OPFOR discussion on possible Syrian tactics?

[Battlefront.com]

I agree that a dispersed, hedgehog type defense is the only practical option available to the Syrians (or most any other nation). What this means is prepositioning forces, weapons, ammo, and other supplies in carefully chosen locations ahead of military action. The local forces then have time to get creative with the defenses.

Large scale maneuver once the shooting starts will not be effective. Air, artillery, and even ground forces will see to that. The war in Iraq clearly demonstrated that. Where the Coallition forces had the most problems were in the areas that were indiginous forces existed. The large Iraqi formations that tried to maneuver to the south of Baghdad were cut to pieces before they had significant contact with US forces, and therefore the effort to result was quite poor.

Like military axioms going back to Sun Tzu, you match your strengths wit the enemy's weaknesses. You do not match your weaknesses against his strengths. Large scale conventional warfare is the West's strength and everybody else's weakness (by comparision). Short attention span is the weakness of the West, biding one's time is a strength in most nations used to conflict. So if one thinks they can maintain military pressure on the occupying Western forces, then that is what one should focus on. Trying to win a conventional war that is unwinable is foolishness from the start. That sort of thinking gets you results like Kafji in the first Gulf War. One good quote from this article is:

Dispersed, camouflaged forces or buried targets would take longer to identify and attack from the air, but by the same token, dispersal, camouflage, and entrenchment precluded efficient offensive maneuver, as the ground offensive of late February attested.

This is exactly what Peter was talking about.

Nations fearful of a determined invasion by Western type forces have few options open to them, other than play for time. This is the strategy that worked for the Soviet Union in WWII, and accidentally in Yugoslavia and Greece (I say that because they had not intended on losing the conventional war).

Steve

[MikeyD]

What should we assume about the level of Syrian preparedness for a U.S. attack? Is this this war coming with a long lead-in? For all we know detailed 'defense of the homeland' preparations may have been initiated a full two years ago when Iraq was first invaded. A lot of 'stuff' may have been prepositioned already. Likely battlegrounds surveyed, high-value targets clandestinely repositioned, secure land-line communication cables layed and hidden, fields of fire cleared.

Conversely, are we assuming the U.S. is not gonna to be going in underprepared (some may say once again) and on short notice? Overconfident in outdated INTEL, unaware of the sophistication of decoys and deception arrayed against them. We could waste a lot of effort fighting ghosts. If this were a prizefight Syria would be doing what it could to tire its beefier opponent out with feints and jabs, circling and dancing, tring to avoid that one 'Mike Tyson' left hook to the head that'll end the game.

[John Kettler]

aka_tom_w,

That link and some of the related ones should go into the CM:SF permanent thread.

Peter Cairns,

I wasn't talking about firing the D-30 from, say, a courtyard and leaving it there to be smashed. Instead, what I meant was that my calculation was based on being able to rapidly pivot the weapon so as to be able, for example, to be able to DF through one or more doorways, windows, archways, rollup doors, etc. The Syrians could easily put a bunch of D-30s, M-38s, etc. on

platforms sitting on rails or industrial rollers, run them out to fire, then race them back in. Heck, I could do the equivalent with only a piece of sheet steel, some chain and a dozer or similar.

Push it out, fire, pull it back in. Laser designators aren't all that difficult to make or buy, the firing procedures are pretty simple, and it's quite possible to imagine the Syrians training at least cadres (starting with SpecOps) to do this in some far away country unbeknownst to us. By rough count, I see over 1000 122mm guns in the list, with 500 being D-30s. How difficult is it going to be to figure out the main supply routes and pretarget the key junctions? And how much damage could even a couple of BM-21s do to the supply columns?

Even if you presume only Syrian DF artillery capability, that's enormous firepower, and we haven't even mentioned the ZSU-23s and S-60s available in enormous quantities. The Stryker's only protected against 14.5mm, recall, not 23mm and 57mm fire. And what happens to all our fancy C4ISR if the Syrians build and deploy that cheap RF weapon I described in the Cobra CAS thread, let alone buy purpose built military ones? Ex-Soviet

radiofrequency bombs are known to exist and have been tested--with devastating results to all electronics in a radius of hundreds of meters. Imagine the fun when one of those goes off as a Stryker unit rolls in. Bye bye computers, radio, data links, etc.!

I truly hope the designers don't hamstring the Syrians by making them fight both crippled and stupid. Also, I think a lot could be done to keep

some sort of Syrian air presence available for a time. Most of the planes have rough field capability, creating lots of dispersion options, and there are tons of places, especially in urban areas, to stash helicopters. Clearly, the large, fixed bases are shooting galleries for PGMs like the I-2000 with laser or GPS guidance.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

Following up on my earlier post regarding easy to build and deploy radiofrequency weapons and the embarrassing possibilities of a nonnuclear EMP bomb, please take a serious look at this.

Just so we're clear, my sole purpose in posting this link is the technical info on RF weapons. My original plan was to simply link to a great article which used to be under Secret Weapons at www.rense.com, but that site has been restructured to the point where I can't find things anymore. A Google search will produce much additional material on the RF weapon topic.

http://archives.econ.utah.edu/archives/aut-op-sy/1998m06/msg00082.htm

Regards,

John Kettler

[ December 10, 2005, 03:23 AM: Message edited by: John Kettler ]

[Battlefront.com]

I think it is safe to say that the Syrians are already concerned about a potential conflict from the direction of Iraq. I would assume they are taking steps to prepare for it, just like they've been preparing for a strike from Israel for all these years. Therefore, by the time 2007 rolls around (CM:SF's setting) they will have had at least 3-4 years of prep work. The storyline includes about 6 months of intensive prep work. So yeah, I would expect fairly extensive hedgehog type defenses to be in place prior to CM:SF's jump off.

US/NATO ability to get intel on these moves would be extremely limited. Human Intel inside of Syria is probably extremely poor, with more disinformation coming out than real information being the likely case. And it is not probable that the real information will be of much tactical value. It would more or less be along the lines of "this or that town is going to be defended tooth and nail" rather than "they have five T-54s dug in 100m north west of the Mosque on the edge of town". So in reality, there should be a lot of tactical surprises anticipated.

Steve

[Peter Cairns]

On Global security I came across a reference that stated that as many as 1,000 of Syria's 4,000 plus tanks are in static positions, probably mostly T-55's and although there was no refernce to it probably also facing Israel, so depending on the US game plan, probably out of the reconing.

What it does show however is that the Syrians may already have put a fair bit of thought in to static defence in depth.

John,

As I understand it the current targeying time for a MLRS is under 30'sec, now when you add that to counter battery location time and add flight time it's probably about 2 minutes from D-30 fire to counter rocket impact from 30 miles plus. Given that an MLRS uses bomblets to cover a wide area, I can't see indirect fire in any way being highly effective.

To move a D-30, you have to unpin the three legs, draw them all forward fix them and then in your case either slide it on rails or drop the wheels and roll it backwards.

Even a well trained team would take a minute. That leaves you one minute to either push it by hand or hitch it and drive it. Driving would be fastest but counting acceleartion and roads, 30 secs at 40mph, is at best 500m from your firing point.

Even if you survive, by the time you move off, re-deploy and reestablish communication,what have you got, an effective rate rate of fire of two or three rounds every of five to ten minutes.

If you had a good EW hardened Comms network that would link independent designator teams to a force on independant and dispersed SP guns who could calculate the approximate relative position of a target and then shoot and scoot, fine you could do some damage.

But I don't see the Syrians having that in place for a decade, not in two years, and it's what the US can do now with heavy artillery from the rear and to an extent the Stryker forces own 81mm.

Likw Steve said, don't take him on where he's strong and you are weak, and an artillery contest is a classic example of that.

As to finding a warehouse, or corner building where a D-30 deep inside can swing through say 270', and fire at atrgets through windows dooors or holes to cover more than one route of advance. I am all for it, especially if you can get it deep enough to hide flash and smoke to a degree and especially if it is shielded enough by other buildings/ terrain so that most of the US force can't see the or engage your position.

My origninal idea had been cover one arc and bore sight down it, I hadn't reallt though about utilising it's fast 360' turn , although it might mean using to open or obvious firing postions.

Peter.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

i still don't see why Syrians would need to use some strange tactics or go all passive & guerilla. they will do just fine as long as they don't try to move a large number of vechiles on open spaces. they are strong enough to stop a US invasion that is build on a Stryker force. while they certainly shouldn't try to challenge US forces into counterbattery duels, there is no reason why they couldn't utilize their artillery effectively. they have enough arty to last for months.

as far as i can see, a Syrian force should be able to deal with a Stryker force just fine, as long as they let arty & infantry lead the battle & use armour mostly just in support.

[c3k]

A counterbattery question: how many counterbattery radars does a U.S. force have? What is its area of coverage? How many targets can it track?

(In "On Point", a book by on OIF, the U.S. counterbattery radar seems to be a very limited use device.)

Ken

[aka_tom_w]

Are you refering to this technology? web page countery battery radar ?

I thought I heard of some form of counter battery triangulation technology that involved siesmic (seismic?) information collected from very sensitive seismic sensors used to locate the location of the incoming indirect fire? (Or was I just dreaming or delusional?)

Or is that just a neato idea that does not actually work in the real world?

-tom w

[Peter Cairns]

Don't forget UAV coverage the US would have Optical and radar coverage out to about 50miles of the Stryker spearhead, so I still doubt artillery could be used effectively no matter how much they have.

Peter.

[flamingknives]

Four widely spaced microphones to pick up the firing report and a fairly simple algorithm gets you a fairly good location. Used as far back as WW2 for definite, possibly earlier.

As far as UAVs go, the Syrians have a really significant portable SAM/AAA capability. UAVs wouldn't be able to operate with the sort of impunity that they're used to.

[Peter Cairns]

The syrians could use sound ranging to good effect given prepositioning and the kind of lead times Sieve has mentioned, but there is the range issue.

For Stryker mortars it might work but if they are dispersed and mobile it would need to be large volume fire to be effective and anything that does that the US would pounce on.

You could of course put some SP's in a SAM zone, and then shoot and scoot to avoid counter battery, and try to hit any aircraft sent to take out the artillery, but given US air and technical superiority it's unlikely to work.

As to long rnage uS artillery. I doubt sound ranging would be that effective, and even if it was, you would be unlikely to have enough in one place with the range to do much damage, and again the uS response would be vicious.

As to UAV's they have low visual IR and radra signiture s but can be configured to detect radra, so as the US would be actively sweeping for any active radar and the Syrians would probably have to use active radar to find them, then I think again the Syrians would loose.

Also I am pretty sure that the US can detect Air Defence Radar of any significant strength from satalite these days, so I'd avoid using it.

They also allegedly have the ability to intercept up to 90% of the worlds telephone traffic, so don't count on falling back on mobile phones either.

Peter.

[Battlefront.com]

undead reindeer cavalry,

i still don't see why Syrians would need to use some strange tactics or go all passive & guerilla.

Because they have zero chance of surviving a conventional war waged against them. No third world military force has a chance vs. a first world military force

they will do just fine as long as they don't try to move a large number of vechiles on open spaces.

Wrong. Static defenses, cut off from each other, are certain to fall. The length of time and the cost are the only questions. I agree that the Syrians would do better with a static, hedgehog defense... but they would still lose.

they are strong enough to stop a US invasion that is build on a Stryker force. while they certainly shouldn't try to challenge US forces into counterbattery duels, there is no reason why they couldn't utilize their artillery effectively. they have enough arty to last for months.

First of all, who said the attack on Syria would be Stryker only? That's silly. It would never happen, and we've certainly never said that is what CM:SF is all about. Strykers would be a PART of the attack. Armor, Mech Inf, Airborne, Marines, and of course massive air power from the Airforce, Navy, Marines, and Army would all be employed by the US. Not to mention the forces of allies that fight along side.

In CM:SF you'll have Stryker forces as your primary force. You will also have Armor and Mech Infantry, as well as air and artillery support. For follow up Modules there will be other force types, for example (possibly) US Marines, British, German, Italian, or other types of forces.

You also need to reexamine your history to see what happens when a high tech, well trained conventional force goes up against one that isn't. Then look at what happens when the same high tech conventional force goes up against a "low" tech unconventional force. If I were a dictator in a country threatened by a Western nation, I wouldn't spend a dime on conventional forces and instead would put everything into unconventional. It would preclude beating up on my neighbors, but these days doing that is likely to be a fruitless effort. Better to think practically about survivial instead of expansion and near certain defeat.

In terms of artillery, whenever the Iraqis fired their guns they died. Either counter battery or airpower took them out. That was as true in 1991 as it was in 2003. And think of the technology increases since 1991. Right now in Iraq the US is using devices that can pinpoint individual snipers to within a few meters. How can poor, underfunded, under trained, under maintained, poorly controlled, poorly lead, and in general poorly coordinated forces stand up to this sort of assault? They can't. At least not in a conventional way.

You also can't coordinate what you can't communicate with. The Iraqis had almost no command and control in either the first or second Gulf Wars because of weapons and tactics that were designed to neutralize C&C.

As for why use asymetrical tactics? The answer is plainly obvious... because they are more effective with less investment and less effort. More bang for the buck, so to speak. A couple fo well placed IED ambushes with RPGs and light weapons is likely to have as much practical effect as employing a mech company in a static defensive stance. If you don't understand why this is true, then you don't understand asymetrical warfare. And you certainly can't possibly be following anything going on in Iraq, because the toughest and most costly fights the US was involved with were NOT against conventional forces. So while you might not "get it", I am positive the Syrians do

as far as i can see, a Syrian force should be able to deal with a Stryker force just fine, as long as they let arty & infantry lead the battle & use armour mostly just in support.

I'd put my money on a Stryker Brigade, backed by airpower and minimal heavy armor, winning any battle in a Syria campaign, any time, any where. The only question I see is how quickly and at what cost.

Now, having said that things are a lot less clear for CM:SF. The presumed near certain Stryker lead victory in a battle depends VERY heavily on the player's ability to command his forces effectively. If the Syrian force does a pretty good job, and the US force doesn't, then I expect the Syrians to get the better of the US forces. They might still lose, and in real life ultimately would, but from a sceanrio standpoint it is very possible that the US player can be defeated.

Steve

[ December 10, 2005, 08:45 PM: Message edited by: Battlefront.com ]

[SgtMuhammed]

With the type of firepower the U.S. is able to put into an operation we could send all our light divisions into Syria and expect success. It would take longer to get there but there would still be little that the Syrians could do about it. Unlike many third world soldiers, Western soldiers have little concern for things like proving their manhood by charging machine-gun fire in the name of "fill in name here." If there is something they can't shoot then let the Air Force or arty or a cruise missile or whatever do the job. For the Syrians there just isn't that option.

The notion that the Syrians can handle any determined attack from a Western power is foolish. They might have some tactical success that the media will over hype but the outcome will never be in doubt, at least from a military stand point.

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Steve,

i guess we simply disagree about what the Syrian military is capable of. i guess we also disagree why Iraq lost the 2003 war.

have you noticed the news in Jane's that have reported things like the Syrian change of doctrine, and the investments into communications & artillery FCS systems? there was also a good article about Syria in JDW some time ago. they seem to be heavily into light low-signature forces these days.

while the majority of Syrian military is outdated and relatively poorly trained, it holds enough of well trained & well equipped forces to offer a good resistance to US invasion. that is all that is needed, for US can not take considerable casualties & a prolonged campaign.

properly trained light infantry equipped with modern weapons and with decent artillery support will seriously ruin the day for any 1st world mechanized force. units that are srongly bound to their vehicles are the easiest prey for such light infantry units. mechanized units that are on a "thunder run" will get absolutely eliminated.

i didn't say Syrians should have a static defence. i said they shouldn't move vehicles on open ground in masses.

i don't think Syrians should go guerilla from day one, because guerilla units are typically too small & disconnected to be able to stop US forces from taking Damascus.

i had understood the CMSF scenario wrong. i thought that the US force would be built around Stryker brigades. now i know better.

[c3k]

Gents,

Umm, a few points. (I am more than ready to be corrected on all of these, but I would ask that you post FACTS, not opinions.)

Counterbatter radar: limited numbers of systems, limited detection azimuth. Unknown how many incoming trajectories can be tracked and turned into targets at a time. Admittedly, any conventional artillery use by Syrians would be suicidal. (Doctrinal battery layout, etc.) A better (?) tactic may be individual guns in hidden, hardened emplacements; rolled out for single shot missions. (See the North Korean model.) Less effective for sure.

Sound based detection systems: they seem to be good, and getting better. However, they also seem to be best utilized in a low-intensity role. Multiple contacts throw them off. (The sniper finder; a microphone, videocamera, computer setup, works great on individual shooters. Not so well in a firefight.)

UAV's: In the entire OIF, the Army had A SINGLE HUNTER UAV for the entire corps. (Yes, there are other types of UAV's, but they are extremely specialized for extremely narrow uses, both technically and doctrinally. We are not at the point where a platoon leader can zoom into any overhead view he wants.)

Electronic Warfare/Intel: Large antenna farms and static HQ's will be destroyed. Distributed comms are the name of the game. Cellphones are great. The US is having LARGE coordination problems in Iraq with conficting demands in the EW field. Jamming blocks friendly frequencies. Monitoring, to take advantage of enemy comms, allows their use. Other more technical issues. EW is not a magic panacea.

Remember, just because a manufacturer can show that a given system is capable of something, doesn't mean it will work that way in combination with others, or in actual use.

There are plenty of shortcomings in the modern US arsenal for a motivated, intelligent opponent to take advantage of. Admittedly, most of these areas are at the extreme ends, in the seams, or otherwise limited. But they do exist.

Regards,

Ken

[c3k]

Gents,

One more quick example of what I'm trying to get across.

Typically, to counter enemy (U.S.) air threats, you'd rely on AAA and SAM assets. The Iraqis knew what happens to those units. They always seem to get destroyed.

The US Army sent in an Apache Regiment (30 or 32 helos) to conduct an assault on an Iraqi unit. The Iraqis used primarily small-arms (to include up to heavy machineguns), as well as light AAA, to destroy the attackers. (Only one was shot down, but ALL were damaged, some requiring WEEKS to be repaired.) The assault was a failure.

The Iraqis used low-tech, widely dispersed, shoulder fired small arms and machineguns to stop a heavy attack helicopter regiment. That was not anticipated. Thereafter, Army aviation assiduously avoided built-up areas.

Why wouldn't the Syrians put a man or two on EVERY SINGLE roof in a town? How effective would a Hellfire be in stopping the incoming fire? Better yet, would that tactic deny Helo support to US ground forces in and around that town?

Just something to think about...

Regards,

Ken

[Bigduke6]

I think the real question that needs to be asked about Syrian equipment is, how many dismountable 12.7mm and 14.5mm machine guns do they have?

Let's get the negatives of those weapons out of the way first:

* Bulky weapon, it takes about six guys to move one on foot, and then not fast.

* Ammo is a bear to hump, loss of mobility plus not so hot for extended firefights

* Can't do squat to a serious armored vehicle, usually. So if the Christians have tanks and tracked APCs, it's a useless weapon.

* Loud as all get out and impossible to mistake for anything else, fire one and you've announced to the world you have a big MG.

* Not useful against aircraft unless you have a lot of them.

*To get decent use out of the weapon the crew has to be trained, maybe not to U.S. levels, but at least so they can pack up and move, control fires, and do stuff like that. So until they get practice not a militia/mujahaddin weapon.

And now the positives:

*Ignores Kevlar. Kill U.S. dismounts, any aspect, pretty much any range.

*In the hands of a reasonably-trained gunner, very accurate at pretty much any combat range.

*Chews up lightly-armored vehicles. I don't know about the Stryker front but I would be very suprised if that vehicle could handle .50 hits from flank or rear.

*Rugged, hard-to-break, about a soldier-proof a weapon as has been made in the last century or so.

*Dirt-cheap, there have to be tens of thousands of these MGs sloshing around the world unaccounted for. Ditto for parts, moreover, the pieces are big: short the barrel and receiver you probably could machine the entire weapon in a Syrian metal shop.

*Ammunition is cheap and available.

*Take it apart and it is for practical purposes indistinguishable from machine tools, if you want to smuggle it. This also means that a Bedouin family could move it around on the family Toyota or about three camels. Try and stop that with a SLAR mission.

*Get four or five together, and the U.S. loses low-level helicopter capacity wherever you set them up, as long as the MGs live.

*Imagine a U.S. Thunder run, and then imagine camel-packed .50 calibers whacking a truck or two along the MSR, and then beating feat into vehicle-impossible terrain. How's the U.S. gonna hunt them down?

This is of course a very "gamey" response, in that a country worried about getting invaded by the U.S. needs to worry about more than a Stryker brigade backed by the trimmings, bells and whistles. So it's not so easy to have the heavy MGs where the Strykers are.

But that said, it would make more than a little sense for the Syrian, if he were to determine the U.S. was doing an Iraq Invasion Super Light with at least part wheeled APCs, to concentrate his heavy MGs, and further dismount every one he can - they are in any case useless aboard a T-55.

But even a half dozen of the things could do a real number on a Stryker platoon, I think. How many Strykers are there in a brigade? Multiply that by five, and if the Syrians could put many heavy MG crews into sector, I would NOT want to be riding with the Strykers.

[Peter Cairns]

Heres some stuff on the Uk's COBRA Radar, I don't know what the US has.

COBRA is considered to be the world's most advanced weapon location system, comprising a high performance radar, advanced processing and an integrated, flexible command, control and communication system.

The design includes state-of-the-art digital processing and an advanced active, solid -state phased array antenna comprising several thousand transmit/ receive modules based on GaAs-MMIC technology.

The COBRA mission is to locate mortars, rocket launchers and artillery batteries and to provide information for countering their effectiveness. With a detection range of 40 km COBRA is capable of locating and classifying up to 40 batteries in two minutes.

Don't know what they mean by a barrery but it's capable stuff.

undead reindeer cavalry,

The Syrians just won't be able able to deploy there artillery in any meaningful way. They will loose the EW battle before it's strts and to use indirect fire in any useful way they need to be able to quickly and accurately locate a mobile enemy and get that information to a position which can accurately and quickly put down a substantial volume of fire on an opponent.

I'd forget trying and disperse what I can and use it for direct fire, If you are only going to get a couple of shots off you might as well have a decent chance of hitting something.

In a way what the Syrians need to do is abandon large mobile unist and break down to lower level combined arms forces, a sort of low tech Stryker model, with every infantry platoon having a T-55, a D-30, or a quad ZSU.

Keep these spread out hide them and let the US get as close as you can before you open fire.

Peter.

[flamingknives]

I would guess that a battery is a unit of guns between 1 and the maximum number that can concieveably be fired in unison.

Regardless of any strategic and operational considerations, I'm sure that CM:SF quick battles will allow us to set up matchups involving Syrian armour, artillery etc. in a way that htey'd never be capable of in real life.

How many of the CMX1 battles were really representative of what actually happened. 1 in 100? In a five year global war?

[panzermartin]

Originally posted by flamingknives:

Regardless of any strategic and operational considerations, I'm sure that CM:SF quick battles will allow us to set up matchups involving Syrian armour, artillery etc. in a way that htey'd never be capable of in real life.

I certainly hope so...Given the narrow scope of CMSF and BFC's "as realistic as possible" approach, I still have some doubts over the customizing freedom we'll get.

[John Kettler]

Am confused here. How is it I make post after post

on various advanced weapons which are readily available or readily buildable by many people, yet find absolutely zero response to what would be high leverage weapons capable of substantially negating many of the well documented U.S. advantages? Is it that no one else has any awareness or expertise concerning them? Is it that it's too disturbing to contemplate? Impossible to model? I rather doubt I've stunned the lot of you into silence, so why will no one acknowledge the elephant in the room? If I were planning the presumptive attack, you'd better believe I'd be seriously concerned about these matters. Were I the Syrians, I'd be moving heaven and earth to get those capabilities.

Regards,

John Kettler

[John Kettler]

Concerning U.S. countermortar/counterbattery radars,

the former is the TPQ-36, formerly built by Hughes but now Raytheon, and the latter is the TPQ-37, same manufacturer. Both are called Firefinder. They are 70s vintage phased array radars with something like 120 degree sector coverage. IOW, they don't go round and round, but electrically and rapidly scan in sector only. Way back in the late 70s we were told that if artillery fire came from Los Angeles City Hall, the Firefinder could tell us which corner it was. Reaction time was such that a well drilled Firefinder crew tied into a dedicated battery could have the first round out before the incoming fire even landed. www.fas.org may well have additional info, as will other sites.

In this day and age, a "battery" is usually 8 but occasionally 6 guns. Since the guns are typically deployed fairly close together in one of several configurations, the firing of one gun (unless it's a roving gun) gives away the battery's location, and the counterfire (tube artillery with DPICM or MLRS) covers enough area to hit the entire battery. This is the "steel rain" which so terrified the Iraqis in Desert Storm. The Soviet planning factor for receiving counterfire (based on earlier CM/CB tech) used to be 4 minutes. That was no doubt drastically cut following analysis of Desert Storm. A CM/CB radar that can handle 40 batteries is capable of generating 40 separate counterfire aimpoints (to some terrain resolution level (grid ref) X) simultaneously before saturating its processors.

BTW, these radars are jammable and make lovely targets for antiradiation missiles, too, whether launched from the air or the ground.

Regards,

John Kettler

[aka_tom_w]

Originally posted by John Kettler:

Am confused here.

snip

I rather doubt I've stunned the lot of you into silence, so why will no one acknowledge the elephant in the room? If I were planning the presumptive attack, you'd better believe I'd be seriously concerned about these matters. Were I the Syrians, I'd be moving heaven and earth to get those capabilities.

Regards,

John Kettler

I for one am stunned into silence (as contradictory as this post makes that sound. )

The last time I saw an EMP bomb go off was last season, (season 4) on "24". The bad guys didn't want to get caugh with their hand in the cookie jar and the CTU ( and Jack Bower of course) were breathing down their necks to get critical info (for national security reasons of course ) off their corporate servers and hard disks. Low and behold the CTU boys get too close to the "good stuff" and the bad guys let of the EMP in the corporate head office and it FRIES everything electrical for a 10 block radius (including all cell phones) in a Los Angles. BUT thats JUST TV science fiction.

So that was "24" and that show is almost science fiction when it comes to stuff like that so who would think the Syrian's would have an EMP and use it? I would bet dollars to donuts it won't be modeled in ANYWAY in the CMSF game!

BUT in real life the EMP bomb would be a HUGE equalizer for the underdog. But if it was that great why didn't the Iraqui's ever get one or set one off???

This page talks about it but it this article was written in 1998 is it is NOT the most current technology. What is current technology like now I wonder?

This is just a better formated page web page quoting the same article that John originally posted about RF TED's and EMP bombs.

None of these scenarios has happened, of course. But recent hearings before Congress' Joint Economic Committee, or JEC, under the leadership of Chairman James A. Saxton, a New Jersey Republican, raise chilling possibilities of terrorist threats to the national infrastructure using new developments in Radio Frequency, or RF, that could put a Popular Mechanics handyman in the terrorist business. Once considered the Buck Rogers baloney of urban-guerrilla legend, simple, portable RF weapons now are within reach -- and affordable.

. . . . For years, military establishments around the world have spent millions on devices that would generate and focus high-powered microwaves, or HPM, aimed at disrupting the circuits of missiles, aircraft, satellites and command-and-control computers. Using essentially the same principle found in the magnetron of a home microwave oven, these expensive devices generate smooth sine waves tuned to frequencies that can enter a target through its own antenna or gaps in its shielding. Like a home microwave, this produces heat in the target by causing atoms to vibrate against each other, leading to meltdown. Only a national-defense organization could field the teams of experts needed to produce HPM. It's not something to try at home.

. . . . But there is another type of RF weapon that produces a single spike of energy which envelopes the target across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, interrupting the flow of electrons performing computer calculations, and in some cases damaging the microscopic circuits themselves. This one is called a transient electronic device, or TED. There is no tuning to a vulnerable wave length here. The broadband burst attacks indiscriminately, like a radio broadcast that could be heard on every frequency. The phenomenon can be compared to the static electric discharge created by walking across a carpet; indeed, every tinkerer who opens up a computer is specifically warned to discharge any static before touching a circuit board.

[ December 11, 2005, 08:05 PM: Message edited by: aka_tom_w ]

[John Kettler]

aka_tom_w,

EMP bombs seem to be very popular on TV programs lately. Not only did 24 have one, but more recently a very strange looking version (bearing no relation whatsoever to reality) appeared on Threshold, where it was used to eradicate a deadly alien transformational virus, which spread by hearing it, from all electronics in Miami, Florida. The only way I know of to get that radius of effect is to pop a nuke at high altitude. And yes, the web page I posted wasn't pretty. Think I'll go dig up Carlo Copp's Air University paper and post the link.

Regards,

John Kettler