Geländetaufe

[Music] sometimes the simplest of things that we do every day without thinking can be extremely valuable skills in warfare or even just living through hard times and one of these simple acts is the concept of the nickname now one might be thinking how can a nickname help in warfare well to help illustrate this let's look no further than the vermont during world war ii though the german war machine did not create this tradecraft the expression in the native german language is quite interesting if not poetic the germans have always had very interesting ways of expressing idioms most of which do not quite translate that well and one of these words is galanda talfa literally translated into english it means terrain baptism this word is used to describe various tenets of observation and reconnaissance that german troops would have been expected to conduct on the front lines when first arriving at a new location units were expected to give nicknames to various terrain features this was intended to do two things for one it enabled everyone to be more situationally aware because they could quickly reference visual landmarks rather than reading off a map coordinate and secondly it was great o be more situationally aware because they could quickly reference visual landmarks rather than reading off a map coordinate and secondly it was great for security because this nickname acted like a code name on the radio any russian soldiers listening in would not be able to understand what they were talking about so this sounds pretty simple and it really is like i mentioned the germans weren't the only or the first ones to do this the germans just added the untranslatable aspect of using this tradecraft to an almost religious level baptizing the terrain by anointing the earth with one's own unique identity interestingly enough some nations like canada have doctrine of the exact same nature but they call it christening the ground which is an interesting term in that it keeps the religious overtones here in the united states we have many terms that mean something similar but that are used for other things as well landmarking terrain analysis battle space preparation terrain sectoring and other typical dod terms that have none of the poetic connotations of other languages the interesting part is that most soldiers do this anyway there is no human being so creative as a board lance poetic connotations of other languages the interesting part is that most soldiers do this anyway there is no human being so creative as a board lance corporal sitting on some mountain waiting and wondering what the holdup is there you will find the creative inspiration required to give unique and most likely vulgar names to pretty much every terrain feature in sight every single service member who has found themselves in a similar situation has at some point or another named a mountain or a tree or a river after some various rude part of the human body and this while seemingly just a kind of crude thing that bored soldiers do actually could mean the difference between life or death one of the things that service members learn quite early on is to create vulgar and crude nicknames for things this is important because the human mind will remember these profane things which is something that higher-ups in the military refuse to recognize for the sake of being politically correct for instance when planning missions and conducting intelligence preparation of the battle space or ipb we might drop points on the map of various terrain features that one might want to reference quite quickly ence preparation of the battle space or ipb we might drop points on the map of various terrain features that one might want to reference quite quickly various mountains rivers buildings peaks saddles and other terrain features which would be kind of handy to reference but what often gets removed is the crude humor that might end up saving lives some higher up will insist that various terrain features will have either doctrinal names or numbers or patriotic names i swear i have seen point eagle drop zone airborne hlz chesty and op normandy about 500 billion times just drive around any military base and look at the street names and those are pretty much the only names for things that stuffy higher-ups are prove which is dangerous in the real world see the average junior enlisted person is not going to memorize all of these boring and mundane names on the map they just aren't if you're sitting on a mountain and start taking effective fire you're not going to be sitting there thinking oh man what was the name of that ridgeline was it patton or eisenhower but i can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that if that ridgeline were to be called porn kardashian no one would ever forget whic on or eisenhower but i can tell you without a shadow of a doubt that if that ridgeline were to be called porn kardashian no one would ever forget which one it was so even though this sounds like an overly simple idea this could work quite well not just for locational names but for people as well if you are observing a static location and the people you're observing have unique physical features you can easily incorporate that into a reconnaissance report sure it might not be exactly politically correct but we personally value capabilities and skills over hurting someone's feelings so the next time you're out in the field try this out and see if it helps you remember various terrain features when you are conducting your initial intel prep of the battle space you can even do this when you're going about your daily life when you stop somewhere to eat like for lunch at some place try to think up funny nicknames for the people sitting around you this will not only encourage you to be more observant but also make it much easier to have better spatial awareness and know where various people are around you at all times and it's always good to have better situational awareness even if it mi er spatial awareness and know where various people are around you at all times and it's always good to have better situational awareness even if it might be a little bit offensive [Music] [Music] you