John Kettler Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 Found this while trying to answer a question on the CMAK Forum and thought you'd be fascinated by this here, especially the part of the M203 in MOUT and what some countries are doing with rifle grenades these days. http://www.combatreform.com/riflehandgrenades.htm Regards, John Kettler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hellfish Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 combatreform.com is to sanity like what the Westboro Baptist Church is to Ghandi. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kettler Posted April 19, 2008 Author Share Posted April 19, 2008 fytinghellfish, I found the discussions there most interesting, whereas what you posted is incomprehensible. Perhaps by design? Regards, John Kettler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scipio Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 John, if you enjoy the 'Combat Reform' website as a whole and have really no idea what's wrong with it, then you shouldn't waste any further thoughts about other people's opinion. Don't bother yourself with colliding worlds The articel about riflegrenades has, BTW, some very interesting informations. :cool: [ April 19, 2008, 12:54 AM: Message edited by: Scipio ] 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kettler Posted April 19, 2008 Author Share Posted April 19, 2008 Scipio, It turned up while I was hunting for some accounts of the U.S. AT rifle grenades in action. Had never seen or heard of it before then. What impressed me was the quality discussion by people who've seen the elephant and/or are professionally involved. I think if I joined the dozen or so military topic discussion groups listed on the main site (one on the Stryker and none to happy with it), I might never see daylight again. While that would doubtless make my critics happy, it would seriously cut into other things I want to do, like WineCape's still on Ultimate ROW. Regards, John Kettler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisND Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 Man, I've never seen a website with so many broken links. I particularily liked how they called themselves 1st Tactical Studies Group (Airborne). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SgtMuhammed Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 John, Just because a guy has been shot at doesn't make him an expert. Ask 100 combat vets about equipment and they will give you 100 "expert" opinions on how crapy/wonderful it is. The combat reform site is the guy that has convinced himself that the M113 was called the Gavin and is the ultimate fighting vehicle. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cool breeze Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 I would really love to eventually see in CMx2 a model of the very interesting force he describes. He describes a future USA force deployed by container ship or c-113s and cargo 747s made of mechanized infantry and light heavily armed tanks. The infantry are all heavily armed with very accurate powerful HE via rifle grenades, rockets and missiles. They are carried in strongly upgraded m-113s. The m-113s have hybrid engines and band tracks (hi-tech plastic metal tracks) So that they can go 60mph on roads really far and maneuver over mud. They They have ballistic glass added to the inside and variable bolt on armor outside. Atop is a remote fired stabilized 30mm or similar. And they all have long range close air support via terminally guided recoilless rifles. They entrench hard and fast with back hoes. To make heavy bases they use the shipping containers to support dirt walls which they turn into concrete by spraying it. I think I just summed the force he argues we should adopt so that we have a behind enemy lines force in addition to our heavier elements. It seems like his is a good idea and I don't accept ad hominem arguments against it. My experience in CM:Shock Force argues that his HE increasing and decentralizing plans are good and that the protection from HE is become more and more important. It make sense that we need powerful fighting vehicles that can go any where the foot soldiers go. The m-113 seems like a good choice because of the expensive I read 4 inch thick aluminum armor 14 person capacity and 12 tons as equipped without the upgrades. And we have 80,000 of em. Oh, he also says we should quit driving on the roads and hitting mines and carry our supplies cross country and on field cement and not live in the cities. Mike Sparks is clearly not a good spokesperson with all the disrespect he gets but his basic ideas seem solid to me. I want to see them in action. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisND Posted April 19, 2008 Share Posted April 19, 2008 Originally posted by cool breeze: I would really love to eventually see in CMx2 a model of the very interesting force he describes. He describes a future USA force deployed by container ship or c-113s and cargo 747s made of mechanized infantry and light heavily armed tanks. The infantry are all heavily armed with very accurate powerful HE via rifle grenades, rockets and missiles. They are carried in strongly upgraded m-113s. The m-113s have hybrid engines and band tracks (hi-tech plastic metal tracks) So that they can go 60mph on roads really far and maneuver over mud. They They have ballistic glass added to the inside and variable bolt on armor outside. Atop is a remote fired stabilized 30mm or similar. And they all have long range close air support via terminally guided recoilless rifles. They entrench hard and fast with back hoes. To make heavy bases they use the shipping containers to support dirt walls which they turn into concrete by spraying it. I think I just summed the force he argues we should adopt so that we have a behind enemy lines force in addition to our heavier elements. It seems like his is a good idea and I don't accept ad hominem arguments against it. My experience in CM:Shock Force argues that his HE increasing and decentralizing plans are good and that the protection from HE is become more and more important. It make sense that we need powerful fighting vehicles that can go any where the foot soldiers go. The m-113 seems like a good choice because of the expensive I read 4 inch thick aluminum armor 14 person capacity and 12 tons as equipped without the upgrades. And we have 80,000 of em. Oh, he also says we should quit driving on the roads and hitting mines and carry our supplies cross country and on field cement and not live in the cities. Mike Sparks is clearly not a good spokesperson with all the disrespect he gets but his basic ideas seem solid to me. I want to see them in action. Paragraphs are a solid idea too. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kettler Posted April 20, 2008 Author Share Posted April 20, 2008 SgtMuhammed, I have no vested interest in the site, nor do I disagree with your fundamental point about opinions. I thought that what was said about the level of training on the M203 and its usefulness in MOUT was worthwhile to know, but that's not the same as endorsing the site owner's entire agenda. I did some spot checking, though, in the Stryker stuff and found the global "going" map of interest. Regards, John Kettler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
luderbamsen Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 cool breeze, Hint: As Normal Dude implied: Paragraphs are your friend. OK, subject matter at hand: combatreform.com and Mike "Sparky" Sparks. Seriously, the guy is a loon. A combination of ignorance, lack of common sense, and far too much time on his hands. "Battleboxes"? It's not like using standard ISO containers to move military equipment is some sort of revolutionary secret. Everybody already does it, today. It's not a coincidence that a 20ft container will fit in a C-130. Enhanced strategic mobility (i.e. getting troops and equipment to the theater of operations faster) is something that has very much been on the minds of military thinkers since before the end of the cold war. In fact, the most prominent (and expensive) current US Army programme is the Future Combat Systems intended specifically to create an air portable mechanised force not unlike Sparky's "AirMech" ideas. Ever since airborne/airmobile forces were used in earnest (i.e. during WW2), everyone have been acutely aware of their limitations, lacking both heavy weapons, armour protection and mechanised mobility. The helicopter, with its relatively limited lift capacity hasn't really changed that equasion. Sparky and combatreform.com hasn't invented or discovered anything, just stated the blatantly obvious. And of course, then the film snaps completely: The only solution, according to Sparky, is the M113 "Gavin" *sigh* and ISO containers, and everyone even considering another solution are either stupid or gay, or both. Somehow, because the M113 is already in the inventory, modifying always simple, quick and cheap, not matter how extensively it is redesigned. It can do anything you ask of it and it always works. If only reality was like that... (trust me, it isn't) Sparky "argues" (in the most obscenely loose meaning of the term) how all other systems are hopelessly flawed. That is, if anything that he dislikes has failed or shown any flaws, just once, it is "conclusive, irrefutable evidence" (again, please don't confuse Sparky's rantings with reality) that it has never worked and never will. Of course, such criteria does not apply to his own inventions: He comes up with a "modernisation programme" for the CH-54 Tarhe. When Sparky is the inventor, turning a half-a-century (yes, century) old chopper into a futuristic helicopter/fixed wing hybrid with superior performance is not a problem: Just add wings and turbofans. Hey, if he can glue together a plastic model, then doing it in real life should be a piece of cake, right? Again, if only real life was that simple... Basically, Sparky isn't particularly knowledgeable, nor very bright (it sounds nicer than saying he's ignorant and stupid, but it's the same thing). Not knowing any better, he thinks his own ideas are brilliant and never before thought of. And not having the wits to distinguish between opinion and fact, any doubts raised about his ideas is considered a personal attack, and he responds in kind. Which leads to the (for him) natural conclusion that the fact that his ideas haven't been implemented by the US military ages ago is evidence of criminal negligence. Or the short version: He's an idiot. [ April 21, 2008, 06:03 AM: Message edited by: luderbamsen ] 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exel Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Sparky, who also goes by various internet aliases, including one female one, thinks, among other things, that US troops today should carry a Soviet SKS automatic rifle - the predecessor to AK-47 - as a backup to US weapons, because it can be reloaded from WWII-style stripper clips. Apparently in his imaginary world stripper clips are as common as mushrooms on an LSD trip. He thinks that the US is losing in Iraq solely because the M113 is not called the "Gavin" and because those are not used in place of superior vehicles. "Gavin" is his solution to everything. If you need to make pigs fly, you can do it with a "Gavin". He holds that the US military doesn't use the "Gavin" for everything because they, or rather more specifically the Marines, are "egomaniac narcissists" who want to be heroic riding into combat in inferior vehicles instead of the All-Mighty Gavin. He also thinks that bicycles are great for cross-country mobility in snow and mud, and generally everywhere else but roads, and that every paratrooper should jump with one strapped to his chest. Yes, a bicycle. He also thinks that this is the future of warfare, jumping out of planes with bicycles and "Gavins". Finally, one of Sparky's "Tactical Studies Group" website loudly proclaims how we, as in humanity, have been infiltrated by Aliens and they will one day take over and make us their sex-slaves, or something. And he is as serious about it as he is about calling the M113 "Gavin", which is to say that he'd rather shoot himself in the head with an SKS before he gave it up. He's a blatant lunatic, and reading combatreform.com is a good idea if you are into having yourself lobotomized and intellectually castrated. In short, Sparky is the village idiot of the internet military community. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SgtMuhammed Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 He does have a lovely singing voice though. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exel Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Originally posted by SgtMuhammed: Just because a guy has been shot at doesn't make him an expert. Ask 100 combat vets about equipment and they will give you 100 "expert" opinions on how crapy/wonderful it is.While that is true, what's more relevant is that Sparky has, according to all evidence, never been shot at or never been anywhere near a combat zone. Sparky has been found giving various, mutually exclusive credentials for himself, including deployments that squarely conflict with his self-proclaimed date of birth. When asked about his service record, he either goes mental, ignores the question completely or gives one of his many randomly chosen false records. What's really scary is that he really is an active-duty soldier in the US military, and a 2nd Lieutenant no less. To date all evidence seems to point that he got kicked out of the Marines (Egomaniac Narcissists!) after a brief service, after which he iirc got into ROTC and graduated as 2Lt. That was, again iirc, some time in the early 90s, and he still holds that rank today - go figure. Presently he appears to be in the job of packing parachutes somewhere (Airborne!). 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisND Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Originally posted by Exel: Presently he appears to be in the job of packing parachutes somewhere (Airborne!). So that explains that second jump... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Clavicula_Nox Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 I don't see how he can remain on active duty at the rank of 2LT for that long. Unless I'm mistaken, 1LT is free rank requiring only TIS or TIG. Even if he was prevented from promotion, wouldn't he have been chaptered out or something? 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Ah... Sparky... haven't seen his crap on this Forum for a while Talk about one of the most discredited, yet talked about nutters, on the 'net. Kudos to him for getting more attention than he deserves Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Exel Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Originally posted by Battlefront.com: Ah... Sparky... haven't seen his crap on this Forum for a while Talk about one of the most discredited, yet talked about nutters, on the 'net. Kudos to him for getting more attention than he deserves Steve Every community needs its village idiot, I suppose.. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisND Posted April 21, 2008 Share Posted April 21, 2008 Originally posted by Exel: Sparky, who also goes by various internet aliases, ... snip... Finally, one of Sparky's "Tactical Studies Group" website loudly proclaims how we, as in humanity, have been infiltrated by Aliens and they will one day take over and make us their sex-slaves, or something. And he is as serious about it as he is about calling the M113 "Gavin", which is to say that he'd rather shoot himself in the head with an SKS before he gave it up. He's a blatant lunatic, and reading combatreform.com is a good idea if you are into having yourself lobotomized and intellectually castrated. In short, Sparky is the village idiot of the internet military community. Now THAT was an internet smack-down. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkEzra Posted April 23, 2008 Share Posted April 23, 2008 Originally posted by Exel: as common as mushrooms on an LSD trip. At Last! Something I actually know about: Lysergic acid diethylamide, LSD, LSD-25: semisynthetic psychedelic drug (ergoline) Better living through Chemistry! Psilocybin : Mushrooms. Nature's own cure for psychic boredom... Never seen a "Sparkey" when tripping but it doesn't mean he doesn't exist...maybe 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Battlefront.com Posted April 24, 2008 Share Posted April 24, 2008 Sheesh, we have our own Timothy Leary here Steve 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MarkEzra Posted April 24, 2008 Share Posted April 24, 2008 Originally posted by Battlefront.com: Sheesh, we have our own Timothy Leary here Steve All in the mist of a long forgotten past 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Webwing Posted April 24, 2008 Share Posted April 24, 2008 Originally posted by MarkEzra: </font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by Battlefront.com: Sheesh, we have our own Timothy Leary here Steve All in the mist of a long forgotten past </font> 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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