Quote:
Originally Posted by swaghauler
This thread brings up an interesting argument in the Twilight2000 timeline. There is this "idea" that frequently surfaces that people would be running around with home-made muskets because all of the firearms and ammunition were either used up or destroyed.
Both the US and Russia have enough small arms stockpiled to re-equip their armies THREE TIMES (although the M1, Mosin, and SKS would probably make an appearance in the third round). I did a rifle count at Ft. Indiantown Gap in the early 1990's for COG (continuity of government). There were 25K M16s (all M16A1s), 10K M14s, 1K M60s, and 1K assorted pistols (M1911s & .38 Model 10s) in this ONE site. There would also be a great number of "battlefield pickups" floating around to arm new recruits with. Finally, the US civilian population has HUGE numbers of both paramilitary and hunting rifles to draw on.
Since the Exchange was of only a limited nature, many of these "stockpiles" would still be intact.
Heavy weapons would be another story, though. From the beginning, this would be a "come as you are" or "bring what you got" war (with regards to the high-tech machines) The time it takes to assemble an M1 Abrams, M109 Paladin, or any jet in the modern age would preclude anything more than replacing "battlefield casualties" during the war. This means that older vehicles would be put back in service to cover losses or equip second line troops fairly quickly.
|
For number of arms, in 2013 the United States advised the Small Arms Survey that they had 2,700,000 total military small arms; in 2010, there were 1.43 million active service members, so the numbers provided suggest around 2 firearms per service member on average, not including reservists. This is probably a little low, since other trinitarian militaries were around 2.5. Typical proportions of arms globally were found to be 72% selective-fire rifles, 13% pistols, 9% machineguns, and 6% other. I would expect the Twilight War military to be slightly higher, both due to having more servicemembers and (probably) a higher proportion of guns
eople.
More importantly, though, military caliber ammunition could become a problem within a fairly brief time. Unless something has changed in the past few years, Lake City (Missouri) produces all the 5.56mm, 7.62mm, and 12.7mm for the military (I think 20mm also, but I never was involved in procuring that). Now, the stockpiles are likely in the billions of rounds (the number's classified, but the DoD regularly transfers millions of rounds to other agencies like the FBI or Marshal Service for their training without batting an eye, which gives at least a rough feel for how vast the number must be), but even if most aren't hit by the Exchange, distribution is still going to be a PITA in the post-apocalypse. I agree with the upthread comment that selective fire would likely be eliminated from most weapons in order to conserve ammo, and there'd probably also be a push to include the more common civilian calibers among second-tier units.