Getting Jigae

Various diversions took my thoughts in the direction of Korea the other day, and I recalled and located this image.

The soldier is Chinese, but the pack design is the Korean “chige” or “jigae”. The text notes that the frame can also be used to serve as section of tent frame. I spend a lot of time on this blog trying to teach people to carry less. Sometimes you have to be able to carry more, and one of the ways to do it is the jigae.

Yes, a floorboard!

I found some images of barrels being carried by jigae but so far no photographic evidence to back up the stories of 210 litre oil drums being moved by jigae

Rooting around the net I came across this company offering an aluminium version. This idea takes the idea further with what resembles a modified chair. Food for thought!

If you have enjoyed this article or it has been helpful to you please feel free to show your appreciation. Thank you.
The Books

More Toggle Ropes

A friend of mine asked me about “the thing with the toggle”, so today I will post a couple of examples of toggle ropes in use.

The first is called “the fly walk”. Two or more ropes are joined and passed behind a soldier. The two men above then take up the slack and the soldier “walks” up the wall. Another book of mine notes that once a high place was reached fishing line was useful for drawing up a toggle rope.
 

The second method uses a pair of ropes as a sort of ladder. Each time the climber bends his knee the man on the rope takes up the slack. The illustration shows a sliding loop for the foot. If you are not wearing rock-hard 1940s army boots I would suggest a fixed loop.

If you have enjoyed this article or it has been helpful to you please feel free to show your appreciation. Thank you.
The Books

"Shooting to Kill" for the Home Guard

There are a number of shooting systems that claim to utilize a shooter's natural pointing ability. While these systems seem to work, I will admit to having been a little sceptical as to just how inherent or accurate such pointing abilities really are. Today I found an explanation that seems answer some of my doubts. The writer explained that when you point at something the finger does not necessarily line up with the eye. Point at something and then move your head so you can look down your finger. You will find your pointing ability is much more accurate than you might have expected.

Learning this is rather timely, since this week I read “Shooting to Kill” by Andrew G. Elliot. Shooting to Kill is a manual written for soldiers and home guardsmen in the 40s.

In my book “Survival Weapons: Optimizing Your Arsenal” I describe a number of methods of using pistols or long-arms when there is not time to use the sights. These include the “Quick Kill” methods based on the book “Shooting to Live” by Fairbairn and Sykes. “Shooting to Kill” nicely complements the latter work, and not just in the symmetry of the titles!

The Quick Kill method can be described as locking your attention on your target and firing as your gun raises up into your field of vision. Shooting to Kill is written for riflemen but uses a method derived from the shotgun techniques developed by Robert Churchill.

Lock your attention on to the target, or more specifically the part of the target you intend to hit. Raise your rifle to your shoulder and fire. This is done without trying to (consciously) acquire the sights. Look, point and fire. The body, support hand and eye are directed toward the target. The support hand fine tunes the muzzle's position. The sights can be used if there is sufficient time, to “fine tune” the initial pointing. If your shouldering action is sound your eye should have naturally assumed a position where it was looking through the aperture rearsight at the foresight. The brain automatically centres the foresight in the field of view. If using a “U” rearsight the eye should have assumed a position where it was looking across the rearsight at the frontblade, the top of the blade level with the top of the U. Elliot notes that for most shots the sights are unnecessary if you have mastered this method.

Elliot notes that a rifleman is unlikely to engage targets beyond 300 yards so advocates that the battlesight be used exclusively in combat. Like many of his contemporaries he notes that a shooter has little need to concern themselves about the effect of wind, distance or rain at the combat ranges they will be shooting at. Traditional shooting ranges were only for zeroing and teaching the very rudiments. All other rifle practice should be combat orientated. Elliot remarks that he gets respectable scores on the target range without using his rifle's sights.

The key to the technique that Elliot advocates is that the process of shouldering the rifle be sound and consistent. The soldier or guardsman should often practise shouldering and pointing the rifle, for as much as an hour at a time. He notes this is also a very practical way to build up arm strength.

A firefight is no time to be guessing at target speeds and calculating leads. Elliot suggests that moving targets be engaged with what would be called a “swing-through” of “smoketrail” method in more modern parlance. Track the target and increase speed to swing past it and fire just ahead without halting your motion. Aiming point against moving targets was “the tunic buttons”. This automatically shortens the lead if the target is approaching at an angle.

Elsewhere he suggests the belt buckle as an aimpoint. Since soldiers often shoot high one can see the wisdom in this. A lower aim is also needed if a target is charging to wards you or at a higher or lower elevation.

Some of the advice in this book needs to be taken in context. Against an enemy firing over cover an aimpoint several inches below the top of the cover is suggested. The .303 rifles of this time had a battlesight zeroed to 300 yards, giving a maximal ordinate of seven to eight inches. The .300 (.30-06) P17 used by the home guard had a battlesight set for 400 yards, giving a max ordinate of twelve to thirteen inches. Thus a head shot at shorter ranges needed a significant hold under. More modern cartridges with a 200 metre zero will behave differently.

Against a prone target Elliot suggests shooting low, which is reminiscent of Rhodesian combat techniques.

The book gives advice on a number of other matters. When engaging low-flying aircraft he suggests a lead equivalent to the distance between the forefinger and little finger tip of a spread hand held at arm's length. This is about ten to twelve degrees, which is about right for a target moving at around 200 mph.

If you have enjoyed this article or it has been helpful to you please feel free to show your appreciation. Thank you.
The Books

Asian Squat

A few months back I reread Tom Wintringham's “New Ways of War”. Much of it is still relevant today and recommended for anyone interested in military matters.

On one page Wintringham opinions that parade drill is only good for teaching men how to stand around. Elsewhere he suggests that one of the first skills a man be taught is how to take cover.

Thinking about this reminded me of the “poppa-san squat”, more commonly called the Asian squat.

“But sometimes, there were no filled and unoccupied sandbag seats available, and for some reason, you did not have your steel pot with you in the NDP or FSB, and wanted to sit down, there was the ultimate GI expression of becoming as one with the RVN environment: the Poppa-san Squat! Also known as going Asiatic to the guys from WWII and Korea.

“To do the Poppa-san Squat, a soldier, just folded up in a sitting/squatting position, with his skinny butt touching the heels of his jungle / combat boots, leaning forward with arms on knees or at the dangle (see pictures of the RVN civilians sitting this way). Once accustomed to doing so, a body could sit like this for prolonged periods of time without discomfort, but no GI could remain in this position as long as a Vietnamese!!! With practice, you could really get comfortable, and simply by pulling down the trousers, it was possible to take a dump in this pose (that is why the RVN copies of those famous old French toilets had footpads inside the bowl!). Be advised that one must be slender and fit to do the Poppa-San Squat without causing damage to muscles and tendons!

“You see, most of the RVN peasantry did not own furniture other than a crude platform bed, and a maybe a table, so that is how they sat for social occasions in the vill, and even the poor folks in some of the big cities too.

“Again this method of sitting has caused many weird looks from wives, girlfriends, family members, passersby, and soldiers who never served in combat in the Pacific, Burma, Korea, RVN, etc. The presence of obvious furniture is again often overlooked, and i even squatted down next to my footlocker in the barracks like this several times, to polish footwear, in spite of the big OD footlocker at the foot of my bunk - this is the Stateside, European or garrison soldier's lounge chair in the barracks environment).[sic]

“It used to drive the lifers wild Stateside and in Europe to see lines of GIs (for whatever reason there was a line waiting) with the RVN vets hunkered down in the Poppa-san Squat instead of standing tall! Not proper soldiers! Bad image! Etc, etc!”

Delta Mike

If a unit halts it makes sense for the majority of the men to drop down. Two men standing in a field might be farmers. A dozen men standing in a field are probably not!

One of the nonsenses sometimes voiced about the Asian squat is that only Asians can do it. Delta Mike's recollections above clearly disprove this. Squatting is also regarded as a Slav thing.

 

Being able to assume an Asian squat would be a useful ability for a young soldier. This is something that is easiest to learn while young and supple. It should probably be incorporated into basic training and its practice encouraged.

There are numerous webpages explaining how to perform the squat. One that I came across was actually intended for weight-lifters who wanted to improve their stance during squat lifts. The technique was to drop into a squat, feet flat on the floor, while having your hands on a solid object you could use to steady yourself. I use the edge of the bath. The video I saw suggested doing 30 seconds the first day, a minute the second, two minutes the day after and so on. I just do a minute, first thing in the morning.

 

I should explain here that time has not been kind to my legs, tendons and feet. I know from personal experience that it is possible to limp with both legs at once! I had been given some stretching exercises to do, like those used by runners, but they did not help much. To my surprise, I discovered that scrunching down into a squat was a far more effective exercise. Hanging on to the edge of the bath was a pretty good exercise for the forearms, too. I will never be able to effortlessly squat like some people can, but training for squats has its own benefits. 

 

The squat is a great way to limber up. It's a good warm-up too. Every other morning I will follow the squat with a minute or so of dumbbell work, then straight into the shower.

Even if you don't want to learn the poppa-san, experiment with adding the squat to your exercises.

If you have enjoyed this article or it has been helpful to you please feel free to show your appreciation. Thank you.
The Books