Page 12 - RSDG Year of 2013

10 EAGLE AND CARBINE
of a full bird American Colonel: fortunately one with a
sense of humour – and a spare car.
For A Squadron the two multiples, led initially by Captains Fred Roberts and James Crawford, later Messrs Olli von der Heyde and Freddie Rider, were based on troops that had moved from the hybrid foundation training year with their troop sergeants; Sergeant McCall and Staff Sergeant Khoo. They were therefore practiced in the delivery of training, the abil- ity to get a conceptual understanding of a drill into the minds of the soldiers and to rehearse them in their individual roles. For tank training this is simpler since the conceptual aspect is well understood and the individuals in command appointments have usually completed training in a more junior role and have seen the drills many times before. For Mission Specific Training and particularly for our deployment to Kabul much of the conceptual material simply did not exist, and of course for security of the Afghan National Army Officers’ Academy (which had not opened when we deployed) was yet to be written.
For our Mission Specific Training we used the Helmand drills as a start point and adapted them for use in a city of five million souls rather than the relatively sparsely populated Helmand. We adapted these through each collective preparatory exercise, in small arms training
at Sennelager and the Castle Martin Training Area. In practical field training this was developed in barracks at Fallingbostel and during our confirmatory exercise at the Stanford Training Area under the supervision of the Operational Training and Advisory Group. The standard drills for Kabul were written during the com- mand and staff training, again at Sennelager, where we had particularly and fortuitously focused on two major sub unit drills. Countering insider attacks is a strategy for the rising risk of being targeted by Afghan secu- rity forces. The second countering so called complex attacks where insurgents, attempt to penetrate a camp’s fortifications with a large vehicle borne improvised explosive device and follow up with armed suicide bombers on foot attempting to cause mass casualties.
Insider attacks had become more frequent in the last three years of the campaign in Afghanistan. The squadron trained conceptually to understand the nature of the threat under the guidance sub unit intel- ligence officer Mr Tim Graham. Some attacks are believed to originate from offence caused by a clash of cultures and the much more violent Afghan soci- ety. Others are inspired by or executed by the insur- gency. Countering these different motives requires a multi-faceted approach and soldiers and officers to understand potential motives and detect signs of an impending attack. It was particularly important to be
A pensive Corporal Barr