Jim let him go, a little reluctantly, and Jack and Caleb shook hands.
“Jim, this is Caleb Jackson, we went through Ranger School together. He’s an asshole, but don’t worry about it,” Jack grinned. Turning back to Caleb, “What’s the deal buddy?”
“I’m the platoon leader of this sorry bunch,” said Caleb, “good to see you man.”
The atmosphere had visibly relaxed and the onlookers started to disperse. Jack, Jim and Caleb went to grab a coffee and catch up on the porch of the farm building. They spent several hours sitting around catching up and discussing the tactical readiness of Caleb’s platoon, as well as the training program. Caleb had been a lieutenant in a light infantry Battalion.
“Hey you!” came the forceful female shout from over by the barn.
What now?
Jack looked up.
“Oh no,” said Caleb, shrinking into his chair.
Advancing across the farmyard was a healthy looking young woman dressed in boots, BDU pants and a tight thermal base layer top, red hair streaming out behind her. She was fixed on Jim, and it did not look like it was going to go down well for him. Jim was looking confused, which was a first for Jack.
She halted at the bottom of the porch steps, “Which of you sorry assed cowboys are responsible for organizing the female accommodation?”
Jack and Jim shared a look, understanding dawning. Oops.
Jim stood up. The woman put her hands on her hips, and smiled at him.
Jim went red.
Jack stood up.
“Who are you,” said Jack.
“THAT is Megan,” said Caleb, grinning.
Megan shot Caleb a look. “I’m Megan, I’m your paramedic.”
“Ok,” Jack said, “Megan, my apologies. I’m Jack Berenger, I’m running the training here. We overlooked the female accommodation. What do you need?”
“Look, it’s not a big deal, but you just need to partition an area off. We don’t want to be changing in there with the guys.”
“Ok,” said Jack, “give us a minute to figure this out.”
“No problem,” she said with a smile, before giving Jim a look and walking away.
“So, you met Megan,” Caleb chortled.
Jim was still looking a little embarrassed.
“She’s not short on character, I’ll tell you that. She was a civilian paramedic and a flight medic in the army reserves. She knows her stuff, and don’t mess with her, she’ll bust your balls.”
“Well,” said Jack, “that was our little ‘Xena, Warrior Princess’ moment for the day. Jim, what the hell were we thinking? What are we going to do with the females?”
“Boss, it’s bigger than that,” said Jim. “We can partition off a sleeping area, but what about all the extra-curricular shenanigans that will end up going on?”
“Yea,” said Caleb with a grin, “maybe you need to ban the wearing of thermal base layers then?”
Jack gave him a look, “Ok, let’s fix this.”
They sat and discussed it. It was relatively simple to partition an area for the females to sleep in, and they called over one of the carpenters and asked him to get on to it immediately.
The issue was bigger.
The solution they came up with was that the females would go through the training exactly the same as the guys. If they made the grade, with the same standards applied, they would be deployed in the teams with the men. If they fell short, they would be employed in other roles, just like the guys.
It was apparent that a good portion of the females were medics, and they would be useful in a medical role at base.
The ‘fraternization’ issue was bigger. They needed more time to figure it out, but they came up with a short term conclusion that it was not really going to pose a problem. If couples got together, that was fine, so long as it was discrete, at appropriate times, and did not get in the way of training.
If it ended up affecting training or operations, then a solution would be contrived, usually moving the involved people around as best as possible. If people got up to anything that was considered unseemly, like having sex at inappropriate times and places, it would be dealt with accordingly.
Common sense seemed to be the best solution.
It looked like out of the projected one hundred and twenty strong fighting company that they would train after all the recruits were in, around forty of those would be females. It was a new thing for Jack and Jim, but they would incorporate the females into areas they were qualified for, showed aptitude at, and could handle just as their male counterparts were expected to do.
One of Jacks pet projects involved what he was calling the ‘thermal poncho’. He had a bunch of the ladies back at Zulu working on the creation of them based on a prototype that he had designed.
He had taken an old style BDU camouflage poncho; on the bottom side he had placed a mylar thermal space blanket, one of the green ones so it remained tactical. On the top side, the side that faced up when the poncho was used as a shelter, he had laid a swathe of drab colored cloth. Onto this cloth he had sewn strips of burlap and camouflage cloth.
The poncho on its own would have been a better waterproof shelter, but he was concerned by the shine of the plastic waterproof material. The cloth laid over it would get wet but it would appear more natural. The sewn in pieces of cloth created a ghillie suit effect, although a lot less densely packed; to sew on massive amounts of cloth like a ghillie suit would have created a huge and unwieldy item, particularly when wet.
He could have used something like the army poncho liner instead of the poncho, which would have reduced the shine effect, but he wanted the thermal poncho to actually work as a rain tarp that the fighters could use when sleeping out, and thus be waterproof. The poncho also added strength to the whole thing, as well as having the eyeholes to string it up.
The effect was that the mylar blanket blocked the heat signature from the person underneath, the poncho allowed it to be strung up and kept the rain off, and the cloth on the topside gave it more of a natural surface appearance through optics.
What was also important about this thermal masking concept was the clearance between the blanket and the person underneath; if the person touched the blanket, body heat would transfer and heat up the blanket, thus eventually showing the thermal signature.
Jack hoped that the standard use of these thermal ponchos when conducting operations out in the woods should allow for thermal screening.
Jack intended for the fighters to develop a standard operating procedure so that for all halts of more than a few minutes, and tactical positions, they would always put up the poncho between pairs of fighters, however much of a chore it became.
He wanted them to carry it at all times as part of their personal equipment, rolled up like a bedroll. They would also carry tent pegs and paracord or bungees pre-attached to the poncho eye-holes. Using this set-up, and sometimes a couple of cut sticks, they would always be able to string it up, whether off trees or from the cut ‘tent poles’.
Thus when they overnighted in a patrol base, or laid in ambush, or whatever they were doing, they should be able to conceal themselves from aerial surveillance. The ponchos themselves were also well camouflaged, with the ghillie suit effect, from visual surveillance, so in that sense they were an excellent camouflage asset.
Jack and Jim had discussed the concept and design of the thermal ponchos at some length and agreed it was a good plan and design. If feedback were to come from the fighters that the design could or should be improved, they were happy to make the modifications.
One of the problems they had was a lack of thermal imaging gear to actually test the ponchos, so they would have to rely for the moment on their theoretical design, in the knowledge that at least they had considered the thermal threat and taken steps to counter it.