4 ms·

Air-burst rounds have definitely rendered trenches obsolete. https://imgur.com/c17lPxF https://imgur.com/c17lPxF

pasabagi 5y ago
Airburst rounds existed in WW1 too. The point is, you hide in a bunker until the shelling is over, then you come up and man positions before the enemy can reach your trenches, or failing that, counterattack while they are cut off from supplies and reinforcements.
- jeffdn 5y ago
  Airburst rounds with timers set by calculation, not airburst rounds that can blow up when they reach a specific point determined by proximity, distance, GPS, etc. It's a completely different kind of airburst.
dragontamer 5y ago
That's not how modern warfare works. Air-burst rounds beat trenches. Armor piercing rounds beat tanks (and bunkers). So the solution: have tanks next to your trenches. If your opponent loads air-burst rounds into their weapon, charge at them with your tank. If your opponent loads armor-piercing rounds into their weapon, run into the trench. Armor-piercing (neither HEAT nor Sabot) can do much vs a trench. (I'm ignoring the AC-130, just assuming land-based combat for now cause AC-130 is beaten by a totally different strategy: air superiority) --------- "Combined arms". Your opponent has to load his weapon with the right bullet for the right circumstance. Mix up your strategies (both defensive and offensive strategies). * HEAT-armor piercing loses to reactive armor on a tank. * Reactive-armor loses to sabot-rounds. * Sabot rounds lose to long-distance battle (air-resistance slows down the round). HEAT is better at long-distance (HEAT always was kinda slow: most of the "power" comes from the explosion that occurs after-the-collision... which is beaten by reactive armor). You can't guard against everything. Instead, you rely upon mixing up the strategies enough so that enemies are kept "guessing" as to which weapon to load / unload.
- axiosgunnar 5y ago
  What if the enemy has… TWO tanks?
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    My point: Two tanks can't deal with a trench. 10 tanks can't deal with a trench. They just don't have the right weapons for the job. What the US Military does, is combine a force of an M1 Abrams + M2 Bradley IFV, maybe with a M109A6 Paladin self-propelled armored Howitzer and a cell-phone that can call an AC-130 if things get really bad. Each machine is designed for a different situation. For the trench, the M2 Bradley IFV has the ability for anti-trench air burst rounds... and the M109A6 Paladin classic "artillery" can lob explosives at a very high angle and probably hit any trench from miles away. ------------ M2 Bradley IFV can take a trench: it has grenades, air-burst weapons, machine gun, missiles and more. M2 Bradley IFV has thinner armor however. So the M2 Bradley fighting by itself is still not the best option: if the opponent has a 100mm anti-armor gun in their trench, they may kill the M2. M1 Abrams can't take the trench, but it can lend its armor to the M2 by driving in front of it: blocking those anti-armor shots and making things safer for the M2. The air-burst attack can likely be done from behind an M1's cover. ------------ If you know the enemy will only send M2 Bradleys, you simply set up bunkers (covered above-grade concrete structures) with anti-armor cannons. Bradleys only have a 30mm gun, so you can build concrete + steel walls that can stop that attack. If you know the enemy will only send M1 Abrams, you simply set up trenches (below-grade dug structures). Tanks are direct-fire, and the ground is a surprisingly good shield. The M1 can probably penetrate any reasonably built bunker with ease: thanks to heavy 100mm+ sabot rounds (I forget how big tank guns are but... much bigger than M2 guns) If you build a trench + bunker, now the opponent has to send the M1 Abrams (for the bunker) + the M2 Bradley (for the trench). Now you have an opportunity for the bunker to shoot the Bradley with a 100mm weapon, killing it. And for the trench to similarly attack the tank, largely with impunity (if the supporting M2 is dealt with). Or maybe the US Army decides to call in the AC-130 and just pew-pew-pew you from the sky at that point.
  - lukemercado 5y ago
    Almost all combat is N+1. The holy grail is asymmetric weaponry/tactics. Unfortunately all asymmetric weaponry/tactics is eventually countered through R&D. The critical question is whether one combatant can gain a strategic edge over another during the novelty period of the asymmetric weapon/tactic. Ah, the joy of the Military Industrial Complex's feature treadmill.
lifeisstillgood 5y ago
But WWI trenches weren't those kind of six foot deep trenches that are dug out by a squaddie and a spade. Trenches (at least on the less mobile German side) were underground bunkers, concrete and steel reinforced that could survive literally hundreds of tons of high explosives. The shit fired here would be laughed at by WWI defences. Honestly the dummies in the trenches were getting hit yes, but they were still standing. 1916 those dummies would be five hundred feet in the air along with a ton of earth. And the machine gunners would be underground safe (if not actually sound). Yes, the air burst attack there would kill anyone standing in an open trench. But a minute after opening up (and remember this is going to be divisional level artillery you are airbursting here - hundreds of tanks across miles of front, someone will notice) once the attack starts everyone is under the ground in bunkers. The minute you stop they come back out and start firing back. (And they will have mined the ground, have anti-tank weapons etc.) Honestly the more I think about how lethal a battlefield is nowadays the more I think any "front" less than 500 miles wide is just going to bog down

Airburst rounds existed in WW1 too. The point is, you hide in a bunker until the shelling is over, then you come up and man positions before the enemy can reach your trenches, or failing that, counterattack while they are cut off from supplies and reinforcements.

jeffdn 5y ago
Airburst rounds with timers set by calculation, not airburst rounds that can blow up when they reach a specific point determined by proximity, distance, GPS, etc. It's a completely different kind of airburst.

dragontamer 5y ago

That's not how modern warfare works. Air-burst rounds beat trenches. Armor piercing rounds beat tanks (and bunkers). So the solution: have tanks next to your trenches. If your opponent loads air-burst rounds into their weapon, charge at them with your tank. If your opponent loads armor-piercing rounds into their weapon, run into the trench. Armor-piercing (neither HEAT nor Sabot) can do much vs a trench. (I'm ignoring the AC-130, just assuming land-based combat for now cause AC-130 is beaten by a totally different strategy: air superiority) --------- "Combined arms". Your opponent has to load his weapon with the right bullet for the right circumstance. Mix up your strategies (both defensive and offensive strategies). * HEAT-armor piercing loses to reactive armor on a tank. * Reactive-armor loses to sabot-rounds. * Sabot rounds lose to long-distance battle (air-resistance slows down the round). HEAT is better at long-distance (HEAT always was kinda slow: most of the "power" comes from the explosion that occurs after-the-collision... which is beaten by reactive armor). You can't guard against everything. Instead, you rely upon mixing up the strategies enough so that enemies are kept "guessing" as to which weapon to load / unload.

axiosgunnar 5y ago
What if the enemy has… TWO tanks?
- dragontamer 5y ago
  My point: Two tanks can't deal with a trench. 10 tanks can't deal with a trench. They just don't have the right weapons for the job. What the US Military does, is combine a force of an M1 Abrams + M2 Bradley IFV, maybe with a M109A6 Paladin self-propelled armored Howitzer and a cell-phone that can call an AC-130 if things get really bad. Each machine is designed for a different situation. For the trench, the M2 Bradley IFV has the ability for anti-trench air burst rounds... and the M109A6 Paladin classic "artillery" can lob explosives at a very high angle and probably hit any trench from miles away. ------------ M2 Bradley IFV can take a trench: it has grenades, air-burst weapons, machine gun, missiles and more. M2 Bradley IFV has thinner armor however. So the M2 Bradley fighting by itself is still not the best option: if the opponent has a 100mm anti-armor gun in their trench, they may kill the M2. M1 Abrams can't take the trench, but it can lend its armor to the M2 by driving in front of it: blocking those anti-armor shots and making things safer for the M2. The air-burst attack can likely be done from behind an M1's cover. ------------ If you know the enemy will only send M2 Bradleys, you simply set up bunkers (covered above-grade concrete structures) with anti-armor cannons. Bradleys only have a 30mm gun, so you can build concrete + steel walls that can stop that attack. If you know the enemy will only send M1 Abrams, you simply set up trenches (below-grade dug structures). Tanks are direct-fire, and the ground is a surprisingly good shield. The M1 can probably penetrate any reasonably built bunker with ease: thanks to heavy 100mm+ sabot rounds (I forget how big tank guns are but... much bigger than M2 guns) If you build a trench + bunker, now the opponent has to send the M1 Abrams (for the bunker) + the M2 Bradley (for the trench). Now you have an opportunity for the bunker to shoot the Bradley with a 100mm weapon, killing it. And for the trench to similarly attack the tank, largely with impunity (if the supporting M2 is dealt with). Or maybe the US Army decides to call in the AC-130 and just pew-pew-pew you from the sky at that point.
- lukemercado 5y ago
  Almost all combat is N+1. The holy grail is asymmetric weaponry/tactics. Unfortunately all asymmetric weaponry/tactics is eventually countered through R&D. The critical question is whether one combatant can gain a strategic edge over another during the novelty period of the asymmetric weapon/tactic. Ah, the joy of the Military Industrial Complex's feature treadmill.

lifeisstillgood 5y ago

But WWI trenches weren't those kind of six foot deep trenches that are dug out by a squaddie and a spade. Trenches (at least on the less mobile German side) were underground bunkers, concrete and steel reinforced that could survive literally hundreds of tons of high explosives. The shit fired here would be laughed at by WWI defences. Honestly the dummies in the trenches were getting hit yes, but they were still standing. 1916 those dummies would be five hundred feet in the air along with a ton of earth. And the machine gunners would be underground safe (if not actually sound). Yes, the air burst attack there would kill anyone standing in an open trench. But a minute after opening up (and remember this is going to be divisional level artillery you are airbursting here - hundreds of tanks across miles of front, someone will notice) once the attack starts everyone is under the ground in bunkers. The minute you stop they come back out and start firing back. (And they will have mined the ground, have anti-tank weapons etc.) Honestly the more I think about how lethal a battlefield is nowadays the more I think any "front" less than 500 miles wide is just going to bog down