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100 Royal Marines defeat 1500 conventional US troops in exercise

Chief of the Defence Staff, General Sir Nick Carter, told The Sun yesterday: “This has overturned the principles of war. Mass is no longer the asset it once was — it is all about effect. If you concentrate your force, you are vulnerable.

Oh look, my 'medium armour' coulda, woulda, shoulda.
 
To reiterate, it's MOD generated boll0cks to justify the cuts they're making.
But the sad part is that it seems to be coming from your top people. Using a single exercise to justify political policy doesn't seem to be a wise idea. The only thing this debacle will reinforce is that your countries top political and military leadership are not to be trusted. If this Carter fella is willing to blab to the press to big your country up and justify your governments decision what else will he do?
 
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Still disagree, I'm afraid. This is something that's obviously close to your heart, but before you ride your (in some ways justifiable) hobby horse into the breach I will say again this is a puff piece for MOD. What do you expect - "Royal Marines try new tactic that looks like it might work but might not", "Our boys did OK but we're still crap because of Iraq", "Even if this works, UK is still no use", or similar? Do you honestly think any of that would do any good for the morale or the reputation of the Forces? Anyone with half a braincell knows we shat the bed in Iraq and Afghan, and have work to do. Celebrating small successes does not take away from that.

To reiterate, it's MOD generated spaff saying the RM have done something good, which it looks like they have. It's not a panacea for all MOD ills, it's an article.

The point of placing articles is to shape perceptions and the fact that Carter attached himself to the article with such an extended name-check shows that this is a perception shared at the highest level. If it was done casually, that makes those involved even more cretinous.
 
This saga reminds me of the comment made by American historian James Sheehan in a lecture about WW2 - military history is full of cruel disappointments and tragic ironies. He was talking about the ideas popular in the 1920s and 30s that airpower and tanks had revolutionised the battlefield. As a result there could be no return to the indutrialised attrition of the Great War.

The British led the way with its independent RAF a champion of the deterrent power of strategic bombing. The Experimental mobile brigade demonstrated the effectiveness of a mechanised army. This was wonderful news as all we would need is a small mechanised professional army - smaller and better. As the history of WW2 demonstrated the enemy could never catch up this technological lead, everything worked as expected and Britain never face an enemy with equal or superior numbers of comparable aircraft or tanks....

AI drones and robots may well have revolutionised warfare, but any "near peer" enemy is likely to have exactly the same stuff.

The point about the relative value from free versus controlled enemy is well made. Before the First World War the big field exercises tended to be free play within boundaries. In the manouvres of 1912 Grierson's Corps beat Haig through imaginative use of recce airrcaft. During WW2 FTXs allowed for a lot of free play. Some of Montgomery's corps exercises pitted one division against the other. Ex Bumper 1941 (two corps on each side) tested how the armoured divisions might work - and Spartan demonstrated that the mixed divisons did not work. They also made and broke reputations. McNaughton's poor performance on Ex Spartan led to his removal as commander of the Canadians.
You only have to watch the footage of the Nagorno-Karabakh war that's still going, plenty of drone and UAV stuff going on over there. Very accurate drone strikes too
 
Two stories of very minor incidence on UK exercises

I was section commander and thought running across the big open field pepper potting was a shit idea for a section attack, so I let off loads of smoke got delta fire time to occasionally fire some blank rounds and let of more smoke while I led charlie fire team down the side using small ridges and the tree line as cover. We attacked the enemy from about 10 meters away because they were focused on their front. Afterwards I was about to get tuned in by the DS, until the CO said what a marvelous idea it was. (And all of a sudden everyone else agreed). The CO was probably bored shitless watching the previous section attacks doing the same thing over and over again.

I was a staffy but being a rifleman in Lydd and having to attack a building in the FIBUA type village, I suggested to the section commander that rather than patrol down the road, that we garden hop and go through building windows and once again we caught the enemy facing front. The DS were once again not to impressed but the female Lt praised the LCpl in charge (he didnt mention it was my idea the glory stealing ******) for achieving the objective by using his initiative, so the DS could whinge to much.

When I was tom my RSM (A bloke called Dave Finnegan) taught me that you dont have to follow the script (so long as safety isnt compromised) I thought it was great training, make a mistake, either fail or rectified it, just as you would in real life.

It occurs to me that right from the biggest to the smallest exercises, most of it is scripted and the only reason I can think of, is so it can be said what a success the exercise was.
Summat similar happened on my Sergeants course. DS said 'Right lead your Pln straight up the long re-entrant to the top, that's your first Checkpoint'. I said 'Fark off, if this was real you'd get us all killed'. DS 'Just get on with it'. 'Alright Sir, thanks very much. They should make you lot practice writing letters to wives and parents'
 
A better solution is we will just teach the US not to keep killing us!

It doesn't appear that our ground forces are going to be linked at the hip as much going forward into the future. The tone of the Bojo government seems to point to that direction. I am sure the Navy and RAF will however continue to share the same hotels and cable packages and get in plenty of joint golf rounds.
 
You make it sound as if the Royal Marines are a bunch of Afghan troops.
Absolutely not, but they were also training material for our Green Weenies who thrive on that sort of mission. Remember they have to work with anybody in their region should it be required. That includes everything from peasants to professionals. Having your pupils kick the Sempers in the nuts on the scrimmage field will bring smiles to all.
 
Absolutely not, but they were also training material for our Green Weenies who thrive on that sort of mission. Remember they have to work with anybody in their region should it be required. That includes everything from peasants to professionals. Having your pupils kick the Sempers in the nuts on the scrimmage field will bring smiles to all.

It will be interesting to see how the new layout of the RM will be used in the future conflicts.
 
It will be interesting to see how the new layout of the RM will be used in the future conflicts.
Well from what I have gathered they seem to be the equivalent of our Rangers when it comes to training and selection etc. They were organized in a more conventional manner and seem to trying to do the whole 12 man detachments which has it's pros and cons. But will your RM keep the ability to actually conduct an opposed amphibious landing? It kinda seems like they are trying to emulate the SBS to an extent.
 
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