Page 46 - QDG Year of 2020

44 1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards
Bad hair day
“And over there, Col, you can see A Sqn getting bogged in”
arms at all, was approached with gusto from all Sqns, and the infantry safety staff were shocked by the firepower Light Cavalry could muster,
particularly on the night serial.
BGHQ had returned from CSTTX in Germany with a week turnaround before deploying to Salisbury Plain but nothing could quell Maj Tyson’s zeal for putting up DRASH and taking it down again on what would be his last exercise in the green Army.
Wintery conditions on
Salisbury Plain were exac-
erbated by the deluges and
strong winds of Storms
Ciara and Dennis which did
not help with seeing the targets but did provide plenty of opportunity for troop- level vehicle recovery.
Reinforcements from the Royal Yeomanry arrived in time for the Commanding Officer’s runout consisting
of a TEWT, raid and a Rearward Passage Of Lines. This was the first time many of the troops had
worked in a Battlegroup context and it was phenom- enally useful.
Exercise ARCHER was the first exercise run by the Field Training Unit and gave an insight into just a few of the frictions to be encoun- tered in the coming two weeks as well as a chance to rehearse OPs and our anti-armour matrix. In all the chaos, Mr Ruddy’s crew managed to capture two Warriors and their crews.
Exercise ODIN was the final training exercise and saw several encounters with
the enemy’s armoured reserve. Battle- group advances both directions across the plain, numerous CTRs and complex raids made for a challenging couple of weeks. We made good use of our anti-armour screen and Sgt Maj Hamil-
ton’s elaborate network of rebros gave us workable comms in a very contested communications environment. Unlike other Battlegroups, the QDG managed to achieve validation quickly. This not only achieved the main aim, which was to be certified as fit to deploy on opera- tions, but also triggered the start of the optimisation phase, where the enemy became more freethinking, enabling us to innovate and develop our battlegroup practices.
As ENDEX was being called, the Adjutant inadvertently volunteered the Commanding Officer for a further tasking, but it soon settled down. The hard work began for the LAD and QM Department
In all the chaos, Mr Ruddy’s crew managed to capture two Warriors and their crews