U.S. Army Shifts Its Training To Fighting Big Wars

U.S. Army Soldiers participate in tactical range training using M-9 Berretta handguns on Normandy Range Complex in Basra, Iraq, July 15, 2009. The Soldiers are assigned to Company B, 445th Civil Affairs Battalion. U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sgt Chrissy Best

Norwalk Reflector: Army Begins Training for Next War, Which May Be Much Different, Bigger

For more than a decade, troops here have been schooled in counterinsurgency.

"Mission-specific" training, they call it: going house to house, busting down doors, rooting out terror cells, recognizing crude explosives.

Now, after a pair of mission-specific wars, an Army in transition aims to get back to the future.

The training needed to fight full-scale, more conventional battles has suffered, Army leaders contend. So Fort Riley is putting soldiers such as Staff Sgt.Gilbert Monroe back into big tanks and simulating wars on a scale grander than Iraq or Afghanistan.

"This is what I signed up for," Monroe said.

He began his military career 14 years ago in an M1A2 Abrams tank. But he spent tours in Iraq commanding more nimble armored vehicles, rolling on eight tires and lacking the heft to blast a target from 2 miles out.

WNU Editor: Events in Ukraine have made everyone realize that big wars do have a tendency to happen .... and it is best to be ready for one.