Page 7 - QDG Vol. 9 No. 2 CREST

This last year has seen substantial change to the British Army as set out under the IR and the Future Soldier plan. Many of these changes will be keenly felt by the soldiers and officers of the Royal Armoured Corps. For that reason, I wrote to the Regimental Colonels in November setting out the broad order design for the Corps post IR. I enclose an extract from that letter below so that the message is transparent across all ranks. The changes to our Corps roles across the Regulars and Reserves are as follows:
• Armour. The RAC will retain two Armoured Regiments (QRH and RTR) ~ one allocated to each of the two Heavy Brigade Combat Teams (BCT). The Armoured Regiments will retain four Sabre Squadrons and one HQ Squadron. Each Sabre Squadron will have four troops of three tanks, with one of the troops in each squadron provided by the Yeomanry. The King’s Royal Hussars will re-role as Armoured Cavalry on the AJAX platform. The RWxY, scaled to four squadrons, will provide formed Troops to support the two Regular Armoured Regiments listed above; scaled at one Yeomanry Troop per Regular Squadron.
• Armoured Cavalry. Two Regiments of Armoured Cavalry (KRH and RDG) will be allocated at one Regiment per Heavy BCT, and the HCR and RL will be allocated to the Deep Recce Strike BCT. All four Armoured Cavalry units will lose their C&S Squadron and Surveillance Troop. Consequently, their three Sabre Squadrons will contain two Find Troops, a Guided Weapons Troop and a Support Troop. All will have an RHQ and G4 focussed HQ Squadron. Yeomanry Regiments will, in due course, be aligned with Regular Armoured Cavalry units. They will generate one Yeomanry Squadron per ACR, mounted initially in Jackal, for warfighting.
• Light Cavalry. The SCOTS DG and LD will be allocated to each of the two Light BCTs, whilst the QDG will be allo- cated to the Deep Recce Strike BCT. The Regular Light Cavalry Regiments will have three Sabre Squadrons (structured as they are now) and a HQ Squadron. At Warfighting these units will be augmented with an additional Yeomanry Sabre Squadron, to bring them up to four squadrons. The SNIY will continue to support the SCOTS DG, the RY the QDG, and the QOY the LD, as well as being tasked to support the ACRs.
The capability to seize, clear and hold terrain is as relevant today as it was in World War II
1st The Queen’s Dragoon Guards 5
Colonel Commandant’s Foreword
You will have heard much
about the changing char-
acter of warfare, of the
so-called ‘grey zone’ and
the requirement for asym-
metric forces. Do not for a
moment assume that the consequence of this change
is a diminished requirement
for armour. War remains a fundamentally human endeavour and a psychological one too. The capability to seize, clear and hold terrain is as relevant today as it was in World War II. Armour is a demonstrable statement on the ability to win a human conflict that will be high intensity and violent in nature. There is a clear imperative to extract the opportunities from the IR. We must be adaptive, innovative, and collaborative across the Corps. The blend of light and heavy armour across the Field Army will impact on how we think about signature management and the blend between dispersal and mass. We must change our tactics to suit the Equipment Programme and we will need to be bold. We must pioneer our own ideas on the application of technology through a willingness to
embrace experimentation in our training. We must collab- orate across our structure so that while we maintain the unique qualities of the regimental system we fight as one Corps.
I shall shortly hand over the role of Colonel Comman- dant RAC to Major General
Nick Perry. He will be a very fine standard bearer for this Corps, and I wish him well. However, my closing comments go to the fine soldiers that make up our units, both Regular and Reserve. Yet again they have delivered excellence across a diverse and busy year; whether that be in Mali, Wessex Storm, US Warfighter or on the ranges and plains of the UK, the standard has never relented. Quite the opposite, it continues to improve. Over nearly forty years in the Army I have seen the structure change many times over. It will change again. What does not change is the quality of our people and despite all the changes in the IR we do well to remember that it’s the people that matter most.
Train Hard ~ Fight Easy
ES-O