Quote Originally Posted by Kiwigrunt View Post
You’re talking about two different things here though. A commando mortar at platoon level is for direct fire and does indeed offer great response capability at that level. The tubes at company and battalion level are for stand-off indirect fire. One advantage of having greater numbers of tubes/sections in a battalion mortar platoon is the ability to leapfrog behind a moving battalion, while always keeping one foot on the ground. Increased numbers of 60 mm at company level would offer the same potential, but does the advantage at this level outweigh the weight and manpower penalties?

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IMO having some 60s at company is cool; it gives some measure of organic indirect support. But don’t get too exited by trying to make in ‘enough’, coz it never will be. You can’t equip sub units at all levels as if they have to fight the war by themselves. And if they do have to fight their part of the war by themselves (distributed ops), well, battalion might lend them a section of 81s.

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So what are your thoughts on Col. Odom's infantry Company. He, and his collaborators, have two 60mm tubes per weapons squad of each inf plt with 4 81mm and 4 120mm in the company mortar (indirect fires) platoon. Personally, I can't see why you'd want the redundancy with the 81/120 combos. Nor could I figure out for the life of me how two 60mm tubes at plt would be supplied (manpower/ammo wise).