RSS Feed
April 23rd, 2013 
Aussie Diggers in 1916: seated, from left, Capt TK Maltby, Capt EGT Permezel and Lt GL Makin; standing, Lt HM Griffiths, left, and Lt JW Dwyer. Picture: Australian War Memorial
Source: Supplied
WHEN the first Australian and New Zealand troops arrived at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915 to forge the Anzac legend, mass infantry formations marching towards enemy infantry formations, bayonets fixed and suffering hideous losses was how infantry warfare was done.
Like the American Civil War and the Crimean War before it, the team with more men standing at the end of the battle was the winner.
Fast forward a century to the high-tech era of the Strategic Private and the level of troop losses recorded in the Great War from 1914 to 1918 are politically, morally and socially unacceptable and firepower rather than manpower usually wins the day.
At the extreme end of modern day warfare the combatants can even be sitting in a room 10,000 km away directing an unmanned drone to fire a missile to take out the enemy.
By the end of World War 1 Australian General John Monash had proven the benefits of a more strategic approach to infantry battles and employing firepower in support of small groups of diggers. The infantry section was born.
Private Brendan Bottalico, from the Australian 1st Mentoring and Reconstruction Task Force mans a F89 machine gun provides cover as members of his platoon move out to check ruins suspected of containing insurgent weapons caches, during Operation Tura Ghar in the Baluchi Valley, southern Afghanistan.
The section still exists and in Afghanistan sections of diggers have been patrolling the badlands and engaging the enemy just as their forefathers did in World War 2, Korea and Vietnam.
The difference is that the modern-day soldier has a vast array of firepower from artillery, precision guided weapons and air power at his or her disposal.
The bottom line at places such as the Battle of Derapet, where Corporal Dan Keighran was awarded the Victoria Cross of Australia, remains infantry soldiers armed with small arms advancing on an enemy also armed with small arms. It was the actions and decisions of Sergeants, Corporals and Private soldiers that determined the outcome.
Major General John Caligari in an infantry officer who served as an Operations Officer in Somalia in 1993 and a battalion commander in East Timor in 1999.
As the the military’s Head of Capability Systems and the former head of modernisation for the Army, he says the modern soldier is a far better equipped and trained warrior than his predecessor from WW1.
Soldiers carry more weight because of body armour and technology and other supplies, but they don’t carry it very far.
“These days diggers can patrol with very little weight and the heavy gear will be delivered to them by vehicle or aircraft,” Gen Caligari said.
In addition to technology and support the biggest change, he says, has been the ability of the soldier to think.
“In WW1 the digger did as he was told. ‘When the whistle blows go over the top in that direction’. In WW2 the Germans taught us about ‘intent’ and telling soldiers what the plan was so they could make their own decisions. Now it is down to section level where big decisions are made by Corporals and even Privates,” he said.
As technology speeds ahead the big debate in modern armies involves mobility versus armour.
How much protection does a soldier require before he or she becomes ineffective as a warrior?
Is it better to stop the bullet or avoid it in the first place?
General Caligari said insurgents in Afghanistan relied on mobility because that, and the insidious home made IED, was all that they had.
“We can’t lose sight of the fact that f the insurgents flee on foot from the battle then there is no way our soldiers will catch them,” he said.
Australian War Memorial historian Peter Burness said the individual soldier today was a far more capable individual than the diggers of WW1.
“Today’s soldier is an eager and highly specialised individual weapons unit,” he said.
“There wasn’t much call for individuals at Gallipoli or the Western Front.”
Meanwhile technology will develop at a rapid pace.
The future soldier will have better training and the latest technology including night vision, intelligent weapons that can see around corners, superior and lighter body armour and he or she will be networked with other war fighting assets including drones.
They might also wear clothing with solar panels embedded in the fabric so they can charge the array of power sources needed to remain networked.
Source Article from http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/newscomauthenationndm/~3/LSThdhqcRmM/story01.htm
Views: 0
Posted in 
