Telegraphing

Purpose

Telegraphing refers to unintentionally revealing your position, intentions, or movements to the enemy through visible or audible cues.
Avoiding telegraphing is essential to maintaining stealth, retaining the initiative, and preventing the enemy from reacting before you are ready.

Definition

• Telegraphing: Any unintended signal or action that alerts enemy forces to your presence, location, or intentions.

Telegraphing can happen through physical exposure, light usage, movement patterns, or poor positioning against the environment.

Key Principles

• Always consider how your silhouette, equipment, and movements appear from the enemy’s perspective.
• Control the use of visible and infrared light sources.
• Use terrain and environmental shadows to hide your outline.
• Break predictable patterns of movement and behavior.

Application

Types of Telegraphing

• Physical Telegraphing:

  • Exposing parts of your body or gear unnecessarily (e.g., muzzles, elbows, backpacks, feet).
  • Poor use of cover resulting in visible protrusions.
  • Moving carelessly around corners without slicing or pieing properly.

• Light and Laser Telegraphing:

  • Accidentally triggering lights or lasers in the direction of enemy forces.
  • Leaving flashlights or lasers activated when not required.
  • Sweeping a laser across walls, doors, or open spaces unintentionally.

• Lightlining:

  • Being outlined by a strong light source (streetlights, interior lights, vehicle headlights).
  • Entering lit areas without adjusting movement or posture.
  • Failing to use dark paths or terrain features to mask movement.

• Skylining:

  • Moving across ridgelines, hilltops, or other elevated areas where your body contrasts sharply against the sky.
  • Standing or crouching at the crest of a hill without using lower terrain or shadowed areas.
  • Ignoring changes in lighting conditions that increase contrast.

Techniques to Avoid Telegraphing

• Minimize exposure: Keep body and equipment behind cover at all times when possible.
• Control light sources: Use momentary activation only when absolutely necessary.
• Use terrain: Stay low against slopes, in depressions, or along shadowed routes.
• Slice the pie: Move gradually around corners instead of stepping out suddenly.
• Break visual patterns: Move unpredictably, vary your movement speeds and routes.

Common Mistakes

• Allowing muzzles, limbs, or gear to protrude past cover or corners.
• Accidentally activating lights or lasers while moving or aiming.
• Moving across bright open areas without planning an alternate route.
• Walking along ridgelines or hilltops when lower ground is available.
• Relying too heavily on concealment without considering background contrast.

Practice and Drills

• Set up movement exercises where players must traverse an area without being detected by observers.
• Practice slicing corners properly while keeping body mass behind cover.
• Conduct night exercises focusing on moving from shadow to shadow without crossing lit areas.
• Train with buddy feedback: partners call out when they spot physical telegraphing errors (gear protrusions, light use, silhouettes).

Quick Reference Table

Summary

Preventing telegraphing is crucial to maintaining the element of surprise and avoiding enemy detection.
By understanding how body positioning, light usage, and environmental awareness affect visibility, players can move and operate more effectively without giving away their presence.