So, I had a thread earlier that talked about Bradley gunnery, and my old boss, LTC Dan Merkel? Merkl? Shit, I don& #39;t know. Great guy, fantastic officer. Good leader.

I knew MAJ Merkl when he was my brigade& #39;s S-3. And then he PCS& #39;d to Florida to be speechwriter for CENTCOM. Who at that time was Schwartzkopf.

I bought MAJ Merkl& #39;s Oldsmobile for $500. Great car, sold it for $500 2 years later.

So, I& #39;mma try to get this thread a little further than last time when I fell asleep. A couple years later, now LTC Merkl is my battalion commander.

And against the Army& #39;s better judgement, I& #39;m amazingly both a Sergeant AND the commander of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle.

There& #39;s what? 54? 58? Crews in each Mechanized Infantry Battalion. And each crew is required to qualify twice a year.

So, not surprisingly a MAJOR training evolution in a mechanized Infantry battalion is gunnery every 6 months or so.

There& #39;s a whole shitload of hoops to jump through, such as UCOFT (there& #39;s a story for another time) and Tables I through VII.

In the end, life fire on what& #39;s known as gunnery Table VIII determines if your crew is qualified or not. And it& #39;s a big deal.