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IIRC Stryker MGS is on its way out on the medium term anyway since it's not liked, not there in high enough numbers to sustain, and pretty much a failure conceptually. I also read that the Stryker is quickly reaching its weight limits and they're angling for a new engine/better transmission. So much for 'growth potential' I guess. The Bradley would have made much more sense as a program if it was a platform for wayyy more things anyway: medic, command, radio, maybe even arty outside MLRS, etc. Pretty much the M113 replacement that has been needed for about 3 decades now.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:07
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KildarX posted:So what made castles and large forts an attractive thing in war pre long range accurate artillery? Wouldn't it just be easier to pillage the land around the fort and then leave? It's not like the emplacement can hold enough troops to affect a large army? The big problem is that they are bastions where enemy troops can hold out and you really can't leave that poo poo in your rear. You either have to take it, dedicate enough troops to bottling it up in a siege, or deal with the fact that you are going to have constant raids on your supply routes, your messengers and couriers are going to get ambushed, etc. They also tend to be located in strategically important areas. The Rhine River, for example, had little forts and castles all up and down it. Using that big, nice river to move supplies and troops gets a lot harder when you've got something that can either shoot down on you (however effective that is pre-artillery) or simply dispatch guys to ambush you.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:10
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bewbies posted:As for the Stryker I'd argue it is one of the better DoD acquisition programs of the post-WWII era, period. It has done its intended mission exceptionally well and the platform still has a ton of room to grow. As an aside, with the pending addition of the autocannon it is a lot more comparable to the BMP-2. The Stryker is actually quite popular among the soldiers who understand its purpose. You're not going to want it for, say, driving across the fields of Europe in a mass war with the Russians. But it's excellent for the lighter combat and police actions we've been involved in lately and is very survivable.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:14
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KildarX posted:So what made castles and large forts an attractive thing in war pre long range accurate artillery? Wouldn't it just be easier to pillage the land around the fort and then leave? It's not like the emplacement can hold enough troops to affect a large army? I'm not hugely knowledgeable about this stuff, but my impression is that the point is that in these periods when you go to war, you aren't after territory. You're after people. Conquest involves killing the other guy, or at least capturing him so that you can ransom him back for a big profit. That's how wars become concluded, until then you might control the land and can pillage it but until you knock out the castle and the people in it, the proper ownership rights of the territory resides with the existing nobility. And they'll carry on calling in favours, hiring mercenaries, and loyalty and titles will continue to be owed to them. Meanwhile your very expensive army gets bored and leaves. Attackers can and do pillage the land around castles and leave with their goodies in hand, but after that the former owners of the land come back out and reassert their control over the area. It's only by knocking over the castle that something significant has happened to shake up the political landscape. Fangz fucked around with this message at 17:20 on Oct 20, 2015 |
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Oct 20, 2015 17:17
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Fangz posted:I'm not hugely knowledgeable about this stuff, but my impression is that the point is that in these periods when you go to war, you aren't after territory.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:21
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HEY GAL posted:depends on the period, what did KildarX mean by "long range accurate artillery" I suspect he meant the kinds of indirect HE lobbers that made the star forts obsolete. Cannon didn't kill off massive fortification projects so much as it made the traditional design of castles obsolete.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:25
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JcDent posted:Coming from Grey's LP? Yep, made me curious, thought this would be a better place to ask. For those who aren't reading Grey's latest LP, for the sake of convenience the game (Combat Mission: Black Sea) ignores reality and just fit's a whole squad into a Bradley.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:27
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HEY GAL posted:can anyone think of any conflict in which the officers on the same side are not huge weeping cocks to one another I don't know the details myself, but I think Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Savoy had a famously good working relationship. They were probably dicks to someone or other, though, just not each other.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:31
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Tomn posted:I don't know the details myself, but I think Marlborough and Prince Eugene of Savoy had a famously good working relationship.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:34
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It's all an issue of the degree of disagreement and bad blood. Any professional organization is going to have professional rivalries and people who don't get along or bad blood between various divisions of it. That said, most of them don't devolve to the depths of the Tsarist officer corps on the outbreak of WW1 or the comical in-fighting between the IJN and IJA. Want an example of a relatively functional professional culture? The US military in WW2. There were officers who didn't like each other, but you also didn't see battles lost because General A didn't want to support the offensive of his arch nemesis General B. Another example of a professional culture which actually improved would be the German military between WW1 and WW2. In WW1 you have all sorts of back-biting poo poo like Falkenheim trying to oust von Moltke and then Ludendorf/Hindenburg trying to do the same to Falkenheim. In many cases that poo poo was successful. Lots of what amounted to back room court intrigue. WW2? The officer corps of the Wehrmacht* was a lot less likely to do poo poo like that. Yes, you have professional rivalries, but they're much more along the lines of what you see in the US. *note that I am very consciously excluding the party apparatchniks and high officers. Goering and Himmler tried to gently caress up the combat capabilities of the Luftwaffe's ground troops and the SS at every opportunity because they were petty dicks. Same with them each trying to either deny nice toys to the Heer or divert resources desperately needed at the front into their own little pet bullshit. Still, on the level of field commanders doing actual fighting it's not nearly as insane. That isn't to say that people didn't run afoul of politics - Hitler sacked a few generals that probably shouldn't have been fired - but it wasn't sabotage from their peers like you see with the machinations in the Imperial German officer corps between 1914 and 1916.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:41
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I had a dream in which I was participating in an (apparently highly inaccurate) WWI re-enactment which featured a pike charge across No Man's Land. Fortunately, we'd been issued with longer pikes than the enemy, and kept them at bay. I'm fairly certain is is how WWI was actually fought.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:42
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MikeCrotch posted:Yeah, the problem is not that it's a bad combat vehicle per se but that it took a hilarious amount of time to develop and cost way, way too much money to get to just an ok combat vehicle, mostly because it was supposed to perform as many roles as possible to 'save money'. What exactly is ok about F-35?
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Oct 20, 2015 17:42
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Empress Theonora posted:I had a dream in which I was participating in an (apparently highly inaccurate) WWI re-enactment which featured a pike charge across No Man's Land. Fortunately, we'd been issued with longer pikes than the enemy, and kept them at bay. i pozzed your brain congratulations
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Oct 20, 2015 17:46
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Fangz posted:I'm not hugely knowledgeable about this stuff, but my impression is that the point is that in these periods when you go to war, you aren't after territory. You're after people. Conquest involves killing the other guy, or at least capturing him so that you can ransom him back for a big profit. That's how wars become concluded, until then you might control the land and can pillage it but until you knock out the castle and the people in it, the proper ownership rights of the territory resides with the existing nobility. And they'll carry on calling in favours, hiring mercenaries, and loyalty and titles will continue to be owed to them. Meanwhile your very expensive army gets bored and leaves. Even if you're after the land, the fort controls the surrounding land and needs to be dealt with unless you're moving through without supply lines, without dispersing to forage, and in sufficient numbers to beat the garrison.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:53
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Hogge Wild posted:What exactly is ok about F-35? It's OK as in "passable." The problem is that the DoD is paying "this thing had better be made of solid gold and be christened with unicorn blood" price for the program and it's still in development.
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Oct 20, 2015 17:59
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xthetenth posted:Even if you're after the land, the fort controls the surrounding land and needs to be dealt with unless you're moving through without supply lines, without dispersing to forage, and in sufficient numbers to beat the garrison.
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Oct 20, 2015 18:19
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HEY GAL posted:lol have you met an east german vietnamese-german? they've all been there for like thirty years and use fresh dill instead of cilantro. no spice whatsoever I mean, I see where you're coming from but in quite a lot of south east asia dill is actually really commonly used, especially in fish stews. edit: that said I'm moving to semi-rural sweden in a couple of weeks and man I will miss the good international food here in London NLJP fucked around with this message at 18:38 on Oct 20, 2015 |
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Oct 20, 2015 18:27
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Cyrano4747 posted:Want an example of a relatively functional professional culture? The US military in WW2. There were officers who didn't like each other, but you also didn't see battles lost because General A didn't want to support the offensive of his arch nemesis General B. While I largely agree, there was the whole Patton<>Montgomery thing...
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Oct 20, 2015 18:38
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Cyrano4747 posted:Want an example of a relatively functional professional culture? The US military in WW2. Counterpoint: the clusterfuck off Samar.
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Oct 20, 2015 18:47
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darthbob88 posted:It's basically an army in being, yes? Even if the soldiers locked inside the fort can't actually control the area, they can prevent anybody else from controlling it. Pretty much, it requires an active commitment of troops to maintain control over an area with a fort you don't hold, and if you were to try and hold and work the land without the fort, the best way to do it would end up being a siege.
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Oct 20, 2015 18:55
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feedmegin posted:While I largely agree, there was the whole Patton<>Montgomery thing... But Montgomery wasn't a US general, and then you have to remember how tolerant Eisenhower was of his antiques...
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Oct 20, 2015 19:00
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Fangz posted:Counterpoint: the clusterfuck off Samar. Double counterpoint: MacArthur.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:05
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HEY GAL posted:i pozzed your brain congratulations Mine have had formations that don't march exactly in time across the battlefield, so the Colonel/my old PE teacher demands the formation go back to where we started and do it again. He says the second go will be easier because there's less of us to gently caress up the group.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:26
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And none of those begin to approach the truly destructive petty bullshit you see in other contexts. Like I said it's still there but it is a matter of intensity and disruptiveness.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:28
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if they don't hire assassins after each other or at least join the other side just because they can't stand to work with each other any more, it's not pro-tier, imo edit: which reminds me that there was a rumor going around the imperial army in 1630 that tilly was going to have wallenstein murdered in secret, which the latter shot down as being completely out of character HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 20:01 on Oct 20, 2015 |
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Oct 20, 2015 19:33
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Fangz posted:Counterpoint: the clusterfuck off Samar. That's not really a good example. The Battle off Samar happened because Halsey (Through both misinterpretation and straight up lost messages) thought that Kinkaid was covering the San Bernardino Strait, and that the Japanese fleet it was to be protected against had turned around. Obviously neither was the case and Halsey hosed up, but that was because of bad luck and Halsey seeing what he wanted to see as opposed to any outright maliciousness on anyone's part.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:33
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HEY GAL posted:can anyone think of any conflict in which the officers on the same side are not huge weeping cocks to one another The naval airship fleet of Germany was filled with chill skyship sailin' bros, but that's a bit low level compared to the petty bullshit of top officers. Thanks to Twin Tringula's posting I'm re-reading The First World War by John Keegan. He mentions that the Belgians dressed like they were going to fight napoleon, and hauled their guns with dogs.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:45
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For perspective's sake this was a military that 80 years before literally had general officers murdering one another. To that end, probably a good third of the major battles of the ACW featured some sort of major event that was prompted in large part by senior officers' inability to play nice with one another.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:47
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Acebuckeye13 posted:That's not really a good example. The Battle off Samar happened because Halsey (Through both misinterpretation and straight up lost messages) thought that Kinkaid was covering the San Bernardino Strait, and that the Japanese fleet it was to be protected against had turned around. Obviously neither was the case and Halsey hosed up, but that was because of bad luck and Halsey seeing what he wanted to see as opposed to any outright maliciousness on anyone's part. Also, the infamous "The World Wonders" telegram was a mistake in decoding. Maybe that's common knowledge already, but it's a favorite story of mine.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:57
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chitoryu12 posted:The Stryker is actually quite popular among the soldiers who understand its purpose. You're not going to want it for, say, driving across the fields of Europe in a mass war with the Russians. But it's excellent for the lighter combat and police actions we've been involved in lately and is very survivable. I understand how light fighting vehicles like the stryker and others (usually wheeled, usually amphibious) are supposed to work but I don't see how they can survive an environment where every enemy, however poor and under-equipped, has some sort of guided missile system that can wreck tanks.
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Oct 20, 2015 19:57
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Every time I read about the Action of Samar, I always forget this hilarious gem. I feel like Hegel's crew would approve:quote:Aircraft from the carriers of Taffy 1, 2, and 3, including FM-2 Wildcats, F6F Hellcats and TBM Avengers, strafed, bombed, torpedoed, rocketed, depth-charged, fired at least one .38 caliber handgun and made numerous "dry" runs at the attacking force when they ran out of ammunition.
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Oct 20, 2015 20:21
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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Empress Theonora posted:I had a dream in which I was participating in an (apparently highly inaccurate) WWI re-enactment which featured a pike charge across No Man's Land. Fortunately, we'd been issued with longer pikes than the enemy, and kept them at bay. Was this before or after you played episode 5 of Life is Strange?
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Oct 20, 2015 20:28
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Slavvy posted:I understand how light fighting vehicles like the stryker and others (usually wheeled, usually amphibious) are supposed to work but I don't see how they can survive an environment where every enemy, however poor and under-equipped, has some sort of guided missile system that can wreck tanks. If the enemy has ATGMs everywhere then even your Bradleys are vulnerable, the extra armor is a waste of weight and you might as well drive around in a Stryker anyways because whatever you're driving will die. If they don't have ATGMs, then your Strykers can probably survive the environment.
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Oct 20, 2015 20:46
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Slavvy posted:I understand how light fighting vehicles like the stryker and others (usually wheeled, usually amphibious) are supposed to work but I don't see how they can survive an environment where every enemy, however poor and under-equipped, has some sort of guided missile system that can wreck tanks. Survivability isn't just a binary equation of armor penetration vs armor thickness; you can increase survivability by being more mobile, by lowering observability, dispersing, concealing, improving your own ISR, and so on. I also think that ATGMs are not really the most significant threat to armored vehicles any longer...there are a LOT of things out there that are pretty effective.
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Oct 20, 2015 20:52
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gohuskies posted:If the enemy has ATGMs everywhere then even your Bradleys are vulnerable, the extra armor is a waste of weight and you might as well drive around in a Stryker anyways because whatever you're driving will die. If they don't have ATGMs, then your Strykers can probably survive the environment. Yes, I realise this. That's why I'm asking: how are they supposed to work? ATGM's are a shitload cheaper and easier to get than any LAV. How do they actually function IRL when literally everyone, down to the poorest peasants, has some sort of anti tank capability that light vehicles are unable to resist?
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Oct 20, 2015 20:52
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Slavvy posted:I understand how light fighting vehicles like the stryker and others (usually wheeled, usually amphibious) are supposed to work but I don't see how they can survive an environment where every enemy, however poor and under-equipped, has some sort of guided missile system that can wreck tanks. I think the answer is supposed to be good infantry/air support, liberal use of suppressing fire, and the willingness to spam smoke launchers the moment you see any sort of rocket. Ultimately, they're still extremely vulnerable to ATGMs, but so is everything with less than 25-ish tons of armor. Light fighting vehicles still beat all the alternatives: Walking (so slow, especially with heavy weapons) Trucks (vulnerable to small arms as well) Horses (like trucks but even more vulnerable to small arms)
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Oct 20, 2015 20:53
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golden bubble posted:I think the answer is supposed to be good infantry/air support, liberal use of suppressing fire, and the willingness to spam smoke launchers the moment you see any sort of rocket. Ultimately, they're still extremely vulnerable to ATGMs, but so is everything with less than 25-ish tons of armor. Light fighting vehicles still beat all the alternatives: Donkeys ominously missing from the list.
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Oct 20, 2015 20:56
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and war chariots
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Oct 20, 2015 20:57
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a well bred riding mule is a fine animal
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Oct 20, 2015 21:00
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Nebakenezzer posted:Thanks to Twin Tringula's posting I'm re-reading The First World War by John Keegan. He mentions that the Belgians dressed like they were going to fight napoleon, and hauled their guns with dogs. They wore knee length breeches, tailcoated jackets and gaiters and bicornered hats? Seriously, I assume they wore old fashioned late 19th century uniforms then it'd be sort of accurate if they meant his silly nephew but I hate that phrase because it pretty much assumes all old uniforms looked the same.
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Oct 20, 2015 21:02
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