Congrats to 2ndLt Gabe Serbu

[SWCAdmin]

SWC Member and author of Heavy Armour in Small Wars and Insurgencies from SWJ Magazine volume 7. Just got commissioned in the Canadian Forces.

[SWJED]

Congratulations - Lt. Serbu!

[SoiCowboy]

Congratulations.

[Monte Cristo]

Thanks guys! I really appreciate it!

[marct]

Way to go!

[Monte Cristo]

Training does not start before next week, which means that I still have a few days to focus on my research. I am currently studying in great detail the September 1996 Taliban offensive on Kabul, a swift and complex series of operations carried out over a wide area. Their use of Datsun pick-up trucks is fascinating. Somali Islamists used similar pick-up trucks during Operation Code Irene. There is shocking similarity between the use of pick-up trucks by terrorists and the Russian tachanka, a horse-drawn machine gun platform, employed by the Bolsheviks during the Civil War. The utilization of carts, open wagons or pickup trucks as machine gun ar recoilless rifle platforms is part of what I would call the poor man’s blitzkrieg.

During the Second World War, browning machine guns were mounted on jeeps, and today, various versions of the M240 are mounted on Humvees, but I seriously doubt that they were/are employed en masse in offensive operations and with the incredible tactical flexibility demonstrated by the Taliban. Moreover, a Humvee might not be the ideal platform for a machine gun...it is too heavy and too awkward. But, then again, I might be wrong.

[wm]

For comparison, you mught see what you can dig up on operations in Chad during the early 80s. I seem to remember use of MGs mounted on Toyota pickups by the irregular Chadian forces.

[marct]

Hmmm, sounds a bit like horse archer raiding tactics. Are you going to publish the research, Gabe? I'd love to see it .

Marc

[JHR]

Don't forget the early SAS with Land Rovers and reused aircraft MGs. At night they even managed to infiltrate German convoys and enter bases. A few explosives and the base thought it was an air raid.

JHR

[Monte Cristo]

It is going to be very hard Marc. They like to keep us dreadfully busy here, at the Infantry School…Not to mention the fact that the school's library is abysmal at best…

Thank you WM, I’ll look into it…

Thanks JHR, although I’m more interested in the employment en masse of pick-ups used as platforms for various military hardware.