Comments by "Titanium Rain" (@ChucksSEADnDEAD) on "Why do Armies do Potemkin Training (and why NATO uses MILES Gear)" video.

@BRANFED Not what happened. Basically Van Riper decided to borderline sabotage the exercise by "playing the MILES game". When BluFor jammed his comms he switched to bike messengers. But the simulation was not meant for that so they still worked like electronic communications. Bike messengers take time to travel, they get lost, they fall, they get intercepted, etc. but in the simulation it worked like unjammable radio. Then he had massive anti-ship missiles installed on small boats. In real life it would not be possible, but the simulation wasn't programmed to prohibit it. Then when the "game" started the BluFor navy had their defenses shut down to avoid them locking up civilian air and sea traffic, and the simulation spawned the boat swarm right in front of BluFor. So nobody had time to react when the simulated attack began. It was basically cheating on a computer game, and Van Riper threw a tantrum when he was asked to reset the scenario.
14
Sim rounds is better in close quarters, MILES is better for open fields.
1
@Nike-nm8jc There are instances of Van Riper attempting to metagame by knowing ahead of time the only places where amphibious landings could be performed. The problem is that most people assume these exercises are like a game of laser tag. We put Red vs Blue and see who wins. But the more important aspects of these exercises are: when you start taking casualties, can you send the medics and blood bags in time; or if a Navy ship has their computers go down in the middle of combat, can you get the IT experts to fix it under fire? In the end of the report the game's outcome was Red team actually accomplishing many of its goals (retaining political control of the country being the main one) and Blue team failing some of its goals. Van Riper seems to have blown a lid and demanded some kind of pat in the back for achieving a huge Pyrrhic victory against Team America, while all the US Navy did was say "You know we enjoyed having you around to run Red team but this circus is costing the taxpayer millions of dollars per day so we better restart and get proper data about our new concepts". The exercise isn't based around "can you win under this circumstances?" but more around "war is getting more complex and now we have computers to help, can we make sure this all works under stress or is it going to be a catastrophe?".
1
The blank firing adapter has a steel rod that goes into the barrel. If you attempt to fire a live round it will get your attention.
1
The issue is that MILES works for like 700 yards, simunition works for 50-70.
1