It's time for a ludicrous hypothetical question

[KG_AGCent]

Originally posted by Bigduke6:

First, there is fuel quality. Modern tanks from what I have seen are pretty picky about muck in their diesel. WW2 diesel was pretty mucky, compared to the modern peacetime stuff. There's your first batch of maintenance casualties.

I don't know about a T-80 or Chieftain or the Leopards but I do know that the Abrams can be fueled by diesel fuel, kerosene, JP-1 jet fuel, any grade of gasoline, or even (theoretically) alcohol.

Second there is support. By this I don't just mean spare parts, whichi its own problem, but all the other stuff that goes into, well, making a modern tank division go. Tanks wear out fast just by using them. If I was in command of a WW2 front and I knew the enemy had two divisions of tanks of Merkavas or Challengers or whatever I couldn't touch, I would just retreat wherever the uber-tanks advanced, and advance wherever they weren't. Let the enemy play fire brigade with his modern tanks until they break. Hey - that's the recipe for fighting Tiger II.

My situation vs. the modern tanks gets even better if the modern tank divisions have to use WW2 supply channels. 'Nuff said.

I don't know about Army logisitcs, but a Marine Air Ground Task Force comes with its own air force (correct, we do NOT trust the wing-nuts in the USAF), Heavy and Medium lift helos, Attack Helos, C-130s, supply trucks, fuel, anti-air missile and ballistic systems, spare parts, tank retreivers, AFV transport vehicles, ammunition, maintenance battalions, beans, bullets and bandaids for 3 monthes of high-intesity, European Theater NATO vs. Warsaw Pact type conflict. A smart general could stretch this out double bearing in mind the fact that combat vs. ww2 counter-parts would not require nearly as much exertion from the fighting men of the MAGTF as it did as of, say, 3rd Shock Army in 1943.

Second to finally, a 500 lb dumb iron air bomb on target will trash a modern tank just fine, if it hits. Just look what the Iraqis or the Palestinians can do when they get 50 kg of plastique in the right place. Stack your P-47s or Stukas and let them have at the modern tank assembly areas.

Again, P-47s and Stukas ain't never seen the likes of MAG-11 or MAG-16. Incoming artillery would last as long as it would take to track the incoming shells, send the coordinates to the organic M-198s and have counter-battery rounds down range before the enemy rounds even land.

Finally, those tanks may be modern, but the people inside them are no more intelligent, enduring, or technically skilled than 1940s humans. Those modern tankers still would have to sleep, eat, get letters, etc. So obviously go after that.

I will take issue to this statement. People driving and maintaining todays tanks, aircraft and assault weapons are much more highly trained and motivated than any fighting force ever fielded. The Marines I was a happy part of in Desert Shield/Storm pale in comparision to the Marines fighting in Iraq today in training, capability and destructive power. Just to be ready for your initial deployment to a Marine Infantry platoon requires a minimum of 12 monthes training in weapons, communications, field medicine, tactical concepts and hand-to-hand combat. Then you start putting all that happy crap to real use as your units work-up for deployments etc.

And if the people in those modern tanks are REAL modern people - meaning they just don't want a meal and some sleep during a war, they have to have three hots and e-mail and the modern PX you're going to have huge problems running those two armored divisions.

The quick answer to that is beer, smokes, dip, playing cards and an occaisional brothel and of course a trip back to their normal time period after the cessation of said hostilities.

[Bigduke6]

KG_AGCent,

Well we'll never know the answer but just for fun here are my responses to your comments, in a friendly sort of way.

This turned out to be a long post, so if it's too much here's my short response: The Germans from mid-1944 had the Tiger II, which in tactical terms was a not whole lot less superior to enemy armored vehicles of the day, than modern tanks would be.

If you put together all the Tiger II's produced two divisions' worth - i.e. say 500 vehicles or so - were fielded. Those Tigers had minor tactical impact and next to zero operational impact, and no strategic impact on the course of World War Two.

Now for the long response:

1. Could modern tanks handle 1940s fuel?

Yeah, I'm aware the Abrahms supposedly can run on almost fuel available today, but I doubt real seriously Aberdeen tested the vehicle using 1940s fuel. Hydocarbon processing has come a long way in the last sixty years, and a good of the advances are in fuel "cleanliness", by which I mean how much burning it in an engine will leave residue. Given the complexity and (relatively) high power of modern tank engines, I am guessing running those vehicles on last century's fuel would gunk them out pretty quick.

2. How long can a modern armor division keep its tanks mobile, assuming no support from higher echelons?

Our notional two modern divisions in Europe 1944-45 for all their firepower would be only pretty small pieces of a giant front, and so their ability affect the war outside of the range of their weapons would be pretty limited, it seems to me. So they would have to run around a lot.

The necessity of running all those modern tanks all over heaven and creation to get a more than local effect from their superiority woudl have to use 1940s roads, and 1940s rail. Your tanks are going to have all sorts of bottleneck problems as you're trying to push 70-ton vehicles and their support vehicles through a road net still mostly geared to horses, in Europe with European buildings.

Even the thought of trying to move Abrams or Leopard II through the 1940s Reichsbahn is a nightmare scenario. Tunnels? Bridges? Partisans?

You have the same problems if not more if you want to put the tanks on trailers to haul them from place to place, and in any case a modern divisin only has enough trailers, generally speaking, to handle the typical 10 per cent non-runners.

So if you want your modern armored divisions to have more than a local effect, they have to move opertionally on their own tracks. Modern divisions don't even try that if they can possibly avoid it. Track life even on a modern tank is the hundreds not thousands of kilometers on good roads, and for practical purposes I'm talking cross-country.

My opinion, if those two divisions of tanks spent a couple of months actually moving from place to place, without the support tail modern divisions have from corps and higher, they would run themselves into the ground. So would WW2 tanks, they were even more unreliable, but the WW2 solution was just to make more, they're cheap. Can't do that with Challenger or T-90.

The West Front was hundreds of kilometeres long. Never mind trying to shift modern tanks operationally on the East Front, where the roads and distances were factors worse.

3. How effectively could a modern division defend itself against WW2 air and artillery attack?

The answer is, obviously, incredibly well until the smart munitions run out, and then they're SOL.

My point is, if you have say 1,000 tactical bombers unloading lets say 2,000 tons of iron bombs on the supply trains of one of our modern armored division's, how do your Abrams or whatever stop that? You only have have so many Patriots and Stingers, and WW2 aircraft were crammed with small-caliber cannon and 50 .cal just ideal for smacking helicopters. So okay, you knock down 200 planes from that 1000-plane raid. That means only 1,600 tons of bombs dumped on your supply trains which, since they're modern, have a whole lot more flammable fuel, ammo, and plastic than a 1944 supply trains sie.

Also I wonder how modern firefinder radars would handle not dozens but thousands of incoming shells. Ok, you detect and destroy the first few batteries, but what if there are dozens sending indirect your way?

4. Who are the better soldiers, 1940s humans or early 21st century humans?

Here you and I are in outright conflict. True, we both agree modern people get more training and education than 1940s people, and so the modern people have that going for them when you try and make them into soldiers.

My point is, that's not nearly enough to counter several things people in mid-1940s had going for them, when it comes to judging their soldierly abilities. Here is a partial list:

Accepting casualties: 1940s people fought in wars against with the background of WWI. The ethic was in wars some people will die, you hope you are not one of them, and sometimes you can't hope. A unit becomes combat incapable after losing maybe twenty per cent of its people, a good unit maybe can push that number to thirty or 40 per cent.

Modern people in modern armies come from a "no friendly casualties" outlook, and so you can make a modern unit back off, usually, if it takes 1-2 per cent casualties. Sometimes less.

Abilities to accept rigor: 1940s people had a much less sedentary lifestyle than modern people, and they were accustomed to far fewer creature comforts. Also the general population was far more rural.

Most modern units think two weeks without showers and hot food is about the limit. I am talking not just modern grunts (although I have my doubts about them too) but the whole division. The grunts at best are 10 per cent of the force. Now think of the German and Russian infantry units, from general on down, every branch of the service, at Stalingrad. Toughness is a military virture.

5. "A People driving and maintaining todays tanks, aircraft and assault weapons are much more highly trained and motivated than any fighting force ever fielded."

KG_AGCent, I have a good deal of respect for the U.S. Marine Corps, but on the motivation side that's propaganda contradicted by a lot of history.

For instance, the average service time in a Roman Legion - a military formation that has kept a pretty good reputation for quite a while - was twenty years. The average Roman legionaire would laugh at a modern soldier's claim he was a pro after say eighteen months in the ranks.

Think of a division of mostly illiterate gunnery sergeants, 10-12 years service on average, a whole lot more physically fit than modern gunnery sergeants, and convinced of their racial superiority in the bargain. That's a typical Roman legion.

As to motivation, with respect, I suggest you read up on the S.S. divisions, for instance. No prisoners, absolute sacrifice, total professionalism, your entire life is the unit's property. Sure the motivation came from a pretty nasty regime, but if you look at the record of the S.S. clearing Warsaw and, for instance, the U.S. military in Baghdad or the Russian military in Chechnya, modern soldiers don't look so hot by comparison.

As to unit pride, are you really arguing that soldiers in modern units have more loyalty to their fellows than, for instance, members of Napoleon's Old Guard?

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

[ January 25, 2005, 03:05 AM: Message edited by: Bigduke6 ]

[KG_AGCent]

As a start, please understand that there was nothing in my prior post that should be interpreted as anything more than friendly discourse offering a differing point of view on the points you had made. Your points are very well thought out and certainly are appreciated as they keep me thinking

Plowing on...

Let's assume for a moment that all you say is true. Let's also assume that we are talking of a MAGTF consisting of 2 complete Marine divisions with accompanying air, service support and logistics that would be deployed with such a force in a combat situation. Knowing the limitations of such a force and, for the sake of argument, we place them in Africa under Rommel at the outset in 1941. Conjecture, if you or anyone else would, on the immediate and even perhaps lasting effects they might have on the fighting there and how that might carry over to other theatres. I have my own thoughts and will add those later.

[Bigduke6]

KG_AGCent,

Don't get the wrong idea, I'm just shooting the breeze here. Nothing personal, you makes some good points. This is just in the spirit of grogdom, nothing more.

So, just for the sake of arguement, let's give Erwin R. a pair of Marine Divisions with all the trimmings, air, support, the works. Land them at Tunis. How far do they get?

Well, it's obvious from the get-go that the regular British army will have next to nothing to do with the answer. The armoured Marines can go wherever they please, destroy whatever they please, within the limits of geography and their own abilities.

But that's the problem. Logistics.

Remember, these two divisions are roughly, if I remember right, roughly the same size in personnel as Rommel's entire mobile elements; but the Marines have (roughly) between two and three times the vehicles, and what with air and all that ammunition and log stuff to move around they have maybe three and five times the fuel demands.

The advance, because that's the only place the Hemmits can go, has to use the same route available to Rommel, Scipio Africanus, and every other non camel-borne army has ever used in North Africa: the coastal road. In 1941 that road was a crappy two-lane frequently drifted over.

(And since it's 1941, there's no satellites, which no automatic 8-digit grids and so every one else have to use maps and compasses to find their way in the dark. Maybe the combat unit leaders could manage, but I think that alone would make for a whole bunch of lost Hemmits. A small thing, admittedly)

The distance from Tunis to Cairo is about 2,000 kilometres. Last I heard, Marines can sustain themselves on their own before hooking up to land-based supply maybe 100 - 200 km. inland, you know the correct number.

The U.S. Marines are pretty studly, but you have to admit that most of their doctrine posits a friendly navy in charge the water nearby. Not the case with Rommel; the Mediterranean pretty much owned by the Royal Navy, although the Luftwaffe made problems from time to time. But basically the Afrika corps had no steady supply, as the ships only came in to Tunis and Benghazi so often, and the Brits were sinking lots of them.

Even if Hitler had been of a mind to supply the two Marine divisions we're talking about (a whole nother thread) the question remains: how do you keep supplies coming when the Royal Navy and Airforce is trying to stop you?

Historically Rommel was able to sustain intense ops to about Trobruk, but after that and closer to Cairo he was on a logistical shoestring.

Our two Marine divisions would tax that shoestring to breaking probably twice as quickly, at least, as the Afrika Korps.

[Q]

Interesting discussion - my two cents:

Your modern tank divisions will win any battle they are in. Logistics and industrial production will still win the war regardless of what side they are on. It really doesn't matter much how many spares and support you bring back if the factories don't come with them. Eventually mechanical wear will do for the equipment the enemy can't hurt.

More interesting is how do you deal with a modern armoured division with WWII weapons? Dozens of third world despots eagerly await the answer...

[Bigduke6]

Q,

That's so easy, it monkey business. Yes, I'm talking guerilla war here.

If you are fighting a modern first world army, and you are third world or worse, and have WW2 technology, use brave young men bent on suicide or noble heroic battle for the nation, which on those terms is pretty much the same thing.

So in tactical terms the solution is fanatic youth, high explosives, and close terrain.

The exchange rate will suck but more stupid young men are born all the time, and if you're third world they're especially easy to replace.

And any success - a single tank burned or chopper shot down - is a big propaganda victory for your side. More stupid young men sign up, hooray!

Which brings us to strabegy.

Over time you organization gets competent at fighting, learns the right tactics, acquires weapons and ammo from the first world army, which can't do jack in return. It's configured to defeat another military, not a periodically agressive civilian population.

Eventually the first world army goes away, they always do, and - bingo! - when they do you are in charge of the best-armed, best-trained force in the country. So you use them to repress the population, and that usually will work for at least the rest of your natural lifetime.

And if you can get some enemies of the first world army to send you arms or money, it's even more fun, albeit unfair to the first world army. Poor saps, they're all trained to kick you know what and take no names, and there they are plopped into a hostile population with no one to fight.

The Russians and the Germans during WW2 were ruthless enough use their armies to invade foreign countries and cow the population, but modern armies have to be nice.

Being mean is a non-option, first world armies only take on third world populations under the pretext of humanitarian aid or peacekeeping or preventing terrorism or similar.

Of course, to do all that the population has to consider you the jefe a more or less legitimate leader, because if they don't they'll be happy to let the 1st worlders in to kick you out, and then they'll fight among themselves to decide who gets to be the next jefe.

So the lesson I think is, if you are a despot with WW2 weapons, keep the population pretty poor, control the media to keep them ignorant, talk up the national angle, repress the opposition, push obligitory military training for the youth, and make sure there are plenty of swamps or mountains or cities or something if there is a fight. But most of all, improve people's lives ever-so-slightly from year to year, so that if the 1st world decides to kick you out, the people will expect lower not higher living standards.

[Tigrii]

In the wars in Iraq something like the time machine thing happened when M-1s went up against old Soviet tanks from as far back as the 1950s. Not surprisingly, the Americans won repeatedly virtually without loss. Of course, there was a large disparity in crew quality, but still...

[Bone_Vulture]

Originally posted by Tigrii:

Of course, there was a large disparity in crew quality, but still...

There was a large disparity in just about every imaginable type of weaponry, and desert warfare was ideal for American air superiority.

[Tigrii]

True, but there were some head-to-head tank fights which showed the relative merits (or lack of merits) of the tanks without much interference from air support or other modern weaponry. And having superior weaponry is the whole point of this time-traveling armored force.

[Bone_Vulture]

Originally posted by Tigrii:

And having superior weaponry is the whole point of this time-traveling armored force.

But in your example, there are old tanks in the present time, instead of modern ones in the past?