Step 1: Split your forces into a fire group and an assault group. The fire group, amongst infantry on foot, are generally medium machine guns (GPMGs) but if you have vehicles they may be .50cal Brownings or Grenade Machine Guns (GMG). The fire group has the task of keeping the enemy’s heads down while the assault group – the riflemen – advance.

As you don’t want the fire group shooting your assault group when they reach the enemy position or on the way you need to separate them and their arcs of movement and fire. This is achieved by either keeping the fire group in front of the enemy and sending the assault group out on a flank to attack the enemy from the side, this is called a ‘Flanking Assault’ or the reverse, where you send the fire group out to the flank and have the assault group attack the enemy from the front. The latter is called a ‘Frontal Assault’. These are the official terms but in my opinion these two forms of attack are effectively the same – all you are doing is sending your fire group to the best fire position and your assault group to the best assault position given the lay of the land with a 90º of arc between them.

Make your choice of position for your forces according to the ground and the defences the enemy have set up – clearly if you can get your fire group above the enemy on a nearby hill then they can see their targets better. In this example you are performing a frontal assault with your gun group out to right flank as fire group. Your fire group brings fire to bear on the enemy and suppress his fire against your approaching assault group. That is, they place the beaten zone of their weapons on the enemy position and keep up a constant fire.

Step 2: As the assault group reaches the enemy position the fire group switch fire away from the position so as to avoid hitting your own men. They continue to fire because the sound of munitions cracking over his head can still suppress the enemy as the assault group makes contact – particularly if the enemy defence is deep and if they have further rows of trenches behind the front line. Then your assault group fights through the position with grenades and small arms.

Step 3: The assault group continues on through the enemy position and out the other side to re-form into a defensive fire position. You should always do this in case enemy artillery or air is targeted on the enemy position to spoil your celebrations. The fire group cease fire. When the enemy has failed to shell their old position the assault group send back a party to the position for a body count and to collect ammunition, documents and maps etc.

There are two things I want to bring to your attention here. The first is that the fire group could be a machine gun or it could be a group of mortars, a squadron of bombers or a regiment of artillery depending on the size of the enemy and the tactical/logistic situation.

The second point is that this type of assault, even when set up properly, involves closing with a potentially very lively and aggressive enemy who will kill you if they possibly can. It can lead to heavy casualties on the attacking side.

Modern thinking on assaulting enemy positions

Since World War II technology has moved forward and armies have become better supplied with more powerful weapons. This means, in practice, that we, the Western Alliance or ‘Good Guys’, have lots of air support and clever, accurate, long-distance artillery. Don’t laugh, I know it never seems to turn up when you need it but when I was a boy the infantry had no air assets to call on and the artillery were always too busy or out of range.

Society has moved forward too and it is no longer thought to be acceptable to send lots of our young men walking towards machine guns until the enemy gunners run out of ammo through shooting our men and are overwhelmed. So tactics have been developed which seek to cut down our casualties by not giving the enemy the chance to shoot us. This can only be a good thing for us soldiers.

As far as assaulting a position is concerned, and given you have access to air or artillery support, the latest best practice is to bring infantry close enough just to pin down the enemy and stop him escaping. This, of course, can generally be achieved without coming close enough to get shot. Then we call in air or artillery and blow the enemy to pieces. Great work when you can get it.

The significant difference here is that rather than splitting your forces and using the fire group to suppress the enemy while the assault group comes to grips, the whole of the infantry team is used as a fire group to pin down the enemy while the assault group consists of more advanced weapons such as attack helicopters, ground-attack aircraft, heavy artillery shells or bunker-penetrating bombs to entirely destroy the enemy. Then all you have to do is go in and count the bodies. So the modern way to do it is:

1. Find the enemy through intelligence, electronic means or boots on the ground

2. Stop the enemy moving by pinning him down with ground troops

3. Destroy the enemy with artillery or air power but no assault troops

4. Send forward ground troops to search the position

Clearing a position

When you advance on a position which has been suppressed by fire of whatever kind your main goal is to kill anything in that position before it can kill you. There may be people in trenches with their heads down and weapons in their hands waiting to kill you. There may be people cowering in the bottom of trenches or bunkers, there may be wounded and there may be people trying to surrender.

Unless weapons have clearly been discarded and hands are in the air, kill them all as you advance line-abreast through the position unless you have specific orders to obtain prisoners for questioning. You cannot tell on the spot if a person is genuine or not, armed or not and you have to wonder if they really have your best interests at heart. If you stop to try to take a prisoner or whatever you are breaking the line of your men advancing through the position and thereby putting everyone at risk. Move through the position using rifles and grenades and leave no one alive. Regroup at the other side in a defensive position and send a team back to search the bodies.

Clearing a building

At times you will have to assault or clear buildings. This is particularly difficult to achieve safely. You will doubtless have seen heroic Special Forces soldiers or SWAT police on TV running into buildings and rooms with torches strapped to their weapons and fancy masks on their heads. This tactic is either for TV or to give the enemy a fair chance at killing you. Avoid this at all costs. The way to clear a room is to toss in a grenade before you go in. Either a hand grenade or a rifle launched grenade is fine. And then, if you are not sure, toss in another.

You are only clearing this room or building because there may be enemy in there and you cannot destroy the building with explosives. Otherwise why would you want to go in? If the room is empty then no problem. If there is a non-insurgent inside then they really ought to come out with their hands up or their day will get worse.

Your problem arises when there is someone in that room who has evil intent towards you. However heroic, well armed and well trained you are, all they have to do is sit still and shoot you through the door as you open it or as you walk in looking around for them. They know exactly where you are – the doorway – but you don’t know where they are. Especially if it is dark and you have a torch in your hand or on your rifle. You are at a massive disadvantage and will die when you meet opposition. Even if you have heavy armour, it doesn’t cover all your head and body or stop every weapon so how lucky are you, really?