OCR Text |
Show U. 5. Pioneers Go At 9 Em With Knives Army Training Most Heavily Heav-ily Armed of All Soldiers'. FORT LEWIS, WASH. A super-fighter super-fighter from the comba engineers is being trained by the United States army to become one of the most heavily armed soldiers in the world and even more versatile than his British counterpart, the Commando. If a soldier of the Mikado's army suddenly sees a black-faced, knife-wielding knife-wielding warrior jump out of the jungle one of these days, he probably prob-ably won't have time to realize that he is about to become a victim of an American Pioneer, the name of the super-fighter. The hard bitten Pioneer will be called upon to do the initial work of a battle or campaign. He is taught to fight with machetes and ' wicked, curved bush-knives as well as with Tommy guns and rifles. The Pioneers are armed with 1 rifles. Tommy guns, 30 and 50 caliber cali-ber machine guns, 37 mm. cannon, axes, bolo knives, machetes, saws and an ample supply of TNT and other explosives. Officers training the Pioneers here said that the Pioneer would be sent into enemy territory to establish bridgeheads, to demolish enemy installations in-stallations and to prepare paths, roads and bridges for the infantry advance. Officers said the Pioneers were not expected to do their fighting with wicked machetes, bolo and bush . knives, unless they had to. But ask a Pioneer which he would use his knife or his rifle if he ran into a few Japs in the brush. He will wet his fingers, cautiously run it down the blade, grab the handle han-dle with both hands and wave it over his head. |