Frag Out! Magazine
Issue link: https://fragout.uberflip.com/i/1542142
der to assign him a mobilization post, for example, as a section chief at the rank of major or as a senior department officer at lieutenant colonel rank? None — even if the military special - ty does not match and only the personnel corps matches, and he is not trained during reserve exercises for the post. What do such exercises look like from the very beginning? They are very schematic; first comes induction and here differences begin. There should be a doctor, but due to great shortages in that corps there often is not, or the doctor is replaced by a paramedic. What does the doc - tor check? Submitted medical le- ave certificates (attendance must be recorded), sometimes blood pressure measurement and the standard question "Are you ill?" Having been "examined" in that way, reservists start exercises, the next stage of which is the "weapons qualification exam" — a farce if ever there was one. In the course of that "training" one can hear such things as: "Your service pistol is the P83, but we don't have ammunition for it, so we'll borrow P94s." Thus the "exam" is on the P83, while actual shooting will take place from the P94… for the army it makes no difference because the exercise report will be written in glowing terms anyway. Let us move on to the actual training during exercises. Of course the descriptions below do not cover training levels in all military units but present the overall picture. Topography/land-navigation tra - ining is conducted not on maps but on computer printouts, which simply do not hold scale. Com- passes were mostly purchased personally by professional sol- diers — very often on AliExpress or Temu — whose quality is du- bious. The instructor's knowled- ge level during such classes in which the author participated could be described as that of a novice scout leader — some - one going to camp for the first time. When told that a protrac- tor could be used to determine a position on the map, the in- structor asked, "what is that?" and when he saw a cartometer he was surprised such a device even existed. This shows that professional soldiers delegated to train reservists are often picked at random, which unfor - tunately has been the norm for years. Another standard training is "marksmanship training." From January 2025, reservists called up for exercises were supposed to undergo retraining under the new shooting training regula - tions, or at least be introduced to it. Unfortunately, due to a lack of sufficient numbers of in- structors and ranges and, as is already standard at exercises, a lack of appropriate equipment and kit, such training was di - scontinued, practically in the first quarter, and the standard returned to shooting for accura- cy and grouping. And here, too, there were many reports that it was done perfunctorily. Training is focused on "assuming the pro - ne shooting position," rather than on dry-fire training or classes aimed at mastering even basic marksmanship fundamentals such as proper grip or trigger control. One of the author's favorite tra - ining topics as a reserve sol- dier is SERE — well, perhaps not full SERE but elements of it. From the basic elements that a reservist called up for exerci - ses may be "taught" are topics such as how to make a campsite using painting foil, how to li- ght a fire, how to boil water. Again, the level of these clas- ses varies — sometimes extremely — but the question remains: why are they organized? The simple answer is: they are filler ac - tivities, easy to organize. And what do these classes contribu- te? Mostly nothing — as the in- structors themselves admit. One of the obligatory activities during exercises is CBRN tra- ining, i.e., the popular "putting on OP1," even though OP1 (type of a legacy Polish Army MOPP Suit) www.fragoutmag.com