‘Soviets’ win war game

Press, 28 June 1983, Page 20

‘Soviets’ win war game

NZPA California American soldiers performed poorly over two years of desert war exercises in California, and were easily defeated by mock Soviet combat forces, says an Army assessment. The soldiers had showed a significant deficiency in important go-to-war skills, said an analysis of the first two years of the National Training Centre, a sophisticated Army war games base in the Mojave Desert near Barstow, California. The 45-page analysis was written by an observer team from the Army’s Forces Command at Fort McPherson, Georgia, which oversees the desert training. A report on the analysis, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, was

published by the “Sun,” a San Bernardino newspaper. The report is based on mock battles and live-fire exercises by infantry, armour, artillery, combat, support, and service troops from bases across the United States. “There is a lack of demonstrated tank crew and anti-tank gunners’ capability to kill targets,” the report said. “For example, during one daytime exercise, crews fired 682 rounds and hit 62 targets. Only 26 hits would have destroyed an enemy tank.” Observers also had found that soldiers wasted ammunition and gave away secrets. Many could not read maps. If weapons had been loaded with live ammunition during mock battles the soldiers would have killed many of their own men, officials said. “Our focus is on what comman-

ders need to improve,” said Briga-dier-General John Kirk, Director of Army training. “There have been some improvements since the report’s information was gathered, and problems will be studied more to correct them.” The centre, on 2600 sq km of mesquite-covered land about 160 km east of Los Angeles has at its heart a computerised war-games monitoring system. The largest mock Soviet force ever assembled by the United States — 1200 men — also is based there. The site has been used for military exercises and war games for 32 years. Observations on which the report was based were collected from October 1980, when the National Training Centre opened, to November last year.