"My buddy is in tanks. He once asked me 'Man, wouldn't you like to be in Armor? Big Gun, No Walking?"

 "I said 'No. A moving foxhole draws too much attention." [My apologies to Bill Mauldin].

 The infantry includes not only the traditional light and mechanized type troops, but Airborne, Air Assault, Mountain, and "Light Fighter" troops.

 AIRBORNE

 "I am Sergeant Major Jaques Bernier. I joined the Parachutistes nearly twenty years ago. Since then, I have jumped from aircraft nearly four hundred times.

 "None of those times were in combat, however. When we were sent to Chad, we drove about as common infantry, in trucks. C'est humiliating, Ne c'est pas?

 "Since I went out on the private market, I have jumped into combat three times. I can see now that the army, she had a point in going in by truck. C'est Dangereuse!"

 Airborne troops are generally elite infantry, distinguished by the means by which they infiltrate enemy territory.

 AIRBORNE - Enlisted

 Entry: Constitution+Strength+Agility 15+

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

Navigation: 1

 Parachute: 2

 Small Arms: 2

 Unarmed Martial Arts: 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of three levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (wheeled)
• Navigation
• Parachute
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile

 Contacts: One per term,. Roll 1D10 for 8+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 AIRBORNE - Officer

 Entry: Strength+Agility+Constitution 14+, and OCS, Military Academy, or Commission.

First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Small Arms 2
• Parachute 2
• Navigation 1
• Leadership 1

 Subsequent Term Skills:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (wheeled)
• Leadership
• Navigation
• Parachute
• Persuasion
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile

 Contacts: Two per term, Military. Roll 1D10 for 7+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 Why are airborne troops usually considered elite?

 Any soldier can put on a uniform in peacetime, and be pretty much the same as any other. But in combat, with the possibility of death hovering around every corner, a group of soldiers quickly sorts itself out between those who can handle the stress and those who can't.

 Jumping out of a perfectly good airplane, which puts the risk of death squarely in a soldier's face, helps perform that sorting before the first shot is fired. By jumping out of that airplane, the soldier has proven that he can look at least one type of death in the eye and keep doing his job.

 That's the reason most special forces units require parachute training, even though they may never use 'chutes in combat.

 (Thanks to Gordon Rottman, "World Special Forces Insignia", Osprey/Vanguard Press).

 MECHANIZED INFANTRY

 "In this M113 we have a squad of eight guys, plus the driver and TCTrack Commander. We all have our packsthe big onesplus a lot of extra ammo for M16's, a couple thousand extra rounds for the M60, three reloads for the Dragon ATGM that Corporal Relph carries, which is no small package itself, and a bunch of extra grenades for the M203's, plus more ammo for the M2 up on top.

 "Add to that a case of mines, a case or two each of frag and smoke grenades, some heavyduty entrenching tools, a few extra cases of food and other stuff, and PFC Blake's dog, some mutt he picked up somewhere the other side of DjongHae, and our track is one pretty darned crowded place."

 This category includes all Infantry whose primary mode of transportation is Armored Personnel Carriers or Infantry Fighting Vehicles.

 Entry: No Restrictions

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Small Arms 2
• Grenade Launcher or Autogun: 1
• Unarmed Martial Arts: 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of three levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (tracked or wheeled)
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: One per term,. Roll 1D10 for 8+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 LIGHT INFANTRY

 "Vanguard Security's got a bunch of specialists—Demolitions, Counterterrorist, Intelligence, Security, and so on.

 "Of all of them, though, I'm probably in the most demand.

 "What am I? A normal, grunt, dogface infantryman.

 "Think about it. If you're some banana republic and you want some specialists for a job, every 'Security' firm's got Engineers, Commandos, and every other kind of whoopdedoo expert on their staffs. But if you want to train your actual ARMY to be anything but a bunch of thugs with machine guns who don't know the difference between an ambush and a patrol, you've either got to turn to one of the big governments, or, if that doesn't work for whatever reason, you're on your own.

 "Ever since I got out of the 101st Airborne, I've been working fulltime, turning green recruits into decent soldiers.

 "I mean, what's the point of hiring some Special Forces hotshot to teach troops to HALO jump, when they can't even walk a decent patrol?"

 This category includes the vast majority of the world's infantry"Leg" infantry. It also includes "Air Assault" Troopsany airmobile infantry.

 Entry: No Restrictions

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Small Arms 2
• Unarmed Martial Arts: 1
• Grenade Launcher: 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of three levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (or wheeled)
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: One per term,. Roll 1D10 for 8+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: "Air Assault" troops can add "Parachute" to subsequent Term skills.

 LIGHT FIGHTER

 "I remember when I joined the 25th Infantry Division. There was this old sergeant, a wiry little cuss named MacPhereson, probably fivesix and onethirty, tan like leather, with these big scars on his face. He sits all us new guys down around him, and just looks us over. It's scary—it's like he's looking through each of us.

 "Finally, he talks.”

"Boys', he starts, 'There's a lot of ways to fight a war. You can do it the way the Air Force and Navy do it, sitting in the rear with the gear and going out every once in a while to lob explosives at the enemy. We will not do this.

 "'You can do it the way Armor does it—come roaring up the road and trying to blast everything out of your path before it blasts you. We will not do this, either".

 "Worst of all, you can do it the way those morons in Mech Infantry do it—ride into a fight with your butt high up in the air in some glorified armored cheesebox.

 "He paused for a second, and seemed to look each one of us in the eye. Then he went on.

 "'We tried that once, in Vietnam. I was there. It did not, REPEAT, did not work. In the jungle, or anything more dense than an Iowa wheatfield, an Armored Personnel Carrier ain't nothing but a big, diesel powered fastfood delivery box against anyone who can hide, and use the night and the land to his advantage.

 "'From now on, we do it the way the other guys, the Viet Cong, did it.

 "'Only', he added with a grimace that I could tell went a lot deeper than the moment, 'we're gonna do it a whole lot better than they did it.'"

 These troops, infantry trained to fight in a more fluid, guerrilla style of warfare (as opposed to most infantry's positional tactics) are found only in the armies of the United States (the Sixth, Seventh, and TwentyFifth Infantry Divisions), Brazil (jungle infantry) and Vietnam.

 Entry: Constitution+Agility 10+

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Small Arms: 2
• Stealth: 1
• Unarmed Martial Arts: 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (or wheeled)
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: One per term, Military. Roll 1D10 for 8+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 INFANTRY OFFICER

 Entry: OCS, Military Academy, or Commission

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Leadership 1
• Navigation
• Persuasion 1
• Small Arms 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Ground Vehicle (tracked or wheeled)
• Leadership
• Navigation
• Persuasion
• Small Arms
• Stealth
• Survival
• Tac Missile
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: Two per term, Military. Roll 1D10 for 7+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 MOUNTAIN INFANTRY—Enlisted

 "This was after the war in Norway sorta ground down into a lot of skirmishing—almost more like gang turf wars than a "real" war.

 "Me and a couple other leathernecks had wound up way up in the mountains near Skanesviksjoen—a little Norwegian village you've never heard about—with this bunch of Norwegian Mountain troops.

 "In the year we were there, the twelve of them wrought this unbelievable amount of havoc on the Russian garrison in the valleys below.

 "In Norwegian, they used to say, 'Froota Byool na Snoor voorna Boorg.' I think it means 'you can't fight what you can't catch'and you sure couldn't catch these guys by trying to drive a tank up a mountain!"

 These troops include the US Tenth Infantry Division (Mountain), the German "Gebirgsjaeger" brigade, Norway's Mountain Infantry battalions, France's Chasseurs Alpins, much of the Swiss and Austrian armies, and Italy's Alpini.

 Entry: Strength + Agility 10+

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Small Arms 2
• Climbing: 2
• Snow Skiing 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of three levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Climbing
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Small Arms
• Snow Skiing
• Survival
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: One per term, Military or Specialist (Mountaineering). Roll 1D10 for 8+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None

 MOUNTAIN INFANTRY—Officer

 Entry: OCS, Military Academy, or commission.

 First Term Skills: The character receives the following skills in the first term:

• Leadership 1
• Climging 2
• Snow Skiing 1
• Navigation: 1

 Subsequent Term Skills: A total of three levels from any one or a combination of the following:

• Autogun
• Climbing
• Forward Observer
• Grenade Launcher
• Leadership
• Navigation
• Persuasion
• Small Arms
• Unarmed Martial Arts

 Contacts: Two per term, Miltary or Specialist (Mountaineering). Roll 1D10 for 7+ for the contact to be foreign.

 Special: None