hi all,

i've heard along the line that MBT and aslav crewman are being offered deployments with SOTG.

now, i'm not saying this is false as i was told the SASR guys want the lavs as they offer better protection which makes alot of sense in there given role.
but, i'm a little curious about the crewman themselves who take on this role as a driver for these patrols.

do they just get attached to SASR and do the pre deployment training witth them (if they actually do that i don't know???) or do they have to complete a course, some fitness standard to be able to cut it out there ect)

i find it very hard to beleive that SASR would even want to take the average crewman on ops with them if they havnt proven themselves to be able to take on this sort of role.


discuss

Drivers for cars. 6RAR has done a fair bit of it in the past.

This sounds a bit iffy to me.

Why would the SASR want ASLAVs? I could understand 2CDO wanting them, maybe, from time to time. If its fire power they're looking for then my guess is the SAS boys are being employed for the wrong ops. If their bread and butter is recon and recon relies on being discreet, then I can't see how you can make an ASLAV discreet.

Also, from what I've read, the bushie offers as good, if not better, protection from IEDs than the ASLAV.



Agreed.

Driving cars in high threat situations is what they're trained to do. I'm sure they're up to the job.

I'm sure there are plenty of crewman that would consider themselves to be a bit more than 'average'. I would assume not just any digger is sent, but the unit would select their better soldiers to deploy on SOTG support.
They are better at crewing these vehicles than the SASR or 2 CDO soldiers, due to the fact they work in them everyday.

The benefit of a LAV over a Bushmaster is obviously Firepower.

I've spoken first hand to an MBT Crewman who was deployed with the SOTG.

I don't see anything overly strange about it, why not deploy people who are trained in the use and maintanence of these vehicles?

And wouldn't you almost be wasting an SF operator by taking him out of his section to drive the vehicle?

You'd be surprised how stealthy you can get with some decent training in A-veh driving.

I've had some crafty Armoured corps mates sneak up on me a couple of times. I knew an A-veh was in the grid square, but not precisely where until it almost ran me over.

There's also a few different ways of inserting recon troops into an area discreetly without giving the game away too much. We've been using those methods with SASR and other recon teams since Viet Nam.

Let me tell you, some of them are fun, and some are downright scary with fresh, inexperienced crewman.

BM drivers have been used in the SOTG for some time. This is nothing new. I'm not amazed at how little people think they know what the Regiment and 2 Cdo get up to.

I was referring more to the use of ASLAVs during ops. By 'during' I mean having armour in support for the length of the operation. I can understand using them for insertion and extraction as this would be the time when a patrol would be likely to be compromised.

I am aware of the use of various methods to insert SAS patrols.

I've always thought of typical SF ops as being short and sharp using speed and precision to compensate for a lack of fire power. But maybe this is just proof of my ignorance.

I know 2CDO are performing conventional ops as well as unconventional ops in Afghanistan at the moment so I can understand the use of ALSAVs during the more conventional ops.



When I agreed with this I was thinking more of what would happen if the vehicle was disabled during a contact. If the cav boys have to get out and hump it and fight alongside SOTG operators. Whether or not this likely to happen or whether or not it would be a problem I don't know. But fitness and skill issues could arise. Having said that, I'm sure the same could be said for helicopter pilots, etc

Fight to the next car and pile in. Problem solvered. They are arms corps diggers. They should be able to do a bit of firing and moving.