Map and compass. Wha…?
For those who don’t know the acronym, BLC is the Basic Leader’s Course, a three week course to make sure young leaders have the basic skills to be good entry level NCOs. Over time, sometimes it was optional for promotion, sometimes not depending on class availability etc. As an SP4 in Germany back when it was a Platoon Leadership Course (PLC, later PLDC), in some units promotion could be stalled while awaiting a precious slot at the school which could delay promotion a year or more. Once there, basic knowledge of keeping your appearance STRAC (who even knows where THAT once-ubiquitous term came from? without looking it up?), drill and ceremony to make sure you knew how to march troops, land navigation… all the good stuff buck sergeant E-5s needed to know.
Flash forward to 2020 – here is a course description from Military Times:
The school is supposed to teach young noncommissioned officers about the service’s policies, including legal authorities, processing paperwork for awards, and sexual assault and prevention efforts.
Forgive me – I don’t know the current leadership course syllabus, granted, but there seems to be a lack of, well, leadership skills. My first thought was that it sounded like a politically correct clerk-typists’ course.
Land navigation was brought back after a roughly four-year hiatus.
Service leaders have been aiming to add fieldcraft and combat tactics to the training, part of a larger effort to get non-combat arms troops up to snuff on basic soldiering skills. At the center of that push is land navigation, which tasks soldiers with plotting points on a map with a protractor and finding spots in the woods using a compass during both day and night. No GPS, which has become ubiquitous in combat with an approximation on just about every smartphone, is allowed.
Okay, that’s a little more like it. One would hope.
But of the 914 soldiers who have been through the training, half have failed that portion of BLC, according to Command Sgt. Maj. Daniel Hendrex, the top enlisted leader for the Army’s Training and Doctrine Command, or TRADOC.
Half? Seriously?
As of now, passing isn’t required to graduate. But the high failure rate is a troubling sign… with future conflicts expected to see the wide use of of cyber weapons, which can knock out the GPS tools soldiers relied on during the Global War on Terror era.
The article goes on to say that much of the training is expected to take place at the unit level, and that support troops have more problems fitting it into their schedules (presumably than in combat arms, as they say the fail rate at Ranger School is only about 6%, implying better unit-level prep.)
Military Times has the article – it’s worth a read.
Tip o’ the hat to Bill, my oldest friend in the world and a purty fair ASA/INSCOM NCO, for the link.
And a shameless plug for Cpl. Kev of the 851st Typewriter Battalion, the protagonist of one of the funniest military strips ever. The book is available on Amazon – great military-oriented book for anyone who served in USAREUR in the ’80s.
Category: Army
I thought basic navigation would be more important now than ever before, over reliance on tech and an obsession with SASH/gender tolerance training is bad for business and does absolutely nothing for readiness.
Some areas around the Mideast we get our radars jammed and GPS signals cut, causing us to resort to the old fashioned round of terrestrial bearings or taking celestial sights. The youngins often stare blank and clueless when we tell them to break out the sextants or grab a running fix.
Land nav was difficult when I took orienteering as a PE course; and still hard when I went through it as part of a refresher / pre-PLDC course. The course at Fort Benning during PLDC was supposed to be a bear; I don’t know since I didn’t go—I told the first sergeant that I was not planning on staying on active duty and I didn’t.
Glad they brought it back. But a fifty percent passing rate is terrible. Do people not know what to do when the going gets tough or did they not know how to teach it?
Whoa. We land navved until our feet bled. Followed by a week or two of platoon and squad stx lanes. Paperwork was something you picked up when nothing else was going on.
Since they are great admin specialists they can just write; “Doesn’t have a clue how to land navigate” on their NCOERs
PLDC was Primary Leadership Development Course, not Platoon Leadership Course…which became Warrior Leaders Course in the 2000s. PLDC was followed by Basic Non-Commissioned Officer Course BNCOC (Pronounced B-knock), then Advanced Non-Commissioned Officer Course (ANCOC or A-knock).
I didn’t make it to A-NCOC because I joined the Dark Side, but I almost got booted from PLDC for lack of that thar “sexual Assault prevention” training, when I mistakenly tried to help a female Soldier get behind cover during our field problem…she was standing in front of a fox hole and refused to seek cover during an attack because I had told her to police up some trash.
I’m a little worried about that 6% fail rate in Ranger School though! Sounds like they lowered the standards…no amount of preparation fixes stupid, and going from above 50% to 6% now that you have added females sounds to me like lowering stadards.
My apologies…I thought that 6% was the overall failure not Land Nav for Ranger School. Yes, if you can’t Land Nav you don’t go to Ranger School period! Units weed you out.
I was very good at Land Nav, in the real world…across Georgia Swamps, Rocky and Appalachian Mountains, and US deserts, but Finding a sign in the dark hidden amongst the trees was a new one for me. Thought I would fail on my first point. Moved out, reassessed, modified my plan…got the GO!
ASA, that was a while back.
That’s a polite way to say “damn, you guys sre old!”
We may be old, but we can at least find our way home in the dark. 😅
You go out after dark?
Me too. Got out in early 72. Darned if I can remember month.
Jan 14.
Land Nav at Camp Jackson PLDC (Korea) wasn’t difficult. The problem was that the course is on a cold frozen icy mountain, one slip and you’re not stopping till you’re 200 meters downhill. Hated the land nav course at Graf, forest so thick you couldn’t see past 50 meters, no landmarks, and angry boars the size of fookin’ Volkswagens.
Landnav/compass course at Ft. Leonard-Wood on first day of Deer Season was Da Bomb! (You can’t make stupid sh*t like that up… realistic as hell though, just glad no one died.)
Kind of disappointed that you didn’t call it by its proper name, “Fort Lost In The Woods.” 😉
Just trying to be less negative, not that I succeeded much…
Not that the First Day is so much worse than the rest of the season. Had a girlfriend when I lived in Fla. whose father ran deer camps during the season. The casualty rate among the dogs was pretty high. Evidently the deer in Fla. are pretty short and have floppy ears, just like beagles.
One year I happened to be driving through the Ocala National Forest on opening day. Wondered why both sides of the road were packed with cars and folks in white T-shirts and blue jeans were wandering around with guns on their shoulders. Then I realized what day it was. I proceeded to exceed the speed limit until I reached safety. I suspect the only reason I didn’t get a ticket was that the police were already miles away.
My land nav partner and I (a trombone player form 8th Army band). Got accused of cheating because we finished so far ahead of the rest of the class. The gave us 10 points, said GO, and everybody ran off to find their points. We sat down, plotted all 10 on the map, then did them in a loop, instead of running all over God’s creation, backtracking and doubling the work. Beat everyone by 45 minutes. We explained what we did to the instructors. Apparently, nobody’d ever done that. They never said we had to find them in the order given. Instructions only said “Find the following points”.
The kind of thinking that makes for a good leader.
My dad always taught me that 15 minutes of planning can save hours of work. He also said “we can hurry the job and have to come back and redo stuff, or we can slow down and do it once”.
That kind of thinking draws suspicion and accusations of cheating. The nail that stands out gets the hammer.
Him, he’s thinking! Somethin’ ain’t right with him!
Land Nav was serious shit in the 70s…if you couldn’t map and compass navigate in the infantry your chances of any leadership role, NCO or Officer, were rather limited…I know the jokes about butter bars, I’ve told some myself but they still had to pass that land nav course.
50% failure means half those in attendance aren’t fit for leadership…at least not where it matters.
Who gives a flying fuck what Private Confused About Their Genitals wants to be called to feel better about their delusions? I’m not supporting any harm to said confused individuals or anyone else and I understand there needs to some level of competency in the paperwork arena regarding military policy, but I fail to see how any of the listed areas of concern add to the lethality of the mission.
Since your showing your age, in the 70’s land nav was taught and tested as a basic part of being assigned to an infantry unit, not part of a special training or test. I even had set up and renovated a couple of courses with less than accurate maps and questionable compass accuracy which was more real world than anything else. As for BNCO course, I was given a choice the course or promotion board took the latter since I was already doing a NCO’s job. Smart move I had the points for promotion and got the stripes way sooner.
It would have been nice if truck drivers, cooks, and such had also been taught land nav. It got kind of cold and lonely waiting for that POL truck to find you and your thirsty track. Hungry, too, sometimes.
Even back then, young and stupid as I was, I figured we were screwed if Ivan had actually crossed the wire.
During my time in I had to learn both mounted and dismounted land nav. My primary MOS was 63B, but I did the H-8 recovery school so I drove the hook. Not being able to read the map on Pelham Range is inconvenient, not being able to read a map in the ROK could be embarrassing, not being able to read a map in Desert Storm may be putting yourself in the wrong place, or at least missing your recovery target. I may not be up to combat arms standard but I was able to pass “Pull DIC” at Ft Benning school for wayward boys.
Depending on your era (and attitude) STRAC could have many meanings. It now means Some Troops Really Are Confused…and not just about where they are or where they need to be and how do they get there. They’re also confused as to which of the 96 genders they are. Fix that problem FIRST (ht2 Tox).
Maybe I’m just too damn Old School (or had proper home training), but as a young troop I paid attention to what was being taught to me and learned how to do what was necessary to help me do what was needed. Having a multitude of experienced Combat Veterans as teachers helped a lot. Better to know how to perform a task and never have to than to have to perform and not be able to. I carried this mindset thru out life and used these concepts to teach others. This needs to be done at the squad level til everybody can can do more than just find their ass in the dark with both hands, a map, and a flashlight.
Basic Map & Compas Land Nav should be required of all ranks.
I taught Scouts and Venturers 20 years of Land Nav. I had 14-year-olds who could properly orient a topo, determine magnetic declination, shoot a bearing, determine an azimuth, and plot a course around or through obstacles. Using only a topo and compass.
14 friggin’ year old boys and girls.
Anyone above E2 who cannot do the same should be smoked and run through the course until they can do it blindfolded in the dark with both hands tied.
Smoke ’em all.
Reminds me of my Scouting days. I loved Land Nav and it was just like magic when you found something like a cave or small creek using a map. 🙂
I really enjoyed running around in the woods as a Scout. That’s one reason I joined the Army specifically for Infantry.
Surprise!
In scouts, we learned Land Nav at a National Guard training site and taught by a couple NG Drill Sergeants. We didn’t get yelled at, but we all learned the whole block of military Land Nav.
I am really surprised this isn’t on US Army WTF Moments.
Back in my day, when I went through PLDC, You didn’t get chow until you finished LandNav course. If you finished an hour late, then the Instructors assumed that you wanted to train more than you wanted to eat. If you didn’t finish at all, then I hope that you pass everything else with flying colors or you are going back home with tears.
Guys yelling “Bambi’s revenge!” while firing full-auto blanks at hunters who wandered onto the landnav course?
Military Land Navigation? I have no clue, however, when my brothers were 10 and seven, me 8 years old papa got us up early said to bring our compass, knife, Pellet gun, sleeping bags, canteen and mama packed our lunch and drove us to a unknown area. Gave us a map pointed to a area on map said you are here, use what I taught you and come home…
Thank you papa for teaching us….best damn adventure as a little kid…
Parenting done right.
Heck yeah!
Ahhhh, them were the dayz. Land Nav with map & compass.
I don’t remember if it was PLC or ANCOC that was in Bad Tolz, (West) Germany (at the time).
(I’m old, & it was too long ago)
I heard horror stories about PLDC at Bad Tolz.
Agree, it was PLC. Thought ANCOC was only taught Stateside but my MOS group was pretty small. We usually caught it when we were already in secondary zone TDY en route on a PCS. Not unusual to start as an E6 and graduate as an E7.
Sadly, even for the last few years when it was still PLDC and while it was WLC and early BLC, they had gone to self-correcting Land NAV (all the points were marked with their grid coordinates, so you could readjust if you found the wrong one).
It was this pathetically easy version, not true Land NAV (demanding all those skills like terrain association, back azimuths, backstops, intersection/resection, etc. so you knew you’d found the right point), that the joes were failing at such a high rate – almost 20 years ago.
When I was in the NYSARNG back in 1975-1977 we did a couple of land navigation courses up at Fort Drum and used the compass and the little plastic protractor for the grid co ordinates. Years later I was attending the Nationial Hurricane conference in Orlando and took the National Grid course and the handed out those plastic protractors. Up in Drum, a couple of the Viet-Nam Vets used the string beads for counting the “clicks”
I was doing orienteering as a kid. Good at it. Was very good at Land Nav. Had occasion to … guide … a few folks senior who thought they knew what they were doing. Lol.
82nd AB Brother had a shave-tail LT get them lost in the swamp trying to avoid the easy path of going down the clearing but taking them through the woods.
They spent the night wrapped around cypress trees to stay out of the water.
When dawn came shave-tail was still trying to find himself on the map. The Sgts. (incl. AB Brother) took the map away from him, AB-B found their position, sent two privates to get the vehicles, and got the rest of the squad out to the clearing to get picked up.
When you don’t know, ask a Sargent.
Did my PNCOC in 1978 (Baumholder MTC) (8ID(M) NCO Academy) Land nav was trained as a part of troop leading/patrolling. Raise your hand if you ever humped the hills and valleys of beautiful Baumholder carrying a M60. Much fun was had as a 11E10R8
I transported a M60 around Baumholder, but in an M113, with the 509th. That was back in 1969-70.
I was 11C back then. No M60, but various mortar parts and/or radio. Carried around an M60 a bit later in other geographical areas. M60 is easier than mortar parts.
I actually liked Baumholder. Except for the winter we spent in a GP Medium tent with no heater pitched on a muddy slope.
I thought Wildflecken was worse. I believe it was one of the few places in Europe where overseas(?) pay was authorized. It did, however, have some historical charm. Pre-WWII barracks, including pre-WWII mess facilities, heated by pre-WWII coal stoves in each squad room. 70+ degree shirt-sleeved weather followed the next day by a foot+ of wet snow. And nowhere near the quality of recreational facilities of Baumholder.
😉😎
I learned Land Nav as a second year ROTC cadet. By the time I arrived at IOBC I had already passed day and night navigation. After two years AD, I could navigate on foot, from an M113, or from an aircraft. And we had no GPS. There is no excuse for this lack of a critical soldier skill. If you can’t navigate, you can’t lead. At Ranger School, when you suddenly become patrol leader, the evaluator’s first question is, “Ranger, where are we on the map?”
I have always wondered how anybody navigated at Eglin AFB. I know the AF missed a resupply drop or two, but the Ranger students never seemed to miss their rendezvouses (plural?) with destiny, although we might have had to wait a bit past the scheduled time.
Rendezvouses isn’t wrong, but it’s rare (though clearly useful in this case). Normally, the plural is simply rendezvous with the final z-sound pronounced.
In print, the first version is less ambiguous.
“Rendezvouses isn’t wrong”
Really? It sure as heck looks and sounds wrong.
I remember Cpl. Kev. Alot of stuff even us AF types could relate to.
I did very good at PLDC at Ft McClellan run by the Alabama Army National Guard, 3 weeks long.
When I was a SPC4 and SPC5, my units wouldn’t let me go to PLDC. My technical services were needed and I couldn’t be spared so they said. Back in the states time crept on. I went to BNOC as a SPC5, pining SSG on there. After I made SSG, life wasn’t bad. Caught another rotation to Germany. While there I was selected for ANOC when I rotated back to the states. Meanwhile, a clerk realized I hadn’t been to PLDC. This is where the fun shit began. I was sent TDY to the 7th Corp academy as a pissed off E-6. The fun part was I was one of two SSG’s. I out ranked all of the instructors except the SFC. At the end of my 3-4 weeks, they were glad to get rid of me.
Me, an E6 with 10 years Army service (4 years Infantry/6 years Recruiter/MEPS Guidance Counselor), PCS’d to 3ID as a Retention NCO on the E7 list with an Advanced NCO Course class date at Ft Benjamin Harrison, IN. Then, 3ID to their horror, they saw I had never been to PLDC.
So the month before going to ANCOC, I went to their PLDC. Cadre there just had me observe and assist.
Proficiency in land navigation takes practice, more practice and more practice. And then some more.