Rocky Balboa Posted May 6, 2021 Share Posted May 6, 2021 (edited) Trying to win a bet and I knew you guys would know the answer. Did light mortar teams (50mm to 60mm) in WW2 use radios and forward observers or did they spot for themselves ... Edited May 6, 2021 by Rocky Balboa 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erwin Posted May 6, 2021 Share Posted May 6, 2021 In CM2 they seem to do both (if that helps). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Combatintman Posted May 7, 2021 Share Posted May 7, 2021 British 2" mortar - no. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domfluff Posted May 7, 2021 Share Posted May 7, 2021 Commonwealth 2" in WW2 is direct-lay only, as is the Italian Brixia. The similar British mortar in CMSF can be fired indirectly. 60mm mortars can be used effectively in either role, and are intended to do both. Larger mortars are intended to be indirect assets, for the most part. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Combatintman Posted May 7, 2021 Share Posted May 7, 2021 1 hour ago, domfluff said: Commonwealth 2" in WW2 is direct-lay only, as is the Italian Brixia. The similar British mortar in CMSF can be fired indirectly. 60mm mortars can be used effectively in either role, and are intended to do both. Larger mortars are intended to be indirect assets, for the most part. Although in my view the 51mm mortar shouldn't be fired using the indirect fire dialogue. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domfluff Posted May 7, 2021 Share Posted May 7, 2021 Yes, that does seem odd to me. I assume that's not doctrinal? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Combatintman Posted May 7, 2021 Share Posted May 7, 2021 36 minutes ago, domfluff said: Yes, that does seem odd to me. I assume that's not doctrinal? Absolutely not - I suspect the 51mm mortar is just the old 2" mortar changed to metric. Use and employment is unchanged - sighting is by eye and aiming is by hand - not like you can add 50 and drop 100 in response to a FOO who would be calling guns over the gunner net. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rocky Balboa Posted May 7, 2021 Author Share Posted May 7, 2021 Thanks so much for the response. While I understand that some "light" mortars like the US 60MM could be used in an indirect fire mode, how were they normally tactically deployed? For example were radios part of their TOE? If not then the normal tactical use of these "light" mortars would have been to direct lay them by team LOS? Is this the consensus? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rocky Balboa Posted May 7, 2021 Author Share Posted May 7, 2021 Russian's I believe also used the RM-38 50MM throughout WW2... Anyone have knowledge of how this weapon was normally deployed? Did it's TOE include radios? And when I'm asking these questions I understand that in a prepared defense they would probably all have wired comms and pre-registered targets but I'm primarily interested in how they would have been used 75% of the time in day to day operations 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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