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Post by mhoyt on May 4, 2021 12:49:48 GMT
As you all might expect, I have some thoughts on the matter. First, a slight revision of my list of principles of American Warfare. 1. Speak softly and carry a big stick. (We seem to shout and our stick is broken.)2. Let’s you and him fight. (or maybe, pay them not to mess with us.)3. Go big early. Get there fustest with the mostest. 4. Tragedy is not the business of the American Military. 5. The US should not go to war to protect repressionist dictators, hereditary monarchies, or corrupt regimes. 6. Don’t get involved in civil or in inter-religious wars; let the old colonial powers deal with it. 7. Don’t get involved in a land war in Asia or Africa. When considering strategy, our record is not so hot when fighting on the Asian continent is 0:4:1 --Korea: Tie, --Viet Nam [we might have been winning when we left, but the South couldn’t use the victory], --Iraq 1: Tactical Victory, strategic defeat, --Afghanistan: Initial Tactical Victory, but ultimately a Tactical and Strategic defeat, --Iraq 2, Tie (Initial Tactical Victory, Strategic Defeat.8. If you must violate rule 6 and 7, make sure the country has a seacoast. 9. If you violate rule 6, 7, and 8, make sure a good ally with a seacoast is adjacent to the country you are fighting (hint: Pakistan <> Good Ally.)10. Remember, we fight on external lines of communication. ------------------- Some other thoughts: You can't talk about war without politics, because war is the continuation politics/diplomacy with the use of force and violence. I'm a fan of Raids and Reprisals to accomplish a particular purpose, primarily punishment for a particular act or perhaps as a rescue. I heard a Colonel on NPR today when asked what he thought we should have done was words to the effect of "Come here, defeat the Taliban, plant some Trees, go home." I think we need to relook punitive expeditions. The trouble is, of course, that the easy targets are no threat. We need to carefully consider our use of drones to conduct raids and reprisals. I think we like them because we are fans of technology, but I believe they actually are mainly counterproductive as the kinetic effects tend to have cascading non-kinetic effects, most of which are not in our favor. We need to remember, we are a maritime nation; naval blockades may have a future use. Instead of going to places where the English, France, Spanish, and Portuguese colonial empires screwed things up due to their (except maybe for the English* in some cases) of resource extraction, human trafficking, exploitation of the native populace, and other mistakes, we should let them deal with the places where things have gone awry. If we feel the need, we can go help Mexico, the original peoples in America, or Canada. We need to be careful with the last, they whupped us twice as I recall.) I think we may need to rethink the purpose and structure of the US Army. (See maritime nation above) We would do well to study Byzantium. I recommend The Grand Strategy of the Byzantine Empire (and also its Roman predecessor) as a starting place. *I give the English credit for wanting to establish colonies in order to build external markets. Some of these things require consideration of COG, but not all. Some are just to inflict violence on the people who do not mean well toward us. And sometimes bribes may work better than raids, reprisals, or punitive expeditions. I like the theory of punitive expeditions, because it probably saves 5 Trillion Dollars. The problem with Afghanistan is it would be a long punitive expedition, until you drove out the Taliban, but we should have left at that time. Just like after Saddam died, we should have dropped everything, said "have a great day" and left (not that I was a fan of the invasion in the first place.
I would call Afghanistan and Iraq 2 - undecided, but I can see where you are going too, and wouldn't argue it that hard.
VR Mark
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Post by mhoyt on May 4, 2021 13:27:35 GMT
Bobby was a superb tactician. He was a lousy strategist. The Germans likewise are/were superb tacticians. They too are lousy strategists, at least from WWI to the present day. If Bobby was a good strategist, he would have adopted his in law's George's approach and lose his way to victory. The Germans get themselves in two front wars. Neither had the logistics train necessary to fight the way they wanted. In WWI, the generals pretty much had complete control. In WWII, the Germans let Hitler be in control. I guess today we are still pretty fair tacticians, up to say brigade. But we have somehow become bad strategists. I don't really know anymore about Division and Corps. They both want to be operational, but our leadership style does not support it with fear of mistakes and casualty intolerance. We persist in fighting along external lines at great distances on the Strategic and Tactical Offensive. I say we should fight on the Strategic Defensive, bur Tactical Offense, and play more emphais on raids, reprisals, and punative expeditions. This really belongs in the modern war thread you started,, so I am going to leave it here, and also post it over there I think you can make a solid case for all three levels of war, or you have different levels of Tactics. A strategy is like the Anaconda Plan, the March Through Georgia -- strategic targets often targeting Centers of Gravity (I couldn't help myself).
For Gettysburg, the idea is to get into the north, and force the Union Army is a position where it can be destroyed in detail. The goal is to destroy Lincoln's political support, and force the North to come to terms.
At the Operational level maneuvering major Army or Corps formations to get an edge in an upcoming Tactical Fight is important. Lee was excellent Operationally, but the "blunders" normally occurred when his tactical commanders failed him; or when he got too much into the tactics. He outmaneuvers the Union Army, and sneaks past them getting into Penn. He needs a road hub at Gettysburg to operate on internal lines.
However, Day 1 Gettysburg, Ewell is approaching from the north, he can literally secure the high ground potentially completing the decimation of at least I Corps, and putting the Union in a position where they have to attack. Ewell is not Jackson (having died in Chancellorsville just prior to this fight). However, Lee's consolidation was excellent. Heth and Ewell failed him. Day 3, and Lee gets to determined to go on the offense, he doesn't get Fredericksburg and why that should have prevented this attack. He has to pull back, he doesn't. So Operationally, he had placed his units in the correct position on Day 1, but doesn't adjust for Day 2 (he has to pull back). Tactically his commanders failed him, and you can probably look at Stonewall Jackson's death, being why Lee wasn't as good after Chancerllorsville as he was before. He lost his best commander.
You can put your commanders in a position to be successful, but they can tactically crap the bed. However, you can label the levels of war anyway you want to, whether you have 2 or 3 levels. Commanders normally command other commanders, and eventually it gets down to small units. Those commanders don't maneuver the units 2 levels underneath them - I know for you two that is obvious but for others - regimental commanders maneuver battalions - battalion commanders maneuver companies....etc. Operational commanders at the operation level are trying to get the operations, (at the LBH to include interpreters & guides), logistics, and scouting (a failure by Jeb Stuart before Gettysburg), messengers or communication, and everything to bring the utmost success to their operations no matter how large the size of the force.
VR Mark
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Post by quincannon on May 4, 2021 17:13:59 GMT
Remarkable post Mark and I am in agreement with most of it, but I would like to add a couple of my own thoughts.
1) I have long maintained, like about forty years maintained, that one of the underlying reasons Lee was beaten at Gettysburg was the reorganization, after Chancellorsville, of the ANV from a two corps organization to three. Primarily my reasoning centers on the rather skimpy resources the ANV had in the way of staff officers. I believe the Army staff work with two corps was barely adequate, and carving out another corps was just pulling at the rubber band until it broke.
2) Having said that, the choice of commanders for those two corps was in my opinion poor. Ewell was a fine division commander, but he had suffered crippling wounds in 1862 and was not really in any physical or mental shape to lead. Hill, if you overlook Hood, was without doubt, in my view, the best division commander in the ANV, but that does not mean he was much as a corps commander, and, again in my view, he was not. The Army was used to the two corps system, having adopted it the previous October, and in practicality adopting it informally earlier in the summer. I believe it would have been best to leave it alone. My choice to replace Jackson, would have been Stuart. According to the letters to his wife, it would have been Stuart's choice as well. He was young, vibrant, and full of piss and vinegar, but moreover he was so intertwined with Jackson in the summer/fall of 62, and the winter/spring of 63, that he knew how Jackson thought and operated. I think there is ample proof by performance, in how Stuart handled the corps after Jackson's wounding. That corps did not miss a beat under Stuart.
3) I do believe Mike is on the right track here. The two northern invasions were in many ways harmful to the Confederate idea, of we just want to be independent, handle our own affairs, and have no designs on any territory other than our own. If that is how they really felt than any invasion of northern territory would be in conflict with those stated goals. In other words bad PR. The south's only hope in my view was to fight on the strategic defense, attacking only to drive out, and husband resources, until the north gave up and started watching Howdy Doody reruns on TV.
4) With regards to who was Lee's best commander, I am a Longstreet guy myself, but that discussion of merits between him and Jackson would last until the Second Coming of Christ, with no definitive winner.
5) I believe Stuart gets a really bad rap at Gettysburg. Lee gave him permission for a ride around, and when he arrived at his LD, Salem (now Marshall), Virginia a good part of the Union Army was marching across his front. He could not go back and catch up with the ANV as they moved north, and provide a screen to the east, the army was too far ahead of him. As for the rest, I think the Union Army had a lot to do with him not joining Lee in a timely manner. It was Lee, don't forget that ordered the operation in the first place, and endorsed downward by Longstreet, so who is really responsible the orderer or the orderee? Lee had plenty of cavalry with the ANV main body for any required screening or scouting. What Lee did not have was Stuart, the only cavalryman he really trusted, and whose reports he took as gospel.
I find it refreshing to get away from tactics, and bend our minds around these higher level discussions
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Post by yanmacca on May 4, 2021 19:07:32 GMT
Not really my cup of tea, but interesting none the less, would you say that Fredericksburg was a similar battle to Gettysburg? Both featured by Infantry against a strong dug in enemy who held the high ground.
At Gettysburg, Lee ordered Picket to make a frontal assault on Cemetery ridge, which resulted in Pickett saying "General I have no division", Lee apparently suffered a heart attack during the battle, but he pulled through, not like nearly 5000 of his men. At Fredericksburg, Burnside made an attack against a large Confederate force in prepared defenses on Marye's heights, it was a bloody failure, which could have been worse only because Hooker called his troops back, he then said to Burnside "finding that I have lost as many men as my orders require me to, I suspend the attack"
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2021 20:59:32 GMT
Picket is said to have broken into song when he told that to Lee, to the tune of "Yes, we have no banana's"
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Post by quincannon on May 4, 2021 21:22:55 GMT
Totally different Ian.
At Fredericksburg, Marye's Heights is really high ground. That ridge dominated the city that was between the heights and the river. At Gettysburg, Cemetery Ridge is a mere bump in the ground from the direction Lee was attacking.
It's called Pickett's Charge but for the life of me I don't know why. Pickett commanded only one of the three divisions involved. The others were commanded by Trimble and Pettigrew, and the three under Longstreet's overall command, although only Pickett's Division belonged to his corps.. The other two divisions belonged to Hill.
That does not change the fact though that both were completely insane. Both doomed to fail before they began, and the reason was really quite simple, THE RIFLE. You don't walk a mile over completely open ground, subject to artillery fire, then for the last 300 yards be subject to deadly accurate rifle fire, and expect to succeed.
The worst part is that at Gettysburg Longstreet told Lee it was a mistake to attack Meade on both the second and third day of that battle, reminding him on both occasions of Fredericksburg, and Lee would not listen. Lee destroyed his own army.
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Post by mhoyt on May 6, 2021 9:02:15 GMT
Not really my cup of tea, but interesting none the less, would you say that Fredericksburg was a similar battle to Gettysburg? Both featured by Infantry against a strong dug in enemy who held the high ground.
Gettysburg on Day 1 was wide open and very fluid. The lack of Ewell to keep pressing to the high ground on Day 1, led to the attack against good defensive terrain on Day 2. Day 2, was more open than Fredericksburg, but the Union did go on the defensive in a role reversal. It is the Day 3 - Pickett's charge (and as pointed out he wasn't actually in charge - this was Lee getting to tactical) that resembles Fredericksburg - but only kind of; the Union forces charged far more times across the field at Fredericksburg, and the Confederates were far more entrenched at Fredericksburg. The fact that Lee believed his troops could punch through a defense on open terrain was tactically stupid (this doesn't make Lee the operational genius an idiot, but he should have grasped the concept of firepower).
The Union soldiers on Day 3 after defeating the Southern forces after "Pickett's charge" mocked them by chanting Fredericksburg. (Many of the Union troops had been in those charges at Fredericksburg the previous winter). At Gettysburg, Lee ordered Picket to make a frontal assault on Cemetery ridge, which resulted in Pickett saying "General I have no division", Lee apparently suffered a heart attack during the battle, but he pulled through, not like nearly 5000 of his men. This was my point reference Lee getting over involved in the tactical fight - he forced Pickett's charge. Once out maneuvered at the end of Day 1; Lee's job as the operational commander was too withdraw to more defensive ground -- that should have been Day 2. He is in the north, he needs to disengage and try to get his forces between Union forces and Washington D.C.. I guess you can get the historical fiction piece of why he didn't from the Movie Gettysburg (the Killer Angels book) and get that author's supposition.At Fredericksburg, Burnside made an attack against a large Confederate force in prepared defenses on Marye's heights, it was a bloody failure, which could have been worse only because Hooker called his troops back, he then said to Burnside "finding that I have lost as many men as my orders require me to, I suspend the attack" There were around 14 or so independent charges on the Confederate left wing on Marye's heights; and they were all stomped. The attack on the Confederate right wing was far more successful actually making it through the line before repulsed. Fredericksburg though is known for the Union troops attacks on Marye's height (which you can walk but the battlefield is basically mostly town now), and the slaughter on those troops - again some who would repulse Pickett's charge.
VR Mark
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Post by mhoyt on May 6, 2021 9:07:38 GMT
Totally different Ian. At Fredericksburg, Marye's Heights is really high ground. That ridge dominated the city that was between the heights and the river. At Gettysburg, Cemetery Ridge is a mere bump in the ground from the direction Lee was attacking. It's called Pickett's Charge but for the life of me I don't know why. Pickett commanded only one of the three divisions involved. The others were commanded by Trimble and Pettigrew, and the three under Longstreet's overall command, although only Pickett's Division belonged to his corps.. The other two divisions belonged to Hill. That does not change the fact though that both were completely insane. Both doomed to fail before they began, and the reason was really quite simple, THE RIFLE. You don't walk a mile over completely open ground, subject to artillery fire, then for the last 300 yards be subject to deadly accurate rifle fire, and expect to succeed. The worst part is that at Gettysburg Longstreet told Lee it was a mistake to attack Meade on both the second and third day of that battle, reminding him on both occasions of Fredericksburg, and Lee would not listen. Lee destroyed his own army. Completely concur. The strategy of getting the Union Army in the open by going into the north - brilliant. The operational movement to concentrate forces brilliant. The tactical stupidity of Day 3 is mind numbing. If Stonewall is there on Day 1 he gets the high ground after continuing the assault. The reason he died was he was trying to get his forces at Chancellorsville to keep driving forward. He was coming back from doing that through his own lines when he was shot by his own men after trying to get his commander's to drive on to that ford to cut off the retreat. They didn't, Stonewall dies, the Union Army escapes, and Gettysburg becomes a disaster.
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Post by mhoyt on May 6, 2021 9:17:35 GMT
Remarkable post Mark and I am in agreement with most of it, but I would like to add a couple of my own thoughts. 1) I have long maintained, like about forty years maintained, that one of the underlying reasons Lee was beaten at Gettysburg was the reorganization, after Chancellorsville, of the ANV from a two corps organization to three. Primarily my reasoning centers on the rather skimpy resources the ANV had in the way of staff officers. I believe the Army staff work with two corps was barely adequate, and carving out another corps was just pulling at the rubber band until it broke. 2) Having said that, the choice of commanders for those two corps was in my opinion poor. Ewell was a fine division commander, but he had suffered crippling wounds in 1862 and was not really in any physical or mental shape to lead. Hill, if you overlook Hood, was without doubt, in my view, the best division commander in the ANV, but that does not mean he was much as a corps commander, and, again in my view, he was not. The Army was used to the two corps system, having adopted it the previous October, and in practicality adopting it informally earlier in the summer. I believe it would have been best to leave it alone. My choice to replace Jackson, would have been Stuart. According to the letters to his wife, it would have been Stuart's choice as well. He was young, vibrant, and full of piss and vinegar, but moreover he was so intertwined with Jackson in the summer/fall of 62, and the winter/spring of 63, that he knew how Jackson thought and operated. I think there is ample proof by performance, in how Stuart handled the corps after Jackson's wounding. That corps did not miss a beat under Stuart. Interesting, but probably Lee wanted to keep him with the mobile arm. Certainly Jackson's loss created a void.3) I do believe Mike is on the right track here. The two northern invasions were in many ways harmful to the Confederate idea, of we just want to be independent, handle our own affairs, and have no designs on any territory other than our own. If that is how they really felt than any invasion of northern territory would be in conflict with those stated goals. In other words bad PR. The south's only hope in my view was to fight on the strategic defense, attacking only to drive out, and husband resources, until the north gave up and started watching Howdy Doody reruns on TV. The South had fee options for victory; by staying South it was inevitable to lose I think. It was a desperate gamble with a low probability of success in a mostly lose-lose situation. Eventually, Sherman is going to do what Sherman does, and being on the Strategic defensive is usually not good.4) With regards to who was Lee's best commander, I am a Longstreet guy myself, but that discussion of merits between him and Jackson would last until the Second Coming of Christ, with no definitive winner. Agreed, I will stay Jackson though.5) I believe Stuart gets a really bad rap at Gettysburg. Lee gave him permission for a ride around, and when he arrived at his LD, Salem (now Marshall), Virginia a good part of the Union Army was marching across his front. He could not go back and catch up with the ANV as they moved north, and provide a screen to the east, the army was too far ahead of him. As for the rest, I think the Union Army had a lot to do with him not joining Lee in a timely manner. It was Lee, don't forget that ordered the operation in the first place, and endorsed downward by Longstreet, so who is really responsible the orderer or the orderee? Lee had plenty of cavalry with the ANV main body for any required screening or scouting. What Lee did not have was Stuart, the only cavalryman he really trusted, and whose reports he took as gospel. I actually wrote a paper defending Stuart's actions as the fog of war, the fact he had done this a few times before, and that Lee should have kept a reconnaissance force for his own element if he didn't want the cavalry screen. I think it is overplayed. Lee destroyed his army because he didn't disengage on Day 2. It was Lee's fault. I was being overly simplistic on Stuart's actions, and oddly this leads to the rise of a young Union General..... come on you Wolverines....I find it refreshing to get away from tactics, and bend our minds around these higher level discussions
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2021 13:14:02 GMT
As much as I like discussing nearly all aspects of military history and mining them for use today, I feel compelled to try to return this to the original premise. The USMC is reorganizing in many ways, deleting a man from the infantry squad to free up people for cyber operations, doing away with armor, military police, and tube artillery to free up more slots, and buying more rocket artillery, as well as trying to increase the skills of infantrymen so they can fulfill any infantry task from rifleman, machine gunner, mortarman, and anti-armor specialist. The Army does this a little bit with a small arms room in some infantry platoon headquarters section with 'extra' weapons. The USMC/USN in an attempt to increase the offensive firepower of its amphibious fleet is taking to placing LARS and HMMVWs/LAV-25s on the flight deck to improve close in protection and offensive firepower of these under armed vessels. The Army is engaged in Long Range Precision Fires which, while angering the USAF, may be able to free it from a dependency on an organization which, while they provide excellent support, never seems to embrace close air support, its numbers of aircraft are dwindline, and manned aircraft may become unusable with the improvements of air defense artillery. It is also experimenting with placing several types of missiles in an a single launcher, such as anti-tank, air defense, Anti-ship, and long range strike in a chassis similar to an MLRS. We may not be thinking forward enoogh. First, we need to come to terms with we are always going to fight on external lines of communications, damn them. We cannot station the bulk of our armed forces in other countries, for a variety of reasons, once of which they will always be in the wrong place. we should consider placing them in other areas such as our territories and possessions, including Northerm Marianas, Midway, Wake, perhaps the US Virgin Islands, and Puerto Ricko. The smaller areas could have more specialised garrisons such as Long Range Strike, Air and Missile Defense and anti-ship Missle units, resurrecting the Coastal Artillery as it were. In any event, we need to consider: * Where do we want to go? * What do we want to do? * How will we get there? * How will we resupply? * How will we get out? 20 years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan have shown just how difficult it is to sustain ourselves far across the world, with few or dubious allies, and without even a contested sea or air lines of communication. In order to respond rapidly we need lighter forces with heavy firepower and perhaps more moderate protection. In the late 50s and early 60s there were concept illustrations of massive suborbital transports capable of disgorging hundreds of infantry with rocket packs. While rocket packs still don't seem able to carry enough fuel to make them powerful enough to lift large loads and go long distances, there may be something here. Perhaps a return to the battlegroup? By battlegroup I don't mean the Pentomic Battlegroup, but it may be a place to evolve from. Perhaps combining them both we should consider Robert Heinlein's Starship Troopers (although I personally prefer David Drake's Hammer's Slammers). Perhaps smaller vehicles with moderate armor, high mobility, lethal firepower (but not necessarilly large weapons), with powerful, economical power trains, and maybe smaller crews? Lacking Heinlein's Powered Armor and drop ships (although perhaps the recent Space-X success with their first successful Starship landing maybe worth considering) the immediate future appears to be small vehicles that can be transported in large numbers aboard cargo aircraft, internally or externally by rotorcraft, ability to be airdropped (although I think this is a problem for the same reason that manned aircraft are becomning unsurvivable). We may need to lose our casualty intolerence as well. The Battlegroup should be relatively small, say perhaps 12 companies of various types, with a maximum of around 100 men each This would include a combat units, some support units, and a forward support company. A lean staff, perhaps with no set subordinate unit structure (like the 19th century cavalry regiment) and supported with long range fires. There may still be a need for two types. One that is armor/mech based and another that is mounted, but mostly infantry. Probably a company would be 10 - 12 vehicles. This may require a large change in our thinking. A small nimble force, suitable for small and large wars, versus a large force structured for a large war, but wedged into 'small' wars as required, without proper training. Robotic vehicles with AI are tempting, but how will they be repaired, unstuck, rearmed, and maintained? Robots on robots on robots? Perhaps something like the German Wiesal or an improved M114 or Armored Reconnaissance Scout Vehicle (ARSV) for starters. Wiesal comes in two sizes one is an small scout vehicle and anti-tank vehicle, but the other is somwhat larger. The US Army has apparently bought several Wiesals for use as robotic surrougote vehicles. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiesel_AWC The Wiesel Armoured Weapons Carrier (AWC) is a German light air-transportable armoured fighting vehicle, more specifically a lightly armoured weapons carrier. It is quite similar to historical scouting tankettes in size, form and function, and is the only true modern tankette in use in Western Europe. The Bundeswehr eventually ordered 343 of the vehicles in 1985.[1] The Wiesel was introduced as a new weapon system for the Bundeswehr with deliveries beginning in the late 1980s. The vehicle was named Wiesel ("weasel") because of its small size and agility, which make it very difficult to detect on the battlefield. Production of the Wiesel 1 ended in 1993.[2] Of 343 Wiesel 1 vehicles, 210 were armed with Raytheon TOW wire-guided anti-tank guided missile system and 133 have the one-man KUKA turret E6-II-A1 armed with the dual-feed Rheinmetall Mk 20 RH-202 20 mm autocannon. Germany deployed both types to Somalia in 1993 as part of the United Nations forces intervention in the Somali Civil War (UNISOM II). The Wiesel 2 is an enlarged and extended version of the Wiesel 1 with five road wheels instead of four, and a more powerful engine. The Bundeswehr ordered 178 of the new vehicle in various types, including air defense, radar, and anti-aircraft missile launcher, 120 mm mortar carrier, command and fire control, and ambulance variants. The Wiesel 2 entered service in 2001. Mass: 2.75 t to 4.78 t Length: 3.55 metres (11 ft 8 in) Width: 1.82 metres (6 ft 0 in) Height: 1.82 metres (6 ft 0 in) Crew: Driver, gunner/commander or driver, gunner and commander depending on variant. Armor Protection: against small arms only Main armament: Varies (7.62 mg, 20mm cannon, TOW) Secondary armament: Varies Engine: Audi 2.1 L 5-cylinder in-line turbo-diesel 64 kilowatts (86 hp) Suspension: torsion bar Operational range: 200 kilometres (120 mi) Maximum speed: 70 kilometres per hour (43 mph) Attachments:
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Post by Deleted on May 6, 2021 13:18:39 GMT
M114A1 ARSV None of these carry a lot of infantry. Each one should be large enough to contain of a squad of perhaps 4 or 5 men. (Oh no! A return to the "fours"!"
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Post by quincannon on May 6, 2021 16:36:04 GMT
Mark: If that was Lee's reasoning for not giving Jackson's Corps to Stuart, it strikes me as much the same as putting Patton in the Quartermaster Corps because he ran a hell of a good warehouse, or keeping George Washington at Mount Vernon, because he produces a great crop of tobacco.
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Post by quincannon on May 6, 2021 16:59:03 GMT
Considering that I am the only one here that ever served ion a Pentomic Battle Group, I will less than timidly say to all that I really liked it as an organization. That said, it was well ahead of its time, and all of the promised technology that was supposed to give it some ompff was too long in coming and the battle group as designed never got all the equipment it was promised.
The battle group was the right size, about 1500 all ranks, but it could have been better if was an all arms organization from the outset. A heavy battle group for instance with two or three tank companies, and two or three mechanized companies, depending upon if the battle groups was intended to be tank heavy or mech heavy. Five is an optimal span of control, then add a combat support company of four platoons, an artillery platoon (six tubes), and engineer platoon (about 60 personnel), a scout platoon (sixty personnel), and an air defense platoon (four fire units). The battle group should be commanded by a Colonel, have a robust staff, and service support integrated into the Headquarters, Headquarters and Service Company. All companies commanded by Majors an in some specialist platoons the commander would be a captain
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Post by quincannon on May 6, 2021 17:18:50 GMT
With regard to Infantry fighting vehicles:
The Army in rejecting the German Puma shot itself in the foot. The primary reason as I understand it is that it would not carry nine dismounts. I have news for the Army. any IFV you develop that will carry nine dismounts will be too damned big, weigh too much, and will not be able to be transported by air in any significant numbers.
An IFV, as the name betrays is a fighting vehicle, and having IFV's in my less than humble opinion is just stupid. We would be much better off with a armored personnel carrier, then you could have your nine. The Stryker Dragoon is the only APC in the current inventory that can carry nine, and also have a first rate Infantry fire support weapon mounted. Do we need an Infantry Fighting Vehicle, or do we need something that does what the Stryker Dragoon can do, carry nine and have a mounted weapon that can support those dismounts in a fire support role?
You have probably gathered by now that I do not like the concept of the IFV. There is too much temptation in my opinion to use it as a tank, when that is not what it was designed to do. Mechanized Infantry should have the operative word being Infantry. The Infantry needs a carrier, nothing more, and preferably a carrier than can support by fire without getting itself involved in a tank battle. Maybe we also need to rethink our mobile doctrine and not form combined arms company teams, but rather keep our companies pure.
My personal opinion, and it is only that is that we developed the Bradley in the first place, because we saw the Russians with a BMP, and convinced ourselves we needed one too.
The problem with the IFV is that it takes a crew of three and the weapons system takes up a lot of internal room thereby limiting the number of dismounts the vehicle can carry. So my advice the the United States Army is learn to live with six dismounts, add one vehicle to the mechanized platoon, and buy the goddamned Puma, and get rid of the less than satisfactory Bradley pronto.
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Post by quincannon on May 6, 2021 17:46:30 GMT
Now, with regard to a scout vehicle. We have never paid proper attention to developing one. The M114 could not be easily dismounted from, and half of scouting involves getting off your horse and skulking around a bit. We can do better than that, but whatever we do must be optimized for scouting and have no other purpose.
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