[chico20854]

For context, the maximum economic production rate for US anti-tank systems in 1986-7 was 30,000 TOW IIs and 6,720 Hellfires a year and 15,000 AT-4s a month (running that plant with 2 shifts). These numbers vs today's reflect the massive shutdowns of the defense industry post-Cold War and the greater sophistication of today's munitions.

(On the AFV side, the numbers are 1,080 M1s, 792 Brads, 540 M109s, 214 M88s, 180 FAASVs and about 600 AAVP-7s).

(These numbers also raise the question of, if they were all fired at Pact AFVs, factoring for misses, misfires, etc., would any Pact AFVs remain?)

I'm kind of working off the basis that the US ramps up to these production rates in early 1996 in response to the war in China and gradually adds more capacity from there (reflecting the relative ease of adding more workers and executing existing plans to ramp up to full production compared to retooling or building new plants all along the production chain).

For China, much of their war industry would come to a screeching halt in late 1995; their only tank plant is located in Harbin, Manchuria, as is much of their other heavy military industry. Starting in the 1960s they dispersed much of their defense production into the countryside, much of it underground, but this would likely result in massive output of small arms, recoilless rifles, mortars and so on rather than ATGMs, MANPADS, tube artillery or AFVs.

Given that NATO planning called for 30-90 days of munitions stocks, and that most nations didn't meet those levels, I figure that ATGMs (and other guided missiles) would become particularly scarce starting in the late spring of 1997. Pulling older stuff out of magazines also raises the issue of the reliability of older rocket motors and explosives... depending on the age and storage conditions the munitions could conceivably be more dangerous to the operator than the enemy!