May have left the question
lost somewhere in the other jibberish. I was wondering if anyone knew why 12 men or was it more of that is just the way it worked out after looking at leadership requirements and having 2 of everything? Didn't know if some one thought 12 was the right amount of personnel and then tailored the make up to this number or the other way around. Understand the comparison is apples to oranges in some aspects.
A question that arises is also mobility assets. Under the current composition a 9 man squad can move by two gun trucks or 1 UH-60(seats in of course). If the squad size increases then do our mobility platforms need to increase in size as well or do we simply increase the footprint (more vehicles). Might simply be to far into 9 man squads in the Army to change at this point. How do the other services handle this?
The number was based on taking the needed
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Originally Posted by
ODB
lost somewhere in the other jibberish. I was wondering if anyone knew why 12 men or was it more of that is just the way it worked out after looking at leadership requirements and having 2 of everything? Didn't know if some one thought 12 was the right amount of personnel and then tailored the make up to this number or the other way around. Understand the comparison is apples to oranges in some aspects.
skills, generally doubling the number for redundancy (and insuring cross training to reinforce that) and was broadly based on the organization and experience of OSS Detachment 101 in Burma during WW II, by far the most successful large irregular warfare operation and way ahead of the success of the Jedburgh Teams.
The very different US Rifle squad, OTOH, is based primarily on Korean War experience and the two fire team leaders specifically date from there and a perceived need to have another NCO for both redundancy and for the training stream. The AR Man in each team (as opposed to a Machine Gun / Gunner) was due mostly to lack of an acceptable MG at the time plus the old "not invented here" syndrome which says that if another nation is doing 'A' we must do 'B.'
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A question that arises is also mobility assets. Under the current composition a 9 man squad can move by two gun trucks or 1 UH-60(seats in of course). If the squad size increases then do our mobility platforms need to increase in size as well or do we simply increase the footprint (more vehicles). Might simply be to far into 9 man squads in the Army to change at this point. How do the other services handle this?
The nine man squad is an abortion; it was introduced in the 80s simply to free up the other two men from the Squad to provide numbers to increase the number of Army divisions -- a process that sliced TOEs to the bone and really hurt the Divisions even as it created two more from the same manpower. Dumb idea then and a dumb idea now. Much more effective was the 11 man squad -- more staying power, also...
Part, not all , of the size of our vehicles is based on justifying that nine man squad -- can't be like anyone else...
Other organizations handle larger sizes with (a) bigger vehicles; and (b) splitting their squads -- just like the US Army has to do all too often...
Thank you for the history.
I tried googling it numerous times and could find nothing about it. Thank you Ken for the historical perspective.
I know it never comes out even but looking at the possibility if squad sizes increased would we increase vehicle capacity or increase the number of vehicles? Personally I'm a fan of the insert an infantry company plus with three CH-47's and extract with 2, 70 personnel per bird + 15,000 foot mountain passes makes for a lot of puking soldiers and over torqued aircraft.
Nah, the Captain was always there, they added the Intel Sgt
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Originally Posted by
Uboat509
I thought that the original ODA was ten men but they added a captain to act as a commissioned advisor to the Team-Sergeant and then a Warrant to do all the paperwork. :) SFC W
and a Lieutenant to provide someone to listen to the Captain. ;)
Warrants were a later-- and good -- idea...
True, however that didn't last very long.
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Originally Posted by
William F. Owen
The original ODA was 2 Officers and 13 NCOs, as mandated by TOE 33-510. Ir was designed to train and then staff a 1,500 strong guerilla Army.
Combination of spinning half the Group to Germany as the 10th (and further splitting a Det from that to Berlin -- with a different TOE) and forming the 77th at Bragg with the other half of the original Group created a minor shortfall in people (as well as new commanders), thus the TOE mod to 12 for the A Teams while the B Teams stayed at 15.
Tequilla, Its not the report but the reference of it in the MC Times
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Originally Posted by
COMMAR
The SAW isn't going anywhere, a Squad will just have another option before leaving the wire. The report fr/ 7th Marines in 2001 should be online, also a recent IAR story fr/ The Marine Corps Times gives some info on it.
Marines to Test, Evaluate 4 Auto-Rifle Models: http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news...ewsaw_020109w/ ....A Change in Mindset (Note view entire article on link, text removed due to copyright issues)
Good informative post, thanks.
However, in the future you might consider that to avoid copyright issues, this site encourages the posting of just an excerpt and a link instead of posting an entire -- or most of -- an article. The various service Times and Gannet in general are one crowd that occasionally get sticky about it. May not be a problem but it just keeps the board from getting in trouble with someone who's picky.
Not so on one, true on the other
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Originally Posted by
Kiwigrunt
I'm not sure there is actually much difference between the two Wilf. The 48 is made in the US, the standard in Belgium, both by FN. They weigh the same. The 48 has a different gasplug and (sturdier) bipod. Other than that they appear to be pretty much identical.
Not sure from whence that statement is derived. They are two very different weapons and concepts.
The Mk 48 weighs 18 pounds LINK, the M240 weighs 27 pounds LINK -- plus. Folks using it today tell me that those carried in theater today easily weigh over 30 pounds.
Note that FN brags about the light weight of of the Mk 48 and provides that weight -- but for the M240 series ground guns does not provide the weight LINK simply because it is the troops greatest complaint about an otherwise excellent weapon. Note also the FN is working on several mods to reduce that weight.
The Mk 48 is not robust enough to take the pounding an Infantry unit would give it; OTOH, it's okay to take out of a stock of weapons on a raid of relatively short duration and possible high intensity followed by return to an armorer to get ready for the next operation. It does not need to be excessively rugged.
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For as far as weight is any indication of robustness, the 7.62 Mimini is not much lighter than the old L4 (agreed, mag fed). I don't think the L4 had any durability issues.
No, the L4 was one of the most reliable guns of its type -- and that operating system is the basis of the M240 system. The Minimi / M249 / Mk 46 / Mk 48 operating system is different, based on but not as robust as the Kalishnikov system and it is not nearly as reliable. Weight is not an indicator of robustness, the type of construction and materials used plus the operating system are.
The MAG 58 / M 240 was designed at a time when those factors were dominant and the gun used heavy, thick plates and a strong riveted construction (The L4 from even earlier was even more so -- the receiver was milled fro one block of steel). The Minimi series OTOH was designed to be cheap to produce -- that was the dominant feature, so the construction is much more flimsy all round.