# Obsolete equipment



## Robert Bickle (2 Mar 2003)

After the Sea King , Ithink the next shameful example of our governments cost saving was sending our naive troops to Korea issued with the obsolete Lee Enfield 303 rifle.....single shot bolt action.   Shame Shame Shame.


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## Michael Dorosh (2 Mar 2003)

What would they have sent them with?   That was the standard issue rifle at the time.

The plan to changeover to American weapons was interrupted by the Korean War.

Defence planning was undergoing a change to respond more to the threat of nuclear bombs flying over the pole from the Soviet Union.  Why spend a lot of money on rifles for an unanticipated war in Korea, and leave the northern frontier undefended through want of funds because you are buying small arms that are only marginally more useful?  What was considered more important at the time?

If you don‘t know the answers to these questions, you cannot consider yourself informed enough to criticize.

Ask yourself also - how important was the rifleman, in general terms, to the firepower of an infantry platoon?

In specific circumstances, the tommygun was more effective (had Smokey Smith not had a tommygun at the Savio, he‘d be dead, for example) but if you read Galloway et al, and their descriptions of Second World War combat, you find the rifle was little more than a "security blanket" and that most of the killing done by infantry was done by machineguns and artillery.

Perhaps for patrol work, etc., there is a case for upping the scale of issue of automatic weapons; but the Canadians seem to have looked after this pretty well on their own.  M1 carbines seem to have been widely adopted in theatre, for example.  In WW II - and I would guess Korea - "extra" Sten Guns were held by companies for issue for special missions.

I suspect Art Johnson may be along to refute much of this, but it would seem to me - as someone who wasn‘t there - that the whole Lee Enfield question has been blown out of proportion, much like the CADPAT in Afghanistan "issue".

Had the Korean War started in 1955, it is possible the Canadians would have entered the war with M-1 Garands.  These weapons were not without their problems, either.


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## Marauder (2 Mar 2003)

Excellent points Mr. Dorosh.

I for one think we should have had the lads kitted out in scarlet tunics, black breeches, and muskets. Now those are some smart uniforms and weapons. Perfect for forming a skirmish line and static box squares, the latest and greatest in infatnry tactics. I don‘t know what this obsession with effective camoflauge and marksmanship sillyness is about; the role of a good soldier is to look smart and die well for his proud and liveried officer. All this running about, ducking and hiding and such, whilst expending so much of the Crown‘s lead.... why, it‘s all so.... indignified. Total bloody chaos. All that sweating and wasting ammunition... why I shudder at the thought.
No no, much better to stick to the tactics and dress the jolly lads from old Mother Brittania used the last time ‘round in Afghanistan.


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## Michael Dorosh (2 Mar 2003)

Not that your sarcasm is lost on us (though the use of such a heavy dose pretty much advertises the fact you have nothing significant to say and no real understanding of theissues at hand), but if you really do have issue with something stated in this thread, why not just say it?  I had thought online forums were for free discussion of these issues - not just smug and smarmy assertions that you somehow know better than everyone else and can simply hide behind comic turns.

The CADPAT issue (if that is what you are referring to) has been discussed in detail and you may want to reference those earlier discussions here before assuming the role of final arbiter.

As for infantry equipment; if the Lee Enfield was described by Strome Galloway as no more effective than a pitchfork, why do you believe the musket would be any different?  Or for that matter, the M-1 Garand?   

Perhaps you‘ve spent too many weekends training with the current Canadian Army school of thought - where artillery doesn‘t exist, and pepperpotting over the prairie in 500 metre long frontal attacks is the norm.  I would suggest to you that some reading on how things were/are done "for real" might open your eyes to how firepower was distributed/dished out in a typical WW II/Korean War era battalion attack or defensive fireplan.

I‘d further suggest the Canadians in Korea were well equipped for the defense, with their Vickers MG platoons, excellent 25 pounder guns on call, and the occasional use of the .50 calibre MG in an anti-infantry role.  As in WW II, they were hamstrung on the attack or for patrolling, but even here, the true effects can be debated beyond mere firing range statistics regarding penetration, muzzle velocities, or rates of fire of the various weapons systems.


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## onecat (2 Mar 2003)

Just to add to this debate, that at the time there wasn‘t much better out there for use as a service rifle.  The Lee Enfield was great a great rifle and yes it would of been good to have something newer, but the FAL was still in testing at the time. The M-1 wasn‘t much faster at rapid fire and was limited to only 8 rounds.  The Korean war was a surprise to everyone even the Russians and World War 2 was only 5 years in the past, it takes time to get systems on line.  I would also add that Canada was first to add the FN FAL and no one in the west had a new rifle mucg before 1960.


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## Jarnhamar (2 Mar 2003)

"Perhaps you‘ve spent too many weekends training with the current Canadian Army school of thought - where artillery doesn‘t exist, and pepperpotting over the prairie in 500 metre long frontal attacks is the norm"

Can you blame the standard reservest for thinking this though? (Maybe even some regs)  
I dont know how many guys i‘ve talked to who think the best way to "kill the enemy" is to charge across a field doing section attacks.  For an eye opener people should use miles gear. One enemy force soldier can and often does take out half if not most of an infantry section doing section attacks against one guy. From the get go i think recruits are informally taught that other trades suck.  As much as i love infantry, with out armored or artillery infantry is pretty useless in a fight (unless its something like jungle or mountians which then even artillery plays a major role.)

I read an article on the afganastan fight that said the most effective weapon the infantry had was mortars then airsupport.


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## stivic923 (2 Mar 2003)

Oh Dorosh, give it up. The guy was only kidding around. You dont have to come in here and degrade him because of what he said, and how he said it. This place is for discussion, not for you to come in here and put someone down in the tone that you did.
If you didnt like what he said, then i suggest you find some better way of telling him that you object to his remark.

And to think that all this started over a stupid bloody 303 rifle.
quite lame


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## onecat (2 Mar 2003)

MIke78, yes Dorosh was to strong in his tone.  But lets face it some it needed to be said as this guy only needed to research on web for 5 minutes and he would found lots of information was what armies were using and that the 303 was up for job.  The Forces should of had more stens and brens though to make up for North Korean and Chinese use of submachine guns.


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## stivic923 (2 Mar 2003)

yes....but radiohead, you gotta relaize that this is ALL over a bloody gun. and a 303 at that too.
I have one of them...not the same one as the CF used back in them days, but i have a British 303 and it literally sucks.

He sure did have a strong tone, but he could have used a normal tone to tell him as well.
Just because he is some sort of vet soldier, doesnt give him the right to chew out some recruit in here.


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## Michael Dorosh (2 Mar 2003)

I‘ve owned several Lee Enfields; No. 5 Jungle Carbine, SMLE, No. 4 Mk I* - and fired them all.

What exactly do you feel sucks?

They are accurate well beyond battle ranges, durable and built to last, easy to operate, strip and clean, and in the hands of a well trained soldier, capable of rapid fire.  In fact, you can fire 10 rounds faster through a Lee Enfield than through an M-1 Garand.

If you want to contribute to the conversation, stop the name calling and start providing facts.  Opinions such as "it sucks" isn‘t really fodder for a decent contribution.

As for the "veteran soldier" thing - I‘m flattered, but it‘s not even true.

It‘s a discussion board, so let‘s discuss.  That means making a statement, then backing it up with something resembling evidence, be it facts, theory or opinion.  The original poster didn‘t do that, and neither does the "it sucks" comment.


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## onecat (2 Mar 2003)

Mike please tell what sucks about your 303?  Most of my experience with them is with a number 4, which are great rifles.  If its from WW1, then I can understand why they not work as well.  My frined in Highschool had a #1MK3 from 1916 and the bolt was so wore that it did suck on range.  On scale of 1-10 for bolt action rifles I would place a Number 4 at 9 for all the reason listed in the last post.  You have rember that things have changed so much in the past 50 years.  Using an Ak or M-16 is nothing like firing a 303 and troops go into the field with a lot more fire power.

Dorosh does make it hard for new comers, and I can understand why you might not like it. But look at the first post, you can‘t conpare Sea Kings to 303‘s.  And so what if this debate is over a rifle they important.


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## Marauder (3 Mar 2003)

> Perhaps you‘ve spent too many weekends training with the current Canadian Army school of thought - where artillery doesn‘t exist, and pepperpotting over the prairie in 500 metre long frontal attacks is the norm. I would suggest to you that some reading on how things were/are done "for real" might open your eyes to how firepower was distributed/dished out in a typical WW II/Korean War era battalion attack or defensive fireplan.


Yep, you got me. I‘m just a moronic toon jackass who can‘t twrap his fragile little mind around any concept larger than the level of a ****in‘ section attack.

Fortunately enough fo me, I‘m not half the mouth-breathing simpleton you take me for. In a perfect world, me and the boys would be hitting the battlefield after a massive TOT arty barrage, with black hats in tow to do the tank/bunker hunting and engineers to blow up obstacles arriving around the same time we air assault onto the objective. Then we would have both vertical envelopment CAS and a FOO on hand to give us a lifeline if the kimchi got deeper than we could swim in. Accordinging to the tactics of a section attack in the method I was taught, we would actually be arriving in LAVs, with a 25mm cannon, section level coax C6, and smoke launchers all raining ****  onto the trench/bunker/building whilst we pepper pot up using the principles of fire and movement. During the reorg we‘d have MSE Ops hauling ammo and water up to us to resup before we stepped off to do it again. What the **** , so long as I‘m dreaming, I‘ll even assume we might have a relief company coming in to give us a chance to rest and recharge and get our cas evac‘d out by choppers. Spread the workload a bit so everyone gets a chance to close with and kill the Hun/Osamama bin Lubbin‘.
Too bad that the level at which the ideal and reality meet is, at most, the platoon (perhaps company) level. Our "armoured support" is basically recce jeeps conducting route recce for our ML-o-copters; our engineer support.... well I think an engineer drove us back up top post- endex one time. I hear there are arty callsigns somewhere in our brigade, but I‘ve never heard them fire, let alone seen the tubes. **** , I‘ve ridden in a Griffon, but have never so much as seen a LAV except the ones I eye****ed in 1RCR‘s lager in Pet.

So, yes I am a lowly unwashed militia mutt, but I do have a handle on how a combined arms approach works in theory. However, if we ever get sent to battle in the current state of the Mo, I want it made **** sure that I have the best available service rifles, MGs, GLs, rocket launchers, and small bore mortar, along with as much ammo and water and med supplies (with perhaps some valid first aid training thrown in) as I can possibly carry with me, because while I know I can reasonably trust that buddy to the left and buddy to the right will be there when we walk into the fire, I can‘t be stack-of-Bibles certain there will be other arms there who know how to properly fight beside/support the infantry.

Just so none of the RegF pers get their knickers twisted, yes I know us toons are nowhere good enough to play alongside the professionals without six months of workup training. But knowing there is a critical mass of "people who matter" out there who give little enough of a **** to do their voodoo to make PRes combined arms exs a flesh and blood reality kills whatever little faith I have in the whole thing whenever someone does something to spark some small bit of hope for the future.

Mr. Dorosh, I do find it funny that you first include a description of the Enfields as being little more useful as a weapon than a pitchfork, then go on to sing its praises later on. Now, granted, my tiny militia infantryman‘s brain may not grasp the subtly of what you‘re trying to say, but that strikes me as a dichotomy.

Ghost: been there done that with the MILES gear. That‘s why my take is that the Res INF arm should focus on being as proficient as possible given our constaraints in long range recce skills, fighting patrols, raiding/ambushing, and FIBUA as possible. Those are areas that are more focused on true light infantry; make no mistake, we are light infantry, no matter what the paperwork in NDHQ says... we have a better chance of conducting an air assault than a mech op, at least in my neck o‘ the woods.
But that may simply be the smug opinion of someone with no real understanding of the issues at hand who thus has nothing signifigant to say.


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## Pikache (3 Mar 2003)

> Then we would have both vertical envelopment CAS and a FOO on hand to give us a lifeline if the kimchi got deeper than we could swim in.


Funniest thing I‘ve heard in some time.
Though even I,the resident Korean, have never waded in a pool of kimchee before.


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## Michael Dorosh (3 Mar 2003)

Marauder, the ability to type extended paragraphs is not in and of itself evidence that you are able to contribute to any given discussion.

What, exactly, did any of that have to do with the issue of the Lee Enfield to the Canadian Army Special Force in 1951?

Let me start over; the original poster expressed dismay that the Canadians in Korea were issued with the Lee Enfield; I drew the inference (after a comparison to the Sea King situation) that he felt the government was being willfully neglectful.

I pointed out that

a) the Canadian government had many fish to fry at this time, not the least being the impending Cold War with a nuclear-armed enemy

b) that a plan was in fact in place to replace the Lee Enfield as the issue service rifle

c) that the issue service rifle was probably not something that should have been considered a priority at the time since they were not used as often as popular imagination would have us believe

d) that in any event, the Lee Enfield was equal to most tasks asked of it in battle in Korea

Now, I‘m sorry, beyond your self-pitying dialogue, what exactly did you have to say in response to any of that?  I found your suggestion that the Korea force use muskets rather fatuous.


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## Horse Gunner (3 Mar 2003)

Methinks guys, this thread is getting bogged down in BS. At the end of the day, would Canadian soldiers issued with whatever rifle instead of the Lee Enfield, changed the out come of the Korean war?....No. As mentioned by other members on thi forum, Canada had other worries/issues to contend with.
The fact that .303 is crap is frankly...crap! It was a very accurate weapon and just to prove my point, the British Army used an upgraded version as their sniper rifle until 1989, when it was replaced with the accuracy international.

Now I too shall sit and wait for the onslaught of abuse


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## Michael Dorosh (3 Mar 2003)

Haven‘t seen you in these parts before Horse Gunner, so I‘ll welcome you - if it‘s belated, my apologies.

It is the fashion in Canada to presume that every decision the government makes or has made is part of a grand conspiracy to kill off its soldiers and do disservice to its Army.  I think it can be demonstrated that at least one or two of the decisions it has made have been done out of legitimate reasons lying outside of this conspiracy.

I certainly didn‘t mean to "take after" the original poster, but a discussion board is,after all, for discussion - not dropping weightless accusations and running.  I don‘t think the implication - that the Lee Enfield was criminally - CRIMINALLY - obsolete in 1951 really holds any water and if I have been a bit vigorous in my defence, I suggest instead of calling for apologies, that anyone seriously opposed mount an equally vigorous offence to convince me that I am wrong.


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## Bruce Monkhouse (3 Mar 2003)

I dont know much about old rifles but I know I just sold my fathers Lee-enfield to a local constable and after 40 years in a closet all that was required was a light oiling and now he says its the best shooting rifle he‘s ever shot. Oh and just one more thing lads, lighten up and have some fun!!!!!!


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## Robert Bickle (3 Mar 2003)

I was hoping my topic would create a good discussion and it has.
 I didn‘t think the .303 would have had so many defenders 6 years after the second war.

It was a fine weapon for its time, quite possibly the best rifle ever,  but when the Korean war started I think there was better rifles available off the shelf for dollars. The Americans had tons of surplus M-1 Garands.

If we had two platoons facing each other in combat and everthing else being equal I would prefer the platoon with the M-1‘s.


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## Jarnhamar (3 Mar 2003)

Bolt action rifles are more accurate then semi-auto‘s.

Good point about the light infantry stuff Marauder.  That being said though with the standards so low for the reserves it‘s a loosing battle. At best the reserves like someone mentioned is like a ‘farm‘ team. Good for picking and choosing good soldiers out of the group but theres still a lot of bad apples.
I don‘t think the average reservest who augments the reg force "needs" that 6 months training to be on par with them. The 6 months i find is for the reg force guys to practice working with each other. The only real new material that the reserves get introduced to (and i would imagine reg force in some cases) is peace support training which is a month and a half, give or take.


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## Infanteer (3 Mar 2003)

Having shot both a Garand and an Lee-Enfield, I can say that the Enfield was a perfectly good rifle to take to Korea, however the fact that it was still being used in the 60‘s was criminal....

As for the next point, six months of work-up is not necessary for a reservist, however it would be nice provided the time was used well.  The work-up training is important to familiarize reservists with company (and on some tours combat team) level fighting.  We only had four and a half months, with a domestic op in the middle, and we showed that we are more than capable of handling the job.  
Ghost, peace support training is only five days long.  Despite the peacekeeper image the public likes to lay on us, the main training focus of a battlegroup before it deploys overseas is warfighting.

Infanteer Out


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## Jarnhamar (3 Mar 2003)

I think its a little longer then 5 days. You have the cultural briefs, couple language classes. Have a bunch of stands with vehicle searches, building searches and crowd control/riot training. Reacting to disturbences etc.. Not to mention the week and a half/two week long FTX at the end of it.  I was including all that into the one and a half month estimate.


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## Infanteer (3 Mar 2003)

Well, it was 5 days when I did it.  There was no FTX, we had "opfor" played by another company and went through Pl exercises after theory.  It was alright, but everything was really learned during handover once on the ground.


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## Michael Dorosh (3 Mar 2003)

Infanteer, Ghost, et al - good discussion.

The Lee Enfield was "officially" replaced in the late 1950s, though of course the Militia would have soldiered with it into the 60s.  The Canadian Rangers still use it IIRC, and as noted, the sniper version (No. 4 Mk I (T)) was used well past 1959 as well.

Don‘t forget we were putting a lot of money at the time into Bomark missles, and the ARROW.  If you want to talk about criminality in procurement policy, there‘s a story for you...(!)


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## onecat (3 Mar 2003)

Also it should be noted that during the Korean war, Nato was still deciding on their common round. The Uk and Canada wanted the .280cal which was more in common with assault rifle theories learned from WW2; while US wanted a larger round.  They got their way and it was decided in 1954 that 7.62 would be the new Nato standard.  So what would of been point of buying surplus M-1 from the United States when they were clearly going to replace them in a few short years.  That would of been a total waste of money, what with large of surpluses of ammo and rifles, not to mention that to switch would of also meant that a new machine gun was needed, as the Bern also used the 303 round.  And Canada adopted the FN Fal in 1956, so with re-tooling they most likely had the 303‘s old of reg service but 1960.  It does take some time to get a rifle supplied, I think it tool the CF 6 years to get all C-7‘s in place and that was just 80,000.

Would like to know why you think the M-1 is hot?

Here‘s a link with more info.

 http://world.guns.ru/assault/as24f-e.htm


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## Infanteer (4 Mar 2003)

Correction to my previous post, I was reminded of some extra stuff we did on peace support training bringing the total up to 8 or 9 days.  However, still nothing close to a month or two.

As for the topic of obsolete kit, I think Mr. Dorosh raises a good point with his "conspiracy theory."  I don‘t think I am ready to by the argument that our military is horribly obsolete.  Of course there are the few glaring examples such as the Sea Kings, or some specific items like the communications suites on our fighters or the lower half of our tanks, but all countries have these problems (Anybody trained with the Brits and had to use their comms equipment?  I swore I would never bash the over-complicated TCCCS after that....)  However, on the plus side, are small arms are among the best in the world, the LAV and Comorant (please get more...please) are state-of-the-art, the Cloth-the-Soldier program, despite its teething problems, is giving us some pretty nice snivel kit, comms equipment is second to none, the new jeeps look pretty snazzy, and I could go on and on.  And whats more, reservists get access to alot of this stuff too.
I think our problems lie in the fact that we are
A) missing a few key items of importance (tac and strategic transport comes to mind)
B) overwork what we got, alot of the times without proper replacement.

After working with a few foreign militaries I have learned to put our armies problems into perspective, namely "the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence."


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## Michael Dorosh (4 Mar 2003)

Infanteer is dead on with all his latest comments.

I was truly surprised to hear that the temperature was below -20 on our last exercise.  With all the truly effective winter kit we are now issued, I honestly had no idea it was that cold.

The comments on small arms et al, I would agree with 100 percent also.

Everybody wants something; we have health care coming out our ears, and people cry for more.  Then they whine cause taxes are too high.  Then they cry because alcohol and tobacco are taxed so much.  Then they complain because they go to the hospital with liver failure and lung cancer and complain again that we don‘t have enough health care.

Throw in complaints about highways, property taxes, bad teachers and not enough schools, and finally, way down on people‘s list, is the fact we are driving 20 year old MLVWs with rusty wheels, and don‘t have any tanks for our tank regiments.

Unfortunately, we can‘t have it all.  On the whole, our kit does allow us to train - and in all kinds of weather and terrain conditions.  You can always imagine your Cougar is really a tank, but you can‘t imagine your combat coat is really a parka when you‘re out at -30 degrees!


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## Jarnhamar (4 Mar 2003)

"Correction to my previous post, I was reminded of some extra stuff we did on peace support training bringing the total up to 8 or 9 days. However, still nothing close to a month or two."

I‘m really glad someone must have seen this as a bad thing and decided to increase the amount of training for peace support training.
The idea of learning peace keeping  stuff "in country" seems as dangerous as training a soldier to fight after he hits the battle field and not before. Even with the amount of training we have now i noticed guys acting with a "war fighting" mentality for lack of a better word. I think we could stil use even more time training in peace support operations. Maybe 2 and a half months war training, 2 or two and a half months peace support and a month off for the pre tour leave etc..

Clothe the soldier i think is a great project. The equipment thats comming out of that for the most part is amazing compared to what we have. The only problem is how long it‘s taking. The other night we got to play around with the new Tactical Vest which will replace the webbing.  The set up was incredible. Everything fit perfectly, it looked and felt great. We were given a class on how to wear it and all the functions then asked to evaluate the class and the booklet it came with. (How do you like the text, are the words easy to understand, do you like the pictures, is there enough pictures, what would you add). We asked how long before we would see the vest and he said atleast a year and a half. Im not sure if that was regs and reserves or if he ment a year and a half to be filtered down to the reserves. It was also said that the vest was the first phase of the load carrage system with the new ruck sack comming out sometime later. (I don‘t want to guess how many years). Looks to me like soldiers will be wearing the new assault vests with the old style ruck sack which im sure won‘t be very compatable.
Awesome project but i wish they would speed things up.


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## Infanteer (5 Mar 2003)

> The idea of learning peace keeping stuff "in country" seems as dangerous as training a soldier to fight after he hits the battle field and not before. Even with the amount of training we have now i noticed guys acting with a "war fighting" mentality for lack of a better word. I think we could stil use even more time training in peace support operations. Maybe 2 and a half months war training, 2 or two and a half months peace support and a month off for the pre tour leave etc..


I disagree.  Peace support operations are mundane and very boring, more like routine police work, and I think we got adequete time training for them.  The "warfighting mentality", however, is something we can‘t afford to lose, especially on an OOTW, as it remains our "raison d‘etre."  Besides, we got a highly professional NCO to keep it in check until neccesary, right.

As for the new LBV coming out, I don‘t think I like it.  Not only does it appear (like the new CADPAT uniforms) to be shoddily constructed, but it is still not up to being a proper infantry vest.  4 mag pouches???  A friend from the Medak said he was carrying 15 mags, loaded, when they went in.  There still remains far superior stuff on the after market, and CADPAT versions will soon be out.


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## Jarnhamar (6 Mar 2003)

Peace support operations are very boring but they have the ability to flair up fast.


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