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JcDent posted:drat, those tanks are clean. People like modeling them with markings and all sorts of baggage poo poo, but these ones are bare-bones. I'd bet they were only a few weeks old. Built in a factory, shipped across the ocean, and sent straight into combat.
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Sep 10, 2018 15:35
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Wasn’t the Red October Factory in Stalingrad still pumping out T-34s in the midst of the fighting, basically driving right off the assembly line, exiting the building, and entering the fight? IIRC they didn’t even install gun sights. Wonder what kind of quality control those tanks had lol.
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Sep 10, 2018 16:04
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:Wasn’t the Red October Factory in Stalingrad still pumping out T-34s in the midst of the fighting, basically driving right off the assembly line, exiting the building, and entering the fight? IIRC they didn’t even install gun sights. Wonder what kind of quality control those tanks had lol. Yeah, crews had to operate them without sights and other equipment. They still managed to rattle the Germans, though, there's an anecdote from a German soldier who hasn't faced them before who is mightily impressed that he could just keep throwing AT rounds at a T-34 without it breaking, until the crew emerged (stone deaf!) to surrender.
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Sep 10, 2018 16:07
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SoggyBobcat posted:It's worth reading at least a few pages into that Let's Read because it somehow gets even more nuts: the rebels apparently defeat the modern U.S. military by using surplus T-34's donated to them from the Russian Tsar. Where is this Lets Read? JcDent posted:Appologies for the Funker vid, but here's some WW2 footage featuring the rarest of pokeymans: an M4 (the cast hull one) with a 76. I wonder what was the longest serving M4 that eventually got the 76(W) treatment. The M4A1 (76) was the first 76-equipped M4 to be produced. I believe they were the '200 or so 76-equipped M4s' that you often hear about being left in the depots in the UK during D-Day. The Israelis got a number of them in 1948 as well. Taerkar fucked around with this message at 16:21 on Sep 10, 2018 |
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Sep 10, 2018 16:18
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Cessna posted:I'd bet they were only a few weeks old. Built in a factory, shipped across the ocean, and sent straight into combat. DLA or someone like them did a recent analysis of this from a "value chain" perspective that was really drat interesting. Basically, the US military, either by accident or sort of on purpose, found itself using a fairly modern corporate supply chain in order to get War Things where they needed to go throughout WWII. Everyone else was still using something like pre-industrial localized consumption and production or archaic point-to-point long distance shipping, while Uncle Sam had this absurdly complex proto-modern node structure that ground everyone else on the planet into dust. There were real-world examples of just-in-time inventory management and MRP being done...almost entirely by hand. Anyway I picture some armor S4 clerk recording a tank as burned out and within 72 hours some plant is stamping its replacement and then the clerk can fanatically track it by its FedEx tracking number all the way to his front porch.
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Sep 10, 2018 16:19
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Taerkar posted:Where is this Lets Read?
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Sep 10, 2018 16:31
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Pro-tip: don't. It's painful to read.
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Sep 10, 2018 16:36
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This meme never fails to amuse me
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Sep 10, 2018 16:48
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:Wasn’t the Red October Factory in Stalingrad still pumping out T-34s in the midst of the fighting, basically driving right off the assembly line, exiting the building, and entering the fight? IIRC they didn’t even install gun sights. Wonder what kind of quality control those tanks had lol. Probably. It sort of sounds a bit like a "just so" story about Soviet workers, but this doesn't mean it didn't happen. I've never found a photo of such a tank, but lots of things didn't get photographed in Stalingrad for obvious reasons. The STZ factory made tanks right until they were forced to evacuate their machinery in September 1942, and resumed production after the Soviets re-took the factory, so there was certainly opportunity. It is well documented that the Soviets cobbled together both half-built and improvised tanks in other battles (Leningrad in particular) so I can absolutely believe they took half-finished T-34s and sent them out to fight. Minor nitpick - the "Red October" factory was a steel foundry. Tanks were made at the "Dzerzhinskiy Tractor Factory."
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Sep 10, 2018 16:49
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So how did Roman procurement work from the perspectives of the legionaires? If a soldier lost his gladius, what happened next?
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Sep 10, 2018 17:01
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bewbies posted:DLA or someone like them did a recent analysis of this from a "value chain" perspective that was really drat interesting. I recently finished The Perfect War: Technowar in Vietnam by James William Gibson. It's about how that corporate style supply chain from WW2 turned into war run like business in Vietnam. It's a shocking read about just how broken the "military managers" system was. We didn't lose because we weren't allowed to, we lost because we were fighting a war of spreadsheets that bore no relationship whatsoever to the reality of the situation. The old joke about the computer telling McNamara "we won last year" isn't far off the truth. Highly recommended.
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Sep 10, 2018 17:44
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Wikipedia posted:The idea was discarded after the 'tanks' attracted public ridicule; however, Bob Semple stood by his design and even stated "I don’t see anyone else coming up with any better ideas." This is amazing 
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Sep 10, 2018 19:46
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Tunicate posted:So how did Roman procurement work from the perspectives of the legionaires? If a soldier lost his gladius, what happened next? During the late empire, there were the fabricae, large state-owned armories that served to centralize weapon production for the empire. So during that period, it probably involved sending an order to the local fabricae for a replacement, and finding a way to requisition some transport. For earlier periods, I believe it was more about contracting work out to locals for a new sword or two.
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Sep 10, 2018 20:17
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For some values of ease of transportation centralized production is actually inferior to decentralized, right? Like if it takes one month to deliver the requisition letter and one month to deliver the gladius but the local blacksmith can bang out something serviceable in a day that's preferrable
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Sep 10, 2018 20:38
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golden bubble posted:During the late empire, there were the fabricae, large state-owned armories that served to centralize weapon production for the empire. So during that period, it probably involved sending an order to the local fabricae for a replacement, and finding a way to requisition some transport. I would have to imagine theyd keep a cache of spares locally, not send a horse and cart on a two day trip for one sword.
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Sep 10, 2018 21:01
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aphid_licker posted:For some values of ease of transportation centralized production is actually inferior to decentralized, right? Like if it takes one month to deliver the requisition letter and one month to deliver the gladius but the local blacksmith can bang out something serviceable in a day that's preferrable generally this just means you keep stock on hand at a bunch of points decentralized production is not usually all that useful unless there are a) severe supply chain disruptions or b) each piece made needs to be customized in some way and there are limited economies of scale
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Sep 10, 2018 21:35
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Tunicate posted:So how did Roman procurement work from the perspectives of the legionaires? If a soldier lost his gladius, what happened next? Decimation
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Sep 10, 2018 21:57
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SoggyBobcat posted:The idea of America teaming up with a conservative Christian Russia to fight back the Muslim and Chinese hoards is not new in crazy right-wing circles, it seems. I wonder if Bannon has read this book. it's because russia has been pushing it to them for decades https://twitter.com/jackmjenkins/status/1026861722852909057
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Sep 11, 2018 00:14
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WW2 Data Chemical, Smoke, Incendiary bombs, Oh My! We get to see a few clusters, some chemical and incendiary bombs, including one filled with Mustard gas. Why should some fuzes not being reinserted? Which bomb uses cheesecloth, depending on how it's loaded? Which bomb uses an "all ways" fuze and why? All that and more at the blog!
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Sep 11, 2018 00:22
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Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom?
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Sep 11, 2018 00:55
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom?
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Sep 11, 2018 00:58
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom? Operation Iraqi Freedom has very little to do with freedom for Iraqis though. I'd say much less than Neptune had to do with the sea.
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Sep 11, 2018 00:59
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom? when its left to the military they'll still give poo poo cool names (ie the one to capture saddam hussein was named "red dawn" and all the nomenclature for the operation was taken from the movie) but when politicians get involved it becomes a lot less fun
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Sep 11, 2018 01:05
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom? Iraqi Freedom is the public-consumption name. I would assume it had an actual code name during internal development / before it was announced.
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Sep 11, 2018 01:06
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The British Army still uses nondescript codenames; in Afghanistan, they used "Herrick", and in Iraq "Telic".HEY GUNS posted:because churchill was extremely good at code names and americans (and mid 20th c germans) are extremely bad Churchill was often brutally stupid, and often incredibly pigheaded, and often both, but sometimes he got it bang on, and this is one of those times quote:I have crossed out on the attached paper many unsuitable names. Operations in which large numbers of men may lose their lives ought not to be described by code words which imply a boastful and overconfident sentiment, such as “Triumphant,” or, conversely, which are calculated to invest the plan with an air of despondency, such as “Woebetide,” “Massacre,” “Jumble,” “Trouble,” “Fidget,” “Flimsy,” “Pathetic,” and “Jaundice.” They ought not to be names of a frivolous character, such as “Bunnyhug,” “Billingsgate,” “Aperitif,” and “Ballyhoo.” They should not be ordinary words often used in other connections, such as “Flood,” “Smooth,” “Sudden,” “Supreme,” “Full Force,” and “Full Speed.” Names of living people, ministers, or commanders should be avoided, e.g. “Bracken.” It didn't stop them calling the deception at the Pas-de-Calais "Operation Bodyguard", mind you, but the thought was there. Trin Tragula fucked around with this message at 01:12 on Sep 11, 2018 |
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Sep 11, 2018 01:09
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The Lone Badger posted:Iraqi Freedom is the public-consumption name. I would assume it had an actual code name during internal development / before it was announced. the code name was in fact operation iraqi freedom i'm sure iraqi cryptologists were stumped to gently caress by that one
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Sep 11, 2018 01:10
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I thought I heard....uh, somewhere, that the US stopped using random codewords because it started to feel inappropriate to write letters home that said things like "we regret to inform you that your son heroically died during Operation Gay Scarecrow" and wanted names with a little more gravitas. I don't remember where I heard this, and there's a very real chance it was the history channel so if that's bullshit please disillusion me before I tell anyone else about it
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Sep 11, 2018 01:22
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Edgar Allen Ho posted:Why did we go from meaningless codenames like Overlord and Neptune to on the nose descriptions like Iraqi Freedom? The old-school op names (up to and including Credible Sport and Just Cause in the late '80s, and even Desert Storm and the dustup in Mogadishu in '93 that I forget the name of*) were, afaik, RNG on a word list and rerolled until it sounded cool. Kinda like the Jaeger names in Pacific Rim. OIF was the fist to depart from that, I think -- wasn't the post-9/11 Afghanistan invasion name changed to be less offensive to the locals after the original name turned out to be hells of offensive to Muslims, or is it the more recent intervention to take down the dictator-for-life of Libya that I'm thinking of**? (*edit for research: The 1993 incident in which 160th SOAR lost two birds and crews and a lot of their SF/Ranger cargo was part of Gothic Serpent. **Afghanistan, was originally called Infinite Justice, rerolled to Enduring Freedom after the locals that were on our side complained that only Allah can use the former term, Odyssey Dawn was the codeword for the helping along the Libyan revolution in 2011, "Dawn" already being used by the local resistance as the op name.) Ainsley McTree posted:I thought I heard....uh, somewhere, that the US stopped using random codewords because it started to feel inappropriate to write letters home that said things like "we regret to inform you that your son heroically died during Operation Gay Scarecrow" and wanted names with a little more gravitas.  as hell.
Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 02:20 on Sep 11, 2018 |
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Sep 11, 2018 01:53
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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Chillbro Baggins posted:The old-school op names (up to and including Credible Sport and Just Cause in the late '80s, and even Desert Storm and the dustup in Mogadishu in '93 that I forget the name of*) The first landings were part of "Restore Hope." I doubt that was a randomly picked name.
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Sep 11, 2018 03:26
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Ainsley McTree posted:I thought I heard....uh, somewhere, that the US stopped using random codewords because it started to feel inappropriate to write letters home that said things like "we regret to inform you that your son heroically died during Operation Gay Scarecrow" and wanted names with a little more gravitas. Why would you even use the codename when talking to a civilian?
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Sep 11, 2018 03:53
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The Lone Badger posted:Why would you even use the codename when talking to a civilian? Maybe it wasn't letters home, maybe it was internal casualty reports or something. I might have remembered it wrong (or, alternatively, remembered it perfectly, but it's bullshit)
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Sep 11, 2018 04:00
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The name of the operation wouldn't be secret afterwards, so whether you tell it to the grieving families or not they will find out when they read in the papers that their son and 500 others died in Op. Drunken Blunder.
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Sep 11, 2018 04:23
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Nenonen posted:The name of the operation wouldn't be secret afterwards, so whether you tell it to the grieving families or not they will find out when they read in the papers that their son and 500 others died in Op. Drunken Blunder. Ah yes, the Gallipoli campaign.
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Sep 11, 2018 05:11
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The military still uses weird rear end cover terms for stuff that sounds like it was picked out of a hat, trust me on that. It also means I've had some heart attacks over completely innocuous conversations before because I'll still be in my work mindset.
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Sep 11, 2018 05:16
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I remember as a teenager hearing about Just Cause and thinking it was "Just 'Cause" as in, "we just kind of felt like it." I wasn't even trying to be edgy.
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Sep 11, 2018 05:49
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Gothic Serpent sounds cool as gently caress, tho.
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Sep 11, 2018 06:00
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Using colors seems both pragmatic and humourless. Although case fucsia might not be great.
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Sep 11, 2018 07:57
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Gold Is that a true story?
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Sep 11, 2018 08:47
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ilmucche posted:Gold Almost certainly not.
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Sep 11, 2018 09:24
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feedmegin posted:That sounds like a PhD thesis in the making to me. Hop to it, man! I'll keep that in mind if I decide to pursue a PhD in a history field. Tias posted:Supposedly, yes. A couple of my mates have written papers on it, but it's been many years now. Thanks for the link, it's pretty interesting even if the focus of the article means that I'll have to dig into the sources for numbers.
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