A squad is marching down a road. There is a cliff in front of the formation. The first soldier is exactly one step away from the cliff. What is the only command that can be given that will save this soldiers life?
Good Luck.
Posts: 46 | Location: IZ | Registered: 02 January 2004
[quote:dde6d0bd8e="onefox140"]This one if for the troopies, no NCO's here.
A squad is marching down a road. There is a cliff in front of the formation. The first soldier is exactly one step away from the cliff. What is the only command that can be given that will save this soldiers life?
This is a tough one guys, you'll probably have to break out the 3-21.5 for this. onefox is asking for a marching command, so it's not gas gas gas... I certainly didn't know it off the top of my head. Great question!
Well then technically, thats not the only command to save their lives. The command of Incline Left (right) will also save the lives of the soldiers. In 3-21.5, Drill and Ceremonies, Chapter 6, section 7 paragraph c, it states, "c. To avoid an obstacle in the line of march, the squad leader directs, INCLINE LEFT(RIGHT). The lead man inclines left(right) around the obstacle and resumes the original direction. All other members follow the lead man." The command doesn't require you to be on a particilar foot, nor is it a two part command, it can be said quickly at any time. Therefore, if the squad is one step away, they can immediatly turn left whatever the appropriate ammount is to avoid the obstacle. If you are going to include non marching commands in the question, then I would say you would have to accept any command given by the squad leader like, "Stop!" and "Look out for that cliff!" and other such crazy answers. They arn't D&C commands but neither is GAS GAS GAS. Incline Left(right) is an actual D&C command which will save the lives of those soldiers.
The Question is supposed to be worded that the next step the lead soldier takes would put him off of the cliff... marktime and incline both take 2 steps to execute.
According to FM 3-21.5 Incline doesn't take two steps, it's not a two part command, it's executed immediately and can be used at any time. You say it and the lead man just guides their way around the obstacle. The normal rules of calling a prepatory command on the left or right foot (marktime), then the command of execution the next time that foot is placed(march), do not apply to an INCLINE LEFT. If I am wrong please reference where it states otherwise in the 3-21.5 so I'll know better in the future.
Well, If we are going to get technical, I severly doubt that any soldier would walk off the friggin cliff in the first place. Otherwise, its a lot faster to yell "GAS" than to tell the formation to incline around a friggin cliff.not to mention that the formation would cease to be if all four ranks inclined at the same moment. they would run into one another and one would probably fall off the cliff. Whatever, this is dumb.
Well my response to that is if they are only a step away from a cliff and about to march off, the squad leader probably WANTS them to walk off the cliff and die, otherwise he wouldn't have put them in that position. Either that or the squad leader is blind, and unable to see the cliff, at which point he wouldn't know he needs to give a command at all. Either way, they all die. This is all taking into consideration that those marching are actually robots, not soldiers, since like you said, they would see the cliff and just stop marching. Therefore, I agree with previous posters, no command is necessary.
As for everyone bumping each other off the cliff with an Incline, it might happen if you are in a column of twos, but won't happen in a normal squad column. Remember, we're marching a squad, not a platoon.
onefox140 is right! Stop getting all wrapped aroound the axle! As for the "incline" command,....the actuall command is "incline around" which in the meantime the soldiers would actually have taken 2 steps as opposed to one. Also,...the incline around command is supposed to be used to circumvent an obstacle that is in your path or "line of march". It is not used to guide a squad or platoon to turn to the right or left. Those commands would be either right turn or column right,......all of which require a prepatory commmand and a command of execution. The bottom line is the answer that he was looking for was, "GAS",....which would have the desired effect. And how do we know that AMY is not an NCO? Hmmmmmmm????
