weaknesses in urban reconnaissance

[Slowpoke]

I may be a little biased, OK a lot, but I don't beleive you can have too much information when you're going into battle. The way to get that information is through Recon! Wheather it's the darkest or the busiest city, it can be done. In the early years in RVN, not many in the Chain of Command thought you could send a small team into the jungle and get any of them back with any useful information. They were wrong then, and they are wrong now.

[Steadfast]

Reconnaissance will always be necessary. That recent movie with Mel Gibson, "We were soldiers once".......proved the need for reconnaissance. Last thing any commander needs is putting his troops in a strong military fortification of the enemy. I believe that Urban Reconnaissance (UR) needs a whole new set of variables to complete the mission. The needs of UR of yesterday is not the same today. I have wondered how missions can be carried out using "black" as you say sotb. I know our country is at the forefront using night vision, IR, Stealth, laser's and a good small force with contingency plans, should a SNAFU arise. And a large back up of Fighter's & Bomber's and AC-130's if necessary. Let us hope that our forces never have to go into an area cuffed by a President without the backbone to conduct missions.

[Steadfast]

You bring out strong points sotb. It definitely is a good read. I enjoyed it. I hear your lament on the lack of reconnaissance by the Marine Corps. But I believe there are many army units that still use reconnaissance to this day. But I don't think we can fully cover the topic as many here feel there are too many eyes looking at our marbles.

On another note it sounds typical that the Marines always stress team work. By bringing FR back into the fold, The soldiers that would general be behind you are actually alongside you. Working on one goal. The Army today is doing basically the same thing by awarding regular troops the black beret and now no longer a priority for Rangers to get a ranger cut. The army is effectively causing all soldiers to blend together. So that Ranger's will no longer stand out except for their Tan Beret.

[Slowpoke]

One of the things that was mentioned in the study (its in one of the downloadable portions), is that for some reason, Marine reconnaissance units no longer practice inserting as part of a larger grunt force. We used to refer to it as "drop-off" inserts. WTF? If a unit is going to walk through an AO, right in the open, what better way to get to that AO than to accompany them and just kinda dissappear while that unit continues to move on? To me, this has stopped happening BECAUSE of the animosity and rivalry that exists between the racoon units and the infantry. Its a shame.

In RVN these were called "stay behind" missions. A little tricky to pull off well, but they usually led to some great info on enemy movements after a unit had left the area.

It's not really surprising that higher eschelon commanders haven't a clue as to how best to use Recon troops. They have a real problem understanding the capabilities and usefulness of a good Recon Team because their own training was lacking in that area. Recon Units, by their very nature, point out that a Commander doesn't know all there is to know, and that can be damaging to a fragile ego. Rather than admit their own shortcomings, they'd rather charge right in and kill everything in sight.

It's kinda sad that the Marines are limiting their use of Recon Units. The Army, on the other hand, seems to be expanding the use of Recon Teams.

[rgrpuck]

The biggest problem with the recon mission is the fact that there has to be a commander that is willing to put a tram of guys on the ground. Many commanders have issue with that .....will the recon compromise my intent? ...what happens if they get busted ? ....Recon is asset intensive ie Aircraft...

So the problem is we have too many recon assets, and not enough platforms to go around. deconflicting these assets to use them at the max potential is a huge problem. Coupled with the fact that commanders are very Casualty adverse. Alot of them look at the risk of recon being greater than the need.

I dont agree with it but thats what I have observed.

[Silverback]

Are we speaking of Strategic or Tactical Reconnaissance ?

[Horned Toad]

This thread blows my mind, I thought the military would be setting the bar on this one.

there ya go with that thinking again :D

[Silverback]

I think the underlying issue here is that we are a force that is "modernizing" the way we fight without modernizing the way we think. When the invasion force went into Iraq we occupied "Safe houses". The safe houses were the perfect way in our eyes to project force and make contact with the smallest element possible. SF has been occupying safe house for ages and this is something we did solely because it made sense. Fast forward 3-years thursday, I was getting an OIF O&I briefing from a unit that just returned and one of their success stories was...their Battalion commander had the vision to occupy "Patrol bases", The "Patrol Bases" were houses that his companies occupied in order to secure some of the routes within his sector and project his force into his sector.

Morale of the story? Rather than demonstrate the least amount of intellectual effort, the Army reverted to a doctrinal term to describe these "Patrol bases" rather than think freely and call them what they actually were....Safe houses.

As far as recon goes, the Humint in Iraq is primarily gathered by Iraqis on Iraqis. During the Invasion we passed out alot of money and we received alot of Humint in exchange. Some of the Humint was bad, Some of it was good. Here's are some of the particulars of Humint in Iraq

1. Everyone in Iraq has an agenda and will be motivated to shape the battlefield in order to achieve their agenda. Example: A member of the Jaburi tribe will give you all kinds of information on a member of the Obedi tribe. The same individual that gives you the information to "Make Iraq free" would never in a second tell you if a cousin from his tribe lived off of the flesh of live babies!

2. Money may create intelligence that didn't exist before the five dollar bill saw day light.

3. There are a very limited number of IED builders but an unlimited amount of IED emplacers. It's like high school, the guy smoking the weed isn't normally the guy who's selling the weed.

4. Just when you think you're sneaky...an Iraqi dog let's you know he's smarter than you (He barks)

Iraq is a unique enviroment in which we have fostered a very successful insurgency since the bginning of the gulf war. Iraq cannot be compared to the border with Mexico, Iraq cannot be compared to a rotation at JRTC. There are a whole slew of things that we will never understand about Iraq. The O&I briefing I received this week did teach me one thing, I knew alot of shit the last time I was there that I have to remember this time if I want my soldiers to return alive.