SeinfeldRules

So this is a common thought, especially in the American artillery community about a decade ago. The issue is that valuing precision over mass briefs well, but only in certain situations. Against point targets or specific stationary systems (ADA, command posts), yes - precision is crucial! Much better to hit it once and be done. Guided rockets, laser and GPS guided shells, and other precision munitions are great tools. But that’s only the portion of the fight. The Excalibur or GMLRS capabilities sound good on paper, but the realities of its employment preclude individual targeting of maneuvering vehicles in almost all cases.   Even laser guided munitions can be difficult to utilize - the US Army had a laser guided round (Copperhead) but got rid of it due to usability issues. The artillery answer to maneuvering units is MASS - throw as many dumb rounds as possible and saturate the area. It is far cheaper and faster to throw dumb rounds at the enemy then try to conduct laser designation on individual vehicles. Imagine a vehicle in heavy tree cover, designated by a UAV sitting at a significant slant angle to avoid enemy ADA  - how can you be sure the laser is actually designating the right place? The reality is more complicated then you think. How can you refine a grid accurately enough to achieve effects with a GPS guided munition? A lot of effort goes into developing targetable data for guided munitions - otherwise you miss your target very precisely. 
You also have to appreciate the morale and suppressive effect massed artillery represents - even harassing fires can pin a unit in place, limiting movement and observation. It isn’t always about see target, kill target - your UAV may never see the ATGM team in the forest, but if you mass a battalions worth of artillery on that tree line for 30 minutes I guarantee whoever is there will NOT be looking for your tanks. Expensive and limited precision munitions can not replicate that effect.
This is where you can’t look at this and assume guided munitions, just because they achieved a direct hit on a vehicle. Howitzers can achieve this effect given enough rounds and proper adjustment… it’s just unlikely, but not impossible. 
 
I have some thoughts on this video in particular that I will address tonight. There are several other comments in this thread that I’d like to discuss as well (including most of your post BFC, I’ll get there I promise!) but I need to wait till after work to give it the proper attention. 

“Artillery supremacy” isn’t a doctrinal term in this case like air supremacy vs superiority. I use it highlight the picture that Trent is trying to paint, that the Ukrainians have a system that vastly outpaces the Russians or even Western nations. My argument is that the data he uses to reach that conclusion isn’t well sourced or understood by him. 
 
The data I see, is Ukrainians artillery primarily operating in traditional formations, utilizing optical fire control equipment, shooting standard ammunition and achieving normal distribution and sheaf patterns. I can certainly believe that Ukrainians are operating with “roving guns” - it’s a great tactic for executing harassment fires - but it doesn’t seem to be typical and they are certainly not fully utilizing digital linkages as depicted in Trent’s post.
Russians getting dumber - there is certainly nothing wrong with more mass, and is in-fact one of the main issues we see US units struggle with when it comes to employing artillery in training - 20 years of COIN has made units hesitant to mass their battalions. It’s a teaching point every exercise. Mass is a critical principle of Fire Support and incredibly effective, wouldn’t say the Russians are dumber for massing. 
Ukrainians being better, faster and more precise - again, I don’t see the data to back that up. Artillery utilizing standard optical fire control equipment can easily achieve effects within 25m of a target using adjustments. It is very rare to find artillery footage this isn’t edited with quick cuts between volleys. Can be quite easy to paint the picture of laser accurate artillery, when the reality could be that it took multiple rounds of adjustments to achieve that effect. I’m not saying that it’s not happening - I’m saying what we are seeing isn’t proof of it either. 

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

So this is a common thought, especially in the American artillery community about a decade ago. The issue is that valuing precision over mass briefs well, but only in certain situations. Against point targets or specific stationary systems (ADA, command posts), yes - precision is crucial! Much better to hit it once and be done. Guided rockets, laser and GPS guided shells, and other precision munitions are great tools. But that’s only the portion of the fight. The Excalibur or GMLRS capabilities sound good on paper, but the realities of its employment preclude individual targeting of maneuvering vehicles in almost all cases.   Even laser guided munitions can be difficult to utilize - the US Army had a laser guided round (Copperhead) but got rid of it due to usability issues. The artillery answer to maneuvering units is MASS - throw as many dumb rounds as possible and saturate the area. It is far cheaper and faster to throw dumb rounds at the enemy then try to conduct laser designation on individual vehicles. Imagine a vehicle in heavy tree cover, designated by a UAV sitting at a significant slant angle to avoid enemy ADA  - how can you be sure the laser is actually designating the right place? The reality is more complicated then you think. How can you refine a grid accurately enough to achieve effects with a GPS guided munition? A lot of effort goes into developing targetable data for guided munitions - otherwise you miss your target very precisely. 
You also have to appreciate the morale and suppressive effect massed artillery represents - even harassing fires can pin a unit in place, limiting movement and observation. It isn’t always about see target, kill target - your UAV may never see the ATGM team in the forest, but if you mass a battalions worth of artillery on that tree line for 30 minutes I guarantee whoever is there will NOT be looking for your tanks. Expensive and limited precision munitions can not replicate that effect.
This is where you can’t look at this and assume guided munitions, just because they achieved a direct hit on a vehicle. Howitzers can achieve this effect given enough rounds and proper adjustment… it’s just unlikely, but not impossible. 
 
I have some thoughts on this video in particular that I will address tonight. There are several other comments in this thread that I’d like to discuss as well (including most of your post BFC, I’ll get there I promise!) but I need to wait till after work to give it the proper attention. 

So this is a common thought, especially in the American artillery community about a decade ago. The issue is that valuing precision over mass briefs well, but only in certain situations. Against point targets or specific stationary systems (ADA, command posts), yes - precision is crucial! Much better to hit it once and be done. Guided rockets, laser and GPS guided shells, and other precision munitions are great tools. But that’s only the portion of the fight. The Excalibur or GMLRS capabilities sound good on paper, but the realities of its employment preclude individual targeting of maneuvering vehicles in almost all cases.   Even laser guided munitions can be difficult to utilize - the US Army had a laser guided round (Copperhead) but got rid of it due to usability issues. The artillery answer to maneuvering units is MASS - throw as many dumb rounds as possible and saturate the area. It is far cheaper and faster to throw dumb rounds at the enemy then try to conduct laser designation on individual vehicles. Imagine a vehicle in heavy tree cover, designated by a UAV sitting at a significant slant angle to avoid enemy ADA  - how can you be sure the laser is actually designating the right place? The reality is more complicated then you think. How can you refine a grid accurately enough to achieve effects with a GPS guided munition? A lot of effort goes into developing targetable data for guided munitions - otherwise you miss your target very precisely. 
You also have to appreciate the morale and suppressive effect massed artillery represents - even harassing fires can pin a unit in place, limiting movement and observation. It isn’t always about see target, kill target - your UAV may never see the ATGM team in the forest, but if you mass a battalions worth of artillery on that tree line for 30 minutes I guarantee whoever is there will NOT be looking for your tanks. Expensive and limited precision munitions can not replicate that effect.
This is where you can’t look at this and assume guided munitions, just because they achieved a direct hit on a vehicle. Howitzers can achieve this effect given enough rounds and proper adjustment… it’s just unlikely, but not impossible. 
 
I have some thoughts on this video in particular that I will address tonight. There are several other comments in this thread that I’d like to discuss as well (including most of your post BFC, I’ll get there I promise!) but I need to wait till after work to give it the proper attention. 

I probably have more questions then observations at this point. I don't think anything fundamentally has changed from previous conflict, even dating back to WW 1. Artillery is still a crucial arm of any modern military and is your only all weather, truly responsive means of shaping the battlefield. Artillery is the King of Battle, even with today's technology. I can't say I've been truly shocked at anything I've seen so far.
All of my observations are based off OSINT videos - I imagine most of the US military's observations of the conflict are still close hold at higher levels due to the sensitivity of collecting in an active conflict.
Drones have proven to be incredibly useful but I don't see anything revolutionary or fundamentally doctrine-altering with them - aerial observers have been a thing since the Civil War, and artillery battalions during WW2 literally had their own observation planes sometimes - we can just get them closer then ever before without risking a human. You still see a lot of "long range" observation from drones in these strike videos however - so there is definitely a real threat of ADA/EW that is keeping drones at a distance. It's harder then ever before to hide your forces from observation, but I imagine there are a lot of smart people churning away at a practical military answer to the UAV problem, and I think it will have an easier solution then the tank will have dealing with top down attack, fire-and-forget ATGM systems.
Loitering munitions I'm still not 100% sold on - probably useful for high value targets (radar, ADA, command posts), but seem hard to utilize at a more tactical level.  Honestly, it seems like a complex solution to a problem that isn't terribly hard to solve with more conventional and flexible fires. The Switchblade 300 is seriously unimpressive to me, a glorified flying grenade. Great for taking out an ISIS leader in the middle of a crowd, not so impactful in a war where individual casualties are a given and virtually meaningless in a tactical or operational sense. I don't think the Switchblade 300 is going to single-handedly stop a town from being lost. Would LOVE to see an actual statistical analysis on the effectiveness of loitering munitions, that isn't all buzz words and "ooooh scary kamikaze drones!!"
Armored vehicles seem to be more vulnerable to artillery then commonly believed in the US/NATO. Lots of footage of (what seems to be) destroyed vehicles due to rocket and cannon fire.
Not seeing much utilization of mortars. Not sure if this is due to a lack of use, improper characterization of OSINT videos, or a function of UKR/RUS TOE lacking a significant amount of mortar tubes?
Russian and Ukrainian artillery forces seldom use effective cover and are often lined up in neat rows in the open, instead of utilizing dispersion and tree lines. I think this is mainly a function of the manual nature of most of their artillery, which requires howitzers to be somewhat closer and more orderly for a variety of technical reasons I won't get in to (unless you would like me to). This is in contract to the digital, self-locating, self-laying howitzers the US military has, which have a more robust ability to "roam". Of note, the M777s we gifted to Ukraine do not seem to have this self-locating capability, as the two videos I've seen of the howitzers operating in Ukraine showed them lacking these digital systems. These may be the Canadian howitzers though. Will be following that one closely.
Lack of digital systems aside, the above does stir some questions in my mind on the actual effectiveness and feasibility of true "counterfire" - meaning a howitzer shoots, then immediately has to move to avoid rapid and accurate fires from an opposing artillery unit. I don't think UKR and RUS artillery units are so pig headed or naive to not appreciate the usefulness of emplacing in a tree line - I wonder if the impetus to do so is even there. What I mean by that is: how often are artillery units shooting and then immediately taking fire? I don't see many videos of fires being directed on artillery units actively engaged in shooting, displacing, or even moving between firing points. In fact, in most videos of fire against an artillery battery, I don't see any people at all! Just the howitzers. And videos I've seen of artillery units firing don't seem to have a terrible sense of urgency on the need to displace immediately, which raises even more questions for me on why that would be the case. Again, would LOVE to do a deep dive into counterfire procedures during this conflict, and the effectiveness of firefinder radars and whether we truly need to "shoot and scoot" after every mission to stay alive. From my limited view of things, I'm just not seeing the same counterfire fight our doctrine envisions us fighting - but maybe that's just due to the nature of what videos are actually released versus what is happening... would love to know the actual ground truth there.

I'm going to take a minute before work to address this Twitter thread by Trent. I only caught the first part of his thread in my responses yesterday, and I think the rest of what he posted is a perfect example of him taking isolated situations and extrapolating them to create sexy scenarios for public consumption with little additional evidence. In this thread he takes examples of shell burst patterns to build this idea of Ukraine using a vast network of distributed, digital howitzers to shoot and scoot across the battlefield. The tactic is certainly feasible on paper - it's been around in doctrine since WW1, the US Army calls it a "roving gun" - but hardly unique to Ukraine. The AFATDS system and digital howitzers that we use are literally designed to facilitate this function. And while Ukraine may be using a digital system to route and process fire missions, but from what I've seen the vast majority of their howitzers (and definitely not the 122mm D-30s he references) lack the digital systems to make it truly effective to the extent he describes. Trent uses a lot of questionable assumption to build this idea of Ukrainian artillery supremacy that is honestly not backed by the data I'm seeing. If he has more sources to back his claims I would love to see them, because none of his thread passes the sniff test for this artillery officer.
Please don't take this as a slight on you Grey Fox or anyone who found Trent's thread interesting, this is just professionally frustrating to see someone the public "trusts" peddling such poorly sourced information in such a confident manner. Now I get to see his thread linked in every Reddit and Twitter thread featuring artillery, talking about something that is almost certainly not happening, at least not to the extent that Trent describes.

“Artillery supremacy” isn’t a doctrinal term in this case like air supremacy vs superiority. I use it highlight the picture that Trent is trying to paint, that the Ukrainians have a system that vastly outpaces the Russians or even Western nations. My argument is that the data he uses to reach that conclusion isn’t well sourced or understood by him. 
 
The data I see, is Ukrainians artillery primarily operating in traditional formations, utilizing optical fire control equipment, shooting standard ammunition and achieving normal distribution and sheaf patterns. I can certainly believe that Ukrainians are operating with “roving guns” - it’s a great tactic for executing harassment fires - but it doesn’t seem to be typical and they are certainly not fully utilizing digital linkages as depicted in Trent’s post.
Russians getting dumber - there is certainly nothing wrong with more mass, and is in-fact one of the main issues we see US units struggle with when it comes to employing artillery in training - 20 years of COIN has made units hesitant to mass their battalions. It’s a teaching point every exercise. Mass is a critical principle of Fire Support and incredibly effective, wouldn’t say the Russians are dumber for massing. 
Ukrainians being better, faster and more precise - again, I don’t see the data to back that up. Artillery utilizing standard optical fire control equipment can easily achieve effects within 25m of a target using adjustments. It is very rare to find artillery footage this isn’t edited with quick cuts between volleys. Can be quite easy to paint the picture of laser accurate artillery, when the reality could be that it took multiple rounds of adjustments to achieve that effect. I’m not saying that it’s not happening - I’m saying what we are seeing isn’t proof of it either. 

I'm going to take a minute before work to address this Twitter thread by Trent. I only caught the first part of his thread in my responses yesterday, and I think the rest of what he posted is a perfect example of him taking isolated situations and extrapolating them to create sexy scenarios for public consumption with little additional evidence. In this thread he takes examples of shell burst patterns to build this idea of Ukraine using a vast network of distributed, digital howitzers to shoot and scoot across the battlefield. The tactic is certainly feasible on paper - it's been around in doctrine since WW1, the US Army calls it a "roving gun" - but hardly unique to Ukraine. The AFATDS system and digital howitzers that we use are literally designed to facilitate this function. And while Ukraine may be using a digital system to route and process fire missions, but from what I've seen the vast majority of their howitzers (and definitely not the 122mm D-30s he references) lack the digital systems to make it truly effective to the extent he describes. Trent uses a lot of questionable assumption to build this idea of Ukrainian artillery supremacy that is honestly not backed by the data I'm seeing. If he has more sources to back his claims I would love to see them, because none of his thread passes the sniff test for this artillery officer.
Please don't take this as a slight on you Grey Fox or anyone who found Trent's thread interesting, this is just professionally frustrating to see someone the public "trusts" peddling such poorly sourced information in such a confident manner. Now I get to see his thread linked in every Reddit and Twitter thread featuring artillery, talking about something that is almost certainly not happening, at least not to the extent that Trent describes.

I'm going to take a minute before work to address this Twitter thread by Trent. I only caught the first part of his thread in my responses yesterday, and I think the rest of what he posted is a perfect example of him taking isolated situations and extrapolating them to create sexy scenarios for public consumption with little additional evidence. In this thread he takes examples of shell burst patterns to build this idea of Ukraine using a vast network of distributed, digital howitzers to shoot and scoot across the battlefield. The tactic is certainly feasible on paper - it's been around in doctrine since WW1, the US Army calls it a "roving gun" - but hardly unique to Ukraine. The AFATDS system and digital howitzers that we use are literally designed to facilitate this function. And while Ukraine may be using a digital system to route and process fire missions, but from what I've seen the vast majority of their howitzers (and definitely not the 122mm D-30s he references) lack the digital systems to make it truly effective to the extent he describes. Trent uses a lot of questionable assumption to build this idea of Ukrainian artillery supremacy that is honestly not backed by the data I'm seeing. If he has more sources to back his claims I would love to see them, because none of his thread passes the sniff test for this artillery officer.
Please don't take this as a slight on you Grey Fox or anyone who found Trent's thread interesting, this is just professionally frustrating to see someone the public "trusts" peddling such poorly sourced information in such a confident manner. Now I get to see his thread linked in every Reddit and Twitter thread featuring artillery, talking about something that is almost certainly not happening, at least not to the extent that Trent describes.

I'm going to take a minute before work to address this Twitter thread by Trent. I only caught the first part of his thread in my responses yesterday, and I think the rest of what he posted is a perfect example of him taking isolated situations and extrapolating them to create sexy scenarios for public consumption with little additional evidence. In this thread he takes examples of shell burst patterns to build this idea of Ukraine using a vast network of distributed, digital howitzers to shoot and scoot across the battlefield. The tactic is certainly feasible on paper - it's been around in doctrine since WW1, the US Army calls it a "roving gun" - but hardly unique to Ukraine. The AFATDS system and digital howitzers that we use are literally designed to facilitate this function. And while Ukraine may be using a digital system to route and process fire missions, but from what I've seen the vast majority of their howitzers (and definitely not the 122mm D-30s he references) lack the digital systems to make it truly effective to the extent he describes. Trent uses a lot of questionable assumption to build this idea of Ukrainian artillery supremacy that is honestly not backed by the data I'm seeing. If he has more sources to back his claims I would love to see them, because none of his thread passes the sniff test for this artillery officer.
Please don't take this as a slight on you Grey Fox or anyone who found Trent's thread interesting, this is just professionally frustrating to see someone the public "trusts" peddling such poorly sourced information in such a confident manner. Now I get to see his thread linked in every Reddit and Twitter thread featuring artillery, talking about something that is almost certainly not happening, at least not to the extent that Trent describes.

I'm going to take a minute before work to address this Twitter thread by Trent. I only caught the first part of his thread in my responses yesterday, and I think the rest of what he posted is a perfect example of him taking isolated situations and extrapolating them to create sexy scenarios for public consumption with little additional evidence. In this thread he takes examples of shell burst patterns to build this idea of Ukraine using a vast network of distributed, digital howitzers to shoot and scoot across the battlefield. The tactic is certainly feasible on paper - it's been around in doctrine since WW1, the US Army calls it a "roving gun" - but hardly unique to Ukraine. The AFATDS system and digital howitzers that we use are literally designed to facilitate this function. And while Ukraine may be using a digital system to route and process fire missions, but from what I've seen the vast majority of their howitzers (and definitely not the 122mm D-30s he references) lack the digital systems to make it truly effective to the extent he describes. Trent uses a lot of questionable assumption to build this idea of Ukrainian artillery supremacy that is honestly not backed by the data I'm seeing. If he has more sources to back his claims I would love to see them, because none of his thread passes the sniff test for this artillery officer.
Please don't take this as a slight on you Grey Fox or anyone who found Trent's thread interesting, this is just professionally frustrating to see someone the public "trusts" peddling such poorly sourced information in such a confident manner. Now I get to see his thread linked in every Reddit and Twitter thread featuring artillery, talking about something that is almost certainly not happening, at least not to the extent that Trent describes.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

I'm going to respond to the rest of this post tomorrow but I can't help but address this one immediately because it's one of my favorite little known facts about artillery in World War II, and I would like to share it with the group: the US military made extensive use of light aircraft as forward observers, working directly with ground troops and FA battalions. They were more numerous then you would think! What's old is new again.
Below is an excerpt from the hefty, 394 page Center of Military History book on the history of US Air Forward Observers:
"Originally, the headquarters batteries of each division artillery headquarters, field artillery brigade, field artillery group, and gun and howitzer battalion in the Army contained air sections... The number of air sections in a division depended on the number of firing battalions organic to it. A standard triangular infantry division had 5 sections, a total of 10 aircraft, 1 section in the division artillery headquarters, 1 in each of the 3 105mm battalions operating in a direct support role, and 1 section in the 155mm battalion providing general support."
This equates to each infantry regiment receiving a section of two spotter aircraft from the FA battalion supporting them... and more importantly, to put this into perspective, this aligns very closely to the amount of UAVs (RQ-7 Shadows) found in a modern Brigade Combat Team. Won't count Ravens into those because those things aren't even close to being capable fire support platforms, and I would argue the same about quadcopters. Great for observing effect but limited in their ability to actually conduct proper targeting.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

I'm going to respond to the rest of this post tomorrow but I can't help but address this one immediately because it's one of my favorite little known facts about artillery in World War II, and I would like to share it with the group: the US military made extensive use of light aircraft as forward observers, working directly with ground troops and FA battalions. They were more numerous then you would think! What's old is new again.
Below is an excerpt from the hefty, 394 page Center of Military History book on the history of US Air Forward Observers:
"Originally, the headquarters batteries of each division artillery headquarters, field artillery brigade, field artillery group, and gun and howitzer battalion in the Army contained air sections... The number of air sections in a division depended on the number of firing battalions organic to it. A standard triangular infantry division had 5 sections, a total of 10 aircraft, 1 section in the division artillery headquarters, 1 in each of the 3 105mm battalions operating in a direct support role, and 1 section in the 155mm battalion providing general support."
This equates to each infantry regiment receiving a section of two spotter aircraft from the FA battalion supporting them... and more importantly, to put this into perspective, this aligns very closely to the amount of UAVs (RQ-7 Shadows) found in a modern Brigade Combat Team. Won't count Ravens into those because those things aren't even close to being capable fire support platforms, and I would argue the same about quadcopters. Great for observing effect but limited in their ability to actually conduct proper targeting.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

I'm going to respond to the rest of this post tomorrow but I can't help but address this one immediately because it's one of my favorite little known facts about artillery in World War II, and I would like to share it with the group: the US military made extensive use of light aircraft as forward observers, working directly with ground troops and FA battalions. They were more numerous then you would think! What's old is new again.
Below is an excerpt from the hefty, 394 page Center of Military History book on the history of US Air Forward Observers:
"Originally, the headquarters batteries of each division artillery headquarters, field artillery brigade, field artillery group, and gun and howitzer battalion in the Army contained air sections... The number of air sections in a division depended on the number of firing battalions organic to it. A standard triangular infantry division had 5 sections, a total of 10 aircraft, 1 section in the division artillery headquarters, 1 in each of the 3 105mm battalions operating in a direct support role, and 1 section in the 155mm battalion providing general support."
This equates to each infantry regiment receiving a section of two spotter aircraft from the FA battalion supporting them... and more importantly, to put this into perspective, this aligns very closely to the amount of UAVs (RQ-7 Shadows) found in a modern Brigade Combat Team. Won't count Ravens into those because those things aren't even close to being capable fire support platforms, and I would argue the same about quadcopters. Great for observing effect but limited in their ability to actually conduct proper targeting.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.

I probably have more questions then observations at this point. I don't think anything fundamentally has changed from previous conflict, even dating back to WW 1. Artillery is still a crucial arm of any modern military and is your only all weather, truly responsive means of shaping the battlefield. Artillery is the King of Battle, even with today's technology. I can't say I've been truly shocked at anything I've seen so far.
All of my observations are based off OSINT videos - I imagine most of the US military's observations of the conflict are still close hold at higher levels due to the sensitivity of collecting in an active conflict.
Drones have proven to be incredibly useful but I don't see anything revolutionary or fundamentally doctrine-altering with them - aerial observers have been a thing since the Civil War, and artillery battalions during WW2 literally had their own observation planes sometimes - we can just get them closer then ever before without risking a human. You still see a lot of "long range" observation from drones in these strike videos however - so there is definitely a real threat of ADA/EW that is keeping drones at a distance. It's harder then ever before to hide your forces from observation, but I imagine there are a lot of smart people churning away at a practical military answer to the UAV problem, and I think it will have an easier solution then the tank will have dealing with top down attack, fire-and-forget ATGM systems.
Loitering munitions I'm still not 100% sold on - probably useful for high value targets (radar, ADA, command posts), but seem hard to utilize at a more tactical level.  Honestly, it seems like a complex solution to a problem that isn't terribly hard to solve with more conventional and flexible fires. The Switchblade 300 is seriously unimpressive to me, a glorified flying grenade. Great for taking out an ISIS leader in the middle of a crowd, not so impactful in a war where individual casualties are a given and virtually meaningless in a tactical or operational sense. I don't think the Switchblade 300 is going to single-handedly stop a town from being lost. Would LOVE to see an actual statistical analysis on the effectiveness of loitering munitions, that isn't all buzz words and "ooooh scary kamikaze drones!!"
Armored vehicles seem to be more vulnerable to artillery then commonly believed in the US/NATO. Lots of footage of (what seems to be) destroyed vehicles due to rocket and cannon fire.
Not seeing much utilization of mortars. Not sure if this is due to a lack of use, improper characterization of OSINT videos, or a function of UKR/RUS TOE lacking a significant amount of mortar tubes?
Russian and Ukrainian artillery forces seldom use effective cover and are often lined up in neat rows in the open, instead of utilizing dispersion and tree lines. I think this is mainly a function of the manual nature of most of their artillery, which requires howitzers to be somewhat closer and more orderly for a variety of technical reasons I won't get in to (unless you would like me to). This is in contract to the digital, self-locating, self-laying howitzers the US military has, which have a more robust ability to "roam". Of note, the M777s we gifted to Ukraine do not seem to have this self-locating capability, as the two videos I've seen of the howitzers operating in Ukraine showed them lacking these digital systems. These may be the Canadian howitzers though. Will be following that one closely.
Lack of digital systems aside, the above does stir some questions in my mind on the actual effectiveness and feasibility of true "counterfire" - meaning a howitzer shoots, then immediately has to move to avoid rapid and accurate fires from an opposing artillery unit. I don't think UKR and RUS artillery units are so pig headed or naive to not appreciate the usefulness of emplacing in a tree line - I wonder if the impetus to do so is even there. What I mean by that is: how often are artillery units shooting and then immediately taking fire? I don't see many videos of fires being directed on artillery units actively engaged in shooting, displacing, or even moving between firing points. In fact, in most videos of fire against an artillery battery, I don't see any people at all! Just the howitzers. And videos I've seen of artillery units firing don't seem to have a terrible sense of urgency on the need to displace immediately, which raises even more questions for me on why that would be the case. Again, would LOVE to do a deep dive into counterfire procedures during this conflict, and the effectiveness of firefinder radars and whether we truly need to "shoot and scoot" after every mission to stay alive. From my limited view of things, I'm just not seeing the same counterfire fight our doctrine envisions us fighting - but maybe that's just due to the nature of what videos are actually released versus what is happening... would love to know the actual ground truth there.

An excellent piece on an Ukrainian artillery unit, videos like this make me miss being a commander. The first several minutes are what really caught my eye, and I'll share some artillery minded observations with you.
First, this is obviously a direct contradiction to my previous claim that most units I see are in the open! I think that's still the case but highlights that drone footage isn't necessarily the ground truth of what is happening - maybe we aren't seeing the videos of artillery in treelines being hit because the UAVs aren't finding them. More on this later however.
Second, it seems that the officer, who I am assuming is the Battery Commander, is the primary person responsible for fire direction. This is a very European way of doing things, and is not really a surprise. The American military (to my knowledge) is one of the few militaries that has a dedicated fire direction section with its own officer that computes firing data. Of note, the American style FDC was "invented" during the interwar period, and allowed a single FDC to control multiple batteries or even battalion. There are stories during World War II of an entire American Corps worth of artillery conducting Time on Target missions. This is contrasted with other nation's FDCs, who had difficulty massing batteries on dynamic targets due to the decentralized nature of battery level fire control. History notes aside, observe that he is using a tablet and phone for what I assume is the calculation of firing data. Presumably this would be the GIS ARTA app discussed early, used to compute a technical firing solution to lay the howitzers. The actual computation of data is not hard, with enough time and patience I could take the American firing tables for a howitzer and put it all in a spreadsheet that spits out an answer as well. A pretty robust solution on the Ukrainian side.
Howitzers begin firing at about 30 seconds in. They are firing off the traditional optical fire control systems, and at 40 seconds in you can see the gunner looking through his pantel (panoramic telescope) to re-lay the howitzer after firing. Note that is highly unlikely that he is receiving new firing data as the narration later on suggests. I have yet to meet a howitzer crew, fire direction crew, or observer team that could accurately and rapidly re-direct fire on a maneuvering vehicle and have it land directly on top. I think this was a nice coincidence that was emphasized in editing to create a better narrative. A little example of the power of video editing that can lead to incorrect conclusions for those not in the know.
I'll take this opportunity to segue briefly into my previous comments about howitzers having to remain close together. One of the most crucial aspects of achieving effective indirect fire is accurate location and direction for the firing unit. Every howitzer in a firing unit needs to be facing the same direction, accurate down to the miliradian. It greatly simplifies firing data calculation, as you only need the data for one howitzer as opposed to 4 or 6 or 8 - all the other howitzers, since they are pointed in the same direction and generally in the same area, can fire that same data. The close you are to your "base piece", the more accurate the fire. So how do they get all the howitzers pointed in the same direction? Enter the aiming circle:

If it looks like a theodolite used by engineers for surveying, you aren't far off, the concept is the same. Through math, multiple rotating dials, and lots of shouting, the aiming circle operator relays direction to each howitzer until every gun is pointed in the same direction. A key part of this step is the pantel that I mentioned earlier, which is how each howitzer references the aiming circle for proper direction. If you firing is spread out in a tree line, or over a great distance, the ability for each howitzer to see the aiming circle with their pantel can be lost. This greatly complicates laying the battery. Additionally, units spread out or in odd formations reduces the accuracy of your barrage - remember, each gun is firing the same data, regardless of their position! Now, with modern computing technology, the ability to calculate firing data for each individual gun can be trivial - assuming you know the location of each gun, down to a 10m or 1m radius. In a GPS degraded environment, that can be quite difficult and time consuming. It's much easier to have everyone located together in a formation that can see the aiming circle and in close proximity to your base howitzer. Then you only need the location of one howitzer.
How do digital systems change this? Well, in a digital system like the Paladin and M777, each howitzer has a GPS and inertial navigation system that accurately tracks the location, but also the direction. The requirement to be laid by the aiming circle goes away, assuming your equipment is working, as the howitzer ALWAYS knows which direction it is pointing. Laying the battery and executing fire missions become simple tasks. You can have howitzers spread out over a kilometer and calculate firing data for each one at the press of a button. The reality is of course more complicated however, and the aiming circle and our "manual" methods still have a role even with fully digital howitzers, but I don't think I will get into that here for a variety of reasons.
Moving on from my not so brief segue, one more point I would like to highlight - at the end of their mission, they all jump into bunker, as a precaution against Russian counter battery that never comes. They have obviously made the decision that taking cover is preferable to displacement - a notion that goes against a lot of Western doctrine. And their cover is not overly complex - enlarged foxholes with trees to stop shrapnel. I suspect the reason we see videos with "abandoned" howitzers sitting in fields reflects exactly the situation illustrated in the video - crew live in bunkers in the treeline and occupy howitzers only when firing. If your howitzers are out in the open, they will be going for that, not you! Again, not something you'll see in a lot of Western doctrine or training. Still, I suspect the level of counterfire doesn't justify the time or effort required to conduct rapid displacements of artillery on a routine basis.
For counterfire I think a lot of what we could be seeing would be probably be described as cross-cueing of intelligence assets in the American military - firefinder radars pickup an enemy battery, but instead of unmasking your own artillery to conduct immediate counterfire, you send a UAV to confirm target location and disposition - greatly enhancing your ability to bring effective fires down on the enemy.