Does CMBB consider the burst plume in computing LOS?

[John Kettler]

I know that the CMBO and CMBB involved not only lots of book research but lots of interviewing soldiers where possible. One of the things which used to annoy me in CMBO is that FO LOS had to be to the ground directly, not to the very substantial plume of explosion byproducts, dust and debris thrown up by an impacting shell or mortar bomb. It seems to me that it shouldn't be all that difficult to adjust fire in, say, trees, given that the round bursts either in the treetops or throws up all kinds of stuff when it hits the ground, even if the ground can't be directly seen by the FO.

For all but the smallest indirect fire assets, it should be possible to figure out where the round's hitting even if the FO can't see the ground directly. At the very least, I'd suspect that 105mm or greater HE ground bursts would be

seeable above all but the tallest trees. Am I wrong? Would love to hear from the artillery types on this, please.

Regards,

John Kettler

[Andreas]

Below 105mm I would find it reasonably doubtful that you could observe a lot. I have a reference to German use of captured 76.2mm, saying that in indirect fire the gun was a bit difficult, since the impacts of the small rounds with their low HE load were difficult to observe.

[Michael Emrys]

I would expect that the observer would need to be on ground high enough to see over intervening trees or other obstacles as well.

Michael