“Yeah, well you better start thinkin’ about your responsibilities or Top’s gonna certify you as unfit and bust you to specialist.”
“ ‘Slippin’ down the ladder rung by rung,’ ” whispered Duncan.
“Yeah, you are,” agreed Brecker, tightly, not recognizing the quote. “But you don’t gotta. All you need to do is wake up a little, maybe do some extra training and they can’t do it.”
“Yeah,” said Duncan, as a thought hit him like a brick. He paused for a moment and considered it. He felt as if a black cloth had been taken off of his eyes. “You read that FM?”
“No, what’s the point, we don’t have suits to train in.”
“No, but we got PT uniforms.”
“Yeah,” agreed Brecker, bitterly, not yet noticing the sudden change. “Like we’re gonna do any running on Diess. The only fuckin’ running we’re gonna do is away.”
“There’s the field here,” muttered Duncan, continuing a different conversation. His mind was starting to turn furiously.
“Yeah, let’s go run around the track. It works for the colonel, night and day. Come rain, come shine, there’s the colonel, motivating us to run on a muddy track by his own example. I’m sure the squad would love to go running all day and night in the rain. Not.”
“ ‘In the absence of available suits, suit drills can and should be conducted in lightweight physical training uniforms, using either standard issue or field expedient simulations of standard suit weapons and equipment.’ ”
“What?”
“It’s in the FM. That’s the new training schedule. I’ll go talk to Sergeant Green. Get the guys pulling out their PT uniforms.”
“It is pissing down out here, you know,” said Brecker, gesturing at the sodden skies.
“Big whoop, they’re infantry, they can handle a little rain. And get ’em thinkin’ about what to simulate their weapons with.”
“You’re crazy.”
“You’re the one who wants to survive, right?”
“Yeah, but…”
“So we gotta train, ’in the absence of suits…’ ”
“Yeah, so we run around a muddy field in fuckin’ sweats? Why not BDUs?”
“You wanna run in boots? Get shin splints? I mean, we are gonna be runnin’, not joggin’, that’s the essence of suit drills.”
“But…”
“Get moving, Sergeant Brecker. I’ll go see the platoon sergeant.”
“Okay…”
“Duncan, what have you been smoking?”
The senior NCO’s room was simply a closed-off corner of the barracks. Across from it was another enclosure to be used as an office; unfortunately the Army in its infinite wisdom had not seen fit to furnish that room at all. The furniture in the platoon sergeant’s bedroom was virtually identical to the platoon’s: a steel bed frame with an uncovered mattress. The platoon sergeant’s bed was made as neatly as possible with a poncho liner and Gortex sleeping bag. Sergeant Green had been hunched over the new field manual, fighting off incipient flu, when Duncan entered. One of the other squad leaders had already told him of the harsh words between Duncan and Brecker and their abrupt exit, so he was expecting a report that the fight the other NCOs in the company had been expecting had finally occurred. Duncan’s rapidly delivered request had caught him completely off guard.
“Nothing, Sergeant,” Duncan replied, shocked. It was not that drug use was unknown in the Army, it was just that it was as relentlessly sought out and as rigorously persecuted as homosexuality or communism in the forties and fifties. It was extremely unlikely that he had smoked, dipped, popped, shot or snorted anything not prescribed since his entry ten years before or he would not have lasted ten years. “I just think we’re missing a golden opportunity.”
“So, what is it you want to do?”
“I want to take the squad out to do suit drills, on the parade field. I mean, those movement methods are completely different than what we’re used to. I want to get out there and start working on coordination and timing. I really like the systems they’ve worked out, the way the units move and coordinate. And it would get the squad off its ass, an’, hell, it’d get me off my ass, too.”
“Yeah,” said Sergeant Green after a moment’s consideration. He had been looking at the same sections and wondering when they could start training on it. But the suggestion in the manual about training without suits had not caught his eye. “Okay, I want to get with Top about the rest of it, but here’s what I want you to do. Take your squad out and start them training. Get them as picture perfect as you can. If we stay here three more days, I’ll try to get the rest of the company out there also, and your squad will demonstrate. How’s that?”
“Great!” The first grin Sergeant Green had seen on Duncan since his Article 15 flashed across his face. “We’ll get right on it!”
“Keep the faith, Sergeant,” Green said with a nod. As Duncan bounded out of the room, one of the crushing weights on his shoulders lifted.
The squad was lined up in a wedge formation, with Sergeant Duncan at the apex. He turned to face the eight unhappy looking troops in gray PT sweat suits.
“Right,” he said as the skies began to drizzle again. “The difference between ACS and normal infantry tactics is that ACS calls for much more in the way of shock and speed tactics. Airborne infantry is deliberate compared to ACS; ACS is more like armored cav. We’re going to train on a few simple maneuvers at first. Think of them like football plays: wedge, echelon right, echelon left, lean right, lean left and bounding line. And the only way to train for open field ACS combat is at the run. We’re going to start off slow then work up to speed. Don’t worry, you won’t be noticing the rain a’tall in just a bit.”
“Captain Brandon, sir, it’s the S-3,” called the company clerk through the open door of the commander’s office.
Bob Brandon had been more than halfway expecting the call since his company began intense ACS drills in the parade field two days before. He picked up the extension phone reluctantly. “Captain Brandon.”
“Bob, it’s Major Norton.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Why are your troops training in ACS drills?”
“It seemed the thing to do, sir. We are an ACS unit.”
If Major Norton noted the sarcasm, he declined to comment. “The problem is, too many of these ACS tactics need review. The colonel and I have been studying the manuals and when we’re ready, and by that I mean Operations, we’ll publish a training schedule of what we want trained on. There’s too much armor and not enough infantry in their damned tactics, they’ll get us all killed if we use half that stuff! In the meantime you are to stick to the prescribed training schedule, do you understand that, Captain?”
“Yes, sir. Might I point out that the training schedule calls for equipment maintenance. Our equipment is stored with the S-4.”
“I know what the training schedule calls for, dammit, I wrote it, remember? Next week’s is being revised for some of that ACS work, work that the colonel and I have reviewed and agree with, and until then you are to continue with the published schedule! Am I making myself perfectly clear, Captain, or do I have to have the colonel call you and explain it in greater detail?”
“No, sir, that won’t be necessary. I’ll be speaking to the colonel about this at length in the near future.”
“And this is… ?” asked Sergeant Duncan, holding up a flash card. “Sanborn?”
“Umm, a Lamprey?”
“Right, and a Lamprey is… ?” he asked, referring to the information on the back of the card.