East Anglia Reserve Forces & Cadets Association

The Queen praised the vital role of RAF reservists today as she presented a new Sovereign Colour and 2 Royal Auxiliary Air Force Regiment Squadrons with their first Squadron Standards.

Hundreds of families, friends and dignitaries gathered beside the runway at RAF Marham to watch a new Sovereign's Colour being presented to the Royal Auxiliary Air Force and 2 new squadron colours being presented to Marham-based 2620 County of Norfolk Sqn, and Honington-based 2623 East Anglian Sqn.

Men and women from all three squadrons were on parade as the Queen arrived by Limousine, wearing a violet silk dress with matching wool coat and hat.

Source- The Watton and Swaffham Times

In 2009 the Shooting Team of 158 (R Anglian) Tpt Regt RLC (V), 49 (E) Bde, defeated the very best of all the TA Infantry Battalions to win the title of Territorial Army Operational Shooting Competition (TAOSC) Champions. It was a significant feat and one that had not been achieved previously by a non-Infantry TA unit since 1986 and, as such, put the Regiment and Peterborough on the map as a hot bed of military shooting. Having triumphed at TAOSC 2009, and also taking all the honours at Inter-Corps, Corps and Bde Operational Shooting competitions in the process, the Commanding Officer laid down the challenge for the Shooting Team to repeat their feat and win ‘back to back’ championships. The Team Captain and Manager, Maj Steve Townell and Maj Colin Bingham, accepted the challenge on behalf of the Team and set out to attempt to complete what many thought would be impossible and which had never been achieved by a non-Infantry unit; to retain their title and yet again beat the best of the best at TAOSC 2010. The challenge was readily accepted! 

TAOSC is an annual operational shooting competition that combines team and individual combat focussed shooting matches designed to fully test participants’ mental, physical and marksmanship skills at distances from 600m downwards. It employs a variety of field skills with Rifle, Light Support Weapon (LSW) and Pistol over a busy 3 day schedule that requires all competitors to wear full body armour with individual load carrying equipment that has to weigh a minimum of 7.5kg. It is a far cry from the ‘gravel belly’ shooting competitions of old.  The Team Matches include the following: 

• Combat Snapshooting Match in two practices where the 8 man unit team split down into 2 four man Fire Teams, sprint from a prone position, negotiate a series of obstacles then engage targets from 300m that are exposed every 5 seconds. The two fire team’s scores are aggregated to give the total section score taken from the quickest time to engage the targets with accurate fire before any more can be exposed and any ammunition brought back. The second practice is a Counter Terrorist shoot that involves the fire teams engaging each exposure of two types of target.
• Fire Team Match includes a timed CASEVAC and ammunition replenishment phase leading straight into a fire and manoeuvre assault from 600m to 100m.
• Section Match is a fire and manoeuvre match exercising the team as two fire teams within a section in suppression of enemy fire, movement to a FUP covering each other, the assault, reorganisation and repelling a counter attack from 600m to 200m.
• Machine Gun Match is a LSW match fired by two individuals with an aggregated score that engages targets from 500m to 100m.
• Pistol Match is a Close Quarter Combat pistol match fired by two firers whose scores are aggregated which is fired at 25m down to 10m engaging targets in deliberate, snap and rapid practices utilising various firing positions.                

TAOSC 2010

All TA competitors within their unit teams compete for Her Majesty’s Queens Medal and fire in individual matches with the Top 50 TA competitors firing in a second stage match to determine the winner of the Queen’s Medal. It is a mentally challenging and physically demanding competition and mirrors many conditions that soldiers face on current operations. The team from 158 Regiment has been Captained and Coached by Maj Steve Townell and ably assisted by Team Manager, Maj Colin Bingham, for the last 6 years. The former retired from the Regular Army in June 2009 and was selected to be OC of 202 (Ipswich) Sqn and is into his 40th year of combat shooting representing the Army, Combined Services and Great Britain. At 56 years of age he was the oldest competitor in the competition. He was still able to achieve 5th place on the second day rifle aggregate and 15th place overall in the TA 50 individual rifle championship, another unique achievement. His outstanding skill with the pistol alongside his other team pistol partner, Maj Stuart Bruce and OC of 201 (Bedford) Sqn, saw them outright winners of the TA Pistol Championship.

Other notable performances were achieved by Sgt Hazelton of 202 (Ipswich) Sqn who achieved 1st place in the second day rifle aggregate and overall 3rd place in the rifle championship to take the Bronze Jewel.

Private Green of 203 (Loughborough) Sqn won the individual Defence match with a maximum score, the 1st day aggregate rifle championship and the runner up prize for his class. Major Stuart Bruce won stage 1 of the rifle championship and the Officer Class prize with Captain Erwin Hughes 203 (Loughborough) Sqn and Maj Townell OC 202 (Ipswich) Sqn taking 2nd and 3rd respectively. Pte Jones from 203 (Loughborough) Sqn took the runner up prize in the New Soldier Class with Pte Howroyd also of 203 (Loughborough) Sqn winning the pistol championship in his class. Overall, ten out of eleven of the Regimental Shooting Team were placed in the top TA 50 rifle championship, which is yet another first at Bisley and an outstanding team performance. The 158 Team won 18 of the 23 trophies on offer winning the Team Rifle Championship, the Team Combat Snapshoot Match, the Fire Team Match, the Team Pistol Match and culminating in winning the Section match (with a record score) and as such winning the coveted Dragon Trophy as Best TA Operational Shooting Regiment for the second consecutive year. This achievement is unlikely to be repeated again by a non-Infantry unit and has cemented the Regiment’s reputation across the Army.

A team of 22 Army undergraduate officer cadets at Cambridge University Officers’ Training Corps have spent part of their summer holidays building a new viewing platform inside the Milton Country Park.  The two-week project, in support of the local community, has been running between 26^th July and 4^th August.  It follows a major refurbishment of the Visitor Centre. 

Under the supervision of Staff Sergeant Jiwan Rai of the Queen’s Gurkha Engineers, the officer cadets planned, designed and built the timber decking viewing platform overlooking a lake.  The site also provides wheelchair access.  It will be formally opened by Lieutenant Colonel Seb Pollington (Commanding Officer) on Wednesday 4^th August (11 am).

Milton Country Park is located on the northern edge of Cambridge and it is increasingly popular with families, runners, cyclists, walkers and wildlife enthusiasts.  It offers a varied natural habitat interlaced with a network of over two miles of paths around the park.

Cambridge OTC aims to develop the leadership potential of selected university students through enjoyable and challenging training in order to communicate the values, ethos and career opportunities of the British Army.  This work will also raise funds for the Army Benevolent Fund – The Soldier’s Charity.

"I am a scientist, an academic, an epidemiologist, but as you can probably tell, I'm not a soldier", says Simon Wessely. The casually dressed professor is based at King’s College, London and is not on the MOD payroll, but, at the department’s bidding, he keeps a close eye on the mental health of the Armed Forces.

In 2003, his team was asked to investigate whether personnel returning from Iraq had any of the symptoms associated with what had been dubbed Gulf War Syndrome. Results showed they did not, but as the conflict in Iraq continued and operations in Afghanistan began, MOD asked Professor Wessely and his team to continue tracking their randomly selected sample of 10,000 soldiers.

“After 2005, Iraq got nastier and casualty rates went up.” says the professor. “Then the same happened in Afghanistan, and an assumption was made -particularly by the media - that this would lead to a dramatic increase in mental health problems. It’s hard to find a newspaper report that doesn’t take it for granted that we were facing a bow wave or even a tsunami of cases.”

The King’s College team’s independent research looked at what had happened to troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan between 2005 and 2009, as well as those who had not deployed. “The answer,
surprisingly, was not very much, says Wessely. His study shows that rates of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) have remained stable among regular Armed Forces, at between three and four percent.

However, the Defence Medical Health Service, NHS and veterans charities are seeing more cases. “That simply reflects that more and more people have deployed,” says the professor. The rate remains steady but the absolute numbers are going up. There’s been no collapse in morale, no catastrophic epidemic of mental health problems. We also did not find an effect of the number of deployments.”

This, he says, is in contrast with the situation in the USA. “In America, the rates of mental health problems have gone dramatically up. It may welt be to do with inequalities in healthcare when troops get home.”

Longer operational tours of duty - US soldiers can be away for up to 15 months - and shorter breaks between tours, may also be a factor. “It’s not the same here,” says Wessely. “And what’s happening in the US is not a good guide to what might happen in the UK.”

However, the news for British troops is not all good. Reservists are nearly three times more likely to suffer mental health problems after serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. This is probably due to the absence of informal support networks found in the Army bases and garrison towns where regular troops tend to live.

The other bad news is that the research highlighted a worryingly large alcohol problem. Troops returning from an operational theatre are 22 per cent more likely to have an alcohol problem than those who haven’t deployed. “Alcohol does much more harm to the Armed Forces, to individuals, to their families, society, yet it doesn’t get talked about,” says Wessely.

“We showed that not only are there high levels of drinking in the Forces, but there is an effect from deployment — people come back and reinstate their drinking at a higher level than before they left.

“It’s not an easy subject and there’s no obvious answer, he says. Because alcohol also has a very positive influence on military culture — units that drink more have better cohesion and higher morale.”

He points out that other close-knit professions, such as doctors and journalists, tend to behave in the same way: “It’s part of how they cope with adversity. I think in any institution where you mix with your own, alcohol is an important factor.”

Professor Wessley’s interest in the mental health of soldiers extends beyond his role as an advisor to the MOD. He is also a trustee of the veterans’ mental health charity, Combat Stress.

“I’m neutral about research but absolutely positive about wanting to improve the health of the Armed Forces,” he says. And he is sure that academic research is an important tool. Of his team’s extensive research, to date, he says: “We’ve only published the headline-grabbing areas so far. We have a wealth of information on tour length, operational stress on families, on jobs, on reintegration into civilian life, reservists and medical counter measures.”

MOD PRIORITY

• Looking after the mental health of Armed Forces personnel and veterans is a “top priority” for MOD, says defence secretary, Dr Liam Fox. He said a programme would be set up to tackle post-combat mental health issues for those leaving the Forces.
• Reservists are offered a mental health assessment, and treatment for combat-related conditions. Seventy- five per cent of those treated recover.
• Those at risk from alcohol problems get counselling and welfare support from MOD. More serious cases receive specialist medical and psychological treatment and rehabilitation.
• Trauma Risk Management (TRiM) and Batttemind programmes are now standard within deployed military units, and decompression breaks in Cyprus are scheduled for all troops returning from operations in Afghanistan.

Source- Defence Focus, July 2010 issue.