TRADOC Pam 525-3-7-01 - TRADOC - U.S. Army

TRADOC Pam 525-3-7-01VignetteRanger Team Rangoon pulled their boats upin four different spots on the Seingar KamparRiver banks and stashed them in the lushunderbrush. It was pitch black and deadly stillwith only the sounds of birds and insects in thisremote section in the middle of Sumatra. The airwas hot and palpably thick with moisture. Teammembers moved rapidly up the cart path on thesouth bank to their designated rally point.First Lieutenant Sam David wondered if theaircraft that inserted their boats ten milesdownstream had alerted any defenders. Nothing showed on his tablet screen but the dotsrepresenting the rest of his team, and they were a pleasant and reassuring blue. He adjusted hishelmet to be able to read the tablet on the visor while navigating with the infrared image from theintegrated helmet mounted cameras. Theirs was a passive mission until 0300 unless theystumbled onto Ibn Ander or any of his forces—a possible windfall given the way Ander movedaround.Ibn Ander was the one-time governor of the Central Province in Sumatra. Now he hadproclaimed his former province the Central Caliphate. He’d either co-opted the GOI forces tojoin his insurgency or drove them out. GOI was too weak to react and now Ibn Ander wascalling for an international jihad to support his eventual capture of the rest of Sumatra and—presumably—all of Indonesia. David’s Ranger platoon was on loan to the lead elements of TFGreen, the U.S. Army component of the coalition mounted to oust Ibn Ander. The Rangers weretied in with other special operations forces and tasked with covert actions to oversee potentialjoint heavy lift landing areas, capture Ander’s key leaders, and pave the way for the final forcibleentry operation aimed at liberating the captured capital city of Pekanbaru.A Company, 2 nd Ranger Battalion had its platoons working the landing areas in AO Aerieeast of the capital. At 0300 the SEALs would be creating havoc north of the city as a diversion tomask the approach of 1 st Marine Expeditionary Brigade in their V22 Ospreys. If all went asplanned the assault would start at nightfall around 1800 that day. Laying low and not beingdiscovered by the fishing boats and local farmers would be fairly easy for David’s platoon asthey were in an heavily forested triple canopy copse of jungle on the south edge of AO Aerie. AOAerie was actually an immense cultivated patchwork of smaller fields with rice, potatoes, wheat,and sugarcane. The huge Condors would discharge an entire FSV battalion that night. Theywould move directly on the road network and cleared fields to the eastern suburbs of the capital.David knew the plan. His job was to make sure the planned flight approaches were clear.He had twenty hand-launched Hummingbirds that would map the area to supplement the satelliteshots using millimeter wave and optical scans to uncover any active aerial mines or anti-aircraftsystems. Any they found they’d either disable or mark for avoidance. The Hummingbirds weresmall and nearly silent. Time to get them up.77