4 ingear ADVENTURE timesonline.co.uk/ingear 05.10.08 5

Pictures by Dan Tuffs FIGHTING INSURGENTS IN BAGHDAD, USA The US army is using mock villages with Arabic actors and movie special effects to train for Iraq. Mark Harris steps into a firefight

t’s another scorching day in Medina Wasl, a small market town in the desert outside Baghdad. I’m walking down the dusty main street, trying to ignore Arabic pop music blaring from a cafe, watch- Iing women barter for sizzling kebabs and getting a few sharp looks from the men sitting around smoking or playing backgammon. Then all hell breaks loose. A roadside IED (improvised explosive device) deto- nates in a spray of shrapnel that rattles my UN-emblazoned Kevlar helmet. The screams that follow aren’t all in Arabic. The bomb’s target, a US army Humvee, lies shattered. One soldier is staggering around, waving his M16. Another writhes in agony nearby having lost both his legs. The bitter taste of gun- powder fills the air as Iraqi civilians either rush to help friends caught in the blast or evaporate into side streets. As if by magic, the cavalry arrive. Literally. The armoured Humvees and tank-like Bradley infantry fighting Troops check their grenade launchers, vehicles of the 3rd Brigade, 1st Cavalry far left, for another mock battle in the Division, sweep into the town centre, Lanes at Fort Irwin, above. Make-up braving sniper fire and angry locals to artists help ‘casualties’ such as the one treat their injured comrades. Medics below appear as realistic as possible leap into action and gunners rake a near- by hotel with large-calibre machine- guns. Then, with a final roar of their “an interactive, combat-focused Broad- warfare. Civilians suffered too, as troops for instance, contain only about as killed. Once he’s fully into combat tor. So the Lanes has 310. These observer/ engines, the Americans load their way play”. with little understanding of local lan- much gunpowder as a firework, but are mode, it will be as hard to re-enter life in controllers (OCs) are the simulation’s wounded and leave the devastated scene Until 2003, Fort Irwin mainly hosted guages and culture sometimes adopted designed to give the maximum bang for suburban America as it is getting used to referees. Some wander through the vil- behind them. “force on force” training operations. Its heavy-handed tactics. the army’s buck — including cork shrap- conditions in Medina Wasl. “When I lages with the trainees, others monitor I can almost hear the director call remote location offered the space (if not The solution? Create a fake Iraq nel for realism. went back to the States [after my first the village’s hundreds of hidden video “Cut!” As the Humvees growl away, the climate) to simulate the sprawling where soldiers could learn and make The latest improvements even use tour], it was like I was in the future,” he cameras and microphones from the “injured” Iraqis stand up and smile at cold war tank battles the US army mistakes without adding to the casual- open cooking fires, live goats and don- says, recalling his homecoming. “Every- base’s control centre. each other. Technicians in fatigues expected to fight in Europe. An entire ty figures. And so the idea of the “Iraq keys to give Medina Wasl an authentic thing was new and different. I took a lit- Forget the .50-calibre machineguns, carry fire extinguishers over to the US regiment, the 11th Armoured simulation” was born — 13 typical Iraqi smell. Sergeant Thavone Phavivong of tle time to see each and every one of my the armoured fighting vehicles and smouldering Humvee and muttering Cavalry, adopted Soviet uniforms and (and Afghan) villages scattered across the 3rd Brigade has been to Iraq twice family and friends — you never know even the occasional Apache helicopter officers behind me start dissecting the tactics to become Fort Irwin’s resident the Mojave desert at Fort Irwin. The vil- and vouches for the realism of what when the next time will be.” that flashes overhead, the OCs carry the American soldiers’ performance. “opposing force” — Opfor for short. lages would offer troops a range of realis- troops call the Lanes: “Exercises in Medi- To simulate the conditions of a real most powerful weapon of all — the God This isn’t really a town near Bagh- Then the Iraq war happened. Since tic training scenarios, from foot patrols na Wasl gave me flashbacks to when I Iraqi town, Medina Wasl is populated by Gun. This small blue plastic revolver dad. It’s not even Iraq. It’s the US army’s March 2003, more than 4,100 US soldiers to clearing underground caves. was a gunner in a convoy over in Iraq. 2,000 villagers, in reality either Opfor sol- can “kill” anything on the battlefield, National Training Centre (NTC) at Fort have been killed and over 30,000 Fort Irwin’s first Iraqi villages were Over there, there are huge crowds, civil- diers or unemployed locals from nearby from an unarmed civilian to a C-130 Irwin in California, and I’ve just taken wounded in a war the army simply little more than a collection of hurriedly ians are all over the battlefield. Everyone Barstow. All speaking roles are handled transport plane, in a silent flash of light. part in the most realistic paintball game wasn’t prepared for. Suicide bombs, painted garages and barns purchased is coming towards you and they’re sim- by an ensemble of 250 Arabic actors and All weapons in the simulation are in the world. Or as NTC commander IEDs and snipers wrought havoc in regi- from nearby retailer Shed World. Few of ply not afraid of us. NTC gives that expe- émigrés. They live on base for weeks at a loaded with blanks, but woe betide any Brigadier-General Dana Pittard calls it, ments that were ill equipped for urban its Opfor soldiers spoke Arabic and all rience over here.” Just about the only stretch, playing the parts of Iraqi fighter who lets their guard down. Every harness also has a GPS unit that allows it looked far too clean-cut to pass for Iraqi thing missing, he says, are dogs running imams, mayors, shopkeepers and house- soldier, villager and vehicle in the Lanes to be pinpointed from the control centre. insurgents. around, an impossibility in the Mojave wives. The men and women (there are wears a harness that is part of a wireless The God Gun allows the OCs to simu- The army needed more realism, it as they would get eaten by coyotes. no children, for safety reasons) come laser tag network called Miles, standing late the effects of bombs by disabling sol- needed it quickly and it had money to Phavivong, like the 50,000 other sol- from all over the Middle East. for Multiple Integrated Laser Engage- diers and vehicles, or simply to punish spend — so it turned to diers “processed” through Fort Irwin Some have fled conflict themselves, ment System. Each Miles harness con- foolish tactics. After each iteration has Hollywood, 200 miles every year, is “getting his head into Iraq others are comfortable Arab Americans played by a genuine double amputee, to fire a gun, mortar or rocket-propelled tions. What happens over the course of tains an array of laser receivers, and run its course, the soldiers get feedback down the road. Con- space”, drill slang for acclimatising to who simply enjoy the wages of around whose simulated wounds are gory grenade They are trained to use the the 14-day training period depends on every weapon (except suicide bombs and on their behaviour, discuss the conse- struction co-ordinators the conditions where you sweat 24 $4,500 (£2,430) for two weeks’ work. For enough to make some trainees sick. same tactics used by real insurgents, how a unit behaves from day to day. IEDs) has a laser emitter. “We really just quences of their actions, and often have from Paramount Pictures hours a day in daytime temperatures of 12 hours a day, they live and breathe the “When the IEDs go off and you see and even benefit from acting lessons If US troops storm a calm village, kick- have a very fancy laser tag warfare sys- to run the exercise all over again. sprayed stucco onto shipping 40C and in the knowledge that you roles of Iraqi villagers, wandering back the amputees, it really makes it feel given by Carl Weathers, star of Predator ing down doors and shooting on sight, tem,” admits John Wagstaffe of the NTC. For the 3rd Brigade, 1st Cavalry Divi- containers to create instant could fall victim at any second to an IED and forth through the streets, selling real,” says Phavivong. “It can be hard and the Rocky films. for instance, they’ll face snipers and The Miles network is smart, so if you sion, the Lanes is the best immersion shops, houses and mosques. or a sniper’s bullet. clothes and cigarettes to each other over when you see injured civilians, but That’s because each of the 112 possi- IEDs the next time they visit. If they try to shoot a Humvee with a handgun, training they can get. “You know Set dressers then added “texture”: Phavivong is hoping that the Iraqi and over again, and screaming hysteri- we’re taught that our first priority is our ble major events (or “iterations” in army hire an interpreter (using real dinars nothing happens. If you accurately tar- what?” says Sergeant Phavivong with a broken-down Toyota pick-ups, plas- conflict is entering its final straight. He cally as the same Humvees “explode” soldiers. And with all the people speak) has a fully fledged script, with shipped over from Iraq) and respect get a person who is vulnerable and with- smile. “I’d love to go through those tic vegetables and meats for stalls, was in the middle of his second tour in every couple of hours. around, it’s not easy to make a positive individual speeches, motivations and local customs, though, they might just in range, they hear a buzzing sound that Lanes again.” But there’s no time for authentically battered cafe tables Baghdad last year when he heard that Another group of actors is even more identification of hostiles.” actions planned out. Not every iteration learn about an Al-Qaeda cell shipping means they are hit. An OC then hands repeats now. In December, the entire Mark Harris with and even Arabic graffiti. his fiancée back home in Minnesota was unsettling. Make-up artists provide buck- The “hostiles” are members of Opfor, is “kinetic” (with bullets and bombs); guns into the area. them a “casualty card” that describes brigade deploys to Iraq for a 12-month two ‘insurgents’ The army even relies on Hollywood pregnant. He knows that every tour ets of fake blood, and the US army victim US soldiers playing Iraqi terrorists and many simply involve talking with Iraqi Managing such multi-threaded sto- their injury and whether they can hob- tour of duty, with no Miles harnesses, in the Lanes for pyrotechnics. The roadside bombs, shortens the odds of getting injured or of the Humvee bombing I witnessed was insurgents — anyone who might have authorities or patrolling tense situa- rylines takes more than a single direc- ble away or fall down dead. Every Miles no make-up artists and no blanks.