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The Old Hack

Discussion of Military, real or fictional

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I started to think about some military matters that I feel do not belong in the politics thread and am therefore creating a new thread for it.

Recently I started to think about the use of conscripted troops versus volunteers, training and equipment (or absence thereof), and situations they are deployed in. (Disclaimer: I myself was a volunteer and I personally find the use of conscripts highly problematic. Still, I can see that there are times where grim necessity may compel their use.) All else being equal, volunteers tend to be superior to conscripts. But there are situations where conscripts may function quite serviceably. This happens if:

  1. They are well motivated, for example if deployed in defence of their homeland.
  2. They receive a decent amount of training.
  3. They receive equipment and munitions that are if not necessarily modern at least capable of keeping up.
  4. They are not used beyond what may be reasonably expected of them. (Holding a pre-prepared defensive line is good. Frontal assaults, not so much.)

This is all of course subject to change. Conscripts may also battle harden, for example, and as time passes, they may gain in capabilities and receive better training. And taking time to build their morale is never a bad idea.

Unfortunately not all leaders have the foresight to use conscripts in such a way. In a certain war I do not think I need to name one side has found itself being driven out from areas it seized in the opening months of the conflict. It has suffered painful losses in equipment and experienced troops and the morale of its troops is... not good. The Great Leader of this side has determined that the correct response is to engage in, shall we say, a leveé en masse, in which a large number of civilians is conscripted into fighting. Few of these have had any active military experience for years, some of them have never been trained. They are being shipped to the front line in a haphazard way, their organization is poor, they have a desperate shortage of NCOs and what equipment they do have available is old if not obsolescent. (I must point out that 'obsolescent' is not quite the same as 'obsolete.' An aging bolt rifle might fairly be considered obsolescent. A muzzle-loading smoothbore musket? Probably obsolete.)

The scenario they are headed for is not a happy one. They are facing a smaller but much better motivated and trained army largely consisting of volunteers, one with half a year of battle hardening to bolster it. Its leadership is superior and they are riding high on a wave of recent victories. They are pushing their opposition back and have momentum on their side. I am having trouble seeing any scenario in which the conscript forces, large numbers notwithstanding, is headed for anything but disaster. If their leaders do have the foresight to have them prepare a defensive line and attempt to hold it, that might help. Some.

I can see only two hopes for these hapless conscripts. One, the weather might provide it with some cover; autumn rains might turn the fighting zone into a morass of mud and temporarily slow or halt fighting. This might buy them time to train and get at least some improved weaponry. Two, there could be agreement on an armistice or a peace. The latter is hard to see happening but I do not wish to rule it out.

I'm interested in hearing the opinions of other posters, if you can either spot any mistakes I have made or if you can add anything. Discussion of different scenarios in which conscripts are employed would be very welcome.

Lastly, this is a general thread for discussion of matters military, be they real life, speculative fiction, wargames and computer games. Go nuts. Humor is also welcome.

Thank you all for your attention. :)

~tOH.

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Any regime which demands that its civilians non-consensually face death in its defense does not deserve to survive, and indeed deserves those conscripts turning their own guns against it. No human authority has the moral standing to demand anyone’s life. A government that forces its people into combat is a greater threat to those people than the invading army is. A government that attempts to fight to the last man will find in the end that it indeed has fought to its own death, and the death of its own people. Literally the only way that this can be justified is if the invaders are planning genocide upon those that they conquer.

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Military action does not happen in a vacuum; it is generally an extension of politics. It is unfortunate that the caliber of political decision makers is generally wanting.

I have no fundamental problem with having conscripted forces, and you, Old Hack, aptly point out the provisions for having such and employing them successfully. The US successfully used drafted troops in WW II, and that was a war worth fighting. The US also fought a useless conflict in SE Asia, and that did not go so well; but the troops were well trained and for the most part, well equipped, so even having the ducks in a row is not enough.

I like the Swiss model, which I thought the Russians had something similar, everyone serves, and everyone is in the reserves. Of course, the Swiss are not known for invading, for them it is a defensive stance. A baseline training, periodic refreshers, equipment accessible. I expect that with wider exposure to military discipline, mass shootings would not occur nearly as often.

Every weakness of the system being used comes out when it is abused. That is what Russia is experiencing. That was the US in Vietnam.

I am very much heartened by the cohesiveness of NATO in supporting the Ukraine, I hope it lasts.

My biggest fear is that a desperate Putin might toss nukes. And then what happens? It might be best for everyone if he had an accident before that happens, I'm hoping his cronies can connect those dots.

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4 hours ago, The Old Hack said:

I am having trouble seeing any scenario in which the conscript forces, large numbers notwithstanding, is headed for anything but disaster

Well, it's reported that they did win their first big battle...

...that being, the regular-army troops demanded that the conscripts hand over all the personal possessions they brought with them (apparently a traditional thing in that military), and the much more numerous conscripts beat the tar out of them.

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These are Kontakt-1 explosive reactive armour (ERA) tiles. When triggered by a rocket-propelled grenade, the Kontakt-1's explosion (to neutralise the RPG) would kill the occupants of this UAZ-452 van 

Fe81hYhWYAI0J9p?format=png&name=small

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In Kyiv Oblast, Russian troops booby-trapped a beehive with a grenade.

The enemy rigged a grenade to detonate on the opening of the lid of the hive, but over six months the bees filled the grenade detonator mechanism with honey and the pin failed to come out.

Fe89NE3XEAEsdZT?format=jpg&name=small

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Reactive armor on van - you could set that off by shooting it with a rifle, couldn't you? Reactive armor is not a bad idea, if applied appropriately. But it is funny there, and the old soldier's overconfidence in it. They should get some kind of award for creatively absurd comedy in the Jackass vein.

Beehive booby trap - I smell 'war crime'. That targets civilians, ... or are they thinking "a soldier is going to loot this, we would".

 

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2 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Reactive armor on van - you could set that off by shooting it with a rifle, couldn't you?

Depends on the ERA, but most of them don't respond to kinetic attacks.  And none of the respond to small arms fire.

 

2 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Beehive booby trap - I smell 'war crime'. That targets civilians, ... or are they thinking "a soldier is going to loot this, we would".

  Yeah, "Some other solider is going to loot this" is the best option.  

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15 hours ago, mlooney said:

Depends on the ERA, but most of them don't respond to kinetic attacks.  And none of the respond to small arms fire.

Part B makes sense ... ish, vs tank, 'small arms' covers a lot of ground.

Part A - they only respond to kinetic attacks, no? I must be missing your point.

 

15 hours ago, mlooney said:

  Yeah, "Some other solider is going to loot this" is the best option.  

Given who we're talking about, seems likely that 'Some other soldier' would be one of their own troops. This is dumb from so many angles.

 

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4 hours ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Part A - they only respond to kinetic attacks, no? I must be missing your point.

 

No, they respond to HEAT (High Explosive Anti Tank) rounds.  Shape charge that makes a hyper-sonic slug of copper heated to plasma that penetrates the armor.  Missiles and RPG use them, as well as low velocity cannons.  They don't care about the speed of the projectile vs "kinetic" attacks which are based on the speed, hardness and size of the attack.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-explosive_anti-tank

 

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On 10/10/2022 at 5:32 PM, mlooney said:

Friday_Case_Conflict.jpg

I have seen this picture before. This guy was literally asleep in his tent when the attack started. He stormed out and took part in the defence and earned himself a citation for his efforts.

You can fault his dress code. You can't fault him for his battle readiness.

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Hmm.  Back in my day if you were asleep while in a place that could have alerts you were expected to wear something close to uniform colors.  Green or black tee shirt (depending on which year) and you slept in your uniform pants.  They may have changed the rules.  And yeah, can't fault his readiness.

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6 minutes ago, mlooney said:

Hmm.  Back in my day if you were asleep while in a place that could have alerts you were expected to wear something close to uniform colors.  Green or black tee shirt (depending on which year) and you slept in your uniform pants.  They may have changed the rules.  And yeah, can't fault his readiness.

Maybe he earned a citation for his combat efforts and demerits + KP for his dress code violations? :danshiftyeyes:

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1 hour ago, The Old Hack said:

Maybe he earned a citation for his combat efforts and demerits + KP for his dress code violations? :danshiftyeyes:

The US Army doesn't do KP even as extra duty any more.  If in garrison you have civilian contractors do that and if in the field you don't have any thing that needs KP for.  You can get written "counseling statements" that would cover things like that.  It's unlikely that you would get any thing worse, unless your 1SG or company commander was a real dick.

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1 hour ago, Pharaoh RutinTutin said:

So instead of one trouble maker being assigned extra duty performing unpleasant and thankless tasks, everyone tangentally involved gets extra paperwork?

Pretty much.  The offender's direct report writes the statement, the offender signs it, a copy goes to the company clerk and the 1SG and maybe the company commander review it.  As military "you are a dumb f*ck" things goes, it's not that much paper work.

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11 hours ago, mlooney said:

No, they respond to HEAT (High Explosive Anti Tank) rounds.  Shape charge that makes a hyper-sonic slug of copper heated to plasma that penetrates the armor.  Missiles and RPG use them, as well as low velocity cannons.  They don't care about the speed of the projectile vs "kinetic" attacks which are based on the speed, hardness and size of the attack.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-explosive_anti-tank

Ah, OK. Are the not effective against DU penetrators? ... I'm going to guess, not so much, a projectile with significant mass vs a basically gaseous cloud, albeit, a high velocity and very hot one.

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43 minutes ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Ah, OK. Are the not effective against DU penetrators? ... I'm going to guess, not so much, a projectile with significant mass vs a basically gaseous cloud, albeit, a high velocity and very hot one.

Ordinary solid armor is effective against DU or other purely solid kinetic impactors. HEAT rounds use the burning hot jet of gases produced to pierce it like a cutting torch, which is why reactive armor (which blows the superheated gas away) is needed against them.

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On 10/15/2022 at 9:30 PM, ijuin said:

Ordinary solid armor is effective against DU or other purely solid kinetic impactors. HEAT rounds use the burning hot jet of gases produced to pierce it like a cutting torch, which is why reactive armor (which blows the superheated gas away) is needed against them.

Color me skeptical that DU penetrators are not effective; if true, this invalidates the value of the A-10 Warthog, which is said to be highly effective.

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Effectiveness of armor is relative—the DU rounds from the A-10’s gun can punch through lighter vehicles or through the more-thinly-protected parts of main battle tanks. I meant to say that solid armor is more resistant against pure kinetic strikes than other types of armor used in warfare.

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45 minutes ago, Darth Fluffy said:

Color me skeptical that DU penetrators are not effective; if true, this invalidates the value of the A-10 Warthog, which is said to be highly effective.

DU rounds are the best current solid shot rounds.  The best US version can penetrate about 1400mm RHAe.  The best armored Russian tanks have about 1200 RHAe armor, so angle of shot matters a lot.  Most of them don't have any where near that armor.

The A-10 is worthless against the frontal armor of most tanks.  On the other hand, it doesn't attack the frontal armor of a tank, just the much thinner top armor.

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