AAR AAR | ARMA 3 | Campaign Black Bear 24 | Operation Swift Response 2

[Rodahl.S]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Name of Combat Mission: Campaign Black Bear 24, Operation Swift Response 2
Number Within Campaign: 2/4
Game: ARMA 3
Server Hosted on: Training Server 1
Date of Combat Mission: 25MAY24
Time of Combat Mission (Zulu): 1900z
Mission OIC: First Lieutenant Sam.T
Mission Controller: Corporal Rodahl.S , Corporal Zaren.T

Attendees: 43
Lieutenant Colonel Dread.M
Major Bunnell.M
Captain Highman.J
First Lieutenant Narramoor.A
Second Lieutenant Grizzle.M
Master Sergeant Couvillion.T
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Dujakovic.R
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Spit.K
Warrant Officer 1 Sutodoreh.W
Staff Sergeant Hilberg.A
Staff Sergeant Phillips.B
Staff Sergeant Turn.J
Sergeant Davis.D
Sergeant Lucander.P
Sergeant Turner.L
Sergeant Willson.JA
Corporal Bethea.A
Corporal Dio.B
Corporal Eugene.R
Corporal Fox.Z
Corporal Hoidahl.N
Corporal Whitehead.B
Corporal Zander.D
Specialist Blade.B
Specialist Hamm.C
Specialist Kuusela.N
Specialist Lee.H
Specialist McAllen.J
Specialist Perea.A
Specialist Walker.R
Specialist Winters.R
Specialist Xinos.T
Private First Class Bryan.R
Private First Class Shere.J
Private Holmes.G
Private Samra.S

 

[McAllen.J]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Bandit-7
Element Leader: Specialist McAllen.J

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
N/A

Pros:

• The infantry's movement was good
• Communication over radio was fantastic, quick responses in platoon net.

Cons:

• Operation felt tedious
• Complete lack of casualties to provide Atlas with something to do
• Communication during care needs to improve

Note: In my personal opinion, this felt like a Viking Op that was made into a Bandit OP with a LOT of walking. If we are doing an air assault, we need to be on foot a lot less. I also think if we aren't fighting that large of a force like this OP, less assets means more squad tactics, means more fun, means (hopefully) more casualties.

 

[Sutodoreh.W]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: LIGHTNING Flight
Element Leader: Warrant Officer 1 Sutodoreh.W "Scooter"

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Warrant Officer 1 Sutodoreh.W "Scooter"
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Dujakovic.R "Costanza"

Pros:

• Lot of fun
• Highman.J did great as the FAC
• Very well-placed air defense, good air-to-air spawns
• Didn't realize it at the time but had a dogfight against 3 MiGs directly over the AO

Cons:

• None

 

[Phillips.B]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT​

Element Callsign: Bandit-4
Element Leader: Staff Sergeant Phillips.B

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:

• Lieutenant Colonel Dread.M
• Second Lieutenant Narramoor.A
• Chief Warrant Officer 3 Spit.K
• Staff Sergeant Phillips.B
• Sergeant Lucander.P
• Corporal Dio.B
• Corporal Whitehead.B
• Corporal Zander.D

Non-7th Cavalry Within Element:

• N/A

Pros:

• Squad Conduct
  • Great internal communcation
  • Great react to contact drills
  • Support weapon effectiveness
• Range Variation
  • Enjoy variating distances of contact when encountered
• Platoon Communication
  • Brevity++

Cons:

• Contact
  • Intensity was lacking
  • Never under any real threat
  • More patrols would improve this
• Terrain
  • Positions were decent but was an island in a sea of bad positions
• Scope
  • Very large operation for 2 hours
  • Can be really cool! But very late start was rough in tandem.
• Crash
  • Another instance of Status Access Violation

 

[Fox.Z]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT

​

Element Callsign: BANDIT-2
Element Leader: Corporal Fox.Z

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Corporal Fox.Z
Specialist Kuusela.N
Specialist Xinos.T
Specialist Walker.S
Specialist Apollo.R
Private First Class Shere.J
Private Holmes.G
Sergeant Davis.D
Corporal Blake.H

Pros:

• Good Squad, great Fireteam Leaders.
• Great team movement and bounding over LDAs.
• Great communication on Platoon Net.
• Props to 5 for quick resupplies.
• Props to 6 for good active management of emerging situations.
• Props to 7 and Atlas for being johnny on the spot for treatment.

Cons:

• Little slow in parts. The beginning movements took a lot of time, but made sense in the essence of the operation.
• Little bit of improvement needed on active communication between fireteam leaders. Each team was on point in their actions, but took a second to inform the other team of what they were doing.
• Blue on blue. Probably due to the nature of a perpendicular assault. Unfortunate but it is what it is. We were fortunate it didn't end up worse!

Personal Improves:

• Stop transmitting Squad orders on PLT net, slowing down keystrokes so I don't mess it up.
• Handing intent down to fireteams so I'm not dragging individual soldiers by their collars.
• Stop going down during assaults because I have a tendency to crest trenches first and kick in doors.

Summary:

• Recovered OPFOR Company Level Maps and Radio Communications
• Cleared the SHORAD Trench! Props to Fixed Wing for schwacking the AA before we got there!
• Found a mass grave enroute to the last objective
• Secured OPFOR HQ and CO on the last objective!
• Had a lot of fun!!

 

[Bethea.A]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Bandit-1
Element Leader: Corporal Bethea.A

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Second Lieutenant Grizzle.M
Sergeant Turner.L
Sergeant Willson.JA
Corporal Hoidahl.N
Specialist Perea.A
Private Samra.S

Retired:
York.A
Houston.T

Pros:

• Squad had a lot of fun and enjoyed the experience.
• Great squad comms and performance. Both FTLs were top notch.
• Platoon level comms and coordination were good.

Cons:

• Light on contact, felt like insurgents instead of Russian Army. IDF was unfocused, QRF was very light.
• Blue on blue incident between the maneuver squads.
• Lanes were a bit hard to discern at times.
• Little bit of sloppy CQB at the end led to some casualties.

 

[Highman.J]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Chaos-1
Element Leader: Captain Highman.J

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
N/A


Pros:

• Perfect amount of work to manage one flight instead of two ships and knowing I could trust the two aviators to collaborate effectively
• Great job by Lightning-1 and -2 to use buddy lasing to designate a stubborn target and eliminate it
• Working under Bandit-5 as a single point of contact worked very well
• Aviators like Sutodoreh.W and Dujakovic.R made my job almost too easy

Cons:

• Managing three radios and direct conversations at once is still a difficult skill to master
• I know that I was slow to provide much needed intel on LZ security
• I needed to do more correlation, and I dont think I was very good about ensuring I knew EXACTLY where Blufor were before I authorized strikes. That's on me.

 

[Eugene.R]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT



​

Element Callsign: Atlas-2
Element Leader: CPL.Eugene.R

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
SPC.Winters.R
PFC.Bryan.R

Pros:

• Good communication and coordination within the team and with 7.
• Mission design was good on paper, ambient sounds were nice addition.
• New troopers doing medic got to learn few things with what little work they did get.

Cons:

• Very long periods of nothing to do, felt like we were being strung along.
• Felt like infantry was never really threatened, being able to clear multiple POIs (including trenches) taking minimal casualties led to little to no medical work for the entire OP.
• Team felt like only 1 medical team would of been better for this OP.
• Individual trooper issues within team overlapping commands, causing one black tag. Need to make sure we're working with each other not against.

 

[Hamm.C]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: GRIZZLY / BUFFALO FLIGHT
Element Leader: Specialist Hamm.C "Hooker"

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Hamm.C "Hooker" (PIC GRIZZLY-1 / BUFFALO-1)
Chief Warrant Officer 2 Villmarsson.L (PIC GRIZZLY-2 / BUFFALO-2)


Pros:

• Lots of fun and lots of rotary.
• Lots of stick time... nicely utilized as a support asset.
• Excellent initial Air Assault insertion (instraction lol) to the LZ. Very good approach, landings, and quick infantry dismounting.
• Excellent comms with Bandit-5.
• Appreciate Lightning Flight clearing the way so our GRIZZLY AOA and LZ were safe.
• Very appreciated threat advisories from Lightning Flight... kept us safe.
• Good resupply opportunities
• Nice EPOW Extract RTB
• ***Much appreciated the latitude/option to transition from Grizzly to Buffalo after initial bulk Air Assault elements were inserted. This is much more advantageous from rotary wing perspective and ultimately the holistic mission objectives/safety/speed/effectiveness.

Cons:

• For some reason, on the deck at base, our fully loaded MH-47 (Grizzly-1) was spiked/painted by enemy forces seconds before liftoff. Almost immediately, an incoming missile destroyed our bird and damaged Grizzly-2 and injured most troopers. After discussing with leadership, it seems that this was the result of a Tunguska missile that was fired at a Lightning aircraft which missed and subsequently locked onto our bird. This unfortunately resulted in a delay but in the positive, resulted in a learning lesson. [Pretty sure video available on this, if needed]

 

[Bunnell.M]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Atlas 1
Element Leader: Major Bunnell.M

7th Cavalry Personnel Within Element:
Specialist Blade.B

Pros:

• learned new stuff since both of us are not Atlas primary

Cons:

• Not a whole lot going on with 2 atlas squads
• A lot of downtime for us medics

Note:

 

[Sam.T]

DEPARTMENT OF THE ARMY
S3 BATTLE STAFF
Headquarters
7th Cavalry Regiment
COMBAT AFTER ACTION REPORT
​

Element Callsign: Bandit-6
Element Leader: First Lieutenant Sam.T


Pros:

• The initial plan was adapted well to emerging situations (updated location of OPFOR and objectives once on the ground).
• Squads felt very solid, and executed at a high level.
• Despite the large number of ODA's to manage, we took minimal casualties. Movement felt very solid throughout.

Cons:

• AO was very large, leading to the OPFOR being very dispersed among several POIs.
• Trying to manage the long periods of downtime led to some hasty decisions from me, leading to suboptimal attack directions and contributing to some blue-on-blue (perpendicular assault on second town).

 

[Rutkowski.P]

S1 Locked!

Assigned Mobius.T for Processing.

 

[Rutkowski.P]

S1 Operations Processed.