Military sight picture.

[TedH]

I have to disagree with the statement "Also the most common problem found with shooters AFTER they enter the military is unfamiliarity with their weapons.".

This may or may not be true for the Air Force and Navy, however, for the Army and Marine Corp, this statement just does hold true anymore. I won't go into how the Marines addressed this even further (they had less of a problem to begin with) but the Army took many steps during the 2000-2010 to address this problem.

1. Extension of Basic Training by two weeks. This extension was to focus on battle necessities not limited to but includes: better marksmanship, IED, Small Unit Contact, Convoy Operations and hand to hand combat. Even live fire exercises at some.

2. Advanced Individual Training also functions as an extension now of Basic Training, with training to include many things outside of the Technical Portion of the MOS. Multiple field exercises, etc.

3. Train up for deployments – for 60 to 90 days minimum, units are focused on training for their specific deployment rotation. Most Active units go through JRTC or NTC and NG/Reserves go through mobilization training. All of these include live fire exercises.

We have to remember now that the current US Military is the most combat experienced military that we have ever had. Do problems still exist, yes, but they are no where near what they were 15 yrs ago. Most of the lessons have been learned the hard way, which is the biggest shame of all.

Hovis

The Army has made good strides in weapons training during the BCT and AIT phases in the last few years. However there are still many units that only handle their weapons on qualification day, or during that one day during the MOB process were they go to qualify.
The issue isn't with the infantry. In fact from my experience, Army infantry is as good as Marine Corps infantry. The issue is with the support and combat support units. In that area the Marine Corps out classes the Army in Weapons handling.
Even after the Private Jessica incident I still hear people say to me. Aww SGT Heck, I don't need to know how to do that. I just work in the motor pool/S1/J2 fill in the blank.
Remember that most of their 1st SGTs and BN commanders came in the Army during that ERA when 9 rounds to zero and 40 rounds to qualify was considered adequate training.
I have actually seen a 1st SGT come apart when he realized that I was going to train his uniformed computer operators on a HOT range, and I had to make him leave the area. The Idea that the SM would be walking around the range with loaded weapons de-cocked on fire in their holsters was so foreign to him that his brain was a scrambled mess for several days. He even told me that he wouldn't have allowed his SM to carry their weapons like that in a combat zone.
Thats just one of the things that you are fighting against to get the army up to speed.

AND really the army doesn't have that much combat experience. IF there are 120,000 americans in AF then less 14,000 are actually going outside the wire on missions, and out of those only about 1/2 will ever be in a TIC. The rest will never fire a shot nor hear a shot in anger. They will only see a dead or maimed person if the work in hospital.
But surprisingly those that stay behind the wire are about 2 x more likely to receive a PSD related disability check.