markppcli
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lol, you should see the inside of a Pizzaro
Our North - SSE Policy Update Megathread
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Fair.
I was just thinking that there has been much discussion about upgunning vehicles generally to something in the 30 to 35 mm range. In the Canadian context, in my mind, the question became what can you fit inside the existing turret. Now it is being suggested that it is not only the gun but the FCS system that needs upgrading.
Additionally there has been the ongoing discussion about whether an APC/ISC like the Stryker needs a crew of two or three like the LAV. It interests me that the Boxer RCH155 operates with a crew of 2.
....
As to the ACSV, my thinking there was if new turrets were to be purchased then it makes more sense to put them on new hulls and the ACSVs are the current production hulls.
As to the LAVs being downrated to APC/ISC/TCVs I was thinking that the ACSVs are actually replacing Bisons and M113s so refurbished LAV6s would be an upgrade in any event.
...
Just wondering if there are any babies in the bath water.
PrairieFella
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Honestly there's nothing really there. I imagine patching the gigantic holes in the LAV6s is not worth the cost on what are getting to be some tired hulls.
McG
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The ACSV is to LAV 6 what Queen Marry was to M113. Without a turret, the ACSV is taller than a LAV 6 with its turret. All the variants with enclosed passenger compartments have standing space in the back. This makes sense for a CP, EW veh, and even the A2 echelon ambulance. But accepting this hull for generic APC, engineer troop lift, and A1 echelon ambulance reflects a foolish acquiescence to buying the platform GDLS wanted to sell us.
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The MRT will be shorter though?
MilEME09
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PrairieFella
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They do have one key thing though, massive levels of LCF.
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So will the crane be able to reach the drive through window at Timmie’s- from the parking lot.
FJAG
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Actually when you look at drone footage you generally see open fields and hedge/tree lines with hundreds upon hundreds of craters around them. That tells me two things. First that they are using guns and rockets at scale. Second, that the accuracy and ability to tightly concentrate their fire is low. The latter is perhaps a sign of the age of both the guns and rocket launchers and the quality of the ammunition stocks which make it difficult in many, but not all, cases to mass their fire in tight concentrations.
I tend to think of the ACSV as exactly the full M113 fleet not just the M577. Not all the ACSVs are high hulled. There are two types of hulls. The Type 2 (troop/cargo, ambulance, CP, EW and engineer variants) have a high roof while the Type 3 (fitter/cargo, MRV and MRT variants) have a low roof more in line with the existing LAV 6.0.
I'm not into the details on the SOR on this project, but it seems to me that there was plenty of room to have user input into these variants. Essentially you start with the LAV 6's common front end and chassis and then built bespoke cargo module to suit the customer's requirements. These variants aren't rocket science. We've had most of these in our M113 fleet and there are numerous examples for other chassis IMHO, the ACSV is the ideal companion to the existing LAV 6 fleet which the army expects to have in service until at least 2035.
Regarding the craters, I have noticed that, but I think we are seeing the cumulative effects of many impacts over a long period of time, sort of like a WW1 no-man's land but not as bad. The pre-war Russian TTP for artillery was to engage with full Bns, and often multiple ones, whenever possible. A break-in against a prepared defensive position should be accompanied by a fire strike using thousands of projectiles. But I just don't see that sort of intensity happening. Whenever I see a video with artillery strikes I make a point of counting the number of bursts and I try to gauge the size of the fire unit. It's rare to see engagements even by a full battery, or bombardments that last for anything more than a few minutes. A battery firing ten rounds per gun per day isn't very much, but over two years it adds up to a lot of craters.
That's not to minimize the effects of artillery in Ukraine - I haven't seen numbers, but I have seen claims that it is still the primary cause of casualties in theatre. It's just not being put together in sufficient mass to permit a defensive system to be overwhelmed.
Guns being shot out is a distinct possibility. Certainly very large numbers have been taken out of the storage bases, probably more than are required to make good on combat losses. Some OSINT aggregators are speculating that the older systems such as the D20s and D30s are being cannibalized for their barrels.
Accuracy does seem to be uneven. At times I have seen first-round impacts within 50m of a moving target, but other times I have seen rounds flailing around in open fields. Another bit of speculation on my part - I think most of the rocket launchers and guns are being kept further to the rear than preferred in order to keep them safe from drones. This would come at a cost in accuracy.
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There is definitely areas that have had full artillery saturation, but keep in mind that at this point neither side has the ability to throw what they want in terms of weight and duration of fire.
There are some out there that have a very frightening level of shells impacting. Keep in mind most of the videos that have popped up in the media are by survivors. Some ISR footage exists of much heavier rates of fire.
There have been a number of instances where it under has.
Lots of things are being cannibalized for parts, on both sides…
Ack.
I tend to agree with you. Especially in certain areas depending on the array of forces against them.
FJAG
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True enough, albeit one can also tell, even from drone footage, strikes which are relatively new from old ones. The wide dispersion, however, speaks as to the lack of concentrated fire - something which is inherent in their brigade-level MLRS
Don't forget the Russians move away from divisions to brigades and the subsequent, and even more decentralized, concept of working in BTGs which rely on a gun and an MLRS battery to support its operations. The requirement to mass battalions of artillery to support the small scale attacks that are happening (often less than battalion attacks) is not there.
Similarly in small scale company-sized operations which can take hours of approach and trench clearing continuous massed fires are expensive in ammunition and can prove hazardous for the attacker who is primarily in the open working against an entrenched defender. The tactic here is to hit the company objective hard and quickly with artillery followed by a quick move into the ground fight while artillery switches off against supporting positions and against counter attacking forces. It's not the same as the massed mounted mechanized divisional melee that Soviet planners built their artillery am for.
That's my take as well.
It's not that they don't have them. After the reforms, the estimates were that the Russians had some 170 brigades each of which would have two 18-gun battalions and one 18-launcher MLRS battalion. So far the Oryx stats amount to roughly 60 bns of guns (towed and SP) and 20 MLRS bns having been lost by the Russians. That leaves quite a few still around. The Russians have a problem though. They have a long front and they are on the longer outside arc. They can't afford to leave any of their areas uncovered any more than the Ukrainians can. The Ukrainians, however, have shorter interior lines and as a result more guns can be brought to bear on a given piece of front line terrain. Observation is such, and the terrain is such, that actually physically concentrating the Russian guns to thicken the fire on an objective is quickly discovered and dealt with. While massing fires means massing projectiles on a target it frequently also requires moving guns in closer than where they would ordinarily be deployed.
In short I think they have the guns, but like the infantry and tanks, they are widely deployed across a vast front line that mitigates against massing. It's not impossible but more difficult than one would think.
The one good thing about older guns is that it doesn't take much to make them operable. Our C3 guns are basically 70 years old and simple to operate and maintain (at least if we could solve some of the stupid IP issues and parts manufacturing) Most of the Russian guns are similarly simple (except maybe their autoloaders) and the Russians hold the IP so can easily manufacture replacement parts even though they may need to resort to cannibalizing in the short term.
Hitting a moving target with "dumb" arty projectiles, or even being close, is more a matter of luck than anything else. Accuracy (or the probable error [PE] of the gun/projectile) and can't be compensated for other than increasing the number of rounds and therefore the probability. Equally difficult is the ability to have two objects the gun firing the projectile and the moving target all coming together at a given spot at exactly the same time. That's sheer luck. Guided projectiles increase the probability. A GPS based projectile has little advantage over the dumb shell because it flies to a set grid reference and one needs to get the moving target to that at the same time. A laser guided projectile, on the other hand, flying to a laser illuminated moving target has a much greater chance of success. IMHO, armed drones are by far the best and easiest weapon systems to use against moving targets as long as the EW and anti-air environment is permissive enough.
I agree they are kept further back. Accuracy does decrease, but not as much as you might think to explain the wide dispersion. The primary effect of being further back is one of range. There is less of the enemy territory that you can reach and cover with fire.
The BTG concept was only partially implemented; many of their Div/Regt structures remained intact, and still do - the forces pushing on Kharkiv are mostly organized on Div/Regt lines. Even in the BTGs, they hadn't abandoned the idea of forming artillery groups using Bns pushed down from higher HQs, so any unit (in the Russian sense of the word) conducting a major attack could expect to have more than its organic artillery.
As a side note, one of my theories for Russia's poor performance at the start of the war relates to many of these reforms only being partially complete - it was not a professional army, and it wasn't a mobilization army. It had the advantages of neither. The BTG is a good example of this problem, being something of a compromise to get decent value out mixed force of contract soldiers and conscripts.
This gets to my speculation about problems with Russian firepower; I think they want to do more than just Bn attacks, but they can't manage to organize the necessary artillery support (or the maneuver forces, for that matter).
That's how its supposed to work, but in practice the Russians are having problems with the "hit them hard and quickly" bit.
By pre-war TTPs, the Russians would fire plan an attack by shooting what they sometimes refer to as a fire strike, which would be followed by successive fire concentrations through the depths of the defence. The first concentration would usually be intended to "suppress" the defenders. The Russian concept of suppression is similar to our concept of neutralization, but they believe that you need to inflict at least 30% casualties in order to achieve it. This leads to a large ammunition expenditure when firing on troops in good trenches. This is roughly equivalent to our concept of preparatory fire, but we don't usually attach a number to it.
For the successive fire concentrations, the goal is to support the attacking forces as they approach and assault the objective. For this, each Bty fires on a specific portion of the target area, and lifts to its next target either on a timing or on the issue of a codeword (which will be a predatory animal, if memory serves me).
The Soviet ideas on firepower never really went away.
I agree with this; I think I made the same point in a different thread. The length of the front limits how much can be massed in any one location. Huge artillery groupings aren't really possible. But they should be able to at least get one or two Bns together to support a single limited attack, and this seems to be proving challenging.
I'm aware of how the ballistics works. It's not entirely luck; maybe mostly, but not entirely. If you know where the enemy is going to be canalized and have a recorded target sitting on it, there is a good chance you will get good results. I have seen some highly responsive shooting that opens and remains close to a target, and I have seen more than a few tanks or BMPs get disabled or destroyed by artillery.
I don't think the range is a big factor, but it is something that impacts overall accuracy. The probable errors do go up with range, but it also magnifies the effects of orientation errors or questionable MV data (the bad gun/bad ammo problem).
I realize there is a both a survivor bias here, and also a disclosure one (neither side shows all of its footage). I try to emphasize that I'm speculating because we only have a very limited amount of information to work with.
I have seen a few heavy bombardments but they are relatively rare, and they were often rockets. But most attacks are going in with only a fraction of the fire support that Russian pre-war TTPs would suggest is necessary.
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With respect to the use of company and infantry tactics instead of larger battalion and brigade pushes:
My sense is that any large group of vehicles (>20) attracts attention to itself during the road march and doesn't survive long.
My sense is that any large group of vehicles (>20) attracts attention to itself during the road march and doesn't survive long.
FJAG
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The problem with a BTG is that it's like a battle group and dependent on the ability of elements to work on a combined arms concept. That takes good mid level leadership and significant and complex training. From what I recall about the early stages of this conflict, many of the infantry units were well below strength with BTRs and BMPs not having much more than their basic crew and with few dismounts. On the artillery side the BTGs then had problems as they were back in the order of march and had trouble deploying into action in the terrain conditions at the time.
That's a problem for the Ukrainians, too. Considering they've both had two years to correct their shortfalls it makes me wonder about how easily Canada can scale back up to brigade and above operations.
In order to destroy a target, the projectile needs to either hit the target or land very, very close. Ordinarily, near misses can shred aerials and optics and tires but generally that leaves the vehicle capable of withdrawing. Disabling a vehicle has value in its own right. Soft skin and lightly armoured vehicles can, of course, have splinters penetrate and either kill or wound occupants and damage equipment and possibly detonate on-board explosives.
You can certainly plan DF targets (and should) and with laser rangefinders and GPS you can easily calculate a known target point. Assuming the round flies true, and you can control the fire of the gun and the known time of flight (which is the easy part) you still need to be able to gauge the movement of the vehicle, which if properly operated, doesn't just mindlessly proceed in a straight line at a steady rate.
Assuming that you can deal with all that, you still have the PE problem which is uncontrollable. It can only be compensated for by increasing the number of rounds fired simultaneously at that spot. Dealing with a multiple vehicle attack compounds the problem if they deploy with the required dispersion between vehicles.
Honestly, my rule of thumb is to keep things simple - you take out a moving target with a guided weapon - whether that's a drone, or an ATGM, or a laser guided round depends on what you have and what's most effective in the situation. That's not to say you can't use dumb rounds to disable or destroy a moving target. B-GL-371-002 Duties of the Battery Commander and the Observer at Chapter 3, Section 8 deals with the techniques involved in engagement of mobile targets and ammunitions such as DPICM scatterable mines, if available, can also be used in this circumstance. It's just that the expenditure of "dumb" rounds to accomplish any effect is very high. That creates a logistics burden.
Range is a factor as to which targets you can engage. As a rule of thumb Canadian CS artillery deploy into artillery manoeuvre areas with the intent of having at least 2/3 of its range extending beyond the forward edge of its own troops. That's so as to be able to strike areas in depth such as reserves, enemy gun batteries, assembly areas, logistics centres and routes, headquarters, advancing reinforcements, etc.
Russian defensive doctrine talks about having the forward edge of the brigade artillery group start about 2-4 kms from the forward edge of the main defensive positions and extending as 3 to 5 kms wide and 1-2 kms deep. (It's the same for the offence generally but hard to accomplish) That's a very concentrated and forward area for some nine batteries but is designed to hit out at the enemies approach march. That presupposes that the enemy's artillery, in the approach, is well back.
The further back you move your guns, the less ability you have to hit these vital targets. The Russian 152mm 2S19 series of SPs generally reach out to 25 to 29 kms. At a standard 3-6 kms setback, that leaves some 20 kms of range forward. As artillery batteries step back to avoid counterfire they lose the ability to reach deep into the enemy's rear. There is a simple reality to the 2/3 range rule of thumb; if you have near parity with the enemy's guns' range then you will never be free of the reach of counterfire as the ranges will always overlap the gun positions. That makes deception, mobility and protection vital. And that's even before you throw in GS arty, drones everywhere and rocket systems.
The BTG isn't that much different from how the Regimental organizations were supposed to fight. The Regts are all combined arms organizations and it has been routine practice for the motorized rifle battalions to get tank company attachments for many years. There are some organizational differences between BTG and Regt structures but the personnel differences are more important. Regts were mostly conscript, with scattered contract soldiers, while BTGs had a larger pool of contract troops (assessments vary, but most estimates are around 30%). Most BTGs weighted one battlegroup with all of the contract soldiers with the rest of the BTG being conscripts; the enablers were usually stacked up in support of the kontraktniks. I haven't seen much discussion of this, but this probably caused serious issues in the first few days of the war as Russian law isn't supposed to allow conscripts to be deployed on military operations outside of the home borders.
The Russians also don't seem to have expected much in the way of serious resistance. The earlier images of the war showed lots of administrative movement rather than tactical marches.
Near misses with HE will do more than knock off radio antennas. They can kill tanks outright. https://www.scribd.com/doc/151124802/Who-Says-Dumb-Artillery-Rounds-Can-t-Kill-Armor
Operations research during and after WW2 concluded that about 13% of all armoured vehicle kills were attributable to indirect fire, and that was all dumb HE. https://www.dupuyinstitute.org/pdf/v1n6.pdf
That said, DPICM or terminally guided munitions are generally going to give better results.
Yes, doctrinally it will usually be located right behind the depth Bn.
So this gets to an important doctrinal difference between western artillery and Russian artillery. In the Russian army, artillery is usually a proprietary asset that fires in support of one commander and one commander only. This is why they feel the need to physically reinforce organizations with additional artillery Bns, rather than just give them a priority of fire or change a tactical task. Artillery assigned to a Brigade or Regiment will focus on that commander's priorities, which are invariably going to be linked to the close fight; a typical mission for an attacking Bde/Regt would be to penetrate to the rear of a defending Bn (immediate objective) and continue to the rear of the defending Bde (subsequent objective). His artillery will support only those tasks.
Depth targets are going to be the responsibility of a higher artillery grouping (usually Div or Army).
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LCF? Im old!
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