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REMINDER (2018) - Army Is Spending Half a Billion to Train Soldiers to Fight Underground
24 Jun 2018
Military.com | By Matthew Cox
U.S. Army leaders say the next war will be fought in mega-cities, but the service has embarked on an ambitious effort to prepare most of its combat brigades to fight, not inside, but beneath them.
Late last year, the Army launched an accelerated effort that funnels some $572 million into training and equipping 26 of its 31 active combat brigades to fight in large-scale subterranean facilities that exist beneath dense urban areas around the world.
For this new type of warfare, infantry units will need to know how to effectively navigate, communicate, breach heavy obstacles and attack enemy forces in underground mazes ranging from confined corridors to tunnels as wide as residential streets. Soldiers will need new equipment and training to operate in conditions such as complete darkness, bad air and lack of cover from enemy fire in areas that challenge standard Army communications equipment.
Senior leaders have mentioned small parts of the effort in public speeches, but Army officials at Fort Benning, Georgia's Maneuver Center of Excellence the organization leading the subterranean effort have been reluctant to discuss the scale of the endeavor…
…"This training circular is published to provide urgently needed guidance to plan and execute training for units operating in subterranean environments, according to TC 3-20.50 "Small Unit Training in Subterranean Environments," published in November 2017. "Though prepared through an 'urgent' development process, it is authorized for immediate implementation."
A New Priority
The Army has always been aware that it might have to clear and secure underground facilities such as sewers and subway systems beneath densely-populated cities. In the past, tactics and procedures were covered in manuals on urban combat such as FM 90-10-1, "An Infantryman's Guide to Combat in Built-up Areas," dated 1993…
…An assessment last year estimates that there are about 10,000 large-scale underground military facilities around the world that are intended to serve as subterranean cities, an Army source, who is not cleared to talk to the press, told Military.com.
The Army's Asymmetric Warfare Group an outfit often tasked with looking ahead to identify future threats told U.S. military leaders that special operations forces will not be able to deal with the subterranean problem alone and that large numbers of conventional forces must be trained and equipped to fight underground, the source said.
Source: https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/06/24/army-spending-half-billion-train-troops-fight-underground.html