C3 Howitzer Replacement

[Colin Parkinson]

Thank You for posting that - fantastic read.  I actually read most of it word for word, rather than skimming over it.  Very insightful!

It also helped change my thinking.


I think some of us (myself included) tend to think "Why spend our limited money on replacing the C3 with another light gun that won't ever see operational service, and is really just there as a basic trainer for the reserves so they can get on an M777 course?"

But after reading that article, especially about the supply chains & support vehicles all being able to be lighter, less maintenance intensive, more ammo being able to be moved, and that a larger number of rounds will probably be more effective than the size of the rounds - it helped me change my perspective on the light artillery gap.

Maybe there actually is quite a useful role for light artillery after all, and have some available for operations in addition to the M777 would actually help fulfill more capabilities that I hadn't thought of.



Seems they are in a very similar boat to us, and are looking at similar systems from similar sources as us.  Some promising systems out there too, even in the vehicle-based mortar perspective, that seem to need the extra push to get off the ground.  (Aka, interested buyers.)

The Brits deployed their 105's to Afghanistan, smaller footprint if your further away from resupply or in a smaller FOB.

 

[FJAG]

...
But after reading that article, especially about the supply chains & support vehicles all being able to be lighter, less maintenance intensive, more ammo being able to be moved, and that a larger number of rounds will probably be more effective than the size of the rounds - it helped me change my perspective on the light artillery gap.

Maybe there actually is quite a useful role for light artillery after all, and have some available for operations in addition to the M777 would actually help fulfill more capabilities that I hadn't thought of. ...

I definitely think that there is. But in part that requires that we structure our brigades better. While we could structure our artillery regiments with two M777 batteries for the two LAVs and a light battery for the light infantry battalion, it would make more sense to reorganize the brigades into a light and two medium LAV brigades and assign guns accordingly. (I'm also still a holdout for a heavy brigade with tanks, IFVs and SPs)

In the days that we had L5s, (2,840 lbs) we could lift them with our Hueys and tow them with 3/4 ton trucks (although we also used 2 1/2 ton and M548 portees) while the C1s (4,980 lbs) needed Voyageurs and deuce and a halfs. Now you need a Chinook to lift an "ultralight howitzer" M777 (9,300 lbs). The US M102 and the GIAT LG1 are only slightly heavier than the L5 at 3,300 lbs while the Brit L119 comes in at 4,100 lbs. The UH-1N could lift 5,000 lbs externally. I'm not sure if the Griffon has that capability but my guess is that it probably doesn't but might still be able to lift a stripped down L5.

If one could move to a UH-60 Blackhawk with 9,000 lb external lift one would have much more flexibility in what kind of gun to employ.

Those weight factors and how easily you move the gun (and it's ammo) plays almost (but not quite) as big a role as the gun's range because it affects how easily you can move the thing and employ it in difficult terrain where your supported grunts might have to operate. I was with the Italians in the Alps and saw just how useful a little piece of kit like the L5 could be for a light footborne force. Even the C1 would have had difficulties there.

That difficult terrain issue also plays into truck mounted self propelled guns. Sometimes you just can't get a vehicle borne/towed gun into where it's needed and that's where you are left with a light gun/mortar choice. I think the Airborne Battery in its day had the right concept being able to field either 6 x L5 packs or 12 x 81mm mortars or a combination of the two depending on the operation.

My problem in this entire debate is that we should never, ever have "training" guns. What we need are the guns that we intend our soldiers to go to war with. By all means get them to use subcalibre training devices to save training ammunition costs but if you don't have the "war gun" when its needed then you won't be able to go to war. Right now we don't have enough M777s and we don't intend to fight with anything else. Just as important, one (and that's everyone from the gunner to the regimental commander) doesn't develop the ongoing muscle memory of training on the gun you will fight with - learning it's capabilities, limitations and idiosyncrasies. You'll forever be having to do predeployment conversion training which is not the same as having trained for years on the kit you are going to fight with.

I think the many years of making do with the substandard equipment that we have and the substandard organizational structures that we have had to serve in has gotten us to exactly the state we are in now.

:stirpot:

 

[Colin Parkinson]

I don't see the 105's as "training guns" even as I mention for the Reg force they mainly are. For the Reserves, a 105 makes sense, everything is cheaper and logistically easier and that means more hands on training and more rounds downrange. Just make the FCS the same as the M777 and invest in modern equipment for the OP's and CP's. The next conflict may very well be "come as you are" so we are going to need tubes and lots of them, along with rounds to shoot. Seems the supply of 155 got pretty short there for awhile.

 

[daftandbarmy]

I definitely think that there is. But in part that requires that we structure our brigades better. While we could structure our artillery regiments with two M777 batteries for the two LAVs and a light battery for the light infantry battalion, it would make more sense to reorganize the brigades into a light and two medium LAV brigades and assign guns accordingly. (I'm also still a holdout for a heavy brigade with tanks, IFVs and SPs)

In the days that we had L5s, (2,840 lbs) we could lift them with our Hueys and tow them with 3/4 ton trucks (although we also used 2 1/2 ton and M548 portees) while the C1s (4,980 lbs) needed Voyageurs and deuce and a halfs. Now you need a Chinook to lift an "ultralight howitzer" M777 (9,300 lbs). The US M102 and the GIAT LG1 are only slightly heavier than the L5 at 3,300 lbs while the Brit L119 comes in at 4,100 lbs. The UH-1N could lift 5,000 lbs externally. I'm not sure if the Griffon has that capability but my guess is that it probably doesn't but might still be able to lift a stripped down L5.

If one could move to a UH-60 Blackhawk with 9,000 lb external lift one would have much more flexibility in what kind of gun to employ.

Those weight factors and how easily you move the gun (and it's ammo) plays almost (but not quite) as big a role as the gun's range because it affects how easily you can move the thing and employ it in difficult terrain where your supported grunts might have to operate. I was with the Italians in the Alps and saw just how useful a little piece of kit like the L5 could be for a light footborne force. Even the C1 would have had difficulties there.

That difficult terrain issue also plays into truck mounted self propelled guns. Sometimes you just can't get a vehicle borne/towed gun into where it's needed and that's where you are left with a light gun/mortar choice. I think the Airborne Battery in its day had the right concept being able to field either 6 x L5 packs or 12 x 81mm mortars or a combination of the two depending on the operation.

My problem in this entire debate is that we should never, ever have "training" guns. What we need are the guns that we intend our soldiers to go to war with. By all means get them to use subcalibre training devices to save training ammunition costs but if you don't have the "war gun" when its needed then you won't be able to go to war. Right now we don't have enough M777s and we don't intend to fight with anything else. Just as important, one (and that's everyone from the gunner to the regimental commander) doesn't develop the ongoing muscle memory of training on the gun you will fight with - learning it's capabilities, limitations and idiosyncrasies. You'll forever be having to do predeployment conversion training which is not the same as having trained for years on the kit you are going to fight with.

I think the many years of making do with the substandard equipment that we have and the substandard organizational structures that we have had to serve in has gotten us to exactly the state we are in now.

:stirpot:

A 105mmm with good range and PGM capability might be just the ticket....

 

[MilEME09]

A 105mmm with good range and PGM capability might be just the ticket....

The key will be numbers, we need hundreds of guns to outfit the reg force, training establishments and reserve, who ever thought we could get by with the few M777's we have I would love to hit on the head

 

[FJAG]

I don't see the 105's as "training guns" even as I mention for the Reg force they mainly are. For the Reserves, a 105 makes sense, everything is cheaper and logistically easier and that means more hands on training and more rounds downrange. Just make the FCS the same as the M777 and invest in modern equipment for the OP's and CP's. The next conflict may very well be "come as you are" so we are going to need tubes and lots of them, along with rounds to shoot. Seems the supply of 155 got pretty short there for awhile.

It's a training gun until there is an operations plan to deploy it into a potential combat zone. No such plan exists and until such time as reserve units (or even sub units) are organized, manned and equipped with everything needed to deploy (including a functioning A echelon) there won't be any such plan.

Yes, the gun is serviceable and is being used by numerous countries as an operational one, but for us, it's merely a training aid.

We currently have only one theatre of operations where the possibility of combat exists: Latvia. No one would be prepared to deploy C3s to Latvia and I, for one, have serious reservations about even using M777s there because they wouldn't last long.

In my recent article and book I keep using the phrase "more lethal, more credible force". Canada currently has in excess of 20,000 reservists who are unequipped and under-trained. The Regular Force has some 13-15,000 soldiers in three brigades. We could easily double the size of the army's capabilities but without the proper warfighting equipment, organization and training we cannot create more brigades.

The US Army National Guard has M777s, Paladins, HIMARS and Avengers in fully equipped battalions. That's what I mean by adding "lethality and credibility" to the force.

:cheers:

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Problem is as pointed out in other threads that the basic infrastructure is not there to support that equipment in the Reserves. New 105's are doable within the structure that exists and foreseeable budgets. You then have something that can deploy. I have given up on "big fixes", mainly as everytime i see a "big fix" it turns into a cluster (Looking at you Phoenix, Workforce adjustment,etc). I think leasing a couple of batteries of Paladins is doable and avoids the procurement cluster, put one in Europe and the other in Shilo/Wainwright. 

 

[FJAG]

In the words of J.L Granatstein and LGen (ret’d) Charles Belzile when discussing mobilization (or “activation”) of the reserves in their ten year review of the Special Commission of the Restructuring of the Reserves 1995:

... Another way of putting this is that no planning is being done for a major war.
This is shortsighted in the extreme. A military that thinks in terms of turning itself into a great host in a crisis is very different from one that is small, thinks small, and plans for very little.
The Canadian Forces needs a plan.

https://d3n8a8pro7vhmx.cloudfront.net/cdfai/pages/41/attachments/original/1413661138/Restructuring_The_Reserves_-_English.pdf?1413661138 at page 12.

Our problem for many decades now is that the CAF "thinks small and plans for very little" and focuses mainly on preserving Reg F PYs at the expense of everything else. Canada pays DND tens of billions annually well over half of which goes into Reg F and civilian salaries.

Infrastructure isn't the problem. We have armouries everywhere where we need them. We have bases and ranges in sufficient quantities and sizes across the country. All we need are some places to store and maintain equipment and there are more than enough unused factories/warehouses around to do that.

All we really need is to cut the financial bleed caused by our overstaffed headquarters and convert that to equipment and O&M funds.

All we really need is a plan. One that can start in small, scaled projects that builds up to a desired end state.

See here for an outline: http://www.journal.forces.gc.ca/page19-eng.asp

And see here for the details: https://www.amazon.ca/Unsustainable-At-Any-Price-Canadian-ebook/dp/B086HXC66Q

End of rant!

:cdnsalute:

 

[Colin Parkinson]

I was using infrastructure as in parts, mechanics, storage and PY's to pay them with. Many of the Armouries are to small or the door won't allow the current truck fleet in. We also need a proper tactical truck that's not a frigging monster that is really meant for roads and will actually fit inside the buildings we have now. Currently the Reserve is the majority "Point of contact" with the Canadian Public, most of the plans I have heard here look to divorce the CF even further from the Public, which will lead to more budget and recruiting crisis down the road.

As part of our pandemic recovery I would run SYEP type courses, increase the numbers of Class B at the unit level for 2 years and offer more courses at the unit level. While i fully understand and see the value of having the same level of courses as the reg force, I not sure how sustainable that is in the long run.

Back to the topic, the one thing I love about the C1/2/3 was it is a very simple system and easy to teach the basic concepts on, the M119 would replicate that, meaning that a lot of the basics can be taught at the unit level, if there was more funding for that.   

 

[FJAG]

I've never been a fan of the M119/L118. Maybe it's because I once owned a Triumph Spitfire and an Austin Mini I consider most British machinery poorly designed and unnecessarily complex. The L118 has had problems with its recoil mechanism and requires a high amount of technical (rather than user) maintenance. The US has done much to simplify the original issues but.... It's not much lighter than the C3 (which could be lightened by the removal of it's shield assembly).

I've never been a fan of single trail/platform guns. Harder to bring in and out of action and less able to cover an arc without displacing the trail. Overall, the C3 is simplicity mixed with durability although all these guns are challenged by the physical strain of the new improved ranges demanded of them.

As for mobility, I've never worked with the Navstar "monsters". I too see it as overkill. The old 2 1/2 tons were exactly tuned to the weight of the C1/C3 and worked well although crew comfort was replaced for utility. The old truck certainly facilitated coming into and out of action. If stripped down it could also (just barely) come within the towing capacity of a HMMWV or JLTV (although it would need two vehicles, a tower and an ammo limber)

Don't get me wrong. I'm not anti C3. I'm anti the "training gun" concept. As I mentioned above, I believe that we should form one Reg F light brigade group and equip them with 105mms so long as we determine what the tactical deployment for the brigade should be and put all the appropriate ancillary equipment in place (including helicopter lift) IMHO, a slightly modified C3 would works as well as any other 105 mm, and better than some of them. I'll go a step further. For such a brigade, at least two of its batteries and some of it's headquarters should be reservists because we don't operationally deploy artillery that often and we could save a couple of hundred Reg F PYs.

The same goes for the reserve force brigade groups. I would have no problems with using the C3 as an operational gun if we created properly equipped and trained reserve infantry brigades (like the USARNG and yes, by all means we must stay in the local communities) BUT having said that I simply do not see an operational role for such brigades so why form them in the first place?  Considering our commitment to NATO and the Baltics, I do see a need for properly trained and equipped heavy forces. We do need more heavy combat power and with that a mechanism for deploying and sustaining them in the Baltics. What Canada has created is a hybrid/light and middle weight force without the proper combat enablers and sustainment capabilities and without any plan to reinvent itself for the future. We seem to be randomly seeking out missions that we can perform (and Latvia, IMHO, isn't one we can perform as configured) in order to justify exorbitant paychecks for an exorbitant Reg F.

I've ranted again. Go read the book.

:cheers:

 

[FJAG]

I'll add one more thing.

When I qualified as a gun number on what was then the M2A2 in the mid 60's, I could have gone up to 4 RCHA in Petawawa and filled in on a gun there without a minute's extra training. They had the same gun, the same gun tractor, the same command post vehicles, the same jeeps for FOO parties, the same Arty boards and even the same crappy 42 and 509 sets we used (just more of everything). Our guns and equipment then, weren't training aids. We could have aggregated a few Militia batteries and had everything we needed (save some of the A echelon folks which would have had to come from the fledgling service battalions). In short, we could have been mobilized to form a bigger Army than the Reg F alone could form.

Somewhere along the line our leaders stopped planning for those eventualities.

:cheers:

 

[daftandbarmy]

I'll add one more thing.

When I qualified as a gun number on what was then the M2A2 in the mid 60's, I could have gone up to 4 RCHA in Petawawa and filled in on a gun there without a minute's extra training. They had the same gun, the same gun tractor, the same command post vehicles, the same jeeps for FOO parties, the same Arty boards and even the same crappy 42 and 509 sets we used (just more of everything). Our guns and equipment then, weren't training aids. We could have aggregated a few Militia batteries and had everything we needed (save some of the A echelon folks which would have had to come from the fledgling service battalions). In short, we could have been mobilized to form a bigger Army than the Reg F alone could form.

Somewhere along the line our leaders stopped planning for those eventualities.

:cheers:

But what about the months and months of 'selection and workup training' we have to do now?

With your approach you'd put hundreds of full timers, in various HQs, out of work

 

[FJAG]

But what about the months and months of 'selection and workup training' we have to do now?

With your approach you'd put hundreds of full timers, in various HQs, out of work

You know this probably isn't unique, but during my years in the Reg F and even during law school when I was in an infantry battalion, I understood everyone's roles and place in the system and I found (with one exception when FMC HQ held up a fatalities board of inquiry I chaired for a year without explanation while the dead soldiers' parents suffered needlessly) that most folks in the headquarters were there to help the folks in the units.

As I climbed up the chain I started to lose all understanding of what most of the people in the headquarters (especially NDHQ/CFHQ, including me on occasion) were actually contributing to the overall effort. We seemed to spend hours getting wrapped around the axle in minutiae and being spoon-fed policy decisions crafted (often poorly) by middling staff officers for us to ratify (And ratify them we did because it was often the path of least resistance). We seem to be building and running processes and policies that are there simply for the purpose of giving a selected staff cell a job to do rather than actually advance the defence effort.

Back in October 1970 within 24 hours of being given a warning order I was standing in the streets of Montreal with live ammo. Betcha we can't do that today. Back in 1981, without any specialized build up training, my battery flew over from Shilo to Germany and within 24 hours we rolled out with the rest of 1 RCHA on a major Reforger exercise. Betcha we can't do something like that today either. Somewhere along the line we seemed to have created a situation where we either aren't capable of doing our job without great work up  training and verification (or we simply believe that we're not capable) The process seems to have hijacked the process.

Personally, I think we could fire 15 - 20,000 Reg F and civilian staff from our headquarters above brigade and equivalent level and still get the job done and use the annual PY savings to fund equipment and O&M so that the remainder of the force (including its reserves) are properly equipped and trained for the missions we are prepared to undertake as a country.

It's my day for ranting it seems. I've again gone  ff topic:

:stirpot:

 

[Colin Parkinson]

In the 80's my unit that was ops tasked was airlifted to Shilo to perform artillery support for the German black bear battle run.

https://www.vancouvergunners.ca/limber-gunner-1983.html

We were more or less equipped like the reg force, after 1984 I think we started getting encrypted radios (Nestor) as I recall. As Ops tasked I think we had 2-3 more Class b's, one in the QM, one REME and one in the Orderly room.

Back then each unit had it's own medic, cooks and some sort of fixed (in the armoury) and mobile kitchen, As a young gunner, arriving early I got to peel many a potato for the cooks, which led to some "extra goodies later". One of our cooks was decorated Korean war vet and was a good "guide" for us young ones. What i see now is a Reserve that has been gutted of capabilities, but the paperwork has multiplied exponentially.   

 

[FJAG]

Those are outstanding pictures and certainly do bring back a lot of memories. Shellburst Valley, if I remember correctly, was the name of the RCAA competition that used to take place back in the day to determine the best Militia artillery units in Canada. I remember my first one which too was in Shilo albeit November of 1965. We were flown to Brandon on two Herc chalks as we didn't take any of our own equipment but signed over equipment from the Royal Canadian School of Artillery which was there at the time. In all other respects everything looked pretty much the same including the snow but excluding the fact that we wore battle dress and were issued sheepskins and our trucks were 3/4 tons v 5/4s. Bloody freezing there.

You folks have a darn fine website.

:cheers:

 

[daftandbarmy]

In the 80's my unit that was ops tasked was airlifted to Shilo to perform artillery support for the German black bear battle run.

https://www.vancouvergunners.ca/limber-gunner-1983.html

We were more or less equipped like the reg force, after 1984 I think we started getting encrypted radios (Nestor) as I recall. As Ops tasked I think we had 2-3 more Class b's, one in the QM, one REME and one in the Orderly room.

Back then each unit had it's own medic, cooks and some sort of fixed (in the armoury) and mobile kitchen, As a young gunner, arriving early I got to peel many a potato for the cooks, which led to some "extra goodies later". One of our cooks was decorated Korean war vet and was a good "guide" for us young ones. What i see now is a Reserve that has been gutted of capabilities, but the paperwork has multiplied exponentially. 

There's a picture in there of one young gunner who went on the be a US Ranger CSM.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Dave made it to CSM? I never heard that? Good on him then.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Dave made it to CSM? I never heard that? Good on him then.

Yep. He even invaded a few places

 

[Colin Parkinson]

That I knew, but did not realize the rank he made, good on him, does not surprise me, he was a good solider.

 

[MilEME09]

Anyone know what came of the MOBAT trials that happened in gagetown? Tests were 2003ish, truck mounted 105, might of been a good system.

From the gentleman I got the pic from who was at the test "RDM was trying to sell it. You could lay that on so fast, and quick in & out of action. Smaller gun det too. Laying the gun was done with a joystick, just put a dot in the middle of a set of concentric rings and it was ready to fire in seconds. Accurate too."