A WW2 fan's guide to the CM:SF setting

[GSX]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

Body armour isn't a "must have" though, Steve.

I still have to wonder; if someone is shot in the body armour, is it not possible they would still be evacuated through the casualty chain? What is the SOP in situations like that? Does the guy just walk it off? Get checked by the medics for evidence of internal injuries?

I would disagree, body armour is a must have for anyone in Iraq. The same would go for Syria. As for stopping a round, it all depends on where you are hit I suppose, if it hits in the ceramic plate, all well and good, elsewhere, maybe all well but not that good.

[Colin]

The AK-74 which would probably be used more commonly in a 2007 Syrian Army The AK-47 featured the short 7.62x39mm round that leaves the gun at about 700M/sec. The 74 uses a 5.45x39mm (I've heard it's actually 5.62mm). It leaves the gun at 900/m second and has much better penetrating tendencies then the AK-47 does because it has a better flight.

The 47 is noted for having a heavy round that dropped off after 300 meters limiting accuracy as well as having a large left kick. None of those problems in the 74.

The other weapons that could be Syrian use these rounds:

RPK : 7.62x39mm

RPK-74 : 5.45 x 39mm

AKS-74 (SMG style): 5.45mmx39mm

PK and PKS (GPMGs) use a full 7.62 x 54R have a muzzle velocity at least a 100m/s faster then the AK-47 does.

I believe they could also have AN-94's.

[ October 20, 2005, 09:23 AM: Message edited by: Colin ]

[M Hofbauer]

while I do commend fytinghellfish for his idea and effort and although any comparisons are always a stretch, some of these I wanted to comment on without wanting to belittle fytinghellfish's original idea or execution thereof:

the main general difference to WW II equipment that is not mentioned is the capability of some of these vehicles to operate under adverse weather or night conditions (note how even the T-55 has an active IR searchlight) with very varying capability.

T-55

one of the most notable thing about the PzIVD was its pronounced choice of different ammo types; this is not the case with the T-55.

the T-55 indeed has the least powerful gun of all MBTs shown here, but still a flanking T-55 somehow ending up firing its D-10 100mm main gun at an Abrams' rear end would ruin the day for the US player (I would -despite all uncertainties- still rate it with at least 400mm AP at close range)

on the other end, I would *not* compare the

T-80

to an IS-2. Not only is the T-80 much more mobile.

It does also not share the IS-2's distinct features of heavy armor combined with a huge gun with very limited ammo.

The armor of the T-80 is only mediocre; it uses the *same* 2A46 125mm main gun as the T-72's / "T-34/85" (85mm compared to 122mm) gun;

the main point, however, which prompted my whole posting was this statement:

Probably the only tank capable of going toe-to-toe with an M-1 and, if not winning, surviving.

- it's the other way around. ONLY if the T-80 will win against the M1, it will survive. It's not like it can absorb punishment (like an IS-2) and limp away with it. I would think of it more like a late Pz IV or a Sherman Firefly in that regard, it has a potent weapon but only limited protection: It either kills, or it gets killed.

Acc. to m,y information the T-80 does not fire the AT-10 but the AT-11 (AT-10 is used on BMP-3 and respectively equipped T-55s); the ability to fire ATGMs is not unique to the T-80; AT-11 is also fired from respective T-72s.

the BRDM-2 has better cross-country ability and is generally more mobile than a Sd.Kfz.222; its 14.5mm however makes a comparison to the White Scout's 50cal more fitting than to the 222's 2cm KwK.

The BTR-60 is a bit more durable than an M3 HT, faster, and able to return fire from a protected turret. Amphibious (goes for BRDM-2, too)(doubt that this will matter a lot in Syria ;o) )

The BMP-1 is no 251/9 at all. Its foremost an IFV/APC, not a support weapon. More ammo, less HE punch, better AT-capability.

apparently, the Syrian army even had some direct WW II vehicles left in their arsenal at least up until the late eighties, beside T-34 SP Arty versions namely our well-known ISU-122 and ISU-152 SP artillery of CMBB fame. Not sure about their current state, guess they have finally been phased out.

[M Hofbauer]

Originally posted by fytinghellfish:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Sergei:

Is this the modern warfare fan's guid to the WW2 setting, all of a sudden? :confused:

I was going to ask a question - what kind of protection against an AK-47 does the current US infantry body armour provide? Does the chest armour stop a 7.62mm bullet from all ranges? And helmets?

Helmets and combat vehicle crewman helmets have been proven to stop the 7.62mm Warsaw Pact rounds. Likewise for the Interceptor body armor, which uses ceramic plates. There are many, many instances of soldiers taking a round or two to the chest and getting right back up. I can also provide a video of a soldier being shot and jumping right back up.

I don't know about specific ranges, but from what I know about combat over there, it's very likely that the helmets and body armor can stop rounds fired from as close as 50m. </font>

[hellfish]

Dude, you're trying to prove your grogness, aren't you?

[M Hofbauer]

Originally posted by fytinghellfish:

Dude, you're trying to prove your grogness, aren't you?

I am grog, only spelt backwards.

Or sumfink.

Or rather, BTS fix or do sumfink.

[Colin]

thank you for the discussion, very informative either way.

I am versed in WW2 but only know modern small arms.

[Wendigo]

Quick note. There are few different things when considering capability to penetrate body armor. If it was as simple(!) as with tank rounds.

There is caliber of the bullet which affects the pressure that bullet generates against armor. Smaller diameter --> more pressure --> better penetration. Energy of the bullet which is not only affected by the weight and velocity but the energy retention capabilities of it. Slow heavy bullets (7.62 in general) keep their energy better than modern light fast bullets. The shape of the bullet affects penetration but it can pretty safely be assumed that with rifle bullets there aren't enough variety to affect thing. Round nosed pistol bullets are different thing.

Then there is the armor itself. Typically multiple layers of modern aramidtype fiber with ceramic plates on top to shatter bullets and to spread the energy to much larger area in lower layers. Because of this the structure and material of the bullet affects the equation too. It makes big difference whether bullet is lead/steel/DU/tungsten and if it is jacketed/hollow-point/solid/hollow. As the plates don't cover the whole area of the armor the physics change totally when the bullet hits straight to "soft" materials.

Then there is of course the normal effects of angle which may change awfully lot depending on

the posture of the person wearing the armor.

The basics however remain the same however. Typically the best penetrator is thin, long, heavy projectile moving with very high velocity (APDS anyone?). Everything else is compromise

[flamingknives]

Ceramics, on top of damaging the bullets, fail in a cone with the base on the reverse of the armour. This not only distributes the energy of the projectile over a wider area, but the energy required to get through is somewhat increased => there is less energy to hurt the chap hiding behind the armour.

Of course, tank armour these days is no less complicated.

[mmtt]

One of the best websites for modern warfare is probably http://www.g2mil.com

While you may disagree with opinions expressed by its editor, it's always to the point and interesting. It addresses modern warfare in general from new weaponry to manpower management.

Some good articles are perhaps now a bit old and only accessible to subscribers. I remember it was once linked here for information on the M1A2 upgrades.

The editor online book is also interesting: http://g2mil.com/war.htm. Depends if you are really interested and wants to know more about it.

It's obviously note the only source, globalsecurity is also very nice, but it gives some nice inputs.

[John Kettler]

mmtt,

Fascinating site! For grins and giggles I speed read the V-22 Osprey OpEval piece. Call me appalled, and that's from someone who thinks the Tilt Rotor's

an exciting machine.

Regards,

John Kettler

[flamingknives]

The V22 piece is interesting, although it does show some significant bias against the Osprey.

What really gets me is that in the effort to so trample the V22 program into the mush, the congressmen pick up some really tenuous stuff.

CONGRESSMEN: Your report also notes that when the V-22's engines are up and it sits on deck for a few minutes, the deck begins to "buckle" as it blows extremely hot engine exhaust directly on the deck, which is also a serious safety hazard. These decks are made of steel, don't you mean melt?

DUMA: I don't know, experts are looking at the problem.

CONGRESSMEN: These problems arose after just a few days of V-22 shipboard operations, and your report noted they happened during previous shipboard testing with the V-22. I've never heard of melted steel fixing itself. Don't these indentations on the flight deck cause serious safety problems, especially for Harriers that use rolling take-offs?

If you'll pardon my pseudo-French, this chap is a fecking idjit.

Obviously he has not heard of thermal expansion of metal, which would cause buckling, which would probably 'fix itself' once cooled, provided that it had not been overheated. Being that a cursory search reveals that Steel melts at in excess of 1200 degrees celsius. If the exhaust was that hot it would melt the engine and probably be lethal to everyone on the flight deck.

The rest of the testing etc seems somewhat worrying, but I have to expose that piece of crass ignorance.

Also worth noting is that the majority of the KPP targets do not seem to be official, but taken from sales literature some years old.

Finally, there's the repeated misspelling of 'extrapolate' as "explorate" what's up with that?

[undead reindeer cavalry]

Originally posted by M Hofbauer:

the T-55 indeed has the least powerful gun of all MBTs shown here, but still a flanking T-55 somehow ending up firing its D-10 100mm main gun at an Abrams' rear end would ruin the day for the US player (I would -despite all uncertainties- still rate it with at least 400mm AP at close range)

Syrians have modernized some 200 of their T-55s. the modernized T-55 should perform better than any of the other undermodernized Syrian tanks: they could actually spot the enemy & hit it. it should do fine against Abram's sides, so penetration-wise a battle between these two should be a bit like a battle between a Panther and a T-34/76.

[Thomm]

Originally posted by flamingknives:

Obviously he has not heard of thermal expansion of metal, which would cause buckling, ...

Well OBVIOUSLY!

But it seems that neither has this Duma person!

Do you think the average citizen has any concept of buckling due to thermal expansion?!

But I like that line very much myself!

Best regards,

Thomm

[flamingknives]

D'oh! I forget myself.

But then the congressman is using 'common knowledge' to strengthen his case. He's looking at an engineering report and making conclusions he has no capacity or right to make.

But then, as an engineer and working in this field, I get tetchy about people taking liberties with that sort of thing.

And you're quite right. Duma doesn't understand it either. But is it his job too? Most engineering reports only expect managers (which I imagine Duma is, as he also seems to be responsible for F22 and BMD projects) to read the summary and possibly the conclusions. The congressmen skimming through the technical aspects should be talking to the engineers about their concerns, or Duma should have had some of the engineers with him.

I think, however, that the average citizen probably understands more than you might think about thermal expansion. A few examples from everyday life, including the 'popular facts' that are often thrown around.

* Concorde and the SR71 Blackbird grow during flight due to air resistance induced heating.

* Roadways, especially bridges, and large concrete slabs must have expansion joints to prevent them cracking in the heat.

* Put a thin baking tray in the oven and it will buckle.

* Tie rods used to hold the wals of old buildings together are heated, put into place, and then allowed to cool. the contraction pulls the walls together.

But, yes, the average Joe on the street might not know any different. Which is why I commented.

[mmtt]

Well obviously you could point out in a mail to the editor those particular mistakes. Mind you, though, G2mil is a long time target for Osprey fanclub members: http://www.g2mil.com/June2002Letters.htm

G2mil usually voices its opinions in a loud manner, which might offend some people, especially defense contractors . I find it refreshing that, contrary to most magazines that just copy and paste the technical specs of an aicraft/tank/ or whatever high tech stuff it is. I grow bored of the usual high tech propaganda stuff you read most of the time (Commanche, F-22, Digital Land Warrior, Osprey...).

Moreover, the whole hearing is made up, the point is to clearly underline in a funny way the inherent weaknesses of the V-22 Osprey that really should be taken care of before it endangers more good marines.

Btw: If you mean idiot in French, it's spelled idiot. And excuse my english, I'm French.

[flamingknives]

Moreover, the whole hearing is made up, the point is to clearly underline in a funny way the inherent weaknesses of the V-22 Osprey that really should be taken care of before it endangers more good marines.

Oops, speed-reading isn't good as I missed that bit.

That really makes it worse, as the whole "conversation" is then a massive extrapolation, or "exploration" if you will, of wild conjecture. It's also gross insult to the engineers designing the thing.

The pseudo-French bit is to cover for the insult, just as when people use proper swearing (in English) they say "pardon my French." As it wasn't proper swearing then it's pseudo-French. Clear?

Unfortunately I don't know enough French curses, as otherwise I'd do an amusing skit about what I would call such a person if I were cursing in French.

[mmtt]

Originally posted by flamingknives:

Oops, speed-reading isn't good as I missed that bit.

That really makes it worse, as the whole "conversation" is then a massive extrapolation, or "exploration" if you will, of wild conjecture. It's also gross insult to the engineers designing the thing.

The pseudo-French bit is to cover for the insult, just as when people use proper swearing (in English) they say "pardon my French." As it wasn't proper swearing then it's pseudo-French. Clear?

Unfortunately I don't know enough French curses, as otherwise I'd do an amusing skit about what I would call such a person if I were cursing in French.

Arhh, none offense taken about French (I'm so used to French bashing that I don't really care about it anyway, if you feared that I felt that way) and btw I think the exploration/extrapolate stuff is also intended as a quotation, not the author mistake.

The conversation in itself is a "wild conjecture" but most arguments remain valid, nonetheless.

Example: a limited payload inferior to cargo choppers while it requires much more space and is much more expensive and not faster. Do you really see the point for such an aircraft? These are not G2mil inventions but facts. And I'm not even talking about risks and lack of defensive capability. I do not say that VTOL aircraft are bad, but V-22 Osprey seems to me ill-suited to its tasks.

I never said that G2mil was the reference of modern warfare but it is very different from what one can read, and most of the times interesting. But I agree that some people may find that kind of made up "jokes" not really suited. To each his own hey?

The Commanche was also "trashed" by G2mil but well... it seems it was cancelled. Maybe G2mil wasn't too wrong about it?

[flamingknives]

Interesting. Their editor doesn't take too kindly to critisicm.

[TufenHuden]

Forgot the T-90 and the Black Eagle

tank......

[flamingknives]

But Syria doesn't operate the T90 or Black Eagle...