Is there a reason why the Syrians suck so badly?

[ChrisND]

Phyrric victories are a possibility for the Red side, NOT a possibility for Blue.

Not if Red surrenders. It becomes an automatic total victory for Blue. And with Blues firepower, getting a surrender is not uncommon. I think I have started about 3 threads on this issue.

[Alan8325]

Are the differences between the shorter-barrel m4 (used by Blue in Al-Huqf) and the ak-74 really that great at MOUT ranges of 50m or so?

I've played Al-Huqf from both sides and noticed that it is WAY easier from the Blue side, but I think the biggest reason for this is the "-1" motivation modifier that all Red units have here. This means that once they start coming under fire they very quickly degrade into "panicked" status and become pretty much useless. Secondly it would be the fact that all Red units have regular experience while Blue has a mix of regular, veteran and crack.

What i've found that all this translates to is that you don't really have firefights in Al-Huqf. What happens when Red sets up an ambush, as the original poster has, is that they open fire on Blue in the open, Blue takes a couple of casualties, the rest go prone or find cover and return fire, Red is very quickly suppressed and remain so for some time, Blue knows Red's positions and can move about freely while Red is still suppressed, even once the fire has stopped. The whole thing lasts about 10 seconds, with only 2 seconds or so of a back-and-forth firefight. This might repeat a few times over the course of the scenario. If Blue then does area fire on the buildings that Red occupies, it is only a matter of seconds before the "-1" motivation Red squads go into a panic and rout.

Playing as Red I've found that even when I'm "winning," as in I've caused some enemy casualties and forced them to take cover while taking no casualties of my own, the small amounts of fire that I have taken have already caused my squads to be rattled.

[dan/california]

Surrender should result in the the surrendering side surrendering losing all objectives, and all points available for force preservation. The side that forced surrender should be given credit for all terrain objectives, except any "preserve" objectives that are now smoking holes in the ground. However, all of those points should be matched against any points the blue side has lost for casualties and or condition of its forces.

Yes Normal Dude, I am repeating what you said earlier, mostly.

[jenrick]

M4/M16A4 vs the AK platform:

The biggest thing the M4/M16A4 has going for it is the electro/optical sights that are now issue items. An Aimpoint, EoTech, or ACOG provides a tremendous boost in terms of acquisition speed, ability to get back onto target after firing, and most importantly the ability to see/use ones sight in a low light condition (such as a building interior). The Soviet block has produced several good electro/optical sights for the AK platform, but they were almost exclusively for Spetsnaz, and lately for the export market. Syrian units equipped with such a sight are roughly on par with the M4/M16A4 platform.

Next up is ergonomics. The M4/M16A4 platform both allow the use to toggle the safety off and on without difficulty or breaking the shooting grip. Magazine changes can be accomplish swiftly with minimal practice, and extremely fast if you practice. The rifle is easy to shoot and recoil cause very little muzzle rise when fired semi-auto. The AK safety requires breaking the firing grip to toggle, or a lot of practice. Magazine changes are not that much slower if you really practice them, but a basic level of proficiency is going to be about 30-50% slower then an AR magazine change. Recoil and muzzle rise is going to be fairly similar to the AR platform.

Overall at MOUT ranges the rifles don't matter too much. The level of the training of the operator matters far more, and US combat personal receive FAR more MOUT and CQB training then most other basic combat troops. Shoot most US combat troops receive more then most non-superpower special forces units receive.

-Jenrick

[TempV]

Steve

Here's an interesting side-by-side comparison of the original M16 with an AK-47.

I've read so many articles concerning this issue and that one doesn't bring any news. Yes, there were many compare tests conducted and they revealed M16A2 shown more accuracy than AK-74 but what are figures? I'm basing on one of the tests conducted in Russia. At 100 m range average spread of AK-74 is 100 mm while M16A2 has 80 mm, which is better figure of course but not a far way better. As far as CM factors are concerned such pros of M16 family like numerous modifications and easy mounts aren't meaningful. And the most important CM factor that US Army troops are armed with M4 which isn't more accurate than AK at all. Of course every soldier has ACOG, better training etc. and this improve accuracy but is not inherent advantage of the weapon itself.

Next. The specs of M16A2 tell us that it has an effective range of 800 m. I really, really doubt it. In fact it's effective range of SVD sniper rifle, which is arguably more accurate weapon than M16. I'd say the effective range for M16A2 is 500-550 m but no more.

[Bigduke6]

AT-3 Sagger - Well, the weapon is certainly not the latest thing in ATGM, it is for intents and purposes a shaped charge on a rocket flown by operator eye into the target. That is, the gunner has to watch the rocket and the target at the same time, and fly the rocket into the target. The weapon typically was issued to an ATGM company, and part of the standard issue was/is a computer simulator, which as I understand it is a screen, a joystick, and a couple of blobs, one of which is sort of round, and one of which is sort of a tank sillouette. One moves left right (that's the target) and the other moves left right up down (that's the missile). The goal is to get the rocket on line with the target and keep it there. You use the same joystick as you use for the real rocket. The tricky part, I have read, is that you need a really light touch on the joystick. I read somewhere else the drill is you launch, go hard right with the joystick, then not quite so hard left, then about half up, then about 1/4 down, and then the missile should be flying along your LOS. The Soviets being Soviets trained using it just like an AT gun: there is a fire sack, the AT weapon points into a sector of the fire sack, when a target drives into the AT weapon's sector of fire then some officer orders a launch. Effect is gained by salvo launches.

The simulator technology is as I understand about on the level of the computer game Pong from the early 1970s. However, provided the thing is functional it trains the basic task of acquiring control of the missile and flying it into a tank-sized object.

That sounds pretty complicated. However, Egyptian recruits, usually kids with a high school education education but no experience whatsoever with electronic equipment past relatives with a television or a transistor radio, used Saggers to wipe out Israeli tank companies, and a couple of time cut up Israeli tank battalions in 1973. The tactic to get around the 500 meters minimum range (gotta acquire control of the missile after all) was of course to have RPG - 7 in the neighborhood, and its official max range is - dang those Soviets - is (an optimistic) 500 meters.

[RANT] IF THERE IS ANYTHING MORE IRRITATING THAN A SCENARIO WHERE THE DESIGNER HAS ISSUED THE SYRIANS SAGGER, AND THEN PLACED THE SYRIAN SETUP AREA 500 METERS OR LESS FROM THE AMERICANS, THEN I CAN'T THINK OF IT RIGHT NOW. FOR HEAVEN'S SAKE, SAGGER REACHES OUT TO 3 KILOMETERS. YOU PUT SAGGER IN A SCENARIO, MAKE A BIGGER MAP![/RANT]

The Egyptian AT network came as a huge suprise to the Israelis, who prior to the war had assumed Egyptians would run from Israeli tanks in all circumstances, that Egyptians were too uneducated and primitive to operate Saggers, to deploy Saggers, to set up fields of fire with Saggers, and to hold their fire with Saggers, and keep discipline enough to fire Sagger salvoes. The Egyptians, to repeat, were not veterans or special forces, they were a higher grade of recruit trained intensively for about a year in a couple of specific tasks, basically taking a Sagger suitcase somewhere, setting it up on the lip of hole dug in the desert, and shooting the missile at an approaching tank.

The Israelis figured out a counter which was supress the Sagger teams with MG fire, and very quickly after that the Israelis decided that armored infantry was nice to have with the tanks after all, as those ifantrymen have eyes and small arm perfect for supressing missile operators. The Egyptians, having trained for just crossing the canal and then digging in, weren't prepared for the obvious counter, which is a higher density of AT weapons to smash the infantry vehicles, so the tanks are stripped of covering forces.

Anyway, it is quite true the way Sagger works makes the operator very vulnerable to supression while the missile is in flight, and CMSF does a pretty good job of replicating this. Of course, the Sagger suitcase comes with a 30 meter wire, and the thing was designed to have the launcher in one place and the operator in a different one, this as the smoke from the launch obviously would draw fire.

CMSF does not (to my mind very unfortunately does not) replicate this neat little facet of the Sagger. In CMSF, Sagger operators do not get to launch from any place except in the middle of the missile's launch signature.

How sucky would Sagger be in a modern war? Is Steve's claim the Blue is badass in CMSF, and the Red mostly suckola in most straight-up CMSF fights, because Blue weapons are modern and Syrian weapons are dated, a valid claim?

I personally am not sure the equipment quality difference is so stark. If you're talking a Sagger, I would expect three of them set up intelligently could whack a Stryker/Bradley/USMC thingie pretty much with impunity provided the operators knew what they were doing. The generic proof of my claim is, the US Army NTC trains desert warfare using pseudo Red forces and Red tactics, equipped with among other things pseudo-Saggers, and visiting units get their butts kicked routinely. The OPFOR at the NTC has several fantastic advantages, first of all their practice level is off the charts, they know the terrain, and they have already seen just about every permutation of possible enemy tactics in just about every situation. With the troop quality the same - after all the OPFOR works for the US Army just like units rotating in for training - it's no suprise the OPFOR wins alot, even though they supposedly are operating crappy Soviet-era equipment.

Or take the recent war in Georgia. The Georgians took into that fight units trained sort of to US standards, many of them carrying M-16, backed by NATO standard rocket-launchers and artillery, and fronted by T-72s, about half of which had been upgraded to T-84 standard. The Russians had AK-74, T-72 of which maybe 1 in 10 were T-80 standard or higher, more than a few T-62 still in the units, and training sort of mixed, about half Soviet traditional and half post-Soviet.

So how did the Russians win, if their equipment was worse? Well, I would say the main reason was, the Russian army has been fighting in Chechnya for about the last 7 years, and the Russian command sustaining that war; while the Georgian army hadn't fought any one since the early 1990s, and since then it had been spending money on equipment not training.

I would say that the main Syrian weakness in a war with the US would be that precise human factor. The Americans have been fighting for about a decade, sometimes fairly intensely, and the Syrians have been doing nothing but buying equipment and sustaining a military bureaucracy without really trying hard to make it capable of fighting.

The final acid test is this question: If the Americans had Syrian equipment, and the Syrians American equipment, and the Americans invaded Syrian, who would win? I think it's obvious the Americans would win - their combat skills right now are the best in the world, their entire NCO and most of their junior officers are war veterans, and they have not been suffering enough casualties to wipe out lessons learned. A US tank platoon in T-72 might require a bit more time to use terrain and fire and movement to destroy a Syrian tank platoon in M1A2, but let's not forget, the Syrians don't have an NTC, their last combined arms war was (generously) 20 years ago, and the average modern Syrian tank driver risks throwing a track the moment he goes off road. Putting people like that against the modern American army is no fair fight, and CMSF I think replicates that quite well.

But in my opinion, it's the people and their experience, and not the weapons, that account for US combat superiority these days.

Lest this sound too rah rah, I'd like to point out the British Army of the 19th century, which also developed into a very efficient small war fighting force, and they were great in a big war too until all the experienced soldiers got killed, which in a big war can happen very fast - and if you have a military that's used to experienced soldiers and suddenly doesn't have them, you can have all sorts of problems like the killing off of entire generations of draftees. Or take the case of the Wehrmacht, a high quality fighting force if ever there was one, but of course quality only goes so far against quantity, which is why in the former Prussian city Danzig they speak Russian these days.

[Zwolo2003]

A. Or take the case of the Wehrmacht, a high quality fighting force if ever there was one, but of course quality only goes so far against quantity, which is why in the former Prussian city Danzig they speak Russian these days.

Polish. They speak Polish in the former Prussian city Danzig these days. They do speak Russian in the former Prussian city of Koenigsberg, however.

Cheers,

Zwolo

[Scipio]

... The specs of M16A2 tell us that it has an effective range of 800 m. I really, really doubt it. In fact it's effective range of SVD sniper rifle, which is arguably more accurate weapon than M16. I'd say the effective range for M16A2 is 500-550 m but no more.

This 'effective range' numbers are pure theory. I can only speak of my military service, of course, but I doubt that you can even hit on 500m distance without a sniper scope. Surely not on the move, under combat stress, enemy fire etc etc. Below 100m or so, the things that really counts is rate of fire and reliablility of the gun. The Ak-47 has a A++ in reliabilty, the M-16 is overcomplicated and susceptible (at least I've read that more than once).

[JonS]

The Israelis figured out a counter which was suppress the Sagger teams with MG fire, and very quickly after that the Israelis decided that armored infantry was nice to have with the tanks after all, as those infantrymen have eyes and small arm perfect for suppressing missile operators.

They also had to (re)learn the lesson that artillery is an important part of the combined arms team, and highly effective at suppressing - in this case - ATGM teams*.

Kind of an obvious lesson, you'd think, but one it seems that armies have to re-learn on a regular basis.

Jon

* In earlier wars artillery was used for suppressing MGs, and artillery, and mortars, and A-Tk guns, etc. The more things change ...

[Piispa]

Next up is ergonomics. The M4/M16A4 platform both allow the use to toggle the safety off and on without difficulty or breaking the shooting grip. Magazine changes can be accomplish swiftly with minimal practice, and extremely fast if you practice. The rifle is easy to shoot and recoil cause very little muzzle rise when fired semi-auto. The AK safety requires breaking the firing grip to toggle, or a lot of practice. Magazine changes are not that much slower if you really practice them, but a basic level of proficiency is going to be about 30-50% slower then an AR magazine change. Recoil and muzzle rise is going to be fairly similar to the AR platform.

Overall at MOUT ranges the rifles don't matter too much. The level of the training of the operator matters far more, and US combat personal receive FAR more MOUT and CQB training then most other basic combat troops. Shoot most US combat troops receive more then most non-superpower special forces units receive.

-Jenrick

Having served with RK-95 and RK-62 (AK-47 variants, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RK_62) as personal firearms, I must disagree with the points above. Using the safety switch without any difficulty nor breaking your grip takes no effort. Really, no effort.

And switching a magazine? Please... There's one lever you push to remove the empty and, after the removal, a slot where you place the new one. You can train a recruit to switch magazines in 2 seconds during a single afternoon.

Accuracy and reliability is where the differences between the RKs and AKs is supposed to show the most, but after they both are of the same family, I can't see how there could be any dramatic differences.

The last point I agree with, it's always more of the training than the weapon when talking of accuracy. Give me any modern assault rifle and I'll score a bullseye in 150 metres after a few sight-correction series.

So which weapon would I want as my personal firearm in a conflict? The most reliable one. The one you can have a tree growing inside it and it will fire. And AK-variants have a total of five parts after disassembly

For comparsion:

M16: http://www.nicolausassociates.com/images/GTA07-01-045-M16A4-Rifle-Disassembly.jpg

RK62: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/2/2b/Rk62_disassembled_transparent.png/800px-Rk62_disassembled_transparent.png

EDIT: For the effective range discussion above, any discussion for any effective range for an assault rifle over 300 metres is completely bull and useless. You can hardly spot any target over a few hundred metres, let alone hit it.

Effective combat range is some 100-150 metres, I wouldn't even allow my platoon ever to open fire over 300 metres and give away our position.

[jenrick]

Piispa: You've either got WAY bigger hands then most, or you're doing something different then a lot of us to hit the safety on an AK without taking your firing hand off the grip. If you're using your off-hand to hit it, then I understand. Can be quiet effective and fast (seen a lot of folks in 3 gun who run AK's use that style). My main issue with AK mag changes, is that you have to hit the lever and extract the mag out, then rock the new on in. For a "basic" level of skill on the reload, that requires your support hand to: release and strip the mag, grab the new one, and lock it in. Where as an AR requires your support hand to: grab the new mag, and insert and lock it in. As I said with a lot of practice there is probably only a few tenths of second between the reloads, but at the "basic" level there's a little more manipulation for the AK platform. I've been smoked before by a guy using an AK in 1-reload-1 drills, he'd just practiced a whole lot.

I agree the AK is a simpler weapon, and the new push to piston driven AR's is people gravitating towards that. However Stoner designed the AR-180 as using the best of both the M-16 and the Ak-47, to bad it didn't get picked up. Sucker is basically the AR equivalent of an AR, and was dang accurate too (well the 180B model I had was at least).

However take a look at something like the M-1 Garand, not exactly an unreliable weapon. It has roughly the same number of major sub assemblies as the AR when broken down, and for a detail cleaning has more. Overall I think the modern AR is as reliable as the solider it's issued to is willing to keep it.

I also agree that in combat ranges over 150-200 yds shooting iron sights are a very rare occurrence. However the AR platform can reach out to 600yds quiet well using irons if you take your time and know how to shoot, USMC qualifications requires 500yds, and High Power shooting goes out to 600yds. ACOG's, EoTech and Aimpoint magnifiers, and the like extend the ability to engage out to 3-400 yards with out it being a waste of ammo if you've got good shooters on the line. The biggest thing the M16A4 has over the M4 is the ABILITY to put rounds down accurately at 300+ yds. If the enemy already knows your there and is hitting you with MG fire, the more lead you can send his way the better. Sure the 240G and 249 are going to put rounds down, but why not have the rest of the squad and platoon get some trigger time too? I'd much rather have the ability for in my opinion a negligible increase in bulk and length then not have it.

-Jenrick

[TempV]

Scipio and Piispa

Very good points here. A common soldier doesn't care about theoretical ranges of effective fire, the first thing he cares about his weapon is its reliability. His own life depends on the fact the weapon should fire in due time. And M16 family was never peice of art in armscraft. Of course, in CMSF there is no such things as reliability and breakdowns of the weapon, so M16 and M4 can enjoy its theoretical advantages (with the help of ACOG's of course). And I totally agree with the point that most firefights occur in 100-200 m and average spread acheived at fire range in prone position has little importance here.

jenrick

I don't know how many AK pistol grips you broke but I also had no problems with its safety. In fact I learned to use it with just few clicks.

[Bigduke6]

Of course, thanks, I should have written Kaliningrad not Gdansk. Mea culpa.

Polish. They speak Polish in the former Prussian city Danzig these days. They do speak Russian in the former Prussian city of Koenigsberg, however.

Cheers,

Zwolo

[Floydii]

Why Arabs lose wars:

http://www.meforum.org/article/441

It is an opinion that all may not agree with, and may not be true 100% of the time. But it certainly explains some things about the fantastic ineffectiveness of their armies in conventional wars.

[Secondbrooks]

Piispa: You've either got WAY bigger hands then most, or you're doing something different then a lot of us to hit the safety on an AK without taking your firing hand off the grip. If you're using your off-hand to hit it, then I understand. Can be quiet effective and fast (seen a lot of folks in 3 gun who run AK's use that style). My main issue with AK mag changes, is that you have to hit the lever and extract the mag out, then rock the new on in. For a "basic" level of skill on the reload, that requires your support hand to: release and strip the mag, grab the new one, and lock it in. Where as an AR requires your support hand to: grab the new mag, and insert and lock it in. As I said with a lot of practice there is probably only a few tenths of second between the reloads, but at the "basic" level there's a little more manipulation for the AK platform. I've been smoked before by a guy using an AK in 1-reload-1 drills, he'd just practiced a whole lot.

Iäm not same person, but what a heck i reply anyways:

Well joint of thumb remains in grip, while rest of fingers are streched to safety switch (kind of)... Then again skillful rifle handler (gone tru basic training) can throw saftey down while rising the rifle. Then again thumb switches i've used are slightly more faster and nicer to use, there are situations where it's nice to be able to switch safety off with small move of thumb. However i've learnd to use AK-type weapon so i'm sure that i dont' handle use of thumb safety switch as someone who has learned use of it therally. I'd say that your average AK user is more recultant to keep weapon on safety while moving in danger situations (as guide books tells you to do) than AR-users.

I believe with RK-95 you dont' have to do even that as safety switch has been modified little bit, to that one needs to rise just forefinger while rest remains in grip... But i'm not sure.

About reload: I think it's easy to just take full mag, and then unlock empty mag with same hand holding full mag and let the empty one fall, then insert full mag in weapon. I don't know how fast you can do that compared to AR-family. I believe it's bit slower, and optics on top of rifle can cause more problems.

Also i have to agree that it seems that most "applicative reservist shootings"-events in Finland are ruled by AR-family kind weapons, 5.56x45 more general. Top shooter seems to favor AR in contenst situations, sure AK types has some success but AR seesm to be main weapon in top of rankings. To be honest, and what many contenstents agrees is that: Situations usually are out of reality, focusing on taking down alot of targets as fast as possible, and where seconds and less are what counts (and weapon hasnt' spent weeks or months in field conditions).

I'm not taking sides... Overall i don't even care. Just wished to share my bit of "understandment".

[Piispa]

Piispa: You've either got WAY bigger hands then most, or you're doing something different then a lot of us to hit the safety on an AK without taking your firing hand off the grip. If you're using your off-hand to hit it, then I understand. Can be quiet effective and fast (seen a lot of folks in 3 gun who run AK's use that style). My main issue with AK mag changes, is that you have to hit the lever and extract the mag out, then rock the new on in. For a "basic" level of skill on the reload, that requires your support hand to: release and strip the mag, grab the new one, and lock it in. Where as an AR requires your support hand to: grab the new mag, and insert and lock it in. As I said with a lot of practice there is probably only a few tenths of second between the reloads, but at the "basic" level there's a little more manipulation for the AK platform. I've been smoked before by a guy using an AK in 1-reload-1 drills, he'd just practiced a whole lot.

As Secondbrooks explained, you can slide the selector with the tips of your fingers while keeping the hand on the pistol grip. No effort, nor requirement of bigger hands. I assure you, my hands are quite the ordinary size The selector isn't that stiff and hardly requires any force to move from one position to another.

And of the mag change, I hardly see if there's any effect on the overall performance of the soldier if it takes 1.8 or 2.2 seconds for an untrained recruit to change his magazine, as I think we can assume every soldier in the world recieves at least some training on switching the magazine on his personal weapon.

I agree the AK is a simpler weapon, and the new push to piston driven AR's is people gravitating towards that. However Stoner designed the AR-180 as using the best of both the M-16 and the Ak-47, to bad it didn't get picked up. Sucker is basically the AR equivalent of an AR, and was dang accurate too (well the 180B model I had was at least).

However take a look at something like the M-1 Garand, not exactly an unreliable weapon. It has roughly the same number of major sub assemblies as the AR when broken down, and for a detail cleaning has more. Overall I think the modern AR is as reliable as the solider it's issued to is willing to keep it.

Sure, but the more moving parts you put in to an equation, the more chance of an error there is. Basic logic and AK-family has less.

I also agree that in combat ranges over 150-200 yds shooting iron sights are a very rare occurrence. However the AR platform can reach out to 600yds quiet well using irons if you take your time and know how to shoot, USMC qualifications requires 500yds, and High Power shooting goes out to 600yds. ACOG's, EoTech and Aimpoint magnifiers, and the like extend the ability to engage out to 3-400 yards with out it being a waste of ammo if you've got good shooters on the line. The biggest thing the M16A4 has over the M4 is the ABILITY to put rounds down accurately at 300+ yds. If the enemy already knows your there and is hitting you with MG fire, the more lead you can send his way the better. Sure the 240G and 249 are going to put rounds down, but why not have the rest of the squad and platoon get some trigger time too? I'd much rather have the ability for in my opinion a negligible increase in bulk and length then not have it.

-Jenrick

Of course, I didn't mean I wouldn't fire if the position was already compromised. The weapon is well effective on the longer distances but I doubt, with iron sights, the ability of an ordinary rifleman to put the bullet on the target accurately over a few hundred metres. Thus, opening fire with distances more than some 100-150 metres, I'd call tactically stupid. Depends on the terrain of course... It's different on the desert than in thick woodlands.

And if continuing the accuracy discussion, the RK-family uses the same basic type of a rear sight as the AR:

AR15: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c2/AR15_Sight_Picture.jpg

RK62: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/RK_62_MILES_2002.JPG

which differs from the standard open sights -style, which AK-47 uses, although the RK-62 rear sights can be overturned to reveal similar type of sights as the standard AK-family.

Now, the AR-style is definately more accurate on basic fireing range practise shootings, no queston about it. But I feel, and I've heard others state the same, that on a quick combat situation, like CQ and urban warfare, the open style is actually preferable. Main reason being that, although AR-style is more accurate, the AK-style is quicker: quicker to bring about on the target and quicker to reacquire the target after the shot, for it gives more view on the surroundings. And in the close distances of urban warfare you don't need the extra accuracy of the AR-style sights, but you sure do need the extra speed that the open rear sights gives, which makes them more preferable.

And we're talking of the iron sights now, I do know reflex sights address the issue.

[Secondbrooks]

Again not taking sides but 'ghost ring' you find from forexample from M16 is said to be brilliant idea. RK has just small hole, not very suitable for close ranges (few tens of meters). Thank god it has those open sights for low light conditions when rear sight has been flipped over it's axis.

[orwell]

On the subject of AK's, why is the clip curved?

[jenrick]

I'll respond in detail more later, but a fast answer to orwell first.

The magazine on most modern rifles is curved due to the rounds being narrower at the front then the back. It allows a simpler magazine spring and follower design then trying to make it all line up square. Older rifles like the SMLE that use a rimmed cartridge will have an even more pronounced curve or slant to the base of the magazine.

-Jenrick

[Battlefront.com]

Heh... we're getting a wee bit off topic here. I recommend starting up a new thread specifically about small arms comparisons. The only reason for bringing it up here was as a part of the discussion about US weapons giving them a technological edge. The M16A4, with all its goodies, certainly does that. At very close range, perhaps not, but one of the things people have been talking about here are the medium to long infantry engagements. The M16 definitely outclasses the AK for that, which is exactly why the Marines retained the M16 instead of going with the M4 like the Army.

Back to the Sagger... I agree with BigDuke6 that inherently it's not a bad weapon when it is used correctly by competent gunners in fairly optimal situations with enough numbers to compensate for the lack of accuracy of any one particular missile. I think this is borne out in the game since I've lost vehicles to AT-3s before. Blue has to watch out for the better quality AT-3 teams in particular since they have modern tandem warhead missiles.

Overall it is clear that the big advantage that the US military has over a country like Syria is its investment in its Human capital. In every category one can think of, except perhaps for blind sacrifice, the overall quality of the US Soldiers and Marines in the field are far superior to anything its potential adversaries can field. That includes even the big countries like Russia and China. The reason isn't that the stock of Humans within the borders of the US are somehow superior, it is that the US government takes only volunteers and then lavishes them with training, flexible doctrine, professional NCOs, and generally competent officers who achieved their commissions through merit instead of nepotism (of course the higher in rank goes the more non-optimal factors count).

When I think of the matchup between the current US military and the military of a country like Syria, I find myself thinking back to the comments of the Israelis who fought against Syrians several times. At the individual soldier level the Israeli soldiers had quite a lot of respect for the fighting tenacity of the Syrian soldier. The problem was, as the Israelis and military historians point out, is that they were generally horribly led and were therefore more than likely to find themselves in situations where bravery and tenacity ultimately did not matter. A soldier that dies bravely without having accomplished anything for his country is no more valuable than a cowardly soldier that doesn't accomplish anything for his country. In both cases the soldier is dead or incapacitated, and the enemy controls the battlefield and eventually the peace.

Compare this with the Soviets in WW2. Many of the same problems, but they had very good senior leadership and industrial capabilities. It took a while, and it almost didn't work, but the Soviet leadership figured out how to beat the Germans in way which was practical. When the Syrians have gone to war with Israel it went in without such practical leadership and, therefore, played its weaknesses against the Israeli's strengths with not surprising results.

There is a very good book out there called "Arabs at War" by Kenneth Pollack. It's a thick book and not too difficult to read. If you want to know why the Arabs still have a long way to go before they can beat the Israelis or the West in a conventional war, I recommend picking up the book. If you want to read a good book about how the Israelis and West can lose an unconventional war, I recommend "Tactics of the Crescent Moon" by John Poole. The cool thing about CM:SF is that it allows you to learn from each and then apply it in the game against the Blue forces.

Steve

[ChrisND]

Not if Red surrenders. It becomes an automatic total victory for Blue. And with Blues firepower, getting a surrender is not uncommon. I think I have started about 3 threads on this issue.

*COUGH*COUGH*COUGH*

[Thomm]

Shameless plug: If you think that the Syrians "suck", head over to www.cmmods.com and grab my new Marines MOUT scenario "The Old City"!

Best regards,

Thomm

[Battlefront.com]

Normal Dude,

OK, I'll dig through the Forum and find one of those threads you started

Steve

[ChrisND]

Normal Dude,

OK, I'll dig through the Forum and find one of those threads you started

Steve

http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?t=84289

[Battlefront.com]

You were too slow, I had already found it Man, I love the reliability of the search function of vBulletin compared to UBB. It makes Searching not only more fruitful but far more enjoyable!

Steve