{"id":11944,"date":"2015-10-22T06:01:43","date_gmt":"2015-10-22T10:01:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.royalmontrealregiment.com\/?p=11944"},"modified":"2015-10-22T06:01:43","modified_gmt":"2015-10-22T10:01:43","slug":"rmr-gets-back-to-basics-with-shovels-rifles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/rmr-gets-back-to-basics-with-shovels-rifles\/","title":{"rendered":"RMR Gets Back To Basics With Shovels & Rifles"},"content":{"rendered":"

Written by Private Katherine Forrest, a Rifleman in 9 Platoon, Charlie Company GPE<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"IMG_6631\"<\/a>
RMR fireteam partners enjoying the frosty morning<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

22 October 2015, Westmount, Quebec – If you ask an average civilian what they think of when you say \u201carmy training\u201c, they\u00a0might respond by saying \u201clots of shooting, the sound of explosions going off in the distance,\u00a0people yelling orders, bodies being dragged back to safe points, etc\u201d. While this type of\u00a0moment driven action training is very important to the infantry, it is only a small percentage of\u00a0what actually happens on GPE\u2019s and in real combat (Editors note<\/span>: “GPE” is the French acronym for\u00a0“Groupe Principale d’Entrainement”<\/em> which is the grouping together of soldiers from various units to form a composite rifle company of approximately 150 soldiers for training events).<\/p>\n

The GPE that I took part in from the 25th to the 27th of September was a company level\u00a0exercise that pulled together RMR, Blackwatch and CGG to develop fundamental skills of laying\u00a0out a defensive position. It was the first time for most troops on the ground that the efforts of\u00a0the exercise were concentrated on a defensive position and as well many years in which the\u00a0RMR had ran a company level GPE. Therefore, everything that needed to happen took more\u00a0time to organise.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6630\"<\/a>
Welcome to the Infantry, here’s your shovel…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

During the GPE exercise, the participants along with myself stayed in hides overnight\u00a0and during the day we worked at digging to level two trenches. At the end of the exercise we\u00a0did a withdrawal from our position. While the long cold waits in the RV points and trenches\u00a0might have been painful for some of the troops, it was a reality check that showed us how\u00a0much planning and work goes into setting up defensive positions and what a real life operation\u00a0might look like.<\/p>\n

The biggest obstacle of this GPE for me was the weather. Trying to adjust my body\u00a0temperature to the cold and learning how to layer for different activities was a challenge.\u00a0Luckily I could look to more experienced members for advice on how to stay warm. I know that\u00a0this is what most of the newly qualified infanteers did.<\/p>\n

Another challenge was learning how to pack my rucksack. There was no transport to\u00a0bring us to and from our positions so we had to carry everything we needed on our backs. We\u00a0had to work together to share the loads and learn what is and what is not worth carrying.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6634\"<\/a>
LMG Gunner Waiting For an Assault<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

For me the highlight of this GPE was on Saturday when we practised section attacks.\u00a0There were a few newly PLQ qualified Corporals who were section commanders and section\u00a02IC\u2019s. They had the chance to run through section attacks and learn from more experienced\u00a0Master Corporals and Sergeants. The first section attack we did was a little chaotic, some\u00a0members were crossing into other people\u2019s firing arc\u2019s, some of us were struggling with stoppages\u00a0while under contact and the section IC\u2019s were all over the place with their orders. It took a few\u00a0hours of practice but by lunch time I felt confident with how our section advanced to contact\u00a0and I felt comfortable with the people I was working with.<\/p>\n

This GPE was challenging for me and for many of the guys I was training with. The\u00a0constant cold weather and the long hours of waiting took a toll on the morale of the troops.\u00a0The exercise did however give us a chance to develop skills that some of us had never practised\u00a0and that others had forgotten about. As infanteers, this exercise brought us back to our roots of\u00a0digging trenches and ruck marching to our positions. It forced us to develop skills that some of\u00a0the senior NCM\u2019s said we had started to lose over the years of doing offensive operations.<\/p>\n

\"IMG_6635\"<\/a>
Sunrise in Valcartier<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This type of training will hopefully continue on the upcoming GPE\u2019s run by the RMR. I am looking forward to next GPE where we will be continuing where we\u00a0left off to further our knowledge of defensive operations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Written by Private Katherine Forrest, a Rifleman in 9 Platoon, Charlie Company GPE 22 October 2015, Westmount, Quebec – If you ask an average civilian what they think of when<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11944\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rmrmuseum.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}