0311

Hi, I'm sorry if this is a stupid question, but I bought Arma a few months ago and found the game unplayable due to several bugs and other issues. I want to reinstall the game and give it another try, but how has the game improved with the current patches out? Several things I noticed was the weapons wouln't fire in full auto or even burst, units wouln't follow certain commands, controls were difficult, etc. It would be nice if most of these basic issues have been fixed. Also, is there a way to easily clear out and remap all the controls? Thanx

Incompetence is just the beginning of it. There's alot more to it than just stupidity at the leadership level. There's alot of plain callous disregard for the ground situation in Iraq with alot of senior govt and military leadership. As for this whole blackwater incident, I know damn well that most of what we read is either misreported or made up. Oh well, I've learned to live with it.

Oh yeah. I wanted to add another point. Someone earlier mentioned the reasoning of the insurgents shooting at American troops stemming from idealogical hate. This is how I classify the enemy in Iraq. You got the professional terrorists. They are generally foreign, religously and idealogically motivated. These guys are ruthless. They're the ones willing to kill thousands of innocents to achieve their goals. These guys are fewer in number in Iraq and most Iraqis hate them. Then you got local insurgents. It's these guys who are doing most of the killing of US forces either by using IEDs, VBIEDs, IRLs, suicide bombing, offensive infantry attacks using small arms, crew served weapons, RPGs etc. The biggest reason these guys have is financial. They and their families get paid considerably to attack us. In Ramadi, alot of the Iraqi police we worked with were former insurgents themselves. You also got a small lot of mercs over there. These guys are highly skilled, often professionally trained in the military. Most are snipers, others work together in small fireteams doing calculated infantry attacks against us. We've caught chechens, Russians, even Chinese mercinaries over there. You also have the whole religious clan, sunni vs shiite thing over there. Often US troops are left out of that fight, but sometimes it does spill over with American blood. But thats more in Bhagdad and other parts than in our AO there.

The actual motives of this war was never to simply remove Saddam. I mean, the stated reasons were as follows. To create a friendly springboard country for better access to the rest of the Mid East. To culturally and socially rebuild the mid east starting with Iraq. And to establish a new oil trading partner there. Today however we just want them to become self sufficient to maintain their own security so we can retrograde outta there. The bottom line is at the end of the day the Iraqis need to do it themselves. We cannot stay forever to hold their hands. That comes straight from the will of the Iraqi people. It really is up to them to make it happen eventually.

Just because they made you think that does not mean that they actually do like you... Well no shit man. That's the way it is anywhere you go. We're all capable of judging a persons character, even Iraqis.

Yes you're right, the reason why we are being attacked in Iraq and elsewhere is not because of the Iraqi armys failure. As you said, there's alot more to it than that. My only point was that the reason it's taking so long to leave/hand over power completely to the Iraqi forces is due to their operational incompetence, as well as shortsightedness within both our and the Iraqi govt.

Baddo, what are you basing your opinion on? I'm basing mine on personal experience during training IA and IP forces. I know what their level of motivation is, and I understood why they acted the way they did at times. In the 8 1/2 months I served in Ar Ramadi, I spent several months as a detachment of 5 other Marines living with the Iraqis, eating their food, watching DVDs with them, joking, discussing our girls back home, killing time in general. I went on missions with the very Iraqis we trained. I knew their personal lives, their political opinions, their various reasons for joining the IA/IPs. Thus I think I'm more than qualified to describe their strengths and deficiencies. Yeah, many of them don't want us there, but almost all of them trusted us and thought of us as friends. Yes, there IS an enormous discipline problem within the Iraqi forces, and it isn't a result of spite or fear of us. I could go on and on about internal difficulties of the IA/ IPs, but I don't have the time right now. Until the Iraqi people in general can decide on what kind of life they want for themselves and find the resolve to make it happen, life there will stay unstable.

So what is the alternative then? We all sit down in front of the politicians and say "Ooh really Mr Cheney? 'The insurgency is in it's last days' is it?" An informed citizenry is one of the fundamental cornerstones of a healthy democracy. People telling others that "it makes them sick" when they express their opinions is the total opposite to democracy, the very thing that is now (in the absence of WMD) supposed to be the reason for US and coalition troops in Iraq. "Hi I'm here to bring democracy to your country and when people have opinions about their governemnts actions and policies, it makes me sick." I understand and appreciate that having been there you have experience and knowledge the rest of us can never have. But don't tell people it makes you sick to hear people exercising the right for which you're fighting to give Iraqis Chops, you misunderstood me. I have no qualms with the people discussing Iraqi events, infact I would like that people take an even greater interest in the situation over there. My problem is with the fact that no news agencies have any clue as to what goes on over there. Honestly, a person is probably going to be better off ignoring the news considering how much of it is deliberately made up, or changed.

Nothing makes me more sick than hearing people discuss the political situation in Iraq based upon things they have seen on the news on TV. Talk to any US combat troop who has been there, pretty much most of everything you hear or see in the news is bs. Either by fabrication/misinformation by our own govt, or due to the lack of understanding on part of the media. When my unit returned from Ar Ramadi(Al Anbar province), we basically did what no other unit could do. We for the most part tamed the entire city. Yeah, it's still a dangerous place. But not nearly the "worst city in Iraq" as it was aptly titled when we arrived there last Sept. The truth is, we gave the Iraqi Army and Police more than all the training and tools they ever wanted from us for them to do their job and keep the city secure. And honestly, they are easily capable of doing that. The problem that we saw why we are still there today is because the Iraqi forces need to get their act together. If you have a group of soldiers who don't like having to deal with discomfort, fear, danger, and all of the other things normal soldiers have to face, then you arn't going to have a very disciplined force. Some of that is cultural, teaching them to bathe, prepare their food in a sanitary way, properly relieve themselves. Most of the guys over there had their mothers wiping up after themselves til they were 40. It's like the saying, You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. Guys there are dying fast because they don't want to wear their helmets, or their flak jackets because they think it's too heavy, or they don't want to follow instruction. They're not all so bad, alot of them are willing to learn and do things properly. But we are facing a horrible cultural dillema in regards to owning up to personal responsibility and hard work on part of Iraqi forces over there. Anyhow, we can't stay there forever. Eventually, it's gotta be either sink or swim.

Hey Wombat, I don't know how it works in the U.S. Army, but in the Marine Corps, certain infantrymen within a company with valid drivers licenses are made to attend humvee school which is a little over a week. Then whenever the company needs a humvee driven somewhere, we have one of the guys with a humvee license drive. In theater howere such as Iraq, it's not uncommon for basically anyone to be told to get in the drivers seat of a humvee assuming that noone thinks he will crash it. So generally if a squad or a platoon wants to go somewhere, they will say something like "Hey, get anderson from 2nd squad to drive, he's pretty good." That's basically how it works. Now as for you question as to callsigns, every company has its own callsign. From there, it is just broken down. So for example if you're in Alpha company, and the company callsign is say ... Apache, and you're in 2nd platoon, 3rd squad. - Your squad callsign would be Apache 2-3. Every unit on the battlefield has a radio callsign. So that means tanks, and air as well. I hope this answers your question. If you have any others, especially about Marine infantry, then my email is e3green@hotmail.com

The only thing I would really like to see(but I'm doubtful that I will) are Marines in game. I mean the army does its thing in the way that it does it, and everyone assosiates US military power with the army, airforce etc. I mean we do things differently and I would like to have a few missions specifically with Marines. Being Marine infantry myself, it would be pretty neat for me to play in the way that I work. (Not to mention I'd rather not play as a soldier wearing those jacked up army cammies). I guess if BIS doesn't put us in, some modder could make a Marine campaign or something.

Yea. Official manuals teach 5 meter lethal zone then 55 meter casualty zone. But it is accepted practically that the entire zone extends roughly 90 meters back. I remember training in 29 Palms Calif, doing an AT4 shoot at one of the mountain ranges. In fact some of those pictures blackdog posted look alot like the Mohave Desert we trained in. But while one of the relays were up doing their shoot I was sitting in a Humvee a good 100 meters off and to the right of the range and we could feel the shockwave that far back. That's another thing about the AT4. It is very LOUD. The SMAW is the loudest infantry weapon out there, but I wouln't be surprised if the AT4 didn't come close or was atleast second.

Yes, but my belief is that something simple such as what we saw in OPF would be realistic, as opposed to previous suggestions where there would be a key to "hold breath" or a way to control the relationship between rear sight aperture and front sight post seperately. That would just seem a little silly to me.

Honestly I think you guys are overcomplicating things. I've trained with my M-16 for so long over such a difficult situations. We Marines can be woken up at 4am with full gear, run up a mountain and through an exaustive combat conditioning course, run up to a target line, and sight in and fire like second nature. Any professional soldier should be able to in a heartbeat look down his sights and fire accurately without consciously aligning his sights. It just happens automatically for us. Why would you want to include all the minutia of actually aiming when it is automatic for us professionals? It would be more realistic with the way it was in OPF.

Yes there is a considerable backblast for the AT4. It can't be fired indoors or even in an urban setting easily. If I remember my training from back in SOI(USMC School of Infantry) there is a total of 60-90 meter backblast that fans out 90 degrees rearward. That comprises of a 5 meter kill zone followed by a 55+ meter casualty range. When firing the AT4, the individual Marine looks to his immediate rear to ensure noone or nothing is within the backblast area. He then announces "Backblast area all secure", then he sounds off "Rocket" as he presses the trigger. This is in training, but the same procedures are done in combat. The USMC is now experimenting with an updated version of the LAW that uses some sort of liquid propellant rocket that has a tiny backblast. The intention is to find a way to fire indoors.

The Marine Corps handles infantry command in groups of 3(Ideally). The fireteam leader has 3 men to command. The squad leader has 3 fireteam leaders to command, the Platoon commander has(generally)3 squad leaders to give orders to, and the company commander has normally 4 platoons to coordinate. The army does things differently I'm sure. In order for this to work in game, you would need smart AI that could tactically make decisions and take initiative on their own and be creative/inventive, be able to judge the situation and make decisions based on your direction. A fireteam leader would need to have the capability to see that an ambush is coming from a certain direction and the best response would be to take his team into an adjacent building and fire from there. He would need to make complex decisions in conjunction with the rest of the squad and then communicate his decisions to the squad leader.

Hi b_ringer25, I just got back after 2 weeks of training up in the hills of Virginia so I didn't get back to check til now. I asked some of the senior guys in my unit about tank formations and the response was they're pretty much moved as big infantry. They'd most likely move in a column until just before contact and move into a large line or wedge formation. Sorry I can't be more specific. Like I said, I'm a grunt, not tanks.

Well, I don't know about armor since I'm infantry, not tanks. but a wedge or line would be an obvious formation to attack in. Espectro in the Marines we call what you are describing as simply "Buddy rushes" or "fire team" rushes. In such a maneuver all Marines get on line in staggered formation. Whether we hit the dirt "literally" and go prone or just take a knee depends on the situation or the choice of the squad leader. Â When we decide to "rush" or assault the target; generally the rearmost line of marines get up and sprint forward of the advance line, then hits the dirt and continues to fire while now the former forward line but now rear line gets up to rush. A tank battalion is right down the street from my unit, maybe I could ask about it for ya. My unit is heading to VA soon for some squad tactics training so I may not be able to find out for a while.