Anyone want to tell me their plan?

'Kay, bit bored, and have Fri off, so thought I would ask any former military men, or just those who have a stratetigcal mind, how, in theory, they would best prepare for this hypothetical operation.

I've not copied it from anything, just sort of made it up as I went along.

You are the commander of 500 elite troops.

You have been located in an area whose name is not told to you, but the terrain is very frozen, there is a lot of ice, and the temps are well below freezing. The area that you are on has a land mass approx the size of Kuwait.

Located someplace on this location are a native population who are said to be a danger to national security. You are not told why, just that estimates range from between 1000-5000. It is also believed that they have fashioned several underground living quarters, very hard to spot, several hundred feet under the ice.

You are not sure where on this terrain those areas are located though, only that they are dotted around, all over the area, and they may be inter connected.

Little more is told to you of the enemy that you face.

They are traditional warriors, but fierce. They rely heavily on crude yet effective weapons, and traps. They use the terrain, and their intimate knowlege of it, to compensate for formal training and technology.

However, it is thought that they may have taken stock of some arms, following a failed attempt by Russian soldiers to locate and disable them.

You have been dropped on the ground, and have been given three months to locate and defeat the enemy.

Your unit may also take only half of the things listed here;

1) Adequate shelters
2) Sufficient food and water
3) Guns and ammo
4) Sufficient explosives for three fairly large charges.
5) Clothing to suit the climate
6) Thermal imaging equipment
7) Compasses
Hand tools, such as ice picks
9) Radio equipment
10 A doctor and medical supplies
11) Motorised snow vehicles, ten of.
12) Materials to make fire.

 

Uh.....

1) Sufficient food and water
2) Guns and ammo
3)medica
l supplies
Beans, Bandages, and Bullets


4) Clothing to suit the climate
5) Hand tools, such as ice picks
6) Motorized snow vehicles, ten of.
7) Radio equipment

I took out the doctor in favor of radio equipment. i couldn’t see any other way to do this without these 6 1/2 things.

Don’t need shelters. Everyone will just have to dig out fighting positions and sleep in them. As for fires, it’s been my experience a well dug fox hole and someone to cuddle with is just as good as a fire.

Compasses seem like a very basic thing one should have had anyways but not at the sacrifice of what i listed.

Thermal imaging and explosives would be nice but not a necessity. The mission could be accomplished without them.

running out of time so...

I would set up a foward base as a headquarters element and operate my vehicles out of there as a quick reaction force to reinforce anyone who is in contact.

with everyone i had left i would send out 30-40 man units out a few days at a time. search and destroy during the day, dig in a defensive postions at night.

would never want them to go out futher where at least one other platoon sized groups could not reinforce them in a timely matter.

and until i covered a whole area, id pack up redeploy my FOB somewhere else and repeat.

idk, there's probably a better way but i killed the last few minutes of work and im going home

 

I felt that since they have fashioned several underground living quarters, very hard to spot, several hundred feet under the ice, that the explosives could somehow be used to cause the collapse of the ground above them - thus encasing them in.

While the TIE could be used to locate them, under there?

 

Drop large loads of water from the and flo them out. Then i would hellicopter in small groups of armed men to pick off the ones that come out. The others will drown or be frozen and incased in to the ground.

 

Where did the helicopter come from?

 

How elite are these soldiers you have?

I'd set up OPs throughout the AO that could be quickly reinforced with a QRF. They'd be small 4-6 man teams that would be undetectable. After conducting reconnissance on the entire area, I'd hit the command and control areas and lay ambushes when their QRF came. I would do all of this in the dead of night and use my thermal sights to dominate the battlefield. After knocking them off balance, I'd start sweeping through their entire territory systematically clearing them out.....again at night. During the day I'd establish heavy defensive positions and use my OPs to guard my supply lines. I'd also begin building relations with the native population and eventually create a native police force to ramp up security. The ultimate goal would be to alienate the enemy combatants and stabilize the area.

 

500 of the best there is.

Good narration, btw.

 

This is rather simple.

500 troops to go against 2-10 times their numbers? Located underground somewhere in almost 18,000 square miles of arctic terrain?

My decision is very simple. Do nothing until a better idea of numbers and location ic achieved. Dropping in that small of a force in an area that is twice the size of the state of Maryland is not only insane, it is murder.

And most of those items you list are not suggestions, they are an absolute requirement for survival. About the only exceptions I can see are the explosives, the compasses (we use GPS now), the vehicles (not enough to be of any use), and the fire materials (every MRE comes with matches, and every smoker has a lighter).

Explosives would basically be a waste. Not enough of them to do any good. Just use the radio and call in air strikes.

 

Of course you're right. I figured I'd make an attempt at it anyway. Helicopters would also be key in this type of situation.

 

Good narration. Night time is the best time to attack. Would you put those defensive positions on the high ground in a place that can easily see from all directions for miles? Probably set up some obstacles to make those defensive positions even more difficult to take and make sure those positions have plenty of ammo. I think the explosives is a good idea to blow up underground facilities during a night time attack. Hopefully the reconnaissance would be able to reveal enemy weaknesses to attack during night time raids.

 

I appreciate the conditions I gave you were tough, with resources scare.

That was done by design, I wanted to see if one or two could make something of it. Which one or two of you have.

 

thermal optics only detect direct surface temperature, so you cannot see through layers of ice.

 

Right.

Going to give you some new supplies, they may or may not be of use.

As follows;

Rocket launchers x 2

Sniffer dogs x 12

Valium gas.

How do you factor that into your approach?

 

Thread =

armchair general (plural armchair generals)

Carry on....

trees...

 

Of course it is. That doesn't mean it can't be any fun. The "rocket launchers" and valium gas kind of crossed the line into complete silliness for me though.

 

Well, you and Mushroom and Krunk...I believe...actually have
relevant military experience...

so you know, no offense directed at y'all...sometimes I think though
that a few hours playing Stratego, makes some folks think they're an expert.

My area was logistics, and I don't pretend to be a field commander..so yeah
threads like this can turn silly...like those

"U.S. vs. Great Britain" hypotheticals...

I just kind of shake my head at that stuff.

 

Of course, and I only engaged in this kind of conversation because I knew there are some experienced people around to make it interesting. Either way, I'm really not much more qualifed to "plan" this regimental/BN size campaign than your average civilain.

 

Nor I.....

Well, perhaps more than the average civilian...both of us.

 

Me too.

Just a bit of boredom being killed, is all it was.

 

Maintain situational awareness, so
I would deploy a JSTARS E-8 over the area...it provides a picture of the ground situation, in the way
that AWACS provides information on what's going on in the air.

Even based underground, the bad guys will still need to vent a heat source and that's easily detectable from aerial based thermal imaging in a cold environment.

Even over a land mass the size of Kuwait, J-STARS can cover a very large area
with long loiter capabilities.

 

To test the feasibility of construction techniques a project site called "Camp Century"
was started, located at an elevation of 6,600 feet (2,000 m) in northwestern Greenland,
150 miles (240 km) from the US Thule Air Base.

A total of 21 tunnels were built; these tunnels also contained a hospital,
a shop, a theater and a church. The total number of inhabitants was around 200. From 1960 until 1963
the electricity supply was provided by means of the world's first mobile/portable nuclear reactor "Alco PM-2A".
Water was supplied by melting glaciers and tested to determine if germs such as the plague were present.

It was discovered that the ice was moving much more intensively than had been anticipated and
would destroy the tunnels and launch stations in about two years.
The facility was evacuated in 1965 and the nuclear generator removed.
Project Iceworm was cancelled for good and Camp Century closed in 1966.

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Iceworm

City Under the Ice; the Story of Camp Century

[ame="http://www.amazon.com/City-Under-Story-Camp-Century/dp/B000E47MLW"]Amazon.com: City Under the Ice; the Story of Camp Century: charles daugherty: Books[/ame]

 

ATTP 3-97.11/MCRP 3-35.1D (FM 31-70 and FM 31-71)
Cold Region Operations
Download available here: http://loadbearingequipment.info/ref/ATTP/3-97x11.pdf

Happy reading warriors.

Preface
This Army tactics, techniques, and procedures (ATTP)/Marine Corps reference publication (MCRP)
is the Army’s doctrinal publication for operations in the cold region environment. Marines can
utilize this publication as an operational reference with the 3-35 doctrinal series.
It provides doctrinal guidance and direction for how United States (U.S.) forces conduct
cold region operations.
The purpose of ATTP 3-97.11/MCRP 3-35.1D is to arm leaders, Soldiers, and Marines
with the necessary knowledge on how to operate in cold region environments.
The information contained in this manual applies to all Soldiers and Marines,
regardless of rank or job specialty. This manual is designed to work with and
complement field manual (FM) 3-97.6, Mountain Operations, and FM 3-97.61, Military Mountaineering.
This manual will enable leaders, Soldiers, and Marines to accurately describe cold region environments,
their effects on military equipment, impacts these environments have on personnel, and most importantly,
how to employ the elements of combat power in cold region environments.
This ATTP provides the conceptual framework for conventional forces to conduct cold region operations within the construct of full spectrum operations, across the spectrum of conflict. It addresses cold region operations at operational and tactical levels.

 

I bet you know more than a lot of officers. Really, I put more trust in experienced enlisted men than I do officers. My experience is the ones that generally know the most and do a very good job even more than college educated officers, are your experienced enlisted men. That is where I put my faith in. I don't knock anybody being college educated, but it seems that the people who know the most are the ones who are on the ground, doing the actual fighting, are in touch with what is really going because they are on the ground and doing the actual fighting and also have learned through hard experience. Generally, those are the people who are the most effective and do the best job. You also see a lot of good leaders in the enlisted ranks who got that way because of the school of hard knocks.

 

Junior grade and even many field grade officers in the combat arms, see as much combat as any enlisted person.
It's called leading by example.

Nice that you perpetuate a stereotype of a fat cat general, sitting behind his desk sending
junior enlisted into battle led only by NCOs., you have little to no knowledge of the reality it seems....

 

Are you an officer? I am just being honest about my experiences. You shouldn't make assumptions about me. The most competent soldiers I have seen by and large are enlisted men with experience. Don't take my observations personal. A lot of your junior grade officers might see combat, but most of them lack experience. Field grade officers (Major and above) see some combat but not as much as the enlisted men and some of the junior grade, but the enlisted men do most of the fighting and junior grade officers might be on the front lines with enlisted men, but many don't have the experience or as much experience (though their is always exceptions to every rule). I was an enlisted man, so I know what it's like and I also have done some deployments so it's not like I stayed stateside. Some of your junior grade officers also don't listen to the wisdom of the experienced NCOs or enlisted men. I'll put my faith in experienced enlisted men before I put my faith in some inexperienced LT or junior officer. I remember an old WWII vet telling me when I was young that if I ever became an officer in the armed forces (which I did not but I was an enlisted man) to "talk with the experienced corporal." He was speaking from his viewpoint of combat in World War II.