Field Craft

Its all about moving about without being seen or detected by the enemy, we practice our field craft skills on a regular basis during night exercises where we have opposing teams battle against each other to complete an objective.

It may sound easy, but to be good at it, you have to be able to crawl up to a foot away from your enemy, without them realizing that you're there! This page attempts to show you how to do just that.

The Five S's of Camouflage and Concealment:

If you want to be pretty much invisible in the field, you need to 'cam-up' and stay concealed. Here are the main pointers for when doing so.

1. Sound - Be quiet, don't tread on dry twigs and watch your footing. Don't talk, but use hand signals and do not carry clothes or equipment that rustles or makes a noise.
2. Smell - Don't smell of Lynx deodorant.
3. Shape - Break up your shape by putting stripes across your face. Do anything to disrupt the human shape. E.g. - lie with a branch across you.
4. Sight - Blend in by being the same colour as your surroundings. Remove fresh foliage and tuck it into your pockets or tie it around your body. If you're staying in one place, you can become completely invisible like this - as snipers often do!
5. Silhouette - Don't walk on the edges of cliffs, hills etc, as you will be silhouetted and seen for miles around.

The Skills:

Kitten Crawl: The quietist and slowest of all movement skills, you lie on your front, move any small objects in your way and slowly move forward making sure you are silent at all times.

Leopard Crawl: Just like in the movies! You lie on your front and move along on your stomach. Be careful, this can make lots of noise, so is best used only when it is essential that you keep a low profile.

Monkey Run: Bend your back right over so that you could drag your knuckles on the floor behind you. Then run, fast and low. This is a good all rounder for concealment.

Body Camouflage:

This is very important, you can sit in as many bushes as you want, but if you have a bright white face people are still likely to see you. 

Tiger Stripes: Another movie classic. It is very easy to do, a base coat of brown is used, then using a "Cam Stick", stripes of varying colours are applied to the face that travel over the face, never in straight lines or parallels. The idea is that it breaks up features on the face, it is often best to put lines across the nose mouth and other features, obviously not putting it where its not supposed to go.

Dispersed Pattern: This is the standard scheme which military combat jackets are done in. To do it on you face is extremely effective, but also takes a lot of time care and attention. Use a Buddy-Buddy system. To do this you need a descent cam set with numerous colours, you start by giving the face a light "tan" then one by one apply the shades of green, brown and black in a similar way to combats. If you get this right it is most effective and you'll have great fun with you increased concealment abilities, but be warned it takes a long time!

If all else fails: It's fast, quick and easy, and supposed to be good for your skin (no promises). You need water, boot and muddy hole. Here's how you do it, apply your boot to the muddy hole until suitably churned up, then apply water to churned up muddy hole, and finally apply churned up wet muddy hole to face, Instant cam, be careful though in selecting you hole and when applying to face.

Buddy-Buddy: One of the best ways of "Camming Up", find a friend, or a willing volunteer. Then pick one of the 3 methods listed and apply the cam to their face, it is a lot faster and a lot more accurate as they can see what they are doing to your face.

Hand Signals:

Hand signals are essential for quiet and effective communication. 1360 squadron, like most in the ATC, use the standard British Army signals.

	Staggered File: This is done on a path. Half the flight goes on one side of the path and the other, on the other side. Then use uneven spacings to create a staggered file.
	Single File: Everyone in a straight line
	Double File: Half on one side, half on the other. Each person has a partner on other side of the path.
	On Me: Everyone drop and gather around this person (normally I/C or 2I/C.)
	Drop: Everyone drop down on the floor and move into cover.