They mostly come at night. Mostly.
- university webpage: McGill University
- conflict simulations webpage: PaxSims
Spud reminded me of the existence of the Australian Army Journal in another post. The latest one is not available online yet but the first article in the July one would support this:
Nothing that results in human progress is achieved with unanimous consent. (Christopher Columbus)
All great truth passes through three stages: first it is ridiculed, second it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being self-evident.
(Arthur Schopenhauer)
ONWARD
Infinity Journal "I don't care if this works in practice. I want to see it work in theory!"
- The job of the British Army out here is to kill or capture Communist Terrorists in Malaya.
- If we can double the ratio of kills per contact, we will soon put an end to the shooting in Malaya.
Sir Gerald Templer, foreword to the "Conduct of Anti-Terrorist Operations in Malaya," 1958 Edition
No Tuk, the standard arrangement is not like that. That construct was used during experiments only, as the IAR concept was worked through out At 29 Palms. Eby led that experimentation effort.
Say again last transmission. That's awfully high for a height-of-burst correction, over.Up 500.
I guess that's what they mean when they say you should stay flexible. I never went into the "Adjust Fire" mode with that type of round before.
As the Actress said to the Bishop -- she was a Howitzer fan.
The 155mm had a 100t yield IIRC. With the 203mm you had dial-a-yield. Or assemble a yield, actually and got from three kt to 40 kt. A 40kt airburst EMP would knock out every unprotected electronic device within a healthy radius with a 1,600' or more airburst. Make a few people sick, too...
Knew that, but thanks anyway.
Ok. So it was just a one off. I just wondered how the logistics of something along those lines would work. Very interesting implications though. Thanks again for the clarification. Although I do wonder wether it wouldn't have been a better idea to run an experiment with two platoons, one using the LMG/SAW mix as per Eby and another replacing the LMG section with a HE projector equipped section, say with M32s or some such. The percentages of hits for no. of rounds fired really opened my eyes (i.e., do soldiers really need to be carryign huge amounts of ammo for such miniscule hit rates- yes, I know, suppression isn't just about hitting the target- when surely SHOCK would be better, in which case HE is the way to go?)That construct was used during experiments only, as the IAR concept was worked through out At 29 Palms. Eby led that experimentation effort.
I don't think we had M32s in use back then, and certainly not any ELRP ammunition that would have made the experiment truly beneficial.
The majority opinion here seems to be that the only suppressive fire that really is effective is that which nearly kills the enemy, which is to say aimed fire that barely misses the mark. Spray-and-pray makes sense for the first minute or so of a meeting engagement, but after that fire control needs to be asserted, not always easy to do in the noise and confusion. The distinction is to shift to disciplined fire at known or suspected enemy locations, not to fire indiscriminately in a general direction.
During my day in the Field Artillery we had "Immediate Suppression" fire missions, High Explosive rounds with Variable Time fuzes (HE/VT) fired at enemy Anti-Tank Guided Missile positions. The idea was to make the ATGM gunner flinch during his aim. That was back in the DePuy FM 100-5 days of the Fulda Gap scenario.
Last edited by Pete; 12-13-2010 at 12:36 AM. Reason: Add HE/VT.
I don't even think we can realistically say that the first minute makes sense.Spray-and-pray makes sense for the first minute or so of a meeting engagement, but after that fire control needs to be asserted, not always easy to do in the noise and confusion.
I think one of the reasons why people are having a hard time getting their head around the concept of the IAR is due to our notion of not just suppressive fire, but how we see it factoring into our TTPs.
Would you guys disapprove or approve the use of full-auto in rifles during Vietnam? Considering that that article quoted above states that the line of sight was often not much more than 5 meters in front of them, and that many engagements were around 15 meters.
Last edited by Blah; 12-14-2010 at 03:58 AM.
By the way, the inventor of the Civil War Spencer rifles and carbines, Christopher Spencer, took his tube-feed idea one step further circa 1880 when he invented the pump-action shotgun. Winchester wasted no time and came up with its own model a few years later. Spencer's invention is still with us.With a Spencer armed unit it may have happened ...
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