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I showed this article to my brother (Ex 8th CH and Dragoon) about calling in fire and he told me about an Ex in Pet...
He also told me you can teach any one to call in fire if they have just a smig of brains,it's not hard to learn.
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It's not hard to learn the procedure, but it isn't always easy to do. Try it when there's loads of dead ground, poor visibility, everyone yakking on the net and if you're a supported arm, while you're also trying to fight your vehicle or do who knows what all else. It ain't always easy, practice in the simulator gets the drill down but real live practice, IMO, is a must.
By the way the simulators are improving in their fidelity, there's an enhanced one now in the Artillery school to simulate fighting in a built up area, it also records the activity for AAR, eventually it is also to include a hostile action function (not sure what yet but something to make the students practice good fieldcraft). Even so I would say the simulator's main function is to support learning the procedure, the realism still falls short (no pun intended) of firing the real thing.
In the AAR there's an intersting point about IFF and airspace coordination, something which can get overlooked in the Supported Arm Call for fire, and is why sometimes there's a considerable lag time before shot is sent.