Anti-Materiel Weapons Mix

[Ariete!]

The shift from ww3-centric to platoon-action-centric ops and training has not in any way diminished the relevance of man-portable anti-materiel (AM) rockets. If I’m not mistaken, for instance, just looking at US land units, right now they are issued with a mix of M72 laws, at-4s, M3 (carl gustaf) and javelin. In itself (side note) this is a good instance of how actual combat tends to generate more complexity vs. peacetime ‘efficiency’ streamlining. Beyond fashions and ‘legacy’ system issues, I wonder where western armies are headed in this respect. Some issues:

 

> Some systems are advertised as being usable in confined spaces (i.e., minimal backblast at launch). Based on googlable material, the PzFst3 (reloadable, unguided) and Eryx (guided) systems have this capability, among the main western systems, though some other systems have low-BB specialized rounds, apparently. How important is this capability, really? Given the horrendous weight of the PF3 compared to a similar system like CG (tube + 4 rds = 21.3 kg for CG but 53.9 kg for PF3); might it make sense to only issue it as a specialist weapon (with some training) to engineers or to troops going into a planned FIBUA situation?

 

> Over anything but a very small number of rounds, one-shot systems of comparable warhead diameter entail a considerably greater weight than reloadable systems (example: 4-6 rounds – plus 'launcher/sight unit' where applicable – means 27-40 kg using AT-4/84mm compared to 21-28 kg for CG/84mm or 19-25 kg for RPG7/85mm). OTOH, there is a value to being able to distribute AM capability across a small unit, assuming a decent level of training. The reloadable unguided systems also arguably have better sights and inherent accuracy, making their effective range not insignificantly greater. This suggests to me that non-mechanized infantry should probably carry something like a CG (with perhaps less powerful but lighter AM systems like the LAW issued to individual soljurs if necessary), while mechanized infantry (which in any case should typically have considerable fire support from IFVs and MBTs, etc., might prefer the larger one-shot systems?

 

> How useful are sighting units (for man-portable guided systems like javelin) as a small-unit surveillance aid? The considerable weight and cost of these systems, compared to a CG-type weapon begin what it is, does the huge accuracy and range advantage suggest that they should nonetheless be issued at Ptn level or should such systems be considered Coy/Btn assets, in ‘light’ infantry ops?

 

 

My (amateurish) impression is as follows:

- air-mobile, airborne, mountain, ‘light’ infantry: CG-type at Ptn level and, in specific circumstances, light one-shot systems at individual level. Anything guided at Coy/Btg level and then only under the very sub-optimal situation of deploying such forces in relatively open terrain in the presence of an armour threat.

- mechanized/armoured infantry: AT-4-type higher-performing one-shot widely distributed. IF doctrine does not imply intimate support from IFV-mounted ATGMs and/or MBT main guns, then Javelin-type launchers at Ptn level.

- Specialized confined-space systems/rounds issued (and trained for) ahead of deliberate off/def ops in ‘brick’ (unless it is possible for such systems to have similar weight / cost as high-backblast rounds/systems).

[EchoFiveMike]

PzF3 has much greater development potential than CG, by virtue of it's external warhead design. It's an AT weapon with a collateral General Support(GS) AM role. CG's AT performance has largely been OBE, being limited to 84mm diameter, and it's current main use is that very GS AM role, with AT as a collateral duty.

 

That said, IMO, it makes much more sense(obviously for the US .mil) to have real ATGM's, such as Javelin, Eryx, etc for AT use, and issue a dedicated HE-frag weapon for general AM use. I'm a big advocate of a 40mm GL being issued to every infantryman (aside from automatic riflemen) simply because they are such a useful weapon, and it largely eliminates the need for things like M72/AT4/etc being used for GS AM use, for which they generally suck when not using a dedicated HE-frag warhead. Whereupon then become useless for AT use.

 

CG still has utility at the Coy level of issue due to it's ability to fire HE-frag, flechette/canister and ILLUM in GS as part of the FPF/company defense plan. To a lesser extent, the same can be said for USMC SMAW. It should be noted that real ATGM's such as Javelin or TOW should be reserved for actual AT use, or provided with real HE-frag rockets. HEAT warheads in light metal/CF missiles tend to suck, as they must rely almost entirely on blast. S/F.....Ken M

[Ariete!]

What you write tends to confirm my impression that the PzF3 is so heavy relative to its range/accuracy that one might as well go for a portable guided system for AT work and use a lighter system for generic AM (with AP mostly left to GLs).

[Simon Tan]

PzF3 is heavy because of the countermass. Lose that, accept backblast and you have an RPG. Disposable rockets and RCLs almost always suffer from crude fire control which exacerbate their inherently passable accuracy. For years, nay more than a decade, I have advocated a RPG team, RPG in this case being a reloadable launcher capable of firing some kind of high explosive munition, primarily anti-materiel/personnel with some kind of fire control (even a simple optical sight). A 2-man team makes it a far more effective and efficient platform as the No.2 can perform a variety of non-firing tasks that enhance the peformance of the PG, e.g. schlep and prep ammo, range find, direct fire, provide security and situational awareness etc.

Rifled weapons like the CG are generally more accurate than fin stabilized projectiles like the RPG and in-bore better than stick bombs. The usual compromises apply but really there is no reason not to have a smaller, lighter projo for for longer work and a heavy projo to defeat more fortified targets. You bring ammunition suited to the AO and mission. Working in the open, you would go with LR projos, in closer terrain and especially in built up areas the Heavy ammo would be more important.

The fire control COULD be integrated with laser rangefinding and atmospheric compenation but then again, you could work as well with a hand held LRF and stadiametric reticles.Much in the vein of precision rifle, since the fundmanetals are the same.

[thekirk]

I honestly think that we're about due for a complete re-think on our infantry small arms systems, from pistol on up to stuff intended to target areas and targets like bunkers and armored vehicles.

 

Whether or not people want to acknowledge the fact, it's all an integrated whole--Tactics and doctrine, weapons, and the combat environment. Right now, we're suffering from a mis-match in Afghanistan, in that we don't want to use the indirect area fire weapons in the tactical scenarios where we would normally use them, given the capabilities of the direct-fire small arms with which we've equipped ourselves. Every war requires evolutionary thinking in this regard, and we should continually be doing the battle analysis which feeds back into our development process. As it is, all too many armed forces tend to view these things in a vacuum state, and focus on one particular weapon at a time, not how they work together as a synergistic whole with tactics and doctrine. That's something I think we ought to change.

[Simon Tan]

If that happens, it will turn into a goat rope that will make FCS look like a shining beacon of effective program management. Between M26 MASS, M25 whatever acronym they now call it and M320, you see a series of disjointed and confused stand alones. The last is actually valid, if they would just not insist on mounting it to a rifle or carbine. It works better standalone though it would actually be better if that was not an after thought.

PEO-Soldier has a Powerpoint master plan with the usual grpahical convolution to show PP-fu but it does not really address any core requirements or capabilities. They are roadmaps to a desired nebulous end state.

[thekirk]

Simon, I'd submit that the first thing to do is fix the process that has crippled us for generations. Then, start re-thinking the weaponry. The problems we have relate back to the unstructured and unfocused thought processes that go into how we've managed these systems going back to the days of the Springfield musket. The things you point out as failures are symptoms of the root problem, which is that our organization is utterly incompetent at doing what it's supposed to--Helping fight more effectively.

 

Here's the thing: Procurement should be an ongoing, continuous process. We should keep a rolling evaluation/development program going permanently, so that instead of having to replace a given weapon system in an atmosphere of panic and dismay, we instead put the already developed next generation into fielding. Every time we've done this, of late, it's always been as a slapdash effort driven by events on the battlefield. That's a mistake, and it stems from how we view these matters. Every procurement is run as though it were in search of the penultimate "final answer" in that class of weapon, and isn't seen as being part of an evolutionary process--Which is precisely what it actually is. The whole system is broken, and that's why we keep having these failures like the OICW and the Dover Devil. We ought to be looking at things from the standpoint of life-cycle, and set our design, testing, and procurement strategies up based on that. Hell, maybe we ought to start treating small arms the same way we do jet engines--Base the program and bids on the number of rounds expected to be fired by the weapons in their lifetimes, and go from there.

 

One thing I think we've really failed on is in operations analysis of small and medium arms: What systems are really doing the killing? What is it costing per enemy casualty, in terms of number of rounds, weight of systems, and logistical burden on the system? It'd be an interesting set of numbers to know if it's more cost-effective to put a man with a rifle on a hill in Afghanistan, or for us to have that hill overwatched by a UAV and a set of command-detonated mines.

[nigelfe]

I honestly think that we're about due for a complete re-think on our infantry small arms systems, from pistol on up to stuff intended to target areas and targets like bunkers and armored vehicles.

 

Whether or not people want to acknowledge the fact, it's all an integrated whole--Tactics and doctrine, weapons, and the combat environment. Right now, we're suffering from a mis-match in Afghanistan, in that we don't want to use the indirect area fire weapons in the tactical scenarios where we would normally use them, given the capabilities of the direct-fire small arms with which we've equipped ourselves. Every war requires evolutionary thinking in this regard, and we should continually be doing the battle analysis which feeds back into our development process. As it is, all too many armed forces tend to view these things in a vacuum state, and focus on one particular weapon at a time, not how they work together as a synergistic whole with tactics and doctrine. That's something I think we ought to change.

 

Your mistake is being limited to infantry weapons, an entirely arbitrary and very silly boundary.

 

Within a project for a single system there are several (6 or 7) 'lines of development' (I suspect different countries have different terms) which address the full spread of relevant issues including doctrine and training.

 

Some countries have long (decades) modelled the impact of new systems in particualr battlefield scenarios. The problem is the varity of battlefield scenarios gets bigger and more complex and its quite possible you'll get different and contradictory results for different scenarios.

 

Do try and keep up at the back of the class :-)

[Colin]

The problem for the Canadian army is that every war since 1812 has been an expeditionary war, pretty much in a different theathre and under totally different circumstances and technology curve. So how do you prepare for something that may range from "classic peacekeeping" to full scale war?

 

The only way is to have a range of weapons and system and try to guess next threats and conflicts. Canada has been quite successful in several Sole-source contracts, which caused some political flak, but also delivered on time and on budget. Normal tendered contracts generally turn into a clusterfuck. Therefore the best thing to do is for governments to submit contract terms to a third party who is neutral and outside of the country who can decide the best bid to meet the contract. I suspect Iceland could make a go at being one of these "third parties" or a similar small state.

[EchoFiveMike]

Your mistake is being limited to infantry weapons, an entirely arbitrary and very silly boundary.

Within a project for a single system there are several (6 or 7) 'lines of development' (I suspect different countries have different terms) which address the full spread of relevant issues including doctrine and training.

Some countries have long (decades) modelled the impact of new systems in particualr battlefield scenarios. The problem is the varity of battlefield scenarios gets bigger and more complex and its quite possible you'll get different and contradictory results for different scenarios.

Do try and keep up at the back of the class :-)

 

If that's what we're doing now, based on past performance we need to stop and execute everyone involved with it....and every single one of their offspring, lest they pollute the entire species. S/F....Ken M

[thekirk]

The general point that I'm making is missed by several posters.

 

Here's the thing I'm getting at: The weapons you choose inevitably influence your tactics. Take a look at the current situation with the Marine M27. Everyone is looking at that weapon selection and going "WTF? They chose a magazine-fed super-rifle to replace a belt-fed squad support weapon? What were they thinking?". Obviously, the Marines were thinking that they wanted lighter, faster movement by their fire teams on the battlefield, placing a premium on more accurate fire delivered at point targets. They want the automatic firepower as a secondary to fast-moving teams whose speed and dynamism will overcome the disadvantage of not having that belt-fed beast to lug around the battlefield. This is virtually a reincarnation of the dichotomy between how the Germans and the US fought at the squad level in WWII. The Germans based their squads around the firepower of the MG, and their tactics and movements were all about getting that MG into the right place at the right time, while the riflemen were basically burdened with security and hauling the ammo around for it. The US, on the other hand, equipped squads with the Garand semi-auto and the BAR auto-rifle, following the idea of having the firepower in the squad more spread out across it, instead of concentrated in one weapon. It's a moot point which worked the best--By the end of the war, the US had effectively put belt-feds into a lot of squads, and the Germans were issuing the Sturmgewehr as the sole weapon in some formations.

 

The irony is that it is only in looking back at it that we find any real system to what they were doing. The Germans decided that the belt-fed MG was the premier killing tool on the battlefields of WWI, and determined to issue the lightest and most mobile MG they could. The US decided to issue the ultimate individual weapon, and went with the Garand. By the end of the war, both sides had worked out on the battlefield that best approach was actually a melding of the two, and that's what we've been moving towards over the last seventy years or so. The problem is, however, that it's all been done as a mish-mash of happy accidents, with no real thought being given to things like whether or not the ammunition loads we've chosen really work for the way we're fighting. Personally, I think that we ought to be stepping up the power on both the individual weapon, and the support weapon that we issue, supposing that we intend to keep fighting these little brush-fire wars where we can't use the other weapons that we've based our firepower on. Seventy years ago, most of the lethal power down at the squad level was based on small arms. Now, thanks to better communications and training, we've off-loaded a lot of that onto indirect fires and combat vehicles. When we can't use those systems, we're throwing ourselves back seventy years or so, and it's quite telling how much we've come to rely on the supporting weapons like artillery and the IFV cannon.

 

Some clear thinking needs to be done, and we need to first determine how everything is currently working (or, not working, as the case may be) at the squad level on up to company. What ranges and targets are our basic riflemen engaging with direct fire? Do the support weapons actually serve to support them or are they millstones around their necks, as the Marines seem to think? Once we define what is actually happening, then you can rationally start making some choices about whether or not we need to field different weapons, and from there, pick a direction we ought to move in for future development.

 

One of my major irritations with US Army manuals on small unit tactics is that there's very little focus on treating the squad and platoon as an integrated weapons system, or how junior leaders should "fight" that system. Most of the information is laid out, but it's not communicated effectively except through word of mouth and practical experience, which is not a very systematic way of imparting this to the troops or leaders. A better job could be done, writing these things down and training them. Unfortunately, we have this mental block about this kind of thing, especially in the Army. The guys who really know what they're doing, out on the ground? They're almost never the ones who wind up writing doctrine or documenting what they've been doing. When the time comes to revise things, it seems as thought it's always one of the drones who are just going by the numbers who wind up trying to put to paper the "best practices". You'll almost never find a really good junior or senior NCO who has the inclination to write and explain, and the guys who do the best job training are often not the best at leading under fire. Thinking about it, I've almost come to the conclusion that the problem has two interlocking halves--There's almost an anti-intellectualism built into the Army NCO culture, along with an expectation by the higher-ups that such things are best left to company-grade officers and higher, who rarely get to spend that much time down in the weeds at the squad and platoon level. By the time a PL starts to figure out which end is up, he's very often transferred off to some other "career-development essential" assignment.

[Guest 105mm]

I think most of them do an adequate job, whether reloadable or expendanble. A 50/50 mix of small arms to HE throwers doesn't seem all that out there (with GLs being on said small arms when applicable).

 

What's the limiting factor is issue and being able to use them just like current small arms. We in the West need to get over the fear of manportable HE and stop relying on small arms that don't do a better job than those of a hundred years ago.

[Colin]

The purpose of procurement for the military normally has the military needs far down the list of what's important. Wars however have habit of short circuiting the normal procurement process. A successful war is won by those who can discard their normal system for a better one faster than the other side.

[Max H]

Personally, I think that we ought to be stepping up the power on both the individual weapon, and the support weapon that we issue, supposing that we intend to keep fighting these little brush-fire wars where we can't use the other weapons that we've based our firepower on. Seventy years ago, most of the lethal power down at the squad level was based on small arms. Now, thanks to better communications and training, we've off-loaded a lot of that onto indirect fires and combat vehicles. When we can't use those systems, we're throwing ourselves back seventy years or so, and it's quite telling how much we've come to rely on the supporting weapons like artillery and the IFV cannon.

Given infinite training facilities, how about battle rifles for insurgency work and assault rifles for full-blown hot wars? Given that small arms acquisition costs are tiny compared to most military budgets it wouldn't be too hard to have a stock of both. Go with something like the HK 416/417 to simplify training.

[nigelfe]

The weapons you choose inevitably influence your tactics.

 

True, but the effects and influences are synergistic and systemic, simple cause and effect relationships are nonsense.

 

The irony is that it is only in looking back at it that we find any real system to what they were doing. The Germans decided that the belt-fed MG was the premier killing tool on the battlefields of WWI, and determined to issue the lightest and most mobile MG they could.

 

They were, of course wrong. No doubt they were relying on what their soldiers were saying (usually a serious error) and weren't able to properly vaildate it.

 

Fortunately the Brits, in the form of No 2 Operational Research Section, part of 21 Army Group, did the job properly for them based on reliable data not Willi's opinion. Analaysis of data (and unlike the Germans the Brits knew what the effects of German weapons were), revealed that mortars were far more effective than MGs.

[thekirk]

The weapons you choose inevitably influence your tactics.

 

True, but the effects and influences are synergistic and systemic, simple cause and effect relationships are nonsense.

 

I don't know that I agree with the idea that "simple" cause-and-effect relationships aren't present. There are always tradeoffs, some deliberate, and some by chance. Germany got away with not fielding a complex semi-automatic individual weapon based on the superiority of their MG, which were the first true GPMGs on the battlefield. Likewise, the UK was able to avoid spending the money on individual semi-autos because of the quality of the Bren, and the superiority of the SMLE as a bolt-action battle rifle. Lacking both a decent GPMG or a true LMG, the US was forced to issue semi-automatic individual weapons--Or, we'd have been at a severe disadvantage. All three cases consist of fairly simple interlocking cause-and-effect relationships.

 

Now, when you start calculating the real-world expediencies and effects like the demand for submachineguns, "borrowed" weapons, captured weapons, and everything else that the guys out on the pointy end were doing to survive and wreak havoc on the enemy, you start to run into some really hairy "how the hell did that work?" questions. Very few of the combatant forces actually wound up following the MTOE as laid out, and that's one reason I'm so damn suspicious of the systems that produce the MTOE and the weapons. You can talk about what was in the manuals of the day all you like, but the fact remains that there probably weren't any "standard configuration" units left, once they had their first few days of combat. And, if they had even a small number of veterans, you can also bet they probably didn't go into those first experiences with anything like a standard MTOE. I've talked to guys on both sides, and the one thing that struck me was just how enthusiastic they were about adding in firepower. One case was a guy who was an armored cavalry scout for the US--His half-track alone had something like six .30 caliber Browning MGs on it, a .50 cal, and a couple of BARs for their dismounts. If I remember what he told me, they were supposed to have one .30, and a single BAR. It was the same on the other side--A German I knew told me of stealing two MG42s out of a repair depot, so his Volksgrenadier squad had some firepower with it. He was supposed have nothing but Stg44 rifles, and an MP40, from what he said.

 

The "Gods of MTOE" can speak, but the guys down on the line are going to be doing things those idiots know nothing about. We robbed POMCUS stocks blind to add more belt-fed weapons onto our MTOE in Iraq, going from having a couple of SAWs in the battalion Support Platoon to having 9 M2HBs and a plethora of 7.62 belt-feds. Back in the 1990s, we'd tried doing just that after the Somalia AARs, and had been turned down and ignored. As it turned out, we were right about what we'd need, and the geniuses who were building the MTOEs were wrong.

 

The irony is that it is only in looking back at it that we find any real system to what they were doing. The Germans decided that the belt-fed MG was the premier killing tool on the battlefields of WWI, and determined to issue the lightest and most mobile MG they could.

 

They were, of course wrong. No doubt they were relying on what their soldiers were saying (usually a serious error) and weren't able to properly vaildate it.

 

I'm guilty of ignoring the German use of the mortar as a key part of their small unit firepower--Which I should have mentioned. Every WWII vet I've read who talked about it, and every one I talked to in person always gave credit to German mastery of the MG and the mortar, which often worked together. When I wrote this, I wasn't thinking of the indirect fire tools, just the small arms. The point I was trying to get at was that the Germans decided to prioritize on their MGs and mortars, and ignored major upgrades to their individual weapon. The Kar98k was basically the same weapon that had been issued back in 1898, with minor improvements. Reading what's available, it seems as though that was a deliberate decision, and one based on WWI experience. With the limited industrial base available, that was probably not a bad decision--Which is borne out by the exchange rates, which remained ludicrously in German favor throughout the war.

 

I'd disagree with what you're saying here, however. It sounds as though you're saying you think that there's nothing to be learned from the actual users of the weapons, and that their input is without value. If that's what you're trying to say, I'd have to vehemently disagree with you. Let's not forget that if the Germans had listened to the "received authority", the Stg concept would never have gotten into the field. It took actual feedback and field experience before the "authority figures" started listening, and decided to actually go ahead with production. Of course, that's simplifying the situation almost to the point of uselessness--The path that the Stg concept took from inception to actual fielding was complex, dating back to post-WWI analysis done by the staff types. It still took an outcry from the men out on the battlefield to eventually overrule the authority figures who were resistant to the concept during the war, as well as some very convincing field-testing.

 

If the system is working properly, it has to have both the ivory-tower and the grubby peasant working together. The Germans analyzed things after WWI, and their ivory-tower types concluded that the way forward was a select-fire intermediate cartridge-firing individual weapon. The users initially rejected the idea, but the authorities kept pressing forward, eventually finding out in the heat of combat that the concept had merit. Unfortunately, the actual decision-maker (Hitler, in this case) wasn't convinced, and it took real-world feedback from the lowest end to convince the institution to make the transition. That's a hugely messy example, but that's also the way it has to work--Feedback between the guy carrying the rifle into combat, and the man in the white smock.

 

What I think has gone off the rails is that we've failed to take a systemic view on these issues, and haven't really sat down to examine our base assumptions in the last few decades. 5.56mm may be a perfectly adequate cartridge, for fighting in jungles or built-up areas, but there's enough dissatisfaction coming back up the pipeline from the lowest end that we ought to take another look at it. The other thing is that we also need to do a better job of thinking out our approach to combat using these weapons, and decide if we're really doing things the right way. Take a look at how the US Army went about designing the infantry squad manning for the Bradley, for an example. Instead of looking at the problem from a standpoint of "What's the mission, and how many men do we need to accomplish it?", they went at it entirely ass-backwards, and built the squad around the number of men they could cram into the platform. I'm still astounded by that, whenever I re-read over that bit of history. It's like building a doghouse, and then chopping the legs off your dog to enable it to fit in the door...

 

Here's another example: US Army Engineer squad of the Cold War era had a set of weapons intended to address their tactical needs--M16s for the individual soldiers, enabling defense against point individual targets up to an optimistic 400m. We had a GPMG that was good for direct fire up to around 1100m, and could probably use it for indirect plunging fires at varying distances depending on terrain. Along with that, we had a pair of M203 40mm grenade launchers, which gave a decent indirect capability out to about 200-300m. Now, here's the problem--That mix of weapons had some serious deficiencies, in that you didn't have anything organic to use to address long-range indirect fires that you'd need to defend your sector or jobsite with, especially in open terrain. I can remember cases where I could clearly see the enemy, but due to the issues with the weapons and terrain, there wasn't anything I could do to bring effective fire on them. In order to do anything, it was bang-zoom, get on the radio, and call in the target set to the boss, and hopefully we'd get some artillery or mortar fire brought to bear. Given the low priority we Engineers had for such things, that usually didn't happen. If we couldn't, the enemy was free to maneuver right up to our belts, and then put their own observers to use bringing in the indirect fire they had. Or, the bastards would simply overrun us, while we were trying to complete our mission.

 

Another "system" of small arms would have given me something like a 60mm mortar, which I could have used to cover the areas I could only hit with supporting indirect fire. Since they couldn't be bothered to provide that, it might have been a good idea to give me something like an organic commando mortar. That capability alone would have allowed me to control the terrain around me out to around 800m, enabling me to complete whatever mission I had. However, the powers-that-be thought I was nuts for even asking for such a thing. Hell, the bastards didn't even want to cut me a mortar team from one of the infantry units we were supporting--Which often resulted in them getting overrun because our obstacle and barrier plan wasn't completed, either. These things are all interrelated, and all have some really weird side-effects.

 

Terrain gets a vote in all this, too. A weapons mix optimized for battle on the North German Plain is going to have issues when you take it to war out on a Mesopotamian desert, and there's not a lot you can do about it.

 

Fortunately the Brits, in the form of No 2 Operational Research Section, part of 21 Army Group, did the job properly for them based on reliable data not Willi's opinion. Analaysis of data (and unlike the Germans the Brits knew what the effects of German weapons were), revealed that mortars were far more effective than MGs.

 

I don't think you're giving enough credit to the Germans. A lot of what went into their decisions simply isn't available to us, due to destruction of the documentation, and a lack of availability in English. Because we don't have that data, that doesn't mean they didn't do it--And, as I mentioned earlier, judging from the horrendous exchange rate difference throughout the war, then the Germans were either better at studying and figuring these issues out, or they were incredibly lucky. I'm not buying the luck theory, myself.

 

There's a lot of theoretical underpinnings to what the Germans were doing with training and weapons design in the 1930s that we just don't have access to. As I've mentioned before, I've read and heard apocryphal references to German "human factors" research that led to their decisions on how to structure their squads, conduct training, and what infantry weapons to focus on. It's significant that they stressed the hell out of crew-served weapons down to the lowest level, and treated individual weapons almost as an afterthought. That see-saw effect between the two schools of thought has gone back and forth, ever since.

[GK Dundas]

The problem for the Canadian army is that every war since 1812 has been an expeditionary war, pretty much in a different theathre and under totally different circumstances and technology curve. So how do you prepare for something that may range from "classic peacekeeping" to full scale war? The only way is to have a range of weapons and system and try to guess next threats and conflicts. Canada has been quite successful in several Sole-source contracts, which caused some political flak, but also delivered on time and on budget. Normal tendered contracts generally turn into a clusterfuck. Therefore the best thing to do is for governments to submit contract terms to a third party who is neutral and outside of the country who can decide the best bid to meet the contract. I suspect Iceland could make a go at being one of these "third parties" or a similar small state.

Colin ,this may be the most brillant posting (in regards to Cdn. procurement issues at any rate) In TN History!

[Tony Williams]

What I think has gone off the rails is that we've failed to take a systemic view on these issues, and haven't really sat down to examine our base assumptions in the last few decades. 5.56mm may be a perfectly adequate cartridge, for fighting in jungles or built-up areas, but there's enough dissatisfaction coming back up the pipeline from the lowest end that we ought to take another look at it.

 

Terrain gets a vote in all this, too. A weapons mix optimized for battle on the North German Plain is going to have issues when you take it to war out on a Mesopotamian desert, and there's not a lot you can do about it.

 

This raises an interesting and important question: to what extent can weapon design, plus the mix of weapons carried, be multi-purpose, effective in any environment, and to what extent do they have to be specialised to particular environments?

 

This is just the issue which is raised (although without solutions) in PEO Soldier's recent report on Soldier Battlefield Effectiveness which I've referenced in another thread - particularly this bit:

 

"Ultimately, Army service rifles must be general purpose in nature and embody a series of tradeoffs that balance optimum performance for a wide range of possible missions in a range of operating environments. With global missions taking Soldiers from islands to mountains and jungles to deserts, the Army can’t buy 1.1 million new service rifles every time it’s called upon to operate in a different environment."

[nigelfe]

There's a lot of theoretical underpinnings to what the Germans were doing with training and weapons design in the 1930s that we just don't have access to. As I've mentioned before, I've read and heard apocryphal references to German "human factors" research that led to their decisions on how to structure their squads, conduct training, and what infantry weapons to focus on. It's significant that they stressed the hell out of crew-served weapons down to the lowest level, and treated individual weapons almost as an afterthought. That see-saw effect between the two schools of thought has gone back and forth, ever since.

 

Theory is one thing, validating it in practice is another matter altogether. I've not come across any reference to the German Army (or Airforce - even less likely). The UK post war review of the army OR effort makes no mention of any German equivalent.

 

Soldiers (and airman's) opinions and feedback are valuable for matters of direct reliable knowledge. The effectiveness of weapons on the enemy does not fit in the category. Of course soldiers like to think it does, and will pontificate endlessly on the matter.

[thekirk]

There's a lot of theoretical underpinnings to what the Germans were doing with training and weapons design in the 1930s that we just don't have access to. As I've mentioned before, I've read and heard apocryphal references to German "human factors" research that led to their decisions on how to structure their squads, conduct training, and what infantry weapons to focus on. It's significant that they stressed the hell out of crew-served weapons down to the lowest level, and treated individual weapons almost as an afterthought. That see-saw effect between the two schools of thought has gone back and forth, ever since.

 

Theory is one thing, validating it in practice is another matter altogether. I've not come across any reference to the German Army (or Airforce - even less likely). The UK post war review of the army OR effort makes no mention of any German equivalent.

 

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. There are tantalizing references in a couple of works discussing German design philosophies that went into how they chose to build several of their bombers, and their tanks. I'm going to have to go do some digging, but I believe at least one is in Len Deighton's Fighter. There are also some intriguing references to such things in discussions about how von Seeckt's Reichswehr transformed itself into the Wehrmacht, particularly discussing some of the exercises observed by Hitler and the other Nazi higher-ups. Someone in pre-war Germany was doing the equivalent of OR with regards to human factors research, or they were doing something else that was just as effective. From the reading I've done over the years, it's not been a subject of very much research.

 

Soldiers (and airman's) opinions and feedback are valuable for matters of direct reliable knowledge. The effectiveness of weapons on the enemy does not fit in the category. Of course soldiers like to think it does, and will pontificate endlessly on the matter.

 

This paragraph just baffles me. How else do you ascertain the effectiveness of a weapon, unless you take into account "direct reliable knowledge"? If you can't get that from the users down at the sharp end of things, which I'd agree isn't exactly easy, how the hell else do you propose to get it? Lab experiments and calculations? How do you verify if your fixes work, without going back down to the sharp edge of things, and listening to the people who used your solution? How do you know you've got an issue, without first listening to them?

 

Here's the thing: The information is out there. The problem is that the system isn't set up to capture it, or to do anything with it if it happens to fall into their laps. What should be happening is that the people in charge of weapons development and procurement ought to be canvassing the folks who are doing the actual fighting (which they do, to a degree--Unfortunately, every one of the attempts I've seen have been poorly designed opinion surveys) about how their weapons worked. Once an issue is identified, then field research should be done to validate whether or not the issue is actually existent, followed by remediation efforts and further testing to determine if those efforts are working well. Past that, the results should be worked into developmental weapons, and made a part of the "lessons learned".

 

They're doing the first step, not very well, but they are doing it. What they're failing on is the follow-up. It's just like the issues I brought up earlier about how they were expecting us to fight as Engineers without effective indirect fire weapons or support. God knows I brought that fact up often enough at my level, but every time I did so, it was blown off as "Well, you're not mortarmen, so it would be too much trouble to give you some commando mortars (which I'd define as the sort that you don't operate in conjunction with an FDC, and over open sights). We also don't want to give you any direct access to fire support, so you guys are on your own, out there...". What they were expecting was for us to operate out in front of the friendly lines, preparing obstacles, and somehow keep from getting killed while doing so. Exercise after exercise saw us getting whacked or driven back to behind our forward positions, unable to do our jobs--Which usually resulted in us getting our asses kicked by the OPFOR, since they were able to blow through the kill sacks too quickly for our TOW systems to attrit them. I don't know that adjusting our indirect fire capabilities would have helped, because they never listened to us and made the experiment of getting us any. That right there is an example of a poorly implemented feedback loop, and is symptomatic of how things usually go on in the US forces.

 

As I've said before, for any informational feedback loop to work, you actually have to go out and capture verifiable information. User surveys can help identify issues, but you have to take the next step and actually go get the data--Which, I'm afraid, you're only going to get by taking your lab rats out into the combat zone, and have them gather the evidence with the help of the users. If things were working the way I think they should, the purely subjective opinions of the grunts that their 5.56mm individual weapons weren't serving to kill the enemy should have been followed up by the development folks going into the field and gathering evidence, in the form of enemy casualties and analysis of actual combat actions. It's akin to the problem with reconnaissance--In the old Soviet system, the S2-equivalent actually had command over the recon elements, and could direct their actions. In US practice, those recon formations were their own bosses, and worked for the S3. The S2 only got to provide input through the S3, and didn't have command or control over them, resulting in less effective intelligence.

 

The development people ought to be able to actively get the data they need, instead of relying on passive after-action analysis that may not be sufficient to get their answers. If it were me, I'd spend the money to get them the time and assets necessary to do a couple of things--Wire an infantry unit for sound, and then capture as much real-world combat as can be done without damaging that unit's operational effectiveness. If that means buying a couple of extra UAVs, and giving the research guys the ability to survey the battlefield while it's happening, so be it--The information needs to be captured. I'd also do a couple of other things, as well: Immediately before deployment, take up every weapon in a unit, and do a complete tear-down and analysis of condition. Do this during pre-deployment leave, and then return those weapons to the unit before it deploys. Upon return, take up every weapon again, and then do the same thing, checking for where things wore and/or broke (you'd also have to capture in-theater maintenance and parts replacement). As a control, take a similar unit, and issue brand-new fresh-from-the-factory weapons across the board, and then take them up after deployment for the same sort of study. From that, you should be able to tell where your weapons are wearing out or breaking, and what sorts of design steps need to be taken to prevent that in follow-on efforts.

 

It's amazing to me how often we've failed to close the loop on many equipment issues, over the years. Hell, every damn time we've gone to issue new field uniforms in the US, we have the same damn issue with the pants--The crotches blow out. We had that happen in Vietnam with the initial OG-107 issues, we had that happen with the initial hot-weather BDU, and we repeated it again with the ACU series of uniforms. Why? Broken feedback loop, that's why. As one of my BA friends once pointed out, we don't really have a "Lessons Learned" program, here in the US. What we have is a "Lessons Identified" program, because you can't really say you've learned anything if you keep ignoring the lesson, or keep repeating the mistake, now can you? Same guy could go on for hours about similar issues he'd had with UK weapons and equipment, so I don't think we're alone in this.

[Simon Tan]

Why does the army seem unique in its crotch ripping? is it a cut problem? Or is the model not properly sized? Or is there an operational issue, i.e. the BDUs are being abused. Are commercial products able to meet the desired crotch durability and if so, was there malfeasence in the design process, deliberate weakening of a key area to force unprogrammed purchases? Is there a crotch gap?

[Chris Werb]

I can (obviously) accept that British research showed that 3" mortars were much better at filling an area with lethal bits of metal that a sustained fire MG. However, the Vickers was retained for a couple of decades post war and an SF kit issued for the GPMG (which AFAIK is still in service). OTOH, HE from the 2" mortar went away for a lot of years and only came back shortly prior to the introduction of the recently replaced 51mm. The only conclusion I can reach from that is that platoon or section mortars weren't felt to be worth the effort as casualty producers for a lot of years and that the British Army continued to and perhaps still envisages a use for SFMGs in an unsighted/indirect fire role.

[thekirk]

Why does the army seem unique in its crotch ripping? is it a cut problem? Or is the model not properly sized? Or is there an operational issue, i.e. the BDUs are being abused. Are commercial products able to meet the desired crotch durability and if so, was there malfeasence in the design process, deliberate weakening of a key area to force unprogrammed purchases? Is there a crotch gap?

 

I ascribe it to the fucking idiots at Natick having zero common sense, and the general ahistorical attitude in the US Army and its supporting agencies. I swear to God, the first set of ACUs I was issued, the first thing I looked at was the crotch--And, they'd gone right back to the same design with limited stitching and not enough fabric that had caused failure with the original lots of the hot weather BDUs. When I saw that, I predicted disaster--Which we started getting before we even left for Iraq in 2005. We got the ACU fielded just before departure, and even the little bit of training we did right before we left generated failures in the crotch areas.

 

You'd think there would have been a file, somewhere, entitled "Shit we did wrong the last time we designed uniforms--Let's not repeat these mistakes", but noooooooo...

 

What they really need to do is go to a gusseted design, and reinforce the living hell out of the seams and stitching. I've got civilian pants with what they call a "diamond gusset", and I'll tell you, they don't have half the issues the pants without them have.

 

I've got a very, very jaundiced view about Natick labs. The couple of times I've interacted with those people, I have had very poor experiences with them. I know for a fact, because I was there, that one of our medics presented their field team that came to Fort Lewis back in 1986, seeking "ideas for the future", with a prototype of something damn near a modern camelback hydration system that he'd built into the flap of an ALICE Large ruck. The geniuses from Natick more or less laughed at him, and said it was a.) unnecessary, and b.) too fragile for military issue. I have to wonder how those assholes felt less than a decade later when they had to pay CamelBak licensing fees to include their system in the MOLLE program...

Edited March 13, 2012 by thekirk

[thekirk]

I can (obviously) accept that British research showed that 3" mortars were much better at filling an area with lethal bits of metal that a sustained fire MG. However, the Vickers was retained for a couple of decades post war and an SF kit issued for the GPMG (which AFAIK is still in service). OTOH, HE from the 2" mortar went away for a lot of years and only came back shortly prior to the introduction of the recently replaced 51mm. The only conclusion I can reach from that is that platoon or section mortars weren't felt to be worth the effort as casualty producers for a lot of years and that the British Army continued to and perhaps still envisages a use for SFMGs in an unsighted/indirect fire role.

 

I think a 3" mortar is a bit big for a small unit to haul around for covering the bits of terrain that a small unit is responsible for. A 40mm GL just does not have the range or the lethality that a 60mm mortar has, and so long as the guys with the mortar don't get too ambitious, it's not a bad tool to have in the kit bag. I'm pretty confident that so long as you keep it to the classic "commando mortar" sort of mission, the required skills aren't that much harder to train or acquire than they are for a M203. With sub-caliber trainers, it's not even that hard to keep up skills. If it were I, they'd issue those little darlings out two to a platoon, along with the necessities.

 

Now, here's a thought for y'all: Why aren't we looking at this from the standpoint of capabilities? If we can look at a squad and say that they're expected to fulfill a role that requires them to be able to cover dead space out to 800m, why not take that as a design requirement, and come up with a system that enables it? How hard would it be to build a box that would allow fairly accurate fire to be delivered by non-experts, either via a mortar-like device, or something like the FOG-M? Plug the damn thing into the network, and haul it around on a "fire support trailer", making it available to the fire support network. I could have taken something like that out to a jobsite, plugged in my likely avenues of approach, and then let it sit there, ready to deliver overwatch fires while my guys did their thing putting in obstacles. We need to be thinking in terms of "necessary capabilities", and then building weapons systems to match.

[nigelfe]

I can (obviously) accept that British research showed that 3" mortars were much better at filling an area with lethal bits of metal that a sustained fire MG. However, the Vickers was retained for a couple of decades post war and an SF kit issued for the GPMG (which AFAIK is still in service). OTOH, HE from the 2" mortar went away for a lot of years and only came back shortly prior to the introduction of the recently replaced 51mm. The only conclusion I can reach from that is that platoon or section mortars weren't felt to be worth the effort as casualty producers for a lot of years and that the British Army continued to and perhaps still envisages a use for SFMGs in an unsighted/indirect fire role.

 

UK ORS were obviously dealing with German mors, not 3". UK MG Bns were disbanded after the war, even during the war those in western theatres seem to have re-equipped 1 coy with 4.2" mors. While MMGs were available until GPMG(SF) arrived, I'm not sure that they were part of any unit's standard equipment. The 1962 inf bn (which introduced the recce pl) certainly didn't have any.