thedrifter
10-11-05, 07:18 PM
October 17, 2005
Missileman, assaultman jobs changing
Infantry specialties taking on new skills
By Christian Lowe
Times staff writer
Packing C4 explosives against a metal door and blowing it open. Blasting a hole through the thick earthen wall to avoid a potential ambush. Knocking a breach through a barrier to set up a concealed firing position. All these moves will sound familiar to Marines fighting insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, but in many cases the leathernecks doing them aren’t trained for those jobs.
Working with explosives safely and effectively is an exacting science, the purview of a few highly trained experts.
Until now.
In a move to more properly align job specialties and bolster combat units increasingly engaged in urban combat, the Corps is changing the assaultman (military occupational specialty 0351) and anti-tank assault guided missileman (MOS 0352) job fields, adding urban explosive breaching techniques to the assaultman’s role and shifting the Javelin anti-armor missile to the missileman’s kit bag.
The idea stems from the 2002 Gunner Symposium, where the Corps’ infantry weapons officers concluded that the assaultman was having too many random jobs and weapons assigned to him. It made sense, for example, that missilemen be trained on the Javelin since it is an anti-tank weapon similar to the missileman’s long-range tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided missile.
“We’ve had [the assaultman] overloaded with eight or nine daily job functions, and he was getting overburdened and unable to perform them all,” said Chief Warrant Officer 4 Jeffery Eby, top officer for the small-arms weapons instruction school at Quantico, Va. “We just tried to refine the duties and responsibilities of the assaultman — reducing the amount he had to do — by matching skills in the right area.”
In all, nearly 1,350 Marines will be affected by the change; they’ll receive new training and gear to execute their added missions. Because the missileman already operates the TOW anti-tank missile, few training modifications will need to be incorporated at introductory schools to use the Javelin, Eby said.
But assaultmen, both in the fleet and filtering through the School of Infantry, must get ready for more demanding standards and some high-speed — and dangerous — work with explosives.
New skills, smarter Marines
The Corps is making the MOS changes in several stages.
First, instructors at SOI East at Camp Lejeune, N.C., and SOI West at Camp Pendleton, Calif., are shifting school schedules to accommodate the added training for new Marines. In the past, new assaultmen spent 55 hours learning to operate the Javelin and gaining insight into target identification for enemy armor and vehicles. Now, that time will be used to teach “urban mobility breaching” — essentially the use of explosives to gain entry into buildings.
Assaultmen already are trained in “mechanical” breaching — the use of rams and bolt cutters to get into buildings — and know how to remove obstacles such as barbed wire, small minefields and trees from roadways by using explosives. But the ability to detonate explosives in a confined space and limit collateral damage or friendly casualties is an art, instructors said.
“These Marines are going to have the knowledge to do a limited amount of damage,” said Staff Sgt. Ken Allen, anti-armor chief instructor at SOI East. “We’re trying to teach them the skills so they’re not tumbling the building down on themselves.”
The new skills — some of the most technical in all the services — demand a smarter Marine, said Capt. Jim Birchfield, Instructor Group Company commander with Infantry Training Battalion at Camp Lejeune.
“You’ve got to know your math,” Birchfield said. “You got to be dead on so you don’t get hurt and your Marines don’t get hurt.”
The missileman curriculum at SOI will skip the Humvee driver’s course to leave enough time to teach Javelin shooting techniques. Missilemen already in the fleet will receive six months of on-the-job training to fire the anti-tank missile, Eby said.
At the same time, the Training and Education Command at Quantico is set to establish an Urban Mobility Breacher Instructor’s Course to certify instructors for both SOI and to help teach follow-on training to assaultmen already in the fleet.
Demolition is a tricky business, said Capt. Mark Thieme, an infantry task analyst with Training Command at Quantico who’s been working on the MOS changes. And learning to teach combat demo safely is even harder.
“One of the concerns is if we’re going to open the floodgates here and we’re going to start giving these guys formal training that’s demonstrative of how we’re fighting in combat, how are we going to mitigate risk?” Thieme said. “There’s a lot more than just learning how to blow something up.”
Thieme said he hopes to have the new instructor course up and running by the beginning of November.
Also, for the first time, the Corps is working to establish a leader’s course for the assaultman and missileman job fields. The plan is still in the early stages, but officials hope to have the school up and running next year.
The new assaultman skills also will relieve some of the pressure on combat engineers — the Corps’ demolition experts — Marine officials say.
Particularly in Iraq, combat engineers already are in high demand to dismantle improvised explosives and to defuse insurgent munitions.
During combat operations, there’s often a shortage of engineers in line units with the expertise to breach doors, walls and gates safely, forcing infantrymen to improvise their own solutions.
Ellie
Missileman, assaultman jobs changing
Infantry specialties taking on new skills
By Christian Lowe
Times staff writer
Packing C4 explosives against a metal door and blowing it open. Blasting a hole through the thick earthen wall to avoid a potential ambush. Knocking a breach through a barrier to set up a concealed firing position. All these moves will sound familiar to Marines fighting insurgents in Iraq and Afghanistan, but in many cases the leathernecks doing them aren’t trained for those jobs.
Working with explosives safely and effectively is an exacting science, the purview of a few highly trained experts.
Until now.
In a move to more properly align job specialties and bolster combat units increasingly engaged in urban combat, the Corps is changing the assaultman (military occupational specialty 0351) and anti-tank assault guided missileman (MOS 0352) job fields, adding urban explosive breaching techniques to the assaultman’s role and shifting the Javelin anti-armor missile to the missileman’s kit bag.
The idea stems from the 2002 Gunner Symposium, where the Corps’ infantry weapons officers concluded that the assaultman was having too many random jobs and weapons assigned to him. It made sense, for example, that missilemen be trained on the Javelin since it is an anti-tank weapon similar to the missileman’s long-range tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided missile.
“We’ve had [the assaultman] overloaded with eight or nine daily job functions, and he was getting overburdened and unable to perform them all,” said Chief Warrant Officer 4 Jeffery Eby, top officer for the small-arms weapons instruction school at Quantico, Va. “We just tried to refine the duties and responsibilities of the assaultman — reducing the amount he had to do — by matching skills in the right area.”
In all, nearly 1,350 Marines will be affected by the change; they’ll receive new training and gear to execute their added missions. Because the missileman already operates the TOW anti-tank missile, few training modifications will need to be incorporated at introductory schools to use the Javelin, Eby said.
But assaultmen, both in the fleet and filtering through the School of Infantry, must get ready for more demanding standards and some high-speed — and dangerous — work with explosives.
New skills, smarter Marines
The Corps is making the MOS changes in several stages.
First, instructors at SOI East at Camp Lejeune, N.C., and SOI West at Camp Pendleton, Calif., are shifting school schedules to accommodate the added training for new Marines. In the past, new assaultmen spent 55 hours learning to operate the Javelin and gaining insight into target identification for enemy armor and vehicles. Now, that time will be used to teach “urban mobility breaching” — essentially the use of explosives to gain entry into buildings.
Assaultmen already are trained in “mechanical” breaching — the use of rams and bolt cutters to get into buildings — and know how to remove obstacles such as barbed wire, small minefields and trees from roadways by using explosives. But the ability to detonate explosives in a confined space and limit collateral damage or friendly casualties is an art, instructors said.
“These Marines are going to have the knowledge to do a limited amount of damage,” said Staff Sgt. Ken Allen, anti-armor chief instructor at SOI East. “We’re trying to teach them the skills so they’re not tumbling the building down on themselves.”
The new skills — some of the most technical in all the services — demand a smarter Marine, said Capt. Jim Birchfield, Instructor Group Company commander with Infantry Training Battalion at Camp Lejeune.
“You’ve got to know your math,” Birchfield said. “You got to be dead on so you don’t get hurt and your Marines don’t get hurt.”
The missileman curriculum at SOI will skip the Humvee driver’s course to leave enough time to teach Javelin shooting techniques. Missilemen already in the fleet will receive six months of on-the-job training to fire the anti-tank missile, Eby said.
At the same time, the Training and Education Command at Quantico is set to establish an Urban Mobility Breacher Instructor’s Course to certify instructors for both SOI and to help teach follow-on training to assaultmen already in the fleet.
Demolition is a tricky business, said Capt. Mark Thieme, an infantry task analyst with Training Command at Quantico who’s been working on the MOS changes. And learning to teach combat demo safely is even harder.
“One of the concerns is if we’re going to open the floodgates here and we’re going to start giving these guys formal training that’s demonstrative of how we’re fighting in combat, how are we going to mitigate risk?” Thieme said. “There’s a lot more than just learning how to blow something up.”
Thieme said he hopes to have the new instructor course up and running by the beginning of November.
Also, for the first time, the Corps is working to establish a leader’s course for the assaultman and missileman job fields. The plan is still in the early stages, but officials hope to have the school up and running next year.
The new assaultman skills also will relieve some of the pressure on combat engineers — the Corps’ demolition experts — Marine officials say.
Particularly in Iraq, combat engineers already are in high demand to dismantle improvised explosives and to defuse insurgent munitions.
During combat operations, there’s often a shortage of engineers in line units with the expertise to breach doors, walls and gates safely, forcing infantrymen to improvise their own solutions.
Ellie