was anyone Guard or reserve? what do you do on your drill weekends?

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[ARCHIVED THREAD] - was anyone Guard or reserve? what do you do on your drill weekends?

Posted: 11/14/2003 10:16:17 AM EDT

I have to say from what I saw the drill weekends before basic are real boring for the reserve guys, PT classroom time.

If you are in a combat unit like infantry after basic and AIT would you be able to do fun stuff like shoot and practice tactics?

for the guys out there is your one weekend a month fun, boring, pain in the ass?

thanks 6 years is a long time!

Posted: 11/14/2003 10:22:33 AM EDT

[#1]

For me it is somewhere in between. last month we did MOUT training and vehicle searches.
the month before, the rear detachment was split in two parts with the bigger being the assault force and the smaller being the defending force...had to "take over" the armory.
PT, and classroom time, too.

Posted: 11/14/2003 10:30:35 AM EDT

[#2]

how much PT do you guys do? a couple miles?

Posted: 11/14/2003 10:43:16 AM EDT

[#3]

going from active duty to reserves was a bit of an adjustment...but i ended up w/ a real good unit (engineer). some drills were spent doing basically nothing, while others were very busy, preparing equip. classes, etc. the majority of the guys from my reserve unit are over here in the middle east. i run into some of them from time to time. good group of guys...well trained.

Posted: 11/14/2003 1:15:04 PM EDT

[#4]

Quoted:
going from active duty to reserves was a bit of an adjustment...but i ended up w/ a real good unit (engineer). some drills were spent doing basically nothing, while others were very busy, preparing equip. classes, etc. the majority of the guys from my reserve unit are over here in the middle east. i run into some of them from time to time. good group of guys...well trained.

have you been deployed?

Posted: 11/14/2003 10:24:28 PM EDT

[#5]

Buddy of mine is 1st Sgt level in CA Guard. Has been moving between units. Lots of training. Probably once a quarter they spent Friday night on the road to Ft. Irwin NTC and back late Sunday. Running and gunning on APCs etc. Lots of range time. They are now guarding bases state side. Expect to rotate back and a few months after that rotate on their previously (pre-Gulf War) scheduled trip to Bosnia.

My Navy unit spent a lot of training for it's mission, lot's of people rotating through so training was a high priority. (Our mission was not one that most fleet sailors would be familiar with but could handle with training.)

Depends on the unit, expect that with current climate that a lot of real training will be on your plate.

It aint your Daddy's Guard anymore.

Posted: 11/15/2003 12:14:16 AM EDT

[#6]

Quoted:
Quoted:
going from active duty to reserves was a bit of an adjustment...but i ended up w/ a real good unit (engineer). some drills were spent doing basically nothing, while others were very busy, preparing equip. classes, etc. the majority of the guys from my reserve unit are over here in the middle east. i run into some of them from time to time. good group of guys...well trained.

have you been deployed?

i LIVE in kuwait...does that count as deployed?

Posted: 11/15/2003 1:15:10 AM EDT

[#7]

Depends on the month. I'm in an enhanced infantry unit. Sometimes we'll go shoot ball at the range. Others we'll do the MILES2000 thing and do some squad, platoon, or company tactics. Sometimes we'll fart around all weekend cleaning stuff and doing classes, punching out NCOERs and OERs, and planning for the next big thing.

PT almost never happens unless we're really bored or we're doing a record PT test. We know that PT once a month will do absolutely nothing for the physical readiness of the unit, so instead of wasting that time we use it for training.

Posted: 11/15/2003 4:24:56 AM EDT

[#8]

funny that I saw this thread considering I am about to walk out the door right now for drill!

Posted: 11/15/2003 4:55:41 AM EDT

[#9]

Friday afternoon:

Come in at 1400 for pre jump and admin matters

0001 Sat morning 20 mins out from DZ

0025 hit the ground, link up and move out to our Hide site, about a 15k walk thru the woods at nite with no NVGs.

Perform LRS mission all day Sat and part of Sun.

Helo Extract was at 1500 hrs on Sunday. Clean Weapons on the bus back to the armory, Released by 1830.

Posted: 11/15/2003 1:50:51 PM EDT

[#10]

Quoted:
Friday afternoon:

Come in at 1400 for pre jump and admin matters

0001 Sat morning 20 mins out from DZ

0025 hit the ground, link up and move out to our Hide site, about a 15k walk thru the woods at nite with no NVGs.

Perform LRS mission all day Sat and part of Sun.

Helo Extract was at 1500 hrs on Sunday. Clean Weapons on the bus back to the armory, Released by 1830.

Schweeeeettt!!!!!!!!!!!!

Posted: 11/15/2003 2:01:02 PM EDT

[#11]

do they have an armourer that does steady work on the guns or is it a temp job?

i was thinking about joining the gaurd or reserves right now to pay for college and learn to be a gunsmith in the process, then after i graduate earn a commision in the army or marines.

is this a possibility or wishfull thinking?

Posted: 11/15/2003 2:07:47 PM EDT

[#12]

There is a job in the Army called Small Arms repairman. Very Small MOS, promotions are very, very slow. Dont know how many NG or reserve slots there are.

Ive met a couple of Armorers in the Coast guard, sweet duty, all they seem to do is go around to Factory training courses, Remmington, Mossberg, Colt, ect and then are land based.

Posted: 11/16/2003 4:44:17 PM EDT

[#13]

Quoted:
do they have an armourer that does steady work on the guns or is it a temp job?

i was thinking about joining the gaurd or reserves right now to pay for college and learn to be a gunsmith in the process, then after i graduate earn a commision in the army or marines.

is this a possibility or wishfull thinking?

there has to be, considering the amount of weapons they have there.

Posted: 11/16/2003 5:29:50 PM EDT

[#14]

And this weekend's drill finished with a couple of hours of government-funded beer.

Ahh, training meetings are nice :)

Posted: 11/18/2003 3:44:27 PM EDT

[#15]

Quoted:
how much PT do you guys do? a couple miles?

Couple miles and a half hour of pushups/ab workout. It is more to remind the fatties that they need to be working out a bit harder than anything else.

Psy, is there a chance you could IM me about the type of unit you are in? SOunds like an interesting drill...[:0]

Posted: 11/18/2003 6:35:29 PM EDT

[#16]

It will depend whats scheduled for that month. You still have to squeeze all the same requirements that AD has, so you can plan on two monthly drills being spent on the range, between M16,SAW,M2, M240 (if ya have them..). Then there are things like Common Task testing that will eat up an entire drill, your APFT (PT test), etc.
The critical thing is staying busy. If your drills are slow, you and your NCO's are to blame. Theres enough to do in those two (or three ) days that there should be no excuse for down time.

E7/ 11H/11B
NYARNG

We are currently activated through December; after that we're going to be busy training up units converting from various MOS's to 11 series...so I don't see any down time for us in the near future.

Posted: 11/18/2003 7:03:15 PM EDT

[#17]

Quoted:
It will depend whats scheduled for that month. You still have to squeeze all the same requirements that AD has, so you can plan on two monthly drills being spent on the range, between M16,SAW,M2, M240 (if ya have them..). Then there are things like Common Task testing that will eat up an entire drill, your APFT (PT test), etc.
The critical thing is staying busy. If your drills are slow, you and your NCO's are to blame. Theres enough to do in those two (or three ) days that there should be no excuse for down time.

E7/ 11H/11B
NYARNG

We are currently activated through December; after that we're going to be busy training up units converting from various MOS's to 11 series...so I don't see any down time for us in the near future.

I've been planning to apply for Army OCS late next summer/early fall...

Now, IIRC OCs don't get as much of a choice of MOS as enlisted personnell do. However, how much of the Army is getting 'transformed' into infantry?

If the Army does it anything like the AF (3 choices, if you don't fit in any of the 3, they put you wherever), I'd be requesting armor, artillery, or (??)...

What chance do I have (assuming I got selected, make it through OCS, etc) of getting an assignment and being 'converted' to infantry?

Posted: 11/18/2003 7:24:15 PM EDT

[#18]

Quoted:

Now, IIRC OCs don't get as much of a choice of MOS as enlisted personnell do. However, how much of the Army is getting 'transformed' into infantry?

If the Army does it anything like the AF (3 choices, if you don't fit in any of the 3, they put you wherever), I'd be requesting armor, artillery, or (??)...

What chance do I have (assuming I got selected, make it through OCS, etc) of getting an assignment and being 'converted' to infantry?

You can count on filling another role at ANY time. It is happening with guard units in this state, and elsewhere--they are getting trained in another, completely different, MOS. Some people don't quite understand that your basic duty is to be a rifleman and from there, you learn other skills. I haven't been in very long at all, and that concept has been pushed on us newbies pretty hard--and I'm hearing that not so long ago, things weren't like that... [:\] --Getting people to wake up and realize that you don't join for fucking college money will improve the fighting force, imo.
Someone else said it..."This ain't your daddy's army"

Oh yeah--we did some Krav Maga (FUUUUNNNN!) at least once per drill.

Posted: 11/18/2003 8:27:43 PM EDT

[#19]

Drill is ussually what you or your leadership makes of it. If we let it happen sometimes nothing but damn paperwork by the readiness NCO gets done. I am an E-6 in a mech unit. Though we rarely see the brads anymore unless we are doing gunnery at AT. I am in charge of the Dismount troops in my Company and I make sure they stay busy. There is a training schedule for all drills that is put out but ussually it is changed due to logistics and such, so it is up to us NCO's to keep it fun and worthwile. Battle drills and squad tactics is the norm for my guys.

[ARCHIVED THREAD] - was anyone Guard or reserve? what do you do on your drill weekends?

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