Giving HMG Indirect Fire Capability

[db_zero]

If I'm not mistaken HMG's could be used in a indirect fire mode to interdict and disrupt movement in areas where no direct line of sight exists. Would it be possible to implement?

[Broadsword56]

The CW armies did this, with the Vickers HMG companies.

But iirc the HMGs mounted a separate sight for these shoots, they would set all the guns up, and then the massed HMGs area-fired at a preplanned map coordinate.

The massed indirect HMG shoots could be quite effective because the enemy -- in some rear area some km away where they thought they were safe -- would just suddenly be caught in a hail of fire, without the telltale warning of artillery or cough of a mortar.

But it required coordination by higher HQ, and it was not something that was done by individual sections or be organized on the fly, at the tactical level we're playing at in CM. I can't see how it would fit within the indirect fire system of CM without leading to ahistorical play and abuse. The current system would make it too easy and quick to do.

[JonS]

B56,

I think as an off-map 'artillery module' it'd be fine. You could assume the MG platoon is set up and surveyed in, and ready to respond to calls for fire ... just like an off map mortar platoon. Then the delay between call for fire and rounds on the ground would represent the time taken (~5-7 minutes?) to calculate a bearing and elevation (and individual offset for each gun, so the fire of the platoon as a whole covers a greater area), set those on the guns, do a modicum of adjustment, and then crack into FFE ... just like an off map mortar platoon.

Having on-map MMGs capable of indirect wouldn't be so cool, though, not with the way the game is now. In some future nirvana, in which C2 links are more robustly modelled (so things like setting up and survey and comms were explicitly dealt with), and units have a sense of their surroundings (so the MGs don't try to set up in the lee of a barn), and the myriad of other things that need to happen before indirect fire can occur are dealt with either explicitly or abstractly, then yeah; on-map indirect fire would be grand. But not yet.

[db_zero]

The off map "artillery module" sounds like an interesting concept.

I was actually thinking about an on map concept. I just don't know how common or practical it was at a tactical level. Perhaps someone with a military background and experience with a weapons platoon or was a machine gunner could shed some light on this.

On the subject of indirect fire, one of the advantages of the Sherman tanks "low velocity" gun was it could be used as an indirect fire weapon and IIRC had the sighting system to do so. Once again I don't know how common it was or how practical it would be on the scale of CM or if it could be abused.

I have read accounts of MaDuces being used in an indirect fire mode in Viet-Nam. Some of the accounts are pretty interesting.

[YankeeDog]

This is from memory so I may be wrong, but I'm fairly sure only the 105mm howitzer Shermans had indirect fire sights as standard equipment. However, I have read accounts of both 75mm and 76mm Shermans being used as indirect fire weapons (nd M10s and M18 TDs too). Without built-in indirect fire sights, it takes more time to set up an indirect fire position, but it can be done.

Back to indirect MG fire, it was certainly done but not all that much in WWII. Among other things, one of the challenges with modeling indirect MG fire is that MGs have very flat trajectories, which limits what they can hit firing indirect. For example, a target on a reverse slope would often be shielded from indirect MG fire. Restrictions would need to be modeled to create a realistic depiction of MG indirect fire.

[JasonC]

Arc ing indirect MG fire was mostly a great waste and a purely theoretical exercise. But there was one quite common use of blind area denial fire by MGs used routinely in WW II.

It was fire lane shooting at night, or in any other limited visibility conditions (fog, smoke, the dust from an artillery barrage). MGs did not need current LOS to lay down grazing fire on pre sighted lanes, planned out long before to overlap and cut up the battlefield, prevent approach, cover wire obstacles, and the like.

[MikeyD]

All types of Sherman and M10TDs had indirect fire equipment in the turret. The TC's manual calls for dealing with AT guns by massed indirect fire using the platoon commander as spotter!

German tankers had nothing for indirect fire gun laying and it was frowned upon as a waste of precious ammo. Occasionally someone would be reassigned to a tank unit out of artillery and bring his knowledge with him. Then he might try to be 'clever'. But that was more of an exception than a rule. I read of a Jagdtiger commander using borrowed indirect fire equipment to pull off a particularly spectacular 'trick shot'.

[Michael Emrys]

I have read accounts of MaDuces being used in an indirect fire mode in Viet-Nam. Some of the accounts are pretty interesting.

This was done at least once in Korea as well using the four MGs of an M16. But how common that was or whether it was done at all in WW II I really can't say. But it was one of those things that required to be set up in advance. If using Jon's idea of an off-map unit, I would suggest that a specific AS would be designated at the start of the scenario and the fire would fall on it and surrounding ASs as with normal area fire. No other AS could be targeted for the remainder of the game.

So, it would be a capability that would exist and could be used, but not really all that useful most of the time outside of very specific circumstances.

Michael

[JonS]

But how common that was or whether it was done at all in WW II I really can't say.

I can. Doing something once in one war doesn't tell us much about a different army who did it routinely in a different war.

Indirect fire isn't magic. It's just a drill. People who know what they're doing, who are trained and equipped for it, and who expect to be doing it as a matter of course, don't have a great deal of difficulty with it.

I'm reminded of a paper I read about US forces using a (comparatively rudimentary and simplistic) rolling barrage for an attack on a hill north of St Lo. The paper's writers (who were involved in the battle) came to the somewhat bizarre conclusion that, although the barrage was instrumental in the attack succeding with low causualties, complex fire plans were a waste of effort. Weird.

[Peregrine]

I thought the only time HMGs were used like this with any frequency was WWI.

[JonS]

Nope. WWII also.

[Michael Emrys]

I can. Doing something once in one war doesn't tell us much about a different army who did it routinely in a different war.

I know that, Jon. Sheesh. I posted my reply in response to what db_zero had posted about Vietnam, as should have been obvious.

Michael

[Saferight]

[John Kettler]

db_zero,

The RESTRICTED pub German Infantry Weapons was prepared by the Military Intelligence Service to help our troops use captured German infantry weaponry. The pub clearly shows the Germans knew how to perform and had implemented procedures for indirect MG fire, to include the provision of overhead fire tables. See pp. 65-77.

http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/cgsc/carl/wwIIspec/number14.pdf

A History Channel/Military History Channel(?) show called "The Deadly Duo --a subset of another series (Deadly Secrets, maybe)--talked about the havoc two S.A.S. officers behind the lines with the partisans caused in Italy to German HQs. Upon receiving British reinforcements, they then attacked a German HQ in a city, using both 75mm pack howitzers and Vickers HMGs firing from behind the crest of a ridge. There was excellent close-in footage shot of the Vickers HMGs firing over the crest, and the Germans went nuts when .303 started raining down upon them, punctuated by 75mm bursts.

Regards,

John Kettler