OUTDOOR TACTICAL OUTDOOR DEVELOPMENT
BASHA UP!
WE THOUGHT IT WAS TIME TO START PUTTING SOME OF THOSE TACTICAL OUTDOOR SKILLS INTO PRACTICE AFTER TALKING ABOUT THEM FOR SO LONG, SO BILL AND JIMMY HAVE BEEN OUT IN THE WOODS BUILDING FAST-SET SHELTERS THAT CAN SEE EVEN THE MOST EFFICIENT AND “LIGHT IS RIGHT” PLAYERS AMONGST YOU COMFORTABLE FOR A NIGHT OR TWO!
B
ack when I was a teenager I was really into my cadet-force life, and lived for “parade days” on a Friday! Back in the 8o’s it was perfectly acceptable to wear our DPM to school and then head straight out to “army training sir”! Due to being in a garrison town we had a regular turnover of units in residence and it was my great honour (although not always pleasure!) to receive training from the likes of our parent Regiment The Royal Engineers, but also the likes of the Parachute Regiment, Royal Marines, the Gurkhas, Royal Irish Rangers, and the Queens Infantry Regiment! Weekend and summer camps were the undoubted highlights of my year, but especially those summer 40
AUGUST 2022
two-or-three-weekers where my friends and I lived and breathed all things “army”! Proper days on the range shooting everything that UKLF had to offer, section and platoon skills, all kinds of field training, but most importantly for me a good 48 or 72 hour exercise to round things off. The final exercise was where we put ALL the training we’d been given into practice, and after a full day of patrols, ambushes and section attacks our platoon laager at the end of the day was where “field admin” really came into play, and I have to admit that this experience went about shaping the future person (and indeed airsoft player!) that I would one day become.
