Fire Support downsizing continues - blame precision

[Kirkhill]

http://www.strategypage.com/gallery/articles/military_photos_20054811.asp
http://www.govcomm.harris.com/solutions/marketindex/product.asp?source=alpha&product_id=333

Getting back to the 51 MG positions - and the desire to eliminate them as HPTs - I find it difficult to believe that our WWI observer, both Allied and German wouldn't have been impressed by the capability supplied by the SDB, and on the allied side happy to see them gone -  some German airborne sappers that had to deliver satchel charges on Fort Eben Emael in WW2 might also have preferred that intervention as well.

Not answer to everything - but sniping with bombs, plastering with bombs or dropping sappers with satchel charges?

 

[Kirkhill]

http://www.nationaldefensemagazine.org/issues/2005/dec1/Services_Focus.htm

This article from the December 2005 National Defence Magazine covers much of the same ground covered here.

A few interesting highlights:

Excalibur is compatible with 1RCHAs new M777 155mms.

....Picatinny Arsenal, N.J., is working to fulfill an urgent request to put the 155 mm guided Excalibur howitzer round, known as the XM982, into combat by early 2006.

The Excalibur, the service's first fully autonomous guided projectile, is more accurate than any other round currently available, according to Col. Ole Knudsen, project manager. During a demonstration firing at Yuma Proving Ground, Ariz., in September, an Excalibur hit a target 15 kilometers away. It detonated within seven meters of the target.

Viper Strike is deployable on AC-130 gunships, Predator UAVs and Little Bird helicopters

Viper Strike is a gliding munition that is capable of standoff, precision attack. It uses satellite-aided navigation and a semi-active laser seeker, explained Steven L. Borden, the Army's deputy product manager for submunitions. It is intended for operations that require a flexible angle of inclination-steep or shallow-particularly in mountainous terrain or built-up areas, where strict rules of engagement are in force.

Its small size and precision provide for low collateral damage in cluttered urban environments, Borden said. Viper Strike's exact precision is classified, he said. However, he did say that it could hit within one meter of its target.

Also, because it carries only 2.8 pounds of explosives, damage can be limited to a radius of 50 meters on the battlefield and 16 meters in an urban area, Borden said. "We can drop this between a mosque and a busload of nuns, and not hurt either the mosque or the nuns," he said.

"We can use it to fly through a window and take out a sniper, or hit a car in a convoy."

Because of its small size, Borden said, the Viper Strike is ideal for unmanned aerial vehicles. "You can put two of these on a Predator for every Hellfire."

HIMARS is the truck-mounted version of the MRLS system - it fire guided missiles beyond 70 km with a 200 lb payload and the TACMS-P out to 300 km with a 500 lb payload

In addition, HIMARS reduces ground troops' reliance upon close-air support to protect them from enemy fire. "The Air Force and half of the Marine Corps believe that air power is the only way to provide fires," said Marine Maj. William D. Rice, his service's precision-fires liaison at Redstone. "But air can't operate in bad weather. HIMARS can help pick up that slack. It doesn't worry about the weather."

And then there is this pertaining to LOS, BLOS and NLOS engagements:

BLOS uses a manned or unmanned sensor to acquire a target, and allows the shooter-either an MCS or an Abrams-to hit the target without exposing itself to enemy fire, Tarcza explained.

In contrast, line-of-sight engagement requires the shooter to acquire the target at greater risk of coming under fire. Non-line-of-sight combat employs an observer, usually from another unit, to acquire the target. With BLOS, the target is acquired by a member of the same unit as the shooter. This gives the commander greater control and increasing the speed of the operation, especially compared with non-line of sight engagement, Tarcza said. A BLOS operation requires an average of 12 seconds to fire-not as fast as the line of signt scenario at eight seconds, but much speedier than the non-line of sight at 2:15 minutes.

 

[Kirkhill]

I feel moved to comment on a comment by Infanteer on this thread (http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/28146.105/topicseen.html) about Naval Gunfire Support.

Obviously, Naval Surface Fire Support is important if we are to undertake "sea-based operations ashore".  Precision, as Kirkhill mentioned above, is one important factor.  Precision is a useful tool and can be a force multiplier in complex warfighting.  However, precision isn't a panacea - as argued in this thread, there are many cases where a well placed munition won't matter, for there are many ways to protect oneself from both the accuracy and the power of precision weapons (this comes out of Biddle's paradigm of Modern System of Force Employment).  The other half of the equation is physical mass - physical mass backed by volume.  Should a platform like the one being discussed above be able of providing both precision and mass?

He seems to be suggesting that because I noted that PGMs could be mounted aboard vessels and launched from the Vertical Launch System that I continue to labour under a belief that precision will displace mass.

If you are monitoring this Infanteer, and I know you are  , my point is not that PGMs necessarily displace mass but that PGMs make applied mass more effective and thus fewer launched rounds are "wasted" by falling remotely from the point of aim.  This reduces the number of rounds necessary in theatre and the wear and tear on the launchers, or conversely the number of targets engaged.

If you want to employ area suppression tactics then perhaps an airbursting PGM would be as effective, if not moreso, as a point detonating shell falling 200 m away from the intended target. 

The Course Correcting Fuze, a cheap (at about 2000 dollars a fuze to be fitted to a 1000 dollar shell versus a 100,000 dollar Excalibur) seems to recognize this by aiming to reduce the CEP for shells employed in supplying "mass" fires TO 50 m.  This is compared to CEPs of 1-13 m for various PGMs and a CEP of 200 m ("LW 155 shall have a bias circular error probable (CEP) not exceeding 200 meters (threshold) to 50 meters (objective) at 25 kilometers." - http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/systems/ground/lw155.htm).

It seems to me that once the Point of Aim can be reliably hit then it wouldnt take much effort to create a fire plan that could cover a large area for an extended duration.  The converse would be that if you can't reliably hit the Point of Aim then it will take a lot of time and area to create the conditions necessary to finally hit a point target. 

Precision munitions seem to be inherently more flexible, if more expensive on a per unit basis (not necessarily a per mission basis once logistics and maintenance are included) than "dumb" munitions.

By the way, while looking for the numbers on this I came across these two presentations:

http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2004precision_strike/PEOPrecisionconf_final.pdf
http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2004fuze/finch.pdf

Some interesting stuff both on fuzes, munitions and "launchers" including Variable Volume Chamber guns.

 

[Infanteer]

He seems to be suggesting that because I noted that PGMs could be mounted aboard vessels and launched from the Vertical Launch System that I continue to labour under a belief that precision will displace mass.

No, I wasn't suggesting that.  I was just stating that a smaller bomb that has a precision warhead does not mean it is more effective because it is still a smaller warhead.  The comment focused on the fact that precision fire from the 16-inch guns Iowa which delivered mass and in great quantities was important - the Commandant of the USMC stated that a 5-inch gun, no matter how precise, would not meet the Naval Fire Support needs of the Marines.

My comment pointed out that precision was one side of the equation, but that if we are going to rely on seaborne forces, perhaps we need a gun with "omph" to get more mass where we need it.

 

[3rd Horseman]

I must agree with Inf it is only a portion of the equation. As per my comments earlier it is important to slect the right weapon and launcher to get the job done, the more in the inventory the better for the fire support O to get the job done by selecting the best weapon and launcher for the job. As a note the 16 inch Naval gun as fired from the US battleships is one of the most accurate guns and it comes with much omph. The gun supported Marines in Lebanon with sniping gun tasks where precision was needed. A single shell would be fired at a single 50cal MG bunker. This was done due to its accuracy and the need to reduce collateral damage. NGOs claim it was extremely effective.

 

[Kirkhill]

I agree. A bigger package of HE applied precisely will be more effective against a wider array of targets than a small package of HE.  My point is that in the past one of the forces driving any artillery (conventional, airborne or missile) towards larger packages of HE was not just the strength of the target but also the inaccuracy of the weapons.  Large packages allowed inaccurately delivered weapons to still be effective.

All I am saying is that regardless of the size of the package of HE it pays to hit the target.  Harder targets will always require large charges but by making small charges more effective then the enemy will be forced to expend more time and money preparing harder defences.  This increases the speed with which he runs out of both and also decreases his mobility as he has more invested in infrastructure that he is likely to be reluctant to abandon.

This is not an argument to eliminate big shells, bombs and missiles - this is simply stating that precision makes smaller systems more effective and thus makes it harder for the enemy to generate effective defences.  It means that any given system is likely to be able to deal with a larger target set.  For me this suggests that this increased flexibility might be exploited in different ways by, for example, adding the GMRLS system to our arsenal thereby perhaps allowing us to undertake missions that previously might have ONLY been possible with fixed wing support.

I am not an either/or type of person.  Gray's my colour ;D.

 

[3rd Horseman]

Agreed,

    And now for something very contraversal but applicable to the current discussion. With all the arguments and discussions for and against and agreements on a combination of the two, precision/HE  throw weight we have forgotten about the other group of weapons in our inventory....non conventional. Nuc, air fuel mix, chemical and bio. As a past fire support O these were always in the quiver for usage except chem and bio. It is important to include chem and bio as the enemy may use them on us and due to that they will defend against it. When precision is not needed and a difficult enemy needs to be cleaned up then non conventional is the way to go. Personally I like air fuel mix weapons they would have easily sorted out the 51 cave issue.

In the words of my Inf instructor (Australian Capt on exchange)...Don't be fooled by the obvious...just because the en is small (insert unmentionable slur) always use the big stuff you will want to get every one.

 

[Kirkhill]

I know that the press finds the Air Fuel weapons controversial but I didn't think the "professionals" saw them that way.  Is there that much difference in effect (ie killing mechanism) beyond scale between and FAE round and an HE air-burst?

The controversial system that I find fascinating is the cluster munition.  As I understand them the big problem is UXOs caused by "fratricide" or grenades detonating so close to each other in time and space that the detonators of a percentage of them are damaged preventing them from exploding properly.  I wonder if in this new world of GMRLS/UAVs/RPVs/Glide bombs they couldn't attach popout wings to a GMRLS with a cargo of grenades, have it fly "lazy 8s" over the target then dispense them on a time release basis.  The ability to deploy all those grenades (200-400?) in one missile over an area, for an extended period of time would surely go a long way to supplying suppression.

As for the NBC stuff....I don't know that we are ready for that even if the other guys do use them first.  It might be different if they were a state enemy but I think that the risk of collateral damage to "innocent" civilians would be just too great -  too unpalatable for the home audience.

 

[Cloud Cover]

As a note the 16 inch Naval gun as fired from the US battleships is one of the most accurate guns and it comes with much omph. The gun supported Marines in Lebanon with sniping gun tasks where precision was needed. A single shell would be fired at a single 50cal MG bunker. This was done due to its accuracy and the need to reduce collateral damage. NGOs claim it was extremely effective.

Some of those were experimental radar and radio wave guided projectiles.