Tactical Errors in the Dismounted Fight

“They do know what a hand-grenade is, it is true, but they have very little idea of cover, and what is most important of all, have no eye for it. A fold in the ground has to be quite 18 inches high before they can see it.”1 — Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front A small unit leader’s basic task in combat is to exploit the effects of fire, movement, and terrain for tactical advantage. While most leaders understand this concept, many do poorly when it comes to translating the idea into action. Time and again during training, soldiers ignore cover, overlook concealment, and fail to effectively coordinate movement with suppressive fires. This has always been an important training issue for infantry troops. But on the ground in Iraq, armor and field artillery units, accustomed to fighting from vehicles, now find themselves operating dismounted, roles normally assigned to infantry or military police. Under these circumstances, it is more important than ever that soldiers of all branches understand how to exploit fire, movement, and terrain to survive and win. Some of these mistakes are more serious than others, but they can all result in needless casualties and detriment to the mission. Fortunately, these problems are usually avoidable. At root, they spring from a failure to fully grasp the three fundamental elements of small-unit tactics: fire, movement, and terrain. We can readily overcome this shortcoming through training. This article addresses a few common errors in the dismounted fight. The first is a simple example, depicted in Figure 1. Soldiers frequently use smoke to mask their movement when the surrounding terrain provides inadequate cover or concealment. This is a simple and effective technique. Although it presents a visual signature that might alert the enemy to the maneuver, it also blocks the enemy’s view so that they cannot effectively engage the moving element. Simple as this technique is, soldiers often do it incorrectly. When a smoke grenade is thrown, it takes a few seconds for enough smoke to emerge to serve as an effective screen. Instead of waiting those few seconds, soldiers often rush out from under cover almost as soon as the grenade is thrown, well before an effective smoke screen has billowed, exposing themselves to enemy observation and fire, and forfeiting the tactical advantage they sought. Another common example is depicted in Figure 2: the dismounted squad or platoon attack.2 In this simple and effective drill, a stationary support element takes up a position from which it can effectively engage the enemy and begins laying down suppressive fires. Undercover of these fires, an assault element executes a bold, deep maneuver, moving by a covered and concealed route using available terrain, vegetation, smoke, or distance to mask the movement from enemy. When executed properly, the enemy remains unaware of the maneuver until the assault element falls on their flank or rear. All this sounds simple, but its execution is anything but, as Figure 2 shows. Many leaders go through the motions, but sacrifice the drill’s synergy by failing to integrate the effects of terrain into the plan. Instead of a bold maneuver, the assault element makes a shallow flanking movement that ignores available cover and concealment, leaving itself exposed to enemy observation and fire along most of its route. If the support element achieves fire superiority (that is, if its own fires are effective enough to prevent the enemy from returning effective fire of its own), then the attack may still succeed; but if not, the enemy will engage the assault element with effective fires throughout its movement, so what the leader perceived as a flanking movement, degenerates into what is effectively a frontal assault. The result will be excessive casualties, a failed attack, or both.


           

   

      

         

    

         

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             — 21 Figure 1

The point ambush is a third example, as shown in Figure 3. Defined as “a surprise attack from a concealed position on a moving or temporarily halted target,” a successful ambush depends on early warning of the enemy’s approach, usually achieved by deploying security elements on each flank of the kill zone along the enemy’s expected route.3 Proper placement of these elements is critical: they must be far enough out from the main body to give early warning without tipping off the enemy to the presence of the ambush. Here too, leaders often fail to account for the characteristics of terrain, positioning their security elements too close to the main body or in positions where they cannot observe over or around obstructions, preventing them from alerting the main body of the enemy’s approach quickly enough, potentially compromising the ambush. Figure 4 depicts another mistake common in ambushes — positioning the unit too close to the objective. Time and again on the training ground, squad leaders position their units in ambush right on top of the road along which the enemy is expected, often as close as a few meters. This mistake presents several problems: it forfeits terrain advantage and risks enemy detection and compromise; it exposes the unit to the risk of an enemy counterattack through the ambushing unit’s position once the ambush starts; it restricts the effectiveness of many weapons; and it may expose friendly soldiers to injury by their own mines and explosives. Where should the attacking unit be located? This depends on the nature of the foe and the on-ground conditions where the unit will fight. The squad or platoon leader should position his unit close enough to the kill zone to facilitate assaulting through the objective, if appropriate, with good fields of fire, and within the effective range of each soldier’s individual weapon. But it should be far enough away to exploit any available cover and concealment to avoid detection and compromise, allow effective employment of all weapons and munitions in the unit’s inventory, and prevent the enemy from counterattacking easily. One of the examples in this article touches on the concept of suppressive fires. For purposes of this discussion, I define suppressive fire as “fires employed by a stationary, supporting element to facilitate the movement of another element.” Suppressive fires accomplish this support in two ways: by fixing the enemy and suppressing the enemy. By fixing the enemy, I mean preventing him from withdrawing, repositioning, or counterattacking. We suppress the enemy by gaining fire superiority over him — that is by showering him with such a high volume of effective fire that we thwart his efforts to reply with effective fire of his own. By fixing and suppressing the enemy, we allow our own maneuvering element to accomplish its task relatively unmolested. The support element achieves these effects — fixing and suppressing — in two ways: by inflicting casualties (physical impact), and by convincing enemy soldiers that if they leave their cover to fire or move, they will become casualties (psychological impact). This begs the question: which is more important — the physical or the psychological impact? This is a source of controversy, as illustrated by my own personal experience while serving as a company commander. One of my platoons had just completed a platoon attack live fire and the after action review (AAR) was being presented. Leading the AAR was the battalion S3 Air, who was criticizing the platoon because during exercise, the support element had, in his view, been firing wildly, keeping up a steady volume of fire on the objective without necessarily being able to identify particular individual soldiers as targets. As it happened, our battalion commander was on hand for the AAR and offered a different opinion. In his is opinion, it was the volume of supporting fire and not necessarily pinpoint accuracy that was of decisive importance for the “Time and again on the training ground, squad leaders position their units in ambush right on top of the road along which the enemy is expected, often as close as a few meters. This mistake presents several problems: it forfeits terrain advantage and risks enemy detection and compromise; it exposes the unit to the risk of an enemy counterattack through the ambushing unit’s position once the ambush starts; it restricts the effectiveness of many weapons; and it may expose friendly soldiers to injury by their own mines and explosives.” 22 — support element. Who was right? By way of answer, I offer an historical account of a Confederate general, grappling with Union troops in an area of close, densely packed vegetation. Perceiving a Union move on the other side of a thicket to his front, he ordered a nearby battery to fire. Fearing his canister shot would be ineffective through the dense undergrowth, the battery commander protested: “But it will do no execution!” To this, the general replied: “damn the execution sir, it’s the noise I’m after!” The point is: we should always inflict real physical damage on the foe whenever we can. But soldiers providing suppressive fire in support of a moving element need not necessarily do so to achieve their purpose. While they might have trouble getting clean shots at individual enemy soldiers, the enemy doesn’t know this — all he knows is hot lead is coming his way. The support element must fix and suppress the enemy. While killing the enemy is ideal, the support element need not necessarily do so to achieve its purpose — all it really must do is convince the enemy that certain death or injury awaits them if they do anything more than take cover. This is not to say that the support element can indulge in the “spray and pray” method, firing wildly and blindly. On the contrary, fire discipline is critical to the support element’s effectiveness. The noncommissioned officer in charge (NCOIC) must ensure the support element’s fire remains constant, without lulls or gaps, particularly those caused by stoppages and magazine changes. He must regulate the rate of fire to ensure that his soldiers do not run out of ammunition before the assault element has accomplished its mission. He must also ensure that the support element’s fire is accurate, directing fires against critical points on the objective when positively identified, and ensuring that fires are distributed across the objective, as appropriate, so as not to give the enemy safe haven in any portion of his position. The NCOIC must also lift and shift fires, as appropriate, to avoid injuring members of the assault element as they seize the objective. The tasks described here are performed primarily by infantry units during high intensity or conventional combat. But they remain relevant to other soldiers in other situations. In Iraq, the Army is aggressively employing dismounted armor and field artillery units in roles customarily filled by infantrymen or military police. Furthermore, even during stability operations and support operations, such as those underway in Iraq, resorting to high intensity conventional combat on a local basis always remains a distinct possibility. Regardless of circumstances, a soldier’s success and survival in combat depends on how skillfully he can integrate the characteristics of fire, movement, and terrain for tactical advantage. Too often, soldiers forget these elements or apply them in isolation. Small-unit leaders and individual soldiers must better understand these fundamentals, if they are to avoid needless casualties and unnecessary friction during tactical operations. Notes 1Erich Maria Remarque, All Quiet on the Western Front, G. P. Putnam and Sons, London, April 1930 (23d printing), p. 144. 2The discussion of the squad or platoon attack that follows, together with Figure 2, appears slightly different in my article, “An Element of Strength: Reinvigorating Small Unit Training,” ARMOR, May-June 2004. 3U. S. Army Field Manual FM 7-8, Infantry Rifle Platoon and Squad, Headquarters Department of the Army, Washington D. C., 1992, p. 3-19. MAJ Dennis Chapman is currently serving as team chief, Deployments Branch, U. S. Army National Guard Readiness Center, Arlington, VA. He received a B. S. from the United States Military Academy and a J. D. from Thomas M. Cooley Law School. His military education includes the Infantry Officer Basic Course, Armor Officer Advanced Course, Combined Arms and Services Staff School, and the U. S. Army Command and General Staff College. He has served in various command and staff positions, including assistant professor of military science, Michigan State University; operations officer, deputy S3, and brigade S3, 2d Brigade, 75th Division (Training Support); commander, Company A, 3d Battalion, 126th Infantry Regiment, Michigan Army National Guard; and rifle platoon leader, XO, and support platoon leader, 2d Battalion 87th Infantry, 10th Mountain Division, Fort Drum, NY. “In Iraq, the Army is aggressively employing dismounted armor and field artillery units in roles customarily filled by infantrymen or military police. Furthermore, even during stability operations and support operations, such as those underway in Iraq, resorting to high intensity conventional combat on a local basis always remains a distinct possibility.” — 23