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Sappers


Subdeacon Joe

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Hmmmmmm

 

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Interesting. The use of the words "Sapper" and "Kit" makes me think this is an account by a British soldier. US Army just called them Combat Engineers until recently.

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16 hours ago, Utah Bob #35998 said:

Interesting. The use of the words "Sapper" and "Kit" makes me think this is an account by a British soldier. US Army just called them Combat Engineers until recently.

What do they call them now? A lot of good appellations get sent by the boards to be PC.  For example, Air Force Global Strike Command just doesn't cut it instead of SAC, IMHO (says he who was SACumsized in 1965 B))

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17 hours ago, Utah Bob #35998 said:

Interesting. The use of the words "Sapper" and "Kit" makes me think this is an account by a British soldier. US Army just called them Combat Engineers until recently.

Define recently. We used the term sapper when I was a Ranger back in 92-97

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13 minutes ago, Redwood Kid said:

Define recently. We used the term sapper when I was a Ranger back in 92-97

I'm old. 92 is recent to me. :D

In WWII military terminology, the US Army did not use Sapper. The guys with the explosives were Engineers.

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Just now, Utah Bob #35998 said:

I'm old. 92 is recent to me. :D

In WWII military terminology, the US Army did not use Sapper. The guys with the explosives were Engineers.

Thanks. Sapper wasn't an official term. They were still engineers. Just unofficially called sappers. Probably something that stuck from UK?

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Many of the assault units on D-Day trained with Brits or had British instructors. Both 2nd and 5th Rangers trained hard with British commandos, 29th ID Rangers had British instructors and each ID assault teams could have had British instruction. The term Sapper could have been picked up but I tend to agree with Utah Bob.

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12 minutes ago, Redwood Kid said:

Thanks. Sapper wasn't an official term. They were still engineers. Just unofficially called sappers. Probably something that stuck from UK?

It's official now. Ir's not an MOS, but a qualification.

https://www.goarmy.com/soldier-life/being-a-soldier/ongoing-training/specialized-schools/sapper-leader-course.html

 

Tabs.jpg

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8 minutes ago, Redwood Kid said:

Wow. Thanks for that. I think those tabs are a bit out of order though haha.

Yeah. http://ar670.com/articles/view/29/combat-and-special-skill-badges-and-tabs/316

 

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2 hours ago, Dutch Nichols, SASS #6461 said:

Army  airborne still used the term sapper in the early 70's

so I donno? 

Yes it is a current Army term. But it was a British word in WWII.

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