In Defense of the Red Army

[Abbott Shaull]

Originally Posted by 95th Rifleman

PG 1 isn't a good example if you are trying to compare NATO/WP equipment.

The Iraqi's fell into the old trap of fighting the last war. They set up fixed, entrenched defensive positions in a similar fashion to how they fought the Iranians in the late 80's. Having a major armoured force drive around your flank tends to cause a few problems with such a defense.

In the late 90's the gap between Western and Russian kit was not as great as many are led to assume, also the tactics devised for fighting in Europe where designed to maximise advantage and minimise weakness of the Russian kit. The game winning card in iraq was total air superiority, this would be MUCH harder to achieve facing frontline Russian air defence systems.

The Russians where (and arguably still are) the world leaders in battlefield air defence, they had to be considering the NATO air threat. the Russians would of formed concentrations of Armour and spearheaded into NATO lines putting massive local superiorityin numbers to overwhelm NATO defensive positions.
Unless you could knock out these concentrations from the air the would just roll over a position and keep going before NATO forces cold respond in numbers sufficient to blunt the spearhead.

True war in Europe NATO would have to over come the Air Defense network, the sheer number of Aircrafts and Tanks that they had in forward positions.

I don't think anyone here is forgetting that PGW1 was very different from the type of war that the troops had trained for, that may have happen in such places as Germany, or Korea...

[dragoon500ly]

I think everyone here pretty much agrees that any NATO/WP fight would have seen bloodletting on a never before seen scale....and that would be prior to any nukes.

PG1 gave just a taste of just how deadly modern weapons can be. And that was, for the most part, directed against military targets. A free fire zone like Europe would become....

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by dragoon500ly

I think everyone here pretty much agrees that any NATO/WP fight would have seen bloodletting on a never before seen scale....and that would be prior to any nukes.

PG1 gave just a taste of just how deadly modern weapons can be. And that was, for the most part, directed against military targets. A free fire zone like Europe would become....

As soon as nations break out the FASCAM to block armoured assaults we can expect to see huge areas of Eastern and central Europe turned into dead zones that would probably exist for decades.

[Abbott Shaull]

No matter who starts it and where. The end will not be good.

[Webstral]

I don't remember my specifications for Soviet scatterable mines, but US FASCAM has a short shelf life. In a fast-moving war, most standard mines are surface-laid and covered by fire to prevent the enemy's vehicles from getting through by driving carefully. The goal with FASCAM and surface-laid mines is canalization, not blocking. It's a fine distinction, but as a result the mines used in highly mobile warfare either commit suicide or are fairly easily handled once the frnt moves away.

In Twilight: 2000 terms, though, we would have seen fantastic stretches of territory invested with complex minefields with mostly buried mines. The Pact would have put tens of millions or hundred of millions into the ground in western Poland. Other nations at war would have done the same in their respective areas. Once the war slowed down in late 1997, buried mines would have gone in around every base camp.

Still, I'd be less concerned about the mines putting large areas off-limits than the rads and chemicals. If it came down to it, I'd put chemicals at the top of the list. During the run-up to nuclear use, I'd expect to see chemical warfare running at full tilt (though obviously there would be pattterns that can be discussed at another time). The use of persistent agents for counter-mobility purposes would leave large areas of Poland, Germany, Austria, the former Yugoslavia, Romania, Turkey, and other locations badly contaminated. Chemicals washing into the rivers would end up in the Baltic, the North Sea, the Aegean, the Black Sea, etc. Lethal concentrations might persist for years anywhere the rain didn't wash the chemicals away. Mines tend not to migrate, but chemicals go where they please. In a water-rich environment like Europe... yikes.


Webstral

[Legbreaker]

Good point re the FASCAM and chemicals.
A well planned minefield should however be designed to channel an attacker right onto the covering guns of the defending force. Fire needs to be available all over the field to prevent unopposed lifting, but any obstacle belt should send send the attacker unconsciously right in front of the machineguns and expose vehicle flanks to AT weapons.

For example, a barbed wire entanglement is not placed parallel to the defenders positions, but is on an angle. The attacker will naturally drift towards the end furthest from their start line, probably bunching up in the process and giving the machineguns an easy target.

As minefields must be marked (with at least a single strand of wire on the enemy side with mine signs every so often) they too have the ability to channel. Note that the wire surrounding a field does not have to be of the same shape as the field - it can be much larger and mislead the enemy regarding the true extent of the danger area.

Anti vehicular obstacles such as dragons teeth could be positioned so that the only clear route requires the vehicle to take a right angle turn and expose their side the the defenders.

[95th Rifleman]

Originally Posted by Legbreaker

Good point re the FASCAM and chemicals.
A well planned minefield should however be designed to channel an attacker right onto the covering guns of the defending force. Fire needs to be available all over the field to prevent unopposed lifting, but any obstacle belt should send send the attacker unconsciously right in front of the machineguns and expose vehicle flanks to AT weapons.

For example, a barbed wire entanglement is not placed parallel to the defenders positions, but is on an angle. The attacker will naturally drift towards the end furthest from their start line, probably bunching up in the process and giving the machineguns an easy target.

As minefields must be marked (with at least a single strand of wire on the enemy side with mine signs every so often) they too have the ability to channel. Note that the wire surrounding a field does not have to be of the same shape as the field - it can be much larger and mislead the enemy regarding the true extent of the danger area.

Anti vehicular obstacles such as dragons teeth could be positioned so that the only clear route requires the vehicle to take a right angle turn and expose their side the the defenders.

Back in WW2 both sides had a habit of "forgetting" or moving mine markers, especialy in a retreat. The Israelis didn't even bother to mark many of their minefields in Lebanon and neither did the Argentines in the Falklands.

The problem with the rules of war is that it is almost always the first thing to be disregarded when things start to go wrong.