Friday, December 18, 2009

War becomes deep







The Photos are of Big Bertha (German gun that smashed the Belgian Forts), the French 510mm Gun, two captured German Rail Road Guns (actually from WWII), a Canadian 16 Inch Super Heavy Gun, and two photos of US Navy 14 Inch Guns.

This is the next part on artillery evolution. I have hit on some lessons learned by both sides in the First World War. Mostly doctrine which is really important for being able to effectively use your artillery (or any military equipment). Both the Central and Allied blocks learned various lessons and adapted a great deal. Be it the impacts of improved survey methods, the effects of weather, planning, the benefits of centralized control versus much to decentralized control (key point here to be addressed later), and one item that doesn't actually get much attention due to it being somewhat of a flash in the pan. For a short time it was VERY important, but was shut out by another technological advance, the airplane.

This item is heavy artillery. I am not talking 155mm guns or howitzers which were division heavy artillery back then. I am talking the MONSTER guns, the railguns, the dismounted naval guns and mortars, the Paris Guns, the Big Berthas, the US 14 inch Battleship guns that were put on huge rail cars. For about 3 years these guns were at the level of cruise missiles in importance and level of control (i.e. they were controlled and received targeting orders from Army level or higher, not a division FA HQ). In about 1918 though, newer bombers began to replace them.

The reason I am discussing these monsters (aside from the fact that they are incredibly cool) is that they added the element of DEPTH to the modern battlefield. WWI changed many definitions, tactical and strategic being two. What was considered the realm of tactical changed considerably with the advent of a howitzer or cannon that was able to shoot out of visual range accurately. With the new 75mm gun (and its like), the tactical battlefield was now no longer just what you could see in front, right and left. It now included what was way in front of you (out to about 6 or 7 kms) and BEHIND you (the enemy can also do unto you). Think of the questions this added to the mix. How can you move troops and supplies safely? Can you store your ammo and food without it being blown up? Can you have your reserves close at hand (and risk them being blown up before you can use them?) or do you keep them farther back (and risk them not getting up in time or being seen and then blown up on the march in). Depth also impacts time, because if you start spreading out and back to avoid the artillery, you now have to factor in more delays and time spent moving things around or time spent digging stuff in so its safe.

No one had really given this a whole lot of thought prior to WWI so tactically speaking it was a bit of a mess as everyone fumbled around figuring out what was up and how to make changes. Eventually they did and what you got was a type of defense in depth to offset the artillery (you had your main defenses back so artillery couldn't see it to be accurate, or was out of range).

Enter the BIG GUNS. The Germans actually had the first big, mobile, monster guns and they were used to reduce Liege and various forts in Belgium. They were slow moving, but the fact that they could be moved at all was amazing. The Belgians had built their forts with the idea that their own big emplaced guns could out range anything the Germans could bring up (155mm being the biggest) and were emplaced in so much concrete that what guns the Germans did get there would be ineffective. The Germans had two designs (one a straight up cannon, the other a howitzer) which were able to smash the forts flat. After the first year, everyone began to use the big guns for something else.

The monster guns were first real operational or strategic (the term operational and the level of command really came into existence in WWI, but not in a formal sense so both terms work for this) weapons that were really hands on for ground combatant commanders. The huge range of these weapons (20 plus miles, some as far as 26 miles) allowed commanders to hit targets well beyond the front lines. But the big guns were slow to load, hard to move (usually took several dozen train trips to move one), and there were never that many. So you couldn't just use them on any target that happened along, you had to do targeting. In today's Army, targeting is a matter of course. It is simply deciding what you must hit and how you hit it, and what order the targets go in. Targeting has moved from just artillery to general concepts like "targeting the enemy's morale, or the support of the local population", but in WWI it was artillery only. You have x number of big guns, you have y targets (usually more than you have assets to hit with), so who gets hit first, with how much, with what endstate (i.e. are we trying to destroy, neutralize or suppress the target?). This was a critical development in artillery doctrine, and it moved from big guns down to all guns eventually (took about 2 years to be standard practice for all countries involved).

Since you were going for the biggest bang for your limited buck, the big guns came under the control of Army level command who were looking at the big picture. A Corps sized ammo dump is obviously going to be a bigger loss than a company of Machine Gun Troops so the Army FA commanders would work off of the Army (or Corps on occasion) plan and angle the monster guns to hit operational/strategic targets deep in the enemy rear that would effect more than just a narrow front. The rear areas became more dangerous and the actual battlefield became much more two dimensional with depth becoming a major factor. Where the tactical issues of moving troops and supplies and digging them in and time involved had been impacted, it was now an army level problem. Its tough enough when you are only worried about a regiment, how do you space out and protect 5 division worth of troops and all the support requirements? How do you fix roads and rails for all of that? Hide and dig in the supplies? Where do you keep your replacements and reserves? How about your Army and Corps level HQs? You can't go left or right, you have to go back. Space required by armies increased massively. To use a WWII example, when the Germans Blitzkrieged into France 1940, the armored thrust was in three echelons. One on the border, one going back to the Rhine River and the final one was on the other side of the Rhine in Central Germany.

Now for the funny part. In order for these monsters to be used effectively, map firing was used. But intel on exact locations was needed for proper targeting. Since recon units could get through the lines, observation aircraft were used to photograph positions. Using the new survey and map firing techniques, the monster guns then could hit the targets. But over time the planes got better and someone figured out that rather than use the big guns you could use bombers instead. Which then led to even deeper missions and eventually to true 3D warfare. You could make more bombers and bombs for the money than the big guns and hit targets further out, so the big guns were replaced during the 1920s and 1930s by more modern aircraft. The last of the Allied monster guns were in the Coastal Artillery units and those were abolished in 1946 (the Coastal Artillery became instead the Anti-Aircraft Artillery). None of the Allies used the big monsters in WWII (other than the coastal defense guns in certain areas, mostly against the Japanese), but the Germans certainly did.

Which is another funny part. The monsters spawned the idea of depth, the targeting process, the concepts of operational/strategic level weapons used by combatant commanders, and some more monster guns (such as the 420mm gun the Germans built in WWII). The three key concepts (depth, targeting, and operational/strategic weapons) were picked up by the Allies (especially the US) who ran with them like a bat out of hell. The Germans, who actually started the mobile big gun ideas and had concurrent developement of the same ideas, ended up ignoring the three good ideas and instead focused on the dead end idea of making bigger guns.

Wednesday, December 16, 2009

And some more






Due to size restrictions I had to add these separately. One historical note: The one about the Sullivan Brothers is a true story. 5 brothers enlisted in the US Navy and all 5 were on the same ship (USS Juno). All five were KIA in 1943 when their ship went down. Also included is a picture of a radical "tea party member" attempting to disrupt a meeting with his Congressman (yes I am joking, but not so much).

Old Posters






Here are some old posters from WWII sent to me by a friend of my uncle. I love these posters and the history behind them. I especially like the Political Incorrectness behind them. Sorry, but if someone is trying to kill me, or flies a plane into a building full of civilians I don't have an issue with calling them a bad name. These posters come from a time when we actually had a real "US" versus "THEM" mentality, and we called our enemies the "Bad Guys" and had no problems doing that (I still don't have any issues with that). But we won't ever see posters like this again as the CAIR or ACLU or some other "Progressive" group would sue the pants off of the person who made it.

Some of these are motivational (buy bonds, work hard), some are requests (enlist), some are to remind us to be careful (OPSEC, or not blabbering about important info), some are to remind us of why we fight (which is something I think we need to have today).

Friday, December 11, 2009

Books: Fighting Divisions and The Bear Went Over The Mountain

I keep meaning to put up book reviews as I finish off books, but I usually end up forgeting or deciding that they are too job related to be of interest (or just to goofy to admit to reading).

I have just finished up several books and I am going to hit on several. For all Sci-Fi lovers out there read The Use Of Weapons. Its part of a, hurm, grouping of books (not exactly a series, but the same background, situation and culture) about "The Culture" who is trying by fair means or foul to get and keep mankind on the right track. I won't get into more as this book was a middle one and I am not entirely sure I have the whole background down yet. Works great as a stand alone novel, but more to it if you read the others.

The two I will hit on are history books. First off is "Fighting Divisions". A quick read, and not exactly a deep read either. Written in 1945/6, this book gives a VERY short history of each US Army (no Marines) Division in WWII. Every Armored, Cavalry, Infantry, and Airborne Division has a short 2 or 3 page history covering its war record. Not something for someone looking for lots of info, but a great "taste" of what they did that could make you want to read more. I liked the fact that this book usually included at least one interesting "Division Lore" story that may or may not have really happened (or at least not the exact way it was finally remembered), such as the division who hacked into the German National Phone system and tried to place a collect call to Hitler's Bunker (they captured a phone exchange intact and for a short time had control of all phone routing in Central Germany). The history also hit on famous high points in the division (invasions, its biggest fights, airborne drops, etc). It was also a great historical peek into how Politically Incorrect things were back then (and I find that to be greatly refreshing). You could definately get the feeling that the guys who wrote it didn't like the enemy and had no problems saying it or bad things about them and the media didn't care. On the downside this book was very short on what it could say about each division (it appears that there was a page limit) so the history was limited. It also tended to gloss over bad fights or problems. I know of several units that did not have great records or had big problems but they are certainly not addressed in this book. And I also thought some things were skipped that should not have been. Using my granddad's unit, the 79th Infantry Division, as an example, they did not mention any of its fighting on the West Wall or the Rhine River Crossing. These two items were probably the most important and the biggest fights they had and not a word (they did talk about Cherbourg though, which would be the third major fight). But not a bad read overall.

The other book was "The Bear Went Over The Mountain". This book was a complilation of short After Action Reviews (AARs) by Soviet Officers on actual small unit fights in the Soviet-Afghan War in 1979-1988. These officer wrote up short AARs (about 4 pages long with a map) and the Soviet Red Army CGSC (the Frunze Academy) analyized them and added some "you could have done this, you should have done this" commentary. The American who translated it added his own commentary for the "the US would have done this" point of view. Great Book. If you want to get a feel for how war in Afghanistan got fought, this book will give you a pretty good idea and give you some ideas of what we are up against. It is a snapshot in time so not all lessons apply now. I used this book for my Officer Professional Development Classes we have once a week. Each LT gets to do a report and brief us on what happened and what could have been done better. The book is not long, but its not a quick read for military folks. You will find yourself re-reading stuff, and doing a lot of thinking. The biggest thing I got from this book is how different the Soviet/Russian Army's mentality was from ours. Things that I consider absolute must haves for a true professional army were not (and still are not) found in the SOviet Military. And those absolutes are ironclad, this is not a question of "different cultures do it differently so keep an open mind".

What I got from this book: a Professional NCO (Sergeants) Corps is a MUST for a truely professional army, patterns kill and humans are creatures of habit and pattern, mechanized forces don't belong in Afghanistan, even small units of specialized troops are worth their weight in gold (Cold Weather/Arctic, Mountain, Air Assault), stupid insurgents get killed quick so after a couple years you are only fighting the smart survivors, you MUST have trained Forward Observers for you artillery to work and you need to have it work, you must work the native population to have any chance of winning, you must practice all actions you may have to use (react to ambush, etc.), you must know how to coordinate air support, and lastly RECON, RECON, RECON your area ALWAYS (if you don't have enough men to be able to send out patrols, you need to leave the area).

I won't get into how well the US Army is following these lessons (we are definately doing better at this than the Soviets did, no doubt), but you will get a real good idea on how different our militaries are by reading this book. I can honestly say we are much better at working with population than the Soviets ever were. Several of the AARs openly talked about executing prisoners, mistreatment of prisoners and civilians and complete disregard for any civilians on the battlefield. If the US military did even one of these events, it would be bigger than Abu Girabi. And it appears to be just about standard practice for the Soviets. But I digress. Excellent book for people wanting to understand the tactical fight and why the Soviets lost in Afghanistan.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Cracks Appearing

If you haven't read about this yet, you need to.

Give North Koreans A Chance - Forbes.com

BLUF: The Norks (North Koreans) have just instituted a currency exchange to fight inflation. You turn in something like 1000 Won (Korean Equivalent of a dollar) to get one new Won. However, there is a distinct limit as to how much you can turn in, something like 20000 Won personal cash, and then 50000 for a savings/bank account. This totally screwed lots of North Korean civilians, especially those who were dealing with the pseudo-free market places opened several years ago to offset the famine that was hitting NK (again). Well, it turns out that the markets worked really well and lots of folks were starting to make some money and get a leg up. This even pushed into the Communist Party pukes as they were taking bribes hand over fist.

But these limitations on currency trade ins actually sparked something that has NEVER happened in NK before: actual protests. Not the big campus ones the US had in the 60s or the street riots in Iran, but in the marketplaces. Lots of people were actually putting up anti-government graffiti, handing out anti-government leaflets and the big one, buring old money publically rather than turn it in.

FYI: that is a federal offense in North Korea due to the fact that it has the pictures of the Ill Jung family (the original jackass and the current $%^&tard). Defacing pictures of the great leaders is considered treason and you face up to life in prison for doing it. And LOTS of people are doing it, including lots of party officals, police and security forces (who stand to lose lots of money off of bribes and taxes).

Maybe, just maybe, this is finally the beginning of the end for the Norks and the final Stalinist regime will go down and we will get yet another example of how Communism is a flat out failure. But then again, maybe the current jackass will keep in power, shoot the people protesting, and then launch a missile in order to get more food and fuel from the West while promising to stop his nuke program. I hate to hope (Hope is not a method after all), but still it is nice to dream about what could be.

One Thing I Like About Fort Sill and Lawton

Around here they just say "Merry Christmas" instead of Happy Holidays. Meaning of Christmas once you boil it down is "Peace on Earth, Goodwill towards Men (aka humanity)". If you get insulted by that, you need help or a slap upside the head.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Speech

I have had several questions from various people about President Obama's speech at West Point and what I thought of it.

First off, I missed it. I was in an online class for ILE Phase IV (CGSC for the older generation) during it so I missed a lot of it. I read a bunch about it afterwards (including that idiotic comment about West Point being an "Enemy Camp") so I have the general idea.

Short and sweet of it is I really don't have much to say about it. I wasn't really surprised by anything he said or any of the reactions (too much or not enough depending on who you listened to). It was about what I was expecting.

I have my own personal option about his decisions, the length of time it took him to reach them, and about his delivery. But they are just that, personal. As a serving officer I don't feel that I need to be spouting off about them on a public forum. I'll talk privately about them if you want to call me. The only thing I will say is that publicly stating a pull out time is not the most militarily intelligent thing to do, but it may have been a smart thing politically. And the big thing to remember is that the government drives the train. The military has gotten orders to do things that are not good military sense before due to political situations (the US Civil War has numerous examples of this and many of them make much more interesting points than anything from Vietnam). Its not always nice, but that is an accepted part of being a US Soldier.

That may sound a bit odd, but its a good thing that we accept it (and we can always quit if we don't like it or can't accept it) becuase if we didn't deal with it that way the US would go the way of the Roman Republic. If the army back then felt like it was getting a raw deal they didn't soldier on, they marched across the Rubicon.

The other thing I will say is about that asinine comment about West Point being an enemy camp. If President Bush had gone to Berkley, would the crowd have stood up when he walked in, listened quietly and politely, and then politely applauded when he left? Yeah, thought so. It doesn't matter who the President is, we soldiers serve the US. We chose to, so that means that we go "yes sir" and carry out orders even if we DIDN'T vote for the guy in the White House (unless he decides to violate the Constitution, but that is another story). Enemy Camp? We are the greatest supporters of this country bar none. That comment was huge insult to every servicemember out there.