Syrian Artillery

[Sequoia]

I assume the Syrian player will have artillery at times though the fire mission call routine will not be as efficient?

[panzermartin]

Same question here. Will syrian artillery have any effect in CMSF given the counter artillery ability of the us?

Heavy mortars must be in surplus in the syrian inventory so I guess these would do the job, when heavy art is pinned. I still think that in QBs things must be more forgiving for the Syrians, so they could use their heavier art assets regardless of the strategic superiority of the US side. Something like using crack panzergrenadiers and Kingtigers in late CMBB qbs.

[Sergei]

Heavy artillery?

It would seem that the focus of the game would be in a company-or-less level, not the good ol' "Three Infantry Battalions And One Of Tanks Plus The Reserves" battles seen in previous games. At which level having any heavy artillery at all would be very unbalancing.

[MikeyD]

One assumes that what the Syrian army loses in technological sophistication it could make up for in 'home field advantage'. No GPS-assisted targetting available to them but they could very well have plotted-out accurate firing coordinates against logical choke points (intersections. bridges. etc.) weeks If not months or even years in advance. And they could've layed secure land lines for spotters at strategic locations that would be immmune to jamming. In CMx1 terms that means U.S. gets 'crack' spotters, while Syrians get more 'bullseye' pre-plotted target markers.

[ January 29, 2007, 02:02 PM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[Kineas]

Originally posted by Sergei:

Heavy artillery?

It would seem that the focus of the game would be in a company-or-less level, not the good ol' "Three Infantry Battalions And One Of Tanks Plus The Reserves" battles seen in previous games. At which level having any heavy artillery at all would be very unbalancing.

Is it sure? Maybe the scenarios will cover only company sized operations, but the new generation engine itself can handle the multi-battalion battles I suppose...

[Sergei]

Probably so, but I think based on what Steve has said, the focus will be at a lower level than before, at least in CMSF. Not just per campaign, but due to hardware restrictions with the greatly more complex graphics and 1:1 infantrymen most of us won't anyway be able to run anything too big for some time.

Anyway, that's just my interpretation. Back in 1999 CM was also supposed to be played with two companies per side max. - but of course current computers can run vastly larger scenarios (divisional level). But it's not designed for that, it just happens to more or less work (albeit with shortcomings). Kind of like trying to simulate infantry platoon combat with Quake.

With the future plans for >2 player multiplayer games, I'm sure that later on purposely designed features will also be included to better simulate higher level command issues.

This doesn't answer the question about the artillery. Sorry

[Kineas]

Thanks, I knew that the design is oriented to the lower levels, but I didn't know the price for the 1:1 representation was such a setback in scope.

Anyway, we will see how scalable it is.

[Sequoia]

Originally posted by Kineas:

Thanks, I knew that the design is oriented to the lower levels, but I didn't know the price for the 1:1 representation was such a setback in scope.

Anyway, we will see how scalable it is.

The scope for CMX1 was never designed to be multi-battalion.

Anyway, Steve gave us an example of how easy it was to use the artillery interface and how effective U.S. artiilery could be, so we will see it even in company level scenarios. My question is what we could expect to see from the Syrian side.

[Andreas]

From Globalsecurity.org

Syria's artillery capability is significant, as it is armed with 122mm Type 2S1s and 152mm 2S3s. Its towed artillery is comprised mostly of 122mm, 130mm and 152mm weapons. Its multiple rocket launcher inventory consists of Type 63 107mm and BM-21 122mms. According to Anthony Cordesman Syria relies principally on static massed fires and is unable to rapidly shift fires. Accuracy beyond line of site is also lacking as their ability to maneuver and exploit counterbattery radars and targeting systems.

The most survivable weapons systems will be the 2s3 Akatsiya and the 2s1 Gvodzika systems. In any case, Syrian artillery would be at a severe disadvantage to US artillery due to the US forces' ability to combine air/ground strikes for CB work. This to me means that the only lasting support would be for forces that can call on the SP systems linked to above. A force calling on a towed system will have one strike in support, and can then expect to have the towed system wiped out. This also may get them a brief window in which the US player will lose arty support on the battlefield because it will be busy combating Syrian arty. So if the sacrifice is made at the right moment, it could be interesting. Higher quality Syrian forces with access to SP armoured artillery could expect more strikes, maybe with delays for PUFOs.

In general I would expect the US side to have a vastly superior artillery support, but the Syrian side to be able to offer a nasty surprise now and then, especially if the US player gets to sure of himself.

Look for info on the 1991 Gulf War, such as this:

http://www.defencejournal.com/dec99/field-artillery.htm

The below is from Nigel Evans'RA in WW2 site:

However, the big change in the 1990s was again led by the British adopting a new approach to sound-ranging. The microphone base was replaced by several unattended microphone clusters, each cluster had a computer, microphones and meteor sensors, and it produced an accurate bearing to the HB. This and other data were sent automatically to a plotting centre where they were automatically collated to produce the HB location and further analysed. This prototype system, HALO, performed well in the Balkans and was subsequently replaced by an even more sophisticated one that was used in Iraq in 2003, reportedly locating Iraqi batteries at over 50km distance.

What this means is that you don't need your CB chaps up front anymore, they can be a bit behind, and you have a dedicated strike weapon at the ready to engage any artillery foolish enough to open up. As a general rule, I would expect any towed Syrian piece to get as many rounds off as it can in the time it takes for rounds coming back by the CB strike to reach it. SP may do better, if they are smart. I have no way of telling whether they are.

All the best

Andreas

[Peter Cairns]

Andreas,

However given that the CM:SF scenario gives the Syrians six months to prepare, there is the possibility that they could put in place there own dispersed sound ranging system.

This would see them hide smallish groups of towed artillery in probably urban locations, with the role of quickly striking US artillery.

The microphones would be prepositioned near forward forces well in advance using GPS and linked to a computer with the job of locating US artillery used in support of an attack.

This way towed artillery that wouldn't be expected to last long, could be used effectively to counter US artillery.

If the Towed batteries were to be located in key towns or cities they could be either targeted for a specific advance, or linked to a series of preset microphone clusters being able to switch to attack a target from any one.

The other possible if we are talking ranges up to 50km, is a national network with SSM's tied in to it. At 185,000km2 Syrian could in theory be covered by a couple of hundred microphone stations.

( say 25km radius, 1,800km2 area each, so thats 100 to cover 180,000km2).

Peter.

[Peter Cairns]

Such a national system would of course be made up of something like 5,000 Microphones masts of which only 250 would be real, but to take it out the US would need to target them all, in a classic shell game.

Peter.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

Andreas,

However given that the CM:SF scenario gives the Syrians six months to prepare, there is the possibility that they could put in place there own dispersed sound ranging system.

This would see them hide smallish groups of towed artillery in probably urban locations, with the role of quickly striking US artillery.

The microphones would be prepositioned near forward forces well in advance using GPS and linked to a computer with the job of locating US artillery used in support of an attack.

This way towed artillery that wouldn't be expected to last long, could be used effectively to counter US artillery.

If the Towed batteries were to be located in key towns or cities they could be either targeted for a specific advance, or linked to a series of preset microphone clusters being able to switch to attack a target from any one.

The other possible if we are talking ranges up to 50km, is a national network with SSM's tied in to it. At 185,000km2 Syrian could in theory be covered by a couple of hundred microphone stations.

( say 25km radius, 1,800km2 area each, so thats 100 to cover 180,000km2).

Peter.

I doubt their artillery would be up to the job, even assuming they get the ranging system right, which is a heroic assumption.

US artillery seems to be heavily relying on MLRS for CB work, to balance out lack of ranging precision with blanketing of fire. The Syrians can not do that. The US can just PUFO their artillery somewhat after firing, since all of it is mobile. It is also fully armoured, again reducing the effectiveness of CB - i.e. you pretty much need a close hit to do serious damage.

Pre-positioning is only doing so much, too. If the US artillery happens to be outside the firing arc of the Syrian towed guns, they will likely not be able to adjust quickly enough to engage before the target has PUFO'd.

Syrian CB will have some successes, but it is unlikely to be more than a speedbump, in my view.

Also remember that if the system worked, the US could just turn off GPS, or scramble it in the region. They can then rely on radar CB, which the Syrians can not (any CB radar will be in HARM's way, if you excuse the pun).

All the best

Andreas

[Peter Cairns]

I see no reason why the syrians can't make it work, they have been capable of sound ranging for decades like everyone else, and neither GPS, networking or using laptops seems beyond them.

As to arc of fire, it just requires discipline. If it's out of range and out of arc, you hold your fire until it is.

It's true all US artillery is highly mobile and can "Shoot and Scoot", but that doesn't mean it does or will.

I doubt if during OIF, when the US troops were being given coveringfire and support from 155mm , that the guns were shifting position after three or four shots, as by the first few days they would have got used to there being little or no Iraqi CB fire.

Peter.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

I see no reason why the syrians can't make it work, they have been capable of sound ranging for decades like everyone else, and neither GPS, networking or using laptops seems beyond them.

Traditional sound ranging is nowhere near those accuracies and ranges. It is the difference between you playing air guitar and Mark Knopfler. In any case, the Syrians would be up sh*t creek if the US turned off their GPS, unless they have their own system (which they don't). General GPS which they have until it is turned off is not as good in any case, which reinforces their problem about thickness of fire. I also suggest you get some more information about the difference between general and military GPS. Guess which one the Syrians can access:

http://tycho.usno.navy.mil/gpsinfo.html

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

As to arc of fire, it just requires discipline. If it's out of range and out of arc, you hold your fire until it is.

Which restricts the number of opportunities, compared to the US commander, who can also call on air support to carry out CB fire.

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

It's true all US artillery is highly mobile and can "Shoot and Scoot", but that doesn't mean it does or will.

They will if there is anything like a real threat.

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

I doubt if during OIF, when the US troops were being given coveringfire and support from 155mm , that the guns were shifting position after three or four shots, as by the first few days they would have got used to there being little or no Iraqi CB fire.

Peter.

See above.

My point is that Syrian CB has no chance at all to come anywhere near the devastating effect that US CB has demonstrated in 1991 and, one presumes, again in 2003. My point is not that the Syrians should have no CB at all.

All the best

Andreas

[Andreas]

To recap - Syrian CB is going to be:

a) Less powerful due to lack of MLRS capability on the same scale as the US - it appears that the best they have is the BM-21 Grad, which should be fairly useless against armour?

Less accurate due to lack of military GPS

c) Delivered by one mode only, ground artillery

d) Less effective even if on target due to the nature of US artillery pieces, which are highly mobile, and armoured.

All the best

Andreas

[Peter Cairns]

They don't need GPS,

They use peacetime GPS to position the microphones and the pre survey artillery positions and then they don't need it.

If you know where all the microphones are and the wind speed and air pressure at each, then all you need to do is digitally check that the sound is the same for each microphone and compare the times of arrival.

Depending on the arrival times to each microphone after the first, you can triangulate on the firing position, the more microphones the better the accuracy.

Oh and I don't know if the Syrians have them yet by Russia exports these.

SETS OF 152mm ROUNDS WITH 3RB30

SW AND VSW JAMMER PROJECTILE

(Joint Russian-Bulgarian development)

Round designations:

- 3VRB38 (with long-range propelling charge);

- 3VRB37 (with full propelling charge);

- 3VRB36 (with reduced propelling charge).

The rounds are intended for firing from D-20, 2S3M, 2A65

and 2S19 artillery systems to disrupt enemy command and

control at tactical level by jamming SW and VSW radio communications

facilities.

Peter.

[Andreas]

Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

If you know where all the microphones are and the wind speed and air pressure at each, then all you need to do is digitally check that the sound is the same for each microphone and compare the times of arrival.

Then all you need is the US arty to position themselves so that you get a good measurement.

And hope they are not jamming your comms, otherwise you won't get much info from the microphones.

And hope that the microphones and stations you deployed are all up and working, regardless of when you last checked them.

And get direct hits with your artillery, each time.

But even if all this is the case, your CB system will still be a long way from what the Americans fire at you in return.

All the best

Andreas

[Andreas]

BTW - I know how CB works, so don't worry about explaining the basics to me.

All the best

Andreas

[Battlefront.com]

It can be expected that Syrian artillery, like Iraqi artillery, would be more of an instrument of harassment rather than destruction. US counter battery technology and training is quite good. Even in Gulf War One the addage was "the Iraqis can fire any gun they like any time they like. But only once".

We are not at all into giving the Syrians capabilities that are not likely within their capabilities. And by that I mean no fanciful "what if they did this" sort of thing. The Syrians have, in many ways, a backwards military with backwards technology and backwards leadership. Expecting them to have large scale innovations like microphoning the countryside is too much of a stretch of the imagination.

Having some sort of hightech round, that is known to be in production and known to be effective, is a matter of finding some sort of evidence that they have it. I've come upon no evidence to suggest that they have anything other than standard, run of the mill artillery capabilities. We are not interested in changing that just for the heck of it.

In short, the Syrian artillery will be a nasty surprise to US forces when encountered. If the US commander (i.e. player) is not very good and/or unlucky, the artillery could hurt quite a bit. But it's not the sort of thing that is going to give the Syrians an edge all on its own. It would have to be followed up by some good defensive tactics.

Lastly, a reminder about the experience in Iraq. During the early phases of OIF the Iraqi artillery performed very poorly. Even though they could have had the massive towed artillery prepositioned and covering obvious advance routes, more often than not that didn't happen. And when they did fire their fire was often inaccurate and ineffective. Then it was either silenced or bypassed. I see no reason to expect much more than that from the Syrians.

Steve

[Peter Cairns]

Steve,

I pretty much agree with all of that.

I don't for a minute expect the likes of Syria to build a national sound ranging system, my point was that as what you might term "High Street" as opposed to "High" technology proliferates, things like sound ranging which only a decade ago wer seen as both complex and obsolete, can come back in to play.

It's one of the reasons the US has quite rightly moved away from

towed artillery.

It's slow, labour intensive and potentailly very vulnerable. The fact that the Iraqi's didn't and the Syrians probably wouldn't be able to exploit that vulnerability doesn't mean it isn't there.

Peter.

[civdiv]

Originally posted by Andreas:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Peter Cairns:

Andreas,

However given that the CM:SF scenario gives the Syrians six months to prepare, there is the possibility that they could put in place there own dispersed sound ranging system.

This would see them hide smallish groups of towed artillery in probably urban locations, with the role of quickly striking US artillery.

The microphones would be prepositioned near forward forces well in advance using GPS and linked to a computer with the job of locating US artillery used in support of an attack.

This way towed artillery that wouldn't be expected to last long, could be used effectively to counter US artillery.

If the Towed batteries were to be located in key towns or cities they could be either targeted for a specific advance, or linked to a series of preset microphone clusters being able to switch to attack a target from any one.

The other possible if we are talking ranges up to 50km, is a national network with SSM's tied in to it. At 185,000km2 Syrian could in theory be covered by a couple of hundred microphone stations.

( say 25km radius, 1,800km2 area each, so thats 100 to cover 180,000km2).

Peter.

I doubt their artillery would be up to the job, even assuming they get the ranging system right, which is a heroic assumption.

US artillery seems to be heavily relying on MLRS for CB work, to balance out lack of ranging precision with blanketing of fire. The Syrians can not do that. The US can just PUFO their artillery somewhat after firing, since all of it is mobile. It is also fully armoured, again reducing the effectiveness of CB - i.e. you pretty much need a close hit to do serious damage.

Pre-positioning is only doing so much, too. If the US artillery happens to be outside the firing arc of the Syrian towed guns, they will likely not be able to adjust quickly enough to engage before the target has PUFO'd.

Syrian CB will have some successes, but it is unlikely to be more than a speedbump, in my view.

Also remember that if the system worked, the US could just turn off GPS, or scramble it in the region. They can then rely on radar CB, which the Syrians can not (any CB radar will be in HARM's way, if you excuse the pun).

All the best

Andreas </font>

[civdiv]

Originally posted by Battlefront.com:

It can be expected that Syrian artillery, like Iraqi artillery, would be more of an instrument of harassment rather than destruction. US counter battery technology and training is quite good. Even in Gulf War One the addage was "the Iraqis can fire any gun they like any time they like. But only once".

We are not at all into giving the Syrians capabilities that are not likely within their capabilities. And by that I mean no fanciful "what if they did this" sort of thing. The Syrians have, in many ways, a backwards military with backwards technology and backwards leadership. Expecting them to have large scale innovations like microphoning the countryside is too much of a stretch of the imagination.

Having some sort of hightech round, that is known to be in production and known to be effective, is a matter of finding some sort of evidence that they have it. I've come upon no evidence to suggest that they have anything other than standard, run of the mill artillery capabilities. We are not interested in changing that just for the heck of it.

In short, the Syrian artillery will be a nasty surprise to US forces when encountered. If the US commander (i.e. player) is not very good and/or unlucky, the artillery could hurt quite a bit. But it's not the sort of thing that is going to give the Syrians an edge all on its own. It would have to be followed up by some good defensive tactics.

Lastly, a reminder about the experience in Iraq. During the early phases of OIF the Iraqi artillery performed very poorly. Even though they could have had the massive towed artillery prepositioned and covering obvious advance routes, more often than not that didn't happen. And when they did fire their fire was often inaccurate and ineffective. Then it was either silenced or bypassed. I see no reason to expect much more than that from the Syrians.

Steve

I read one account during Gulf War I that the Iraqis accurately targeted the Marine breaches of the berms to the south in Kuwait, but only after about 45 minutes, IIRC. They held up the follow-on forces for about 15 minutes as CAS and CB murdered their arty. After that Iraqi arty was not a factor.

Currently, I would assume the US is very adept at CBR (Counter Battery Radar) aquisitions and response, especially with GMLRS. Does Syria, like Egypt had during the '73 battle, have a string of semi-permanent SAM sites?

[Battlefront.com]

Peter,

It's slow, labour intensive and potentailly very vulnerable. The fact that the Iraqi's didn't and the Syrians probably wouldn't be able to exploit that vulnerability doesn't mean it isn't there.

No argument there, but when we start going down that route there are all sorts of vulnerabilities inherent within the US military that could be exploited. The ones that require the least coordination, such as firing a sholder launched missile at a helo or putting an IED along an advance route, are the ones that are more practical. And since they are more practical they are almost by definition more effective.

As for "High Street" thinking I think you've got it backwards. Trying to get a miniscule possible advantage out of monstorous system that consumes large amounts of treasure is a bad idea no matter how clever it might be. If I were in charge of remaking the Syrian military I would get rid of all heavy weapons and armored vehicles. I would take all the resources that are completely wasted on such things and plow them into training, high tech small weapons, decentralized command, and lots and lots and lots of weapons caches. All the high tech weapons in the US would be rendered largely ineffective, thereby leveling the playing field in a way no amount of microphones ever could

CivDiv,

Does Syria, like Egypt had during the '73 battle, have a string of semi-permanent SAM sites?

Yes, in the mountains near Lebanon and Turkey. This is also reportedly where their WMDs are. The sites are built into the mountains themselves and are thought to be largely untouchable. I think it is things like this that have another round of bunker buster bombs in the works.

Steve

[Andreas]

Originally posted by civdiv:

One caveate; it is not all armored. Neither Airborne nor Marine forces have armored artillery. It is solely towed. But agreed, the bulk is armored.

Thanks for this correction. Good thing they are presumably not modelled in the first module then.

All the best

Andreas

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Finns have only a few self-propelled artillery pieces and absolutely massive number of towed arty. partly this is because of economic realities - we need massive arty firepower to counter Russian military (we have more arty than UK, Germany and France combined) and simply can't afford it all to be self-propelled - but partly it's because modern technologies allow different approaches to counterbattery survivability.

the Finnish approach is that the crucial part in modern CB survivability is the ability to disperse and scatter guns widely within a battery and still easily use previously unused firing positions. this requires modern artillery fire control systems but it does not require guns to be self-propelled. the idea is that wide gun dispersion, together with the capability to use any location without extensive prepartions, makes enemy counterbattery fires highly ineffective because you are giving him a great number of worthless targets to process & he can't concentrate his fire while you still can concentrate yours. enemy counterbattery fires are likely to result in just harassing fires that do not reduce operational capability of entire batteries.

one of the largest Syrian investments has been into modern artillery fire control systems so i suspect they plan to use the same approach as Finns. of course it's questionable how well they get it to work but i wouldn't flatly rule out Syrian capability to sustain concentrated artillery fires just because the invaders have CB capability.