The Visiting Artilleryman

And Blocked Again...

2011-05-08T11:12:00.000-07:00

So much for trying to share some pictures of my latest travels. I had some nice ones too, but due to bandwidth issues they will have to wait until stateside. I had a great one when we flew through a mountain pass in an old UH-1 Huey. And a nice sunset in the Tarwin Khot Bowl which is north of us, up in the mountains. Sorry, you are going to have to wait till I get home or get a better internet connection.

Afghanistan Update

2010-11-21T00:28:00.000-08:00

Greetings all. Its been awhile since I have posted anything. Part of that is due to the lack of internet access (can't get it in my room and the computer lab is a long walk) and the other is the fact that I can't talk about much of what I do.

I am having a great time over here. My job is great, I get to blow things up nearly every day, the targets are all legitimate, and I get to see, use and access devices that are Sci-Fi level stuff. And that's the rub. Just about 75% of everything I have going on is classified so I can't share it with everyone which is a drag because I am sure the conversations would rock. So the reality is I can't post a whole lot.

I can post that I just got back from Qatar from a WEPTAC (Weapons and Tactics) Conference in Al Udied AF Base. Very good use of time, lots of discussions, lots of meeting with people who are good to know, and a cool tour of the CAOC. That's the Air Defense/Control Cell for all of CENTCOM. Think "Wargames" control room, but much more updated.

I can also say that we are firing a great deal more than I thought we were going to be. I have seen some mentions in the press about our various operations, so if you have been paying attention you will know we are conducting operations against the Taliban in and around Kandahar City. We have flushed a lot of them which results in more business for me. We have also found lots of weapons caches, and booby-trapped buildings which is also more business for me. Compared to Iraq we are much more kinetic here which is saying something. We are also much better at keeping civilians out of the way here than Iraq which is a very good thing.

Not much else right now. Stay safe everyone.

I am at Kandahar

2010-10-07T00:59:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone. I am safely arrived at KAF (Kandahar Air Field) and inprocessing. I have included a couple of photos. The TGIFriday's is real and on our boardwalk (tell me I am not a REMF). The other photo is 3 Mile Ridge. Its the dominant terrain here and gets used that way occasionally by the insurgents. We actually have lots of facilities here that are pretty nice. MWR, nice PX, several nice foriegn PXs (German, Dutch, and French), some restaurants, a couple gyms (the NATO one is NICE). This place is packed with NATO. We have Brits, Aussies, French, Germans, Yanks, Canadians, Slovaks, Romanians, Poles, Dutch, and of course the Afghans. Truely a multinational effort. NOt much else right now. I will be facebooking but I will try to post photos here occasionaly so until then.

What some words mean to me

2010-08-09T19:36:00.000-07:00

WARNING: RANT

Most of you know I had a hellish job for a year working at a Furniture Chain back in 2003. Part of my civilian experience before I came back on active duty. I don't begrudge it one bit as I see it as a very valuable experience and something that has made me much more open minded about somethings when compared to other officers who have never worked outside of the military.

Everyone knows I hated that job. Specifically I hated the people I worked for, who were mostly bullies, people who didn't know that they could have done much better, or vicious careerists who would sell you down the river in one second; and the people we did business with that I had to interact with which were usually low income, racist as all hell (I had never been called a "cracker", "honky", "white trash", or "gringo" until I worked here), and usually had zero sense of honesty, keeping an agreement/your word, or just paying what you owed.

Which leads me to the rant.

"Free-Spirit": a worthless thief who feels no obligation to pay for anything, or to keep his/her word, or feels that they have any obligation to anyone other than themselves. These scumbags usually prattle some BS about the evil of wealth, or some progressive babble about equality while they felt free to come in and order the most expensive TVs, stereos and other electronic equipment we sold and then would make off with it. Most of them usually ended up stiffing their roommates for shares of rent (I heard lots of that), or pissing them off by using them to co-sign and then leaving them on the hook.

"Spiritual": a worthless jackass who wants to have their religious/spiritual cake and eat it too. I mean it like so: religions are fine and they address a simple issue (what happens when we die, aka our souls). Religions have all developed rules over time, and all of them usually have some caveats to the tune of "if you want a heavenly reward, you need to try and do the right thing while on earth". This usually means you have to do some not fun things, and attempt to make amends when you (inevitably) screw up (we are humans, and humans are by definition imperfect, so we are expected to screw up). In other words, try to do the right things, even if not fun. Someone who touts being spiritual usually is saying (and this is my experience) "I don't want to ignore my soul, and the possibility of what might lie in the great beyond, but I want to have fun and I don't like guilt. Religion gives me guilt and I would just rather not deal with it. I'll continually bring up organized religion's problems and since I don't belong I can be smug and condescending about it without feeling bad."

Both of these groups are continually found within the "progressive" community. They are not very damn progressive, they are lazy, opportunistic slobs who get off by getting over and feeling smug about it. "Spiritual"? Bite me, if you are going to worry about your soul then that means you need to have some guilt, not a get of jail free card. You should feel bad when you do something wrong. Of course if you haven't been taught right from wrong by your progressive parents, you are going to have an uphill battle. "Free-spirit"? Again, bite me. Get a job, stop stealing, stop screwing over your roommates and figure out that you actually ARE hurting someone with your BS world-view.

For the curious, this rant is brought to you courtesy of an article I read earlier today extolling "a simple, progressive life" that mentioned these two terms in gushing, glowing words. I knew a lot of "free-spirits" and "spiritual" people in Austin, and they were all thieves and self-righteous prats. And no, I am not perfect or sin-free. I jack up all the time, and have plenty of sins to worry about. But I will damn well call a jackass a jackass when its called for.

General McCrystal

2010-06-23T15:48:00.001-07:00

I figured that I am going to get some folks wanting to know what I think about this so here it is.

General McCrystal was the POTUS' hand-picked commander on the ground in Afghanistan and he resigned today due to some remarks he made to a Rolling Stones reporter about the political leadership.

Short and sweet of it is that General McCrystal made the one mistake you CANNOT make when you are a general and that is make comments like this on public record. The POTUS is the boss and generals must obey the final orders or quit. You can disagree behind closed doors, you can complain, but when you get the word that this is what it is, that's it! Running down your civilian partners (the ambassador), your potential boss (he made some choice comments about the VP), and your boss' staff (White House Clowns was the phrase I believe) is NOT allowed.

This is a very solid rule and generals who have violated it have all been punished. McCellan and MacArthur are two of the big ones historically that come to mind but there are others as well. Generals must not cross into political realms, or if they do they must be doing so with the full backing of the POTUS (Petraus was doing this some in Iraq during the surge, but he had briefed the plan and the POTUS was on board along with all the other team). The bad thing about this is that with the Joint environment we now fight in, politics is becoming a bigger issue for generals. You are expected to deal with politics when overseas, but not with the US? Hard to keep the two separate.

McCrystal blew it, and he is gone. And that is the right thing to do.

Now, how does this hurt us? And hurt us it does, there is no silver lining to this.

First, the man with the plan who was hand picked to fight the COIN strategy and the mini-surge and had planned and overseen it and was to fight it all the way through is gone. That will hurt. Second, we are pulling General Petraus out of CENTCOM Command to take command in Afghanistan. That is actually a demotion for him as he goes from combatant commander to theater commander and furthermore he now will not be finishing off Iraq and running other things that need attention. Third, it effects the POTUS. He did the right thing, but McCrystal was HIS handpicked choice for whom he removed someone ELSE in order for him to take over. That doesn't help the POTUS' image in terms of things military and Joint (getting the Civilian/Military Team working together). Fourth, the Afghans liked McCrystal, and he was about the only guy over there that they did like and could deal with (dumb comments or not, the ambassador is not exactly high on Karazi's list).

This really brings home a major point, the US Army just doesn't have a whole lot of bench when it comes to COIN operations (Counter-Insurgency Operations). We have to demote someone to fill the gap because we have no one else who can step up. But we could do worse than Petraus so I can't complain about that.

Things just got much harder for us. Not impossible, just harder.

Book Review: The Echo of Battle

2010-06-05T10:01:00.001-07:00

The Echo Of Battle is written by Brian McAllister Linn. Its topic is simply a in depth discussion of the US Army Way of War, or more accurately how it rotates between three focal points. Mr. Linn holds that there are three "traditions" in the army that influence how the army thinks, prepares, fights and reviews its conflicts. These three traditions are the "Heroic" (man is the key), "Guardians" (Fortress America types who focused on looking inward versus overseas), and "Managers" (bring order to the battlefield, science can remove the grey area and men are merely parts of the whole).

This book is a great look into how the US Army has thought strategically for its entire existance and how it has gone through changes, often painfull. The US Army has rarely been ready for the war it actually ends up fighting and it is pretty clear in this book. But the intersting part of this book is how the Army then veiws its lessons from the war and what it takes away. Linn's main thesis seems to be that the army usually gets it wrong, or somewhat wrong and then runs on the fly to fix and overcome (which seems to be a major strength of the US Army).

This book is not a light read. Parts were somewhat dull, and there is practically no "action" to relieve the discussion of army theory and strategic thought. I am not sure that I agree with all that the author says and I think he does a bit a shoehorning to make people and ideas fit into his three major traditions. But he does give a good run down of how the Army thought about doing its job and how the three traditions have morphed over time.

A couple of other items that this book brought up. First, the author makes a great point that I don't think he quite realizes. The Army, despite its mistakes and its muckups, still has always been able to pull it out when push comes to shove (with one exception). When the shooting starts, the learning curve explodes. The biggest thing I have seen out of this is that one can't seem to replicate the conditions for the "explosion" except during war. In some cases you can come close, but not perfect. So you could argue that while being prepared for war is a good thing (it certainly is) it might be better to be an organization that can learn fast once the shooting starts.

Second, he points out that in the 1990s the US Army had poor senior leadership. The major threat had gone away, the world was changing and the Army failed to change with it. In 2000, I did an NTC rotation and our training was a stand up Fulda Gap Force on Force Scenario. Why? Who was going to try and fight us like that ever again? While our senior leadership was focused on Berets, we should have been trying to figure out how to fight in a failed nation state.

His third point is an interesting one. The current wars have been going on for quite some time now. What that has brought about is something very intersting. Just about every officer and soldier has seen combat. Instead of having a service dominated by a "clique" of officers (such as what happened after Desert Storm) who had been in the fight, EVERYONE has been in the fight. You can't just bring in an expert and expect them to not get questioned by people who can say "I was there and this is what I saw, why are saying different?" This is VERY good for the army. Everyone feels that they have the right to pipe up and provide input. A debate where just about everyone is taking part if you will.

And that is good stuff.

Ok, overall an okay book, but a tough read. Unless you are really wanting to dive into a historic focus of how the army has learned over time, this one is not for you.

Korea

2010-05-28T08:48:00.000-07:00

I have been asked by several folks about my take on the situation on the Korean Peninsula. The three reasons for this are that I have been there (stationed at Camp Stanley for a year), I am in the military, and I constantly study stuff like this. So I will put in my two cents worth.

My humble opinion is that militarily the North Koreas are in a world of hurt, but the situation is really bad politically for the US.

The NKs have two strong military cards to play. The first is the King Of Battle, their artillery. They have Corps of Artillery, and by that I mean whole Army Corps made up of nothing but FA, and its all aimed at Seoul. Thousands of MRLs (Multiple Rocket Launchers) and tube artillery (cannons) that can range Seoul and do a world of hurt. These units are in hardened positions (bunkers and caves) and have pre-surveyed firing positions and stockpiled ammunition. It would take a lot of counter-fire missions and air strikes to knock them out, figure (my estimate here, not anything offical) at least 48-72 hours to knock out over 50 to 60% of them. In that time, Seoul would be pretty badly banged up.

However, this isn't as war winning as it seems for several reasons. First off, most of this artillery is OLD, 1960s technology, and so is the ammunition. A high dud rate can be expected and accuracy is not all that (of course with this many guns and rockets you don't need much). Plus there is the fun fact that the really heavy Koksong guns have a design flaw that makes them brust after about 6 to 8 rounds of rapid firing. We know exactly where all these weapons are so knocking them out is just a function of shooting a lot. The ROK and the US Army have some pretty good systems in place to do this. Our Air Forces of course (NK ADA is probably about as good as Iraq's was and their AF is a joke), but also our counter-fire artillery systems. We and the ROKs have MLRS systems that were pretty much designed for just this. And we now have GMLRS that can outrange the NK artillery (80 Km range to their 40 to 60 kms) and never miss. 1 MLRS load of GLMRS will destroy 12 NK FA Systems and it can be fired in less than 1 minute. Computing data is already done since we know were everything is already. The only issue is there is so much of it.

The second big punch the NorKs have is their Special Forces (SF). This is a big item to worry about. They have one of the largest Special Forces in the world and they train constantly to do their worst to the South in the event of a war. They have commandos, ranger-types, SEAL-types, sniper-types, recon troops, fifth column types and air-assault types. They have special miget subs (one is suspected of the torpedo attack that started this), they have Hughes Helocopters modified to look like ROK army or civilian models, they have a whole mess of spies and people who have been passing info for years. Nasty stuff.

However, historically these guys have turned out to not be as good as thought. In 1968, the so called "Second Korean War" was fought. Lots of raids, ambushes on the DMZ, and commando raids into the South to attack ROK government facilities and an attempt on the ROK President. The deep raids failed miserably and no one in the world really noticed because this was a side show compared to Vietnam. While the SF has been training more than the standard army, they have still been cut back on. Worse, the effects of the famine have hurt them as the eligible pool of recruits is much smaller to pick from. The ROK has been training on defending against these guys for years and have gotten better at detection and interception. Even these tunnels dug under the DMZ are not such a big deal as they don't go that far behind them (if you pop up in the middle of a battalion defensive position you are in trouble, SF or not). Once they have shot their bolt, there is no way home. No sub could make south after the shooting started, and the AF would be shot down after about 2 days. Once you are on the run, you are going to get hunted down. The South doesn't have anywhere to hole up and their are no guerrilla bands to join. They would do some damage, but not enough.

And that is the main point. The two major strengths of the NorKs are not enough combined to finish off the south, only enough to do damage and make them MAD. Mad enough to decide to finish the stupidity once and for all and END it. The ROKs have enough men to do it, and their equipment is now 50 years more advanced than what the NorKs can throw (think WWII armies fighting the Coalition in Desert Storm).

The NorK Nuke threat only works on the defensive by the way, they have no method of delivery. No missile they have can carry their bomb design, they have no planes that can carry it. They could bury it and set it off after someone rolls over it, but even that is limited thanks to the mountainous terrain (blast would be channelled so small area of effect on your own soil).

So why is this bad politically for the US? Simple, what if the ROK decides to pick a fight? Or vice versa? The ROKs have every right to confront a rouge nation and the world is actually standing aside on this one. If it escalates, the US is bound by treaty to aid the south. The ROKs are in the clear to DO SOMETHING right now if they want so their is no "we can't help because they are the aggressors".

So the POTUS would get another war, and a nasty, knockdown, bloody one at that. He can fight with the allies and loose support from his base, or he can pull out and loose a LOT of international clout and a LOT of independent votes. Loose Loose if you are the current POTUS. Even worse, he has a ROK that is set up to actually want to do something, and CAN do something this time around.

Book Review: The Soviet-Afghan War

2010-05-22T20:47:00.000-07:00

The Soviet-Afghan War: How a Superpower Fought and Lost was a book written by the Russian General Staff after the end of the USSR and translated by Lester W. Grau and Michael A. Gress. It is the third in a triology of books by Grau, the other two being "The Bear Went Over The Mountain" and "The Other Side Of The Mountain", both dealing with the tactical level of the fight, Soviet and Muj sides.

This book is, or was, to be the offical Soviet General Staff study of the war. The Soviets had made a point to do this after every fight (starting with WWII) for future study. Since they lost, this was somewhat of a backburner project. When the USSR became Russia again, there was really no offical desire to write it. But being a "free" society, a couple of officers got together and published it on their own dime with some help from Grau. So its a pretty interesting book to start with just for that.

This is the offical look at the war as fought by the Soviets. The "Big Picture" if you will. Not a whole lot of tactical fights (some examples to explain a point usually), but lots of "This was the doctrine, this is what worked or didn't, this is what we developed" and so on. As a division staff officer, I found this to be very useful reading.

I learned a couple things that went a long way to explaining why the Soviets blew this fight. First, the book explains the Soviets focus on being an "Operationally Based" army. Since most of you won't get that term here it is: The Soviets don't fight battles at a battalion or BCT (Brigade) level, they fight in terms of Divisions, Corps, Armies, and Army Groups/Fronts. Like us (NATO/US) they viewed Western Europe or Northern China as the next big fights and were looking to repeat WWII. Lots of tanks, troops and FA moving straight ahead. Where we would be maneuvering a company or battalion, they thought in terms of moving a division or corps. Scale is vastly increased.

Now, for Europe this idea has a good deal of merit (Northern European Plain is ideal for this, not so much Central or Southern Germany though excepting the Fulda Gap). Afghanistan, not so much. Mountains, deserts, few roads, high altitude and so on. Afghanistan is a TACTICAL fight. In the US Army, a Corps is the highest level of tactical fighting you get. Usually we mean something like a company or battalion, maybe a platoon or BCT (Brigade Combat Team), a small combined arms team. Its our great strength. And the Soviets greatest weakness. The leaders in this fight are NCOs and junior officers, again our great strength. The USSR had a absolutely pathetic NCO corps and its junior officers were pretty much overpaid sergeants. Which was exactly the thing they couldn't afford to have and win. They didn't win so you can figure out how it worked for them. That fact alone was worth the read.

This book had sections on every branch and service and how well they did or did not do. FA, Transportation, Supply, Maintenance, Air Support (fixed wing and helio), armor, special forces, engineers, chemical (smoke and flamethrower units, no gas although there were rumors of its use), and even PXs and pay. A very useful insite to how they did business and where they came up short which was all too often.

The other major issue that this book brought out was one I thought interesting. The political lens that the 40th Army had to put on everything in order to be in line with the communist party political views. You would think that wasn't something you needed to worry about but it ended up being a major issue. The Soviets could not successfully explain what was going on to the political leadership due to this war being something that didn't exist. According to Marxism-Leninism theory, a country that has become communist will never want to be anything but that so it will never have a home grown revolution against it.

I am NOT making that up. The Russians tried to pin this on the US, Pakistan, China, Britain, Japan and Gulf Arabs, but since none of them actually ever showed up to actually fight they had to conclude that it WAS a home grown anti-communist revolution. But they couldn't tell that to the political bosses, or if they did (once or twice) that couldn't be sold to the people. So they couldn't devise a political strategy to support the military one (sound familiar? not for Iraq though, we did manage that). Confusion at the top had some bad effects.

I have to admit this book was very interesting, but it was hard to read. It took me about 3 months off and on to finish. General Staff Officers are not exactly great writers to begin with, but the topics were not exactly light reading either. You can't make a chapter on the Theater Maintenace Program for vehicles to be very exciting even if you hire Tom Clancy to write it. But it was very informative and I really have an understanding of how the USSR fumbled this war.

As a counter to what we are doing I can say that it appears we are not making nearly as many mistakes as the Soviets did. We are doing vastly better at the Combat Support and Combat Service Support functions the Soviets jacked up and we are doing much better at the political side of the house in that our problems are completely different than what the Russians faced. Yes we have major ones, but we managed to make ours original so at least we are not guilty of repeating past mistakes on that level.

This book is also great for its huge amount of "They did WHAT?" items they hit on as well as explaining many confusing items due to different army setups. Things like the fact that Soviets counted smoke artillery as chemical rounds so technically they did use chemical weapons in Afghanistan were as we count them as a type of artillery round. Or that they used LOTS of flamethrowers on about everything that moved. Or that 67% of their entire force serving in Afghanistan was hospitalized due to sickness at one point in time (we haven't ever gone past 5%, and probably not even that).

One of my favorite items: when the Soviets pulled out 6 regiments of troops in 1986, they laggered them together prior to moving them home. They had a Hepatitus outbreak and rendered all six regiments combat ineffective for 2 months until they could get them healthy again. They didn't identify it in time, they didn't contain it well and they couldn't get their soldiers to obey simple hygine rules to stop the spread.

Another fun fact: pay for a Soviet soldier was between 350 to 8 rubles a month for pay. 350 for senior officers, 8 for lowest private. Each ruble was worth (offically) $1.59. That was including the combat pay bonus, so if you were a private you made offically less than $15 a month for serving in Afghanistan. The comment was that a soldier who saved his money might be able to buy a pair of bluejeans when he mustered out. And to add another fun fact: the actual exchange rate of a ruble at this time was actually about 20 cents. Nice, thanks for your service.

The list goes on and its full of stuff that makes you do double takes. And this is written by the Soviet General Staff, which makes me wonder what they didn't talk about.

Over all, a very good book. This book is not meant for a casual read or someone with a superficial interest. You need to want to know what this book has in it to finish it or to read all of it and not skip parts that seem dull. I recommend it for people who also really want an understanding of how different our militaries worked and function.

As a professional aside, I have heard from several sources that the Russians are of two minds about our involvement in Afghanistan. One, many want some payback so are for us being there. But many others are really pissed that we are doing so well compared to them. We have been there going on nine years. We just hit the 1000 KIA in Afghanistan. The Soviets lost in a same amount of time at least 25,000 KIA (new number, numerous sources in Russia have published this number as the actual loss number instead of the offical 13,000, and its been independently verified that the 25K is correct).

Why I like Rifts

2010-05-09T10:43:00.000-07:00

Rifts: a role-playing game by Palladium Books that combines every type of game style in existence (D and D type stuff, Sci-Fi, modern combat, superheroes, supernatural, etc.) and combines it into one system. Rifts itself is based on a future earth where a huge disaster killed nearly 7 billion people and destroyed pretty much everything else. Rifts are rips in time and space and they suck stuff in and dump stuff out (like aliens, monsters and demons). Magic and physic powers returned to the world and basically the entire earth had the Wackyland sign put on it (IT CAN HAPPEN HERE).

This of course makes for a great game where you can play any type of character and use magic, technology, superpowers, physic powers, magic swords, summoned terrors from beyond and so on.

I love this game for many reasons, but the biggest one has to be the storyline. They start with the Golden Age of Man (late 21 century) with high tech stuff, the disaster itself (which you can actually play in the game Chaos Earth), and then the Dark Ages where mankind barely hung on. And then the period known as "NOW".

NOW in the time period rocks. You have new nation-states and groups, some good, some bad, some with parts of both because lets face it people, grey is the standard human color. You can be the noblest nation on earth and still do bad things in the name of good because they need to be done (such as dropping two nukes to end a war, or assassinating someone in order to stop a genocide or a war, possibilities are endless).

Palladium Books is the one group that really captures that aspect. They even encourage play like that. You can be good guys fighting for a bad nation for a good reason. Nice mix that.

The chat boards have a lot of people who really don't get that part though. Coalition (the High Tech, human supremest nation in North America) is bad period. Anyone fighting them is good period. Not really in depth viewpoint for some of these folks. Also not very military either. The Coalition is THE military powerhouse in North America. So when it starts a fight, its usually going to win.

The biggest thing I love about this game is centered around that aspect. Palladium Books avoids the "good guy" trap that so many other games fall into. This is know to many gamers as the "Star Wars Trap", "The StormTrooper Rule" or the "Rebel Alliance Clause". Because the rebels/non regular military establishment/militia are the "good" guys they will win, no matter what the real ground military truth is. Any professional military force will be defeated by a rag-tag bunch of heroes, and the nameless soldiers in bad guy armor can't shoot straight except during the opening scene when we are establishing the fact that they are the "bad guys" when they gun down some unarmed women and children. Unless of course the "military" is a group of scruffy, unshaven, graffiti all over their armor and vehicles misfits who are constantly in trouble for doing things "their way" in which case they will pull it out after being ordered not to do something by an superior officer who graduated from the academy.

The Tolkeen War (a recent storyline) focused heavily on that. The Tolkeens (a magic focused kingdom in Minnesota) fought against Coalition invasions. They won some fights, but the Coalition professional military machine ended up crushing the entire kingdom. Which makes perfect sense as the Coalition Military was well equipped, well trained, and after some sorting out, well lead. But many were surprised by this, as the Tolkeens were the "good guys" so they should have won. They didn't and I am thankful that the storyline worked out that way.

I bring this up because I just got "Triax 2" which deals with the other big human technological power: The New German Republic. I won't get into the huge details behind this group, but they are fighting for their lives against Gargoyles and Brodkil demons in Europe. And they just scored a huge victory by using actual military strategy and thought. In the book/series timeline, they were able to cut the demon zones in two by using an amphibious/airborne assault behind the lines and have wiped out nearly a third of their enemy using realistic military tactics. The NGR's army is disciplined, shaves, keeps their equipment clean and well maintained, and has officers that are smart and listen to their NCOs on occasion. In short, completely opposite of every effective Sci-Fi military in existence. I so love that about this game.

Yes, I know its a game. Yes I know we are talking about fantasy and sci-fi. Yes, I know none of this is real. But its nice to see some realism in certain things.

Book Review: Queen Victoria's Little Wars

2010-05-09T09:50:00.001-07:00

Well, I have finally finished a book after having been stumbling around reading four different ones over the period of the move from Fort Sill to Fort Drum. And this one is a recent purchase I saw at Borders about a week ago. So here we go.

Queen Victoria's Little Wars was first released in 1972. Written by Byron Farwell, it is about the various conflicts, expeditions and outright wars fought during the reign of Queen Victoria starting in 1837 and going up to 1900 when she died. Quite a lot of area to cover historically speaking.

First off, this book is considered a classic by many history and war buffs. It gives a pretty fair listing of and short run downs of the whole expansion of the British Empire and how its politics changed. It hits on how the Empire actually did expand, the politics behind it and how they shaped and pushed things. And often as not, how the guys on the ground did stuff that was opposite of what the guys in charge (but back in England) wanted, but once done couldn't be undone. Pretty much how most Empires happen really.

It was a great read, but for me that was all it was. Due to the size of the topic, it couldn't give more than a short chapter to many huge topics (The Second Boer War was only one chapter as an example, and the Indian Mutiny was three). If you were looking for huge amounts of detail and information, this book isn't for you. If you are looking for a starting point, this is a good one. I did learn a lot about conflicts I knew nothing about or very little, but I knew much more about the Boer War and Zulu War than was presented.

I also need to add that this book had two great features going for it that makes it worthy of reading. The first was the bibiliography that was included. The author pulled from a HUGE amount of sources, so if you want to learn more about one fight or war, you have the prefect list to work off of and he linked it to each conflict so instead of having to hunt down books throughout the whole list, it was already done. Second was the list of medals and the appendix dealing with the British Army Regimental system. If you have never dealt with the British system, the regiment can be a difficult thing to understand. This appendix (read it first before the book) is a great source of info and explains a lot. It also includes an explanation of all the medals given out so you can figure out what all the "VC, DCO, SRC, etc" mean in terms of who did what when.

I recommend this book, I enjoyed it.

Fort Drum and Watertown

2010-04-28T14:27:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone. We are now in week three of Fort Drum after PCSing from Fort Sill (aka we moved on the army's dime to a new assignment). And we are LOVING it.

First off, Tamara had a tough year in Oklahoma this last year. I won't get into details but she had been living there for 15 years and the shine was off. She was really unsure about this move as I had never been to Fort Drum and there were plenty of horror stories about this place usually involving weather and the area being serious banjo music land.

The weather stories are probably true. It has been nice much of the time, but it has been cold (really cold) several times and it snowed yesterday. It has all melted, but still getting snow in late April was a bit off-putting. But when its nice, its NICE. No harsh wind, no nasty sticky heat (yet), just pleasant cool weather, perfect for a sweatshirt.

As for the area around here. This place beats Lawton hands down. The nearest major town is Watertown, population about 25 to 30K. It gets bigger if you include the rather large number of small towns surrounding Fort Drum and on the lake (Lake Ontario) and the St Lawrence Seaway just an hour north. Lawton was 100000 and had maybe a quarter of the things that this place offers. Much more outdoors stuff that is family friendly (Fort Sill had some stuff but it was OUTDOORS outdoors, no kids or wives stuff). River cruises, Lake Cruises, lots of nice shops and places to eat. Hunting up the ying yang. Easy gun laws (unless its a pistol then brace yourself), all sorts of guns shops and outdoor places (they even have a firearms section in the PX, how cool is that?). The Mall is easily as good as any in OKC, and there is a much bigger one in Syracuse an hour south. Lots of GOOD chain resturants (unlike Lawton). TWO Drive In Theaters (we went to one last weekend, first time for Tamara and she loved it). And the people go out of their way to show that they are NOT like people in NYC. I have had two people apologize to me about NYC and how it must have "ruined" my expectations of what "real" NY is like.

Reminds me about how everyone in Nebraska keeps saying don't judge us by Omaha.

The only issues I have here is that housing is a pain. We are on the wait list for a house on Fort Drum and there isn't a whole lot of rentals. What is here is too small, too old or not easily leasable for less than a year.

On the whole, this is looking like a great move. I highly encourage my friends and relatives to visit us while we are here, this is a great place. But wait until after July so we can get a house first.

On the Road Again

2010-04-07T20:27:00.000-07:00

Hi everyone. I am typing this from Hammond, Indiana where we (Baby Girl, Wife and me) are staying for a few days to visit her parents and brother. We are in route to Fort Drum, New York for my new assignment in the 10th Mountain Division.

Fun times to say the least. The actual packing was simply insane. Tamara had to watch the baby and I had to supervise everything, so it was not 2 people moving it was 1 person moving two people. And it worked out that way, we had a bunch of stuff packed accidently when I had to step out for a few minutes to get the car weighed. So I have to show up early to get some gear.

But overall it has been a good trip so far. Baby girl has been enjoying it (the windmill farm in Iowa had her attention and then some), and even Tamara is relaxing some.

Army-wise Fort Sill was pretty good to me. I had a tough job but enjoyed it. I had two very good battalion commanders and I did some good work while there. I was able to get a couple VERY good schools before I left which will help a lot in the new gig. I got a wife and a baby girl, so even better. I also got Branch Qualified and then some with my tour as Bn XO (you need a minimum of 1 year in one of three different slots, and I got 2 years and 2 months), and a GREAT OER. I am pretty pleased with my last two years+ at Sill.

Fort Drum is going to be a whole new thing though. I am trying for base housing, and I have a job in Division Staff. A pretty high up one artillery-wise too. I have never worked higher than BDE, so this will be interesting.

The last thing is what is coming up in the fall. Some of you may not have heard yet, but I am heading to Afghanistan this fall. I will be working at Division Staff and I am working in RC South area. Yes, the area where most of the action is going on. But my job is a staff pouge so I shouldn't be doing anything too dangerous (of course, I said that the last time and look what happened).

Purple

2010-03-15T17:50:00.000-07:00

Yes, Purple. That is the topic today. It is a color and in the military it stands for JOINT. Not the smoking kind, but the very cool world of Joint Operations.

Joint Operations are simply operations involving all the services (Army, Navy, AF and USMC), some of them, other Government agencies (say DOD, DOS, ATF, DEA, CIA, or FBI or any combination there of), and other countries (the Superfriends: Britain, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, or others such as South Korea, Japan and other NATO types). While this may not sound like a major thing (hey that is how we always do things right?) it is actually a fairly new development.

Sort of.

We (the US military) have been working as a team for quite a while. Earliest examples are the Mexican War and several impressive operations in the US Civil War (see Grant's Western Campaigns along the Mississippi). But these were not doctrine, they were usually ad hoc and much depended on how well the CO's got along or what the orders from Washington said. But in the late 1980's Congress passed a neat law known as the Goldwater-Nichols Act. This act forced the services to actually work as a team by law.

For example: instead of having a fleet, an air force, and a army in an area of the world working through their branches in the rear, you had a defined theater in which their was one boss. You could have an Army General commanding Navy and AF units, or Navy commanding the same or AF (even a Marine in theory). This commander reported directly back to the SECDEF and not through the parent services. This mean you had truly one team. And to make sure everyone worked together the DOD put out Joint Doctrine to get everyone "speaking" the same language.

All of this may sound "duh", but it is a unique development in the world of warfighting. The US (and the Superfriends) are really the only countries that do this. And it shows, the US has been running Joint Operations since Panama and has had pretty much major successes in just about every one. Panama, Desert Storm, OIF all successes (yes OIF is pretty much a done deal and we have won, someone tell MSNBC). Somalia not so much, but that could be argued as a break in method (Clinton set up two task forces, not one unified command). OEF is ongoing so we will see.

Purple is the color code of all Joint Doctrine and I have been attending JOFEC (Joint Operations Fires Effects Coordinator) these last two weeks and we talk nothing but Joint. It is extremely interesting, and also a major challenge. Getting everyone synched is huge challenge and it is a complex process. We are still working the kinks out of it. But kinks or not, this makes for a incredibly successful military as well as other elements. Please note we include civilian agencies in this so we usually get a full up team effort or this with everyone more or less pulling together. It also makes the movies about the army running off and doing craziness on its own rather funny for anyone who knows about this (if you have to work together for everything how do you do things without someone else finding out and diming you out?).

As military history goes this is an exciting time to be in the military.

Motivation

2010-02-19T14:21:00.001-08:00

And for those requiring motivation...

War On The Western Front

2010-02-10T14:52:00.000-08:00

Book review time. I finished this yesterday, due to paternity leave and the snow storm I had enough time to polish it off along with the book "Afghanistan". I want to review this one first as it was much more interesting.

The War On The Western Front by Dr. Gary Sheffield was focused on the soldiers and tactics used on the Western Front from 1914 to 1918 in WWI. It was very interesting and kept my attention the whole time. The first half of the book discussed a "typical" example of a French, German, British and American Soldier. Why they joined (or if they were drafted), basic training, how the training changed over time, equipment used, and so on. Food, medical treatment, life in the trenches and so on where hit on in good detail.

The second half detailed the equipment and tactics and how they evolved over time. This to me was the really fascinating part. I have become convinced that WWI is one of the most poorly understood wars of all time. I think it has suffered from "Vietnam" syndrome, which I mean that it was so politically charged for so long that you really had to have most of the people involved die off before you could have some real discussions about it. And when it came time to start having them, other things were in the way. 20 years after you had WWII, which kept everyone focused. Then 40 years after you had Vietnam, and no one wanted to look back that far. Now everyone involved is dead, so we have no more first hand accounts. There are lots of books out there on WWI, but most are pretty rare.

The part about this book that is very fascinating is the discussion on tactics. WWI is commonly viewed as a mindless bloodbath in which everyone was blundering around until one side finally caved in due to exhaustion. This is only part of the truth. WWI is a great example of technological impact on people and how difficult it can be to understand, especially if you are trying to get huge organizations and bureaucracies to work FAST. Modern staffs and organization like we have now did not exist back then, and you had commanders who thought the telephone was suspect for field use and had earned their spurs charging Arabs in the Sudan (Germans and British). People who couldn't figure out how best to use a machine gun. WWI was an example of a world (literally) trying best to figure out dozens of new ideas, concepts and machines in the worst possible conditions. Results were of course messy and very misunderstood. This book brought it out and showed that contrary to popular belief, change was constant and progress was made. And that for every new change, more work was then needed to figure out step two.

A very good book, I highly recommend it.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you Victoria Maria Eason

2010-02-07T10:02:00.000-08:00

Here is my baby girl, born 31 January 2010 at 1949 hours. She weighs in a 7 pounds and 10 ounces, had her mother's eyes (brown), 21 inches long, and according to everyone asked she has her father's toes (I have no idea how that topic came up, but there you are).

Day 3

2010-01-30T12:48:00.000-08:00

As punishment for posting an AAR the power died at 2200 Thursday and has not come back on yet. So we have been on generator power ever since. Yesterday I had to go to Lawton for gas and the drive was scary. Every tree in the area has been coated in ice and most have broken in half. The temperatures have not gone above freezing yet so no ice has melted except on the roads. All the power and phone lines are sagging nearly to the ground.

But we are ok. My 4400 watt generator is running like a clock. It produces 3500 watts regular with surge capacity of 4400. After reading the guide and some experimentation we have figured out our setup.

One tank of gas (4 gals) gives us ten hours. We can power one space heater, two floor lamps, tv and dvd. We can use our G Foreman grill/hotplate with either the heater or lamp. So we had noodles and vension stew and borscht for supper. We use the garage as the fridge. We also discovered that our hot water heater is well insulated and we have hot water (well warm this morning) so we have able to take short showers too.

I have I'd'd a couple of changes I think I will put in. One, I need to have some items with easier access for plugging in (aka the fridge). Two, I should get the fuzebox modified so I can plug directly into the house instead of running cords. I also need the switch to prevent returning power from blowing up the fuzebox (you turn the house from grid to generator and back). Three, a bigger generator may be in order. 4400/3500 watts does ok, but I can barely use 2 space heaters on this one. A 5500 watt would be able to handle a bigger load so we could use more of the house (more heaters).

The generator is use is a PowerMax 4400. Its made in China originally for RV power and its pretty good. It cost me 450 dollars through Amazon. It was one of their top ten recommended choices and it was a good buy. It was several hundred dollars cheaper than compable models. It is a pull start but it has started on the first pull each time. You can get these models with an electric start and I may do that for my wife's sake next time. PowerMax also makes 5500 models and that will be my next step up.

Being Prepared

2010-01-28T19:18:00.000-08:00

Well, I got my fill of being justified today. I have always been someone who believed that if you do something "just in case" then it usually doesn't happen. And if it does, then you are ready for it. However this does tend to make me have a bunch of stuff that usually just sits around gathering dust waiting for that "just in case" moment.

We had that moment starting at 1100 today when the Ice Storm hit Fort Sill. WE have just finally dug out from the huge snow storm and everyone was thinking we were ready for this one. But it occurred to me that this was an ICE storm, not snow, and that is a world of difference.

Good thing I was thinking ahead a bit. Part of my JIC stockpile is a propane camp heater, two lanterns (one battery and one hand crank), and a generator with all necessary items to provide heat, light, coolness (a fan really), power to charge cell phones and even allow me to watch TV should I be bored. I even have a small gas tank (15 gallons). But since we are moving I had drained it and no gas. But I had a bad feeling about the coming storm and took some lunch time to fill a 5 gallon can.

We were released from Sill at 1300 (I left at 1400 due to an emergency in the unit), and the drive home was really making me nervous. Ever tree was coated in 1/2 inch thick ice and many had snapped off or snapped in half. Power lines were also coated. Being from where I am from, I knew this storm was going to screw up the power royally. When I got home I pull out the emergency locker and got ready.

At 1500 our power went out and it stayed off till about 2100 tonight. The power company couldn't give me a definite time so I got to break out the gear. My wife, who tends to give me grief for some of this stuff, has repeatedly stated that she married correctly after I got everything going. My generator worked fine, we had lights and heat and comfort.

What I learned:

1. Know your gear. I initially tried to used a smaller electric generator (think a big car battery with a built in plug set) to power the heater and figured out that it didn't pack nearly enough juice to do anything. However it was great for cell phones and small stuff. I am still needing to figure out how much stuff I can really use on my generator, but it worked great for the basics.

2. Have your stuff set up. My gear was mostly ready to use, but I had to re-arrange my garage in order to get the generator into a workable place (can't keep it indoors due to exhaust), and get the power cords strung. Spent about 30 minutes outside in an ice storm due to this, not fun.

3. Test gear prior to use. I violated this twice, I hadn't tested my generator or my propane heater. Both worked well, but what if?

4. Back up to the back up. I had several light sources ready if the generator didn't work, and two heaters (well, one heater and the other was a small cook stove but in a pinch it could provide some heat).

5. Have the plan ready. I had already figured out how to use what I had for best effect. In this case, one floor lamp and one space heater in the master bedroom with the rest of the house closed off. Heat is trapped in one area, and the floor lamp gives tons of light. Plus I was able to counteract the loss of heat due to having to crack a door for the power cord by running under several other doors which "sealed the leak" in a manner of speaking.

6. Know you emergency. Figure out what are likely problems in your geographical area for preparing. And then figure out what MAY happen and be ready for that too (ICE in Ok? Who would have thought THAT?). This isn't so hard actually, when you boil it down, most emergencies end up needing the same stuff (food, water, medical supplies, power, commo, tools) so in preparing for one, you can in many case prepare for all.

We were able to be warm and do a lot of stuff (I read some important stuff for my next assignment and Tamara worked on some accountancy paperwork) while some other folks were having to stay in their cars for warmth. And being that my wife is pregnant, I don't like the idea of my wife and baby being in an unheated house should this storm linger. So I have some serious piece of mind.

We Win

2010-01-24T10:51:00.001-08:00

Just in case you missed it (and since it certainly didn't make MSM I am sure you did). Yesterday the USMC pulled out its final unit in Iraq and handed it's areas of responsiblity over the the US Army and Iraq Military.

Area of Responsibility? Anbar, part of the Sunni Triangle and most heavily fought over area in Iraq (aside from some areas in Baghdad). No explosions, no attacks, no nothing bugged the ceremony. Which was unlike the one we had for FOB Danger, when we had a rocket attack during the handover (missed of course, but a PR coup for the insurgents).

No more Marines in Iraq and the Army will be down to 50,000 troops by summer's end. Hmmm, sounds like victory to me.

Words that make you go "DAMN"

2010-01-22T07:26:00.000-08:00

From General Gulzarak Zadran (Afghan Army General and Mujahideen Commander):

"I should mention here that the Russian Army is a worthless military institution and that no professional soldier will give them a high mark in discipline or the will to fight. They are useless."

I took this quote from "The Other Side Of The Mountain" by Lester W. Grau. He made this statement in 1988. There is a lot to be said for an all volunteer force and this quote hits it home. You can't make a professional military when your basic building blocks are fear and brutality.

Book Review: "Hitler's War"

2010-01-22T07:06:00.000-08:00

Hitler's War is the latest Harry Turtledove book. The change in history this time is that the war starts in 1938 when Chamberlain DOESN'T appease the Nazis and Czechslovokia is attacked. That and General Franco doesn't become the head of the Nationalist Forces in Spain (the original leader doesn't die in a plane crash).

First off, I have to say that I loved the concept. I have often wondered how something like this would have played out. Turtledove had some interesting twists such as Poland allying with Germany because they were more afraid of Stalin than Hitler in 1938 (and really who can blame them). He also added the twist where the Germans don't have the plane crash with the invasion plans in Belgium so the attack through the Ardennes Forest doesn't happen and we have a conventional attack through the Low Countries and Belgium instead. End result is another almost successful drive to Paris, but the Germans again can't quite pull it out against an intact BEF/French Army that has comparible numbers and tanks. The fun twist is that in 1938 the Germans were tooling around in Panzer 2 tanks armed with 20mm cannons so not only do the Germans have worse tanks but they have a lot less than in 1940 and are still not quite up to Blitzkreig level stuff. They never are able to break through and can only drive the Allies back.

But the counter is that this book wasn't all that well written. I read the Amazon Reviews and they were mostly negative and I can see why. Very disjointed writing and its execution isn't quite up to his better stuff. I am hoping the sequel is better as I love the idea. Stalin is still blundering around shooting everyone, Poland jumped on the Nazis side, and the Germans start the war on much more equal footing and are not the world-beaters they were in 1940. But I think I am going to wait for the paperback on the sequel though.

The Lord's Resistance Army

2010-01-02T11:49:00.000-08:00

This is a REDFOR post about a practically unknown group of terrorists/insurgents/guerrilla fighters that are responsible for destabilizing a rather large chunk of Central Africa. The Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) was founded 16 years ago by a guy named Joseph Kony. It was one of the numerous militias that spun up around the time that a lot of the third world dictators left over from the Cold War starting dying off and their countries spun into civil war.

The LRA got its start 16 years ago in northern Uganda. Its roots are tribal (Acholi), and its started with the usual complaints that the government was favoring other tribes over them. Religion also played a part (this area is where Christians, Animists/traditionalists, and Muslims all meet). Kony started up a revolutionary movement that rapidly got nasty. The Sudanese government provided some support to destabilized Uganda and Southern Sudanese rebels and things got out of hand.

While I would normally go into detail about tactics, weapons and capabilities of this organization there isn't much to hit on. Kony's force is estimated to be less than 1000 hard core fighters, but they have had an impact way out of proportion to their numbers. The LRA has raided Uganda, Central African Republic, Sudan, Congo and Chad in its history (and all them in the last 2 years). They have raided for slaves (for their use and to sell on the slave markets in Sudan, yes they exist), child soldiers (they are one of the big users in Africa), food, supplies, and sometimes just blood. In 2007/08 Christmas season the LRA launched a series of attacks in various countries (mostly Uganda) where LRA fighters hacked dozens of people to death in churches (45 in one attack alone).

The LRA was based out of Garamba National Park in the Congo until early 2008 when Ugandan and Congo/UN troops swept the area. Since then the LRA has been constantly on the move hitting anyone and anything they can, usually civilians.

Despite numerous attempts to make peace with this group, the LRA appears to be a group that needs to be hunted down and wiped out. The main reason negotiations have failed is that Kony has been indited on numerous counts of War Crimes ranging from mass murder to using child soldiers. He is looking at life and since he can't get amnisty he appears to want to go down fighting. Uganda and the Congo are refusing to let the criminal charges go, so this won't end nicely.

This is prime example of how Africa was set up for failure when Europe left. One group with ties to various tribes in several areas has moved from place to place causing huge amounts of suffering and disruption. Kony's extended tribe is spread out over at least two countries and he has recruited followers from a total of five countries. He isn't a problem for one country, but for the whole region.

This is also a great example of the MSM's failure to provide real news. The LRA is something that should be front page and should be a major focus of effort to run down. The UN is kinda sorta involved in finding him, but if the US ran this bozo down and killed or captured him, that would do more good in central Africa than any 10 USA For Africa Concerts would. It would make us a lot of friends and do something tangible for regional security. But its Africa and the US MSM could care less.

Learning To Eat Soup With A Knife

2010-01-02T11:32:00.000-08:00

Book review time. "Learning To Eat Soup With A Knife" is a book written about COIN operations (COIN: COunter-InsurgeNy) by a US Army Officer (Lt. Colonel at the publishing time). I don't have the book at hand right now so you will have to forgive me on the name.

This book book is a contrast between two counter-insurgency operations, one successful and one not. In this case its the British in Malaya and US in Vietnam. The book was very good and took a hard look at both sides. The final point is that the British were able to win due to them being a "learning organization" where as the US Army (at the time) was not. This book pulled no punches and I have to admit that the US Army really botched it. When we were fighting in Vietnam we (the Army) did a pretty good job, but we totally fumbled everything else. And that is the whole point of COIN in many cases.

The British had their issues as the book shows. But they had a military much more open to ideas and willing to try everything in order to win. Having a military with vast experience in the "colonies" and a police force and political department with equal amounts of experience and the ability to work together were major points. I found it odd that the British were the ones more open to "bottom up" ideas in this case, but then again I am in a different Army than the one my dad was in.

The thing that really stood out for me was the parallels I saw in the book in modern day. But I am glad to say that the US Army I am in seems to be more in line with the British in this book. Not quite (we had some serious infighting to get the COIN experts listened to in order for things like the Surge, and the Son of Iraq created), but definately better than Westmoreland and the MACV. However, I will put out that we need some serious education in other branches of government. We have some work needed there (and in the Army for working with them).

If you want to get an education on guerrilla warfare, this isn't the book. But if you are interested in some (reasonably) clear explanations of COIN, and what works, and what you need to have to find things that do work (there is no one solution to insurgency, every case is different as the book repeatedly explains), this is a great read. The biggest thing I learned is what factors make an organization a "Learning" Organization. If you have that, you have a military (and government) that can probably pull off a successful COIN operation.

War becomes deep

2009-12-18T07:42:00.001-08:00

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.

And some more

2009-12-16T06:43:00.000-08:00

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

2009-12-16T06:37:00.001-08:00

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).

Books: Fighting Divisions and The Bear Went Over The Mountain

2009-12-11T06:14:00.001-08:00

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.

Cracks Appearing

2009-12-10T13:40:00.000-08:00

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

2009-12-10T07:05:00.000-08:00

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.

Speech

2009-12-06T10:44:00.000-08:00

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.

Global Warming takes a hit.

2009-11-24T06:41:00.001-08:00

If you have missed it, check out the story here: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100017393/climategate-the-final-nail-in-the-coffin-of-anthropogenic-global-warming/

And you might very well have missed it if you just follow the regular media. The BBC and Reuters both have not run anything on this since the story broke. Neither has MSNBC, and the NY Times has refused to publish anything from the leaked data as its "illegally obtained" (funny, that didn't stop them during the Bush Years).

Short of it is that a hacker (or maybe an insider who is in hiding) put out a huge amount of papers, emails and data from a climate research unit in a college in East Anglica, Great Britain. While everything has not been gone through yet due to the amount, several trends have been noted: constant referals to actual data not conforming to Global Warming Models, data being tampered with to make it conform, emails dicussing how to lose data or delete dicsussions about tampering or reasons why the model was not matching the data, emails discussing how to marginalize opposing viewpoints and other scientists, emails discussing how to ensure that only one viewpoint was acceptable, and emails discussing how they actually got rid of data and stonewalled Freedom of Information Act Requests in both the US and UK.

So much for science being open to critical debate. This sounds more like something the Spanish Inquisition would pull (I'll leave off the obvious MP reference). And the media is tucked in nice and snug with the AGW crowd.

I am a biology major (environmental) from college. I haven't used the degree much, but I have a pretty good understanding about how things work in terms of environmental science. We really are still learning about how our planet works, and how its interacting with the sun and space. Real science, able to really start understanding what is going on has only been around for less than 100 years. Not a lot of time to start making grand pronouncements about how we are dooming the earth. And I also have issues with how they are pushing this. I actually am all for new types of energy and moving away from coal and oil, but we can't seem to make the jumps because these idiots keep getting in the way. Nuclear is clean, natural gas in clean, how about we move into these more? One more nuclear plant (as in brand new) could shut down a lot of coal power. Natural gas burns much cleaner, and we have loads of it in the US, so no more "blood for oil" and less greenhouse gas (if that is actually a real problem). Nope, we have to hold out for "alternative energy" becuase god forbid we actually move gradually, we need the miracle NOW. Or we need to shut down the US economy in order to save the world from itself.

But even if we do all of this, I honestly don't think it really is going to stop climate change. The climate is GOING to change because it always does. Its how the earth works, its NATURAL. So let's drop this stupid idea and work on clean and more efficent power because its the smart thing to do. Even if Greenhouse gas is bogus (and it is certainly an unproven theory) it stinks. That's enough reason in my book to switch to a cleaner fuel right there.

Winning the war against Car Bombs

2009-11-17T16:51:00.000-08:00

Check out the link: http://www.popsci.com/bown/2009/video/video-bombproof-wallpaper-vs-wrecking-ball

A Popular Science article that discusses a new Bomb-proof Wallpaper. No I am not making that up. Its a type of flexible, stretchable wallpaper that will flex and then snap back when his with kinetic force (wrecking ball, bomb blast). Helps the wall mantain its structual integrity and also prevents splinters from blasting into the room or the other side of the wall.

This is VERY cool. It probably won't stop a huge truck bomb, but it will certainly reduce damage and this thing has the potential to vastly reduce the effectiveness of all types of explosives against buildings. A hardening of the infrastructure. A major science breakthrough in the counter-terror art.

And the pictures

2009-11-15T19:50:00.000-08:00

WARNING: Due to it being a bit dark out and my wife using a different camera, the picture is a bit, urm, graphic (as in you can see some of the knife work from the field dressing). So you have been warned.

Well, THAT didn't take long...

2009-11-15T08:40:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone, Mike here from the farm. Deer season opened yesterday. I missed the morning because I had to drive up here. But I got here in time for the evening hunting. A day in deer season is divided into two sessions: morning and evening. Deer only move around during those times so if you are hunting in the middle of the day you are wasting your time.

Let me run this down for you. I arrive at 1430, just in time for the UNL/KU kickoff. I watch the first half of the game (tied at 10 all at half). I get dressed in the old Woodland pattern BDUs and Gortex, with winter boots (it wasn't that cold out, but the boots are water proofed and the padding wicks away sweat so the feet stay dry). We move out to the south pasture. Once there, we have a bit of stumbling around as my dad forgot the exact location of the blind. We find it, and I climb up into it. I have to say it was a scary blind to be in. No safety bars or straps and some of the "steps" were just small knots in the wood. Well, I get up there, hang up the camelbak (water and knife), and the rifle, dad leaves and I start scanning with the binos.

I am not there more than 5 minutes when two good sized does move out behind me in the river. I hear the splash and turn around and see them. I would have shot one if they had been closer, but I had a 30-30 with iron sites (I was going to use the 30-06 with scope this morning). The shot was VERY awkward from the blind so I figured I would wait. Were does are, bucks will soon be.

About 10 minutes later I heard a lot of brush breaking and twigs snapping from off to my right. I at first thought it was a hunter on foot. Deer can be loud, but not that loud. Whatever it was, I made noise for about 5 minutes, but I never saw what it was. The noise dies down and I turn around to face the river and I am staring at a four point buck standing on the sandbank not 25 meters from my tree blind. And I mean staring, the blasted deer had seen me turn around and was looking me in the eye. So I froze, and tried to make like a bush (30 feet up in the air, but what else can you do?). I had my binos in my hand, and I had to switch out for my rifle. I moved slowly, but he spooked and ran off.

So I figured I had blown it for the night's hunt. I had a good location certainly, but no other deer would be back after that right? Wrong.

Key rule about deer: they are stupid. Especially when its this time of year and they are after does.

I am slowly scanning around for about another 20 minutes. The sun finally drops a bit so I have a good view up river. I am doing a slow scan when I here another splash and some twigs snapping off to my left again. I turn around and there is a nice big buck coming across the river onto the sandbank. He keeps looking over to his right (my left) where those does were at earlier. Everytime he looks over I move a bit and bring my rifle around. He gets about midway to the main bank and instead of going over where the does were he starts moving my way. He walks almost to the spot where the other buck saw me and he looks up and sees me. And right as he freezes I shoot him dead center chest. We looked at the wound later and while I missed vital organs I broke his back about what would be waste level if he was bi-pedal. This paralyzed him. He actually sat down and didn't move, just stared at me with this "crap, this is what I get for thinking with the wrong head" look. After about 20 seconds he started to move and (not knowing where exactly I had hit him) I shot him again which dropped him (heart shot).

The buck weighed about 160 pounds after field dressing, which will give me about 90 to 100 pounds of deer meat. My mouth is already watering. Not the most impressive rack I have taken though. Only a 3/2 point. The two point horn was actually broken off, so this guy had been mixing it up earlier. He was a 2 or 3 year old. Bigger by a good 60 pounds than the last one I got though, so more yummy, deery goodness for me and the family.

This was the SHORTEST hunt I have ever had. From start to my second shot it was not even an hour. In that time I saw a total of 5 deer (another doe happend by after the first buck, but was running at a distance) in that time and I would have gladly shot anyone of them for size. I had five days of leave for this, now I just get to sleep in and goof off. Photos to follow.

"Its the second day of deer camp, and all the guys are here, we drink, play cards and shoot the bull but never shoot no deer, the only time we leave the camp is when we go for beer, the second day of deer camp is the greatest time of year!"

Why it pays to invest in your military

2009-11-11T13:56:00.000-08:00

Here is something you should keep in mind when wondering why we spend so much on the military. We are coming up on nearly a full 10 years of war (we are at about 7 and a half). We have over 4000 dead in that entire time in two theaters of war against some rather tough opponents fighting us in a way that is as much as possible focusing on our weaknesses.

In the Battle of Antietam, in 1862, we lost 3600 dead in one day, with another 19500 (approximately) wounded.

When you invest in a professional military and make them constantly study and work and change and think, you go from two mobs slaughtering each other to nearly 8 years of war with roughly 500 dead a year (and that includes accidents and causes other than combat).

Money well spent? I think so.

Here's a more modern comparison. Russia in Afghanistan offically lost 15000 soldiers in 9 years. Recent studies have shown that number was grossly understated (new estimates by the Russian military (surpressed by the Russian government) put the number at 45000). We have been there for nearly 8 years now, we have less than 1000 dead including losses other than combat.

And not one of our losses was a draftee, everyone volunteered for this.

And for the people who made this Holiday possible...

2009-11-11T11:19:00.000-08:00

HAPPY VETERAN'S DAY!

The 11th Hour of the 11th Day of the 11th Month.

Japanese Addendum

2009-11-08T06:46:00.000-08:00

This is an add on to the other post. Japan was the other country on the Allied side that had some input into the artillery fight in WWI, but not in the way you might think.

The Imperial Japanese Army had fought the Russians in the Russo-Japanese War in the early 20th Century. Despite the fact that they had older weapons than the Russians, the Japanese were actually one of the first countries to develop the concept of Indirect Fire. This is the idea of having your guns/howitzers firing from far enough away that you cannot see the target from the gun. Observers must be used to successfully determine if you are hitting the target and to make adjustments as needed. The Japanese didn't use range so much as they used terrain. They would position guns behind hills, folds of ground, in forests, anything that concealed the guns from the Russians seeing them. Often the guns were very close to the fight. But the Japanese used their Battery Commanders to go forward with phone/telegraphs and flags to signal back to the guns adjustments needed. The Japanese were able to maximize their guns and beat the Russian Army in artillery in just about every battle.

Now, this had two impacts. One was that the Japanese got a very poor opinion of European artillery. Even when the Japanese used guns in direct fire mode, the Russians were often unable to knock them out. The Japanese started using their guns in more direct fire modes as they could greatly assist the infantry against dug in Russian positions. In WWI, the Japanese fought limited actions against small German forces in China, and again were able to use guns in direct fire mode without issue (the Germans had very small forces and couldn't stand up to the Japanese attacks). Then when fighting the Chinese in the 1920's and 1930's the Japanese again had zero counterfire threat and pretty much moved to close in support of the infantry via having the guns close in. They never developed the concepts of massing guns or centralized control due to their experience.

The other impact: one country was highly impressed by the Japanese ability to use indirect fire effectively and going into WWI had this as their key concept for artillery deployment. This country would build on it and combine it with the centralized fire concepts of the French.

That would be the US Army.

The Allies

2009-11-07T10:55:00.000-08:00

Greetings all, this is the next part on my little series on artillery evolution. This focuses on the Allied Forces. We are mostly discussing the British and French, with a bit of Japanese. No Russians (they really didn't add much for this war in anything, but learned a lot), and not really anything from the US (I'll hit the Yanks later for a special reason).

The Allied forces were mobility focused in their artillery concepts. Lighter guns, rapid firing, able to keep up with the maneuver forces. When you hit the enemy you smother him with firepower allowing your infantry (sometimes cavalry) to then rapidly overwhelm him. This concept had developed from two main experiences. For the French it was the concepts of Napoleon and the experiences of the Franco-Prussian War. Maneuver was the key to victory, massed firepower allowed you to break through and keep moving. So the guns had to keep up, and you had to use them to provide DIRECT support to the infantry. If you study Napoleon, you see his use of artillery in mass as key in many of his fights. For the British, the concept was similar. Mobile guns, direct support. This concept came from the "Small Wars of Empire" that they had been fighting for decades. Artillery slaughtered the natives in direct usage because they had nothing to hit back with.

As the saying goes "Works in Theory"...

The sad part of this whole concept is that both the French and British had some very close examples of why this theory was no longer the case and that they were dangerously behind in artillery theory, if not actual equipment (their guns were actually quite good). For the French, the reorganizations that followed the Franco-Prussian War were not actually very good in certain areas. The big point the French completely missed was that their new rapid firing guns still needed to be massed for maximum effectiveness. The French created a huge army with a reserve system, but they did not create an integrated method to fight it. Once you got down to it, the French were fighting battles like they were hundreds of little regiment on regiment fights with almost zero coordination. You could have three units within a few miles of each other and would be in a practical vacuum, unable (or unwilling) to help the flank unit. Now, the communications problems still existed for everyone (no radio, phones were crude) but the Germans continually worked on these issues so they had an understanding of what they faced. Not so much the French. The really bad part for the French was that because of poor coordination, their wonderful artillery was parcelled out and unable to mass to support the key operation. There were some seriously bad strategic thinking going on too but that goes beyond what I am looking at.

The British were in the same situation. No centralized fire control for artillery, and an absolute archaic theory on its use (drive it to the sound of firing, roll up to the front of the lines, and start shooting direct fire and whatever moves). Worse, the British had very recent experience with the Boer War against people who were as well equipped as them (the Boers had Krupp artillery, Mauser Rifles and Machine Guns) and had seen what that theory got them (lots of dead artillerymen and lost guns).

Both the British and French lacked in heavy artillery and had no concepts about using deep fires to disrupt enemy forces beyond the front lines.

But as learning curves go, the British and French actually outpaced the Germans in this case. They started farther back in theory, weapons and development and they pulled even and even ahead by the wars end.

First, the Allies rapidly learned that the concept of firepower usage had changed. Simply rolling up the guns and blasting the nearest front line no longer worked. Even rapid breechloading guns could not win the firepower war against hidden machine guns in a direct firefight. So they rapidly learned that the new long ranges had to be used to make the guns survivable and effective. More guns were needed to hit an area, even with 15 rounds a minute a battery could not effectively support a regimental attack. So habitual relationships (battery to a infantry regiment) were broken up and artillery centralized control was set up to mass and control the growing numbers of guns needed.

With the creation of Central Fire Control for the Allies, the next big developments were in observed and unobserved firing. With newer phones, the Allies set up OP (Observation Posts) that could spot artillery and adjust the rounds on to target. Ground units alone could not see everything so the airplane (equipped with new wireless radio) and the balloon were used to spot artillery (this led to more air to air combat as each side was trying to shoot down the other sides observers, but that is another story). The Allies got to be very good at this as the Germans stood on the defensive for 3 years and had dug in on the best defensive terrain (highest ground).

As this was going on the Allies started bringing in heavier guns. The French had the 155mm howitzers and the British had the 4.7 in and 6 in guns and howitzers. These heavier guns led the Allies to discover the concepts of depth in the battlefield. These guns could hit the German rear areas and disrupt transportation and the movement of reserves. But often this was in areas they could not see or get observation planes over. Which led to the development of Map Firing.

Map Firing was simply the process of hitting a target using a map only. Sounds simple but it is actually VERY complicated. The Germans never quite got it, but the Allies did after much trial and error. First, the Allies fixed surveying problems and designed new mapping methods that finally created maps with modern levels of accuracy. In doing this, they discovered the issues involved with making a square map work when you are dealing with a round area (the world is round remember?). Azimuth adjustments, curvature of the earth, height of sea level (for both the target and the guns), actual versus magnetic north. And once these were fixed the Allies then discovered how weather effected long range firing (wind direction, air temperature, the possiblity of different wind directions at different altitudes). The Germans also did some work on this, but the Allies were the ones that really ran with it. The Germans focused this on their heavy guns, the Allies realized that this effected ALL artillery and used it as such.

The final problem that the Allies (as well as the Germans) ran into was the tying in. Making your artillery hit where and when it had to sounds simple enough, but how do you do that without a radio? ONce the infantry moved out, they were almost immediately out of contact with higher HQs. There were no man portable radios, runners were slow and had a bad habit of dying, wire got cut or shorted out or ran out, and pigeons often times got lost. So what happens if you are 10 minutes late to a location and the artillery fire has stopped firing suppression? You get mowed down by unsurpressed MG fire. Various Tactics were developed to deal with this. The "Creeping Barrage" was an Allied invention that more or less worked, but still had issues. A Wall of Artillery fire moves forward at so many meters per minute, the infantry walks behind it and in theory arrives at the target just after the FA fire lifts. But what happens if you get delayed (happened a lot), or you missed something like a concrete bunker that wasn't knocked out? You fall behind and your artillery fire outruns you. And you get mowed down. This problem was never quite solved in WWI by either side.

The Allies ended up with a huge learning leap in WWI in terms of artillery. Becuase of this the artillery became the key component of the War for them, the French Army went from being insanely gung ho to incredibly methodical (which bites them in WWII). The British were much slower learners and it wasn't until 1917 that they really started getting the ideas down. And this was actually lost lessons in many cases due to some rather stupid attacks in 1917.

Next time we start talking about the end of WWI and what everyone started taking away from it for the next round.

Education

2009-11-01T08:47:00.000-08:00

This last week we bid goodbye to 4 "Snowbird" Lieutenants. A Snowbird is a soldier (officer, enlisted or NCO) who has to wait at some location for several months (usually not more than 4) until their next assignment is ready for them. We had four LTs who had been comissioned but their OBC date was not until November. So we got to use them for about 3 months.

We were glad to have them as we are usually short on officers, and they did a great job for the short time they were here. The one thing I very much enjoyed was our OPD (Officer Professional Development) sessions. We had (and still do) have one a week when we do a short battle analysis. The idea is to see what we can learn from a certain battle so that we don't repeat the problem later on. The books I used are "The Bear Went Over The Mountian" and "The Other Side Of The Mountain", both about the Soviet/Afghan War in the 1980's. We focused on the Soviet side and I tried to zero in on things that we are doing now over there (Convoys, raids, ambushes, etc.). The concept is to figure out what both sides did right and wrong, and what would we do as Americans (our TTPs are different so many times our solutions to the same problem are different).

We all learned a lot. I can tell you this much: my estimation of the Soviet Military machine dropped considerably after this study. I knew that the Soviets didn't have much focus on NCOs, but our studies brought home the difference in a huge way (example: for a squad sized ambush would YOU put a MAJOR in charge? In the US, that is the job of a corporal or a buck sergeant, but they Soviets used Majors and even higher several times). But this was all lead up.

Our Capstone study was an analysis of the Battle of Wanat. This was a US action fought last year, 8 US troops died and over 20 were wounded. A COP (Combat Patrol Base) was almost overrun by Taliban. We held them off, and inflicted heavy losses. But the point was I wanted my LTs to see that many simple lessons we thought were absolute in the US Army were not so absolute. I told them this was the "hard look in the mirror" and to not slant their views because these were US troops involved. It was not a pleasant discussion, especially considering these guys were also paratroops and part of a unit considered to be elite by many in the US. But it was a great learning experience. It really hammered home to the LTs that the military is a profession, and in professions you must study and apply what you learn. Lots of folks miss the difference, but I think I have got the point across.

Now we are going to study the Afghan side. Should also be useful.

God, We SUCK

2009-10-24T15:23:00.000-07:00

I just got back from the UNL/Iowa State Game. I have rarely said bad things about Nebraska Football, but I have to say it now:

WE SUCK.

VMI could have done better than what I saw today. Our Defense is pretty solid, but our Offense is non-existant. 7 Turnovers, 4 of which were within 10 yards of the goal line. UNL has imploded, and it sucks.

A Moment of Silence

2009-10-22T19:33:00.000-07:00

My Laptop appears to be DEAD. This is being typed on my wife's new Toshiba. I have just about everything saved on my portable harddrive (thank god). But its a sad day, it was a vet of the Iraq war like me...

Grant's Memoirs

2009-10-08T16:43:00.000-07:00

I finished read Grant's Memoirs about two weeks ago and forgot to put out the review. So better late than never.

This is the biography of US Grant, aka LT General Ulyssess S Grant winner of the US Civil War. One of my personal favorite generals of that war and in general (no pun intended there). His rep has been beat up, usually due to his drinking problem and his rather poor performance as a President. And of course, LOTS of people like to beat him down so they can build up Robert E. Lee of the Confederates.

Well, all that aside, the book. This book seems par for the course in that just because you are a great general you won't necessarily be a great writer. It starts rather slow and glosses over a great many things in Grant's early life. I was especially annoyed that he didn't write anything about his drinking issues and his business failures. I can understand why you would want to gloss over things like this, but one of the reasons I admire Grant was that he overcame some rather great adversity to quite literally get to the top. Much more than Lee did by my estimation. Much of this book focused on the Civil War, and was quite good. His insights into other generals was particularly interesting. He didn't write anything about after the end of the Civil War, so I got nothing on his Presidency (again a shame).

I would recommend that you either read this and then read something else immediately after about Grant that fills in the gaps to get a good feel for him, or vice versa. He sounds much like a general I would very much get along with and follow. He was always calm, and he conquored some major personal demons along the way. As I am very much a believer that someone who has failed and keeps at it is usually a better person for it, I can very much relate to Grant.

I also like his take on how he viewed the Civil War. He had a very high level outlook. Not just a battle (McCellan) or a campaign (Lee), but a broad a to b to c approach to win the war. He was probably one of the first American Generals to have a mental breakdown of warfare by Strategy/Operational/Tactical levels and how they interacted. Mass your men, attack where the enemy (weaker than you, outnumbered by you) has to fight, force him to defend everywhere or give up areas that will hurt him (the South had to fight for Atlanta, the Valley, Fort Fisher, and Richmond, but could NOT hold every area, so not enough set to win, but enough sent to get beat and weaken other areas). And Grant was a pretty good hand at maneuver warfare despite what critics think. You don't think so? Vicksburg. Still no? Chattanoga. Still no? Virginia 1864/65. Yeah, the last one was bloody. But old Bobby Lee never once held the initiative in that campaign, not once. He moved to Grant's tune, no one else ever did that.

Over all good book, but needs some filler to get all the details about a great man.

(PS: Thanks Jim and Maddie for the book).

Suspected flag burner pilloried -- Page 1 -- Times Union - Albany NY:1884:

2009-09-28T17:09:00.000-07:00

Suspected flag burner pilloried -- Page 1 -- Times Union - Albany NY:1884:

I am testing the link thing. It looks like it will work so if not, hit the old Bing.com for searching (I am trying not to use Google anymore).

I just LOVE this article. It would be so much better if this happened to a anti-war protestor instead of someone who was kicked out of the VFW bar for failing to produce an ID to buy a drink, but its still great.

Simple point here, your right to protest is equally matched by others rights. If your protest involved messing with their property or something they REALLY care about, you could rapidly end up in world of hurt (as in being given the chance to have your butt whipped by a war vet which was choice B in this incident).

I have to think this is why you never see anarchists targeting the American Legion Convention to stick it to the man, or ALF trying to attack a biker rally over the leather jackets. Even the truely dense understand that there are things you don't do and places you don't go when protesting. This truth spans the spectrum of right to left (you never see KKK at a Black Panther rally, or PETA in Deep woods West Virginia on the opening day of hunting season).

Initial Lessons Learned

2009-09-26T09:19:00.001-07:00

This is the next bit on artillery evolution in WWI.

In my last post I discussed the initial doctrines of the various world powers going into WWI. 1914 saw the only true bit of maneuver warfare on the Western Front until late 1918. For the rest of this time, it was "static" or "trench" warfare. It was in this arena that the concepts of true modern artillery came to be as the various grey areas that had been discovered were eliminated through often painful real world experience. We are going to talk about the Central Powers first (aka Germany).

For the Germans, the major breakthroughs were actually not many. Their concepts of centralized fire planning (that is artilley planning) were actually very much ahead of the allies and given the large battles being fought (we are talking whole armies worth here numbering in the hundreds of thousands), this was actually very successful. Being able to control and mass your artillery to support the decisive effort (the main push if you will) was often key in the German victories. It also greatly helped the Germans that they were on the defensive on the Western Front until the spring of 1918. In defending, the Germans were able to avoid the communications issues that still plagued the offensive (they had dug in phone lines).

Where the Germans did make advances were in Chemical Warfare. The Germans were the first to use Poison Gas, and rapidly discovered that artillery shells were much more effective in dispersing it. Just releasing gas from a cannister only made a cloud that could blow back on you or dissipate rapidly. But with artillery shells you could keep pumping gas into the cloud, put the chemicals were you wanted them and you could put them FAR to the rear of the enemy. The biggest military benefit of Chemical weapons isn't actually their killing power, its their staying power. Soldiers can function in protective gear in a chemical environment, but everything takes longer and you tire quicker. But the Gas is persistant, even stuff like Chlorine gas can linger for over 24 hours in certain places. When confronted with this, often time military units will just place the area off limits or go around it. This great for area denial, or for helping cover your flanks or rapidly plug gaps. Or for contaiminating a logistical node or railhead. Even 12 hours can be critical if the area off limits is a key road intersection for instance.

In utilizing gas, the Germans discovered the weather played a huge roll in how this weapon was used. Not only in how the chemicals were effected, but in how accurate their deep artillery fire was. Meteological data (or MET as we call it) has a major impact on how artillery shells fly through the air and even how the shells react (i.e. go boom or not). First there is the wind, which the Germans (and also the allies) discovered can be at different directions at different altitudes. This can throw a shell off by hundreds of meters at long distances (such as in a deep chemical strike). There is temperature. This can also effect the shell's trajectory, but it can also effect the mechanics of the shell. Certain mechanical timers would freeze or become brittle in cold weather which would make a dud or might set the shell off early (bad that). Certain shell loads could melt or freeze which would effect the shell's rotation and cause it to literally spin off course (this mostly happened in White Phosphorous Rounds, but also chemical rounds). And of course the weather in general would effect how well the chemicals would work. Rain would wash away most persistant agents, but cold, snow and even sun effected them. Rain could even set off shells early if the fuze (set for point impact) hit a raindrop when flying through the air.

The Germans discovered that by gathering accurate MET data, they could adjust the artillery computations using mathmatical formulas in computing firing data. Through some trial and error, they learned certain methods of storing ammunition that would cut down on weather effects (such as covering ammo when it rained, keeping it off the ground, not stacking it but placing it on its base). They also fixed the mechanical problems for most fuzes (although the rain drop one was only fixed in 1986).

In fixing these issues the Germans refined their methods of Map Firing. Map Firing is basically shooting blind without someone observing where your artillery actually landed. The Germans had figured out by late 1915 that with a accurate map and accurate data, you could do this successfully (more or less, we are not talking 1 shot with a Tomohawk missile, we are talking 500 guns taking out a square mile or two). Since they were standing on the defensive, they could survey in all their controlled territory, and zero their targets. This was one of the main reasons why the Western Front was so bloody, the Germans were often times shooting fish in a barrel.

The other major area of German Artillery development was in heavy artillery. While the Allies were focused on the lighter, more mobile stuff. The Germans focused on the BIG guns. The Germans had more heavy artillery per division than any Allied division, and they had corps and army level artillery commands to use it properly. Krupp (those lovable German arms makers) specialized in heavy guns. 6 and 8 inch guns and howitzers were the norm in the German Army of WWI. Please note I said howitzers. Unlike the Allies, the Germans liked using howitzers because of the range and ability to hit entrenched troops. The Germans quickly learned something with their heavy guns and that was DEPTH. The German battle plans throughout the war (and this includes the early years) always had artillery hitting the enemy key areas as far back as they could. While the Allies intially had a very short view of the battlefield, the Germans realized that with long range weapons you could hit things behind the lines that would effect the actual battle. This was one of the driving forces to get Chemical Weapons modified for artillery use. The Germans were really the first group to get a truely 2 dimensional view of the battlefield (length AND depth). And this led to the REALLY big guns.

I am going to stop here as the really heavy artillery I am going to cover separately (the Big Berthas and so on). Next time we will hit the Allies (no pun intended).

And its a...

2009-09-16T17:22:00.001-07:00

GIRL!

Tamara and I will be having a baby girl in early February. We just had the ultrasound today and found out. Tamara is 4 and 1/2 months along and the baby is doing great (mother also). The baby was also doing some rather severe physical activity because it took us 30 minutes to get her to stop moving long enough to get all the ultrasound data. She is into crunches apparently.

Into the Wilderness

2009-09-13T10:55:00.000-07:00

After a bit of hiatus, I am going to continue with my artillery historic posts. I am picking up with the start of WWI.

August 1914 saw the start of the First World War. Artillery-wise every major combatant (even the US) was equipped with roughly the same types of artillery. Recoilless, long ranged (as in over 6 kms), rapid firing, and using self-contained ammo (i.e. you put in one shell at a time and fire away instead of loading powder, then shell, then primer). Everyone was WAY short on ammo stocks (everyone was thinking a short war). Where the difference lay was doctrine and number of gun types.

The Allies (Britian, France, Russia and a host of smaller nations) had a focus on lighter, more "mobile" rapid firing guns. Heavy guns and howitzers existed, but were much rarer. The British actually had to use dismounted naval guns for heavy artillery (4.7 inch and 6 inch) due to the shortage. The basic tactical doctrine for the allies was to splice out your artillery to maneuver units (usually the regiment or a brigade) and have them provide on the spot artillery in support of the tactical maneuver unit. Great for small unit warfare, bad when its not just small units. Where this system had problems was when you attempted to mass your fires of several artillery units on one target. Without a higher artillery headquarters or a doctrine for controlling hundreds of guns (and we do mean hundreds) you had major issues of command and control, and it was an absolute mess getting the guns to obey you instead of the local commander.

The Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary) were pretty much the exact opposite. Centralized control and massed fires were their method and it was pretty damn effective too. The German General Staff was arguably the only military group who had actually been working on war plans that focused on whole armies instead of smaller units. They were very much "Big Picture" guys and their fire doctrine reflected it. An operations order would contain very detailed instructions on how to use your artillery and it was massed to provide the maximum amount of fire support for the key operations and the decisive (or main) effort. Instead of everyone getting some fire support, the most important effort got everything and then some. This worked great but its weak spot was in being able to adjust when things went wrong. If some defensive points were missed, it was incredibly hard to get fire support to take them out if it was not in the plan. Since a couple of machine guns could hold up entire regiments, this was not a minor problem.

Both sides had one shared major issue: communications. Fires could be adjusted, new targets plotted and changes made IF YOU COULD TALK. But this was very hard in an era of no radio and unreliable telephones. Once battles started, unless you could keep up with messengers (not bloody likely), pigeons (yep, they were used), flags, or phone, you were gong off the plan. If you were allied you couldn't help nearby units in trouble and if you were central you couldn't get help to knock out a missed machine gun nest.

So how did everyone do and how did they adjust?

That will be in the next article.

XM-326 Dragon Fire II

2009-09-10T16:57:00.000-07:00

New toy for us artillery types in the works. Called the XM-326 Dragon Fire II (I can't get a picture to download right now, sorry), this is the rather belated arrival of wheeled self propelled artillery. And technically its not really artillery but an improved rifled 120mm heavy mortar.

The brain-child of the USMC, this baby has a range of 8.2 Kms (an increase of 1 Km over current 120mms) and is mounted on a wheeled 6400 mil capable baseplate. You can tow it OR you can mount it in a modified LAV (the eight wheeled armored car the stryker is based on) for a SP gun. This thing is semi-auto, so its rate of fire is pretty good (sorry, no unclassified numbers for this). Its a heavy mortar, but its loaded by prepackaged shells so no "hanging" of mortar rounds (quick item, the USMC considers heavy mortars to be "artillery" versus the lighter mortars (81mm and less) that are "Infantry" weapons).

And the most cool aspect of this baby is that it is able to shoot while on the move (you have to slow down some though). That right there brings down the artillery house if they can make it continually work without issue. Right now this baby is in experimental stages, but prototypes are already existing and the USMC (and the Strykers in the Army) are VERY interested. For the Army, this would be a near perfect SP weapon for the medium/stryker BCTs in existance. And I would be happy that the US Military has finally figured out you can actuall have wheeled SP artillery (which the Czechs proved in 1990, but we didn't buy into).

This is why Mercenaries Suck

2009-09-05T10:21:00.000-07:00

I am going to assume that everyone has heard about our "contract security" and the "situation" they have with them in Afghanistan. If not, short and sweet was that a group of hired contract security guards who were supposed to be protecting the US Embassy and other US State Department building/compound in Afghanistan are now being investigated for having drunken orgies complete with naked dancing, hookers and lots of booze (in a supposidly Muslim country too I might add). Several guards have told investigators that they were hazed, forced to perform sex acts for their bosses for good shifts and that the multination force couldn't even talk to each other due to language differences. Which was really great since the guys that they couldn't talk to were Gurkas and arguably the most effective guards they had.

I am a professional soldier, and I don't have much use for mercs. Historically speaking, mercs (usually) are not effective fighters or soldiers. Yes, there are exceptions, but not many. Usually the biggest issues with them are discipline related, and if the chain of command for them is hazy, they rapidly can go out of control. The 30 Years War in Europe is a great example of how out of control mercenary forces can get. Other most recent examples of stupid merc tricks are Abu Gurabi (contract interrogations without supervision which spilled over to a regular unit), Blackwater (take your pick, but the famous ones are the shootout in Baghdad which killed a lot of civilians, the heliocopter getting shot down becuase they were in a hurry, or lots of other smaller incidents, some of which I saw firsthand), and Triple Canopy (had the initial contract to protect US diplomats in Iraq and got fired after one year). This one, however takes the cake.

Simply put, the mercs don't fall under a military chain of command so the military cannot hold them accountable if they jack up. And the civilians they work for frequently don't want to really dig down as this stuff is something they don't understand or don't want to be bothered with. So the mercs can get a pass for doing some outragous stuff. And this makes the problem worse by who it attracts.

I have dealt with mercs in Iraq. The high pay and rather loose discipline attract a bad crowd. Frequently, the guys I talked to were prior military, with over five years in but usually less than 15 years in. This is important because it indicates something. A military retirement is 20 years service, and a initial hitch is usually 4 or 5 years. Most mercs were over 10 years in, so why not go all the way for retirement? Because they wouldn't have made it. Usually discipline problems. I heard a lot of "the army was just jacked up and wouldn't let me do my thing, or do what would have worked, or let us really get tough". Translation: I couldn't follow the ROE and other orders, I was trigger happy and I had trouble with authority. So, ex military with discipline problems? Why not join a high paying group that shoots first and rarely asks questions?

The State Department requently has issues with the Defense Department. I can understand that, but for crying out loud we can follow orders and have discipline. I can't say this mistrust is why State is hiring so many mercs to protect them. I know that State is short security personnel because of the various wars we are in so that is probably a more realistic reason. But this is what you get when you really don't want to be bothered with "details" on security because its something you don't get or think is beneath you. But how are they going to punish these guys? If the army did this, how many coals would we be raked over? But what about these clowns? What can they do aside from fire them? Can they be brought to court? Can they be sued? Can they be punished in any way? THe contract can get jerked, another one awarded and you know what? They will probably hire the same boneheads to do the same thing.

This should be a scandel equal to Abu Garabi, these are STATE DEPARTMENT EMPLOYEES having ORGIES! But since they are mercs (and a couple of other political reasons I will not go into) they fall into a nice grey area. So now, the US Army is having to provide guards to guard the guards while this is "looked into".

This alone should be the biggest argument for a professional military you would ever need.

A Clue for the Masses

2009-09-02T17:07:00.000-07:00

This is a mix of rant and FYI for various folks out there. Before ranting or rambling on about what books we should be studying for Afghanistan, or that our "Strategic Focus" is off, do myself and other professional military types the favor of at least reading the definitions of what tactical/tactics, operational and strategic mean.

I recently read a WSJ article on how Afghanistan was headed in the wrong direction and that we were following the wrong "Strategy" for winning the war. Now, there is some truth to that saying and certainly we can improve on many things (you always can, no one ever jumps into war and it goes 100% perfect and exactly to plan, not even the Nazi War machine which usually gets tossed up as an example). Where I had the issue is the following paragraph which the author gave a list of books that many officers were reading and studying to prep for action over there. Books like "The Bear Went Over The Mountain" which is a translated copy of the Red Army's AARs for over a hundred small unit actions ranging from squad to battalion size. The reviewed the actions and commented on improvements that could have been made within the Soviet Doctrinal framework. Then the translator added some more based on what the US would have done using ours. Numerous highly useful TACTICAL lessons can be gained from this book. The article author made a huge stink about how this book was merely showing the US "failed" (and most of the actions were not exactly shining examples of how to do it right certainly) ideas and that this was totally undermining the strategy and teaching our officers bad ideas.

This shows an incredible lack of simple understanding of terminology. This book (which I use to train my Junior Officers on in weekly OPDs) is a TACTICAL book. It isn't supposed to be about STRATEGIC level thinking or even operational. It does make some tie ins for certain items along the lines of "The US wouldn't do this as the press would crucify us and its a war crime", but that isn't the point of the book. Its about small unit tactics that junior officers and NCOs might use if they are ever deployed to Afghanistan, and mostly about what NOT to do (I am not kidding, you read this book and any idea of the Red Army being a major military power is going to take a severe hit).

Junior Officers are supposed to have some understanding of strategic aims and operational aims, but their focus is the close in fight. Commanding platoons, doing maintenance, training and so on. The books that this writer was hammering were excellent sources for THIS LEVEL. They were not aimed at strategic levels or operational levels. But this civilian (brutally obvious if you know what you are reading) had his levels and terms mixed up. I agreed with some of his points, but he really needed to work on his understanding of the different levels of warfare. The books he cut down are excellent sources of information that are very useful to draw on at the TACTICAL level.

Apples to apples, not apples to pears or peaches (or guavas).

Inglorious Basterds

2009-08-29T18:34:00.000-07:00

Today my wife and I saw "Inglorious Basterds" by Taretino.

It ROCKED!

This is certainly NOT a war film, or even mildly historically accurate. But it was vastly entertaining. It went from being funny to "ewwww, that is a bit graphic", to a mix of both.

And it was absolute proof of a something I have noticed. That item is this: no one cares if you do bad things to Nazis.

No lie, they showed a Nazi being beaten to death by a guy with a bat and the audience was laughing at the one liner. I was, and so was my wife. Of course the idea behind the unit was that they were going to be as bad as the Nazis (and they were and then some), but no one had any issues with US Troops doing this to Nazis.

Nazis are the one group that absolutely NO ONE will defend at all. The absolute bad guy, the perfect villan, the one undeniable product of WWII in that you have someone that no one can ever possibly root for. And everyone is tickled pink if you are doing something to them that would repulse you if it was someone else and make the ACLU call the President.

Don't get me wrong, I like the fact that Nazis are thought of this way. They should be. But so should Communists, Maoists and Stalinists. AQ and Hamas too. They are not, and that is a pity. I really don't like how the term Nazi gets tossed around so much and how many on the left use it paint those on the right (especially since the Nazis were actually socialists, irony can be thick in history). Call someone on the left a Nazi and you will get a strong reaction to be sure. My biggest issue isn't the labling, its the fact that this label runs the risk of loosing the sting of due to over use. Nazi might join the legion of other words that no longer pack the punch that they once did due to over use. Remember when "damn" was something you never heard on TV?

The Nazis were as close to pure evil walking the earth as has even been (and they had some good company who got off light). I really hope that the term never looses its punch and that no one ever has a qualm about laughing when watching a Nazi getting beaten to death.

Happy Birthday!!!!!

2009-08-27T17:51:00.000-07:00

I am a day late, but HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

to the CANNON!

Erm, maybe.

On August 26th, in 1346 AD at a location know as Crecy (Yes Russ, right up your alley this one is), the Genonese crossbowmen had the very distinct honor to be the first soldiers in history to be taken under cannon fire.

Maybe.

There are two other possible uses of cannon prior to this (one in approximately 1250 AD by Muslims against Mongols, and in 1339 by the French against Edward), but neither was well documented and cannot be verified. Edwards the IIIs army had records and even some pictoral records of the cannons.

So Happy Birthday to the CANNON my fellow Redlegs and other lesser creatures...

Speech

2009-08-22T14:22:00.000-07:00

I just got back from speaking to the Oklahoma Chapter of the "Friends of Ukraine" in OKC. They paid for my lunch (Porogi, similar to cheese raviolli) and I gave a short 20 minute speech on my trip to Ukraine and my impressions as a "true" American.

The speech went well and everyone seemed to enjoy it. The lunch was great too.

The best part was this guy I met. I can't pronounce his name (never mind spelling it), but he had some awesome stories of his own. This gentleman was from around east-central Ukraine. I told him what I did and he really lit up. He told me repeatedly how much he loved US soldiers and the US. After we talked more I found out why.

This gentleman was liberated from a concentration camp/factory in the Hartz Mountains by US soldiers in 1945.

When he was about 13 or so, the Germans invaded the USSR. They had driven to his area of Ukraine with a couple of SS Panzer Divisions. The Red Army had been smashed up pretty bad and was trying everything to stop the Germans. The Soviet Commissars rounded up every male 14 and older and marched them to the front to fight. No training, equipment (other than rifles and ammo) or support. The man said that he lost one brother in this fight. The other brother survived and retreated with the Red Army. He heard after the war that his brother had been wounded 11 times during the war and the last time they sent him back in before he had healed and he was killed. Since this gentleman was not old enough he stayed in the village and ended up behind German lines. He told me how the next village over was wiped out as a reprisal for a Insurgent attack on some SS. They rounded up 180 people, herded them into a church and burned it down with everyone inside. THey took him and all the other boys and impressed them into a forced labor battalion. They were the ones who dug the tunnels were the ME262s were built. Another crew they were barracked next too dug and ran the V2 tunnels and another one was working on the German Atomic Bomb program (not much was really done other than dig some work areas, the Germans were way to far behind in development to do much more). US troops liberated him and about 15000 prisoners (his count).

Talking with him made my whole day worthwhile. Its nice to hear nice things about US troops and to hear someone make the point that US troops have never herded people into churches and burned them down, or impressed young boys as slave labor to dig tunnels for weapons projects, or gathered a bunch of civilians together, tossed them rifles and said "Charge those Tanks" (although our militia troops have ended up doing about that good, difference there is that all the militia volunteered). This guy had some great history to share and I am really glad he did.

Hearing stories like this make me glad to live in the US and prouder to be defending it.

Whole Foods, Greenpeace and Health Care

2009-08-19T17:04:00.001-07:00

If you haven't heard about all of this you need to get online more. First off, Whole Foods CEO wrote an article suggesting his take (as a private person) on how we could do better on Health Care. He had some good points I thought (Tort Reform anyone?), but it was the response he got that makes him my hero and gives me a reason to shop at Whole Foods (other than my wife who likes them).

The far left "progressive" crowd went completely bat#$%% over his commentary and article. Lots of them stated that they would NEVER shop at Whole Foods again (wow, an added bonus for me). Daily Kos posters have pretty much called for his public execution. I absolutely love this. I am wondering what is making them madder; the fact that a CEO of a major corporation is weighting in against the President, or that they are now realizing that for all the "progressive" food and ecology and world love that they are associating with Whole Foods its still a major capitalist corporation run by a guy who makes tons of money off of them and doesn't care if they shop there or not.

And if this guy hadn't been running it, it wouldn't have worked out to start with.

The GreenPeace item is the article in the BBC Today in which the retiring head of GreenPeace admitted that the famous "All the Arctic Ice will be melted by 2030 unless we do something NOW" statement was a flat out lie. He said that they knew the data was wrong but went with it because the cause was just and the "US economic growth had to be curtailed". Nice. So if my cause is just I can lie? Wow, what a concept. It appears that lots of our current political establishment has taken that lesson to heart and then some.

Which leads to Health Care. Not much to say on this except that being in the military I am currently on the closest thing to a Socialist Health Care System the US has. And it sucks compared to the alternative. Tamara has kept her own health care as long as she could because its nice to be able to make a same day appointment instead of having to wait 5 to 8 days (that is the rough turnaround time at our Post). I'll agree we can improve our current system and that we have some serious issues with it. But this current monster they are pushing? Oh hell no.

Not only is it 1000+ pages of legalise, but its going to run run by an organization that can't run a used car sale or even read the entire bill before pushing it.

Guys, how about some research or something? Or keeping that promise to post all the bills for the public to read before signing? Bueller?

Wife Celebrating

2009-08-17T16:34:00.001-07:00

My lovely wife is off to Chicago for a week to visit her parents and to celebrate Ukrainan Independence Day. This is the day when the Ukrainians celebrate the collapse of the Soviet Union and gaining their freedom.

This was also the day that EVERY statue of Lenin was ripped out of the ground rather violently and with malice of forthought.

Anyone who ever thought Communism was a good idea is invited to swing by the Ukrainian section of Chicago this weekend and get some "feedback" on that.

And I highly recommend you leave the Che Geuvera T shirt at home...

Progress

2009-08-09T14:12:00.000-07:00

I was working on my personal set of tactical gear this week. I have what the army gives me, I have what I have been given or acquired over the years (the army paperwork will gradually give you stuff over time) and I have what I have personally purchased for my own use. Usually ammo pouches for gear or ammo (I do use this stuff for hunting and camping), but I also purchased a lot of stuff when I shipped over to Iraq as the stuff they gave us didn't quite work for me (I needed some regular pouches for a small set of binos, language phrase books and some other stuff). And of course it didn't help that the Army has gone through 3 different camo sets since this war started and we can't mix and match.

So I have a bunch of gear. One item I was finishing out was my personal first aid kit. I had what the army has given me and I have some stuff I have picked up. But I had also just purchased something called an IFAK. IFAK: Individual First Aid Kit. These are the new first aid kits that have come out due to the war.

I have to admit, nothing pushes progress in certain areas like war. This kit is a great example. WHen I first joined, your first aid kit was a sealed field dressing in a small pouch. Anything else you provided on your own. Now you could do a lot with this thing, tourniques, pressure bandages, regular bandages, seal sucking chest wounds. But still, all you had was a large bandage and that was it.

When I deployed we got this plus a new quick release tournique which was all the rage. So an improvement, but still not exactly amazing. But after much research the army realized two things.

One: every soldier coming out of basic training is Combat LifeSaver Qualified (think of this as one step below a medic, 40 hour course taught by medics).

Two: these same soldiers can actually use all kinds of first aid gear.

So why not give it to them? Result: IFAK.

This thing is really advanced. It has pressure bandages, quick release tourniques, some of those QuikClot bandages, a lung depressurizer (for lung shots), a special air passage kit for CPR and for clearing breathing passages (you can also do a quick and dirty trac with it). This kit is designed to treat the 6 most common and life-threatening wounds on the battlefield with the most advanced first aid gear in existance. It is designed to allow anyone with a modicum of first aid training (such as a combat lifesaver) to be able to the simple things that can keep people alive until a medic can get there.

I have to wonder about why it took the army so long to get to this point. I remember when I was a Platoon Leader, the requirement was one combat life-saver per platoon (in MLRS which is a small unit, usually it was one per squad). Now it is EVERYONE. The 10th Mountain was the first unit to do this right as they entered Afghanistan in 2002 and everyone took notice with the results. But still you would think that this would be common sense.

But progress is progress. I wonder if they will keep it up once the war is over with. IFAKs are pretty expensive ($80 plus), and in peace time you know what happens. But for now its good progress.

Fishy

2009-08-06T16:44:00.000-07:00

Short post.

Did anyone else have a "WTF?!?!" moment when you heard the news release about the White House asking for people to send them an email about "fishy" healthcare info?

I did.

This is what we get from a government that is so inept that it can't run a Used Car sale...

Yoiks and AWAY!

2009-08-01T11:32:00.000-07:00

I have been debating posting this as I don't want to be talking ill of an officer in another unit, but I can't hold out any longer.

This is an example of someone who helps to give new Lieutenants their reputation and reaffirms the old adage that you shouldn't try to show off how cool you are.

For anyone who ever watched the cartoons on Saturday morning and saw the Bugs Bunny Roadrunner show, you will recognize the title line from Robin Hood Daffy. This was the line Daffy shouted as he leap from a tree on a vine and promptly smashed into another tree. When I heard this story, the cartoon popped into my head and I could not get it out.

We have a training event in the first week that is a rappel tower. Nothing you really ever do in the military (unless you are in the Air Assault), but its a good gut check and helps motivate new soldiers. You have to do rope bridges, jump into a cushion from a height and rappel down a tower.

When you rappel you should have the following: a set of gloves, a belay man (runs a safety rope) and someone above you to make sure you don't get tangled. You can rappel several ways including a method called "Austrailian" which you are facing your front straight down the tower and you basically run down the side of the building (commandos use this a lot). When done correctly it looks very cool.

Of course this story involves it NOT being done correctly.

We had a LT who wanted to show off to the new soldiers. So he decided to do Australian down the tower. Well, there was no other cadre available to help so he had no belay man. He also discovered that they had not brought all the gear out yet so he only had ONE GLOVE. But no problems there. Last issue was that the rope was wet from some rain. Anyone who has done this should be whincing by now.

Well, the LT lowers himself into position and does his first bound. He tries to pull the rope to his waste (which will usually stop your slide down the rope), and discovers that the wet rope is sliding through his ungloved hand and won't stop. He has no belay man to use the safety rope to stop him so he has to hold on or he goes freefall three stories into a sandpit. He is able to slow himself enough to fastrope face first into the ground.

Minus most of the skin on his right hand.

Ow.

His failure to save cost him all cool points, a trip to the hospital with 3rd degree burns, and a honorable mention in the Darwin Awards since he lived.

This was quite literally a "Yoiks and AWAY" moment. He jumped off and just went straight down for the "CRUMP" and dustcloud out of a Wiley Coyote cartoon. IN front of 200 new privates and the cadre that showed up right as he was starting.

Continuing Education

2009-07-29T16:38:00.000-07:00

I am into my third week of AOWC (Advanced Operational Warfighting Course) online. The virtual class room is pretty much boned and yet again another example of the DOD living up to accusations of Fraud, Waste and Abuse. Btu the course itself is pretty fun. The idea behind this course is simple. You are going to be a staff pouge for much of your military career (simple fact of army life) so we are going to make you a really good one. Why? Simple, it is better to have 12 Blutchers than one Napoleon (for my readers lacking any military history knowledge (Hi Aunt Jan) Blutcher was the Prussian who aided Wellington at Waterloo and helped win the big one).

Translation: Genius is a great thing, but if you only have one of them he can't do two very important things. One, he can't be everywhere. Two, he cannot be 100% on his/her game 100% of the time. So what happens if you get hit in 2 places or on a bad day? Bad things happen. The Prussians figured this out and devised the staff system as we have come to know it (although we in the US modeled ours after the French Staff System developed prior to WWI). The idea is that even if we don't get a genius (a Fredrick the Great) we can train enough Blutchers that it won't matter. Our sum whole leadership will be better than your sum whole (especially if you only rely on one guy).

I am doing the AOWC to finish off my ILE (Intermediate Level Education) which is the Masters Level of military training. This stuff isn't easy by a long shot. We study leadership, operational and strategic thinking, critical thinking, history (as in we dig out the lessons it can teach us, this is not done very much in civilian schools or they are horribly off due to lack of (go figure) critical thinking). I personnally am really enjoying this as it is challenging (nothing good is easy) and it makes me think and learn and push.

Now, as I am wont to do, I have been thinking about all of this. When you boil it down, the US military produces some amazingly educated people. Then I realized that actually we produce not some, but a hell of a lot. A Captain is going to have not only lots of hands on experience in high pressure situations and in "intersting" locations, but he has been taught a huge amount. College, but also the courses the army will send him too. In my case, a rough translation of what I have been taught is going to equal two BA/BS degrees and 2 Masters degrees (when I complete ILE anyway).

This being the case, can someone tell me why the hell we still get looked at like we are gunslinging cowboys who can't put two words together in a sentence? I guess it is just easier to steriotype us, because actually thinking about what we say and do, and realizing that maybe the answer can't be condensed to a bumper sticker, would require some critical thinking and some serious education too.

Which is seeming to be in shorter and shorter supply in this country.

RFO

2009-07-23T17:53:00.000-07:00

RFO = Request For Orders.

This is the what you get when the bs'ing and gopher dancing between you and your branch gets done and you finally find out where your next assignment is.

I got mine today.

And the winner is...

Fort Drum, New York.

I was getting bounced around by branch (I was offered Hawaii and Colorado, but couldn't get released in time. Don't ask how I feel about that.) and I almost ended up with the 3rd ACR in Fort Hood Texas. But that fell through due to poor management on branch's part (they started filling early and Fort Hood shut them down due to an overabundence of majors). So I got a gig with the 10th Mountain Division, Light Infantry.

Yes, you heard right. Light as in "we walk everywhere". Good news is that I report to the Division HQs, so this is probably a staff gig. I am hoping for an Effects Cell or Fires Coordination Cell as I am already Branch Qualified with (by the time I move) 2 years as a Bn XO. Combat tour guarrented, Iraq possible but I'll lay even odds on Afghanistan.

In other news, I discovered and fixed a little problem with my date of rank and board dates. This is majorly good as if this had gone un-noticed, I would have missed my initial board and had my file jacked up.

Oh yeah, Mike Rezabek was picked up for LTC below the zone...

NORK Humor

2009-07-21T16:23:00.000-07:00

This is too funny. Follow the link:

http://www.forbes.com/2009/05/27/twitter-north-korea-technology-internet-twitter.html?partner=email

This link is to an article about a guy who impersonated the PRK (aka North Korea) on Twitter. What is truely histerical? The guy didn't change anything, he just used actual headlines from the NK media.

This is more than we bargined for.

2009-07-19T11:52:00.000-07:00

This is the next artillery evolution piece. The post I wrote previously on this dealt with the French 75mm and its capabilities. This post will detail with how the various powers started to work with the new capabilities.

The biggest and most important thing the French 75 brought to the table of artillery was its ability to shoot accurate indirect fire rapidly. Which is really three items, but they combined into one whole that was so much more than the sum of its parts. With a range of around 7 km, and recoil system that allowed the gun to stay inplace and not have to be re-aimed for every shot and a breechloader that allowed you to shot as fast as you could stuff a new round in, the artillery world was in possession of a weapon it was mentally not ready for. All artillery doctrine to this point had been dealing with only direct fire (i.e. you shoot at what you see), and a vastly slower action time due to having to either a slow reload, or having to reaim the gun. In one swoop, everything holding up artillery rates of fire vanished with the added bonus of such a long range the gun crews could no longer see where the round landed.

This occurred in 1897 in France and within about three years every major power had its own version of the French 75mm with more or less the same capabilities. Where everyone had a chance to be different was in HOW they used these guns. The French had wanted a peice that could use rapid firepower to blast enemy lines into plup which would allow the infantry or cavarly to break through. The British also wanted mobile guns that could keep up with rapid movements and be used to overwhelm forces with firepower (especially for duty in the Empire). Most other powers wanted the same thing initially, but some (the ones with a much more professional outlook) started to think beyond the smaller units (regiments or brigades). Germany was argueably the first major power to realize that with the increased range you could effect the battlefield with artillery without having the guns actually there.

Longer range meant DEPTH. Germany realized that these new guns (and even bigger ones on the drawing board) could be used to influence the battlefield from a distance. Either their own guns could be safely away from the actual bullets (unlike what the British and French were doing) or they could be knocking out targets behind the enemy so that while the initial fight was going good the follow on was already lost (reinforcements, lines of communications, HQs, supplies could be destroyed or delayed via this long range artillery fire).

While this rocked in theory, it led to other issues. How does one control these fires? How can you make sure that your rounds are hitting the right place? How do you adjust the fire, how do you move it if you find out that the target moved, or if a new one shows up? The Germans used a top down plan to control the fires. "Top Down" means that the higher HQs made the plan, controlled the artillery and selected targets to support the ground forces. The problem with this was that for a fluid situation adjustments were hard make on the fly and the Germans discovered that COMMUNICATIONS were now a major issue. Remember, the French 75 came out before radios did.

The French and British did not have a very professional approach to their artillery control. Their focus was on the mobility and firepower aspect. In short, keep the guns close to maneuver forces, when the battle starts you move up to the unit you support and take commands from the guy on the ground. Now this works great on a small scale battle. For the British in the Empire this was a perfect method for fighting (also the French). But the breakdown was when you were NOT fighting in the bush leagues. Battles against another Great Power involve hundreds of thousands of men over huge areas and lasted days. Being subordinated to a infantry brigade meant that you could not easily bring one set of artillery to aid another. No cross-talk, no real higher artillery HQs to coordinate, no method of communicating. Worse, the artillery was often pushed up to the front with the infantry for direct fire use.

Now, some may say "WWI had not happened yet, so how could anyone know any of this?" True, the BIG ONE had not kicked off, but there had been several smaller wars that gave excellent pointers as to how this stuff could work. And everyone had observed them. We had the Boer War, the Russo-Japanese War, and the Balkins War. All of these wars involved major powers and the modern weapons and every one of them hinted to the problems the new artillery faced and also its new strengths.

The really interesting thing is that everyone did learn something from these wars. No one was able to put everything together for a perfect setup (that wouldn't happen until 1940 when the US Army finally got everything set up), but the contrast as to how everyone envisioned the use of the new artillery was VERY educational.

The British and French didn't really learn a whole lot. One could argue that the British actually unlearned artillery lessons from the Boer War and tried some ideas that had been proven WRONG during the fight (namely: don't use direct fire on a dug in enemy you can't see). The Germans learned that a centralized fire plan was doable, but you had major issues in adjustments and that you needed LOTS of ammo. The Russians learned they needed better coordination and more modern gear, but they had Czar Nicholas and he was a moron so no fixing got done. The Japanese started with a great artillery plan, focused on indirect fire linked to forward observers. But the Russians were so inept that the Japanese learned that using new artillery in direct fire would work and that they really didn't need to coordinate outside of the immediate unit (that would bit them badly in WWII).

The Americans amazingly learned a huge amount. From the Russo-Japanese War the US determined that Indirect Fire would work, and that it was preferable to direct fire. The US then started a heavy focus on the communication problem (flags, phones and eventually radios) and the idea that if you can communicate with ANY unit, you should be able to support them regardless of what maneuver unit you belong to. Which meant that some type of central HQs would be needed. Where the US really differed was in the fact that they were actively seeking the "happy medium" between the British/French direct support for maneuver (great for the commander on the spot), and the German "Top-Down Plan" (great for the greater whole or overall scheme of maneuver). The US realized it wasn't there yet. Further doctrinal devlopment in the US was hampered by the small size of the US Army and the fact that anything bigger than a Brigade didn't exist so much of what was worked on was pure theory. But they were the only ones thinking that going into WWI.

One thing which everyone did miss (except Bulgaria if you can believe that) was that ammunitions supplies needed to be drastically increased. The Germans realized that some increase was needed, but were still way short going into WWI.

A Truely Great Saying...

2009-07-12T17:41:00.000-07:00

From my AOWC readings:

"History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme."

Foamy Cartoon

2009-07-10T17:20:00.001-07:00

Folks, if you have not seen the latest Foamy cartoon at http://www.illwillpress.com (titled "Zip Codes") you need to see it NOW.

Guardians of the Public Trust

2009-07-08T17:00:00.000-07:00

This is a rant, so if you are not into this sort of thing skip the rest.

Otherwise...

"Guardians of the Public Trust" is a phrase that I have seen several times this week in various bits of reading material. First one was from the Memoirs of US Grant discussing his job as regimental quartermaster in the Pre-Civil War Army and how he was required to account for public property (aka, all US Army equipment his regiment possessed that he was signed for). I have read this same phrase in an Ethics Brief we are required to read ourselves and then brief to our battery leadership, who briefs it on down the line. I used this same phrase when explaining to a West Point Cadet who is training with us over summer break about Reports of Survey/FLIPLs on missing equipment and assigning blame and more importantly liability as to who was going to pay for it or be punished for failing to keep proper accountability of said property.

This phrase is an old one obviously. The US Army (and other uniformed services) have been using this term since prior to the Civil War to explain a fundimental point about the military. We serve the people and Constitution of the US, we are beholden to them, and when we screw up we answer to them. Not just the big media circus shows like Iran-Contra, or f-ups in Vietnam, or not planning Phase Four of Iraqi Freedom. No, we do it every day. Every part, every weapon, every tool, down to the smallest screw, someone is signed for it and is held accountable for it should something go amiss. This week alone my Brigade has had two investigations into missing equipment and I have signed off on a shortage annex (a document that shows that equipment was damaged, worn out or lost due to regular use) for a change of command inventory that involved 6 full days of inspections for every piece of equipment in a battery so the incoming commander knows that when he signs he has every piece he is signing for. And once this is done, he briefs the BDE CO. This is how much detail we go into.

Why? The army's equipment is public property. Not in the sense that every Joe on the street can sign out a tank, but that public monies were made available by the people's representatives (aka Congress) to equip us and that they TRUST us to use it correctly and make every attempt to insure against loss, theft or damage. Every soldier is a guardian in this sense. Even a brand new private who has been in the army less than a week signs for and is then responsible for his personal equipment (helmet, poncho, body armor, etc).

We are able to do this on a regular basis without too much drama.

WHY THE HELL CAN'T WE GET THE EFFING CONGRESS TO DO THE SAME DAMN THING?!?!?!?

Or the President's Finance Wizards or "Czars"(boy, what a great name to use huh?)? Or the FED?!?

The army spends a couple billion over on a new weapon system and we get front page on the NY Times and blasted on how this money could be better used in some social program or to save minnows in Oregon. The government passes a bill that in one swoop spends as much as Bush did for 8 years, and can't account for where it is all going to go, and then forces the Independent Auditors who are supposed to keep this whole thing honest to resign or fires them, and NADA.

WTF!?!?!?!

I am a true Guardian of the Public Trust. Every piece of gear I have ever had I have accounted for or paid for if I damaged or lost it. I am involved with an appeal over a piece of equipment I lost as a BC. But while I am appealing, I am also paying the monthly fine with the understanding that if I do win I get it back. It might take a while to get everything cleared up, but I am not effing around and not paying while I fight it. The law states clearly what I must do and I follow it.

I am trusted to kill for my country, I am trusted to account for millions of dollars of public property for my country. Why can't we get the same out of our government who is responsible for TRILLIONS OF THE PUBLIC'S MONEY?

It can be done, we just need to MAKE THEM do it. Time for forget parties, next time around find the guy who releases his income tax statements and submits to regular audits and is loud about wanting clarity in spending. I will vote for a DEMOCRAT if they can do this (that should give you the idea on how much this is horking me off).

Fourth Of July

2009-07-06T10:31:00.001-07:00

Happy Fourth everyone. Late I know, but its the thought that counts. We spent it up in Nebraska with the extended family. Just about everyone seemed to make it for this year which was nice. This was due mostly to everyone who missed the wedding came to meet Tamara and her parents. They also were there and had a great time.

I didn't have much time up there so unfortunately the fireworks was not quite as massive as usual and we didn't fire up the Big Lizard. Also the jeep was in the shop due to a problem with the fuel pump. But that was ok as if either event had been going on I would have had to blow off the reunion and party my parents threw. My parents gave a two hour party for everyone in my home town to come by and meet Tamara and say hi, and then gorge on Root Beer Floats (FYI, you can get Root Beer in a KEG), cake and beer. Everyone had a great time. My In-Laws were a bit thrown off at first because in Ukraine all "parties" that involve "family" are very formal affairs with lots of toasts and hard liquor and sitting down and eating together. This might be the first "American" party they have really been to and once they realized how everything worked ("here's a beer dude, pitch in" is the quote of the weekend, told to my father in law by a guy I knew in High School) they had a great time. The only thing I had a bit of an issue with was that the weather was overcast and just cold enough to make you want to have jeans on, so no swimming or river walking.

Stories for this year are the Saturn Missile Battery that nearly went off in my face (everyone on the beach heard my "OH S#@^" when it tipped over facing me), and the pack of bottle rockets that literally flew in opposite directions from where you aimed. I even managed to avoid any major arguments over politics (although it came close when someone made a comparision of the Iranian militia that crushed the demonstrations to the US National Guard because of Kent State).

Happy Fourth to everyone!

Arrogent Elk

2009-07-02T16:20:00.000-07:00

Okay, I am a bit peeved. While driving home tonight I happened to look over to the west side of I44 onto one of Fort Sill's hay fields (for the horses we have, don't ask), and what did I see?

A herd of Elk.

Not just does either. There were at least three bucks, including one that was big enough to put a saddle on. I am not kidding, this guy was HUGE. He had a rack that had to be as wide as my car.

And he was standing there looking at me with that "Yes, I am the most magnificent Elk you will ever see in your life and I know you can't shoot me becuase I'm not in Season" look.

)(&@*&@_!#@%$

I hate arrogent food.

Lost Victories

2009-06-29T17:24:00.000-07:00

Since my headers includes books, I felt it time to include one. The Book is "Lost Victories: The War Memoirs of Hitler's Most Brillant General" written by Field Marshal Erich von Manstein. This is a memoir of a rather good German Field Marshal whose claim to (Western) fame is the fact that he was one of main developers and pushers of the famous French Campaign in 1940 (through the Ardennes, over the Meuse at Sedan, on to the Channel, BEF escapes at Dunkrik). While he was pretty good on that one, his Eastern Front exploits put that to shame. But since they were against Russians/Soviets, they are not so well known to most Americans.

Well, Germany lost the war so you guys know how the ending goes. Manstein requested to be relieved of his command in early 1944 and refused to come back later so he really did sit out the last part. He survived Hitler's nuttiness and was captured when Germany was plowed under in 1945.

Since I haven't written a book review before forgive the rambling.

Okay, the book. This book is NOT for the casual war nut. I am not even sure its for a serious war nut. Manstein is proof that just because you are a brillant man in another field, that does not automatically translate into the ability to write well. Compared to Guiderian or Rommel this book is a TOUGH read. Both had a much better writing style that moved on quickly and still gave you some good data. Manstein's book is a serious look at high level warfare and how it works (or not). I am talking strategy and operational levels. Most of this book deals with Army Level Command or higher, and that doesn't make much "fun" reading. This book requires you to work at it and think about what exactly is going on. Not something a causal reader looking for a good "war book" is going to get into. It helps to have a good background about what is happening, and you better be able to figure out a map becuase you will be referring to one a LOT. When you have several Army Groups worth of space (on the EASTERN FRONT mind you), you are talking hundreds of miles of operations.

Now, if you do dare this book it gives some seriously good insights into how Hitler's mind works. Manstein had some seriously interesting comments on this. Some were pretty standard, but he hit on some that make perfect sense but hadn't occurred to me. Such as Hitler's total inability to think long term operationally or strategically (the furthest out Manstein could get him to really think was maybe 2 weeks, tactically ok, but an absolute distaster if you are trying to think operationally, and words are not in existance to describe how bad this is strategically). He also helped to flesh out some more well known "Hitlerisms" such as "no retreating allowed". He had some serious great input as to how the SS and Luffwaffe Field Divisions seriously boned the regular military in terms of replacements and this was made worse by the fact that the new full strength divisions usually had no vets and so got torn up in combat until they learned. I had never thought about that angle other than the old units were short men, but he was absolutely right.

Overall, this book is a work for a scholar to read. If you are one, hit it. If not, I would recommend Guiderian to start. I am thinking this is proof of the B.H. Liddell Hart Rule: If Hart wrote the foreword, its a thinker's book.

(Hart was one of the first theorists of mechanized warfare in history. He was in the British Army, but due to some of the quirks that accompany the "first great thinkers" in any occupation, he never became famous outside of historian circles).

The Lennon Rule

2009-06-25T17:24:00.000-07:00

Michael Jackson is dead.

And I don't care.

Reasons: The John Lennon Rule. The Fame Going to Your Head Rule. Media General Stupidity Rule.

Game Over

2009-06-25T17:07:00.001-07:00

Well, as much as I was unsurprised by how things turned out I am still sorry they did. I am talking about Iran and the crushing of the protests. I am in no way surprised by this, I have held that the Iranian Clerics and the Revolutionary Guard was way to brutal and ruthless to be over turned by demonstrations for as long as I can remember. Unless the RG refused to do something, or the regular armed forces joined the protestors what happened in Iran was ineviable.

A couple of observations.

First, anyone who ever thought that peaceful protest and peaceful revolutions are the way to go always should have gotten a brutal wakeup call. When you are up against something like the RG and the Clerics, they don't care about bad press or world opinion or moral high ground. They care about POWER period. And they will use it whenever they can to maintain it or expand their own.

Second, the UN has again proven pretty weak. Not even so much as a nasty letter.

Third, I don't envy the POTUS on this one. For him, this was a lose-lose situation. He can't invade and put some bullets in some well deserving heads due to public opinion and the liberal establishment in his party base (ironic though, the guys who yell the loudest about freedom sure don't seem to be really worked up about this one). He can't really come out and give strong verbal support for partially the same reason, but also when he has to either put up or shut up he would loose a lot of face and pull when he has to shut up due to issue one. He has to say something, and since he was trying to balance he looked weak and/or waffling or like he didn't really care about the cause (liberty folks, Iranian version, but its liberty none the less). Really, no where he could really go on this one with out catching flak. I don't envy him for that. I would have done it differently, but I am not the president so it doesn't matter.

Fourth, this means trouble for our boys in Iraq and to a lesser extent Afghanistan. The Iranians will either use this as an excuse to try and divert attention by some overseas adventurism or will think that the POTUS is weak and they can start trying to cause trouble with the JAM again (Iranian backed militia that we have crushed before).

Its a shame we can't do some old fashioned gun-running to the other side here and foment some nice rebellions. Of course that didn't work to well for us the last time, but I can't think of a better group of people to cause trouble for.

42 equals the 75mm Gun

2009-06-20T16:07:00.000-07:00

After all the work up, we now finally get to the actual artillery piece. The Gun that started the revolution, broke the 1000 year box and made a whole profession go "hmmmmm".

Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the French 1897 Mle.

An actual, functional French 75mm in action at Fort Sill (photo complements of the author).

A close up picture of the French 75 Mle, slightly modernized with rubber tires for towing with motor vehicles (also from the author).

Okay, so its a cannon. No, its not. This is the FIRST MODERN CANNON ever created. The older black powder weapons had been brought to their evolutionary end in the late 1880s with several changes and developments.

First, we had improvements in metalluragy which had led to new alloys, better steel and therefore stronger guns capable of taking greater pressure and force. Which was great due to the second development which was the development of new chemical propellents which replaced black powder. Black powder was dirty, corrosive and didn't work well in the damp and wet. Several types of new propellent and explosives were developed during this time, the most commonly used being cordite (which we still use). These propellents would have blown older bronze or iron guns apart unless they were built with heavier barrels which in turn meant you couldn't move them. With steel guns, you could use this stuff and still have a mobile gun with the added bonus of increased range, less smoke and greater reliability.

The other two improvements were mechanical in nature. Number three development was the invention of a easy to use and reliable breech loading system. This was called the "Nordenfelt Essentric Screw" and it allowed the use of fixed ammunition (i.e. a shell, its propellent both put together in a brass shell casing). You rotated a lever and moved a solid breech block either down and out of the way to eject and reload a shell, or move the block up and lock the breech closed to fire.

But it was the fourth development that really rocked the artillery's world and was a pure work of the French Army. This was the Long Recoil System (or if you want the technical jargon, a hydro-pneumatic recoil system). Although the original idea had been worked on by Krupp, they were unable to make it work due to leaks of the hydrallic fluid and loss of air pressure. The French hit on the design and assigned several engineering officers to work on it starting in 1892. They fixed the issues by 1896 and started production in 1897. This system allowed something that had never been done before in artillery history and that was the ability to shoot without having to relay and reaim the gun for every shot. The long recoil system absorbed the increased blast and pressure and allowed only the gun barrel to move backwards on the rails with the force being absorbed by the air pressure and hydrallics. The carriage remained motionless and when the gun moved back into firing position it was aimed in the exact same spot.

So, what does all of this translate into? Well, here is some raw data: 75mm caliber (roughly a 3 inch shell, weights 5.5 Kgs), max range of 6860 meters (compared to about 3000 meters for a Napoleon), a self traverse (i.e. the barrel could be moved left to right without moving the gun carriage) of about 6 degrees (not much, but remember this was the first gun that could move AT ALL), and a elevation of about 29 degrees. Most importantly (for the French) was its rate of fire: maximum theoretical rate was 30 rounds per minute, actual sustained rate (what you can shoot over a long period of time) was 15 per minute.

Pardon the pun, but this gun blew away it competition. The first truely modern artillery piece.

But here was the rub, it fit the designed need of the French military. The French wanted a rapid firing, accurate artillery piece that was mobile enough to keep up with the infantry and cavalry and could swamp the opposing enemy with firepower, usually in a direct fire (i.e. we can see them from the guns as we shoot). The French got that. But if you look at what they actually built it was a lot more that that. It could shoot accurate INDIRECT fire (shooting at something you can't see from the guns). For the first time, an army had actual artillery that could really reach out and effect the battle from a real distance. Or, if your mind had a sneaky twist, you could effect things outside the immediate battle area (the rear, units moving forward, supply dumps, road intersections, headquarters and so on). These guns added DEPTH to the battlefield and made the battlefield a whole lot bigger. And made artillery a whole lot more complex with a whole lot more problems.

Which I will hit on in the next post.

(source of technical data is "Allied Artillery Of World War One by Ian V. Hogg)

Oh God My Eyes

2009-06-15T17:30:00.000-07:00

Folks, I watch and collect war movies. I have seen a lot of them, and have collected quite a bunch over time. I have, thanks to Vulcan Video in Austin, seen a good many foreign war movies. And now even more thanks to my wife. Which leads us to this little gem, "Come And See" by Elem Klimov. This movie is a Russian flick and won numerous awards. Sean Penn even commented on how great it was. Yeah, well if we needed more proof he was a moron we have it now.

For those who saw my Facebook warning, I will hit a bit more detail. This movie was about a young teenager who joins up with the Partisans in Byelorussia to fight the Nazis. Now, we all know that a) partisan warfare is a highly unpleasant type of warfare, b) the Eastern Front was probably the NASTIEST part of WWII with two highly motivated groups of very nasty people trying to outdo the other in nastiness, and c) any movie made in the USSR about WWII is going to be overboard on the nastiness. So with this formula I was expecting a pretty vicious movie. My wife, upon learning I had ordered this from Amazon, told me that she had seen it and WOULD NOT ever watch it again (her high school took her and her class when they were 16 to see it and I would say that was child abuse).

My response: "Oooooo, I have to see this now."

Yeah, that will teach me.

This movie was absolutely disgusting, made very little sense other than "See how evil the Nazis are", and appeared to be an experiment in cinema as to how to portray war in film. It had lots of allegory and innuendo, and was over the top on symbolism (the only thing missing was a giant flashing sign that said "Nazis Suck" in the background continually flashing). It had several characters who were plain nuts and made no sense unless you could dig down for the deeper meaning (for a war film? dude, war is hell and Nazis suck, what more do you need?) and even then it was iffy for the mental hookup. It showed two villages being exterminated (the piece de resistance was the second village which took 45 minutes to show it getting entirely burned down and all associated crimes with it), several rapes (very unpleasant and I skipped over them, I can imagine what my wife was thinking when she saw this at age 16), torture, a very liberal use of flamethrowers, the after effect of mines, the old "how many bodies can a rifle bullet go through?" trick, cripes you get it.

This thing was more of a "Faces of Death" than an actual movie. Like I said earlier on Facebook, this was a combination Shock French Art Film, Ingmar Bergmann, and hyper violent "Saving Private Ryan". Only make sure you pull the worst parts from all of those movies and combine them.

I am keeping this movie to use against Andy, but I honestly don't know if I can stand to watch it again.

Avoid this turkey, it hurts.

BOOM!

2009-06-11T12:34:00.000-07:00

Today I got to have fun. US Weapons with a Artillery Live Fire right over our heads. And they PAY me for this...

Update: Photo from the other day, I couldn't get it to download via the BB. This is the Middle Impact Area on Fort Sill. To your right at a greater distance is a hill called "Blockhouse Signal Mountain". The little dot on the top is the blockhouse. This is the world famous location known to all artillerymen (urm, Western ones anyway). The big cloud of dirt is an impact from a 155mm shot from behind us by a M777 battery. Way behind us...

I love my job...

2009-06-08T16:21:00.000-07:00

As I am still working on the linking thing (and this article couldn't link), I just copied it whole from New Scientist. The comments I left off as they took a severe left turn about why waste money and resourses when babies are starving, etc. I will couple this with the fact that I was at the Fires Center of Excellence Fires Seminar this last week and got to walk through the displays of new stuff. But first read the article.

New Army Rifle Fires Laser-Guided Smart Bullets With Onboard Targeting Chips
New rifles with explosive rounds can be told where to detonate
By Dan Smith Posted 06.05.2009 at 5:09 pm 10 Comments

Smart Rifle: You won't see the rifle or the bullet until it's too late
It would be hard to describe a bullet as smart, but what if that bullet was laser-guided, radio-controlled, and carried an onboard targeting CPU? The US Army has announced the creation of the XM25 rifle, which can fire a new type of explosive round that fit that exact description. Imagine the implications: hitting targets inside buildings or hiding around walls. Whoa.
First, the scope on the rifle has a laser that gauges the distance to the target. The soldier can set exactly where the 25-millimeter bullet will detonate by adding or subtracting 3 meters from that point. Then, the scope will send a radio signal to a chip inside the bullet telling it how far it should travel before exploding.
Now, here’s where things get truly nuts: Each bullet has a small magnetic transducer that interacts with the Earth’s magnetic field, generating a tiny alternating current every time it spins as it speeds toward the target. Measured against the gun's specially calibrated rifling, this means the bullet can keep track of how far it has traveled in real time. Whoa, again.

Smart Bullets In Action: Trenches are no longer a safe place to hide The Army has proposed the uses can range from hitting enemies hidden in trenches (as pictured above), or even hitting a sniper hiding in a building by setting the range about a meter beyond the window. They are also proposed as a smarter alternative to grenade launchers, which can serve the same purpose but be less accurate and have limited range, making them more prone to collateral damage.
The Army will begin field tests with the XM25 system soon, with hopes of deploying it into regular duty by 2012.[New Scientist]

Neat stuff. Sci-Fi gear in real world. That goes double for the stuff at the seminar. M777s (the new howitzer), the new ADA systems, the NLOS system (think a Javelin type missile fired from the bed of a truck, but with a range of 80 kms and guided by satellites). The proof that I had "grown up" in terms of neat stuff was the Command and Control Vehicles they had come up with. A Bradley M3 IFV that was completely redone and had 4 computer systems and radios. You could run a battalion CP while driving on the road and not miss a beat. And it looks exactly like every other M3 Bradley so there is no "SHOOT HERE" sign because of too many radio antennas.

Tech rocks.

The Odd Side of History

2009-06-01T16:32:00.001-07:00

This post deals with an odd situation I ran into in Ukraine. Background: WWII is being fought, a minority of Ukraines hate the Russians so much they side with the Nazis. However, thanks to Hitler's brillant plan of "displace the sub-human slavs" many more decide to fight as partisans. The USSR beats back Germany and eventually rolls their butts right out of Ukraine. Here comes the fun part. Many of the Ukrainian guerrilla groups decide that the Soviets are just as bad as the Nazis and keep fighting them as hard as they had the Nazis. Added to this situation is the large amount of criminal/outlaw gangs that have sprung up due to the vicious warfare that has ruined much of this area and the great terrain (mountains, forests and broken ground, perfect for the old irregular action). The result is a 5 year war going from 1945 to 1950 in which the Ukrainian Nationalist groups are slowly ground down and crushed by the Red Army and Special NKVD Groups. In the USSR days (and still today in Russia) this conflict was known as the "War against Various Armed and Bandit Gangs".

Odd name isn't it. This name was actually a sop to the Ukrainians as they didn't want all of their Nationalist groups lumped in with those that were actually criminal gangs. Here is where it gets strange, at least for me. WWII and things around that time are pretty untouchable here in the US. It was a straight up war against groups that everyone agrees were the "Bad Guys". In Ukraine, I saw how history can be modified or changed or how it can actually be veiwed differently. Sure there is some of that in the US (especially in the south), but time has really dulled it. Not here. Which leads to the oddness of it for me.

This is a picture of the memorial to all the soldiers who died fighting in the War against Armed Groups and Bandits. It has my wife's grandfather's name on it. He was an officer who survived WWII and was killed while on patrol in this region when his patrol was ambushed by Ukrainian partisans. If you are thinking that this memorial is somewhat neglected you are spot on. It is 50plus years old to start with, but I was struck by how run down this particular grave yard was. Part is due to the fact that Ukrainians do not mow their grass (the grass grows short so they fail to see the need), but there is a definate sense of neglect. It felt like many of the people here really didn't want this here but out of respect for the dead they let it be.

This is another memorial. Note the trident symbol in the center. This is one that is commemorating the abolishment of Serfdom and Ukrainian Nationalism. It was torn down by the Soviets in 1946 and put up in again in the 1990s. It is well kept, in the center of town and flaunts Ukrainian Nationistic symbols. I have video of others that were about the same thing but with Ukrainian Flags and the National Ukrainian Army Flag (the partisan flag). These were usually right next to sites that commemorated Soviet soldiers who died fighting partisans or bandits. Here is were the odd feelings really hit.

The Soviets won the fight, and in Russia and to some Ukrainians they were the good guys. To many others they were not. While they lost their war, their cause ended up winning. And they now have numerous memorials to them proudly displaying the Ukrainian Trident and their flags. And the memorials to the "winners" crumble away and are neglected.

I am not sure if I am sad about this or not. I firmly side with the Nationalist on this issue while understanding why they lost. But it is hard to see a neglected grave or memorial to a fellow soldier. Its harder still when its your wife's grandfather. It doesn't help that these newer memorials are usually right next to the older ones and degree of care really sticks out. This was not a nice war (yeah, I know that is a statement rich in the "WTF"), but I have to tell you the stories I have been told by my wife's side are pretty nasty. I'll spare you but I have a new appreciation for how things went down in Kansas and Missouri in the Civil War. I guess every country goes through stuff like this. Part of a country growing up.

Making the Leap

2009-05-31T18:11:00.001-07:00

This is the next part of my little series on evolution of artillery. I keep saying that I am going to hit on the 75mm next post, but I keep remembering the stuff I need to hit on earlier. This post is no different. Another part of the build up to the 75mm gun and its brethren, I am going to hit on the driving factors behind the development of this gun.

One of the biggest driving points behind many weapons is something called doctrine. A military doctrine is simply a standardized guide to how that military is supposed to fight. Does it focus on infantry, artillery or cavalry? Does it combine them? How fast does it expect a war to be fought? Guerrilla or conventional? Heavy or light? Both? And so on. Once you have an idea on how you want to fight you are supposed to figure out if you can actually fight like that, and then build weapons to support your endstatement. Note the use of the word "supposed", this is not always the case. In the 1890s/1900s the worlds militaries were really running into a frightening situation of technology outpacing their understanding of how it effected their doctrines and some did not study how they wanted to fight, but declared how it was going to happen and then designed weapons to support it, evidence or not. The 75mm gun was a product of this thinking.

Numerous technological advancements had occurred that were drastically changing artillery technology. Better materials such as steel alloys, chemical propellents, and hydralic systems were making guns stronger and more powerful and allowing some interesting perks such as actually being able to have an effective breech-loader (i.e. you can load from the rear instead of ramming it in from the muzzle). The real question that started this ball rolling was asked by the French Army starting after the Franco-Prussian War. The French accepted that there would be another war with Germany. The question was how do we win it? Obviously their old tactics were a complete failure, especially their artillery which hit a big nerve as the French had always considered themselves the best artillerymen in the world (Napoleon was an artilleryman).

Old muzzle-loaders obtained effects by massing large numbers of guns in one location and blasting a hole in the enemy's line. This was no longer effective with the new breech and bolt action rifles which would mow down artillerymen firing Napoleon-style cannon before they could cause enough damage. Also the French felt that they had been unable to maneuver and mass guns quickly enough to be tactically decisive. So the conclusion reached was this: artillery for the next war needed to be maneuverable on the field, survivable, and could bring lots of firepower to bear quickly without having to have lots of guns (i.e. rapid firing guns).

History recognizes this theory as the "maneuver" arguement. Light guns, capable of keeping close to infantry, but having enough firepower that they can help to rapidly overpower the enemy forces without having to mass in large formations that became easy targets. This system is very decentralized and puts the decision in the hands of the infantry or cavalry commander on the spot as to how he needs the guns used. It is great if you are fighting smaller units (brigades or regiments), fighting people who have a lower tech level or are poorly trained and equipped. It breaks down in large scale operations against opponents of equal ability. The key to victory is being able to mass your effects in the location it is needed when it is needed. A decentralized system where your assets are parcelled out among smaller units makes massing difficult, and almost impossible to do quickly. This is especially true when you do not have radios or other means of reliable and rapid long distance communication.

This maneuver theory spelled out the doctrine for the French Military. With these requirements they designed a gun to meet the need. The Mle 75mm Gun.

Now we get to the fun irony of this situation. The French did design a gun that meet their specified requirements. But the problem was that they built a gun that went WAY beyond what they had been looking for. And it doing so caused a whole bunch more questions that eventually didn't get worked out until WWII. The next post will be on the actual French 75mm (HONEST).

Nork Artillery Capabilities

2009-05-29T17:08:00.001-07:00

This is really a tie in to HappyCrow on the possiblity of a Nork (North Korean) invasion of the south. Rather than bury his blog, I figured to focus on the FA side of the house. Reason: the Norks have a HUGE amount of it and its one of their only strengths, sort of.

First off, the Norks have honest to God Artillery ARMIES. No, I am not making that up. Whole armies that are nothing but artillery. Based on the Soviet model, designed to support old Soviet-style mass warfare. They have lots of towed stuff (D 30 type howitzers), lots of BM series rocket and missile launchers (think MLRS on a truck with 1970's tech), some SP stuff for the armored units (1960s level tech) and some interesting homemade stuff (the Kokson Gun, a huge cannon with a 45 km range). Most of this is dug in along the DMZ or in caves near firing emplacements that are pre-sited and surveyed. Just add launcher or gun and fire away. Their power lies in the MASS of artillery. It is effective because they have lots of it. To quote a friend in 1995, "NK has more artillery than God. And God has a lot of artillery." Also, Russian built FA is longer ranged than some American and ROK artillery. The BM Rocket systems have a 40 Km range which outdistances any of our tube artillery and until the advent of GMLRS, outranged some of our MLRS. The D30 howitzer outranged all of our 105mm howitzers and some of their larger stuff could outrange our M109s.

Issues with this. First, the stuff they have is OLD. Nothing new since the late 80's and even then it was older stuff from China or Russia. They have no precision weapons like the US or SK, so it mass fire (aka, we will hit it because we are firing so much stuff something is bound to hit). Their ammo supply is also old and they have a major problem storing it so it doesn't rot or ruin (A/C is a major thing to have in Korea due to the humidity which will wreck ammo unless its stored correctly). All their firing sites are known and targeted by the US/ROK, and our stuff is a guarrented hit thanks to lasers or GPS smart munitions. Many of the homemade systems (the Kokson Guns are notorious for this) are not designed for sustained fire and will burst or break after a short (8 hours or less) amount of sustained fire. Their ADA and air force are laughable so any system that is out in the open (aka every FA system) will be hit by air power shortly after fighting starts. Most of this stuff in not mobile, should the fighting move south (not bloody likely) or north (getting much more likely every day) these systems will be out of range or overrun.

These systems will likely cause heavy initial damage, but will not last long in a sustained fight. The US caught a major clue in the late 90s and relooked how it planned to fight in the ROK. Most US bases are in the south or are moving south, out of range of both FA and commandos. The chances of them being taken out early (which is critical to the Norks plans) are rapidly decreasing. Also, the remaining US forces in the ROK are set up to really fight here. We have lots of artillery, ADA and guys armed with smart, man-portable weapons that can smash up the mobs of Nork armor and stationary artillery. The ROK Army's FA has gotten very modern so it is more than able to knock the Norks around. Aside from our precision munitions have come range increases that give us the advantage in both range and accuracy. 6 US shots are 6 hits, 6 Nork shots are maybe 1 hit, odds like that rapidly cut down the numbers advantage. This area is one place that Rumsfeld actually fixed up in a better way. Were we to fight here, it would be the last of the old Cold War era fights in both participants and doctrine.

Too bad for the Norks we have moved on in equipment and thinking.

The real threat is if the Norks can utilize this FA for chemical or biological attacks. Cannon or rocket delivered nukes are beyond their tech level. Biological is a bit too frightening for anyone and also very complicated. Chem they could do, but the backlash would be bad. Not world condemnation (they could care) but the "gloves off" that would result.

Good God WHY?!?!?!?!

2009-05-29T16:44:00.000-07:00

No this is isn't about anything Congress did. As most of you know, I attended VMI and as a result of this marched in every parade for 4 years except for 1. I thought I was done with that.

Oh no.

Today I got to march in another one as the S3 for my battalion at the Post Retirement ceremony. This is done to honor soldiers who are retiring so its a good cause. But it still sucks to do. Especially since our post commander can't give a short speech (30 minutes long, and bad jokes to boot).

Ever stand at parade rest for 60 minutes? "Blows" doesn't get it.

IN case you were wondering...

2009-05-25T16:07:00.000-07:00

I need to post a disclaimer. Some folks have mentioned via other media (emails, facebook, etc.) that I should comment on the Norks (aka North Korea) nuclear test, Iran's little ship trick and how our current President is reacting. I have the following comment on this:

No comment.

You heard me. I have an opinion on this, but since this site has made it fairly clear that I am a serving member of the armed forces this site isn't a place for me to be mouthing off about it. I may not always agree with the POTUS and what he decides to do, but he is the boss and it is unprofessional to shoot my mouth off in a manner that undercuts him. There is a regulation on this and it is against that reg to be talking bad about the C in C. It can (and does) get violated, but usually in private or in the form of standard grumbling (Cripes, the POTUS is sending us WHERE? I gotta deploy in 2 weeks?, etc.) I may send an email to a relative or friend discussing it, but it will be with the understanding that it is a private conversation and not for public consumption.

BLUF: (uh, Bottom Line Up Front) I'll leave the political commentary out of this blog when the politics deals with the President. I have buds who do better on this than me, so I'll stick to my own area. I will hit on politics, but on areas outside the chain of command. It will usually be in a post that deals with high level strategy or operations (such as getting the State Department and Defense to work together and plan joint ops, a major topic of debate as this is a very common issue), or on more domestic stuff such as local laws, stuff dealing with the US Constitution and its amendments and the like.

And just to mention it: the Norks are Dorks, all this did was give more juice to the Missile Defense System bubbas.

The Napoleon

2009-05-24T17:32:00.000-07:00

No, not the short little Corcisan who helped reinforce the concept that invading Russia is a bad idea. We are talking the cannon:

This is the next article on artillery evolution I am undertaking. Before diving into the "42" (aka the French 75mm), I feel it necessary to hit on some background. This is a recap of a short field trip I take my LTs on at Fort Sill to get them into the idea of innovation and how the army/military adapts to change and transformation. Before we talk French 75mm, we must talk Napoleons.

The Napoleon is a 12 pound cannon capable of shooting both round shot (aka cannonballs) and actual shells that can be set for timed explosions or point detonation (i.e. they hit the ground and go BOOM!). It is a smoothbore (no rifling) cast out of bronze (which is why it doesn't have rifling, bronze won't take the pressure a rifled shot would generate). This weapon system is horse drawn (usually 6 to 8), and has a cassion which carries its internal ammo supply of mixed types (ball, shell, grape and cannister, think shotguns). It had a crude system of elevating the tube and aiming. It had no internal recoil absorber so when it fired the gun rolled back and you had to manually reposition and aim it. Crew of 6, usually 6 guns per battery. Range varies: max with cannonball was out to 3000 yards (rarely used), usually used at 2000 yards or less. If you were less than 500 yards out you used cannister or grape. It could be fired using an open flame (if you were ghetto) or a percussion cap. It was a muzzle-loader, which meant you rammed the powder and projectile in from the front.

This gun was the high water mark for the black powder cannons, the pinnacle of black powder cannon technology for field artillery. This may be argued by some other cannon enthusiasts, but I am using a certain range for determination. It was as mobile as these systems ever got, it had decent range, reasonable reloading time (under a minute if you were quick), if was a flexible system that could shoot a variety of munitions and it was fairly dependable. It was a great example of "the box".

This is "the box". The first recorded used of black/gunpowder was in China around 800 AD. The first record of a type of firearm was dated in the 1100s. This was a type of hand cannon: metal tube, open on one end, apply flame at other, projectile blows out the other end. The point I made to my LTs is a simple one. A early user of the hand cannon could have figured out how to use a Naploeon cannon with little trouble. Boiled down, there was no massive difference in how either system worked just the overall size and range (even the most powerful black powder field artillery was still a direct fire weapon that was only used on enemies you could see). This leads to a "box" when it comes to thinking about how this type of weapon can be used. A box that was 700 years old. How do you think outside a box that is 700 years old? That is a hell of a box to try and disregard.

I bring this point up to set the stage for the arrival of what we recognize as modern artillery. The development of the French 75mm and its brethren destroyed a 700 year old box of military thought. Literally overnight, everything everyone thought they knew about how artillery worked no longer applied.

Welcome to Challenge 101.

Next post in this series will detail the French 75mm, its capabilities, and why it was different enough to literally change existance as it was know for every artilleryman on the planet (and why some of them didn't realize it).

And how everyone reacted to this.

Happy Memorial Day

2009-05-23T17:35:00.001-07:00

Greetings All. More blogging later on this weekend but not so much right now. Recovering from a summer cold and a new boss. Just needed to say have a great Memorial Day Weekend and please take a moment to remember those who we are supposed to remember on this day. The ones who didn't make it back to enjoy the weekends and those that did but have now moved on.

And please take a moment for those who are in harms way now and face the chance that one day their name will be on that list of those departed sooner rather than later.

We cannot live the lives they wanted to live, we can only live ours and be thankful to them for their sacrifice that made that possible.

And its Game Over

2009-05-18T17:18:00.000-07:00

Well, if you are a typical American you probably missed this. But the world's longest running insurgency has finally been crushed. The commander, founder and singular reason it ran so long of the Tamil Tigers was killed by Sri Lankan Army forces this morning (our time anyway) and the last 300 meters of Tamil Tiger controlled ground was taken. For the first time in nearly 30 years the Sri Lankan government controls all of its territory.

This is awesome. The TT were a bunch of rat bastards. By that I mean that they were mean, motivated and tough as hell. And also, they were just nasty people, especially towards the end when they were herding the people they were supposed to be "protecting" into zone to use as human shields while they had Tamil Immigrant groups in Europe protesting to have the EU stop the government advance.

Several observations. One, time length was LONG. Folks, this is insurgency. Long, unpleasant and nasty. Also expensive. If you are a typical yank and you want a nice clean and quick solution to these problems, do us all a favor and leave the pool as it is adult swim time. Two, the British have again proven how far they have fallen. The end of the world's longest insurgency and Britain's first statement was about "disturbing" reports of human rights violations by the army and "possibly" by the TTs. Yeah, this is why no one really listens to England much anymore. The SL government then sat back and let a mob nearly overrun the British embassy and when they complained the response was "Sorry, celebrations got out of hand. It happens when you WIN."

Let them cheer, they have earned it. And England can shut its gob on this, SL deserves its moment of triumph. They won without any help so let them cheer.

I have been following this fight since I was in high school. It, along with Angolia and UNITA, were some of the first real-politic situations I ever studied. I honestly never thought it would end like this with such a absolute victory.

My growing interest in WWI

2009-05-16T17:34:00.000-07:00

This doesn't deal with Ukraine. This deals with some military history and a topic that I am finding myself more drawn into recently: World War I (aka "The War to End all Wars" and the "War that would Never Happen").

Now, why would this war interest anyone? Well, major shaper (if not the defining shaper) of the 20th century aside, it is the massive changes in technology and how the various countries dealt with them that has completely captured my interest. What is lost on so many people due to the huge bloodletting and the completely jacked up ending (I have started to call this the war no one won thanks to the peace treaty that promised a rematch or our money back), is the absolutely perfect example of military transformation and impacts of technology on how militaries do business.

In a short period of time (20 or so years), every aspect of how a first class world military did business was changed. Infantry got machine guns and bolt-action rifles. Artillery got the rapid firing, recoil-less, long ranged cannon, aircraft were invented, the cavalry had motor vehicles/armored vehicles (Armored Cars to start, tanks came in the war), transportation had trains and motor vehicles and so on. And this was the first war which the medical science really started to be effective.

A very common word in the recent decade in the US Army has been "Transformation". We are talking about how the army/military is transforming due to new developments. This started as cyber/technology focused impacts, but after 9-11 it has included all kinds of asymetric threats and has started overlapping into all other areas (a good thing too, id Wilson had been smarter than he thought he was and had tied the military and polical parts together maybe WWI woudl have had a different ending).

I am not so big on the political aspects of this stuff. I will never be a general, so I am not trying to pry into that part. For me, the big one is the impact of new ideas or technology. Or the ideas that come from the new gear or the gear that comes from an idea or any other combo. And WWI (or the time leading up to it) provides a wealth of this stuff. Especially artillery which will be the center peice of this thread.

My thesis was actually on the impact of new artillery systems on doctrine in the US Army prior to WWI and how well did the US Army crack the code on the new rules. Or rather, its failure to do so even with 3 years of sitting on the sidelines while Europe provided examples on "how to NOT do things". But I realized something while studying this, this question is so complex and has so many factors influencing it that the answer wasn't that everyone got wrong. The problem was that everyone hadn't figured out what the exact question was.

Yes, to use a Hitchikers Guide reference, everyone got 42 and didn't have the question.

This discussion is way to long for one post, so we are going to do it in chunks. Next time I will discuss the "42" of this problem: the French 75mm.

For Russ and the little voice inside all of us that secretly wants to smash something with a mace...

2009-05-16T16:26:00.001-07:00

Pictures from the Armaments Museum in Lviv (or Lvov if you are a Yankee). This part of Europe has been fought over for a LONG time. Lviv itself is over 800 years old and while the old city is cool as all get out, a great portion of that time has been fighting. Mongols, Cossacks, Turks, Tarters, Poles, Hungarians, Rumanians, Russians, and Germans have all marched through here and many marches were not nice. I have made comments about Russians not being very popular (and they are not in this part of Ukraine), but how about Poles? To some even less than Russians. I thought that was weird at first, but once you figure out some of the history it makes sense. This area is truely where Europe ends and where Russia (as in big, endless, steppe and snow Russia) begins. Like Poland, this area doesn't have a place where you can draw a line and go "here is where x ends and y begins". Germany and France have the Rhine, Italy has the Alps, UK is an island. Once you come down out of the mountains it is a big open area where control goes back and forth over time.

And alas, this leads to lots of warfare. But now for the pictures.

Mail coat and sword. Found in the river that flows through the city center. Found along with the original owner about 10 years ago. The Lviv soldier fell in the river during a siege and drowned.

Crossbow. Not exactly fast loading, but you are not getting up anytime soon if hit.

Stupidity should hurt...

Polearms. Lots of them. A rather big collection in this museum for some reason, couldn't find out exactly why. Something to do with the original collector's taste.

Me and my patron saint. Well, that would be St. Barbara. This is St. Michael, warrior saint. Also Lviv's city saint if I understand correctly. They also had a big church dedicated to him in Lviv. The most common church names were for St. Michael and St. George (the saint of knights and heros) in Ukraine.

Here is more my speed. Lviv was a major cannon maker for the area. It was this coupled with other gunpowder weapons that finally stopped the nomad invasions of Eastern Europe. I screwed up and didn't get a full picture of the tapestry you can see in the background which depicted the Battle of Halych that saw the Ukraine/Orthodox Church defeat invaders in the 1200s (urm, we think as Tamara doesn't remember exact dates). Who were the invaders? The Tutonic Knights (aka the Germans) and the Catholic Church. This battle is considered one that saved the Orthodox Church in the Ukraine and stopped the eastward expansion of the Tutonic Order. Ukraine became recognized as a distinct area/country after this.

This is a cannon in the shape of a fish and my wife in the shape of a tourist. The church commissioned this piece to fight the Ottomans.

Cavalry/Hussar armor (this and the following picture were taken for Russ Mitchell).

Not a bad museum if you are really into the old school stuff. I thought the cannons were interesting, you could definately see these were city guns and not really the mobile pieces. I did notice that this area was much more into swords and lighter weapons for a much longer period than Western Europe. Which makes sense given the terrain. Mobility here meant horses, horses meant less emphasis on gunpowder weapons until they became small enough and reliable enough to use. Cannons were great for city defense, so plenty of them. Matchlocks and later flintlocks not so much. Most gunpowder stuff I saw here was from Central Europe (Hungary, German states, Poland) until we get into the mid 1700s. I hate to say it, but since this wasn't my area of expertise I probably missed some great photos of great stuff just for simple lack of knowledge.

Ukraine Trip

2009-05-14T18:19:00.000-07:00

Hi folks, we are back from Ukraine. We had a great time. I got to meet Tamara's family still over there (uncles, aunts, nephew, freinds, grandmother). We stayed in her family's house in Bohorodchany and we visited numerous places were she lived (she moved once while in grade school) and also her parent's hometown. Very much like one of the Eason guided trip of North Bend, except it was over a much larger area.

Several items:

One. Area we were in. Western Ukraine near the Carpathians. And I mean near. We were literally in the foothills of Carpathians, go one hour west and you were up in them. We stayed at a small house/hotel overnight and spent 2 days in the actual mountains. We hiked up one (1.2 kms in height, 14 km round trip) and also visited a Vail grade ski resort (which transformed a Deliverance style backwater into a Ukrainian Aspen in about 5 years). Go east and you get the steppes and a whole lot of Nebraska style open. Imagine the Platte River Valley but flatter and wider.

Two. May 9th. WWII Victory Day. Its a BIG deal in Ukraine. Every town had a major memorial (big honking Soviet style thing) in the center of town which listed every person who died fighting in WWII. It reminded me of older towns back east in the US that had Civil War memorials in the town cemetary, or France with WWI monuments. Parades, banks closed, whole thing.

Three. Ukrainian Nationalism. Next to every WWII monument was a new one which featured more names, a Trident, and two flags. These monuments were for the Ukrainian Liberation Army/National Army who fought and lost to the Soviets in the 5 year insurgency after WWII. The Trident is the symbol of Ukraine, the flags were the Ukrainian National Flag and the Liberation Army Flag (Black over Red). These monuments were VERY well kept up and always had flowers on them. In contrast, many WWII monuments were run down, not defaced though. I am going to do a separate post on this one as there was some interesting history worthy of a separate line. It was also interesting to note that some WWII monuments had been modified recently with some words obviously removed or sanded off.

Four. Livestock. Okay, I am a farm boy, but being in a city of 40K and being woken up by chickens crowing and seeing cows wandering around was a bit of a shock. And the cows literally walked themselves out to pasture and back again for milking. Bizzare in a way. And there are a bunch of crows in Ukraine too. Please note that this particular cow was actually a country cow we hiked past in the mountain. I only have video of the city cows.

Five. Water. Odd one to point out, but every house there had its own well. Even if they had indoor plumbing (and unless you were in small towns you did), you had a well. I rather liked that and the water was good. Again, this is a country well, but the design is the same. Again I only have video of city wells.

Six. Communist Stuff. NADA. And I do mean NONE. Every statue of Lenin had been torn down (in some cases rather violently I was told), and the one picture of Brezhnev I saw had the glasses, horns, beard, and a punk hairdo painted on by the locals with the words "Bite it commie" under it (in three languages, one being English). Russians are not so popular in Ukraine, but they will take their money. And as an interesting side note, Pres Obama is not really popular either. Not that he is unpopular, but the Ukrainians want into NATO and are not so sure O won't sell them out to Russia. This isn't my words, I heard this from many folks over there.

Um, no pictures. I have a cool video of a hole in the ground where Lenin's statue was, but it lasted about 10 seconds after Ukraine went independent.

Seven. My family. I now have family in Ukraine and they are a great bunch. Top to bottom, a Ukrainian Colonel, Commandant of a local military school. He is an Uncle in Law (great guy), Tamara and her Grandmother (Babushka) and her great aunt. Me and uncle Yuri and aunt Oksana. Last is Tamara and her nephew Andrew.

More stuff to follow as we go along.

We're Back

2009-05-13T18:19:00.000-07:00

Hi folks. Tamara and I have just returned from our trip to Ukraine to visit her home and family. We had a great time and I saw some neat stuff. I will post more on this later on, right now its time to hit the sack.

Hamas' Brain Trust

2009-04-27T17:54:00.000-07:00

First attempt at an entry. Discussion point is an article I read on Strategypage.com titled "Hamas Aims to Look Sharp" (http://www.strategypage.com/htmw/htlead/articles/20090427.aspx. The short and sweet of this article was the results of a Hamas internal study of the last round of fighting in Gaza against the IDF (Israeli Defense Force). Urm, if you want to call it a fight anyway. Hamas has figured out that they didn't do so well in all categories (including the media surprisingly) and have made some plans to fix this for the next round.

The major point is a complete and total failure of leadership at all levels of the spectrum of conflict. Strategically it was a embarrassment, operationally this was planned and executed at about the level of Mussolini's invasion of Ethopia, and decorum prevents me from using the most correct words to describe their "tactical" abilities. They couldn't communicate or synch their political and military leadership, goals or plans and once the IDF started rolling, Hamas gunmen were abandoning their uniforms and hiding.

Hamas fell into the trap of fighting the last war (in this case, attempting to do what Hezbollah did in 2006). Happens to the best militaries, so its hard to hit them that hard for that point. However, they also made the mistake of doing an exact copy of Hezbolla's plan and not doing any modifications for the vastly different terrain, and more importantly the different level of training they had. Hezbollah does actually train somewhat and has some trainers who are not bad (Iranians and Syrians), Hamas has some Dirty Harry Videos, a copy of Tom Clansey's Rainbow Six and the Third Edition Battletech as guides. Quality for Hamas is POOR in the realm of the standard, urm, fighter (they sure are not soldiers, and I even balk at calling them gunmen).

And they are fighting Israel, who proved that 1st class militaries CAN learn and adapt from when they mess up (all good militaries have to include Russia, England/UK, USA, Israel).

While all of that is painfully obvious, the article is talking about how Hamas is "learning" for the next go around. And it is looking like their reputation isn't going to be improving anytime soon. THe main conclusion they seem to have drawn is that they need more heavy weapons to take on the IDF's heavy mechanized forces (Engineering vehicles, Tanks, IFVs). This means rocket launchers, guided anti-tank missiles, anti-aircraft weapons (missiles or cannon/heavy machine guns). In short, they are moving to a stand-up fight with the IDF.

This may very well top out the bad idea scale from a group who makes a living off of getting high marks on it. Every Arab force that has fought the IDF in a stand up fight has been whipped badly. Some have pulled out a pseudo-draw (Egypt), but then made a permanent peace. Hezbollah didn't exactly win in 2006, but did better than many thought possible so got some street credit. But the IDF learned the right lessons and Hamas found that out in a bad way.

If Hamas is going to follow through on this line of thinking, they are going to get smashed up worse the second time. Sure heavy weapons can stop armored vehicles, but they can only do it if you have the right setup and support. Hamas has no air power, they have no supporting artillery worth mentioning (light mortars, not nearly powerful enough), they have no terrain advantage, and with the precision weapons the IDF packs they can't even hide so much anymore. And heavy weapons can't move. You set up a guided AT missile site and its going to stay there for awhile. If it doesn't move, it will be seen, it will be targeted and it will be taken out. If they put it on a truck, then the air force and drones get to play.

Yeah, I am beginning to think I need to lay off the French when I am bashing militaries.

Black Berry Test

2009-04-27T09:22:00.000-07:00

Well this is test2. This post is coming from my bb at work (just before lunch so no I'm not being lazy, just in line). I am liking this bb more and more as I play with it. And my wife's phone is still cooler (she can watch realtime tv on her's). Technology rocks.

Which will be an upcoming topic. But first we will hit on Hamas...

It Begins...

2009-04-23T19:13:00.000-07:00

Well, its a start. Welcome to my Blog.