Ok.. one major outfield down.. several to go.

Well, I finally endured ATEC which wasn't as hyped up for me compared to some of my platoon mates.. Yea, cos I was relegated to guarding a couple of 5-tonners, that no one would really want to attack. So it was pretty relaxing for me in a way, my duties including mostly of sleeping..

Well, without going into the full details, ATEC is supposed to be an assessment of a unit's fighting proficiency, kinda like a exam. How accurate is it? Oh well, like ALL exams in S'pore.. not very; in my opinion that is. Exams are after all set in different conditions compared to the real thing. The whole thing is scripted, and therefore comes with goals and expectations. Like all puzzles, they have a key, a shortcut. Cause you see, puzzles are constructed from rules and are therefore rigid. And all rules, can be bypassed.. You just need a little reasoning and creativity.

For example, I was told that our vehicle was supposed to guard a certain entrance, because they think the enemy was gonna attack somewhere in the middle of night. Well, me and my sergeant took turns to stand watch.. When it was my turn to look, I admit it, I was pretty nervous. After all, the enemy was more experienced in this kind of raids..There was only 2 vehicles and 1 pathetic infantry sentry of 4 men, guarding 2 entrances. Then, after all, the whole ridiculousless of the situation cam upon me as a reasoned it out. Why would the enemy divert forces to attack this location which was pretty out of way from the rest of the main force? Perhaps there was some crucial supplies that they wanted. Ok, that granted, how to conduct this attack? How much forces to bring? Where are they? So you need to scout out the location.. And if the enemy are really that good, they would accurately know what is the strength of the defending force. And they would correspondingly bring just enough to match it. Or they could really use quick surprise tactics. While armored forces will crush puny infantry on the battlefield, armored forces are no match of the swiftness of infantry units when close quarters. Because the armored units are slow and bulky once they are stationary. On close quarters.. infantry can probably get in close enough to at least disable the vehicle's operation before the vehicle can bring its firepower on that guy. Feasibly, one lone commando could take out our logistics. If that's the case, then our sentry is really futile against the determined enemy.. So why fret so much? As it is, I reasoned that they won't come to attack us, because we are just not worth the time for them to come for us. And we're proved correct, the whole night passed without any enemy forces ever coming, because all the enemy forces were concentrated on wiping out the main force.

Oh wells, it was a difficult 4 days, mainly because there was nothing to do, and I sat on that hard driver's chair for almost all the way.. Because if you get out of the vehicle, you are really vulnerable.. so why not just stay inside..? I think my butt now in some pain, from sitting down too much.. The food was horrigible, i survived mainly on biscuits.. Yea, the moments, where I was just sitting there doing nothing, watching the seconds go by, from morning to dusk, to night, watching the night sky fly past to give way to dawn again.. it was pure torture.. I took to anything, to keep myself sane, like trying to think about some math problems to solve, hum some music to myself, relive some of the moments with friends, think about the memories of some people.. I guess that is how life is for people in jail..

There is going to be more to come.. because next month is EX Wallaby. A whole f***ing month in Australian forests, who treat us like aliens invading their space, possible contaminants. I hope I don't go lose my mind over there. Please preserve me so that I get to see S'pore soil again on 31st Oct.