. We usually get released every night between 1900-2000 so there just isnt a lot of time. I think collectively our platoon averages about 4-5 hours of sleep a night, and its only week two.

Also, have some spending cash for your gear. I'm not saying go be a PX ranger but you will have to buy equipment because they issue you only a basic TA 50. So gloves, eyepro, and the like are on you. They do allow you to add some pouches and stuff on your FLC. I would advise you get a leader pouch, where you can put your pens, paper, protractor, and any other handy dandy tools. Also start making a leaders book ASAP. Fill it with all sorts of stuff like cheat sheets for weapon capabilities, range cards, nine lines, uxo or anything that comes from an FM. If you need ideas on what to put email me and Ill send you to a link that has a lot of good stuff.

Lastly next week is all in the field at the range, culminating in a team life fire. So we also did the video game version on Friday. It wasnt too bad, but I'm ready to get out of the classroom!