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Old 05-02-2018, 11:50 AM
madmikechoi madmikechoi is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Matt Wiser View Post
Well, I should be honored: the first person I've ever encountered who was in favor of the SGT York system.
Sarcasm aside- ADA needs both missiles and guns. And it's one of the few gigs where making the enemy go away is almost as good as killing him. And like all things in life you need both high and low. Even if Sgt York was adopted and money was thrown at it to upgrade various systems such as a radar and improved fuzing/fragmentation.... Big Army still would have had pressure from the Duck Hunters Union to field a missile based SHORAD system that had a slant range well over 5-6000 meters or 3 plus nautical miles w/ a ceiling of at least 15k ft.

Remember during the 80s, the Left had a real hard on WRT to the Reagan build up and St Ronaldus Magnus in general. Many, many big ticket items for all the services, so the Reds... er, opposition wanted their fair share of flesh. ADA had three systems that were either being developed or already developed and being fielded but all were more expensive than their predecessors. Stinger, Patriot, and Sgt York. And sometimes, most times two out of three. Sgt York was fielded yet in reality it was supposed to be complemented by the US Roland system. Roland was supposed to be in corps based brigades and DIVAD divisional but at the time there was a mix of the Vulcan and Chaparral at heavy division level (the Chaparral would later be kicked up to corps level brigades often paired w/ HAWK and Patriot battalions to provide them SHORAD coverage).

Again, the problem with the real issue with DIVAD is as a branch ADA ignored their own tactical mantras about having a missile gun SHORAD mix. It's not so much the radar didn't work especially tracking doppler returns and shortcomings using a 3000 psi hydraulic traverse/elevation would be replaced with a 5000 psi aviation type hydraulic system to give the turret occupants Captain Insane-o type speeds but the fact is a gun can only reach out so far even if the radar can track a helo popping up or coming around a bend and letting lose a ATGM or three. Again, mobility issues? Big Army still planned on using the M60 series of tanks for a good bit longer at the time.

Twilight 2K sorta solves this by providing a high low mix from the get go although Chadwick and company didn't realize it.
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