Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Swoop on April 16, 2009, 05:56:02 PM
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Here are a few definitions to clear up some of the confusion around military terminology....
You see, all people in the Army are soldiers, all privates are soldiers, but not all soldiers are privates. Some are officers who are commissioned, but some are officers who are not commissioned. Obviously if every private was called private it would be confusing, so some privates are called things like trooper, driver, gunner, craftsmen, sapper or signaller. Not all of the drivers actually drive because some of them cook, but we don’t call them cooks, for that matter, not all drivers are called drivers – some of them are privates or gunners. Gunners as I’m sure you know are the guys that fire guns, unless of course they are drivers or signallers in which case we call them gunners rather than drivers or signallers just to make it clearer. All gunners belong to the artillery, except that in the infantry we have gunners who are called privates because they fire a different sort of gun, for the same reason we call our drivers and signallers private as well.
A Lance Corporal is called Corporal, unless he is a Lance Bombardier then we call him Bombardier to distinguish him from a full Bombardier, who is just like a Corporal. All other ranks are called by their rank for the sake of simplicity except that Staff Sergeants are called Staff, but they are not on the staff, some Warrant Officers, who are not officers, are called Sergeant Major although they are not Sergeants or Majors. Some Warrant Officers are called Mister which is the same thing that we call some officers but they are not Warrant Officers. A Lieutenant is also called Mister because they are subalterns, but we always write their rank as Lieutenant or Second Lieutenant, and second comes before first.
When we talk about groups of soldiers there obviously has to be clear distinction. We call them Officers and Soldiers although we know that officers are soldiers too, sometimes we talk about officers and other ranks which is the same as calling them soldiers. I guess it is easiest when we talk about rank and file which is all the troops on parade except the officers and some of the NCOs – and a few of the privates – and the term is used whether everyone is on parade or not. A large unit is called a battalion, unless it is a regiment but sometimes a regiment is much bigger than a battalion and then it has nothing to do with the other sort of regiment. Sub units are called companies unless they are squadrons or troops or batteries for that matter. That is not radio batteries and don’t confuse this type of troop with the type who are soldiers but not officers.
Mostly the Army is divided into Corps as well as units, not the sort of Corps which is a couple of divisions but the sort which tells you straight away what trade each man performs, whether he is a tradesmen or not. The Infantry Corps has all the infantrymen for example and the Artillery Corps has all the gunners. Both these Corps also have signallers and drivers except those who are in the Signals or Transport Corps. Both these Corps provide a special service and that’s why the Transport Corps provides cooks. In fact the Signals Corps is not a service at all because it is an Arm. Arms do all the fighting, although Signals don’t have to fight too much, rather like the Engineers who are also an Arm but they don’t fight too much either.
So you see, it’s really quite simple.
Swoop (Ex Rock Ape Gunner).
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Thanks for clearing that up :aok
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:huh
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:rofl :aok
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Makes perfect sense to me.
Should I be worried?
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ROFLcopter!
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LOL.
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:lol
My head just did a 360 and my brain did a 360 the opposite way. Im good now. :aok
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swoop was a pebble monkey !!!!!!
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Swoop, when were you there - served on the Rock from 94 - 97 and had to "liaise" with the army guys there at times
Just curious is all, prob best to answer via pm
Wurzel
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Was in from '90 - '94.
No.1 Sq. Supposedly based at Laarbruk but I was support weapon flight which operated as a seperate detachment and it was a busy time anyway so I think I spent 3 days at Laarbruk in 3 years.
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Sounds normal to me. :cool:
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So wait, Swoop as a Rock Ape, you must surely have been an Airman, not a Gunner even though the regiment is an infantry unit. And if you join 2 squadron are you are paratrooper, Airman, Gunner or what? ;) :confused:
One serious question though, why join the air force to become a soldier? I'm always puzzled at the idea of joining the RAF regiment. Why not the army?
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omg its so confusing
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swoop was a pebble monkey !!!!!!
We discovered Swoops love for primates a long time ago !! Just because out of the three of us he's the only one that wasn't in the best Squadron we shouldn't pick on him too much :devil
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Swoop, when were you there - served on the Rock from 94 - 97 and had to "liaise" with the army guys there at times
Just curious is all, prob best to answer via pm
Wurzel
I was there but quite awhile before you Gummage, I think it was 80-82. Got short-toured on promotion and had a great time there, spent more time playing cricket than actually working, played in the Section games twice a week, RAF games twice and then Combined Service games whenever. Liked how our little teams always made the TV news on GBC !!
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Yep, got on the tv there myself (and no, it wasnt most wanted before anyone says it :devil) was for darts ner............
oh, and a little bit of a karate demonstration at one stage.
Gib is a fun place to be, mostly good weather, lots of pubs - and some fantastic totty too..... ;)
Wurzel
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Was always fun on the pub crawl seeeing how many of those bars you could possibly get to.
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Yep, never managed to make it all the way down main street myself, I'm such a light weight drinker ;)
Wurzel
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Yep, never managed to make it all the way down main street myself, I'm such a light weight drinker ;)
Wurzel
LOL I don't think I ever got out of the Piazza !!
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Lmao, thats seriously light weight - even by my standards....... :devil
Fun place for sure to go on the ritz tho.............
Wurzel
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So wait, Swoop as a Rock Ape, you must surely have been an Airman, not a Gunner even though the regiment is an infantry unit. And if you join 2 squadron are you are paratrooper, Airman, Gunner or what? ;) :confused:
One serious question though, why join the air force to become a soldier? I'm always puzzled at the idea of joining the RAF regiment. Why not the army?
Nope, gunner. Cos I had a nice shiney L96.
And I joined the Regiment for several reasons. They're the best (shut it!). The Regiments role is way more varied than the poxy army (eg, Iraq '91 No.1 sq was the recce screen for the division). The living quarters are much, much better than the army. I like blue. And finally, it wasn't an army recruiting party that came to my school when I was 16 and let me have a go on a milan simulator.
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We discovered Swoops love for primates a long time ago !! Just because out of the three of us he's the only one that wasn't in the best Squadron we shouldn't pick on him too much :devil
:p
Could be worse, I could have been a snow drop.
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:p
Could be worse, I could have been a snow drop.
Very true gotta give you that one.
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That's funny swoop!
As a measure of how times change, I'd like to note that in the Army Infantry now everyone below a rank of NCO is just referred to as "love muffin" or some other equivalent.
Soldiers who are lazy, incompetent, get in trouble a lot or display poor attitudes are bestowed with more colorful labels.
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That's funny swoop!
As a measure of how times change, I'd like to note that in the Army Infantry now everyone below a rank of NCO is just referred to as "love muffin" or some other equivalent.
Soldiers who are lazy, incompetent, get in trouble a lot or display poor attitudes are bestowed with more colorful labels.
:(