What Squad Leaders Want to Know in Battle
Abstract
The Battlefield Information Questionnaire was developed to measure the relative importance of 88 different types of battlefield information to squad leaders in four combat situations: planning, assaulting an objective, consolidating and reorganizing on the objective, and defending the objective from counterattack. This questionnaire was then administered to a group of 106 non-commissioned officers, each having combat experience as a squad leader. The types of information they most wanted to know, and least wanted to know, were highly consistent across combat situations. Averaged across situations, the ten types of information most important to squad leaders in battle were: location of threat personnel, vehicles, and weaponry; casualty collection point location; ammunition remaining; location of personnel in their squad; location of units in contact with the enemy; personnel location in adjacent friendly units; their own location relative to other personnel; location of mines, obstacles, booby traps, and improvised explosive devices; availability of supporting fires; and direction of movement for enemy personnel.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Aug 01, 2006
- Accession Number
- ADA457179
Entities
People
- Kenneth L. Evans
Organizations
- U.S. Army Research Institute for the Behavioral and Social Sciences