Modern battlefield game changers (WW2, war, Egyptian, greatest)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
In modern wars (post US Civil War) what weapon do you think has made significant game changes?
Modern bolt and semi and auto firing rifles
Machine gun
Tank
Shoulder fired missiles and rockets
I guess you can add others to the list. I would have thought the machine gun or modern rifles but watching what has been happening in the past 20 or so years, im thinking the shoulder fired grenade, rockets and guided missiles are changing things.
Poorly trained and ragtag insurgents can certainly put a lot of harm on well trained and equiped troops now. Look at what the Taliban have done to US units with just RPGs. If you have caught some of tge videos from Syria, you can see a lot of Assads tanks go up in flame.
Should Israel ever go to war again with Hezbollah, their vaunted tank corp will not have it as eay as the 1967 war. Remember how tge Egyptian army when they crossed the Suez Canal in the 73 war used early Soviet anti tank missiles to initially blunt the Israeli tank corp.
In modern wars (post US Civil War) what weapon do you think has made significant game changes?
Modern bolt and semi and auto firing rifles
Machine gun
Tank
Shoulder fired missiles and rockets
I guess you can add others to the list. I would have thought the machine gun or modern rifles but watching what has been happening in the past 20 or so years, im thinking the shoulder fired grenade, rockets and guided missiles are changing things.
Poorly trained and ragtag insurgents can certainly put a lot of harm on well trained and equiped troops now. Look at what the Taliban have done to US units with just RPGs. If you have caught some of tge videos from Syria, you can see a lot of Assads tanks go up in flame.
Should Israel ever go to war again with Hezbollah, their vaunted tank corp will not have it as eay as the 1967 war. Remember how tge Egyptian army when they crossed the Suez Canal in the 73 war used early Soviet anti tank missiles to initially blunt the Israeli tank corp.
So what are your thoughts?
None of the above. Modern communications has done more to improve the battlefield then weaponry.
It's not the weapons itself, but the tactics that have developed to take advantage or counter these weapons, that has changed warfare. So I would say the tactics of 1.) Combined arms - the element of using combined artillery, moblie armour, infantry, and air power...and 2.) Small Arms Tactics - the development (first used by the Germans I beleive, in the Franco-Prussian war) of small fire teams trained in the arts of fire, supression, then movement.
And as I said, every weapon has a counter strategy...including insurgency. And let's not forget suicide bombs and fanatical enemies have been around since WW2 (i.e. Japan kamikaze fighters), it's nothing new to US fighting forces. Effective strategies were developed then, as they are now. Israel has learned how to counter Hezbollah with the development of urban fighting vehicles designed for the task, infantry tactics, and selective use of air power. They have no problem cleaning their clocks, with the main concerns being political and minimizing civilian casualties.
You mentioned RPG's by the way, which really aren't any more sophisticated then the WW2 era Panzerfaust's (german bazookas) that the Soviet's based them on. The Taliban hasn't "done" anything to the US with "just RPG's", nor have the Taliban as a fighting combat force "done" anything during US combat engagements except die. Which is probably why they prefer killing women and babies, or laying IEDs and then hiding. Anyways, the RPG has limitations - not being guided, and will not pentrate all armour (Abrahms for instance), and it's user must be relatively close to the target thus exposed to fire. So it's not a game changer on the battlefield. It's benifit is, like AK47's, their are just so many out there available to use and they are easy to use for untrained fighters.
None of the above. Modern communications has done more to improve the battlefield then weaponry.
I agree. I have put a lot of time into reading about the Civil War and one could write an entire book about things which went awry because of miscommunications and the lag time between something happening and the responsible commander learning of it. To coordinate attacks by the different wings of an army, signal guns were used or the Corps/division commander would be told "When you hear Soandso's guns open up, that is when you launch your attack."
Several times this reliance was fouled due to what is called "acoustic shadow", a phenomena where the lie of the land combines with wind direction to create conditions where someone a mile to the left can hear perfectly, but someone a mile to the right is completely shielded from the sound. The most famous of these acoustic shadow incidents took place at the battle of Iuka where Grant's pincher movement was frustrated because the troops waiting to attack from the south, never heard the engagement taking place to the north.
I would also add machine powered transportation to the list. The ability to move troops using railroads was a huge factor in the Civil War. The first Mananas battle was won by transporting General Johnston's army rapidly to the field. The battle of Chickamauga was won due to the rail transportation of General Longstreet's Corps from Virginia, and the battle of Chattanooga was won by transporting General Hooker's Corps from the east and General Sherman's army from the SE....by rail.
In the Franco Prussian War, the German victory was partly a product of the superior ability of the Germans to rapidly assemble and concentrate their troops using their railway. WW I was partially caused by the need for the Germans to stick with their pre war plan of knocking out France first, something that they felt could be accomplished via the rapid mobilization and movement of their armies using the railroads.
It struck me that if one could go back in time, and one wished to end WW I before it grew to such monstrous proportions, the thing to do would have been to encourage England and France to develop and build a bomber force before the war. Then once war was declared, use the bombers in an all out campaign against the German rail marshaling yards. Destroy the German rail time table and you destroy their entire initial attack.
And of course everyone here is familiar with the demonstration of motorized warfare which was the key element of the blitzkrieg rapid penetration idea.
I agree. I have put a lot of time into reading about the Civil War and one could write an entire book about things which went awry because of miscommunications and the lag time between something happening and the responsible commander learning of it. To coordinate attacks by the different wings of an army, signal guns were used or the Corps/division commander would be told "When you hear Soandso's guns open up, that is when you launch your attack."
And something that supports both our points - the importance of communication and tactics, not just the weapons itself - The French had superior tanks at the onset of ww2, better then the Germans. The difference was tactics - Germans knew how to use armoured vehicle for advanced deep thrusts, and communication - Germans had radio's in there tanks and were able to communicate with other tanks and headquarters. And thus France fell in 30 days.
It's not all weapons technology.
Other non-weapons improvements that are more important then one single weapon improvement - logistics (the ability to supply troops by rail, motorized vehicles, and later air) as you pointed out as well, and medicine/desease containment.
Modern communications, GPS and satellite technologies are the greatest war game changers of all time. The fact that most of that stuff started as military tech is just an added bonus.
Concentrating on weapons only, the atomic bomb strikes me as the biggest game changer of all. It is the weapon that has prevented WW III and defined the Cold War. The greatest remaining fear on the part of western civilization is the marriage of a nuclear device and religious extremism, that informs existing foreign policy.
I would add that it was the weapon which won the Pacific War, but based on the recent thread on that topic, that probably would cause a thread hijacking. How about..."major contributor to ending the Pacific War?"
lasers and other 'directed energy' weapons are coming along, and some predict a game change from them.
And btw, as I reread the above post, keep in mind that this perspective largely comes from Boeing, who of course would love to sell these directed energy weapons to the US gov't for billions upon billions. That said, just because it's coming from Boeing doesn't prove there's not something to it, either.
Concentrating on weapons only, the atomic bomb strikes me as the biggest game changer of all. It is the weapon that has prevented WW III and defined the Cold War.
But it has never been used on a battle field and more importantly it did very little to prevent any of the various wars that have broken out in the later part of the 20th century. In terms of actual battles it has been so inhibited by its own effectiveness as to render it a non-factor. That leaves me torn between armor and the machine gun, and if I had to make a choice I would have to go with the machine gun.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
