Quotulatiousness

March 12, 2013

US Army to standardize on four current UAV models

Filed under: Military, Technology, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 08:56

The US Army reasonably expects their budget to be under strain for some time. Here’s at least one sensible economy move:

Faced with smaller budgets over the next decade the U.S. Army has halted evaluation of new UAVs and is standardizing on four existing models (Gray Eagle, Shadow 2000, Raven and Puma). All four of these were developed and purchased in large quantities over the last dozen years and will remain the primary army UAVs for the next 5-10 years.

The army currently has nearly 7,000 UAVs. Over 6,000 are micro-UAVs like the Raven and Puma, These tiny (under six kg/13.2 pound) reconnaissance aircraft have become very popular with the troops, anyone of which can become an operator after a few hours of training. These tiny UAVs are a radical new military aircraft technology that is took air recon to a new level. That level is low, a few hundred meters off the ground. The army has nearly 1,798 Raven and 325 Puma UAVs systems in use by ground troops. A complete system (controller, spare parts, and three UAVs) costs $250,000 for the Raven and over $400,000 for Puma. These tiny aircraft have changed how the troops fight and greatly reduced army dependence on the air force for air reconnaissance. The lightweight, hand launched Raven UAV can only stay airborne about an hour per sortie, but troops have found that this is enough time to do all sorts of useful work, even when there’s no fighting going on. This is most of the time. The heavier Puma can stay up for 120 minutes.

March 7, 2013

US Department of Defence to change standards for awarding the Purple Heart

Filed under: Humour, Military, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 10:35

A recognition of the importance of maintaining service members’ self-esteem in the face of harsh and unyielding forces beyond their control:

Purple Heart medalIn the wake of the newly unveiled Distinguished Warfare Medal, the Department of Defense intends to relax standards on the nation’s oldest military decoration — the Purple Heart. Under the expanded interpretation, the award will now be available to any disgruntled service member suffering from disillusionment and shattered expectations.

“Acute Rectal Inflammation, colloquially known as ‘butthurt,’ is a serious and grossly underrated epidemic plaguing our military,” Lieutenant Jimmy Chang, Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine, told The Duffel Blog. “Essentially, psychological or emotional trauma, stemming from either internal or external stimuli, manifests itself and eventually begets anal trauma. In severe cases, butt cells can become so hurt that they become malignant. In fact, butthurt is the leading cause of colon cancer among service members.”

February 27, 2013

Sequestration and the defence budget

Filed under: Military, Politics, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 09:10

At the Cato At Liberty blog, Christopher Preble graphically refutes the notion that sequestration will automatically weaken the US military:

Click to see full-size infographic at the Cato Institute blog.

Click to see full-size infographic at Cato At Liberty.

Military spending will remain at roughly 2006 levels — $603 billion, higher than peak U.S. spending during the Cold War. Meanwhile, we live in a safer world. The Soviet Union has been dead for more than two decades; no other nation, or combination of nations, has emerged since that can pose a comparable threat. We should have a defense budget that reflects this reality.

To be clear, sequestration was no one’s first choice. But the alternative — ever-increasing military spending detached from a legitimate debate over strategy — is worse. We should have had such a debate, one over the roles and missions of the U.S. military, long before this day of reckoning. And politicians could have pursued serious proposals to prudently reduce military spending. Instead, they chose the easy way out, avoiding difficult decisions that would have allowed for smarter cuts.

Update: Nick Gillespie explains why you shouldn’t worry too much about the sequester:

Update, the second: Putting the actual numbers in perspective:

February 17, 2013

Money talks, fading historical memories edition

Filed under: Britain, Middle East, Military, WW1 — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 10:42

The British army’s officer training college at Sandhurst (think “West Point” in the American context) has invited a lot of criticism for this decision:

Britain’s top military academy, Sandhurst, has come under fire for renaming a sports hall commemorating a First World War battle after the King of Bahrain.

The Mons Hall — named after the 1914 battle where thousands died — will have its name changed to honour the Bahraini monarch who has given millions in funding to the Army’s officer training college.

The building will now be called King Hamad Hall and will reopen next month after being refurbished thanks to a £3 million donation from the king, who is the patron of the Sandhurst Foundation but is known for brutally repressing demonstrators at home.

Sandhurst has also accepted a £15 million donation from the United Arab Emirates to build a new accommodation block, raising questions about the college’s links with authoritarian Gulf states accused of human rights abuses.

Critics say the Army is betraying the soldiers who gave their lives and that Bahrain and the UAE are trying to avert criticism of their regimes by buying silence with donations.

The 1914 Battle of Mons was the first major battle of the war. Against overwhelming odds, the British Army inflicted 5,000 casualties on the Germans. At least 1,600 British troops were killed.

February 14, 2013

Crony capitalists make pitch for industrial policy in defence purchases

Filed under: Business, Cancon, Government, Military — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 11:02

Canada doesn’t really have a defence industry — certainly not in the sense of Britain, France, or the United States. We have some companies which happen to make products of use to the military (armoured vehicles, for example), but our government is not tightly tied to the fortunes of these companies in some sort of maple-flavoured Military-Industrial Complex. Some movers-and-shakers want to change that:

It goes without saying that the proposal to siphon funds to defence contractors is gussied up in industrial-policy jargon. For instance, we’re told how defence industries are “important sources of technological dynamism and innovation [and] leading-edge participants in global value chains.” (Who today isn’t part of a global value chain?) Also in keeping with current industrial-policy trendiness, the government is instructed to be strategically selective in KIC-starting the sector. “KIC,” you see, stands for “Key Industrial Capabilities,” which is what we’re told we should focus on.

But despite the alluring bells and whistles, the message to firms selling to the government is clear: Either pay up or forget about getting the contract. From now on, if the committee gets its way, how you plan to spread the industrial booty around the Canadian economy will weigh directly in the balance with how your product performs. The new fighter jet doesn’t accelerate quickly enough to elude missiles? Well, never mind that, it comes with a new plant in Mississauga. Shells pierce the new tank’s armour? Too bad. But the innovation spinoffs for Thunder Bay are just too good to pass up.

You might think that interpretation extreme. Surely safety for our soldiers and value-for-money for our taxpayers come first. But what else could be meant by the recommendation that bidders specify the industrial benefits they’re offering as part of their bid itself, rather than as an add-on after the performance characteristics of their product or service have won them the contract?

Suppose that instead of causing defence contracts to be inflated with offsets for Canadian industry, this committee consisting of a high-tech CEO, a former chief of staff at national defence, an IP specialist in a defence company, a retired general and Paul Martin’s one-time policy guru recommended levying a 5% tax on all government defence purchases and using the revenues thus generated to subsidize Canadian defence contractors?

I sent the original Globe and Mail URL to Jon saying, “The very last thing Canada should be attempting is to use government money to build a ‘defence industry’. Let the military buy what they need on the open market — regardless of country of origin — at market prices. The fetish to have a domestic defence industry is pure crony capitalism clothed in a “patriotic” fig leaf.”

February 7, 2013

Almost a clean sweep of top Canadian military leadership

Filed under: Cancon, Government, Military — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 00:02

As Andrew Coyne noted in a tweet, “In some countries, this would be big news”. Lee Berthiaume in the Ottawa Citizen on the upheaval at the top of Canada’s defence establishment:

Spring cleaning has come early at the Department of National Defence as the Conservative government announced Wednesday it was sweeping out a number of the military’s top officers — including the head of the Canadian Army and the Royal Canadian Navy — in a major shuffle.

The moves represent a dramatic change at the top as National Defence faces a major shift in focus from the days of the Afghanistan war and increasing budgets, to a state of deep budget cuts and limited deployments.

[. . .]

In addition to [vice-chief of defence staff, Vice-Admiral Bruce] Donaldson, those leaving include Royal Canadian Navy commander Vice-Admiral Paul Maddison and Canadian Army commander Lt.-Gen. Peter Devlin.

Maddison’s deputy, Rear-Admiral Mark Norman, will take over as commander of the navy; Lt.-Gen. Marquis Hainse, who was serving as deputy commander to the NATO headquarters in Naples, Italy, is the new head of the army.

Lt.-Gen. Walter Semianiw, who oversaw all Canadian military missions inside Canada and North America, including the Caribbean, is also on the way out, the apparent casualty of a Defence Department restructuring that started last year.

January 28, 2013

India’s Chinese border to be reinforced

Filed under: China, Economics, India, Military — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:43

Strategy Page on the Indian government’s planned upgrades along the shared border with China:

The Indian Army wants $3.5 billion in order to create three more brigades (two infantry and one armored) to defend the Chinese border. Actually, this new force is in addition to the new mountain corps (of 80,000 troops) nearing approval (at a cost of $11.5 billion). The mountain corps is to be complete in four years. The three proposed brigades would be ready in 4-5 years. By the end of the decade India will have spent nearly five billion dollars on new roads, rail lines and air fields near the 4,057 kilometer long Chinese border.

The Indian Army currently has 37 Divisions including; 4 RAPID (Reorganised Army Plains Infantry Divisions) Action Divisions, 18 Infantry Divisions, 10 Mountain Divisions, 3 Armored Divisions and 2 Artillery Divisions. There are also 12 independent combat brigades (five armor and seven mechanized infantry). Most of the army has been organized and trained to fight the Pakistani army in flat terrain. The Chinese border is largely mountainous.

Three years ago India quietly built and put into service an airfield for transports in the north (Uttarakhand) near their border with China. While the airfield can also be used to bring in urgently needed supplies for local civilians during those months when snow blocks the few roads, it is mainly there for military purposes in case China invades again. Uttarakhand is near Kashmir, and a 38,000 square kilometer chunk of land that China seized after a brief war with India in 1962. This airfield and several similar projects along the Chinese border are all about growing fears of continued Chinese claims on Indian territory. India is alarmed at increasing strident Chinese insistence that is owns northeastern Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh. This has led to an increased movement of Indian military forces to that remote area.

India quickly discovered that a buildup in these remote areas is easier said than done. Moreover, the Indians found that they were far behind Chinese efforts. When they took a closer look three years ago, Indian staff officers discovered that China had improved its road network along most of their 4,000 kilometer common border. Indian military planners calculated that, as a result of this network, Chinese military units could move 400 kilometers a day on hard surfaced roads, while Indian units could only move half as fast, while suffering more vehicle damage because of the many unpaved roads.

Women in combat roles

Filed under: Cancon, Military, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:06

In the Globe and Mail, Margaret Wente “celebrates” the recent announcement by the US government that American women will soon be allowed to take front-line combat jobs:

In a milestone for gender equality, the Pentagon is finally ending the combat ban for women – a ban that had become woefully obsolete. At last, women warriors will get the recognition and promotions they deserve. The brass ceiling has been shattered, and that’s good news for both women and the military.

But she admits that there are problems with the new rules:

But please, people. Let’s get real. Women cannot equal men in ground combat, the kind of dirty, brutal stuff that (fortunately) makes up a very minor part of modern military life, especially post-Afghanistan. It’s not that they can’t be trained to kill — they can. The issue is that the physical differences between men and women are very large, and on the battlefield, they really matter, and can’t be wished away. Men are better fighters because they are bigger and stronger and can endure far more physical punishment before they break down.

The average female soldier is “about five inches shorter than the male soldier, has half the upper body strength, lower aerobic capacity and 37 per cent less muscle mass,” Stephanie Gutmann, author of The Kinder, Gentler Military, wrote in the New Republic. “She cannot pee standing up … She tends, particularly if she is under the age of 30 (as are 60 per cent of military personnel) to get pregnant.”

And there’s the practical experience the Canadian army has accumulated:

Overall, women account for 14 per cent of all jobs in the Canadian Forces, a slightly lower percentage than in the U.S. As a result of a human-rights decision, front-line combat jobs were opened to women in 1989. Yet today, despite strenuous recruiting efforts, women hold just 2.4 per cent of these jobs. Their commanding officers praise their competence but treat them differently, by shielding them from combat. According to a Wall Street Journal report this week, the widespread impression among Canadian female soldiers — much to their frustration — is they are used “only sparingly.” Men serving next to women also exhibit a counterproductive battlefield trait: protectiveness. They want to carry women’s gear and keep them out of harm’s way. As one male soldier told the Journal, “That brother-sister protective thought was always in the back of your mind.”

When I was in the militia in the mid-1970s, our basic training was fully integrated: the girls did the same physical training and field exercises as the boys. Even in peacetime, it was quite obvious that the sections with girls in them were doing what they could to encourage the girls to pass the training (re-distributing their gear to the others in the section, and pairing the girls up with the biggest guys for the more physical duties like digging trenches, etc.). I can only imagine that the same thing goes on in actual combat conditions.

Fortunately, we didn’t have any of the girls drop out for pregnancy (it was a summer training course of just about two months duration), but the US military reported that over 10% of all women in combat zones (not in actual front-line combat) were evacuated from the combat zone due to pregnancy in 2008.

January 23, 2013

Canadian Army introduces updated combat uniforms

Filed under: Cancon, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 15:46

A press release describes the changes as the “most radical change since 1970s”:

Canadian Army uniform improvements

After 18 months of testing and operational user feedback, production has begun on the Enhanced Combat Uniform for Canadian soldiers.

This product improvement to the combat uniforms includes more than 20 changes which will allow for greater comfort, enhanced protection and greater integration with personal protective equipment, allowing soldiers to more effectively train and perform their duties while deployed.

Some of the major changes are:

  • a flexible Mandarin-style collar;
  • integrated soft kneepads;
  • flat pockets and zippers to avoid pressure points;
  • an action-back for increased range of motion; and
  • a flexible waist for improved fit.

“The uniforms are better integrated with the rest of the combat equipment while increasing comfort and providing greater wearing options adaptable to the environment a soldier is deployed in,” says Major Stéphane Dufour of the Director of Land Requirements’ Soldier Systems Requirements section. For example, the integrated soft knee pads provide protection in and outside a vehicle. The flat chest pocket style also removes any pressure points while wearing ballistic protection and fragmentation vests.

[. . .]

The uniforms will continue to use the Canadian Disruptive Pattern, known as CADPATTM, which allows soldiers to blend in with the field environment.

January 22, 2013

British army facing next wave of cuts

Filed under: Britain, Government, Military — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 10:14

The British army has to reduce down to a slim 82,000 troops by 2015, and the cuts coming down later this year are part of the 2010 Strategic Defence and Security Review (SDSR):

Up to 50 brigadiers and other senior officers are expected to be axed as part of a sweeping round of army redundancies that will result in up to 5,300 troops leaving the forces over the next year.

In what is thought to be the biggest tranche of redundancies faced by the army since the early 1990s, infantry battalions are likely to be worst hit as the military reorganises itself for the post-Afghanistan era.

Special forces units will be spared any losses, but officials made clear that this round of job cuts would take “a large slice out of the army in one go”.

Separately, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) also admitted more medical staff from the army, Royal Navy and RAF staff were likely to face redundancy later this year.

Some of the details from the SDSR were discussed in 2010. I also posted that I suspected SDSR actually stood for “Slashing Damage to Strategic Resources“

January 20, 2013

Identifying Britain’s “greatest” land battle

Filed under: Britain, Cancon, Europe, History, Military — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 11:41

Setting aside the fact that there’s no rational way to compare battles from different wars in different eras, the National Army Museum is holding a poll to determine the top five British battles, then a debate among historians followed by a concluding vote to determine the “best” of them.

As well as famous battles, the list includes some less well-known clashes, such as Megiddo in 1918, in modern-day Israel, where a British-led force decisively broke through the Ottoman front lines.

The earliest battle on the list is the English Civil War clash at Naseby, in 1645, in which the Royalists were defeated by the Parliamentarians’ disciplined New Model Army.

It is one of two that took place on British soil between two armies from this country. The other is Culloden (1745), which marked the end of the Jacobite rebellion.

Not all the battles ended in victory. The list includes the failed Gallipoli campaign (1915-1916), in which Britain and its allies tried to invade the Ottoman Empire.

Others are less conclusive: such as the Crimean clash of Balaklava (1854) – noted for the disastrous Charge of the Light Brigade — and the Somme (1916).

The most recent engagement is Musa Qala, in Afghanistan, where, in 2006, a small garrison of British, Danish and Afghan troops withstood a lengthy Taliban siege.

Only land battles are being considered, ruling out naval victories such as Trafalgar (1805) and air campaigns such as the Battle of Britain (1940).

Speaking non-scientifically, clearly the most important land battle in British history was the clash between Wolfe and Montcalm on the Plains of Abraham:

… also known as the Battle of Quebec, (Bataille des Plaines d’Abraham or Première bataille de Québec in French) was a pivotal battle in the Seven Years’ War (referred to as the French and Indian War in the United States). The battle, which began on 13 September 1759, was fought between the British Army and Navy, and the French Army, on a plateau just outside the walls of Quebec City, on land that was originally owned by a farmer named Abraham Martin, hence the name of the battle.

The battle involved fewer than 10,000 troops between both sides, but proved to be a deciding moment in the conflict between France and Britain over the fate of New France, influencing the later creation of Canada.[2]

The battle (and its aftermath) tend to be ignored in Quebec, but it shouldn’t be:

Montcalm died before dawn on the 14th. Hit again, probably by a Canadien militiaman, Wolfe died as the French ranks dissolved. Fighting on the Plains continued until dusk, sustained by Canadien militia and their native allies. When Quebec sovereignists killed plans to re-enact the battle they helped keep that heroic story secret. Perhaps they had no idea that it happened. When French regulars fled, the militia fought on.

Five times they stopped Fraser’s terrifying Highlanders from slaughtering the terrified regulars. Thanks to their despised militia and aboriginal allies, Montcalm’s French regulars could safely stop at Beauport, catch their breath, and begin a long, dreary march back to Montreal to prepare for another year of war. Did the separatists not want anyone to know?

January 18, 2013

Camouflage patterns and the patterns of inter-service rivalry

Filed under: Bureaucracy, Military, USA — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 00:01

In The Atlantic, D.B. Grady reminds us that some patterns are more deeply dyed than others:

Military combat uniforms have two purposes: to camouflage soldiers, and to hold together in rugged conditions. It stands to reason that there’s only one “best” pattern, and one best stitching and manufacture. It should follow that when such a uniform is developed, the entire military should transition to it.

MARPAT woodland patternIn 2002, the Marine Corps adopted a digital camouflage pattern called MARPAT. Rigorous field-testing proved that it was more effective than the splotched woodland pattern in use at the time, and the Combat Utility Uniform (of which it was a part) was a striking change for such a conservative institution.

UCP patternNot to be outdone, the Army drew up digital plans of its own, and in 2005 issued a redesigned combat uniform in a “universal camouflage pattern” (UCP). Three years after the Marines made the change, four years after the invasion of Afghanistan, and two years after the invasion of Iraq, you might think the Army would have been loaded with data on how best to camouflage soldiers in known combat zones. You would be wrong.

In fact, not only did the Army dismiss the requirements of the operating environments, but it also literally chose the poorest performing pattern of its field tests. The “universal” in UCP refers to jungle, desert, and urban environments. In designing a uniform for wear in every environment, it designed a uniform that was effective in none.

[. . .]

Such dysfunction is not unique to the Army. MARPAT was a success not only in function, but also in adding distinction to the Marines wearing it. Naturally the Air Force wanted in on that action, and set about to make its own mark on the camouflage world. It’s first choice? A Vietnam-era blue tiger-stripe pattern. (You know, to blend in with the trees on Pandora.)

After an outcry in the ranks, the leadership settled on a color scheme slightly more subdued. The new uniform did, however, have the benefit of being “winter weight” only, which was just perfect for service in Iraq.

January 14, 2013

In the re-enacting world, don’t be a “Walt” or a “Farb”

Filed under: Britain, History, Military — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 09:15

Dick Delingpole tells us more about the less-welcome members of the re-enacting hobby:

Re-enactors have a term of abuse, “Farb”, thought to have originated in the States, which is used to describe someone whose authenticity standards leave much to be desired. There is also a term of abuse directed at re-enactors from outside the hobby, notably from the Armed Forces: “Walt”. It means “fantasist” or “wannabe”, and derives from James Thurber’s fictional literary fantasist, Walter Mitty. It is not used affectionately, and implies ineptitude with delusions of grandeur. Just google “walt” and “re-enactor” and you’ll get the idea.

Despite my deep and abiding affection for our Armed Forces, I think there’s a bit of misunderstanding here.

In 12 years, the only re-enactors I’ve met who think that they’re soldiers are the ones who actually are. And there are many of them: regulars and TA, retired, current and soon-to-be-joining. While ex-soldiers are attracted to the cameraderie associated with re-enactment, many are pursuing an interest in the history of their own regiments which doesn’t confine them to an armchair.

[. . .]

Early period re-enactors (anything pre WWII, but the earlier the better) attract relatively light amounts of abuse from the Armed Forces. One fellow Napoleonic re-enactor who is a serving Major in the Rifles, describes the kind of Walt most likely to get a soldier’s back up. They are overweight middle-aged blokes who can’t march or hold a gun correctly, but who have the kit, uniform and insignia of the current SAS or other specialist elite unit. Here I feel the insult is possibly justified. Why, asks the squaddy, don’t these people just join the army? And why must they represent elite forces whose serving members have sweated blood to be part of?

H/T to Elizabeth for the link.

January 11, 2013

British forces to replace venerable Browning 9mm with new Glocks

Filed under: Britain, Military, Weapons — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 10:22

Lewis Page on the recently announced retirement of the Browning 9mm from British military service:

The new pistol is the Glock 17 Gen4, which fires the same NATO standard 9x19mm cartridge as its illustrious predecessor. However the Glock holds 17 rounds as opposed to the Browning’s 13 — and even more crucially the new weapon can be carried with a round in the chamber ready to shoot at a moment’s notice due to its modern safety mechanisms, a practice which was normally forbidden with the Browning.

[. . .]

The now superseded weapon was designed way back in the 1920s by the legendary weapons engineer John Browning and first manufactured by Fabrique Nationale of Belgium in 1935. It was known commercially as the “Browning Hi-Power”. It was first issued to British forces during World War II, and gradually replaced all other pistols then in service to become the UK’s standard military sidearm. In its day it was a great weapon, and pistol design has evolved only incrementally since then, but today’s handguns are measurably superior and it was surely time for a change — the more so as the existing Brownings must have been pretty worn out by now.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have enabled the British forces to slowly and belatedly sort out their dire personal-weapons situation of the 1990s. The crappy Royal Ordnance/BAE Systems SA80 (L85A1) rifle was rebuilt in German factories so that it is now a good weapon, and proper belt-fed light machine guns and 40mm grenade launchers were procured. Other popular pieces of kit such as the L115A1 sniper rifle (from the famous Portsmouth firm Accuracy International, perhaps better known under its commercial name Arctic Warfare Super Magnum), the new combat shotgun and the new 7.62mm Sharpshooter rifle have also appeared in response to battlefield needs. Now with the new Glocks, at last, pretty much all the personal weapons carried by British troops today can be said to be first-class.

The Browning 9mm was first handgun I ever fired, and is still one of my favourites:

December 13, 2012

US Army study confirms what every NCO already knows

Filed under: Humour, Military, USA — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 09:28

The US Army recently conducted a study on the effectiveness of their officer corps:

Army Chief of Staff General Ray Odierno announced today the results of an Army-wide study on company and field-grade leadership, which showed Majors are far more dangerous to soldiers than Second Lieutenants.

“While this was something we suspected for a long time,” Odierno said, “this study confirms it and provides the scientific background so we can appropriately react.”

[. . .]

After several pie-chart-rich slides, Bond summarized, “While we all know 2LTs have no experience and practically no training to mitigate that, no one expects anything more than marginal performance from them and no one gives them any real responsibility. That rests with their platoon sergeants.”

“Majors, on the other hand,” Bond explained, “with around 10 years’ experience in the Army are expected to actually know something and can be given positions of pretty significant authority. With that authority, bosses expect these majors to perform. Unlike when they were lieutenants, these majors seriously think they can succeed without a senior NCO carrying the weight for them.”

Odierno admitted that this was a problem he has had his eye on for a while. “Remember I was there once. When I was a 2LT, I had a Platoon Sergeant looking after me. When I made major I was the battalion S3, Ops Officer, and suddenly the Battalion Commander had expectations. Fortunately they were low expectations. At least I didn’t lose two vehicles like the major in supply. Of course Dennis recovered and he’s the Commanding General at Army Material Command now. Our boss just kept reminding us we were really lucky he graded on a curve.”

H/T to John Donovan for the link.

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