Big Demonic Bunny

Modern tanks really don't need anything more than HEAT-MP-T and APFSDS rounds for it's 120mm gun. The effect of the coaxial machinegun is bad ass enough when it's supported by the systems of a modern MBT. In the case of the Leo you got 1200 7.62 rounds per minute that pretty much will annihilate any soft target it's aimed at. From trucks to personel. The role the machinegun doesn't work effectivly in and the APFSDS is poor at(taking out targets only protected against light calibre fire, and no more) is a niche where the HEAT-MP-T excels. So the unavailability of a pure HE round for the M1 or Leo 2 is no problem.

Maybe he has one of those Stephen hawking style synthesisers?

Aye, an Abrams isn't exactly a good tank for long fighting since it has a cruising range of a mere 275 miles and needs to be refueled every 8 hours on average. Not to mention that it features a gas turbine, which means unconventional fuel and I don't think that WWII germany could even correct the slightest error of such an engine since it requires very heat-resistant parts(I think we all know about the troubles WWII germany had with Me-262 engines). The allies wouldn't have it alot easier either. The Leo 2 would be easier to maintain since it runs on conventional diesel and uses a conventional(if advanced) diesel engine. It also has a cruising range that far supercedes the M1. EDIT: SgtGoody. I don't know much about the Abrams off-road preformance. But I do know that the Leo 2 can handle fords, creeks and tons and tons of mud with ease. More than both the Challenger or the Leclerc. We had a 2 week exercise in our poor excuse for a training area(it's basicly a moor with a few sour pine forests in the dryer areas). We had 1, I repeat 1, just a single Leo getting stuck during the whole exercise. And none threw a track. And it had been raining for half a month so that the field after those tanks had gone through looked like a meterdeep mudpit. [ January 09, 2004, 08:18 PM: Message edited by: Big Demonic Bunny ]

Those hits would have to be VERY lucky. Even 40mm high velocity APFSDS tungsten ammo has a tough job of getting through the side or rear of the Leo 2A5 S. The Leo 2A5 S and Abrams are pretty much clones when it comes to armorthickness(pretty much the only thing that separates them are the electronics and that one runs on a gasturbine and the other on a diesel). As for never getting above 20mph outside the autobahn... ROFL!!!! Leo 2 does almost twice that off-road. I've seen it myself in the muddy fields and broken terrain of southerns sweden. And they can push it to go even faster. It does 50mph or more on a road if I'm to believe the tankdrivers that I know...That is if you push it. Tracks arn't exactly suited to high speeds. (EDIT: Officially it's off road average speed is just shortly above 25mph and it's on road speed about 40mph. But I've seen crazy tankers push their tanks to alot more) Lets just say that as long as that tank keeps moving it's not going to be taken down by WWII weapons. And that is probally as long as the engine doesn't suffer a breakdown or it runs out of fuel. Lets see YOU try to hit the tracks of a target moving at 30mph with a sufficiently heavy weapon. It's difficult to say the least. A target moving at 30mph(3-D, lets not forget that the terrain that tank is moving on isn't exactly smooth as a road in most of the cases, so trailing isn't as easy) is even difficult to hit with an automatic rifle, much less an ATR or AT-gun. Maybe with a 20mm flak or something, but I doubt it. WWII weapons were NOT suited to fighting a heavy tank that moved that fast and could fight on the move as good as it fights while standing still. It could knock out ANY opposing tank at a distance of 3km. The AT-crews would not be used to facing a tank with IR sights, so they would be screwed as well. And if anyone got close enough to duke it out they would be die by the principle of 1 shot 1 kill while the Leo wouldn't even be likely to be hit at all, it's simply moving too fast. And even if they hit they wouldn't get through. The only locale that you could stop it at would be in a cityfight, but you're not going to risk a superweapon in a cityfight where it's not suited. For that you got grunts. But yes. It could be stopped eventually. By isolating it and hitting resupply and repair crews. It only has to break down once. Though it would be harder than to stop a Tiger since the suspension and engine are alot more durable and it's not likely at all to get bogged down. EDIT: As for the person who said that weapons to counter it would be developed in just a few months. I doubt it. They were able to churn out those weapons because the enemy infact wasn't all that far ahead. It was merely a question of vision and not technology. To catch up with 50 years of the fastest development in the known history of mankind is a completely different thing. [ January 09, 2004, 08:04 PM: Message edited by: Big Demonic Bunny ]

Well, I did my service as a FO. Nowdays you don't use TRPs as a FO. You got GPS(plus a small horde of non-satellite related navigational tools) that can pinpoint your position to a millimeter as well as FO equipment that will give you pretty automatic range and direction. And then the arty has GPS/navigationequipment of his own as well as a ballistic computer where they simply imput the weather data and where they want the shells to land. And you can get a hit within 25 meters at the first shot with fairly accurate weatherdata.´ You're still trained to be able to do it the old fashioned way though, in case everything fails or gets blown to bits, but it's not standard procedure. The major advance of TRPs though was during the 70s with accurate mapping! Maps accurate enough to chart TRPs without pre-firing. I don't know if the WWII forces had maps that were accurate enough to chart TRPs. This was before the satellites came you know. Actual TRPs where the arty had prefired with smokers/HE shells was probally alot rarer. Especially since the element of suprise would have been valuable, and as such only really available to the defense in case of a long term defensive position. And the NORMAL "non-TRPd" Arty in CM is probally where the arty have already made rough pre-calcs. Otherwise in that day and age it would take alot of time to get some arty firing. Still. Compensating for 400 meters(roughly) isn't difficult from a pre-calc. They didn't have any computers so the calcs would have to be made by hand and charts would have to be consulted etc etc. I have no idea how long it would take though.

Even though WWI Vickers/Maxims were stationary and watercooled machineguns which didn't even bother to attempt to make the weapon mobile(thus there were no compensations to reduce weight) I highly doubt that they in the field fired 10000 bullets without a hitch. Being watercooled eliminates one problem. Being stationary eliminates the problem of mud and similar problems related to movement. Being designed to be stationary meant that things like the internal mechanism could be made alot more reliable. But when considering the poor ammoquality of WWI as when compared to today(as frequently brought up by WWI flyers memoirs) I am quite sure that firing those 10000 rounds flawlessly were more of an exception than fact. Add to that the problem of cloth belts(which I believe was popular in those early machineguns) those 10000 rounds weren't fired during rain either.

I spent a little time firing with the FN MAG(basicly I qualified with it as well as carried&fired it on some exercises). Now the FN MAG is as far as I know based on the MG42 and known to be very reliable. But damned if it didn't screw up alot anyway. Never any machinefailings(the gun never broke on me) but there were ALOT of other stuff. First off. Every 250 rounds of fire you had to change the barrel(faster if on continuous). On the FN Mag that was easy and only took a few seconds though. The MG34-42 doesn't look as easy to switch though. Then there was the problem of faulty ammunition. Now the 7.62 Swedish NATO is reliable ammunition. But as a machinegunner you go through ALOT of rounds and every now and then there will be a case where it's a dud or it had some imperfection that prevented it from being ejected properly. So there you have a few more stoppages. In the case of not being ejected properly a very timeconsuming stop. And WWII ammo was not as good as the stuff we have today. Built up residue. Now the FN Mag was very forgiving when it came to residue. But after some thousands of rounds it was an issue. And concerning the ammunition standards of that age there would have been more residue than today. Dirt into the mechanism. It happens....alot. Even when you're very careful it's in the nature of a gun to get dirty when you're running around in the terrain. Temperatures. At least the FN Mag was very annyoing when it came to temperatures. At least compared to a modern assultrifle. It was a tricky thing setting the correct gas pressure. If it was too high you increased the risk of deforming the cartridge so that you got a jam due to ammunition problems. If it was too low the gun would just stall because it didn't have enough power to complete it's cycle. And the gas power necessary depended on outside temperature, residue buildup, how hot the barrel became etc. Then there were faulty links as well as other odd errors. So I imagine that the jamfrequency is quite accurate.

Odd, the documents that I have says that the Boys ATR faired "decently" against the italian tankforce in the opening stages of the desert war(and it wasn't until 1941 and the introduction of several heavier tanktypes that the Boys ATR became totally useless). With just 6-30mm armor(and that of low quality!) the Boys ATR shouldn't really have any problems at ranges shorter than 100m.

Oh no. That I'll have to dispute. On the defense the russians were the match of the germans. The basic soldier was fairly decent. But on the offense the russian infantry tactics from Squad and up to companylevel were abyssmal. Basicly "The Human Wave". Attacks using brute force of artillery and manpower to make up for what it lacks in finesse. These flaws in russian infantry tactics have lived on(partially) and is a serious weakness in the tactics of Warzawa pact armies and their successors.

You'd be suprised how realistic it is for pilots to bomb the first target in their sights, even if that's a worthless target.... For several reasons. One could be simple fear. Drop your stuff and get out of there(back to base and grab a beer instead of taking flak)! Another is, he doesn't KNOW that the target is worthless. You're flying by in a cabin at a very high speed trying to detect people who are activly trying to remain undetected. Gee, forgive him for not knowing exact troopsize, value and morale of the troops that he's trying to bomb. For me CAS has been a very positive experience. In the Descent on Malene scenario I only lost 2 squads to friendly bombs(they were trying to overrun an AA position that got bombed). He on the other hand lost several guns, several bren carriers(and at least 1 ATG carrier) and quite alot of troops. All thanks to airsupport. Not to mention that the airsupport eased my attack on Pirgos by blasting several buildings to rubble(it made my attack alot easier)

I can say that I'm QUITE annoyed with the heavy armor of the matildas after playing the "Descent on Malene" operation. Those two matildas would ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS set them selves up so that they had a perfect position from which they could pin down my main assult with that machinegun of theirs. And none of my guns had the slightest chance of knocking it out. It wasn't until the 4th round of battle that I managed to get an AT-gun to the side of one of the tanks, and through MASSIVE bombardment managed to immobilize it(both 37mm AT-guns, 1 Inf Gun and a 20mm Flak shelling it for 2 turns straight at short range). Afterwards I snuck up on it with tankhunter teams and tossed a few explosives. The second matilda survived all the way to the end. I truly do pity any paratroopers that had to face heavy tanks.

Odd. I know for a fact that the Strv122(Swedish version of the Leopard 2A5, with improved coms and armor...plus a few other features) has an ACTUAL front armorthickness of 1-1,5 meters. What the RHAe is for that I have no idea since it was way above my classification level(and I mean WAY above it). Note: I looked through the FAS OPFOR WEG. Most of those weapons have a penetration of about 400mm RHAe. The Panzerfaust 3, RPG-7V and RPG-29 have a penetration of about 750mm RHAe.

Sure, some of them have a penetration of 1000mm against rolled homogenous armor. The problem is. Rolled homogenous armor went out of date with the T-72. No modern AFV uses it. The penetration against a modern figting viechle using various forms of layered armor(like chobam) is much much less, closer to a 100mm. Today, if you're carring a handheld LAW(like the AT-4), you'd be lucky to get through the side of an infantry fighting viechle, much less a main battle tank. Anything that weighs 30-tons or more is out of your league as a foot soldier unless you happen to have a 150mm+ anti-tank missile(and those need to be transported in a jeep at least). If you're extremely lucky you might hit the turret ring. But that is a 1 in a million hit, and exactly what happened to that unfortunate Abrams, and that WITH a very modern anti-tank weapon, and possible large calibre as well. What you MIGHT do against a tank with a LAW is to damage the tracks enough so that you immobilize it.

First I played as the Axis(this was my first time...ever... playing the game). Playing as the Axis My initial plan was to send one recon platoon over the left to reveal enemy positions by the simple expedient of letting them shoot at me. The rightmost recon platoon would do the same thing on the right. The center reconplatoon would sneak into the gully, right up to the end of it, and be ready to pounce at an oppertunity. Since the enemy positions looked the weakest towards the right(not a large amount of cover from his point of view) I decide to have my scout cars pop up there and provide some covering fire for my right side platoon. Expecting the majority of the enemy defenses to be located around the objectives I set down the Artillery markers right next to the mosque. My initial plan for my panzers was to have them concentrated on the left flank(since that offered the best approach once the assult would begin), they would be in a depression for most of the way. But originally I planned to have them shoot from the ridge. Initially the plan went well, my recon squads sneaked over the ridge to the left, center and right. The armored cars went into hull down position on the right and immideatly an enemy halftrack revealed itself and was eliminated by the fire from my armored cars. At that moment my own halftracks arrived and I decided to send them and the infantery with them to support the rightmost attack. Then came the low point of the battle. In just 2 turns the AT guns supported by tankfire from the extreme left made smoldering piles out of all of the halftracks and 2 scout cars. On my left flank my recon was detected and came under fire. The center recon though managed to get into the gully undetected(and over the following turns quickly maneuvered into position at the end of the gully, ready to strike). I started to rain down artilleryfire around the mosque, figuring that since there was an AT piece there and probally loads of infantry this was probally the best time to unleash some death from above. The artilleryfire knocked out the central AT-piece. Which meant that as for now the threat against my viechles was the AT gun on the right and the tanks on the left. My panzers had started arriving and I grouped them up for an attack on the left, dismounting infantery just behind the ridge. I knew that my panzer IIIs would be unsuited for fighting against the AT piece on the right(Alot of punch for its calibre against tanks with an L60, but against infantery it's the calibre that's important, and 50mm just isn't enough) If I had any PanzerIVs I might have tried to gun down that AT-gun, but now I didn't. So I decided that it would be best for my infantry to push on the attack on the right and destroy/pin it down while I made my move on the left. From now on I simply viewed my forces on the right(2 scout cars and 2 platoons of infantry) as expendable, a diversionary maneuver. I knew that the lethal range for a Panzer III wasn't all that good, the tanks of the Afrika Korps had always been inferior to the tanks of their opponents, and 50mm/L60 vs 75mm/L38 didn't look good at all. He had both longer barrels and a larger calibre. I had to get close where my guns would be proportionally more effective...and where my numbers would take it's toll. When I had formed up my panzers for assult it showed that I could just fit in 10 panzers down that gully if I wanted to maintain a single line and a bit of space between them. With the AT gun in the center down I figured that 1 Panzerplatoon could advance along the gully and then attack the enemy from the right, giving me a few shots against their side armor. That idea looked even better when the Allied crew abandonded the AT gun on the right under my fierce attack(which meant that I brought up the Scoutcars alot closer to support my troops against the pesky infantery that had revealed themselves. Now my panzers surged forward, the infantery running along besides them. I lost no panzer as I crossed the ridge(suprisingly enough) and then surged into the valley below. On the right my infantry came under bombardment from two shermans, but luckily my scoutcars were deployed where the shermans couldn't hit them, and the shermans were deployed too far back to hit my Panzers on the left(the orchard was in the way). The infantry on the right was now firmly bogged down from the combined might of the shermans and the remaining infantry, but as I viewed them as expendable I didn't mind. As long as they occupied the shermans it was worth it! My attack on the left went exceptionally well. The 2 panzerplatoons on the utmost left quickly surged forward and went into a hull down position JUST infront of the grants and started to trade slugs(the Grants NOT giving as good as they got). Meanwhile my panzers in the center surged forward, crossed the gully and attacked the Grants from the right(destroying a Halftrack skulking behind the houses along the way). Now that my panzers were up close the Grants went down quickly, with just 3 of my own panzers lost(and one of those to a bazooka team). The following turns were spent bombarding the enemy infantry around the leftmost objective into submission while my own infantry caught up. Once my own squads caught up they charged and the enemy infantry surrendered or were destroyed. Now my Panzers on the center started bombarding the infantrypositions around the mosque. The forces on my leftmost flank now wheeled in, and promptly I lost 2 panzers to shermans skulking behind the buildings and way back in the orchard. A fierce battle between my leftmost Panzers and those Shermans erupted, and ended with 3 shermans dead. I had now lost a total of 6 panzers(the rightmost platoon being unharmed the leftmost platoon being eliminated and the last platoon having lost 1 tank). I was just lucky the Shermans on the far right were still trying to shoot up my infantry(with little effect, they were bogged down, but not taking alot of casualties). Now my infantry surged up to the mosque and from the gully(the Recon platoon that had been left there) and quickly eliminated the enemy. The support of 9 panzers was quite enough to keep the enemy pinned down whily my forces assulted, and once close up the forces who had endured fire from panzers and artilleryfire were quite thinned down. I left a platoon of infantry to guard the objective and surged on towards the Orchard to eliminate the last tanks and to mop up the remaining infantry on the right. The 2 remaining shermans proved to be quite a nuiscance and eliminated 4 more panzers before going down. Then the computer surrrendered. End result. A major victory for me. Remaining forces were: 5 Panzers(3 from the Rightmost platoon and two from the central) 1 Scout car(the other had been eliminated by the shermans) Loads of infantry(except for the recon and infantry platoon on the right the Panzers had done most of the fighting, the infantry merely mopped up. Blitzkreig personified). Closing comment: Not bad for playing the game for the first time. As the Allies This fight was ALOT easier. Defense when you're in hull down position and the enemy tanks have a disadvantage at range, combined with an AI that isn't all too keen on the assult ends up with a quite easy victory for the allies. With my experience of the limitations of AI this time I fully expected the enemy panzers to stay back at the ridge if I gave them enough of a fight. With that in mind I let all armored viechles stay in place. I only made two real changes. 1. I regrouped my central bazooka team and the HQ captain to the left flank, besides the AT gun. I figured that if the enemy attacked at the center my AT units would have a field day anyway(with lots of flankshots), and I had a plan for those bazookas. I also withdrew my spotter to the mosque and repositioned the central mortar to a more favorable position. 2. I grouped my Halftracks in the orchard so that they couldn't be seen from the ridge but could bombard the area directly infront of the low wall around the mosque. At the start of the battle I set all my units to hide. Predictably enough the enemy infantry surged over the ridge, and when they were unopposed the scout cars(followed by the halftracks) did the same, right into my trap. My AT guns and a Grant opened fire and quickly eliminated 3 Halftracks and 2 scoutcars. The remaining forces ducked back behind the ridge. Now my shermans arrived and I positioned 3 shermans behind the mosque area, the low wall giving them a hull down position. The Shermans on the left quickly rushed into hull down position just infront of the oasis. The following 20 turns were quite uneventful. Merely a long range gunduel where the combined might of my shermans, AT-guns and Grants very slowly pounded the Panzers to pieces. The enemy infantry surged forward. On the left flank(against my 37mm AT gun) the attack was weak. Probally just a recon platoon and was quickly repulsed by my infantry(and with the occasional assistance of the two shermans when ever they weren't firing on the panzers). But on the center(along the gully) and on the right(infront of my Grants) the attack was fierce. On the right they were shot to bits at close range by the Grants, but at the mosque they called in an artillerystrike that pinned down my troops and then surged forward en masse. The only thing that saved that position was the fact that I had positioned the two halftracks in the orchard. With the aid of the halftracks the last 30 meters before the wall was turned into a killing zone and the attack was repulsed. Then the enemy infantry just milled around in the brush. I couldn't get clear shots at them, and I didn't want to advance against them and instead was satisfied to shoot any infantry that showed itself(and emptying my 75mm artillery on a particulary dense mass of krauts). During the slow wearing gunduel the panzers had suffered losses. Severe losses. The ridge was littered with some destroyed(but most abandoned) panzers. All in all I counted 11 panzers destroyed, plus all remaining halftracks and 1 scoutcar. I knew the enemy had only 1 scout car and 4 panzers left(having played the scenario before as the germans). Now I sent forward my leftmost infantry(leaving a machinegun, the platoon leader and 1 infantry platoon to keep the jerries in the brush pinned down from the side). The rest crept up toward the ridge led my my captain(The captain with 2 infantry, 2 bazookas). Then they sneaked along the ridge(occasionally sending up an infantry squad to take a peek). The discovered the remaining scoutcar and the bazookas pulverized it. Then the Grants knocked out 1 more Panzer and I decided to send up my two shermans on the left. Combined attacks from the bazookas and the two shermans neutralized the final panzers, and then the enemy gave up. Total victory. NO lost viechles. I just lost 1 AT gun(the central 57mm AT gun being knocked out by infantry and artillery) and some infantry. P.S.: My attempts at Line of Defense didn't go nearly as well. Both as attacker and defender I found it to be tough...very tough. As the defender the lack of tanks and panzershrecks was....worrying. As the attack. Urk... those hidden AT guns were nasty, and the Tiger at the end pretty much eliminated all my remaining tanks..except for 1 Stuart and 1 Sherman. I never managed more than a Major victory as the attacker and a minor victory as the defender)

Michael Emrys: I can't. Not any written scientific paper in any case. That statement of mine was based purely on my own experience(limited as it is) and the experience of people I know(which is quite alot greater than mine). Now when I do think about it there might be a higher effect if the jet doesn't go straight through the viechle(from the effect from hitting the armor on it's way out). What I do know for a fact is that friends who served in Kosovo as well as in East africa have on a total of 3 occasions been shot with HEAT with no casualties. Twice in APCs and once in a mini-buss. In the case of the APC it was mostly thanks to an inner polycarbon anti-spalling layer and Kevlar and the fact that most of the energy just went straight through. In the case of the mini-buss the beam just went straight through one door and out through the other with no damage for the people inside. Besides, it's pretty common knowledge(at least among military personel that I've met) that if you shoot a HEAT round against a non-armored target it's highly ineffective(they teach you that if your in a poor position with a fortifiend adversary, don't shoot the AT through the window, then you'll do nothing. If you can, aim for below the window which is the most likely placement for the radiator, which is the only way to create a sufficient amount of spalling). To me that was confirmed few years back when a criminal MC gang here in sweden stole a bunch of AT-4s. Shot 2 of them into the HQ of a rival MC gang(which had 7 people in the room that was hit). Not a single injury. Believe me, or don't believe me. It's up to you. Snarker: You won't get through an abrams with a HEAT charge(except from above). The HEATs power is directly related to it's diameter. And a 120mm HEAT won't even get close to penetrating an abrams, except from above. And in anycase. With the amount of force it takes to knock your way into an Abrams the energy released inside is quite respectable if you get through. Though I believe that it must have been a kinetic penetrator of some sort, or some form of modern AT-missile and those create quite a effect anyway(enough to pulverize an T-72 so that only the tracks and undercarriage remain).