Military Discussion Thread

[da12thMonkey 1943]

Does the British DoD have any problems with getting personnel? Here its pretty bad, like having battalions only half filled for years. After every rotation out or Afghanistan more people leave the service than people come in, even lowering the standard (yeah great idea right?) didnt help.

I ask because 43.000 people are a lot of people getting unemployed in harsh times.

Recruitment numbers for the armed forces are actually pretty strong but like you we have quite a lot of difficulty retaining the same personnel. Numbers have been close to full strength for an number of years now, as the number of blokes leaving is matched by recruitment - obviously there are concerns with losing experienced soldiers even if there are new blokes to replace them numerically.

It's expected that quite a large number of those lost from the armed forces will be senior ranks because all three services are 'top heavy'. Combat troops involved in current operations are supposed to be exempt from the losses.

Cuts in Defence Civil Servants are part of a wider cull of nearly half a million public sector jobs. Privatisation of some of the MoD's assets will probably contribute to the reduction in MoD civil servants without everybody losing their jobs. I know of at least one of the MoD's Trading Funds that is going to be sold (the one I work for) with an initial loss of some 600 jobs; but will effectively transport 3,000+ people out of the civil service.

We've been subject to a recruitment and pay freeze since the last election (applied across the civil service) but prior to that we had no trouble filling places for apprentices. However, the numbers of staff and of apprentice engineers that we take on annually have been decreasing for decades, as the business has gotten smaller. I can't really comment on how recruitment and personnel numbers have changed across the rest of the MoD.

[Baff1 0]

Draw down in Afghanistan is currently planned to begin next summer and full withdrawl to be completed by 2015 as I understand it.

The wars have made for personnel retention going down, but also for recruitment going up. Prior to these recent wars it was the otherway round.

Edited October 21, 2010 by Baff1

[pre-Vet 10]

Privatisation of some of the MoD's assets will probably contribute to the reduction in MoD civil servants without everybody losing their jobs.

Oh, never thought about it that way.

Pay freeze? like in not getting money for months?

Hope you will be allright!

---------

I sure hope the BAF will get a pause after 2015 to complete the modernization and (problably) restructuring.

Weird to see recruitment going up in the wars, mot people dont want to get send overseas or..??

[Baff1 0]

People who join the army want to see action. It's a volunteer force, they seek it.

And then they get married and have kids and don't want to be away from home anymore. They get older and their priorities change.

Also many of those who have seen action, have proven something to themselves. Have achieved a rights of passage that they sought. For many of them the drive has been removed.

So joining a paper army that is not going to fight does not have the same lure. Also, without a war, the only way for those people to see action is to become members of the elite, the special forces, so retention is higher. They have to stay in longer before they get to test themselves.

These days with so many wars, everyone see's action. No one has to stay in for 15 years first.

Edited October 22, 2010 by Baff1

[da12thMonkey 1943]

Pay freeze? like in not getting money for months?

Hope you will be allright!

No, it's nothing bad like that. It just means nobody's eligible for a pay rise regardless of any extra responsibility they might take on a result of reductions in staff numbers or crap like that.

I just mentioned it because you asked about MoD recruitment.

Tah for your concern, but I'm not too worried about it to be honest. I've been anticipating this, and a number of other scenarios that'd effect my job directly (like scrapping certain armoured vehicle projects) since May.

[spooky lynx 73]

I was interested by one question - why UK MoD have chosen another variant of Stoner AR as sharpshooter rifle rather than refurbished and modified SLR? Both of them are .308 caliber, both have semi-auto fire mide. Wouldn't be such SLR cheaper than new L129A1?

[da12thMonkey 1943]

I was interested by one question - why UK MoD have chosen another variant of Stoner AR as sharpshooter rifle rather than refurbished and modified SLR? Both of them are .308 caliber, both have semi-auto fire mide. Wouldn't be such SLR cheaper than new L129A1?

The starting point would be to look at what our forces actually wanted in a sharpshooter rifle to match the operational requirements for Afghanistan: the UOR for specified that the rifle should have a 16" (or shorter) barrel and an adjustable butt stock - features our SLRs didn't have.

Of the SLRs we have left (we sold thousands of them to 3rd world countries like Sierra Leone and destroyed countless others) there aren't many that are in good condition (barrels that aren't completely shagged etc), so it'd be difficult to quickly refurbish the 400-500 required for Afghanistan. The fact that it shoots 7.62*51 doesn't mean it'd inherently cut the mustard as a marksman's rifle either; not only would new parts have to be found to replace those worn out, but additional ones would have to be sought to improve the rifle's ability as a sharpshooter rifle.

Knowing the MoD's procurement history, the research and development cost of accurizing the SLR probably would exceed the unit cost of a new, off the shelf rifle; especially in the case of such a relatively small procurement of weapons. The SLR was designed as an infantry battle rifle, and certain things like the scope mounts, trigger and barrel aren't up to spec of a rifle like LMT's LM308MWS (factory model of the L129A1), which was designed from the ground up to be a precision rifle.

There is also an issue of who we'd get to perform this work: the UK's military firearm industry is small, so we'd probably get HK to perform the upgrade (as we did with the SA80, and are doing for our lightweight GPMGs). They'd probably just turn around and say; "Do what your special forces did and buy our HK417 instead".

[Baff1 0]

It was available. It was the right price.

They needed it fast, so they bought off the shelf, I expect.

[TomatoArden 0]

New GPMG, oo...have they brought those in yet? Are they anything like the upgrades done to the M240 in the USA to make the M240L?

[da12thMonkey 1943]

I think the lightweight GPMG still under development. HK-manufactured L7A2s have been issued for a while though.

The lightweight one basically a looks the same as the current gimpy, but it has a titanium receiver (like M240L) and fluted barrel to reduce weight, and picatinny rails along the gas-tube and feed-tray cover. HK showed a version with a slightly shorter barrel as well.

I'll stick a few pics of it up later

Ed:-

Edited October 28, 2010 by da12thMonkey

[TomatoArden 0]

Nice, wonder if these'l get a new designtion..like L7A3

[dm 9]

So the weight they save with the fluted barrel and titanium reciever they put back on with picatinny rails and MOAR LAZORS! :D

[Baff1 0]

I think the fluted barrel gives it a larger surface area, meaning it radiates heat better.

I remember reading on guns.ru about how the russian machine guns no longer have changeable barrels because of this.

Lasers is the business. A gun without lasers is a rubbish gun indeed.

[Archamedes 10]

This is my take on the afghan war, before you cut in and flame me for being a taliban sympothiser please give me the chance to say what i gotta say.

Firstly, the whole 9/11 for the us and the 7/7 for the uk is something i did not agree with. those bastards where complete fanatical scum of the earth that deserves no pity, they were brainwashed cowards who didnt even deserve to be born.

now the taliban in afghanistan.

I refuse to believe anything i read in the papers because the media have a very powerful way of printing things to control people. the media tell us who to hate, who to love and who to vote for and they twist and manipulate the facts to make people to be worse than they actually are. The papers love to justify the taliban as the evil in the world after all it makes it easier for all of us to digest and accept the war if the enemy is actually evil and not actually another force fighting for what they believe is right. Not that i personally agree with their goals or beliefs but as far as the media and news go, the taliban are bad.

A common opinion now is that the taliban have been fighting for hundreds of years and are now "lazy" because they use IEDS to fight for them.

Yes it seems right to believe this, but why do you think they do this? For one a few arab mercenaries only armed with a few ak47's and the odd rpg really isnt going to cut it against an army of american and uk forces that have pretty much every tactical advantage to hand. Its a very unfair fight and the taliban use IEDS simply because it is their only effective way to fight rather than marching up to an USA/UK FOB and expecting to successfuly storm it with the relativly simple munitions they have to offer. If you gave them tanks, a fleet of fighter planes/helicopters, modern weapons and technology then you can call it a fair fight.

I saw a documentary about british troops who do road convoys acros helmand province and they said "yeah we get apaches to escort us cos the taliban hate them." well of course they do, they don't stand a chance against them and don't even have attack helicopters of their own to make the fight fair.

The americans will hate me for this but its the way i and a lot of people i know see it. American forces see the afghan war as a reason to stomp into villages shouting out "HOO RAAR!" at the top of their lungs and seeing the mission as an american flag raising campaign, then complain co's the locals throw rocks at them and bitch because they are there. The british forces work using hearts and minds by building trust, showing we are there to help them and we are on their side, yet an american paveway will land in the centre of a civillian town and will wipe out all that hard work and throw it back in our faces. many people who reside in afghanistan have reverted to the taliban much more becuase of the aggressive military presence when they wouldn't even bother before.

In all honesty i don't agree with this war, when there are terrorist sleepers mixing semxtex in bathtubs no more than 400 feet away from where we live in our own countries. i think a lot of money and lives could be saved if we worked on sorting these people out and not those who live 3000 miles away and pose no direct threat to us. But then the sleepers who live down the road aren't sitting on an oil refinery are they?

Government officials say that they are fighting against terrorism and want to free people in these war torn countries who are suffering at the hands of rebels. isn't it interesting that rebels who torture and cause suffering in other african countires and in burmha aren't confronted... or is it that these other civil war torn countries are not sitting on a rich oil supply?

That's my take on it.

[HyperU2 11]

^ How about we just do us versus them with rifles only on an open field? We'd be done by Christmas. Of course they wouldn't show up for that either.

[Archamedes 10]

oh they will show alright. i mean when the military walk into a taliban occupied town or they get put in a corner, they will fight to their last round, but its easy for us to call in a cas on them when things get a little too hairy, yet if they run away from the fight they are cowards.

Just like the taliban are evil people who place IEDS on the road side, but if the navy seals or SAS place a roadside bomb in order to take out a taliban insurgant leader via road convoy they are deemed heros.

I am sure there are a lot of people on this forum who have placed a satchel charge at the side of the road in an arma/flashpoint mission at some point.

Edited October 30, 2010 by Archamedes

[Tonci87 163]

Many times^^

You are particulary right. It is true that the Americans Made some really stupid things there, and that they are there for the resources and the political control. Otherwise they would have landed in Dafur a long time ago, or in North Korea. But I still think that this war is necessary. The Taliban have declared war on the western (non muslim) World and have been training thei men and preparing Operations in Afghanistan. So this is a good thing that they can´t do this anymore without risking to been blown up.

[Archamedes 10]

Many times^^

You are particulary right. It is true that the Americans Made some really stupid things there, and that they are there for the resources and the political control. Otherwise they would have landed in Dafur a long time ago, or in North Korea. But I still think that this war is necessary. The Taliban have declared war on the western (non muslim) World and have been training thei men and preparing Operations in Afghanistan. So this is a good thing that they can´t do this anymore without risking to been blown up.

Yes i guess so in that respect but it also didnt help that our own people trained the taliban back when the russians where trying to invade, that kind of blew up in our own faces

[Baff1 0]

The Taliban have declared war on the western (non muslim)

That's news to me, and news to them I expect.

£5 says their goals and ambitions are somewhat more limited.

[maturin 12]

Tracers in real life do not look stretced as thay do in Arma 2. They look this way on tape due to the frame rate of the footage. In reality they look like little balls.

Is this at all accurate? The guy in the Addon Request thread says that the Opflash FFUR mod got it right, but I can't seem to find any good footage.

[Inkompetent 0]

Yes i guess so in that respect but it also didnt help that our own people trained the taliban back when the russians where trying to invade, that kind of blew up in our own faces

Stuff like that *always* blows up in one's own face. History shows that time and time and time and time again. Yet no one cares about it, because short term goals always take precedence. It's like the Canadians wanting to arm the Afghan population to help them take care of the Talibans themselves. Well, that might work fine and dandy for a while. Then what? It'll go to hell too in the long run.

[HyperU2 11]

Is this at all accurate? The guy in the Addon Request thread says that the Opflash FFUR mod got it right, but I can't seem to find any good footage.

Nope, they look like streaks irl. Our night shoots looked like Starwars.

[Colossus 2]

US deploys 'game-changer' weapon to Afghanistan (Yahoo!)

It's called XM25, which fires 25mm air-burst shells aimed to eliminate hostiles hidden behind walls, windows and other obstacles.

It's not "news" per se because there were apparently a demonstation video already posted on YouTube in May 2010. But I suppose the deployment of the weapon is the news here :)

Here is the demo:

Edited December 1, 2010 by colossus

[concurssi 11]

US deploys 'game-changer' weapon to Afghanistan (Yahoo!)

It's called XM25, which fires 25mm air-burst shells aimed to eliminate hostiles hidden behind walls, windows and other obstacles.

It's not "news" per se because there were apparently a demonstation video already posted on YouTube in May 2010. But I suppose the deployment of the weapon is the news here :)

Here is the demo:

Quick question: "The gun's stats are formidable: it fires 25mm air-bursting shells up to 2,300 feet (700 meters), well past the range of most rifles used by today's soldiers..."

I always thought that the standard rifle had a range of around 1Km. So what is the real range?

[Daniel 0]

Well if you're talking assault rifles and effective ranges: about 300m or more? Certainly nowhere near 1000m.