John D Salt

"Traditional" and "conservative" are certainly true, but neither of them necessarily imply "by-the-book". Several authors mention the fine old British Army tradition of arguing with orders, and it was the Duke of Wellington himself who bemoaned the fact that his officers only ever read orders as one would read a novel, for amusement, and not as a guide to their own conduct. Certainly regiments each have their own tradition. Take my own old regiment, the Queen's, now amalgamated into the Princess of Wales' Royal Regiment; the fact that the date when I marched (after 19 years out of practice) behind the standard of the Regimental Association was the Glorious 1st of June this year is not entirely unconnected with the regimnetal tradition that the loyal toast is drunk sitting down. As to having our own doctrine -- well, it was a habit in HQ company always to go right flanking in section attacks, so as not to waste time on that tedious terrain appreciation stuff; in the terrain we trained in, there was always enough cover for a competent section to pepper-pot round either way. But the rifle companies probably did things their own way... All the best, John.

One of the most common "old fashioned random variates" would yield a uniform distribution. </font>

Eh? What's fuzzy logic got to do with it? An old-fashioned random variate drawn from the appropriate probability distribution would do just fine. All the best, John.

I was under the impression that most explanations of the Fall of France featured more than a passing mention of the Luftwaffe. While the reasons for the outcome of anything as complicated as a military campaign can never be summed up in a single phrase, I think that in this case the phrase "air superiority" counts for a great deal. Zaloga's "Blitzkrieg: Armour Camouflage and Markings 1939-1940", while essentially a picture-book, gives some strength charts for the tanks formations of the relevant nations. Strengths of the Panzer divisions are given as follows, the numbers being first for light and command tanks (Panzers I and II and Panzerbefehlswagen types), and second for gun-armed tanks (35(t), 38(t), Panzer III and IVB): 1 Pz Div: 161 + 98 2 Pz Div: 195 + 90 3 Pz Div: 273 + 68 4 Pz Div: 259 + 64 5 Pz Div: 243 + 84 6 Pz Div: 59 + 159 7 Pz Div: 109 + 110 8 Pz Div: 58 + 154 9 Pz Div: 97 + 56 10 Pz Div: 185 + 90 Strengths of the major French armoured units are given as follows: Infantry: 3 Divisions Cuirasses, each with 90 H-35s and 70 Chars B-1. 1 Division Cuirasse with 135 H-35s, 45 D-2s and 50 Chars B-1. 24 Battaillons Organiques each with 45 R-35s, H-35s or H-39s. 7 Bataillons Organiques and 1 Bataillon Coloniale each with 63 FT-17s. One Bataillon Organique with 6 Char-2Cs (gigantic, impressive, and in the end, worthless). 4 Compagnies Autonomes each with 15 H-39s or D2s, 3 each with 10 FT-17s, 5 each with 11 Chars B-1. Cavalry: 2 Divisions Legeres Mecaniques each with 80 H-35s and 80 S-35s, 40 P-178s and 40 AMRs. 1 Division Legere Mecanique with 60 H-35s, 80 H-39s, 80 S-35s and 40 P-178s. 4 Divisions Legeres de Cavalerie each with 12 H-35s or H-39s, 12 P-178s and 20 AMRs. 1 Division Legere de Cavalerie with 12 H-35s, 12 P-178s and 3 S-35s. 5 Groupes de Reconaissance de Division d'Infanterie each with 12 P-178s and 20 AMRs, and 2 with 12 P-178s and 20 H-35s. Strengths of the BEF armoured formations are given as: 7 cavalry regiments, each with 28 light tanks and 44 carriers. 2 infantry tank battalions, one with 5 light tanks and 50 Matilda Is, the other with 7 light tanks, 27 Matilda Is and 23 Matilda IIs. One armoured division, with 134 light tanks and 150 cruisers. Armoured cars are also present, of which 42 are Daimlers. To make some kind of comparison with the German numbers we might count all tanks armed with anything better than the ludicrous 37mm SA18 popgun as a "gun tank". We'll count Chars B and Matilda IIs as super-tanks, too. I'm no expert on French tanks, and their armament confuses me, but if we count all the H-39s as having long guns, we get the following strengths in light tanks, gun tanks and super tanks: 1 Division Cuirasse 0 + 90 + 70 2 Division Cuirasse 0 + 90 + 70 3 Division Cuirasse 0 + 90 + 70 4 Division Cuirasse 135 + 45 + 50 1 Division Legere Mecanique 80 + 80 + 0 2 Division Legere Mecanique 80 + 80 + 0 3 Division Legere Mecanique 60 + 160 + 0 Total for independent infantry bns and coys (Bataillons organiques and compagines autonomes): 1614 + 60 + 55 (+ 6 super-duper-monster tanks) Total for Divisions de Cavalerie and GRDIs: 308 + 335 + 0 Total for BEF, ignoring carriers: 419 + 162 + 23 The Matilda II was a very fine tank, but with only 23 of them in the BEF, I hardly think they were likely to prove a decisive factor. The Char Bs and S-35s would be much more of a problem for the Panzers. The total strengths I get for light, gun and super tanks, using the categories listed above, are as follows: Germans 1639 + 973 + 0 (all in Panzer divisions) French 2277 + 940 + 326 (of which 1922 + 395 + 61 in independent units) British 419 + 162 + 23 (of which 285 + 12 + 23 in independent units) In overall tank numbers, that gives an Allied superiority of a little over one-and-a-half to one, which is reversed if one counts only tanks in armoured divisions. In numbers of gun or "super" tanks, the Allies also have a superiority of about one-and-a-half to one overall, which reduces to near parity of numbers if one considers only tanks in armoured divisions. This shows that there certainly was a "frittering" or "penny-packeting" effect in the pattern of Allied, particularly French, deployment. However, the effect is more pronounced for the relatively useless light tanks than for proper gun tanks; even if one counts only tanks in armoured divisions, the Allies have a comparable number of serious AFVs which look better, at least in crude measures on paper, than their German opposite numbers. All of which, I suppose, should serve as some kind of dreadful warning against attmepts to estimate combat effectiveness by counting beans. Concentration occurs in time as well as in space; one of the main reasons for the collapse of the French defence was probably (it would be currently fashionable to say) poor situational assessment (it is noticeable that the assignment of recce assets in French armoured organisations is much less satisfactory than in German or British) and the better-trained, better-controlled Germans getting inside their Boyd loop. I rather suspect that loggy or arty enthusiasts could make a case for the contribution of those elements to the German victory as well, though. All the best, John.

I would say off the top of my head that it was resonable to operate the 3-in mortar platoon decentralised into sections (2 tubes and one mobile fire controller). Unfortunately, though, I can at the moment find absolutely no documentary evidence for such a practice. All I can say is it's the way it was done when I was in the TA, from 1978; battlegroup (battalion) commanders had the option of running their mortars "centralized" or "Decentralized" -- one was advised for attack, the other for defence, and I can never remember which way round it was. A 2-tube section is enough to do useful damage, according to one of the PRO reports I seem to recall reading (anyone want to know the ranging procedure for 3-inch mortars? ) This makes sense, as it is the number of bombs falling, not the number of tubes firing, that does the damage, and mortars have a very high rapid rate of fire. Certainly the Germans used to decentralize mortars in this way in defence, and the Americans did in offence; I doubt the Brits were much different in practice. Support weapons in British organisations tend to "float" up or down an organisational level quite often; 2-in mortars from the platoons might be centralised with some Brens to form a "pepper-pot" under the CSM, and I believe that PIATS are formally issued to the company, not to the platoons. As with so many things in the British Army (which only really discovered the word "doctrine" in about 1984), a lot probably depended on the personal preference of the CO. All the best, John.

PRO doc WO 291/308, "Effect of flamethrowers on military personnel", says that the main effect is on morale. It estimates that a gallon of burning fuel in contact with the victim will kill. Information from flame actions showed an average of 270 gallons per death, 9 gallons per prisoner. The document points out that two kinds of fuel can be used in a flamethrower. Thickened fuel gives a clean flame rod, with little or no obscuration, and the fuel continues to burn on the ground. Unthickened fuel produces a sheet of billowing flame, good "flash burn", much obscuration, and little burning on the ground. This obscuration effect could be used to blind pillbox slits at 20 yards or over with a manpack flamethrower, then approach to 10 yards, close enough to shoot through the aperture. WO 231/32, "Notes on Wasp and Lifebuoy", has the following to say: "An attack by flame depends largely on its terrifying effect for its success. Troops familiar with Flame Throwers will offer greater resistance than those inexperienced." "It is difficult to get large quantities of burning fuel in through the slits in a pill box. Anti-ricochet slits and flaps afford additional protection." "The occupants of a pill box are fairly safe if they retreat behind the partition wall." The report advises that woollen blankets and greatcoats, especially if wet, give good protection against radiant heat, but should be easy to remove in case they do catch fire. WO 208/2112, "Translation of German flamethrower manual", says: "In order to give the men a greater sense of security attention should be drawn to the fact that should the weapon be struck by an infantry bullet or shell splinter it will not explode." WO 232/70, "Flame throwers – Exchange of information with Red Army", says that the Red Army used manpack flamethrowers on the following scale: For first-line rifle companies :- In attack 8–10 flame throwers: in defence 10–15 flame throwers. The report also says: "In battle, flame thrower platoons are generally split up; sections being attached to rifle companies, while within companies they are distributed in groups of 2–4 flame throwers amongst the rifle platoons." "The number of flame throwers allotted to an assault group formed to attack a pillbox depends on the number of embrasures. On an average 3–4 flame throwers are allotted per pillbox." At a meeting on 19 Feb 43 Soviet officers stated that no special fuels were used in Soviet flame throwers, but were under development. Diesel oil is the usual fuel. It was given as the opinion of the Soviet general staff that thickened fuels would have more incendiary effect, but that the effect on morale is known to be reduced. WO 291/986, "The operational effectiveness of the flamethrower tank (Crocodile)" produces statistics from a survey of 175 Crocodile and infantry actions in NW Europe. The actions listed show from 2 to 15 Crocodiles supporting typically 1 or 2 infantry companies, but sometimes other numbers. It is stressed that Crocodiles should be used en masse, with half a squadron as the minimum force. The report concludes that, as indicated by casualties sustained by the attacking infantry, the Crocodile was better than a standard tank in the support role by a factor of about 2 in day actions and about 2.5 in night actions. Of the 175 actions, in only 11 cases did the infantry fail to reach their objective. In about 50% of actions little or no opposition was encountered after flame was used. "This indicates the great morale effect of flame". In one instance, a German NCO ordered his men to surrender if they were attacked by flamethrowers. For each trailer of fuel expended, about 6 enemy were killed and about 28 captured. The report also says: a) "Flame was most effective against houses and fortified buildings. There were invariably set on fire and gutted. Open defences among woods, hedges and undergrowth provided good targets as the vegetation was easily set on fire. c) As would be expected, flame was least effective against pillboxes and the like; only if it could be projected through apertures to the inside did the occupants suffer." "As a rule it was not usual for Crocodiles to open fire until they were within effective flaming range, every effort being made to obtain the maximum shock and surprise. Against this, after a heavy air or artillery bombardment or where little determined resistance was expected flame would be fired from much greater ranges (up to 180 yards) and would be kept up as the Crocodiles moved in. This manoeuvre was frequently successful in inducing the enemy to surrender." WO 291/1060, "The A45 flame gun versus the Panzerfaust", says that "a frontal shot of ignited fuel does negligible harm to men in a slit-trench providing they keep their heads down." The trench should either be enfiladed, or an unignited shot fired first. Because of the different ballistics of ignited and unignited fuel, it is likely that two unignited shots may be needed. It is also stated that, if wind conditions are such as to affect shooting, the first shot will usually be wasted, used for indicating wind direction. That little lot should serve to correct a few misconceptions about flamethrowers. In summary: They rely mainly on terror effect rather than physical destruction; Their tactical characteristics differ depending on whether they use thickened or unthickened fuels; They are not especially effective against pillboxes; They should be used en masse; They do not explode when hit. All the best, John.

This is welcome news. You are to be congratulated on the exemplary stringency of your security precautions. They appear to be very much more stringent than those in force with organisations such as QinetiQ, DSTL or RMCS. Not even so much as a squadron number? That can't compromise anyone's security, can it? That information doesn't carry a protective marking, does it? JDW had no protective marking last time I saw it, it was just bl**dy expensive. I don't know what the status of the Swedish conference you allude to was, but if it carried a protective marking, you should -- with all your attention to security and all -- know better than to refer to it in a public forum. "The use of Hannibal's tactics during the Gulf War"? Come on, you've got to give us a reference to that! Tell me, do you know Dave Rowlands? All the best, John.

But of course. "I knew they were wrong because as professionals we know they are wrong. That is why my company is in existence. We cannot deal with facts that are incorrect because we would be unemployed." Now, it is not my habit to complain about the "tone" of postings, so I leave it to people to make their own minds up about the "tone" of this little extract. However, the claim that he deals only in "correct facts" logically requires an infallible ability to tell truth from falsity. Not even the Pope now claims as much; and no academic worth the name would make such a fatuous boast. If you're going to start flinging accusations of "bullying" around, I think I'd like you to quote specific instances, please. That's not saying much. </font>

Indeed; just as we can easily read between the lines of P-51D's stuff. I don't know what you consider a "casual manner", but claiming to be a "professional" military historian, and an infallible one at that, doesn't match my idea of "casual". I wasn't aware of any great tradition among military historians of whining about "peer review". P-51D's treatment by the board was substantially more polite than a lot of academic reviews I've read. If he ostentatiously parades the fact that he has a published paper (although his apparent failure to understand the meaning of "publication" certainly looked odd) on the subject at hand, he has absolutely no grounds for complaint if he is asked to provide a reference to it. Maybe, if he needed a couple of days to find his sources, he should have moderated the dogmatic tone of his continued postings, don't you think? Still, I fail to see why he needed to refer to his references to be able to tell us his name or the name of his company. Indeed, there has to date been no shred of evidence presented against this position -- despite the extreme ease of doing so had it been available. It is not "treating someone like crap" to ask for a reference to a paper of theirs they have brought to your attention. Nor is it "treating someone like crap" to correct errors of fact they have posted. Nobody ever put any time limit on P-51D to post his references, and certainly not one of 3 hours, so that is a strawman argument. Indeed Mike Dorosh made it quite plain that he would welcome their posting at any future date, and I imagine that goes for the rest of us, too. There's only one person who is responsible for P-51D not posting his claimed references, and that is P-51D himself. He has absolutely no reason to whine about his treatment in this thread; still less do you have any justification for whining on his behalf. All the best, John. (Apologies in advance if something very similar to this pops up at a later date; I can't see the posting I made on the subject last night.)

I think a compromise solution is indicated, along the lines of the ISIHAC game "One song to the tune of another". I vote we have the tune of the old Soviet national anthem, with the words to "It's my party and I'll cry if I want to." Try singing it, it really works well! All the best, John.

Certainly it did, as the Ruhrstahl X-7 "Rotkäppchen" ("Little Red Riding-Hood"). A drawing appears under the appropriate entry at http://www.digitalfact.co.jp/missile/missile-data/jiten2.htm Gander & Chamberlain's excellent "Small Arms, Artillery and Special Weapons of the Third Reich" (MacDonald and Jane's, 1978) has an entry for it on page 339. It gives the following details, which match those given on the abovementioned site apart from length: Body diameter 150mm Wingspan 600mm Length 950mm Weight 9 Kg Warhead weight 2.5 Kg Initial velocity 100 m/sec Burn time 2.6 sec Max speed 360 km/h Max range 1200m The entry also mentions, intriguingly, "troop trials took place on the Eastern Front early in January 1945"; so it seems more likely to have seen action than the Maus, at least. I can find no details of the guidance system, except that it uses some form of wire guidance, but it seems a fairly safe guess that it would use acceleration-control MCLOS. The drawing in Gander & Chamberlain shows the guidance wire paying out from a wingtip nacelle on the starboard wing; to my mind the nacelle as drawn doesn't look big enough to hold 1.2 kilometres of wire. All the best, John.

I can find no posting anywhere in this thread where anyone calls you a liar. Can you point it out, or has it been edited? All I can see is repeated polite requests to quote your sources, and references to sources which disagree with some of your claims. Scholarship, in other words; what academics are supposed to be good at. You're right, we don't know you. You have not posted your real name, nor an e-mail address, nor provided any real information about yourself at all, so it is hard to see how any rational person could expect things to be otherwise. We have to judge you by your posts. Your refusal to post either the number of the Typhoon squadron, or a reference to the paper you claim to have published, is all we have to go on so far. Surely you can see that this does nothing to convince anyone that you are right? So "Tell the truth and shame the Devil", as my old Granny used to say. I can think of only one real reason for you not to do so. All the best, John.

{I wrote} If anyone can point me to a good source of angles of descent for WW2 anti-tank guns at different ranges, I'd be very grateful. ...or, just as good, a way of calculating them... All the best, John. [ May 28, 2002, 05:02 PM: Message edited by: John D Salt ]

How do you arrive at the hard figure of 8% ?</font>

While I agree with the idea of voting "yes", I would like to make it quite plain that I do not share this posters opinion of the alumni of Texas A & M, who are well-known well beyond the borders of their native state. I say this because I really don't need a bunch of shotgun-toting, wad-chewing, plaid-shirted Aggies on my lawn shouting "Gig 'em" at four in the morning. All the best, John.

{John D. Fiddlespoon, of Fiddlespoon, Grognard & Claptrap (solicitors and commisioners for oaths) rises, and interjects:} On a point of information, that's "Ekins", M'lud. {Lord Justice Cocklecarrot (for it is he) peers over half-moon glasses and mutters:} I'm grateful to counsel. Proceed. All the best, John.

Errr, I don't. Would someone see fit to enlighten me? I know the type of person who gets labled a grog, but why? Why not fiddlespooner? </font>

Au contraire, the plot thickens! I think it was General Kutusov who said "The worst pencil is better than the best memory", but I'm not sure, because I didn't write it down. The only photo I have seen of 007 certainly does not support the conclusions you seem to have drawn from it. How many such photos are there? No, but it very definitely is your fault if you refuse to provide a clear reference to it. Now, for the third time of asking, will you please give a reference to your paper? Journal title and issue number and author's name will be sufficient. In the absence of such a reference, suspicious-minded people may begin to suspect that you are not what you claim you are. This sounds very like an argument from authority. If you are really an academic historian, you will know how much such arguments are worth. I'm also somewhat surprised that you don't think Ken Tout or Mike Reynolds are part of the military history community. The British Army seems to think that they are. Oh, and just in case it's not mentioned in the paper of yours that you are about to post a reference to, could you tell us which Typhoon squadron it was whose operations book showed the attack on Wittman's Tiger? A PRO piece number would be ideal, but it shouldn't be hard to finmd with just the squadron number. All the best, John.

Amazon gives the publication date of Lefevre's "Panzers in Normandy then & now" as June 1983. Simpson's "Tiger Ace" was first published in 1994. Reynolds' "Steel Inferno" was first publushed in 1997. I can't find my copy of "A fine night for tanks" right ast the moment, but Ken Tout's preceding book, "Tanks, Advance!", bears a first publication date of 1987. I'd be interested in a precise reference to your paper. All the best, John.

I wish I could find the reference for this, but from memory, the usual defintion of "lethal area", also known by the terms "vulnerable area" or "area of effect", is the area within which 50% of targets will suffer an incapacitating hit. The targets will for trials purposes probably be 2 x 5 foot or similar-sized deal (pine) boards, penetration of which to the depth of one inch by a fragment was considered an incapacitating hit ("the Zuckermann criterion"). One needs to be careful, when looking at figures for areas of effect, to determine whether they account for terrain masking or not. Obviously, areas of effect against targets under cover will be much smaller. Most of the figures I have seen quote areas of effect in square feet, but sometimes they are given in square yards, just to confuse those of us accustomed to a rational system of units. Considering man-sized targets, of course, considers only the effect on the gun's detachment. It seems likely that the neutralising effect of the fire will be more important than the lethal effect. There is also the possibility that the fire will destroy the gun itself. In this respect PRO document WO 291/620, "The vulnerability of guns to attack by bombs and shell", says that "A sunken or sandbagged emplacement restricts effective rounds to those actually bursting in the emplacement except where part of the recoil system is above the barrel." WO 291/262, "Study of casualties caused by bombardment", gives some examples of 88mm guns surviving the burst of a 5.5" shell in the gun pit. Both the above documents are referred to in my W2 weapons effectiveness file at the usual place, and it also includes some areas of effect for different weapons, mostly unfortunately indirect fire, but the 6-pdr and 75mm M3 certainly get a mention. I could e-mail you a Word version of the latest file if you like, but I don't think it includes anything new on this topic. All the best, John.

Well, great, now we only need to make WARSIM playable solitaire on a PC and fling in the WW2 unit details and we've cracked it. I'd be preapred to bet that the AI would play worse than it does in CM:BO, though. Personally, I feel no desire to command anything bigger than about a battalion; telling every corporal's guard where they should be every minute just gets to be too much effort after a while. I'd rather see CM add more detail at the section level, so I can order my blokes into arrowhead, file, single file or line. It's true that commanders are trained to think two up and two down. It's also true that the humblest private soldier will, in a well-run army, have been given some idea as to the state of the national and international conflict. But as one moves further away from one's own level of concerns, the detail of one's perception becomes fuzzier. You would know the location of every section in your own company, perhaps, but only platoon locations for the rest of the battalion and battalion locations for the rest of the division. Likewise you would have greater vaguesness about their strength, activities, intentions, terrain and enemy. Now, obviously, there is an easy answer to all this. What is needed is a method of portraying to the player the level of detail that is appropriate to his organisational (or in some cases physical) distance from the thing (and "thing" could mean place, friendly or enemy unit, or intention) being looked at. In the case of terrain, say, you can see the leaves in your immediate vicinity, the trees in the rest of the forest, and the forests that stand on distant hills. Notice that we've also got rid of the "edge-of-the-map" effect here -- one is in the centre of a notionally infinite terrain, which decreases in detail of representation in all directions. When more detail is needed, it can be generated and stored (an incremental-detail geotypical terrain generator is considered a fairly easy thing to produce compared to the rest of the problem). Evidently, changes in the displayed state of distant undetailed things will need to be updated less frequently than those near at hand. For friendly and enemy units, where information is not available from the player's direct observation, the detail available should depend on what has so far been reported to the player. To prevent the player achieving god-like omniscience, but the decision speed of a snail travelling uphill with a lot of heavy luggage, the player will need to be able to "tune" the level of detail he wants on different aspects of the situation, so that they can be viewed at different magnifications (and of course we need to be sure that the underlying representation loses no detail when "magnification" changes). So, under the Salt Universal Continuum of Knowledge Engineering & Representation System (SUCKERS), one or an arbitrarily large number of players can experience a synthetic environment at levels of detail and updatedness appropriate to their physical and organisational position in the overall scheme of things. "Near" things will appear at high resolution, "distant" things at low, and with time-lags appropriate to the time it would take the player's character to become aware of them. Having once mentioned the idea, I shall wait for, ooh, six weeks before declaring that STRICOM, DSTL, DSTO and everyone else are unutterable poopy-heads for not yet having implemented a scheme like this, when 9 out of 10 of their customers would love to see it. All the best, John.

1st Northants Yeomanry. At St-Aignan-le-Cramesnil, at around midday on 8th August 1944. The gunner was indeed trooper Joe Ekins; his tank commander, Sgt. Gordon, was disoriented by being hit on the head by a falling hatch, and later wounded by MG fire. The other claim to bagging Wittman for which I have seen any evidence presented is to RAF Typhoons, a claim mentioned briefly and attributed to "Panzermeyer" in Mike Reynolds' "Steel Inferno". Gary Simpson's "Tiger Ace", a biography of Wittman, says he fell to 1NY, as do Ken Tout's books, of which the relevant one is I think "A Fine Night for Tanks". I have never yet seen any supporting evidence offered by those who claim Wittman was bagged by the Canadians, and so assume that this is an error attributable to the fact that 1NY were at the time operating in a Canadian sector. 2nd Northants Yeomanry served as an armoured recce regiment in Cromwells before they were broken up to provide replascements for 1NY; something of their story is told in "Sixty-Four Days of a Normandy Summer" by Keith Jones. All the best, John.

Possibly so, but I would have thought that a more natural response from a Sherman TC would be to lay smoke using the 2-in smoke mortar, and use the 75 to make the Panther crew's ears ring with an HE round. Hunnicutt's "Sherman" lists the smoke mortar for all Sherman gun tanks it gives data sheets for apart from early production M4A1s and M4A4s. I would hazard a guess that emission starts when the round first strikes the ground, and the reason for using ricochet fire is to try to speed the development of the screen. All the best, John.

CM:BO does not distinguish between different types of smoke, either. The example quoted refers to WP, which tends to "pillar" and requires frequent stoking. Base-ejection smoke (BES) uses longer-burning candles (90 secs for each of the 3 candles in 25-pdr BES) which generate a "cold" chemical snoke which tends to hug the ground more, and will only require a low rate of fire in stoking. I have no information on the German oleum/pumice bursting smoke shells, but I imagine they would be less effective than BES and require more stoking. Another of the aspects this brings out is that CM:BO's artillery system makes no provision for firing at different rates; everything is a simple concentration at the rapid rate. There's lots that could be done to change that, but don;t get me started on artillery rules... All the best, John. [ May 18, 2002, 02:48 PM: Message edited by: John D Salt ]

Ah. I assumed these refs were for open documents. I suppose it was too good to be true. By visiting the PRO on-line catalogue at www.pro.gov.uk, if you can stand the interface, you can tell the access status of records (and you don't even need a reader's ticket). All the records cited are noted as closed records with open descriptions, and carry the notation "Retained by Department under Section 3.4". Still, look on the bright side -- at least the records are shown as being stored at Kew, so they won't have been lost in the DERA split or when the folks moved out of Chertsey. So we might get to see them one day. All the best, John.