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Subject: New Guns
Aussiegunneragain    11/7/2009 5:59:12 AM
Senator the Hon John Faulkner Minister for Defence Printer friendly version 20 Oct 2009 MIN3709/09 DEFENCE FIREPOWER TO RECEIVE MAJOR BOOST The Minister for Defence, Senator John Faulkner, today announced that the Government has given Second Pass Approval for a $493 million project to provide the next generation artillery system for the Australian Army. Senator Faulkner said the first phase of Land 17 (the Artillery Replacement Project) will provide the Army with four batteries of 35 M777A2 155mm Lightweight Towed Howitzers. “The Lightweight Towed Howitzer is the most advanced towed artillery system available in the world. It is air-portable under CH-47 Chinook helicopters and can provide a weight of fire not previously available to rapidly deployed forces,” Senator Faulkner said. “The second phase of the artillery enhancement will include the procurement of a self propelled artillery system, which will be capable of providing fire support to highly mobile mechanised forces. The artillery system will be further enhanced through the future acquisition of a digital terminal control system for the tactical control of artillery, naval and close air support fires by forward observers and joint terminal attack controllers. This element of the project will be considered by Government in the second half of 2010,” said Senator Faulkner. Senator Faulkner said these are high priority acquisitions which will provide improved protection and precision firepower to Australian soldiers, allowing missions to be carried out more efficiently, safely and effectively.
 
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Aussiegunneragain       11/14/2009 7:29:10 PM

The difference these days is that each regiment now has far more JOSCCs/JOSTs etc and is able to provide enough JOSCCs for one to each battlegroup. So 8/12 may only have 2 batteries, but it has enough JOSCCs to provide for each battlegroup in 1 Bde. Therefore each combat team can have a JOST, and each platoon can be given an FO if need be. The main effort for the artilley at the moment is not the guns, it is the development of the FO/JOST/JOSCC/JFC (whichever acronym they are using these days) capability.



From this website it looks the same as what we used to do with different acronyms, with the Battery HQ being called a Battalion JOSCC and the FO team being called an JOST. The FO's that you have seen at platoon level are probably more likely FO's assistants, bombadiers who are second in command of the FO team and are sometimes attached to a platoon independently with their own sig. I note that each battery also has two rather than three sections in this scheme, just like they used to.
 
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neutralizer       11/27/2009 11:16:34 PM

The important part of artillery is the ammo, even if it?s a lot less sexier than guns so makes ministerial announcements less exciting (although I?ve never seen Faulkner as a guy who does excitement). Excalibur Block 1 in current use is only 85% reliable, Block 2 should be 99% (they?ve found critical component supplier in UK that can do the biz), which is what GMLRS offers. Then there?s the dumb natures. According to BAe 155mm HE M107 lethality is matched by their new 105mm Fd round (although it undoubtedly depends on the target type). That said high lethality HE appeared in the early 1970s, HE L15 has 11+Kg of HE compare to M107?s approx 7kg, however M795 appeared a few years ago with 10+ kg of HE. The French have a design as well. Then there?s smoke, Red Phos seems the way to go.  This also raises the issue of insensitive munition policy, Kuwait in 1991 was the big wakeup call for several armies. Not forgetting propelling charges, and my understanding is that M777 is designed around modular charges, but performance seems to vary a bit between different suppliers and their designs. Then there?s fuzes, the latest Junghans MRF offers Delay, SQ, Time, Prox (2 HoB options) and 5 foliage penetration options, and of course induction fuze setting. AFAIK the only Aust ammo announcement of modern ammo has been for the least relevant ? anti-tank SFM!

If a new towed 155 really is needed then there isn?t much option except M777. Whether or not it is a particularly good gun only time will tell. It?s not clear to me whether Aust is getting the standard US version or has taken the sensible option of adding the power rammer, which adds to the weight but should reduce the detachment size (and sweat). The induction fuze setting arrangements are also unclear to me. The obvious problem is the whole carriage structure and the time it takes to move the gun if a target is outside top traverse limits. Of course compared to other towed 155 it might be Ok in this respect.

Organisation of the gun group is a simple subject. In 1965 105 Bty operated 6 single gun positions, each with its own CP element, from within its normal establishment (they may have been issued a couple of extra plotters, etc (instruments not men).  Deployment pattern depends on the situation, if ground attack is a serious threat then a single tight battery position is usually the way to go, computed sheafs made gun layout irrelevant years ago. If the CB threat is high then dispersal across several sq kms is best, possibly combined with frequent movement within the area (not a notably practical option with towed guns mainly due to ammo handling), but this can still be centrally controlled through a single bty CP. You only need to split a battery up if the area to be covered by fire is large, and it can?t be covered from a single bty gun area, as was for 105 Bty in 1965. You can split a battery in any combination of fire units that you want on the same gun position, but more than about 3 perhaps 4 simultaneous separate fire missions from one CP gets difficult for one person to control. I?d like to assume that like similar systems an AFATDS processing cell (eg a bty CP) can support 30+ guns in any number of fire units.

This raises an issue, the extent to which AFATDS can support Aust fireplanning practices. Making the assumption that the AFATDS data message set is basically the same as TACFIRE then there may be a problem. A subset of the TF set became STANAG 5620, the Brits adopted this for BATES but had to add a lot (about 100% more) of msg types to do the sort of gunnery they wanted, one of the major deficiencies was fireplanning, the STANAG would have had these if they were in the TF set.  AFATDS does all the processing that uses and creates msgs so you really are locked in to the American way, this doesn?t usually include allowing a FO to order fire to more than one bty, better hope that AFATDS isn?t too US doctrine fixed if you still want to do Aust gunnery.

I?d agree the big arty problem today is providing enough observation parties. There seems to be a bit of a roles and msns issue in the ADF, as I understand it RAA was intending a trained RAA badged FAC in every obsn party, but now the RAAF has created 24 Sqn to provide FACs. Incidentally the US may still have a DS bty for every manoeuvre bn, but UK hasn?t had this for decades. Currently, regular army, they have 21 gun btys for about 50 manoeuvre bns. Even their bdes, generally with about 5 BGs, only have 3 gun btys.

 
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Volkodav       11/29/2009 5:34:52 AM
I suppose my real concern is what do we have to support dispersed SF and CAV elements that are operating outside the range of the dropshorts?  I know the assumption would be that they would call on allied CAS but what if its not available?
 
A 60mm mortar would be a solution that could be issued at one per vehicle for mounted ops while a recoiling 81 or 120mm could be issued at platoon or troop level.
 
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neutralizer       11/30/2009 6:05:08 AM
I assume the AMF got rid of Lt Mor as a rifle pl wpn in the 1950s.
 
It's always an easy notion to load more on gear onto any particualr group.  Whether or not its sensible to encumber reconnaissance forces is another matter.  My understanding of SF is that they can generally pick the weapons they think they'll need for a particular task.
 
Currently in Afg it takes about 12 minutes for requesting CAS to having a/c overhead.  You can have arty fire on the ground in about 3 mins (no doubt depending more than somewhat on which army is doing the firing), mdm or hy mors won'r be any faster because its the air clearances that slow the process.
 
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ArtyEngineer    neutraliser   12/1/2009 10:12:52 AM
 
"Excalibur Block 1 in current use is only 85% reliable, Block 2 should be 99% (they?ve found critical component supplier in UK that can do the biz), which is what GMLRS offers."

Thats not the reliability figure I have for teh rounds fired in theater.  True ther have been M982's that have gone to the BIP or not functioned due to not getting withing the required tolerance to the aim point.  However subsequent investigations have revealed the issues were not related to the projectile itself.  None of the issues that resulted in the replacement of the Honeywel IMU's have manifested themselves downrange.

"Not forgetting propelling charges, and my understanding is that M777 is designed around modular charges."
 
No it wasnt, where did you get that idea from?
If a new towed 155 really is needed then there isn?t much option except M777. Whether or not it is a particularly good gun only time will tell. 

Well im not sure what criteria we use to determin whether its a "good gun" or not but US forces have fired close to 80,000 rounds from the triple 7 in the afghanistan theater without a SINGLE system abort!!!!!!  I dont have numbers for teh canadian weapons but they all have had new tubes so that alone tells a story.  Now are there things we can improve upon, or if we had to start from scratch again we would do differently? Absolutely.   But a major part of my job is collecting user feed back and helping identify critical improvements and coordinating retrofit activities as improvements are implemented.
Here are two quotes which should illustrate how the Triple 7 is thought off down range:
"I heard nothing but great praise for our M777 howitzer (frequently described as ?awesome? ? at over 29K it can consistently hit the target without adjustment, and can be called in as close as 100M (or less if necessary) to our own troops." -
Ernest B. Beno, OMM, CD
Brigadier-General, Retired
Colonel Commandant
The Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery
and here is an email some of us recieved from a Battalion comander currently deployed
"We are just in a lead slingling contest with Class V.  The M777A2's are doing great.  The farthest our initial round has been in adjustment is (Censored) meters.  We are either a TGT hit with first round or one adjustment and straight into FFE.  Like I said before I was not a big believer in the M777: however I am sold now.  Speed and accuracy cannot be matched by any other system in the inventory.  The other thing I need to mention is the gratitude that comes from teh manoeuver forces when we shoot for them.  I have never seen anything like it.  The come back from patrol and stop by the firing PLT's and tell them how the guns saved their lives while on patrol.  Its really cool."

It?s not clear to me whether Aust is getting the standard US version or has taken the sensible option of adding the power rammer, which adds to the weight but should reduce the detachment size (and sweat).

The triple 7 does not have an option for a flick rammer.  It was something we looked at but did not pursue as the extra weigh and complexity out weighed any supposed advantage with regards to crew fatigue. 

Here is a vid of teh USMC in action and you can see that manually ramming isnt that fatiguing

http://www.youtube.com/v/IvnSKclWcEg&hl=en_US&fs=1&;" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true">

And here we have the Canadian Forces in action.  The have developed their "own way of doing things"

 
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Aussiegunneragain       12/2/2009 6:22:38 AM

 
Evary other mission in afghanistan is an "Out of Traverse" or "Action Azimuth" mission and once the crew gets the drills staright 3200 mil shifts in < 1 min are the norm.  I have witnessed a 43 second which was very impressive ;)  Here is a vid of an dry fire action azimuth.  These guys are actually pretty slopppy and do a bunch of stuff wrong but this was taken not long after teh initial fielding so thay are still really learning the weapon and the best way to accomplish things.


One minute to move the gun 3200 mils is fine. All the CP needs to do is to plot a rough bearing once the grid reference comes in from the FO, which would take about 10 seconds, and give it to the guns so that they can be moved roughtly into travis while they are plugging the detailed data into the computer or putting it onto the plotter (if they even bother to do it manually any more). A couple of the gun crew can do the tasks like preparing charge bags and setting fuzes as the data is coming in from the CP, and the data will all be available for the gun to be layed and loaded as soon as it is pointing roughly in the right direction. Its all about practiced concurrent activity.
 
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ArtyEngineer    AGA   12/3/2009 7:15:21 PM

One minute to move the gun 3200 mils is fine. All the CP needs to do is to plot a rough bearing once the grid reference comes in from the FO, which would take about 10 seconds, and give it to the guns so that they can be moved roughtly into travis while they are plugging the detailed data into the computer or putting it onto the plotter (if they even bother to do it manually any more). A couple of the gun crew can do the tasks like preparing charge bags and setting fuzes as the data is coming in from the CP, and the data will all be available for the gun to be layed and loaded as soon as it is pointing roughly in the right direction. Its all about practiced concurrent activity. 
You are spot on, its all about maximizing your efficiency.  At teh US Fire Bases where the need to provide 6400mil fires exists one of the techniques is to simply divide the gunpit into Octants, with pre dug spade pits for each octanct.  The gun crews are also very tactically aware of what is goin on outside the wire i.e. which octants there are foreces operating in.  There is also a radio in each gun pit on the same freq as the net monitored by the CP/FDC on which calls for fire will originate.  As soon as a call for fire is recieved without any command from teh CP the guys on the gun are already shifting the weapon into teh appropriate octant based upon who and where.  This means that when or if the FIremission is processed and transmitted to the weapon its a simply matter of conducting a regular fire mission.  At teh end of each fire mission some guys also will prep the weapon in anticipation of the next mission requiring a shift, ie bringing the tube down the the QE shown in the vid and pumping up the suspension.  That is offcourse unles a priority target exists where in that case they go back any lay on that target at teh end of every mission.
 
Regarding prepping charges, well thats the beauty of the M231 and M232 Modualr charge system, you either bring 1 or 2 increments of M231 or 3,4 or 5 Increments of M232 to teh weapon.  The nightmare of "fecking around" cuting Green bag and White bag is no more...Yay!!!
 
Next time im in the field I will get some footage of an "Action Azimuth" done by a very profficient gun section.
 
Regards
 
Arty
 
 
 
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neutralizer       12/4/2009 7:48:12 AM
IIRC the report about Excalibur appeared in IDR some months back, it's a normally reliable publication.
 
As I said, only time will tell whether M777 turns out to be a good gun.  In the end it will depend on how the users find in a variety of circumstances, that said the guys operating a gun usually reckon its great, firstly its a pyschological thing and secondly because they often have nothing to compare it with. 
 
It's encouraging that reasonably rapid carriage traverse is possible, this is the usually drawback of larger calbre guns.  That said 105 Bty RAA will tell you that in 1968 at FSB CORAL, if they had their 105mm M2s in centre of arc and not in the needed direction then the outcome would probably have been very different, 45 secs can be a a long time.  (And given that FC systems calculate a full set of firing data in less than 1% time of flight you don't produce partial data, and since target details are provided via data comms the computer is a lot faster than CPO with check map).
 
All engineering design involves tradeoffs, the benefits of flick ramming are not really detachment fatigue, they are the capability for burst fire and a small minimum detachment, given the manpower element of lifecycle costs this can be important.  Note that in the early 1960s the US and other nations agreed that 3 rds in 15 or less seconds was required.  That's why FH-70 provided it, of course sliding block breech and primer magazine also help.
 
39 cal barrels conforming to the 1960s MOU are predicated on conventional bag charges, cancellation of Crusader presumably led to loss of US interest in modular charges, assuming they don't have the same insensitive ammo issues as UK.
 
Obviously a handheld induction fuze setter is useful for fuze setting behind the gun and as a fallback mode.  There are benefits in having it fixed adjacent to the breech, not least because it doesn't need a person to hold it, although a handheld can be used by the breech operator. 
 
I'm cynical of the whole lightweight thing although 105mm has its place.  I always think of a senior UK arty officer early in WW2 who said words to the effect that in peacetime everyone wants mobility, in war they want weight of fire.  I'd call the latter rate and range. 
 
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ArtyEngineer    neutaliser   12/4/2009 10:41:20 AM

IIRC the report about Excalibur appeared in IDR some months back, it's a normally reliable publication.

As I said, only time will tell whether M777 turns out to be a good gun.  In the end it will depend on how the users find in a variety of circumstances, that said the guys operating a gun usually reckon its great, firstly its a pyschological thing and secondly because they often have nothing to compare it with. 
It's encouraging that reasonably rapid carriage traverse is possible, this is the usually drawback of larger calbre guns.  That said 105 Bty RAA will tell you that in 1968 at FSB CORAL, if they had their 105mm M2s in centre of arc and not in the needed direction then the outcome would probably have been very different, 45 secs can be a a long time.  (And given that FC systems calculate a full set of firing data in less than 1% time of flight you don't produce partial data, and since target details are provided via data comms the computer is a lot faster than CPO with check map).
All engineering design involves tradeoffs, the benefits of flick ramming are not really detachment fatigue, they are the capability for burst fire and a small minimum detachment, given the manpower element of lifecycle costs this can be important.  Note that in the early 1960s the US and other nations agreed that 3 rds in 15 or less seconds was required.  That's why FH-70 provided it, of course sliding block breech and primer magazine also help.
39 cal barrels conforming to the 1960s MOU are predicated on conventional bag charges, cancellation of Crusader presumably led to loss of US interest in modular charges, assuming they don't have the same insensitive ammo issues as UK.
Obviously a handheld induction fuze setter is useful for fuze setting behind the gun and as a fallback mode.  There are benefits in having it fixed adjacent to the breech, not least because it doesn't need a person to hold it, although a handheld can be used by the breech operator. 

I'm cynical of the whole lightweight thing although 105mm has its place.  I always think of a senior UK arty officer early in WW2 who said words to the effect that in peacetime everyone wants mobility, in war they want weight of fire.  I'd call the latter rate and range. 

I found the 85% number regarding Excalibur.  It is indeed a valid number.  The number I have is purely for rounds expended in the Afghanistan theater which is significantly better, however I think we both understand statistics well enough to know why that is.

Regarding 'Target details provided by data comms"  not in the afghanistan theater.  Most calls for fire come as "You" this is "Me", immediate suppression grid 1234, 5678.  Via the voice net.  But that is purely due to teh circumstances of that theater with each platoon basically acting as its own independant fire suport asset.  Everyone is that spread out there is no "massing of fires" from various platoons, batterys or even battalions.  So as a rsult there is no Battalion level or above fireplanning element as the central location for receiving calls for fire and then pushing down to teh battery and platoons via data comms.
 
Regarding Flick ramming, detachment size burst rate of fire etc. I agree a flick rammer would reduce detachment size by 1 man,  however the triple 7 was designed around a optimum detchment size of 7 consisting of Section Chief, Gunner, No 1 and No 2 Cannoneers and then an Ammo Team Chief and Cannoneers 3 and 4 in the Ammo team.  The 10 man section you find listed in various literature came from teh USMC and the US Army needing justification to maintain troop strenght levels by TO&E.  Logic for this going something like this: "If we are supposed to have 10 then we have a chance of actually having 7 or 8.  If we only are supposed to have 7 then we will most likely only every have 5 or 6 per section and thats not going to work".  On the burst rate of fire :"requirement" of 3 in 15 secs.  I would assume that originated from a desire to have a "Certain Effect" on a certain "Target Type" when enagaging with X guns or batteries based upon first round accuracy and subsequent dispersion of fall of shot.  I would argue that our demonstrated ability to have lethal effect on target first round these days as a result of our much better ability to fulfill the 5 tenets of accurate predictive fires makes
 
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Aussiegunneragain    Neutralizer   12/4/2009 7:09:42 PM
I certainly don't agree that the guys operating the gun always think that it is great. When we were operating the Hamel in the early 1990's many of the older hands pined for the M2A2. They felt that the Hamil was too fragile, had inadequate traverse without moving the trails (100mil versus 400 mil left and right on the M2A2) and in particular we all hated having to take the wheel off to rotate the barrel (which was only the case so that the wheelbase could be kept narrow enough to get through english roads ... really useful in Australia). I personally felt that on the balance it was a better gun because of the greater range possible with the L-118 barrel, but it was by no means universally popular and we did have a basis for comparison in the M2A2, the Oto Melara pack howitzer and the M-198.
 
Your point about the quick 6400 mil traverse of the Hamel is valid, it is a strength of the design and in a direct fire situation it might save the bacon of a fire base. However like you say gun design is a trade off and there would be situations where a Hamel gun battery couldn't save the bacon of the infantry it is supposed to be supporting, while a M-777 battery could. Notibly if the call for fire is more than 20.6km from the gun battery and if PGM's are required, both common situations in conflicts like Afghanistan, then the 105mm battery may as well be trying to fire from England or Australia. Moreover I think that the M-777's slower 6400 mil traverse speed could be managed even better than the way that AE describes, by having one gun on each of the 6 most likely octants when they are not firing. That way there will always be a gun ready to begin adjustment, fire PGM's or fire a direct fire mission in 6 of the 8 octants without moving the trails. Whats more if you are using splintex or similar on muzzle action the gun (do they have splintex for the M-777? They did for the M2A2 and L-119 but not the L-118 when I was in the RAA) for a mission in the adjuacent octant, the crew could just traverse the gun to the extreme of its traverse and the projectiles will spread substantially into the next octant anyway.
 
As for the cynisism about the light 155mm role, I can't help but think that if the UK had had three M-777 and five hundred Excalibur rounds in the Falklands it could have left the rest of the RA contingent at home. They would have been able to use one gun to fire from San Carlos on Goose Green using Excalibur, destroying the Argentinian's position by position as they were identified and then for hidden positions as the infantry probed and identified them. They would just need to take an entire mortar platoon along rather than the two tubes and 3 light guns that they did, to provide insurance in the instance of an Argentine counter attack. Then they would just have had to repeat the exercise in the battles on the hills with a gun in support of each attacking battalion.
 
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