Re: Humvee as a infantry fighting vehicle?

In article <slrnd975v2.b4d.dan1701usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Dan Holdsworth <dan1701usenet@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
#The problem with the Humvee is that it was pretty much designed by a
#committee on the lines of "Make it have incredible off-road ability, and
#let's stick lots of guns on it".

Please quote a source for this. What committee was that, or who
layed down those requirements?

#The end result is something that is big, powerful, but not at all
#armoured.

The HMMWV was designed to replace the Jeep and the commercial pickups in
Army inventory with one vehicle. In that, it has been a fabulous
success. It was NEVER intended to be an armored vehicle.

# The third-world guys have something similar; a Toyota pickup
#with a light machinegun on it; useful for clobbering lightly-armed
#rioters, useless on real troops.

If you are referring to Somali Technicals, they greatly preferred Heavy
MG's, and they were highly useful for clobbering like vehicles.

The purpose of putting MG's on HMMWV's is to provide some measure of
defensive capability to supply chains and convoys. The bizarre tactic of
using it as if it was an armored vehicle is not the fault of the
vehicle.

#Unfortunately the US army is still tooled up for clobbering the USSR;

The US Army was never tooled-up to "clobber the USSR". At best, it was
tooled-up to hold it back for 48-72 hours, in an effort to negotiate
before going tactical nuke.

# if
#you're hunting ex-Soviet tanks you need heavy armour and big guns. If
#you're busy rounding up some rag-tag local militia, you need light
#armour and lots of it, plus troops sane enough not to open up with
#everything they have as soon as a camel farts within 50 metres of them.

The problem is not the sanity of the troops, it is intelligence of what
is happening on the ground. Overwhelming firepower is very useful in
urban combat.

#So, with the current layout and armaments you get Somalia and Iraq. The
#politicians back home aren't helping, either.

You got one thing right.

Ken.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Mail: kmarsh at charm dot net | Just say "no" to liars SCO and Soyo
WWW: http://www.charm.net/~kmarsh | Return services to local CIS offices!
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
.