Unlocking. Extraction. Ejection. Loading. Insertion. Locking. Firing.

Repeat as necessary.

=========

G-R-I-T or GRIT = Group, Range, Indication, Type-of-Fire

e.g. Two Platoon, 100 (metres), reference lone pine at 2 o'clock, two fingers right at edge of tree line - enemy hiding behind bush, RA-PID FIRE!

It's nice being able to write whatever I want to - not that I need to but since I'm tired, I though tI'd take a moment to concentrate on the things which I haven't had to use in a while and practice. Greg is very well read and surpasses even myself and probably all the officers combined. Bit of a prick. Annoying as well but still very well read and a definate know-it-all. This contrasts with Rad who is young, eager and Polish. Which makes him very eager and agressive and not so concerned with authority unless he works directly for you and can't either outrun you or outfight you - anything else in any shape rank or form is fair game for his wanton lack of respect. I'm sure being chosen top candidate did not a little to swell his head.

How is anyone supposed to weave this disparate mob into a team of officers who can work together in the field and not get themselves, let alone their troops, killed?

Lieutenant John Milne is the senior subbie, or subaltern. He is 37 and living in Portland, Oregon with his ex-girlfriend, now his new wife, Katherine, while he finishes up his cyropractic education. John is a lean, jovial, friendly scot with a border accent in his head (that'd be the Scottish border) and we are always exchanging knowing glances when we catch each other using the humour and wit of the old country and it sometimes seems that we only know. John reminds me greatly of what the English, or British still do right - they grow up with a good sense of right and 3wrong and don't have a huge hangup about 2 very annoying North American traits: the worry about liability and the political correctness. When he and I say "handicapped" or "crippled", there is no malice in it. He does not bat an eyelid and doesn't hesitate to have some holigan up against the locker by the scruff of their collar or neck. For all my education and experiences, I am less prone to doing stuff like that but the sentiment is there. "Good luck" he says to me as he leaves for Portland - knowing that I'd be lef tin a sea of new officers with little to do about control and everything to do with keeping sane and "helping" them alone with how officers should act.

Impressionables: Vlad, Nick, Roland - mostly well entrenched into the Rad version of life, seeing as they want to learn from the best, and rightly so. Too bad they the subbies are mostly on their own and don't have anyone to rein them in, so we dont' churn out little monsters like Rad who admitted that he doesn't intend to take prisoners. As far as he's concerned, other than it being beyond his capacity as a warrior-leader, the precedent has been set somewhere and he is intent on following it to his utmost. Whatever doesn't get his troops killed.

Well, what happens when the troops start dying? I have no doubt that Rad will be the first to win the VC. With his natural athleticism and boyish need to fulfill himself, he will do well. But I seem to recall the old adage - don't share a trench with someone braver than you are. Luck and fortune, true to its own adage, are with him for he is nothing if not audacious.

For now.

Then again, it is meet that junior officers should be wild for if they are not, they are already useless, for they will not act when need be and the ability to know what can and cannot be done is best learned by being told and no-one tells you if you do the cautious thing all the time. Where's the senior subbie when you need him. Hang on - I'm the senior subbie when John's not here.

Good luck indeed.



Must try to find a copy of John Masters' "Bugles and a tiger".