Afghanistan AARs From a Marine Platoon

[salwon]

Not sure if this has been posted already, but here's a fascinating series of AARs of a marine platoon in Afghanistan. Really interesting to see the Taliban's tactics, especially how they focus on vehicles, and how tenuous the CC link is. On the Marine side, CAS CAS CAS! seems to be the rule of the day.

Relating to CMSF, I liked learning about the time difference between reality and the simulation - the first ambush described would've been over with near 100% casualties in the game after about 5 minutes. And again, it really demonstrates the need to work closely with the air assets. From the red side, good fire discipline is shown to be crucial - set cover arcs carefully! Micro-managing RPGs is also a good lesson here. Does the game recognize different aim points on vehicles, or do the pixeltruppen not control rocket fire to that level?

Anyway you look at it, this is a must-read for anyone on this board!

EDIT: Beaten! http://www.battlefront.com/community/showthread.php?p=1122190

[Apocal]

Does the game recognize different aim points on vehicles, or do the pixeltruppen not control rocket fire to that level?

Not entirely sure of what you mean, but the different damageable areas are actually positioned on the vehicle in 3D. My LAV-ATs had their hammerheads over a hilltop and and enemy Dushka destroyed the TOWs and the IR optics, but left the rest of LAVs untouched. Quite a nice level of detail, says I.

[akd]

What he means is: does the AI target specific parts of a vehicle?

[salwon]

What he means is: does the AI target specific parts of a vehicle?

Exactly - obviously damage to different parts is modeled, but is AIMING at specific parts modeled?

[Chainsaw]

that would be gamey if they do.

anyone fired a shoulderlaunched grenade or rocket launcher knows you are lucky to actually hit what you intended in combat when its like 150m out or so . why?

1. wind deviance affects those rounds not extrem much, but a bit as they arent any APFDS going 1400m/s

2. your breath makes the sight djump up and down.

3. stress during combat

4. not having perfectly range to target

so we are talking "if they hit" the vehicles, not WHERE do they hit the vehicles...

[akd]

that would be gamey if they do.

anyone fired a shoulderlaunched grenade or rocket launcher knows you are lucky to actually hit what you intended in combat when its like 150m out or so . why?

1. wind deviance affects those rounds not extrem much, but a bit as they arent any APFDS going 1400m/s

2. your breath makes the sight djump up and down.

3. stress during combat

4. not having perfectly range to target

so we are talking "if they hit" the vehicles, not WHERE do they hit the vehicles...

Yet it says right there in the AARs that the Taliban consistently target the engine compartment of Humvees rather than the crew cab. I think you may be underestimating the accuracy potential of the RPG system in the hands of an experienced user. The above factors all affect a rifle as well (wind drift obviously less), yet we don't scoff at the idea of trained user targeting a humvee engine compartment with a rifle at 200m. So the real issue is here the inherent accuracy of the system versus that of any other shoulder-fired weapon. I don't know the actual ballistics for a PG round, but that should be out there somewhere.

[Guinnessman]

The wikipedia entry for the RPG7 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RPG7 has some interesting info on the ballistic performance of the round from TRADOC sources.

[Wengart]

Actually, I would also like to know if our troops specifically target parts of a vehicle. For example, some Opfor guys are attacking an Abrams front armor, and lets say they can't penetrate the front armor with their current AT weapon. Would the Opfor troops attempt to get a mobility kill in that case or just not fire at all?

I would like to add, that from my experience they do not but that is only observing AFVs, such as the Bradley, firing against other vehicles.

Also, in reply to Chainsaw I would think it perfectly reasonable for troops to fire at certain parts of a vehicle. Although at range their accuracy would not be great it could still be done, and especially at ranges closer than 100 meters.

[Chainsaw]

maybe if you fire under 50meter or so you might be able to aim for certain parts, Im just having hard time beliving it after all my training on M136 and M2 Carl gustav where ive fired on rangers from 100 to 600m, both on range exercise and combat exercises (wich are hell allot of difference from range firing). You always aim center mass to increase the likehood of hitting.

A possibility is that the Marines think the talibans are aiming for the engine because they are firing on the humwee frontally, wich means it hits the engine or something.

A thing I just came to think off, if you set up the ambush in advance you got the time to range where the vehicles will be and in that way increase the hit-likehood, enabling you to actually aim for certain parts.

All I can say is that I wouldnt do something like that. but on the other hand im a trained regular soldier, not a uncon trying to find solutions.

[Denwad]

to say that the uncons are not proficient with their weapons is simply ignorant, the document says that as well.

These guys are GOOD with their weapons, the limiting factor for their effectiveness is our aircover. I think there's only one ambush scenario there where aircover isn't involved.

There's a part of that document where Micheal Yon ( i think ) states that he observed an enemy combatant calmly aiming an RPG as .50 was hitting right next to him. These guys aren't Iraqi fighters, some of them have been fighting longer than some of the troops in Afghanistan have been alive.

[Apocal]

There's a part of that document where Micheal Yon ( i think ) states that he observed an enemy combatant calmly aiming an RPG as .50 was hitting right next to him.

It was the author's of the AAR that wrote that, the SPMAGTF Recon unit.