panzersaurkrautwerfer

I'm not sure the MIM-46 counts unless it was purchased in bulk and issued to units while exploding. Also the commonality of the BMP-1* has less to do with capable, and more to do with the cheap as free nature of Soviet military aid. As the case is, arms into breaches are an interesting problem on vehicles that entered serial production, and the speed of the remediation is small solace to that.

I thank the jebus I never had to ride in the back of a Bradley but once. Yeah. That said it's sort of mind boggling how many US projects got all sort of project creeped trying to catch up with whatever the parade claims were for the Soviet platforms (see Sheridan vs PT-76, and the mess that came from trying to make the Bradley float because if the BMPs could do it, then SURELY WE MUST MAKE THE IFV SWIM)

MRLS systems are not unitary deployment, in that ALL launchers regardless of type are available at certain echelons. Many of the more potent systems are retained for targets that are much higher priority than a platoon fighting position. Grads make sense, because they're simply everywhere and exist at echelons well within the control of CMBS, but many of the larger assets are reserved for high value targets or are fired well in advance of the 1-2 KM standoff on most CMBS maps.

Re: tripwires I don't know much about engineer laid, or even infantry stuff, but in the Cav end of things we never trained or maintained the equipment to set it off with a tripwire. It's a lot handier if you can scoop it up and take it with you vs needing to be defused. Re: Nidan Screw that noise man. I'm glad our local insurgents weren't that sneaky, or that clever.

No. We generally did not treat our hardware like toys. A slower deliberate turn is what you want to do (slower, as in moving quick but not to the degree you've lost traction) if you need to change travel direction.

There's a whole saying about "fast is smooth and smooth is fast." Seems applicable here.

For weapons controls you generally have two sets on most tanks, a powered traverse/elevation and, and then a manual handcrank traverse/elevation. While it does not strictly spell it out, I'd always imagined "weapons control" failures to mean the power traverse is broken and it's reverted to manual. If the turret ring itself was broken (thus preventing ANY traverse) that's pretty much tank leaving the battlefield/evacuate the tank criteria there). For ATGM type vehicles, anything that constitutes "weapons control" strikes me as a reason the missile wouldn't work. Some of the missiles have dual guidance systems but they're generally controlled through the same "box". So if the radar on the Kriz is snipped off by a sabot it can revert to SACLOS from my understanding, but as John points out if the FC is fried you're in a world of suck. As far as the TOW vehicles mentioned, the Stryker ATGM and Bradley are more or less in the same boat, and have similar optics (not "The same" but not a wide gap) while the HMMWV's is just the standard dismounted TOW launcher on the roof of the HMMWV. If it's weapons control is broken, I imagine it's because the ITAS is smashed, or the soldier controlling it is not doing so well.

Neat. I've always liked T-55s and T-72s more simply for the mass proliferation of variants and improvised armor schemes. I wonder for a future CMBS if there couldn't be some way to randomize external fittings to give a Syrian type army's tanks a more authentic hodgepodge look.

From my understanding, command detonated explosives do not qualify as mines under the various treaties to same, it's mostly directed against target triggered devices. The concern isn't mines are especially terrible on soldiers, it's that mines don't understand cease fires or peace treaties and will still blow up someone even decades after the two warring parties have shaken hands and moved on. Command detonated weapons lack the means to be triggered by random passer bys years later, and offer no greater threat than conventional UXO (indeed, very likely safer than a dud as the detonator is no longer connected at that point). Claymores are still issued and employed. They're generally employed under observation as part of an obstacle plan, or to cover dead space (like it's mounted oriented to fill what would overwise be a good bit of ground to get behind with ball bearings). They're often used in more deliberate positions (such as firebases, or established fortified battle position) however given their small size, and (relative!) ease of recovery they're also used often for hasty defensive positions too (like as part of the bed-down location security plan on a long dismounted patrol, or to guard the flanks of a infantry platoon's hasty battle position). I learned how to set one up when I was a cadet, although it was merely on a training claymore (all the firing circuit, none of the delicious candy filling), believe it's still taught to recruits*. They're a neat tool that'd be a cool addition to all the various countries currently modeled in CMBS. I think it'd be best to package them with the uncon module that's been hinted at given the similarity with other command detonated devices. *Not likely Cadets though as summer training has gone way more touchy-feely and less tactical. Can't train combat leaders of the future to fight and all I suppose.

Re: MikeyD That's actually not at all why the Abrams did not go to Afghanistan. You'll note the ABV, and the single Company the USMC took to Afghanistan operated with no significant hangups. It's also worth noting that the amount of fuel brought into Afghanistan is already a vast never ending chain of fuelers (as uh, look at the sheer number of rotary wing assets and fixed wing going in and out of country). Sending even a Battalion sized element of Abrams wouldn't have challenged the logistical train too much more. On the other hand, the primary US Army AOs are in the least vehicle (let alone tank!) friendly places in the country, and the Taliban's MO rarely involves standing in one place long enough for the "Cavalry" to arrive, or picking fights with strong US elements. Marines took the Abrams in the south were it was little more traditionally desert, and they were conducting operations against a subset of Taliban that was trying to physically maintain a hold on some urban centers. They operated them until it became apparent from my understanding that the Taliban just opted to stay in "just an innocent farmer!" mode when tanks were about. ABVs proved much more useful, and also did not tax the logistical net to the breaking point.

Size of the shockwave is proportional to the projectile breaking the barrier too. A super-sonic missile will be loud, but it won't exactly be the same as if a fighter jet buzzed your house at super sonic speeds.

Generally at the Company level we had fuel available, although the format might vary*. The intent was that if we did reach a certain level of fuel exhaustion we would conduct some sort of resupply (mission depending of course). With that said however, the rate at which we depleted fuel is well outside the length, and operational range of your average Combat Mission sized fight. Which is to say, having tanks puttering to a stop because they're out of fuel mid-mission is equally akin to soldiers suffering from hunger or starvation effects, or failing to model vehicles arriving to the fight with non-combat induced mechanical faults. It's a factor in planning or in a lot of "higher" thinking, but in a game that rarely covers more than a few square KM, and takes up on average somewhere around 45-120 minutes of "combat" it's a bit absurd to include fuel exhaustion because of simply how acute the lack of fuel would need to be for that formation to not be able to operate within those limited confines. *On the attack, we'd have a fueler+PLS with partial basic load ammunition resupply, and those elements would remain with the Company trains, being called forward once a location was sufficiently clear. Resupply generally operated as a "service station" with the supplying assets parked and tanks basically resupplying from trucks as needed (generally fuel, ammo, water and food from the Company internal supply asset), or "tail gate" with tanks parked in a security position, with the resupply asset making a stop off at each parked tank to complete supply upload. "Fresh" fuelers and ammo carriers would come forward with each logpac to allow the previous element to reload. Sometimes the assets would be concentrated into mega service stations, or especially for defensive type operations the resupply asset would "visit" but once the refueling/ammo upload was complete it would return straight to the rear. This is pretty out of sight out of mind for a "tactical" type game simply because it's not something that occurs within 2-3 KM of the FEBA. Generally you have a lead element that'll serve as spearhead, and once it needs to stop for more gas you'll have a following element assume the spearhead to allow the previous lead element to stop off for more fuel, without stopping the advance. Which is to again, say that to run out of fuel at the CMBS level is "realistic" in the sense that it historically has occurred to poorly prepared/supplied units, but is such an acute failure as to include chances of radio batteries being depleted and the unit having none to replace them, or tanks throwing track because they're using high milage worn out tracks. They're things that certainly happen, but the mitigation for said events is well above the player's level in game, and it's best to simply assume everyone's supply chain is working reasonably well enough to allow for non-combat ineffective levels of supply.

Re: Spreading Troops I'd like it if the AI "read" the terrain it was crossing and figured out a good dispersal. Given that it's effectively tile based terrain, the AI could be given cues for what sort of spread it needs for each flavor of tile. While it wouldn't be "easy" it doesn't seem outside the capability of the current generation of programming to accomplish (assuming availability of time and resources). Re: Movement of troops Other folks have also added a lot of things worth noting, the troops in the mission are likely as "fresh" as someone who's been living on combat rations, sleeping in the back of an IFV on the move and likely spent all the previous day running around while being shot at. Further again it's not "tired" in the sense they're done, it's tired in the sense that they need a breather. Agreed. We still wore our front/back plates, but usually omitted the side plates and some of the add-on "soft" type armor in training for conventional conflicts. Even at that the endurance of even very fit infantry guys is pretty short, and it's practically non-existent in chemical weapons protective posture. It's not that they can't RUN it's that they can't run with 60-80+ lbs of kit over bad terrain. The ROKA dudes we trained with handled it much better, but their average soldier only carried a personal weapon, helmet, 3-4 magazines (I think the small magazine count was because that was the ammo they were issued for the lane vs a combat thing) and their uniform (they'd also have been in a world of suck in a firefight as far as injuries go though). Re: Gats The standard method of engagement at long-medium range for the US is simply to aim center mass and fire individual aimed shots. The short range is what we call "controlled pairs" (semi-auto two shots) also fired center of mass. Firing at legs and letting the muzzle ride walk targets on is cool, but in practice spotting that much of an enemy infantryman is rare (common in veterans accounts is never seeing a "live" enemy. It's not for lack of contact, but often the firing is at muzzle flashes, vague outlines or movement, so seeing a full color toe to head enemy soldier is usually not accomplished while he's alive), so aiming for the middle of the largest part of what you can see is optimal. In terms of rifle sights, "iron" sights are not frequently employed in US use. They're trained on and nearly all rifles have them equipped, however the M68 CCO is effectively standard for all troops at this point. The big difference with it is that once properly zeroed you don't have to align the rear and front sight elements, you just get the red dot onto the target and go (the reflected aim point is "zeroed" to the bore of the rifle, so it'll move based on how you view the optic, but will continue to reflect the point of aim). The ACOG style optics are also very common in infantry units. They're not issued at a 1:1 ratio, and your mileage varies (some units may have nearly 80-90%, while others might only have them issued to their DRM), but they're certainly not rare. These are both marked improvements over firing with iron sights though, while to me is why it's irrelevant if the US troops were operating the M-74A1 (invented by Mike Kalasheson) and the Russians using the AK-16M (designed by Eugen Stonerikov), the difference is more in the sighting tools and the employment of the weapons system, than the bullet launcher itself. In terms of M4s and their accessories, the common widgets mounted on a US Army platform are: 1. Optic (M68, ACOG, and we're allowed to mount our own optics) 2. PEQ-15 (Laser, mostly used to allow night firing) And that's about it. Forward grips are not uncommon (I had one that flicked out into a bipod. I never used it for shooting, but it was handy to let you set the rifle down without getting it in the dust), and some units really liked having flashlights in Iraq (in an urban fight the ambient light often made NODs less helpful, but having a light to flick on before entering a dark house was useful). You had "geardos" in most units that would buy all the various widgets to tack onto their weapon (my favorite being an ACOG with a baby red dot optic on top of it) but the common M4 in service use isn't tarted up much. I like the M16 more than the M4, but it's simply because the M16's fixed buttstock better fits my body structure than the M4 does. On the other hand the M4 was a lot handier going through the cramped confines of Iraqi houses, or if you're crammed like spam in the back of an MRAP/M2 or whatever. In regards to pistols, part of the reason the M4's rate of issue exploded was it became apparent just how limited a pistol was in terms of actual utility. Regardless of M1911 or M9, they are more or less the knife at a gun fight if the enemy has anything more than a pistol themselves. They're still highly sought after downrange as they're easier to manage (you must have a weapon and magazine on you at all times, so it's easier to go get lunch with your M9 than your M4), and I preferred to qualify on my M9 vs a rifle post-Iraq because a pistol range is pretty easy to get through in a hurry, while a rifle range is usually most of your work day (and the novelty of firing an assault rifle wears off after the first 200-300 rounds).

Just some guesses: 1. Running in kit is different from moving tactically in kit. I've done a fair share of running in "battle rattle" but most training events of that sort are conducted on surfaces conducive to supporting a guy running, vs assaulting across "off road." I had a platoon of quite in shape scouts when I went to NTC (we accomplished several 2 KM+ runs, and had done assault course type PT), and even with fairly moderate loads (weapon, body armor with only front/back plates, water source), they were about done assaulting up a fairly small hill. Same deal with moving in MOUT, it's a lot of going over and around stuff at rapid pace, wearing gear that's about as well ventilated as a plastic bag, and doing it in a lowered posture. Also the air is absolutely full of crap (smoke, dust etc). It's really not the optimal environment for human performance. I would suggest your training was not so much to really get you to go 2-3 KM in full kit, but instead get you in reliable shape to accomplish 400-500 meter movements at a pace intended to help you build that endurance and cardio. 2. The tight grouping is from my understanding a limitation of the way the game manages infantry. A wider spread would be optimal, but I'd settle for slightly boosted surviability (sort of abstracting in smarter infantry placement). 3. In regards to rifle marksmanship, there were some really awesome studies out of Iraq in regards to training accuracy vs actual performance. In general it found only the very top percentile of shooters reliably hit targets at even modest ranges, while folks with the 50%-80% percentile type scores struggled to hit much of anything reliably/outside of close quarters. Personal firearms, at least from my own conclusions are only really optimal killing weapons against exposed unaware targets, or in the close quarters type assault. I would argue however in the case of US vs RU/UKR accuracy of fires, the abject proliferation of small arms optics during the day, and IR lasers at night for the US makes for at least a noticeable improvement, and is likely part of why USF tend to hit a bit more often.

Here's the thing though: Who would the buyers be? The main audience for Russian exports are the folks that the Armata is supposed to be designed to push around, and an audience that realistically could not handle the Armata (or in so many words are folks who struggle to keep T-72s and T-90s operational). India seems like the most likely source for a large procurement, but post PAK-FA, and with domestic tank production, there's reason to doubt that much.

I've been in the back of a wide variety of APCs. That's a very naked troop compartment. Granted it's the corner but you should be able to see seating or stowage or acess to stowage. That green thing is way too low to be a bench.

The odd thing about the nature of war is the actual intensity of the conflict depends widely on who you are and where you are on the battle field. On a whole in Southern France the German resistance was fairly weak and a great number of German units simply either gave up, or packed whatever they could loot and booked for the Fatherland. However that wider picture is often entirely irrelevant if at your particular road junction this particular German platoon has decided to make a stand and your particular squad is pinned down by their machine guns. So it's entirely possible to have a campaign widely characterized as never seeing a German from the front, while having engagements that rival anything that small collection of soldiers at that nexus in time and space will ever see again.

What are your thoughts on the Chechens then? Do you shed tears for those civilians? The various Russian elements in the Ukraine are the problem. If they hadn't started this war, there would not be all the killing and death. Russia thought it had conquest on the cheap, instead it bought a war. Bluntly if you take issue with conflict in the Ukraine, the Ukrainians are not the ones to point fingers at.

I will attempt to aid you in your reading comprehension: 1. Ukrainian media can, and does lie. A lot. However some of what they said has been somewhat factual with external verification. 2. Russian media is literally a mountain of lies built on a complicated system of lie caves, drawing pure lie-onium from the depths of the liar layer of earth's crust. Much of it is deeply and obviously false even with modest research. Both should be read, and fact checked, but one ultimately is reporting on events that ARE occurring in one capacity or the other, and one is claiming those events do not exist despite some very clear external reporting. Given that, the Russian narrative cannot be taken as "honest" and should be instead viewed as a smoke screen for other actors and methods. This is on par with the Russian preference for deception and hybrid warfare too. It's also interesting you bring up the lack of WMDs in Iraq, because it seems to indicate a very superficial understanding. The fact you should require additional education on the matter is not surprising however. he issue at hand with Iraq is that group think, paired with confirmation bias led to a decision making cycle that was incapable of filtering "bad" information so long as it supported an already agreed upon conclusion. The fact that WMDs were not found* is something freely discussed, and admitted. Further to that end, a very exhaustive, and very expensive search for WMDs was undertaken because again, we'd sucked ourselves into a silly magical land in which we believed any crap defectors told us, or unvetted reporting, and totally expected to find these WMD caches somewhere. If we were Russia I'm sure we'd have found them though. They might have had to have been shipped to Iraq, but in keeping with the Crimea fabrication (which Putin admitted to) and the Russian fabrications in the Ukraine (which the rest of the not-Russian portion of the earth knows is going on), Russia would have found a way to try to make reality match what it's saying, vs the other way around. *In quantity, or as a functional program, small stockpiles of chemical weapons weren't what we went in for.

Interesting. It seems to lack any sort of internal storage, seating, or the like. I imagine that's on par for a prototype though.

Operation Dragoon could be best characterized as a series of small engagements between scattered German forces (of sometimes dubious quality) and fairly overwhelming, often veteran allied units. While it was likely very important, and frequently quite nasty to the dogface at the front, on a higher operational to strategic level there were not many large battles. In terms of wargaming it, it looks similar to lots of the small platoon-company level fights that make up the post-Operation Cobra breakout scenarios. Equipment for the Germans will be about same as Normandy, only less of it, and manned often by less capable soldiers. US forces largely equipped on par with early Normandy equipment (no M4A1 76s, no M4A3s, more M8s less M7s) with a few well blooded US units straight from Italy. Also of note was fairly sizable French insurgent activity as the writing was on the wall for Germany in France, and a lot of previously fence sitting folks came out of the woodwork to arms.

Tanks running out of gas is an operational-strategic sort of event that doesn't fit in with a tactical game. You don't drive a tank like it's a car, to the 5% remaining in the tank and then find a service station, most logistics planning is built around refueling well before two hours remaining fuel is even a factor. In practice we tried to top off well before getting to 50%, and any long movement has some sort of fueling plan. This is done precisely for the reason that you don't want to get into a two hour firefight and have to start thinking about fuel. In that regard, assuming a semi-functional logistics element, and available fuel from it, the length of battle for most CMBS games is simply too short for fuel consumption to be a factor worth modeling. Also just cause' 1. Gas turbines are actually pretty efficient vs diesels when you're working them at high speeds/heavy workloads. The trade off is they're MUCH less efficient at idle or slow speeds. 2. The average tank speed in a fight is something like 10 MPH. The faster you go, the less likely it is you'll see someone before he shoots you, and no matter how fast your tank is, it cannot outrun a shell. Good speed is still very helpful when moving from cover to cover in terrain that supports that, but tanks blasting across the battlefield at 45 KPH or whatever just doesn't happen. 3. Thrown tracks, from my understanding are part of what drives tanks that become immobilized in CMBS not as a result of enemy action.

It's also worth noting that late Cold War offers a wide range of capabilities within each of the major factions. Sure on the high end of 1990 there's US units in M1A1HAs with M2A2s. On the other hand there's still regular army units puttering around in M60A3s with M113s. Same deal for the Soviets, some formations had T-80Us up to the gills with BMP-2s, while others made due with T-62s and early run BMP-1s. It's also at a point in history in which the "state of the art" was not quite so uneven as it is today (or a T-90AM vs M1A2 SEP v2 is still a pretty unfair fight. A M1A1HA vs a T-80U is much more even). It's also when the number of "viable" military formations was frankly through the roof with Denmark and the Netherlands of all things being tough enough to actually have an MTOE worth including, let alone France, West Germany, the UK, and Italy. To a lesser extent this also applies to the Pact formations although obviously they're more slightly different flavored Soviet formations vs something as radically different as US mechanized infantry to Norwegians or something.

See example: There's doubtlessly more available "free" media in the west than in Russia. It's not the abject denial that Russians have access to alternate news sources, but in practice most folks use the handiest news sources. And the level of honest denial from the average Russian on the street that followed the Russian actions in the Ukraine leads me to believe that while the "free" news is available, it is some combination of: 1. Simply not used, Russia Today is just so handy, why would I go through the trouble of finding a western based Russian speaking news agency/read something that isn't in Russian? 2. Treated with the same disdain as Russia Today. It's all just propaganda anyways, and I'm not starving, so the economy must be okay. 3. The same sort of rose colored glasses that blinded a lot of Americans going into Iraq. It's not so much a selection of which news source is most "true" it's a selection of which source is best telling me what I want to hear. Russian state media tells me everything is okay, I want everything to be okay, and here's an article about how Germany is overrun by canniabalist homosexuals. Serves them right. From that as the case is without reasonable dispute Russia is: 1. Not doing so hot economically. 2. Is executing a lot of very expensive projects. 3. It is canceling some of those projects and undergoing budgetary contractions of other sorts. From that a very distinct possibility is that something that's both very expensive, very risky, and sort of in an odd spot as far as purpose* will not be pursued seriously, and in some time we'll be talking about T-90AMs and other various legacy fleet upgrades with the Armata either Black Eageling or turning into a variety of less comprehensive packages (only some of the variants are produced and serve as a top tier replacement, procurement is slow to the degree that it's some years before even a modest fielding is reached, Armata is canceled but serves as the launchpad for the T-21 and BMP-5 etc). *It's not enough tank to reasonably turn the tide against NATO armor. It's way more tank than is needed to deal with Russia's non-NATO neighbors.

I'm in the same boat with Fulda being a higher priority. It's a more interesting theater, and I feel CM is the best venue for playing out the Battalion-Platoon level spectrum of fighting. It's also a pretty small leap as far as game dynamics (the only "must include" in terms of game dynamics would be having chemical/nuclear effects (not the weapons themselves, but the contamination) and defenses included (basically making meaning all vehicles operate buttoned up, infantry's everything suffers from rolling around in full protective gear). What I like about CM is with the editor it does not strictly have to be one scenario or the other. A US-ROK-Chinese combined mission fighting the mixture of unconventional (with conventional augmentation) NKPA holdouts is equally interesting to a outright joint NKPA/PLA invasion. And because it's all effectively alternate reality anyway, having campaigns that offer China as a friend (perhaps "friend") of the west or a foe ship with the base game is totally do-able.