Sand, Wind and Cannon; A Gamer's View of the National Training Center by Sgt. Mark Martin
	NTC No, this is not World War III, this is the Army's National Training Center at Fort Irwin California. What I have just described actually happened, albeit with pyrotechnic simulators and laser engagement systems. NTC is the premiere center for training today's soldiers in maneuver warfare. Myself and the tankers, infantry and artillerymen of the Texas Army National Guard underwent a month long training rotation at NTC, and I am going to attempt to describe our experiences, and to give a gamers perspective. I have been a soldier for over ten years. I first began as a Combat Engineer, and then transitioned to tanks two years later. I was initially trained on the M60A3 tank, and then the M1 and M1A1 series of main battle tanks. One of my most memorable experiences as a mechanized infantry soldier came at the National Training Center at Ft. Irwin, CA in July of 1992. I had been assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 1st Battalion, 8th Infantry Regiment stationed at Ft. Carson, CO and I was on my first tour at the infamous NTC. We had laaggered the vehicles for the night following the live fire exercise we had executed earlier that day. All brass and ammo had been accounted for and we were some of the most tired soldiers anywhere on the planet. Later into the evening we received a warning order that we were going to serve as the reserve element for our sister task force that night. They were executing a movement to contact and their attack had been bumped up due to a scheduling conflict arising out of the live fire. The original reserve force would have been made up out of several scout and slice elements that were assigned to us for the purpose of real world TO&E. You see…when you go to war, you don't go as an Infantry Battalion. You go as a task force. That means you integrate Armor, Infantry, Artillery, Cavalry, and slice elements from Division Support Command consisting of Military Intelligence, Military Police, Medical, Signal, and various and sundry other animals of military life even down to a delegate from the JAG corps to ensure that international law is being adhered to. You draw from support units and they are tasked out to a Battalion+ sized organization consisting of two Infantry and two Armor companies. That way, when you go into the fight, you have every available resource at the fingertips of the battalion commander so that he can properly array his forces to the best tactical and strategic advantage. Theoretically. That evening, there was a "scheduling" difficulty with the original Cavalry support element (which closely resembles an hybrid infantry/armor battallion) so they were unable to come to the party. That put Task Force 1-8 in the driver's seat (literally) for the reserve element mission. Guest of OPFOR Now, I don't know if any of you have ever been guests of the Opposing Force resident at the National Training Center in Ft. Irwin, CA, but for those of you who have, you'll know what I mean when I say that the most devastating and dangerous eastern bloc Red Force element in the world did not reside within the borders of the USSR. They were permanent party at a US Army post in the middle of the high desert less than 80 miles away from the greatest tribute to Sodom and Gomorrha known to man (Las Vegas). Going into this evening, our track record was just about as good as it gets for a Brigade who hadn't even completed transition to the Bradley Fighting vehicle from the M113. Which is to say that we hadn't been decimated to the point that we would have had to retire our colors had this been an actual ass-kicking. The score was 0 & 3. We were licking our wounds pretty bad. As we mounted up, I remember the track commander telling us that it was going to be a long night, and sure enough it was the longest night I have ever had in my life. Two hours into the fight it became apparent that Task Force 2-77 was taking it in the rear and they were in no shape to continue the fight in their present situation. Click to continue		It was at this point that the Brigade Commander (who was a ballsy son of a bitch by the way, awesome guy) decided to execute a reverse in square and conduct a rearward passage of lines through the reserve element. This would allow TF 2-77 to gain some perspective and also give the commander a chance to put his Divisional Artillery slice elements to work if the Red Force saw fit to pursue the fleeing task force. This meant two things to me. One, we were about to be in the hot seat after a long-ass day of live fire exercise, but good. And two, we were going to execute a rearward passage of lines between two task forces in the middle of the "Oh my God I can't see my frigging hand flapping in front of my face!" night. Strap in, right? Pulling Out As 2-77 began it's all out run like hell retreat in the jaws of the OPFOR, I prepared to dismount and meet up with the rest of the dismount element that would provide the combined briefing at the meeting point prior to the maneuver. This was to help minimize casualties during the crazy god-awful stunt we were about to pull out of our collective asses. All I remember my squad leader telling me that night was that we all needed to remain inside the lane of passage by the compass reading regardless. As long as we stayed inside that lane of passage then the rest would work out just fine. It occurred to me that I was going to be running a hell of a lot on shifting sand while mammoth sized hard steel vehicles were doing their best not to run me the hell over in the demented ballet that was to be our maneuver plan that evening. I remember hearing that the Red Force had not been informed of the operational change in reserve elements prior to the execution of the exercise. I know someone got an ass chewing for that little deception, but that wasn't my problem. After seeing their prey running like hell before them, the OPFOR lost all caution and gave pursuit to the rout that they had created. I don't think the OPFOR commander would have pursued that battle plan had he known the size of the reserve element waiting. Once the O/Cs determined the amount of attrition caused by the artillery, the Red Force broke upon Task Force 1-8 in all their fury. We were dug in and ready. In the one and only victory of our rotation that year at the National Training Center, we walked out of our "reserve" battle with 2 APC's, 4 M1A1's, and the various surviving TOC and TAC vehicles that contained the command and control center. It wasn't pretty, but it was a by-god win and I'll be damned if we didn't strut for the next two days like we had an Anthrax shot go bad right in the center of our chests. SGT Mark Martin is a member of the Minnesota Army National Guard. He was assigned to the 4th Infantry Division and 75th Ranger Regiment on active duty for 4 years prior. His awards and badges include the Expert Infantryman Badge, Parachutist Badge, The Army Achievement Medal, The Good Conduct Medal, National Defense Service Ribbon, Non-Commissioned Officer's Professional Development Ribbon and the Army Service Ribbon. Join a discussion forum on this article by clicking   HERE.
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