Horses in T2K
 

I'd guess with fuel, spare parts and mechanics beeing scarse, horses and people with experience in breeding/training would be an excellent asset.
This relates offcourse on how f**** up the world is in regards to nukes,weather etc. In HQs campaign 3 nuke-wars has resulted in allmost nothing growing.....

Could be some crossover here with the Entertainment Pricing thread :sawink2:

"boo" "hiss" to Targan.

One of my favorite horse documents covering encumbrance, feeding and fatigue.
http://www.thesupplybunker.net/Morrow/horses.txt

he he T.

Horses have been an important issue around here for month. I agree with you general, horses will quickly become important but you'll find huge differences according to regions.

Actually, this will not only be true of horses but it will be true of all kind of burden annimals: Mules, Donkeys, Camels, Oxes, Elephants, Lamas and even... dogs. Strangely, I have the feeling that the less advanced countries will find themselves in a better position. In T2K I'll rather be a peasant in Mali than one in the great plains of US or in the farmlands of France.

However, even as I have always been a supporter of horses in T2K, I can see several difficulties. Many actual mounts won't be well suited for even mild tasks and they will probably end up as food. In addition, the actual population is certainly not sufficient but several communties will probably engage themselves in a "short term" breeding process. This can help a bit in a matter of a few years but such communities will also attract attention and they will soon find themselves under attack. Their survival and success will depend on their hability to repel invaders.

I second this doc at the bunker. It's quite good.

Horse numbers in the US are rising each year, however the vast majority are light 'pleasure' horses, not ones trained to harness. This does NOT mean they can't be, rather they will be less likely to work well for farming or heavier drafts. Also using a horse on a small holding is a challenge. Unlike a tractor, it requires fuel 24/7 whether it's used or not, one of the reasons for farm mechanization. Human labor with spades can do adeauate work on small holdings, and there will not be shortage of human labor, and YES they need fuel 24/7 as well, but humans are more apt to feed the human labor than the horses.

Horses require carbs to work unless you want to ruin (founder) the animal. They can NOT function for long on grass/hay alone.

WIth that said, it takes up to five years to get a replacement from conception to harness.

Yes I can see horses (mules, oxen, etc) being used, but not overly aboundant until about three years after TDM or more depending on how organized etc the are is towards recovery. Nothing we have discussed about recovery will be immediate, there will be the slide, halt and gradual climb.

Leadership... leadership.. leadership.

If a horse breaks down, unlike a vehicle, you can eat it ;)

(OTOH, you can't strip a dead horse for spare parts)

Mules are probably better than horses -- better tempered and not as stupid (a horse will let you work it to death, a mule rarely).

Ummm thats what the dogs and sheep are for!!

Unless you get 2 extremely good rolls for Medicine-Surgery

Not convenced on the better tempered:D
The mules also know when to quit eating, where as a horse will eat themselves to death also.

Drawback on mules is you can't breed a mule, as they're hybid.

Canadian Army gave me a great link for mules in Arizona. Thanks, man! As I plunged further into researching mules and wild horses in Arizona, I developed more ideas about how a larger-scale economy might work in Arizona in 2000 and how more areas of Arizona outside SAMAD (Southeastern Arizona Military Administrative District) might look.

Horses and mules play an important part in Arizona economy after the second post-nuclear winter. As much as half of the population of Arizona dies by July 1998, due principally to food shortages, medication shortages, and violence. By 1997, there are a lot of aging snowbirds in Arizona. Without medications, a lot of these people are going to die fairly quickly. Hundreds of thousands flee Greater Phoenix and Tucson, and many of these people never make it home. Winter in the mountains of Arizona can be brutal. One of the first tests of fire for the 111th Brigade is managing refugees-turned-marauder in the Gila River Valley. It’s the middle of an unusually cold winter, and Phoenicians refugees have coagulated under a prototype marauder warlord in a rough preview of the situation described in Allegheny Uprising. 326th MI Battalion is sent north to bring some order to the situation and ends up in combat against a mass of armed and desperate former Phoenicians. But I digress.

By March 1999, Arizona has lost most of its population. Phoenix and the surrounding cities are down to about twenty percent of their pre-war population. Gangs and local defense co-ops are the rule of the day in a semi-arid version of Armies of the Night. Agriculture occurs along the Salt River and anywhere a well can bring up enough water to keep people going and irrigate crops. In short, Greater Phoenix has ceased producing large numbers of refugees and marauders.

Outside of Phoenix and SAMAD, the rural and semi-rural populations survive by reigniting local agriculture. In some parts of the state, animal husbandry forms the foundation of the food supply. Banditry becomes the largest problem. Enter the 111th. With fuel supplies low, horses make a dramatic comeback as the preferred mode of transport. Capturing, breaking, and conditioning wild horses becomes a major industry wherever populations of wild horses are available. SAMAD is going to be a major customer. Mules, which are found in surprising numbers throughout the state, become very popular as draft animals. Again, SAMAD will be a major customer.

The trade links are reestablished as a result of reconnaissance-in-force and response-in-force. I have been rethinking the level of isolation I previously have imposed on SAMAD. For a little while, I have been thinking that a more realistic model might be for Huachuca to slash its responsiveness during the 1998 campaign season. However, once the manpower levels start to rise again, the post can afford to send bodies of troops on longer-distance patrols outside the Yellow Zone.1 In fact, company-sized and battalion-sized operations in service of towns throughout the southern part of the state would be an excellent way to break in new replacements. Towns troubled by marauders might receive the services of a company team or a battalion task force, who would spend a period of time tracking down and wiping out the marauders. I’m going to have to develop this idea more.

Word will get out that Huachuca is a market for horses and mules. Soon, Huachuca will realize that horses, mules, and donkeys are to be had elsewhere in the state. Longer-distance missions will soon follow, and merchants might follow soon after that. Animals and salvaged goods might go to Huachuca, while manufactured goods might go back out. Of course, SAMAD is going to take an active interest in developing its own equine industry. However, for a time equines might prove such a powerful draw for Huachuca that the 111th spends more time in the field chasing marauders than I had originally intended.

1 Huachuca designates three levels of security: green, yellow, and red. A green zone is inside any of the cantonments, which are walled off or surrounded by other obstacles and which are under very tight control. The perimeter of each green zone is under someone’s eyes at all times. The area that Huachuca claims as SAMAD is the Yellow Zone. This area is heavily patrolled, but troops do not move here without being armed and in numbers smaller than a fire team. Most of the crops are grown here, and most of the herding is done here. This area includes most of Cochise County, much of Santa Cruz County, and the area around Tucson. Outside of the Yellow Zone is the Red Zone.


Webstral

I'm a New Zealander. Please don't talk to me about sheep.:D

Except if that info is wrong, mules are in use among Marines and US troops in Afghanistan. As far as I know the french army is also using pack animals again and some mountain units are currently being trained with them.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/unle...erican-ta.html

In Portugal they are still used in some regions, simply because mechanization is impossible.

pack horses
 

Norway disbanded its last horse unit in 1986 - it just didnt fit the cold war tactics and equipment anymore .but as times have changed ,the horse is making a comeback in many militaries
the Austrians
the Indian military
The US military ( supposedly)
Germany

a link -in Norwegian - but it has pictures of Austrian and Norwegian troops with horses.

http://www.fofo.no/P%C3%A5+fire+bein...b7C_w7fMZc.ips



I am sure there are more .Horses aer primarily used for transportation of gear to areas where helicopter is the only other option or in a recce and patrol role -the days of the glorious charge are gone I am afraid .Also consider all the police forces using horses - against a largely poorly armed civilian mob horses in combat are used all the time .
In T2K horses would be a precious commodity - but also costly to maintain .They eat alot .

For what it is worth the 1985 US Field manual on Map Symbology (FM 101-5-1) does not reference horse units and the 1997 version does. Would have to assume that means that horses units were becoming more common even before the US war in Afghanistan.

Mules
 

I was reading this thread and I decided to add my two cents on Mules:

First; you can breed Mules, True, all male mules and most female mules are infertile. But, a mule is the offspring of a male donkey and a female horse; which means all you need is one fertile male donkey and one fertile female horse and you will get a mule.

Second; as for availability of mules, there are dedicated number of mule breeders, continued the tradition of breading as hobby and continued the great lines of mammoth jacks started in the United States by George Washington; with the gift from the King of Spain of two Catalan jacks. Also, Amish farmers, who reject tractors and most other modern technology, commonly use teams of six or eight mules to pull plows, diskers, and other farm equipment.

Third; as for use of mule in the military, currently the US Marine Corps conducts an 11-day Animal Packers Course; which covers the use of mules; at its Mountain Warfare Training Center, located in the Sierra Nevada near Bridgeport, California.

As for other countries using mules check out this picture I found will surfing the Web, I believe Soilder is West German:
http://i71.servimg.com/u/f71/11/91/03/51/24318210.jpg

These days are gone since the end of the US civil war. Nevertheless, the last time a horse army was used as the spearhead of an offensive was 1945. The Russian army which invaded manchuria was composed of horses and tank units used in a kind of blitzkrieg.

Tanks were used as tanks in a modern way while the horse carried infantry was used as their support infantry: horses being used in place of halftracks...

We already had several discussions on horses and several among us raised the problem of feeding for the horses. That is a point but horses units can be fed with what can be found on the field. From 1919-1945, Russians trained their cavalry unit to live on foraging. Each one of their cavalry division had a special company dedicated solely to foraging. However, a cavalry division usualy had half the manpower of an infantry division. Then, one problem was the lack of heavy weaponry (not really a major problem in T2K). Another problem was their vulnerability to air power: on one occasion an entire russian cavalry division was wiped out by the luftwaffe (not a problem in T2K again).

CA.. I thought of how the comment I made about breeding sounded after I logged out. You are correct of course, the mule is a hybrid. What I was refering to about breeding is you can't get off spring out of a mule for the reasons you pointed out. sorry if I misled anyone. Good info here. You can also breed a male horse to female donkey too, though it is not as common as the reverse. I think mostly because of the off spring size.

You right about that but that hybrid is not as strong and sturdy as a Mule (size also, then). People don't get them intentionaly. I don't know what the name is in english but in french the result is called a "Bardot" (not to confuse with a Mule).

If memory serves it is a "Hinny".

CA if indeed, your picture is that of a German soldier, he is part of the Gebirgstragtierwesen (Mountain Pack Animal Detachment) 230. that has 60 mules and 20 horses. Here is a link to this (and else):

http://horsesoldier.wordpress.com/page/2/