greg.loutsenko said:
hi,
i recently joined a TA uni, the signals to be exact. i am currently at uni, full time student, and i am on the TA Sponsored Officer scheme where by i train with the officer training corps. anyway, i want to ask does anyone have any further info on All Arms Commando Course for TA units. i know that any memeber of the armed forces can attend that but i want to ask
1)do they run the course during the summer, when i have my holiday from uni and
2)if one gets paid for the course?
Greg
On your specific questions, mate, I think there're a couple of courses per year and, yes, you would get paid for it - providing that your unit approves of you going on the course. Although we all work for the Army, as a TA soldier your pay comes out of your individual unit's pay budget. Obviously priority goes to covering the manpower budget for the training that is the unit's main responsibilty. You should also be aware that you will have a limit on the number of days a year that you are allowed to work for the TA - and if you're already doing lots of officer training you might exceed that by spending two weeks at Lympestone
More generally - and this is where your problems start - it is not easy to get onto AACC. Places are limited and so priority is always going to go to people serving with Cdo roled units: rather than to badge-collectors, military-tourists and people doing it 'because it's there'. That's not having a go at your reasons for doing it, just stating the case. To have a chance of getting on it, you would need to be supported by a Cdo roled unit (there is no TA RSigs Cdo unit. In fact, there is no regular RSigs Cdo unit). You would need to do a lot of beat-up training to get a grip of the various AACC requirements - rope work, practice runs over the Endurance course etc. Typically this is, I think, about six months of intensive build-up training with frequent visits to CTCRM to practice on the obstacles used on the course.
Moreover, the course itself will not really teach you infantry skills. This would be covered in some of the pre-training and your fieldcraft would be tested on the final exercise, but again, it comes back to which unit you can do the pre-training with...
None of this is trying to p**s on your chips and I did know a guy from an OTC who got onto AACC:
but he was doing all his pre-training with a Cdo unit and had committed to join them once he graduated, which was why the gave him one of their slots on the course. The bottom line is that you aren't likely to get onto AACC unless a Cdo unit backs you and you'd be unlikely to pass the course without their help in preparing for it. You might want to consider joining a TA infantry unit once you commission (I'm sure there are some in Notts) or waiting and trying to transfer to a Cdo roled unit once you graduate.
Probably not what you wanted to hear but hope this is of some help.
