#11
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From 93-96 I was with the 1/4 Inf Battalion at the Combat Manuver Training Center in Bavaria, Germany. We were next door to a small village called Hohenfels.
The 1/4 Inf was an Opfor unit. Sometimes called Opposing Force. We "fought" not only American units, but Spanish, French, Dutch, German and Italian. We had MILES equipment not only for individual soldiers, but vehicles to include helicopters. As an individual soldier I had a harness that I wore in place of the LBE harness. It had sensors on it. I also had a laser emmiter that would fire a laser whenever I fired a blank round.The emmitor clipped onto the top of my M16 barrel. If I was hit by a laser beam my sensor harness would emit a high pierced squeal. In order to turn it off I had to remove the key from my laser emiter and use it to turn off the squeal box. Once I did that I could no longer fire my weapon so I was out of play. We also had laser emmiters for our machine guns. The Observer controlers had what we called a God Gun. So if an artillery barrage, air strike or what not was called in they could do an area kill with their god gun and take out multiple soldiers, vehicles ect with that god gun. The could also bring back dead soldiers. There was more to it of course, but that gives you an idea of what was involved. The MILES beams could be defeated by heavy moisture in the air like rain/snow and they could be blocked by things like tree leaves. But at the time it was the best we had to simulate real combat without using real ammo. For those who care the 1/4 Inf Bn has it's own website as does the CMTC at Hohenfels. |
#12
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Ugh, don't say CMTC, it provokes bad memories. I've spent WAY too much of my life at the one in Wainwright.
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#13
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LOL. I still get that same reaction from vets who trained at CMTC-Hohenfels when I tell them I was stationed there. I just tell them that if they think the few months they spent there during their overseas tour was rough they should have tried living there for three years!
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