Black Hawk Down Oart III

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Hard Ball

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Looking at the threads on Black Hawk Down and Black Hawk Down Part II it occured to me that many members are interested in Military weapons and National Defence Policy while pther members are not.

I have suggested that a new Military weapons and National Defence Policy forum be added to TFL which interested members coud vist and non interested members coould ignore.

For the next week opinions pro and con are being requested. If ypu have ab opinion one way or the other you should post your cpmments under the topic in the Sugestions & Comments forum.

[This message has been edited by Hard Ball (edited February 17, 2000).]
 
Hard Ball: I am biased, but I am for it.

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God truly fights on the side with the best artillery
 
Yeah, good idea. The only problem is I didn't recognize most of the acronyms used in the preceding threads. I guess I have been out for a long time. OK gotta go have to clean my Krag.

Geoff Ross
 
I'm game. Goeff - don't worry you aren't that outdated sometimes it only seems like the M16A1s we have are as old as your Krag :)
Most of ours are marked Colt AR15 on the lower receivers.
Jeff

[This message has been edited by Jeff White (edited February 18, 2000).]
 
STLRN,
Did you see the article in this weeks Army Times about hooking the Artillery up to the "tactical internet"? I found it interesting in light of what you posted about going back to voice for fire missions.
Jeff
 
Hard Ball, I chipped in over in the Suggestions area. the General Discussions forum is a bit overloaded, likewise for other gun-related forums. the gun forums are serving very well at providing a meeting place for "birds of a feather". most of the people I know wouldn't know the difference between a tank and an IFV.

K80Geoff, join the club. I get about 1/3 of the TLAs. ;)

"tactical internet?" you mean there's a web page somewhere that I can call up some arty? :) that would come in handy this spring when the birds start dive-bombing my car; an airburst or two ought to teach them a lesson...
 
K80 Geoff
I love my GI issue Krag too. The 100 cartridge lppp web rifleman's belt that came with it is a fascinating piece of equipment and it has the smoothest bolt action of any military rifle I have ever shot.
 
Tactical is the current term used to describe the digtial hookups that are the cenerpiece of the Force XXI experiments. Using data terminals (much ike the MDTs police departments use) they are trying to hppk everyone up. It's supposed to end fratricide and give everyone "real time" information just like the internet. They have a Brigade at Ft Hood playing with this technology now. A lot of bugs to be worked out but it shows promise. The digital brigade supposedly can operate with less combat vehicles because of the digitalization. They ran them through an NTC rotation a year or so ago but they didn't do well. More fratricide then non digital brigades have experienced at NTC.

Jeff
 
have IFF sets been tried by ground forces? seems like it might be easier to ping and respond a potential target than keep a running uplink to locate units.

on a side note, there's a 2-page article in the latest issue of the AIAA's main rag, in which a new transport concept is described. its sort of a C-130 replacement, but its a very strange bird. no tailplanes, 4 turboprops on a tilt-wing, and *very* wide; cargo bay is 21 feet wide! despite the tilt-wing bit, it sounded like it is *not* VTOL, only STOL. sounds rather expensive to me (didn't we just go thru this with C-17?).

TLA = Three Letter Acronym
IFF = Identify Friend or Foe
VTOL = Vertical TakeOff and Landing
STOL = Short TakeOff and Landing
AIAA = American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics
 
Are you referring to the V-22 Osprey? A great idea, the Marines want to replace most of their helicopters with them, butI think cost per unit is already so high, we'd never buy enogh of them to really use them. I think there is a special ops varient to replace the MH-53 Pave Low helos the Air Force operates.

I think they have experimented with several IFF ystems for combat vehicles, but I'm not sure how thwy are doing in that area. One of the versions of the OCIW rifle was to have an IFF system but I think that was dropped from the one they are testing now.

Jeff
 
nope, this is something new. its a paper design, but Boeing (recall that they absorbed Douglas Aircraft) is working with the USAF on this new concept. it has an acronym which escapes me, but its unofficial moniker is "Superfrog" which is rather accurate. the thing is roughly C-130 sized but the fuselage is twice as wide. its good that the USAF is trying to improve on the Herc, but one of the nice things about the Herc is we've got lots of them and they run good. this new design is a little out there IMHO.

the V-22 *concept* is good, but the program was designed for failure. firstly, the first operational tiltrotor should have been a small gunship (I seem to recall that Bell Helicopter had a concept called the Bat which was tres cool). bigger is harder, especially for rotorcraft (there are some scale effects that make smaller, easier). plus, a radical new technology like that shouldn't be used for a grunt-hauler; too high-risk. since tiltrotors are inherently expensive, the plan was to ensure orders of several hundred from all four services. problem was that the Navy demanded wing-folding and blade-folding to minimize deck footprint. Army wanted ballistic tolerance, Air Force wanted extreme range for SOCOM operations, and the Marines initially thought they couldn't afford it. well, by trying to address all wants, the price got too big and everybody pulled out except the Marines, who finally realized what it could do for their amphib assaults. what they should have done, in my opinion, is develop a simple one first for Army air assault use. then a spec-ops sub-version of that. *then* add wing- and blade-folding for operations off a deck.

one potential problem with the V-22 is that our heavy-lift rotorcraft cannot keep up either speed-wise or range-wise with the troops. we'd need to develop equivalent aircraft big enough to carry HMMMV-based equipment, not to mention larger systems to carry light armored vehicles. disregarding spec ops for a sec, it doesn't make much sense for rifle platoons to outrun their arty, C3I and whatnot.
 
The MV-22 can sling load the XM-777 lightweight 155. The 9000 lb max weapons weight was specified becuase of the requirement to be able to be carried + crew and ammo by a MV22. The vertical artillery raid is not done all that often in the Marines, the Army does it quite a bit with their M119. The problem they run into when the do heliolift of guns is that it is not unsual to damage quite a few howitzers whenever it s done.

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God truly fights on the side with the best artillery
 
Twice as wide as a C130? That would be great! We could put balloon tires back on the M198s. We have trafficablity problems wth the M198 howitzer. They old artillerymen tell me that they originally had balloon tire, but these were removed so they could fit into a C130.

The whole concept sounds like a good idea.
Jeff
 
Jeff, its currently called the ATT (Advanced Theater Transport). time frame is quite a ways off, article implies serious work beginning around 2010, thus in service around 2020. Air Mobility Command is the father, Boeing is the mother (or vice versa; never too clear who's really on top between DoD and manufacturers). part of the design philosophy is consideration of the next generation of light vehicles, which is sort of like trying to hit a moving target with a moving gun during an earthquake. ;)

weight-wise, is it feasible to carry SP arty of 105mm or larger in a C-130 sized aircraft? ignoring size constraints for the moment, that would seem to be the ideal outcome for you guys.

STLRN, I've seen pictures of it being done but that doesn't mean its a good thing. I haven't heard anything on how well the V-22 handles with a sling load, but putting a sling load on a tiltrotor is like putting a trailer hitch on a Formula 1 racer. if you're going to do that, it'd be cheaper to go with a conventional helicopter. of course, that requires two aircraft types with all that entails, but a conventional heavy-lift chopper is usually required anyways due to engineering and recovery work. I expect that the next-gen cargo tiltrotor will probably have a large enough cargo bay to carry big things internally.

btw, I saw a picture of that lightweight 155; boy, that thing looks flimsy. this isn't a "monkey trap" scheme, is it? "abandon" a whole bunch of these things in a bogus retreat, then while the bad guys try to get them working, you bring out the real guns? ;)



[This message has been edited by Ivanhoe (edited February 21, 2000).]
 
One thing I haven't heard mentioned yet is the fact that you can not do rappel or fast roping from a MV-22. The down drafts are far too great. Of course you can do this with the CH-53 either. Just the million year old 46. So now you have to land the bird with all the clearence problems and other bad things that this entails. Sling load a M777? Wow. Sounds like a wonderful way to break things. This is according to my HRST master friend. Still wondering why the pathetic pop-gun 39caliber barrel. The Finns make a 52 cal barrel, Singapore has fielded a 52. We on the other hand, have removed systems from service(M110A2) Whose side are the procurement nerds on? Semper Fi...Ken M
 
Sgt Mike:
The reason we went will stick to the 39 caliber tube is weight. The XM777 frame can hold up to a 52 caliber tube, but the 9000 lbs limit, limits the tube length to 39 caliber. Some additional problems that arrise to from the 9000 lbs limit is the weapons ability to deal with the shock of firing high charges. One of the first problems to arrise was the spades were found to be insufficent and the piece with experience extreme displacement. Another problem is more a peacetime problem than war. The tube was takened from the tube used by the paladin howizer, and thinned for weight savings and chromed to deal with corosion and errosion from firing MACS. Well the thin tube transmits a lot more sound than the old thick one. With hearing conservation be what it is today, there is a potential problem in peace time training because of the sound it puts out.
The reason 9000 was chosen was the weight that a MV22 could carry. The Corps has wed itself to the MV22 and AAAV because it supports the future operational concept of Operational Manuever From The Sea (OMFTS) in which the sea becomes manuever space. To accomplish this we need platforms that are faster and with longer legs. Also since the current navy NSF( based on 5"54) is only 23 KM and the soon to be adopted 5"x64 doesn't give us a range beyond 75 KM. The fire support must be able to be carried ashored be aircraft. And yes, vertical deployement will break quite a few guns.

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God truly fights on the side with the best artillery
 
Thanks Sir,
I thought it was something along those lines. Question is: are we stockpiling 52 cal barrels? The fact that the gun bounces around a bit is disconcerting. Any problems with accuracy? I have had bad experiences with mortarmen kicking the legs of the bipod on the mortars. Things got far too exciting, shall we say. I was at the spec-ops spotter course at Little Creek last year and we discussed naval gunfire at great length. I am not really happy with the current state of NGF support(of course neither is any body else<g> )The big problem I see is keeping the gear functional. What happens when the gear breaks? I know that the M40A1 is a cast-iron bitch to get fixed because it has to go back to Quantico to get fixed. Six month min turn around time. With all the titanium on the M777, is maintainence going to be a problem? I realize the guns are new and so there won't be problems yet. But has Ft Sill (or somebody)told the operators about anything to watch for? I have had various interesting (as in Chinese curse interesting) problems with various Marine Corps issued things that go bang, and I can imagine that having a 155 barrel assembly recoil back and keep on going would be far more exciting than anything I've done. Big problem at CAX was the unavailabilty of arty support becasue they were displacing. That was with three batteries of M198's and trucks. After you start breaking guns, I imagine that it's going to get worse. This assumes a permissive environment as far as ADA/SAM goes. And the biggest problems I would worry about for you cannon cockers is moving the guns after firing. I doubt the higher is going to allow risking a mega million dollar MV-22 once the counter battery starts falling on your pos, especially when this is only system we have and in such limited numbers. Semper Fi...Ken M
"I can read something, it's in Chinese.....It says "front towards enemy", Uh? I think we have a problem"
 
In an interesting new case of high tech vs low tech, the Army is developing a new high tech infantry "rifle" planned for initial issue to troops in 2005.
The new weapon is called the Objective Individual Combat weapon. (OICW) It combines a .223 (5.56mm) automatic rifle with a semiautomatic 20mm (.84 caliber) semiautomatic rifle. The 20mm high explosive rounds use laser range firing and are set to explode at the range determined by the laser range finder.
Accuracy firing 5.56mm ammunition is to be "equal or better than that of the M16A2 ."
20mm ammunition is tp be accurate at 1,000 meters. The weapon is supposed to weigh 12 ponds or less and incorporate "recoil mitigating features."
One concern I have is the 20mm round. A typical 20mm cannon HE projectile weighs approximately 4 ounces. I wonder just how efective this will be as an air burst(AB) round. The Army has said that a single burst will "produce hundreds of lethal fragments capable of defeating Kevlar type body armor resulting in a large lethal area."
Perhaps the miricales of modern science will save us.

Some additional information supplied by TFL members is:
The weight of the OICW prototypes is currenly @ 19 ponds
2) A "blowup" occured with one of the prototypes during Army testing injuring two technicians.
 
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