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At least if you served in both Africa and Europe you wouldn’t have had to be deployed to the Pacific after VE Day.
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Feb 5, 2019 21:46
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:I’ve heard more then one person say that it should have been like in WWII where once deployed the troops shouldn’t come home until the war was won. This argument always involves invading the North of course because that would have been genius. When somebody says this, point out the fact that the US didn't rotate units off the front to integrate replacement soldiers got a whole lot of Americans killed needlessly.
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Feb 5, 2019 22:01
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Yes, it's like a lava lamp.
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Platystemon posted:Stop engaging in forever wars. This is from a few pages back but it's pretty clear the US has really dialed back the forever war, and has placed much more emphasis on using local allies as the long term occupation forces instead of US personnel. This change came presumably developed many because of necessity, but its obvious the US is more reticent about long term commitments than it was in 2003. the 2007-present African Union occupation of Mogadishu and war with al Shabaab is the first post 9/11 example that comes to mind, which was 100% financed, equipped, and trained by America and her allies. The 2016 Battle of Sirte against ISIL is how I imagine US strategy makers hope to fight the forever war from now on, with minimal troops on the ground but a whole lot of air power supporting local militias. The US strategy in the Afghan war is increasingly based around advising and assisting local forces. This emphasis building local forces to handle occupations and counter-insurgencies is why I presume SOCOM has been continually expanded over the last two decades, as US soldiers are being pulled off the front-lines and put back in training and support roles they need more of the special forces skill set.
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Feb 5, 2019 22:20
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I know the Pentagon is playing it closer to the vest since Trump is letting them, but what's the total number of troops deployed right now? Also, how many PMCs are doing work that the US military would have to if the PMCs weren't there
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Feb 5, 2019 22:30
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Cessna posted:In very brief terms, Marshall published a book called Men Against Fire, which was a Hot Take on WWII infantry combat. One of his big points was that the majority of soldiers don't fire their weapons effectively - only 10-15% or so are actually engaging the enemy with accurate fire, while the rest are confused, disoriented, etc. I have a feeling that he looked up a report on the need for remedial infantry training in 1944 stressing increasing the amount of firing and firing on the move and extrapolated that to a massive psychological argument instead of more reasonably coming to the conclusion that a basic training regime mostly composed of parade drill and long range marksmanship did not do wonders for infantry combat effectiveness. I feel like Ambrose's arguments would be far more interesting had he studied one of the late-comer ETO US infantry divisions, as those came to the continent with far less preparation than the ones that got to stay in England for more than a year before entering combat.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:02
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Shimrra Jamaane posted:One of the more common arm chair general Vietnam Lost Cause arguments I’ve heard is that the whole 12/13 month tours in country prevented unit cohesion and combat effectiveness. The whole “we didn’t fight one 8 year war we fought 8 one year wars” thing. I have a longer post if you check my history that explains the WW2 American training and replacement system. Basically it started out as a cadre system, where after Basic soldiers would join their unit and train with them (with a cadre of experienced veterans giving advanced training rather that dedicated teachers or drill sergeants). Then the whole unit would go overseas and come back together. This was replaced with the replacement depot, or “repple depple”, system. Soldiers were instead given their advanced training for their role at dedicated training centers and shipped overseas. They would languish in replacement depots (basically tent cities in friendly territory) before being assigned as a replacement for a unit in the field. If they were needed immediately, they’d practically go from the boat straight into combat. The replacement soldiers had no advice from experienced soldiers before heading to Europe and no camaraderie with the unit they were joining, to the extent that veterans would resist learning their names to avoid getting attached after they inevitably did something dumb and got their brains splattered on the ground. This continued to be a problem in Vietnam, where soldiers were rotated out individually.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:16
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoBWUs8poYU This Sound Kills Fascists In historical retrospective, are we happy with the M1
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Feb 5, 2019 23:24
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If they told MacArthur to gently caress off and made it in .276 Pedersen (along with the BAR) it might’ve saved us a lot of god drat trouble later but overall the Garand was and is a very good rifle and probably the best regular issue service rifle in the entire war (mostly on being semi-auto).
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Feb 5, 2019 23:32
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Mazz posted:If they told MacArthur to gently caress off and made it in .276 Pedersen (along with the BAR) it might’ve saved us a lot of god drat trouble later but overall the Garand was and is a very good rifle and probably the best regular issue service rifle in the entire war (mostly on being semi-auto). You're gonna have to tell me why those are the wrong bullets.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:34
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Mazz posted:If they told MacArthur to gently caress off and made it in .276 Pedersen (along with the BAR) it might’ve saved us a lot of god drat trouble later but overall the Garand was and is a very good rifle and probably the best regular issue service rifle in the entire war (mostly on being semi-auto). Speaking of this, suppose that they actually did do just this. How hard is it to shut down an obsolete logistics line and replace it with another--in this case, going from .30-06 to .276 Pedersen--and would it have considered a "significant" effort for US industry?
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Feb 5, 2019 23:37
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zoux posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoBWUs8poYU Extremely. The Garand is reliable, accurate, and quick to reload if you train to its quirks. The US being capable of mass producing so many semi-auto rifles helped, but it was easily the best or one of the best at the time of its invention.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:42
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zoux posted:You're gonna have to tell me why those are the wrong bullets. There’s a solid handful of posters who can explain it better than I but 30-06 is a large and very powerful rifle round, honestly way too powerful for most infantry needs. It makes guns weigh more and you carry less ammo for the same weights. In the case of the Garand I think the .276 version was like 2lbs lighter? Also all the small arms issues with like the M14 stem from us continuing to use those hugely overpowered bullets. Adoption of .276 might’ve alleviated a lot of those post-war problems (this is black gay hitler territory though). Davin Valkri posted:Speaking of this, suppose that they actually did do just this. How hard is it to shut down an obsolete logistics line and replace it with another--in this case, going from .30-06 to .276 Pedersen--and would it have considered a "significant" effort for US industry? It’s a valid argument pre-war since they had the ammo stocks but given how much poo poo was going to scale up for the war itself I don’t think it would’ve mattered that much. Also the BAR firing .276 would’ve been an extremely interesting gun. Again, there are better educated folks than me for this commentary here though. Mazz fucked around with this message at 23:57 on Feb 5, 2019 |
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Feb 5, 2019 23:45
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The switch from .276 to .30-06 required some modifications to the Garand itself that made it a worse rifle - it introduced a weakness in the bent op-rod and reduced the magazine from 10 to 8 rounds. It also made the weapon more difficult to shoot well, especially with follow up shots, because .30-06 has harsher recoil and not as flat a trajectory. Despite all that, the Garand was such a fundamentally good design that it was still a either 1a or 1b of issued service rifles, depending on how you feel about the StG-44. I’m phone posting so I’ll talk about the BAR when I’m at a computer, but going to .276 on it would almost certainly been an improvement (and a good opportunity to fix a bunch of other issues). As for the economic/industrial aspect, there’s two different answers. For the cash starved US Army of the mid-30s, it would have been a tough sell. It could have been done but it would have meant giving up something else. However it would not have been any kind of barrier once war time production kicked in. If you knew WW2 was coming for sure, then it would have been clearly the right choice. With what people knew at the time, sticking to .30-06 is defensible at worst.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:53
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And the worst issued service rifle?
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Feb 5, 2019 23:56
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zoux posted:You're gonna have to tell me why those are the wrong bullets. Nicer recoil, more controllable in fast semi and even FA if we’re looking ahead to the m14, better accuracy (although that’s more theoretical for a main issue rifle and more of a deal for theoretical sniper rifles down the road), and lighter so you can carry more. Probably some other stuff I’m forgetting. Not to mention the gains from putting other poo poo in it especially the BAR Plus down the road when we get into intermediate cartridges it would be a no brainer to cut it down and basically invent a slightly fatter 6.5 Grendel 40 years earlier. One of my long term goals is to get a beater Garand and have it rebarreled in .276
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Feb 5, 2019 23:57
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zoux posted:And the worst issued service rifle? G41(M)
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Feb 5, 2019 23:58
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Now if you REALlY want me to get salty about calibers ask me about .280 British aka our chance to make that .276 mistake good and get really kickass FALs in the bargain.
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Feb 5, 2019 23:59
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dublish posted:G41(M) I will CUT you. youre Not wrong, even though it was a limited trial deployment
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Feb 6, 2019 00:00
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A big challenge would have been rechambering/replacing the M1919 stocks.
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Feb 6, 2019 00:01
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zoux posted:And the worst issued service rifle? Canada's Ross Rifle
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Feb 6, 2019 00:20
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Cyrano4747 posted:Now if you REALlY want me to get salty about calibers ask me about .280 British aka our chance to make that .276 mistake good and get really kickass FALs in the bargain. Also, of course, loving over Britain and the rest of NATO, and not even buying FALs in the end. Thanks guys!
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Feb 6, 2019 00:21
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Weren't the Italian Rifles pretty bad in WWII?
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Feb 6, 2019 00:58
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EvilMerlin posted:Canada's Ross Rifle The Ross isn't a bad rifle, just very un suited to trenches. There were also problems with the ammo they were supplied by the british, iirc. Basically the Ross was built to a fairly high standard and .303 British ca. 1914 was more of a general theme than a solid standard. Personally I would toss the M14 on the pile as a candidate for worst issued rifle 1) not all that significant an upgrade over the Garand. Yeah, detachable magazines are great but the Garand was also pretty fast to load with en-blocs. The gas system was refined but this wasn't some earth shattering thing. 7.62 NATO is cool and all but you can chamber Garands in that. Yeah it had full auto capabilities but this wasn't really a useful feature. Oh, and for what it's worth there was a select-fire prototype of the Garand with a box mag. The T-20. IIRC they retrofitted a BAR barrel into it and it fed from a BAR mag. The army figured it wasn't worth the hassle in 1942 and they were right. 2) One of the main selling points is that it would basically be an upgraded Garand, with a bunch of the Garand tooling being able to be reused. This would have been a huge saving, especially when it came to forging the receivers. Problem: this was a dirty lie and none of the Garand tooling was reused. 3) the ergonomics were from a previous decade. Realize that the FAL was a contemporaneous firearm. 4) hilariously crooked procurement process In the end we might as well have just saved the money and kept trucking with M1 Garands. We were producing them into the mid 50s so it's not like we didn't have a poo poo ton lying around and they're not a difficult rifle to rebarrel in 7.62. It isn't that it was a terrible, awful, no good rifle it's that it was an almost entirely lateral move from what we had and we would have been way better off doing just about anything else.
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Feb 6, 2019 00:59
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Jack2142 posted:Weren't the Italian Rifles pretty bad in WWII? They ranged from pretty decent to poo poo. The pretty decent ones were the various rifles and purpose made carbines. They're within the broad category of "eh, good enough bolt action." Nothing to wax poetic about, but functional. Minute-of-Kennedy accurate. The "poo poo" part comes because of a unique little feature: the m91 Carcano had progressive rifling. Progressive rifling starts out with a slower twist then speeds up as you get towards the end of the barrel. There was a school of thought that this let you get more accuracy with less barrel wear around the turn of the 20th century, but it never really panned out. One of those things that sounded neat but didn't really do as advertised. I mean, it didn't HURT. Well, until Mussolini notices that everyone is issuing "carbine" length rifles. Don't think carbine like M1 carbine, a shorty thing for NCOs. Think K98k vs the full length goodness of the WW1 Gew98. Italy is broke as gently caress in the inter-war period so he orders a bunch of m91s cut down into fancy, modern carbines. This leads to the m91/24. Problem: cutting off the end of a progressively rifled barrel lops off the faster twist bit at the end, just leaving the slower twist part. The now-carbines horribly under-stabilized their bullets, leading to just dismal accuracy that would not warrant the LBJ seal of approval.
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Feb 6, 2019 01:04
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Do modern M4s have a full auto setting
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Feb 6, 2019 01:05
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zoux posted:Do modern M4s have a full auto setting Yes and it is actually really easy to use with a grip handle and a good reflex sight. It really makes me wonder why it took so long to put a drat handle on a gun.
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Feb 6, 2019 01:07
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bewbies posted:Yes and it is actually really easy to use with a grip handle and a good reflex sight. When are modern riflemen trained to use full auto over other modes, and has that changed since, say, Vietnam
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Feb 6, 2019 01:08
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Cyrano4747 posted:dismal accuracy that would not warrant the LBJ seal of approval. 
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Feb 6, 2019 01:08
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Cyrano4747 posted:The now-carbines horribly under-stabilized their bullets, leading to just dismal accuracy that would not warrant the LBJ seal of approval. lmao
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Feb 6, 2019 01:09
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bewbies posted:The army's approach in GWOT was all "deploy as unit" but to encourage commanders to pull back units at the end of their shifts as much as possible, which is probably the best compromise all things considered. I have no idea how this learning might be applied to a proper hotwar situation though. I rather suspect that in a modern Hot War scenario units are going to be shattered faster than they can learn, never mind faster than they can fatigue or think about short time. If you go in then you're in for two weeks and then you're either dead, in the medical system or forming a cadre to rebuild your old unit around. Modern artillery and airpower is straight up bullshit.
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Feb 6, 2019 01:15
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zoux posted:When are modern riflemen trained to use full auto over other modes, and has that changed since, say, Vietnam Broadly speaking you're trained to point your weapon at what you want to kill and shoot in full auto and hope for the best. The only guys who really aim and whatnot are DMs and to a lesser extent marines.
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Feb 6, 2019 01:25
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bewbies posted:Broadly speaking you're trained to point your weapon at what you want to kill and shoot in full auto and hope for the best. The only guys who really aim and whatnot are DMs and to a lesser extent marines. How long does it take to mag dump an m4? Would dudes just be constantly reloading?
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Feb 6, 2019 01:26
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zoux posted:How long does it take to mag dump an m4? Would dudes just be constantly reloading? You still want to fire in bursts, so it depends on your level of enthusiasm I guess. That said the basic load when I first enlisted was 7 mags. I rarely left with fewer than 15 in combat though, and I generally went out of my way to not use my gun.
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Feb 6, 2019 01:30
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Cyrano4747 posted:Minute-of-Kennedy accurate. 
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Feb 6, 2019 01:30
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bewbies posted:You still want to fire in bursts, so it depends on your level of enthusiasm I guess. i thought you were some variation of staff officer.
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Feb 6, 2019 02:07
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Cyrano4747 posted:The Ross isn't a bad rifle, just very un suited to trenches. There were also problems with the ammo they were supplied by the british, iirc. Basically the Ross was built to a fairly high standard and .303 British ca. 1914 was more of a general theme than a solid standard.
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Feb 6, 2019 02:31
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zoux posted:Do modern M4s have a full auto setting Some do, most have SAFE/SEMI/BURST. The Army had a program where they modified some of the M4s from 3 round burst to full auto, then modified them back and put them back in supply system. Then had to recall them because the modifications caused an issue where the hammer would drop when the selector was moved back to SAFE. This is why we had an Apache pilot ND into the tarmac in Kandahar. Well, that and he had chambered a round when he went over the wire, in an Apache.
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Feb 6, 2019 02:39
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Mazz posted:If they told MacArthur to gently caress off and made it in .276 Pedersen (along with the BAR) it might’ve saved us a lot of god drat trouble later but overall the Garand was and is a very good rifle and probably the best regular issue service rifle in the entire war (mostly on being semi-auto). They didn't tell him to gently caress off about that because they had millions of .30-06 rounds left over from WW1 and it was in the middle of the Great Depression. It was the right decision to use that round no matter what creepy gunfucker NRA-adjacent nerds say almost a century later. 276 PEDERSEN I scream as logistics experts beat me to death with a shovel whilst I'm turning into a corncob Vincent Van Goatse fucked around with this message at 02:47 on Feb 6, 2019 |
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Feb 6, 2019 02:44
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SimonCat posted:Some do, most have SAFE/SEMI/BURST. The Army had a program where they modified some of the M4s from 3 round burst to full auto, then modified them back and put them back in supply system. Then had to recall them because the modifications caused an issue where the hammer would drop when the selector was moved back to SAFE. This is why we had an Apache pilot ND into the tarmac in Kandahar. Do helicopter drivers normally fly with automatic carbines in the cockpit Oh also does “parabellum” mean anything special in terms of ammo? I know its Latin meaning
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Feb 6, 2019 02:48
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what's commonality of ammunition I say as Russian-paid agents who masturbate when mass shootings happen scream about how MacArthur bad because of the one correct decision he ever made
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Feb 6, 2019 02:49
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