Artillery Support

[Pak_43]

I'm thinking of WW2, not modern. On the top of my head is an incident or two where the author of Company Commander, captain MacDonald, has access to an artillery battery himself, from the comfort of his defensive bunker.

If I remember the circumstances correctly in the case of Company Commander, he brought the fire down via telephone onto a pre-registered point. He doesn't get spotting rounds delivered and then adjust them before a final FFE mission. Given that the guns are pre-laid onto a registered position it doesn't require the skill of an FFO to call it in (IMO).... My memory plays tricks on me though, so I'll look it up when I get home...

[John Kettler]

C'Rogers,

Even before we factor in the quality of the FO when it comes to actually bringing fires onto a given target, I should point out that U.S. Army studies and field tests in the 1980s found that the average own location error for FOs was 300 meters. This discovery was one of the things which galvanized the development and fielding of a series of technical fire direction means, some of which went directly to FOs to help them orient themselves and give accurate range and azimuth cuts to the target.

In FIELD ARTILLERY JOURNAL, I read an account by a Redleg who described how his FO instructor in the 1980s was so incompetent that he couldn't generate a bracket within the prescribed five rounds. Believe he needed ten!

This argues strongly that the FO function, in the U.S. Army at least before modern fire control, is heavily dependent on the competence of the individual FO. The best FDC in the world can't put steel on target in a timely manner if the FO doesn't know where he is, can't orient himself, can't figure out where the enemy is relative to himself, and can't issue the proper commands to bring the fire down in the right place.

Conversely, effective shoots have been conducted, in fog, by untrained soldiers using acoustic adjustment techniques. This happened during the Battle of the Bulge while in defensive positions.

The soldier in question knew where he was and knew where the enemy was relative to himself. He then simply walked the spotting rounds toward the enemy concentration he could hear. Once that was done, he called in FFE. Somewhere between the trained FO and our untrained in FA technique Bulge soldier, we find the U.S. Army officers and even noncoms who got at least some training in the basic techniques of calling for fire and fire adjustment.

The wholly different approach used by the British,

Russian, and German (?) militaries, wherein the FO

is directly supplied from a parent artillery unit

or specialized fire direction organization is another matter altogether.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Baron von Beergut]

In 'Nam during quiet spells, bored to death FO's calling from already known locations sometimes had competitions for beers on who could call fire in the least number of spotting rounds. Example, in the area between Da Nang and Hue - one 4.2 inch mortar spotter and a 105mm spotter each picking a hooch to call and see who hit their target first -- the best I heard being 4 rounds, but one claimed 3. In Desert Storm just before I retired it was all different since we had GPS amongst other things to accurately call in 155 SP guns plus an Air Force captain to call in A-10's. This guy would then whip out a golf club and start whacking balls into the desert while waiting for the planes to arrive a few minutes later... (I was with 3rd Brigade/3rd ID which deployed in place of 1st Brigade/1st Armd that remained in Vilseck Germany).

As mentioned for WWII, preregistered is quicker - and in the game that's already taken care of with TRP's. It would be neat but not fun if due to having low quality FO's there be a random chance of landing totally off target in the initial impact turn when not using TRP's though. BvB/Scott

[John Kettler]

BvB,

A most interesting set of anecdotes!

Regards,

John Kettler