FORST for the Army??

[apod]

I was reading up recently on the way FORST works for the NS. It seems like a sound concept. I wonder would a similar standing evaluation unit be a good idea to evaluate Army units??

There are Ad hoc evaluations teams formed to evaluate Overseas unit MREs but could a standing unit that evaluates Individual regular units be of use?? Perhaps tie it in with the NATO OCC Evaluation process?? Units,whether being put forward for OCC or not,could be evaluated by the new unit to NATO OCC standards.

Good idea or a pipe dream??

[DeV]

I was reading up recently on the way FORST works for the NS. It seems like a sound concept. I wonder would a similar standing evaluation unit be a good idea to evaluate Army units??

There are Ad hoc evaluations teams formed to evaluate Overseas unit MREs but could a standing unit that evaluates Individual regular units be of use?? Perhaps tie it in with the NATO OCC Evaluation process?? Units,whether being put forward for OCC or not,could be evaluated by the new unit to NATO OCC standards.

Good idea or a pipe dream??

J7 inspections would be a paper based version but very different animal

[apod]

J7 Inspections are just like an Audit of your books pretty much.Not a training evaluation.

Probably the right section to next "Army FORST" under though.

[na grohmiti]

The closest to FORST in the army currently I'm guessing is pre-deployment training, but it begs the question, once someone finished training, at what stage will their usefulness within the unit be assessed again?
Keep in mind though that much of the FORST evolution are Nautical, rather than military in nature, but are necessary because of the inherent danger that goes with working at sea.
I'm not sure how that could translate ashore.

[A/TEL]

The closest to FORST in the army currently I'm guessing is pre-deployment training, but it begs the question, once someone finished training, at what stage will their usefulness within the unit be assessed again?
Keep in mind though that much of the FORST evolution are Nautical, rather than military in nature, but are necessary because of the inherent danger that goes with working at sea.
I'm not sure how that could translate ashore.

For normal annual MSDO operations yes, but it was more military orientated for OP SOPHIA and OP PONTUS pre-deployment evaluations.

[Truck Driver]

RDF were doing Bde level Ex's (Ex Slaney for instance in the case of 2 Bde) in years gone by.I think 1 Bde RDF did similar. Short answer to original question - having an assessment of the readiness of your forces cannot be a bad thing

[DeV]

NATO OCC
This year - Arty https://forum.irishmilitaryonline.co...-cork-barracks

next year - Engr

https://twitter.com/df_engineers/status/1537461026878377989?s=21&t=KXgJouxrW5XxVBIfB5ESsw

[DeV]

Engr NATO OCC

https://twitter.com/df_engineers/status/1676528197276520449?s=46&t=AkgweFTsD599sqgWidCthw

[spider]

I'm not sure about the Irish Army , different armies, different missions, but my lot do annual collective training which I always thought was the land version of FOST. They progressively build up their training as follows;

CT-1 Platoon level
CT-2 Company level (up to Company live fire attack, may include an overseas company level ex)
CT-3 Battlegroup level (EX Wessex Storm, Askari Storm that sort of thing)
CT-4 Brigade level (Germany and Oman, probably bi-annually)

If they are preparing for ops, they do mission specific pre-deployment training. I'm pretty sure that if a unit failed any of the above the CO would be removed from appointment. That cascades downwards too, company and platoon commanders get moved on if they're not up to it. Quite ruthless really.

[trellheim]

Every time I have been on serious exercise it has been excellent. We don't need USA NTC but there's definitely a concept worth grasping

[DeV]

Except we don’t have a Mech Engr capability

https://twitter.com/df_engineers/status/1679104479684067331?s=46&t=AkgweFTsD599sqgWidCthw

[irishrgr]

Like spider posted, here in the US we have a similar evaluation process. It's the Army Training & Evaluation Program. There are standards from individual all the way up to division staffs. It's a series of manuals laying out everything a unit has to do at a given scenario.

Active units up to the Brigade will get an evaluation culminating in a rotation to NTC/JRTC, reserve units non-mobilized will get a evaluation up to company and in some units battalion level. Evaluators are usually external, typically from another BDE, they can be internal where the commander certifies the eval or completely external at one of the CTC's.

Individual Soldiers standards are things like using individual weapon, communicate with XXX radio, etc. Collective tasks could be something like "platoon reacts to enemy contact", a Division task could be something like "Division staff issues the current running estimate to the commander". They all have "go/no-go" standards. And like spider said, a commander fails and eval at their peril, it's never career enhancing. A soon to deploy unit will go through one of these evals shortly before getting on the plane.

There is usually a pre-deployment certification for operations too, that's going to be theater specific. For my last trip it was weapons qualification, familiarization with the .50 cal and GPMG for everyone, trauma certifications, some of the new tech and so on.

Don't know what Ireland uses, but something like this is a useful benchmark for leaders. But then I don't know if there is any kind of readiness reporting back home either. I sense Ireland builds units for deployments as opposed to having "ready" formations. So there may be less of an appetite for the DF to know XX Bn is at YY% of readiness.

[DeV]

https://x.com/df_engineers/status/1725077293855367385?s=46&t=AkgweFTsD599sqgWidCthw