Ammo stockpiles

[dragoon500ly]

A lot also depends on if the unit maintains a partial load on its heavy vehicles, roe example, in the 1980s, tank units in Germany, forward of Ansbach, would maintain a load of 40 rounds of main gun ammo, usually 25 APDS and 15 HEAT. When an alert was sounded, the plan (snicker) was to move out to our ready positions, where the ASP would bring the semis with the rest of the ammo load to us. Since we had M60A3s, our WP and HEP were stored on the trailers, following the switch to M1s, everything was switched to APDS/HEAT only. Since.we were armored cavalry, we also had a selection of land mines, cratering charges and demolition gear, as well as TOWs, Dragons and LAWs.

For the units stationed west of Ansbach, they depended on the ASPs for all of their ammunition. Although I have heard that this policy was changed whenever tensions increased.

Pretty much the only units that I am aware of that had small arms ammo readily available were the units equipped with Pershing, the forward SAM batteries.

Going stateside...trust soldiers with live ammo? Only on the firing ranges! The ASPs were protected by armed civilian security.

As the tee shirt says, "They don't trust us with ammo, but they want us to be able to run really fast..."

[Apache6]

I use T2K Version 1 timeline, so I think that the Russian - Chinese war would provide the lead time needed to ramp up the ammo production.

I know that US government contracts often include a contingency capabilty requirement. They are 'contracted' for a certain amount of production capability, even though the actual orders might be for less. Theoretically they already have the materials and workers to ramp up production.

USMC and Navy ASPs are ran by service members, the security forces are supplied with live ammo.

[Draq]

Don't forget, the us was also operating in the middle east and africa. So production would be considered 'war time' I think.

[aspqrz]

Thanks for all the replies, I have a much better handle on how things would play out in a ZA style scenario now!

Phil

[.45cultist]

Originally Posted by aspqrz

Thanks for all the replies, I have a much better handle on how things would play out in a ZA style scenario now!

Phil

I'm toying with the GPS Biohazard entry, which is a type of living zombie- Infected, Rager type. Since There are a lot of resistant bugs, I'm going with the lab working to solve this. When the accident occurs, an investor rep is present. The bacteria seem benign in its currant strain and the all clear is given. He has several grants to check across the U.S. getting the bacteria into the international airports, where a mutation gives it its deadly variant.
This is as far as I've gotten. Sorry about the OT. But ammo availability will vary according to population and law. New Jersy discourages self defense with hollow points, they've even jailed retired LEO's for failure to turn the ammunition in. Also during one ammo panic, police departments had to wait 6 months to replenish their stocks.

[aspqrz]

Originally Posted by .45cultist

I'm toying with the GPS Biohazard entry, which is a type of living zombie- Infected, Rager type. Since There are a lot of resistant bugs, I'm going with the lab working to solve this. When the accident occurs, an investor rep is present. The bacteria seem benign in its currant strain and the all clear is given. He has several grants to check across the U.S. getting the bacteria into the international airports, where a mutation gives it its deadly variant

As I sorta stated at the beginning, there are NO ZA books, movies or TV series that bear even the most cursory logical examination. Not a one.

They are all completely, totally, and utterly implausible ... indeed, mostly impossible.

Some I can tolerate because they are fun, and, generally, short ... others, are just too stupid for words. A few start out well and then descend into idiocy ... Ringo's books are like that, first was fine. Second started to become unbelievable. Third (and presumably successive ones) completely jumped the shark.

There are three key issues that ZA scenarios completely ignore because, if they took them into account, they would all be disasters, but not apocalyptic ones with mankind almost wiped out.

1) Zombies use energy (to move around and chase down other humans at the very least). Unless you repeal the laws of thermodynamics, the energy has to come from *somewhere* ... so Zombies need to eat.

As they are, by definition, possessed of at best animal cunning and no intelligence as such, that immediately eliminates all tinned and heavily packaged foods as a food source, and, in any case, they'll all be gone in a few days to a week or so from local stores, anyway.

Ergo, they need to eat something readily available ... since they are probably too stupid to recognise most plant foods (fruits and suchlike excepted) and since there is bugger all of such in cities, they will eat meat. Any meat. Not just humans.

The result? Well, how many herbivores does it take to feed a single Lion? Or how many Deer to feed a single Coyote? Given, of course, that the prey doesn't really want to be a Lion or Coyote's main course?

Answer: A heck of a lot. Which is why Lions are so thin on the ground and Coyotes ditto (compared to humans or human domesticated animals).

So, within a very short time cities might as well be deserts ... not enough food to support more than dozens or scores of zombies in an entire city ... unless the zombies eat each other, which has the same effect, more quickly, in fact.

There would be no massive hordes of zombies keeping people penned up on rooftops or the barricaded upper floors of multi-storey buildings ... not gonna happen.

In the countryside? Not much better for zombies ... they'll have to spread out like any apex predator, so the density per square mile will actually be very very low. So, at best, a dozen or so in a group, maybe a score or so.

Makes for very short post Zombie adventures.

2) Humans are quite fragile. Living in unsanitary conditions kills us off in large numbers, especially if malnourished.

Note what I pointed out in #1 above. Zombies will be thin on the ground because there isn't enough food.

Follow on. Humans are ill suited to relying on instinct and natural weapons to secure food ... the reason why we are the apex predator of apex predators is that we are intelligent. Tool use etc.

Zombies aren't intelligent and don't use tools. They would be relatively useless as hunters. They will routinely be malnourished ... if they remain in an urban setting, garbage and pollution will be breeding grounds for all sorts of nasties that would require modern medical care to allow them to survive ... and a heck of a lot more that will kill people (zombies) who get no medical care at all (it is well known, if widely underappreciated, that basic nursing can reduce the death rate for even high lethality diseases such as Smallpox, the Plague etc. Keeping the patient warm/cool/protected from the elements, toileted and clean, fed and watered).

The mortality rate would be very very high, and ongoing.

Zombies in rural areas, presumably away from urban filth, would be better off ... but, as noted, almost certainly routinely undernourished and, hence, much more susceptible to disease. And, of course, this brings us to ...

3) Climate. Humans are woefully adapted for anything but a warm climate. Our intelligence and tool use enable us to modify our environment and/or makes us resistant to it (housing, climate control, clothing) ... but Zombies simply aren't intelligent.

Ringo Zombies, being completely naked and all, if not thinned by starvation or disease, would increasingly succumb to exposure ... especially as the weather turns cold.

In most of North America and Northern Europe they would, for example, freeze to death in droves over the first (and all succeeding) winters.

I suppose they might instinctively migrate to warmer climates ... but that can bring its own problems. Think about unintelligent instinct driven poorly adapted for hunting or survival zombies trying to work their way south in the US ... into increasingly arid and semi-arid areas (if not outright deserts).

More die backs in large numbers.

Finally, as a clue as to how many Zombies the planet could support - it is estimated that our early stone age ancestors probably numbered no more than 100,000 worldwide ... only increasing to a million or so with the technological developments of the New Stone Age and Chalcolithic period.

Not much of a threat.

YMMV

Phil

[aspqrz]

I, to, have been kicking around ideas of how to have something like a realistic 'Zombie Apocalypse' ... and, as you may have guessed from the immediately preceeding post, it can't be done with anything like classical zombies.

But you can get a similar effect, I think.

I posit a badly mismanaged (or merely incredibly unfortunate) 'supersoldier' project designed to use wet nanotech to create enhanced human combatants. Make them stronger, faster, more resistant to injury ... create an internal 'mechanical telepathy' (hook a wet nanotech transceiver created internally that allows networked comms between them) and create a networkable but bios controlled tactical computer to assist them.

Add to this mission creep ... the ability for the nanotech to be (relatively) easily passed on to friendlies and to reanimate newly dead (enemy of course, say the PR flacks) corpses into remotely controlled meat puppets.

See where this is going?

See, unfortunately, using the supersoldier abilities tends to cook your brain (a la Ringo zombies), at least in the early stages ... and then the programmed tactical computer combines with the remaining animal instinct ... so you get severely brain damaged pseudo-zombies who can use tools (weapons at the very least) and maybe even drive simple vehicles.

Worse, the reproduction capacity meshes ... badly ... with the brain damaged ones, and they will attempt to impregnate captives or recently dead with 'eggs' (wet nanotech products that start converting those into which they are inserted into zombies ... or breeders, whose body is turned into an incubator for more 'eggs').

Even though the nanotech isn't all that infectious, it can be spread by blood or bodily fluids or other wastes through mucous membranes or skin punctures, cuts or abrasions.

Thing is, the more Zombie Supersoldiers there are in close proximity, the more intelligent they become, the more dangerous ... the more like real soldiers ... and, once a critical mass is achieved, one or more in each super-group will start to develop something like a 'machine intelligence' with a degree of self awareness ... but rarely tempered by any compassion or emotion, merely the need for survival.

They won't (initially) spread explosively from some lab accident, but if they spread anywhere and have time to form a breeding colony and reach a critical mass, heck, once they get access to decent weapons, you're effed.

Then assume, in desperation, one side (who presumably sees themselves to be 'losing') in a Twilight War or 3rd World War type situation lets them lose, not properly tested ... really, really nasty.

They're not unkillable mindless husks hungering for braaaiiinnnsss ... they're something far, far worse.

Phil

[Legbreaker]

Originally Posted by Apache6

I use T2K Version 1 timeline, so I think that the Russian - Chinese war would provide the lead time needed to ramp up the ammo production.

Last I heard the Chinese didn't use Nato calibre ammo, therefore most of the ammo production during this period (beyond normal peacetime production) would be useless for the US and allies.