Oswestry School CCF Exercise

I’ve been working with Oswestry School for a couple of years now, but had little to do with the military training of the CCF (Combined Cadet Force). This has been due to my regular commitment to another CCF unit that happens on the same afternoon of each week in term time.

However, yesterday afternoon I was able to join the Oswestry cadets for the start of a 24 hour exercise on Nesscliffe training area. The exercise was primarily part of the Year 10 cadets’ training, but a number of the Year 11s took on command positions as section commanders and 2i/cs and a handfull of 6th formers acting as ‘enemy’.

Having deployed onto the training area, the sections patrolled to a prearranged location to set up a patrol harbour. For most of them, this was the first time they had done this in a tactical setting and they struggled to achieve this quietly. As a result, they gave their position away and soon found themselves under attack from their ‘enemy’, which had unforeseen consequences. On contact from the enemy, the cadets understandably ran in the opposite direction. However, unknown to them, there was a platoon of regular soldiers dug in about 150m infront of them. Consequently, after about 30 seconds of running away, the cadets turned on their heels and ran back even faster when the regulars opened up on them with automatic weapons! Remembering of course that this was all done with blank rounds, there was no real danger but I’m sure that the event will last a long time in the cadets’ memories – one to tell the Grandchildren in years to come.

Recce patrols were sent out during the first half of the night in order to gather information about the suspected enemy position, whilst a rota of sentries was posted throughout the night. After a set of orders in the morning, they launched a platoon attack on the enemy using one section as fire support, one as the assault group and the third as a cut off group. The attack actually went very well, although there are always complications along the way, and the objective was achieved without too much drama.

The rest of the exercise was spent working on section battle drills and patrolling skills before heading back to school for the inevitable clean up. Personally, I thoroughly enjoyed getting out and training with a new unit. It always takes a while to get used to how different units work, so I felt that my contribution was a bit limited on this occasion, but I’m sure that this will change if I get the opportunity to train with Oswestry School CCF more in the future.

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