Ranger U Episode 7: Danger Areas

All right, barrel chested freedom fighters wherever you are this is Ranger you in classes now in session today We are closing out chapter six particularly on pages six dash nine six dash ten and six dash eleven talking about Danger areas, okay Danger areas what they are kind of what they're defined as why we want to avoid them how we avoid them and then if they can't be avoided How we're going to tackle those? How are we going to get across these areas without being decisively engaged fixed destroyed and Generally having a really bad day So on page six dash eight danger areas are defined at the bottom of the page subsection six dash 23 a danger area is any place on a units route where the leader determines the unit may be exposed to enemy observation or fire Some examples of danger areas include open areas roads trails urban terrain enemy positions natural and man-made obstacles, okay bypass danger areas whenever possible how we begin to bypass a danger area honestly Starts in your planning process when you select a route, okay, just because a straight line is the quickest To an objective doesn't mean that it's right, right? So we want the we want to take the hard right over the easy wrong the easy wrong would be Let's go ahead and walk straight ahead. Let's go ahead and have three or four different roads or trails Those would be linear danger areas, right that we have to cross or oh, hey We'll just walk right through this open field because it's convenient instead of skirting the wood line and using either a contour Bipass method or a detour bypass method to get around those areas, right? This is essentially where we begin to mitigate against those danger areas right avoidance is the best technique for Well avoiding danger areas. We don't want to be decisively engaged Which means we don't want to get into some sort of firefight We don't want to get troops in contact because what we are doing is an infiltration We are doing a foot movement in contested or enemy territory so that we can go execute a mission, all right whether that mission is A combat patrol of some sort like a raid a deliberate attack or an ambush or a reconnaissance patrol of some sort We don't want to be compromised, right? So Linear danger areas. Let's let's talk about them for a minute, okay? obviously The obvious is roads Trails things of that sort, right? But we also talked about natural obstacles, right and you can have a natural linear linear danger area as well IE it could be a large dry creek bed. It could be a water a shallow waterway of some sort, right? It could be a break in the tree line that is more linear in nature than open in nature, right? And the open danger areas. These would be like Established urban areas, right? Like a like for example a clear cutting area for a village It could be a opening a grove in the trees and orchard that opens up something like that, right? something where The enemy could dictate open observation and feels a fire on those positions and that ideal, right? And we don't want to be engaged in these Okay, so let's talk about real quick You know some standards for dealing with danger areas if we have to, right? We are going to use our movement techniques and formations To prevent the enemy from surprising the main body, right? So we talked about One of the techniques that we have for movement which is traveling overwatch and another one which is bounding overwatch Where we have essentially elements of our formation that are moving ahead To get eyes on so that the main body cannot be surprised, all right by utilizing these sorts of techniques Either traveling overwatch or bounding overwatch. It can help to mitigate You know walking into a fire fight with your main body, which is never a good day, right? We want to avoid an ear ambush. We want to avoid the fight in the phone booth, right? So that's what we are going to use. We're going to move ahead with our smaller elements first And we are going to provide overwatch for that main body as we close with these potential danger areas All right, move all personnel and equipment across the danger area Okay, obviously we're going to cross it with everybody. We're not going to split our formation And conduct the rest of the movement while the trail end of our Platoon and equipment stays on one side. Okay, so the entire platoon will eventually move across or bypass this danger area Prevent decisive engagement by the enemy. Okay, so once again as much as humanly possible using a combination of Overwatch security and speed and efficiency all right with our How we prosecute this particular problem is going to eliminate the amount of time that we're there reduce our signature as much as possible So that we're not engaged by the enemy. Okay Some fundamentals of crossing danger areas designating near and far side rally points. Okay, so a near side rally point A rally point in general is where your platoons going to stop and pull a quick short halt 360-degree security conduct seals be quiet All right, and just kind of get our bearings and get get our shit together a little bit before we attack this danger area and then obviously using a good map reconnaissance We're going to select a grid and a terrain feature on the far side of whatever Danger area we're looking at be it linear in nature be it open in nature Okay, and we're going to designate a spot Where the platoon will have to get to all right We get a hundred percent up on men weapon and equipment and then we'll continue mission. Okay, so that's what a near and far side rally point would be We're going to secure a near side left right flank and rear security. Okay, so again This is just 360-degree security of the area We're going to recon and secure the far side. Okay, so the far side of a Danger area you have what is called near side and you have what is called far side It should be pretty self-explanatory Near side means it's the side that you're on far side is the side that is on the other side of your obstacle It says here that we need to recon and secure the far side Of our danger area we'll talk about exactly who and how that happens here in just a second Okay, we'll cross the danger area and then plan for fires on all known danger areas Okay, this goes back to your planning piece right we talked about we want to avoid them But if they cannot be avoided remember we talked about the forward observer and the forward observer advises the PL and plans all fires and all phases of the operation So if you know that you are going to encounter a road or if you know you are going to encounter some sort of open field The FO and the PL have already designated some predetermined target locations all right that have been strategically picked that are In the vicinity most likely of enemy travel so that they can be used offensively or defensively to support your movement either across that danger area to continue mission or to support a retrograde or a retreat Off of that or withdraw let's we don't retreat we would draw all right Withdraw off of that area. Okay, so on page six dash ten We have a breakdown I mean figure six dash four of a linear danger area and there's essentially it looks like three simple steps if you will Okay To crossing a linear danger area and we're going to kind of talk about that right the first thing that we want to talk about in regards to linear danger areas is what Is actually worth conducting a full-scale Halt Secure and then moving the platoon across in accordance with LDA crossing SOP versus something that we might determine Speed is our security and we are going to go ahead and quickly bypass this thing right so If you're walking through the woods and let's say you're that lead element. Let's see Let's say you are the lead team leader you are at the the very head of the formation. Okay, the point man. Okay And you happen to walk up on a linear danger area that you barely even notice It's not like an established trail. It's not an established road There are no power lines running on it. There's no great break in the wood line anything like that. It looks more like Maybe an old trail that's not used anymore or not used often at all and there will be signs of things like this It'll be very run down. It will be very Very thin in nature. There will be you know vegetation growing across at things of this sort You might make the determination to call a quick halt right because that's the right thing to do You call your squad leader up squad leader gets eyes on Maybe you call it the pl or you should call it the pl pl should get hip to you know my formation stopped I'm not exactly just sure why at this time, if no hand in arm signals have been sent back, you know, maybe at this point it's just a halt. We haven't determined that this is an actual LDA that needs to be crossed. So there's no need to radio and hand signal it up to the entire platoon, but let's go get eyes on it real quick. So the PL will move up to the 12 o'clock of the formation and everybody will get their eyes on it. And then you make the determination very quickly. Do we need to go into a deliberate, linear danger area crossing, or is this something that we can continue movement on and bypassed? If it is determined that we can continue movement, stand up, Charlie, Mike, let's go, let's get across this thing quickly, step it out just a little bit and we'll get moving. If it's something that is now determined that we need to go into a more deliberate LDA crossing, a couple things are going to happen. Number one, the PL will go ahead and confirm that. And then there will be a hand and arm signal passed back that will designate. This is an LDA crossing. All right, now almost every element that I've worked in and the Army SOP for hand and arm signal, okay, is you're going to create a knife hand with your non-firing hand and you're going to slash it diagonally across your body. Okay, that is LDA. That alerts the entire platoon that there is an actual LDA and that hand and arm signal needs to get passed back all the way to the six o'clock of the formation all the way to the back to the last person. I would also say historically, typically, that a radio call would also be associated with this, but I'm also keenly aware that for the next fight that we are training for, which could be a near-peer type engagement with another relative power out there in the world, whether it be the rushes, the China's, you know, the Iran's, the North Korea's, what have you, right? Radio traffic and our FM signals are something that really need to be reduced as much as possible. So that's why hand and arm signals exist. That's why you can also just speak in a normal tone, you know, and everybody will get the gist in lieu of needing an actual radio call. So for my war fighters of the future here, you need to start thinking in terms of this kind of stuff because in Afghanistan, when we had the counterinsurgency fight, we were able to dominate the airspace, we were able to dominate everything because it wasn't a near-peer threat. We got a lot of, we got away with a lot of bad habits in terms of light discipline, laser discipline, radio discipline, these sorts of things. You have to start thinking in terms of, I need to be more cautious and more conservative with how I use some of my equipment for a force that can actually make me pay for that, all right? So that's just my two cents on that. Anyway, I digress back to LDAs, right? So the first thing that's going to happen is you're going to want to send an element far side of this LDA, okay? You want to send an element far side of the LDA because before actually securing the LDA itself, right? Because if we, you know, spend a lot of time on the near side of this linear danger area, messing about, okay? And there is enemy just on the other side of it, and we're getting engaged across that LDA now, across the wood line, right? That's a bad spot to be in because now we don't have any forward elements painting a picture for us, able to lay some sort of base of fire to where we can get the rest of the platoon to maneuver at that point in time. We're all stuck on one side of the wood line kind of bunched up in a, in a bad spot, right? So we do want to send that forward element across first. And I would recommend that you send a, at least the team size element, you could send the entire first squad, which could be your security squad, alpha and Bravo team along with your squad leader to go ahead and create some space on that far side of the linear danger area. So that's going to be the first thing that happens. When that lead element gets across there, remember they need to keep in mind, they need to make enough room for the rest of this platoon to at least get most of the main body across so that we don't have our entire ass hanging out on a linear danger area looking like the fucking DMV. We don't want to do that, right? We want to clear some space out. So be aggressive, push into that, you know, that far side, just far enough to where we have enough command and control still, but we're clearing out enough space for the rest of this platoon. When you get far side, pick up sectors of fire, all right, interlock your sectors of fire, place key weapon systems where they're going to be most effective as your team leaders and squad leaders and conduct seals, stop, listen, and smell. All right. If nothing has peaked your interest, if there's no enemy presence detected, nothing dangerous and nature's kind of returned to its natural order, then that's when you can go ahead and send either a visual, a verbal or like I said, mate, but perhaps the radio signal back to the PL to let them know that the far side is secured. When the far side gets secured, the PL platoon sergeant, this is where they need to link up, okay, towards the front of the formation. The platoon sergeant's going to be coming from the rear and what he's going to do with that rear element, which is going to be assault two at the back, he's going to go ahead and designate a fire team size element that's going to move up to secure the rest of this linear danger area so that the rest of the platoon can mosey across now. All right. And when I say mosey, I don't mean literally, I mean, you're going to be moving quickly across this LDA. So what's going to happen is an element from the rear from that assault two element, you're going to want a saw gunner for sure, okay. You're going to want to split a fire team. And then if they have a 240 attached as well, like if gun two, like if you're running two guns in the platoon and gun two is back there with a assault two, you're going to want them to come up as well, okay. What you want to do is you want to take one part of that fire team with the saw and you want to put them on what is called, quote, unquote, weak side security, okay. That would be the direction of travel that is opposite where the enemy is most likely to come from, right? Okay. So let's say that you have an east west running road and it's most likely that the enemy is going to come from the east, okay. Then you want to go ahead and put that saw and that the saw and that part of the fire team on the west side of the road. And then you're going to want to take that 240 along with the remainder of that fire team and you're going to want to put them on the east side of facing of the road, okay. So you want them in the direction that's most likely enemy travel coming. Once those blocking positions have been set, okay, blocking positions or security positions, it's interchangeable term, all right. Once they've been set, then we can go ahead and continue movement for the rest of this platoon across the linear danger area. So what's most likely going to happen at this point in time is as the platoon leader, since I have the RTO and the Ford observer with me, all right. I'm going to go ahead and push up to the 12 o'clock of this formation and I will be I will be crossing with the next element that crosses whether that is assault one or the remainder of that security squad if you only sent a team across, right. As the platoon sergeant in the medic, okay. At this time, I'm also going to be at the 12 o'clock of the formation and what I'm going to do before I expose myself to the LDA, I'm going to tuck back somewhere with a little bit of covering concealment and I'm going to establish a choke point for accountability purposes. And I'm as the platoon sergeant, I am keenly aware of how many bodies are already on the far side of this LDA, right. So let's say I've got seven bodies on the far side of the LDA already. My count starts now at eight when I start counting the rest of this platoon through my choke point, okay, for accountability purposes. Once that choke point set, we're going to get the rest of the platoon ready and they're going to start moving, okay. They're going to hustle through this choke point and across the LDA. Once they hit the, you know, the actual like side of the LDA, itself where they're exposed, they need to be double timing it across this LDA to the far side of the linear danger area. Once the last member of the platoon that is not on those blocking positions has crossed through that choke point, as the platoon sergeant medic, I'm going to pick up my choke point and then I'm going to move it to the far side of that linear danger area. I'm going to establish it one more time and then I'm going to break down my blocking positions to come through my choke point so that we can pick up trail and continue this movement. How that is done is these blocking positions will mutually support themselves across the LDA. So for example, I'm going to leave the machine guns in position, the guys that are with them, the team leaders, the, the, the Grinidir, the regular riflemen, they're going to move far side of the road, pick up a sector of fire, then we'll break down the machine guns, they'll leapfrog past them, they'll start coming through my choke point if I'm a platoon sergeant, and then everybody else is just going to peel off in turn until we are all across the linear danger area. Once I am solid on my total count, I'm going to call up to the platoon leader to let him know that right we're trail up we're good on all bodies and then we're going to continue movement on mission and that's basically how that's done now when you get out and rep this there will be finer points that you'll capture when you actually get out and like conduct this as a as rehearsals and this should absolutely be priority of rehearsals if you know you are going to be encountering at least one linear danger area on your movement when you set priorities of rehearsals and planning you absolutely need to rep this stuff so that you can see how it's going to work who's going to be in what position and so that everybody knows their job their role and their responsibility while this is happening all right so that is how you tackle a linear danger area let's talk about an open danger area really quick on page six dash eleven we have an example in figure six dash five of a small open danger area okay so what it essentially is is just a break in the trees all right in the foliage where we do not want to walk down the middle of it because we could be forward observed on we could be decisively engaged it might be you know a textbook spot for the enemy to ambush us we don't want to do that there are two methods for essentially staying in covering concealment and bypassing the danger area the first one is the contour method and then the second one is the detour method all right once again you're still going to establish a near side rally point and a far side rally point the contour method takes your platoon and you essentially just walk the nape of the earth right you just walk the tree line okay basically around following mother nature until you get to your far side designated point that you did with your map recon right the detour method is a deliberate route okay let's say that walking contour isn't gonna work right either the terrain doesn't lend itself to it you're you're worried about command and control something like that so you want to make it even even more simple all right for your platoon to to do this okay there are pros and cons the both okay pros and cons the both with the contour method you're going to essentially give up a little bit of command and control but you may be in a better position to receive contact at least to your 12 and your flanks while you do that because you're moving in a more natural platoon formation without any drastic turns right with the detour method you're actually going to be making deliberate turns right like 90 degree turns on your route because you're trying to deliberately go around something so for example you have a near side and far side rally point with your detour method maybe your first leg of that route is 50 meters at you know do north right and once you get to that pace count then it is we turn do do west literally 90 degree turn for 100 meters all right and then once we get to that pace count we turn back do north for 200 meters and then once we get to that pace count now we're turning you know do a west so a hard left right and we're going 100 meters or so and then we're turning again do north so a hard right turn and we're and then we're going to that far side rally point all right clear as mud in in page 6-11 of your ranger handbook there's an illustration of this okay so if I confuse anybody go to 6-11 of your ranger handbook and take a look at these illustrations but essentially that's the pros and cons that each right a little bit of command and control may break down if you're walking contour but it isn't a more natural formation right without the hard turns exposing yourself to potential flanking or frontal fire and with the detour method it's a little more like I said it's more Mickey Mouse it's more like direct control but you're not potentially in the best position to fight if an open danger area cannot be avoided okay because this does come up sometimes there is no avoiding it how do we mitigate our risk for moving through this danger area well once again you change your movement technique right so let's say you have a giant field right on your route that you just you cannot detour you cannot contour you can't get around it it's the only way at that point in time what I would recommend doing is changing your platoons movement technique to either a an exaggerated traveling overwatch potentially like a platoon v formation something like that where I have two elements out in front I have a central element in a trail element right and what I want to do is I want to use a combination of traveling overwatch and bounding over watch all right and maybe some alternating bounding so that I'm moving across this field as quickly as possible but I can mutually support myself across this open danger area right I can get barrels in that far woodline I can get 360 security as I move across just in case there's a fight we can fight and maneuver quickly what I don't want to do is walk in a traveling posture with my main body with no advon no flank and no rear elements and just hope for the best I don't want to do that I damn sure don't want to get in a big ass line and a damn sure don't want to get in a file so I would I would utilize a either a platoon v formation or maybe the inverse of that a platoon wedge formation which basically just looks like a giant letter a with your lead element your security element kicked out from something like that you have to think in terms of how can I take this shitty situation that I'm in the field I can't avoid how do I set it up best to set the conditions for myself to be able to fight if I need to and certainly utilizing again your assets such as your forward observer and whatever pre-plan targets you can have on that area to deny the enemy a chance at wiping out your element so those of the foods for thought about danger areas it's definitely something that I wanted to go over to to close out chapter six because I feel like it does get glossed over a bit and to be honest on several patrols that I've walked I have not seen platoons handle it well right so I hope that that was a little bit of a help for you again taking a look at the end of chapter six dive into them a bit and look at your illustrations and read into the text a bit and then rehearse these things at the platoon level because rehearsals will save your life all right make them a priority any time that you're about to go out on patrol you should always re-blue how we're going to do an LDA crossing or an open danger area crossing on our patrol class is dismissed