RE: Rail guns (was: US SOCOM desires...)

[Leon Harrison <juni0r@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

><<<big snip job>>>
>
> > to make reloading faster. Simple optics improve the
> > marksmanship of joe infantry. I don't think anyone
> > disagrees with that.
>
>I do.  Many shooters I know also disagree with it.  Optics tends to make
>good shooters better, and lets a bad shooter miss with more certainty.  If
>you want to improve the marksmanship of Joe Infantry, spend the money on
>training Joe Infantry, not on giving him a nifty scope.

Agreed there mate.  People need to get back to basics and learn 
marksmanship principles.


> > Hmm...I would say that they are useful in 99% of
> > situations. Even a 30 round box magazine is a pain 1%
>
>50% at most.  The other 50% of the time, it's dark.  Nowhere near 99%--and I
>wouldn't even agree that it's 50%.
>
>When you're stuck in the sharp end, it's raining cats and dogs, you're
>trying to stop bleeding, you dropped your rifle in a puddle a minute ago
>when you took shrapnel in your hand, and you haven't had time to clean your
>optics off yet... optics aren't much use when everything's coming down
>around your ears (as tends to happen quite a bit in the sharp end).
>Marksmanship skills are with you for as long as you've got eyes and a
>trigger finger.

Agreed.

Why do people so quickly forget how different real combat is to sitting 
comfy like on a range hitting the Fig.11?

Bit like, oh dear my optics are broke, well I've hardly trained to use my 
open sights so I'm up the creek without a paddle...

Even without considering light conditions, troopies are known to have fired 
into walls because of tunnel vision while on FIBUA (MOUT), tunnel vision is 
a killer.  Open sights help to avoid this.  Another point is, technical 
gear is fine until it craps out or the batteries die.  Seems to be that 
they rather give a soldier a laser range finder rather than teach him how 
to estimate range.  If you've got a brain and learn the basics, keep with 
them then you're on the ball.  Tech backs up hard learned skills, not the 
other way around.

Don't get me wrong though, a scope has its place.  I just tend to see it as 
a more specialised piece of kit that perhaps shouldn't be so liberally put 
forward.

> > Even the assault rifle hasn't really changed infantry
> > tactics in a revolutionary manner. Neither did rifles
>
>Certainly it has.  In Vietnam, we were firing off 50,000 rounds of
>ammunition for each kill.  We were, more often than not, firing stark blind
>against unseen adversaries, trying to kill them by sheer volume of fire.
>That was simply not possible for an infantry unit before the advent of
>assault and battle rifles.
>
>Note that I'm not saying the wall-of-lead approach is a particularly good
>one.  But claiming that the assault rifle didn't revolutionize the way
>battles are fought strikes me as pretty specious.

Well, when we (the Kiwis) and Aussies were in Vietnam we tended to avoid 
wall of lead tactics.  Ambushes and patrolling actions with small teams of 
men.  Army Rangers and SEALs tended to adopt tactics more similar to ours, 
as opposed the bulk of US forces there.  Tended to be that, from our 
experiences in Borneo, Malaya, that a native with his bow was at no 
disadvantage than the guy with an SLR.  Sure get ambushed fire like hell 
through the enemy position sure, but the principle of surviving is not to 
get catch, ambush him while avoiding getting ambushed.  That comes down to 
training and common sense.  Also helpful when you have a limited supply of 
ammunition.  More reliance on logistics with massive expense of 
ammo.  Guess its easy to waste heaps of ammo if you think the supply lines 
are not going to get cut.

In any case its the nut behind the butt not the rifle that really 
counts.  When an old deer stalker can nail you at 1000m with his .308 bolt 
action and you can't even touch him... well.  Again it comes down to 
knowledge of terrain, tactics and confidence.  Not hardware.

Some jokers don't even know how to move in the bush properly.  Professional 
soldiers, and that scares me.

Also it is interesting to not that many of the situations forwarded talk of 
tech' like we've got this and the other bloke hasn't.  Eg: PNG, TI etc, 
well, how about if the fellow we are going up against has the same type of 
gear or even better.  Then it is the skill that counts and sadly that is 
lacking, more and more today.

A former SGT in the USMC told me of his experiences in the Gulf.  The 
Iraqis were real good on their arty plotting, ONLY technology meant that 
the Coalition batteries could take them out after the counter battery radar 
had pin pointed them.  A mater of seconds difference between one side with 
the tech and the other side without it.  If they didn't have that tech, 
things would have been a whole different story.  That is scary.

<<<Snip job>>>

>Are you really claiming optics are going to drive high-ranking diplomats in
>belligerent nations to commit suicide?

Agreed, but err... yeap... if they knew a sniper was gonna nail them 
:)  But to avoid the funny side, again its the nut behind the butt, if his 
scope fails, his skill will see him through, and most of that comes from 
the stalking, range estimation.  Squeezing off is but a small part of the 
big picture.

>Good marksmanship is a necessity; optics are a luxury.

Yeap, sure are.

Leon "Junior" Harrison

PS : Its been a while so I had to ramble on for a wee bit :)  Been some 
good stuff coming up on list.


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