Us Army Drill & No Ammo

[E20thLRP]

AHhhhh Anyone Going to the Sand Box will be issued AMMO and a chance
to Zero individual weapon I don't know what Unit that was But
I live in the Fort Benning (you know home of the Infantry) area and just called the Boss at Range
Control and he told me that was B.S. now this could of happened
the supply Sargent forgot to order ammo for them to Qualify and
they would not have it for that day !! but we had enough on hand
for Physical year 2007 that Lake City and others were working .......... working .......24/7 .....
to get caught up !!! BUT THE CIVILAN MARKET might feel it first !!
Echo.....Out

 

[Vern Humphrey]

This was the "standard system" when I went and looking back on it now it strikes me as rather Soviet.

Armies are not warm and cuddly -- they do what they have to do.

Nevertheless, the system orders or reserves all required resources well ahead of time -- if you can't get what you need, you have time to reschedule that training, and do something else in the interm.

 

[Titan6]

Well at least they gave every man a gun instead of every squad. The soviets were very responsible for turning the Eastern front into the meat grinder it was but logisitcs played a role also. I think the OP was saying that he suspects a logisitcs problem when this is likely a paperwork problem.

 

[U.S.SFC_RET]

Every Batallion has an Ammunition Officer in charge and an Noncommissioned Officer in Charge The NCOIC for short has this job at Batallion level as his sole job. That is his bread and butter job. He went to school for it. Ammunition supply. Ordnance Ammunition,how they eat and ship whatever type of ammunition the U.S. Army needs to fulfill whatever mission requires. The sole purpose of anyone in the Army is to put steel on target. Mechanics fix vehicles so ultimately the vehicle either puts soldiers on the battle site to put steel on target or the weapon platform.
Understand it this way. Ammunition Supply Sergeant is not just a supply Sergeant who orders whatever the unit needs. Ammunition Supply Sergeants deal strictly with ammunition and is a close advisor to the commander on the ground dealing with ammunition requirements.
Range Officers are often simply elected by their commanders to run the range. They are often not even qualified to give you an appropriate answer as to why the ammunition didn't get there. His response could be the typical response "supply forgot to order it"
What probably happened was funds got diverted and the ammunition purposly did not get ordered and the training did not get cancelled.
There is short term planning for training and there is long term planning. Short term planning is used to make sure range time gets cancelled if ammunition is not available for whatever reason.
Long term planning is used to plan the range, set aside funds for ammunition. calender planning, yada, yada, yada. The basics.
These tools are an attempt to cut the last minute crunch time out of the way. To manage time more effectively. To limit the hurry up and wait.

 

[trueblue1776]

Ha ha ha ha ha ha

Ok, I'm not gonna call anybody a military noob, but...

Ammo is a command/supply function, you just have some retards in your division. It happens. If your supply guys are clever they'll civilian source it that day, and get some ammo quick.

Not to bust any balls, but if these guys have been in the Army for any period of time, who cares about range qualification?

 

[U.S.SFC_RET]

trueblue1776 Quoted:

Ammo is a command/supply function, you just have some retards in your division. It happens. If your supply guys are clever they'll civilian source it that day, and get some ammo quick

Impossible, how could they source civilian ammunition? The accounts get tracked and they get busted and lose their career. Civilians cannot supply the military with ammunition, it must be controlled.
Ammunition is readily available right on post. All they need is a truck with the proper hazmat cards on the side and a qualified driver who is licensed to go and pick it up. Proper paperwork should have been done up. These guys know the drill, they more than likely been doing it long enoughand can do it standing on their heads.
Government Ammunition is one of the most tightly controlled commodities on military installations. World wide. One of the reasons why the military will never accept cilivilian ammunition is the lack of control due to incoming venues, proper storageability factors of the residual ammunition leftover after the range.
You just can't order up any ol kind of 5.56- 223 ammunition either, soldier's careers depend on it, lives depend on it as well. If it doesn't shoot as well as stringent military ammunition that has been tested then many factors turn it into a can of worms.
That potential E-4 cannot make E-5 because his promotion points won't be high enough to make the cut. That soldier win't be trained properly to shoot out to 300 meters.

 

[ID_shooting]

Things may have drasticly changed since I was in, but one of my funtions as Armorer was to req ammo. When we did our bi-annual qual all I had to do was request a 4 man detail from the platoon sergeants, grab a 5-ton and drive to the ASP. I had a nice signature card on file with my commander's authority and sign for what I thought we needed (I had a formula, X# of troops = X# of rounds.) Simple as that. Our budget was set so that we had funds for shooting twice a year and this was in a REMF transportation company, albeit BRO, still a REMF unit.

No "ammo officers" no "ammo NCOIC" just one lowly E4 CPL doing his job.

Somthing smells fishy to me...

 

[trueblue1776]

Impossible, how could they source civilian ammunition?

Materials of urgent need are acquired the fastest way possible. I can't help but notice the "RET" in your handle, it is entirely possible that things change.

 

[TexasRifleman]

Wow!! Supply can be screwed up? That could never happen

From the "How to Be A Supply Officer Home Study Course" manual....

Supply Officer: Walk from bedroom to bedroom with magical bottomless cup of coffee in hand. Skillfully bring fellow housemates' misfortunes to the forefront to steer conversation away from the fact that they are forced to use saran wrap as underwear while waiting for the standard 3 week laundry turnaround period to expire

and of course the famous Skipjack toilet paper episode. (true by the way)

USS SKIPJACK

June 11, 1942

From: Commanding Officer

To: Supply Officer, Navy Yard, Mare Island, California
Via: Commander Submarines, Southwest Pacific

Subject: Toilet Paper
Reference: (a) USS HOLLAND (5148) USS SKIPJACK req. 70-42 of 30 July 1941.
(b) SO NYMI Canceled invoice No. 272836

Enclosure: (1) Copy of cancelled Invoice
(2) Sample of material requested.

1. This vessel submitted a requisition for 150 rolls of toilet paper on July 30, 1941, to USS HOLLAND. The material was ordered by HOLLAND from the Supply Officer, Navy Yard, Mare Island, for delivery to USS SKIPJACK.
2. The Supply Officer, Navy Yard, Mare Island, on November 26, 1941, cancelled Mare Island Invoice No. 272836 with the stamped notation "Cancelled---cannot identify." This cancelled invoice was received by SKIPJACK on June 10, 1942.
3. During the 11 ¾ months elapsing from the time of ordering the toilet paper and the present date, the SKIPJACK personnel, despite their best efforts to await delivery of subject material, have been unable to wait on numerous occasions, and the situation is now quite acute, especially during depth charge attack by the "back-stabbers."
4. Enclosure (2) is a sample of the desired material provided for the information of the Supply Officer, Navy Yard, Mare Island. The Commanding Officer, USS SKIPJACK cannot help but wonder what is being used in Mare Island in place of this unidentifiable material, once well known to this command.
5. SKIPJACK personnel during this period have become accustomed to use of "ersatz," i.e., the vast amount of incoming non-essential paper work, and in so doing feel that the wish of the Bureau of Ships for the reduction of paper work is being complied with, thus effectively killing two birds with one stone.
6. It is believed by this command that the stamped notation "cannot identify" was possible error, and that this is simply a case of shortage of strategic war material, the SKIPJACK probably being low on the priority list.
7. In order to cooperate in our war effort at a small local sacrifice, the SKIPJACK desires no further action be taken until the end of the current war, which has created a situation aptly described as "war is hell."
J.W. Coe

 

[entropy]

Things may have drasticly changed since I was in, but one of my funtions as Armorer was to req ammo. When we did our bi-annual qual all I had to do was request a 4 man detail from the platoon sergeants, grab a 5-ton and drive to the ASP. I had a nice signature card on file with my commander's authority and sign for what I thought we needed (I had a formula, X# of troops = X# of rounds.) Simple as that. Our budget was set so that we had funds for shooting twice a year and this was in a REMF transportation company, albeit BRO, still a REMF unit.

No "ammo officers" no "ammo NCOIC" just one lowly E4 CPL doing his job.

Somthing smells fishy to me...

+1. ID_shooting! I got stuck with it too, and danged if I didn't happen to order a few extra thousand rounds each time so I got my 'trigger time' in after everyone else qual'd.

 

[Jeff White]

Ammunition management is a joint S3-S4 Operation

ID_shooting said;

Things may have drasticly changed since I was in, but one of my funtions as Armorer was to req ammo. When we did our bi-annual qual all I had to do was request a 4 man detail from the platoon sergeants, grab a 5-ton and drive to the ASP. I had a nice signature card on file with my commander's authority and sign for what I thought we needed (I had a formula, X# of troops = X# of rounds.) Simple as that. Our budget was set so that we had funds for shooting twice a year and this was in a REMF transportation company, albeit BRO, still a REMF unit.

No "ammo officers" no "ammo NCOIC" just one lowly E4 CPL doing his job.

Somthing smells fishy to me...

entropy said;

+1. ID_shooting! I got stuck with it too, and danged if I didn't happen to order a few extra thousand rounds each time so I got my 'trigger time' in after everyone else qual'd.

How long ago did you guys serve? I can't remember the training ammunition system ever working that way in the Army and I served from 6 Dec 74 thru 1 Nov 03. From 1983 on, ammunition management was part of my job as a Readiness/Training NCO.

The Army publishes a standards document for weapons training. It's known as STRAC (don't ask me what the acronym stands for, it's not coming to me at the moment). This document sets out exactly how many rounds each soldier is authorized for each type of training event. It's also MOS specific. In other words a rifleman assigned to a rifle or scout squad will have more qualification requirements and hence more ammo, then say a truck driver. The STRAC tells the commander what training events he has to do to qualify his soldiers to the Army standard.

The commander takes the STRAC, the doctrinal publications for his unit and sits down and plans his training for the next two years. When he decides when and where he's going to conduct his training, the plan goes up the chain of command for approval. The higher commanders, who in most cases own the resources such as fuel, ammunition etc. approve the plan and agree to resource it, or tell the subordinate commander to make changes in it.

Once the plan is approved, the operations side of the house turns in a forecast of ammunition requirements and the locations where the ammunition will be used. Then the process goes to the logistics side of the house and they actually order the ammunition on a DA Form 581. A copy of the DA581 goes to the supporting ASP (ammunition supply point) for the location where the training will be conducted. The ASP then sets the ammunition aside or physically has it transferred from whatever location it's at to the ASP that will support the training. Then, when it's time to conduct the training, someone from the unit goes to the ASP and actually draws the ammo and transports it to the range.

Sometimes there are snafus. 5.56 linked was in short supply for almost the entire time the M249 was in service. I don't know how many times I was issued ammo on stripper clips or in cardboard boxes and had to conduct SAW qualification using magazines.

A good ammunition manager at unit level kept in close contact with the ammunition manager at whatever level actually owned the ammo. It seemed like there were always units that didn't use all of their allocated ammo, and it was often possible to get the surplus reallocated to your unit. Then you can get your soldiers some extra trigger time.

Since in most cases a unit doesn't own it's ammunition, the higher headquarters does, training events can be changed because the higher level commander may have an unexpected higher priority training event that causes him to reallocate one unit's ammunition to another. The guy in the unit who's coming to drill is probably only going to know that they have no ammo when he comes to drill, not why there is no ammo.

All soldiers must be qualified with their individual weapons before overseas deployment. The unit will shoot before they go.

As for civilian ammo, I've seen it once. When the M9 was adopted the Army stopped procuring .45 ammo. As it ran out, contracting officers at levels way above the company level bought commercial .45 ball for qualification requirements. The commercial ammo was issued from the ASP just like all the other ammo.

HTH

Jeff

 

[entropy]

I was in 86-90,7thID(L). Yes, there was an Ammo OIC, and NCOIC, but it rountinely got dumped on me. Sure, I could have made them do it themselves simply by deliberately f'ing it up, but stuff rolls downhill......

The S2/3 office would let me know when there was a range set up, and I'd order the ammo. Working in Bn got me a lot of extra range time,as I usually went with to the ranges, in the case of one Company, the CO insisted I went with, as his Armorer screwed up some of their 60's by putting the gas pistons in bass-ackward-I happened to be there, and fixed them post haste so his men could qualify. I got to fire up the excess ammo as usual, as well as a Letter of Recommendation.

 

[Titan6]

Jeff how do you remember all that four years later? ahh Never mind....

Anyway somebody likely messed up. I can assure you there is absolutely no ammo shortage here. I am shooting so much I am actually starting to get tired of it :gasp: ...

 

[U.S.SFC_RET]

trueblue1776quoted:

Materials of urgent need are acquired the fastest way possible. I can't help but notice the "RET" in your handle, it is entirely possible that things change

I retired in 2005. That isn't too long ago. I never seen civilian ammunition on the range.

 

[ID_shooting]

Jeff, I got out in 96. I was the Armorer while stationed at Ft Riley, KS, Aco 701 MSB. Sure, our training NCO and Commander setup the training schedules and forcasted ammo needs, but we could draw anytime.

I remember one field problem, we were only supposed to support a combat brigade not take part in the training. This had been planned for months ahead of time.

We got a new DISCOM commander who came fresh from a line command. He didn't want anyone in the field without full Battle Rattle. Top called me in told me we needed a couple cases of blanks for the M2s and M16s. I grabbed a fresh req (I forget the DD or DA #) and drove down to the ASP. Just signed for what we needed.

Granted most of the time we knew well in advance what ammo we needed, but maybe BRO was different. We could draw any amount, any time.