!983 British training film on fighting the Soviet MRR Advance Guard

[LukeFF]

Keep diggin' that hole.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

9 hours ago, chuckdyke said:

The way it started was I showed how house clearing was performed in real life. HE through the wall followed by cannister then a fireteam of three men enters the building. Some character here found it necessary to rubbish the real life units involved. Quoted his affiliation with the Returned Servicemen League. Say no more that organization refused membership of returning units at the time because Vietnam Vets had not been involved with a real war. That was lifted 20 years later. People who still have that attitude of twenty years ago there is only one thing to do for me let them know my disgust and contempt. About me you can say whatever you like don't rubbish people who can't answer from behind your keyboard. 

You appreciate that several of the people you are now talking at know exactly how 'house clearing was performed in real life' because they do (or did) it for a living? 

You need to apologise to @Combatintman & then shut up for a while. 

Edited November 28, 2021 by Sgt.Squarehead

[Combatintman]

Ok … so let’s start with what ChuckDyke said:

“Here is something for house fighting and the difficulty of maintaining command and control during MOUT operations.”

He posted a video about the Battle for Binh Ba in South Vietnam 

Let’s see what I said in response:

“Binh Ba was hardly Hue, Fallujah, Berlin or Stalingrad though was it?  This was a skirmish over a non-descript village which didn't even fill a grid square in Vietnam involving no more than 500 combatants on both sides and 100 casualties. The Australian Army lacks the size and experience to do offensive operations against a well-prepared enemy in anything larger than a village so MOUT is certainly not the appropriate descriptor here.”

For those not familiar with Binh Ba, this is a contemporary map.  The grid squares are 1km so the total mapped area is 4km². 

Note that it does not fill that area.

Moving on then to the Australian Army’s own doctrinal publications as an example:

According to Land Warfare Publication-G 3-9-6, Operations in Urban Environments,

The urban environment is classified into the following zones:

a. the city core,

b. the core periphery,

c. commercial ribbons,

d. residential sprawl,

e. industrial areas,

f. outlying high-rise areas, and

g. shanty towns

This is just one reason I stated that Binh Ba was not an urban environment as it only has one of those characteristics.  The same publication cites the battles for Fallujah, Grozny, Hue and Stalingrad in its examples of urban combat.  That publication makes one reference to Binh Ba as the preface to Chapter 7 – Building Clearance as follows (my bold):

The battle was triggered shortly after 8.00am when a Centurion tank travelling through the village was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. Initial intelligence suggested there were two Viet Cong platoons in the village. From the strength of the fire met by the company sent to deal with them, however, it was apparent that the enemy presence was much greater. There followed several hours of devastatingly fierce fighting. Twice tanks swept through the village, returning enemy fire by blowing open the walls of the houses. Then each house was cleared room by room by the infantry. By nightfall the village was still not secure and fighting continued in the area the following day. When the battle was finally over the enemy toll was 91 – at a cost of just one Australian life and eight wounded.

The battle of Binh Ba posed the perennial problem of the war in Vietnam – how to separate the enemy from innocent civilians. The occupation of towns and villages by the Viet Cong was a deliberate tactic designed either to ambush the relieving troops or to cause the Australians to use an excess of force.

Now ChuckDyke initially said (my bold):  “Here is something for house fighting and the difficulty of maintaining command and control during MOUT operations.”  My response said:  “MOUT is certainly not the appropriate descriptor here.”

Taking my argument that the Australian Army lacks the capability to do offensive operations against a well-prepared enemy in anything larger than a village let’s go back to LWP-G 3-9-6, Operations in Urban Environments.  Its Combined Arms Scenarios section (Chapter 8 refers) shows a Company Team attack in the context of a Battlegroup.  The example imagery map for that scenario has the Battlegroup boundary covering three streets and 22 buildings.  Hold that thought …

The Australian Army is basically capable of deploying a division of three combat brigades.  This would be war of national survival stuff as its more recent deployments where the usual premise of ‘to deploy one, you need three’ comes into effect has been to deploy nothing bigger than a brigade.  Australian Army brigades sit in the three to four battalion range.  Being generous let’s say four battalions which gives you four battlegroups.  Keeping one in reserve, because it is good practice to have one then according to the example in the Australian Army’s official doctrine on urban operations, a brigade can conduct an offensive operation comprising nine streets with 66 buildings.  If we go for the war of national survival then, assuming one brigade is the divisional commander’s reserve, then that is 18 streets and 132 buildings.

Here is a map of Hue where some of the calculations above have been applied to illustrate the point:

The image below is the zoomed area that I have marked as a green rectangle in the overall city map.

So in simple terms, according to the Australian Army's own doctrine, a brigade can conduct an attack on a small corner of a city.

My point about the capabilities of the Australian Army is based on having served in it and knowing what it can and cannot do which I think the argument presented above demonstrates.  It is no more an insult than saying the Australian Army cannot deploy a parachute battalion.  Why?  It doesn’t have one.  Facing up to reality and knowing your strengths and weaknesses is an important discussion to have.  Nations/militaries that overestimate their own capabilities and don’t challenge them generally end up coming second in wars.  I recall that the British Army claimed (and bored everyone to death) that they were the masters of limited war/COIN because of Borneo, Malaya, Northern Ireland and the killer tactic of wearing berets/soft hats only to end up having to eat humble pie in Basra.  There are few people in British military circles and veterans who served there who disagree with the assertion that Basra was an utterly miserable performance on the part of the British Army.  One of my friends was killed there by the way so I have little interest in denigrating the sacrifice of those whose lives were changed there.

On then to impugning the courage and sacrifice of veterans … Recalling that ChuckDyke said that my comments would not be welcome in an RSL (Returned Services League – a veteran’s association) I pointed out that I have been a member of it for 10 years.  Later ChuckDyke changes his position on the RSL and decides that it is not such a good thing after all because of the way it treated Vietnam Veterans.  A claim I don’t dispute, it is well documented, and it was not the organization’s finest hour.  Anyway – I think we can agree that his position on the RSL is inconsistent.  Whatever the argument, my membership subs help Australian veterans and while serving in the Australian Army I collected in Brisbane and Sydney for Legacy ... a veteran’s charity.

For my part, I have been and continue to be a member of the RSL.  I am also a member of the Royal British Legion … you’ve guessed it … another veteran’s association.  This month I have given the equivalent of three full working days (in addition to my day job and my hobby ‘job’ for Battlefront) collecting for the Poppy Appeal plus assisting with the organization of, and attending, a cross laying ceremony at the town church as well of course as attending Remembrance Day itself and participated in the RBL committee meeting at which this most important appeal and other issues affecting veterans were discussed.

One of those issues was our disgust that the County level RBL have decided that organizing the ANZAC service at the Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery on Cannock Chase is ‘too difficult.’  My branch is now taking it on and I am one of the lead members in this initiative.  The majority of the Commonwealth dead there are New Zealanders.  A country whose army I have never served in but the people commemorated there are fellow ANZACs.  Most of them died of Spanish Flu which the more ungenerous might say wasn’t a war death.  However, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission rightly designates them as war deaths and, incidentally, many of them had fought some hard actions on the Western Front before being brought back to the UK.  Hardly the behaviour of someone with no respect for the fallen.

Nowhere in the phrase "this was a skirmish over a non-descript village which didn't even fill a grid square in Vietnam involving no more than 500 combatants on both sides and 100 casualties," do I denigrate veterans.  Non-descript village is a fact is the number of casualties and participants on both sides. 

Anyway, I think I’ve made my point.

Edited November 28, 2021 by Combatintman

[The_Capt]

58 minutes ago, Combatintman said:

Anyway, I think I’ve made my point

And the mic drops...

So what we have here from my point of view is free professional military advice offered to people who don't want to hear it, largely because it makes them uncomfortable.  This discomfort comes largely from wanting to believe myths as opposed to reality.  

The reality is that no 5EYEs nation is built for sustained heavy urban operations.  Even the US would be stressed in a serious fight to control a city of any metropolitan size.  This is not an insult to any nation, or its war dead, it is a fiscal reality.  https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/military-spending-defense-budget

[Edit, had to slip this one in as it really puts in perspective ]

Defence spending as a % of GDP crashed after the Cold War, with a blip for GWOT and all these little side hustles over the last 20 years, but all western nations have largely scaled down dramatically since the late 80s.

My own military, Canada, cannot even come close to fighting heavy at a Battlegroup level, let alone sustain it in an urban fight against anything remotely near peer.  Why, well funding is a big one and the fact that we have largely spent the last 30 years "peacekeeping" or "hunting humans" (putting those two terms in a single sentence shows just how weird things have gotten).  And you know what...that is fine.  I am sure a lot of important social programs got a boost and taxes fell, whatever. 

The moral of the story is that you fight with the military you bought, not the one that you remember one day a year.

Now let's back to the gaming world where everything is better...

Edited November 28, 2021 by The_Capt

[Bulletpoint]

Whenever I see a morale-building training video like this, I wonder how things looked from the Soviet perspective. Surely they wouldn't just have charged in blind.

Edited November 28, 2021 by Bulletpoint

[Halmbarte]

1 hour ago, Bulletpoint said:

Whenever I see a morale-building training video like this, I wonder how things looked from the Soviet perspective. Surely they wouldn't just have charged in blind.

There is charging in blind and there is audacity. From what I've read the Sov perspective is that audacity shortens the fighting by seizing chances that a more cautious approach would lose. The corollary is that the overall shortening of the main conflict is better than a more cautious approach in money and manpower. Maintaining momentum is the key to how the Sov wanted to fight. 

 

It's easy to see how they came to that perspective. Early in the GPW(Great Patriotic War) the Germans were audacious and brushed aside Sov troops that were just barely not in position yet, grabbing huge advances and capturing millions of Ivans. Late GPW was a meat grinder for both sides. The meat grinder was better than losing, but the Sov thought hard and long on how to avoid a repetition of the late war attrition tactics. Audacity and echelons was the answer they came up with. 

 

How well that would work at the pointy end of the stick is one of the reasons for a game like CMCW. 

 

H

[Ithikial_AU]

10 hours ago, Combatintman said:

Anyway, I think I’ve made my point.

A good post.

With the GWOT, it seems that Australia rarely sent more than a battalion and a handful of aircraft to overseas areas of operations let alone a full brigade of troops to take and occupy terrain alongside their allied partners. I've suspected logistics constraints, effectively not having a system in place for supporting ongoing larger scale deployments, also played/dictated Australia's contributions over the last few decades.

<-- Has not served a day in uniform (if you don't count cadets in high school ) so freely admit I'm an armchair general happy to be schooled.

[dbsapp]

Jumping on the bandwagon of this heated discussion - which I read only in parts of course - I would ask a question: does Australia need military at all?

In my opinion, this beautiful country is in the perfect circumstances to get rid of this money burner and pump recourses into education and health care. Australians don't have natural enemies, except maybe kangaroo and New Zealanders. They are separeted from others by vast ocean. 

Only Pentagon lobbyists can discuss with straight face the possibility of China or Martians invasion of Australia.

And I'm not saying that those 2 meters high surfers (why all Australians are 2 m height people with surfing board?) couldn't be formidable foe on the battlefield.

To prove my expertise in the issue I would like to recall remarkable movie by excellent Australian director Peter Weir "Gallipoli". 

 

 

 

Edited November 29, 2021 by dbsapp

[chuckdyke]

3 hours ago, dbsapp said:

Jumping on the bandwagon of this heated discussion

Home | Australian War Memorial (awm.gov.au) Right now whatever the US is involved in Australia is too. Goes back to WW1. During WW2 the alliance shifted more to the US under the Labor Prime Minister John Curtin. Korea, Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan were the wars Australia played a supporting of the US. At present relations are at a low with China. During the Vietnam war this country lost 500 men. Long Tan and Binh Ba were major engagements not skirmishes. Not my words but from the Australian historical archives. I take issue if people belittle the army of the country in which I live. Some joker expect me to apologize I rather uninstall my games and be banned before I do that. Other campaigns since WW2 were the Malayan emergency and United Nation missions like in East Timor. 

[Sgt.Squarehead]

[Combatintman]

The 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (5 RAR), the main infantry unit involved in Binh Ba on 06 June 1969, was involved in a mine strike on 15 June 1969.  There were, according to the 5 RAR War Diary, 2 x Australian KIA and 21 x Australian WIA in that mine strike or put another way ... double the losses of the so-called 'major engagement' at Binh Ba.  All of 5 RAR's operational reporting of the Binh Ba battle refers to it as a village ... which goes back to my point that Binh Ba is not an example of MOUT as was claimed.

In Combat Mission terms - it scrapes in as a 'Large' scenario and actually is a battle you could do in the editor as a single mission, unlike Berlin, Fallujah etc ...

[The_Capt]

1 hour ago, Combatintman said:

The 5th Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (5 RAR), the main infantry unit involved in Binh Ba on 06 June 1969, was involved in a mine strike on 15 June 1969.  There were, according to the 5 RAR War Diary, 2 x Australian KIA and 21 x Australian WIA in that mine strike or put another way ... double the losses of the so-called 'major engagement' at Binh Ba.  All of 5 RAR's operational reporting of the Binh Ba battle refers to it as a village ... which goes back to my point that Binh Ba is not an example of MOUT as was claimed.

In Combat Mission terms - it scrapes in as a 'Large' scenario and actually is a battle you could do in the editor as a single mission, unlike Berlin, Fallujah etc ...

Points for trying but I am not sure the target is listening.  The plus side is this discussion took me on a bit of journey on the question.  So closest I could find to a recent true urban warfare example was the re-taking of Mosul in 16-17.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mosul_(2016–2017)

So this took 9 months and was really more of a hybrid warfare fight than a true conventional peer-on-peer fight but it fits the bill close enough.  If you look at the numbers the Blue/Green force had over 114K combatants clearing a city of 180 sq kms with thousands (possibly tens of thousands) of densely packed buildings (a freaking nightmare).  Red Force had approx 6-12k in forces but we are largely talking uncons so all types and weirdness there.  

By true urban warfare standards this one was actually pretty light.  About 7k Blue force casualties and pretty much all of Daesh in a 9 month grind.  Compared to Stalingrad this was a minor side action.

To put that into perspective the entire US Army regular force is about 485k, with NG and reserves that number can get as high as about a million but I doubt more than half are combat forces.  Toss in the Marines and you might get another 100k So what? The US military as it stands today would have been challenged in this fight.  That is probably 15-25% of the entire US land field force eaten up in one city against an adversary whose capabilities fall roughly into the "tethered, highly challenged one eyed goat" territory.  Nuke and Bypass indeed.   

Edited November 29, 2021 by The_Capt

[Sgt.Squarehead]

Poor Mosul! 

[Bil Hardenberger]

@Combatintman Karl, outstanding posts.  I really appreciate you expanding on your initial comment re: Binh Ba and backing it up with fact and references, very well written... if @chuckdyke can't read that, take it in, and then back down and apologize for his knee-jerk reactions, well that speaks volumes about his character, to me anyway.

I suggest you ignore him and get back to work... I know you have better things to do and the clock is ticking soldier.   

[Combatintman]

51 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

Points for trying but I am not sure the target is listening.  The plus side is this discussion took me on a bit of journey on the question.  So closest I could find to a recent true urban warfare example was the re-taking of Mosul in 16-17.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Mosul_(2016–2017)

So this took 9 months and was really more of a hybrid warfare fight than a true conventional peer-on-peer fight but it fits the bill close enough.  If you look at the numbers the Blue/Green force had over 114K combatants clearing a city of 180 sq kms with thousands (possibly tens of thousands) of densely packed buildings (a freaking nightmare).  Red Force had approx 6-12k in forces but we are largely talking uncons so all types and weirdness there.  

By true urban warfare standards this one was actually pretty light.  About 7k Blue force casualties and pretty much all of Daesh in a 9 month grind.  Compared to Stalingrad this was a minor side action.

To put that into perspective the entire US Army regular force is about 485k, with NG and reserves that number can get as high as about a million but I doubt more than half are combat forces.  Toss in the Marines and you might get another 100k So what? The US military as it stands today would have been challenged in this fight.  That is probably 15-25% of the entire US land field force eaten up in one city against an adversary whose capabilities fall roughly into the "tethered, highly challenged one eyed goat" territory.  Nuke and Bypass indeed.   

Funnily enough - I did the IPB for the Australian mentors supporting the Iraqi CTS who took the brunt of that battle during my Iraq tour with the Australian Army from May-December 2016.

[The_Capt]

Just now, Combatintman said:

Funnily enough - I did the IPB for the Australian mentors supporting the Iraqi CTS who took the brunt of that battle during my Iraq tour with the Australian Army from May-December 2016.

And I watched the feeds safely back at HQ...it is a small world.

[Combatintman]

4 minutes ago, The_Capt said:

And I watched the feeds safely back at HQ...it is a small world.

Binh Ba small?

[The_Capt]

4 minutes ago, Combatintman said:

Binh Ba small?

Ah, I see what you did there....

Regardless, what have we learned on this thread so far?

- John Kettler is feeling better and posting good stuff.

- There was a battle at Bin Ba and brave people died.

- Australian nationalism is alive and well

- Western militaries are not ready for a peer fight of any serious size

- Do not try and take on Combatintman lightly.

- CM brings the world together and will no doubt contribute directly to a world where we no longer need militaries.

[Combatintman]

@The_Capt - thank you for bringing up Mosul.  It is actually instructive in the discourse about scale and urban areas - here is Binh Ba scaled and overlaid on Mosul ...

 

Edited November 29, 2021 by Combatintman

[Sgt.Squarehead]

That's only very slightly larger than the Hayy Al Karamah. 

[chuckdyke]

7 hours ago, Bil Hardenberger said:

I suggest you ignore him and get back to work...

Thank you for this suggestion. You can say what you like about me but leave the country where I live alone. The issue was the Australian Army was not capable of Urban Operations. By 1966, when Australian troops moved into Phuoc Tuy Province, the area was controlled by the Viet Cong. The Australians' role involved setting up check points, clearing villages and controlling the transport of food, weapons and medical support to Viet Cong forces as well as their involvement in patrols and combat operations. In the game I take issue of the amount of fire required by a tank to clear a house. (Test it for yourself). During the assault of Binh Ba fortified houses were dealt with firing 2 shots by the 20 pounder tank-gun(equal to the US 90mm) one HE and one Cannister which was sufficient for a squad to secure the building. Happy gaming as I leave this forum with its established pecking order alone for a while. I respect the man and you as a scenario designer but that is where it stops. Customers just can't criticize some aspects of the game. It degenerates to rubbish you personally and the place you live.  

Edited November 30, 2021 by chuckdyke

[Sgt.Squarehead]

49 minutes ago, chuckdyke said:

I respect the man and you as a scenario designer but that is where it stops. Customers just can't criticize some aspects of the game. It degenerates to rubbish you personally and the place you live.

You didn't criticize the game, you accused a long standing veteran (of both the forum and the armed forces) of something that would be a criminal offence were he a US citizen. 

PS - As I suspect this forum is hosted in the US, he could probably sue you off the face of the planet. 

Edited November 30, 2021 by Sgt.Squarehead

[chuckdyke]

2 minutes ago, Sgt.Squarehead said:

You didn't criticize the game, you accused a long standing veteran (of both the forum and the armed forces) of something that would be a criminal offence were he a US citizen.

Stick to the game and leave personal life's experiences out of it. By definition they are off topic. I was working in health care for more than 25 years that doesn't mean I am more qualified when I comment on buddy aid. There is never a shred of evidence of what a person claims to be on the internet one way or the other as far as the game goes it is irrelevant. Out of real life I do my research and see what is published on a subject. I respect the man in regards of his contributions to designing scenarios. I am not interested in the fact he was a member of the British Army. TBH I get slightly irked by people who find it necessary to quote their past positions. Find a publication and use that as a reference instead. That is what you do when you want to publish something. Myself right now I am a 72 year old pensioner with too much time on his hands. Stuck in Western Australia and not allowed to travel.

[Sgt.Squarehead]

So which historian would you suggest could have helped me write 'Ashsh Al Dababir', while the fighting on the ground was still actually going on (albeit in West Mosul by that point)?

While I'm not the type of person to 'thank someone for their service' (as a rule, there are exceptions), I do very much value the unique insights & perspectives of former & current sevice personell (even if we disagree).

Yours.....Not so much. 

[IICptMillerII]

Glad to see another JK thread has run it’s usual course. 
 

Friendly reminder that everyone’s favorite Australian pup doesn’t even own Cold War, has no intention of buying it, and is not discussing anything remotely related to the topic at hand. Not that he ever does, but I digress. 
 

This thread should be locked for elder abuse. Not that it isn’t warranted, but still.