Small Arms.-No AR-15 conversation allowed

[Zinegata]

When I have a primary source stating that once Germany had enough Semi Automatics to start equiping battalions with them when fighting America it sounds pretty significant, when I have a primary source from the United States Army that states the Germans doctrine was an abysmal failure against them until they adopted the G43 and MP44 on a widescale in the west, when the same primary source states than in 1943 the British, Canadians, French, Polish, Australians, New Zealanders and pretty much every occupied military force requested the M1 Garand and that the only reason the US declined most of them was due to production just Gearing up.

It makes me wonder what you're thinking, going "it's a matter of doctrine" is such a double standard it's mind blowing. The fact is that the US attributes the Garand to why they were so successful in fire fights, not the 105 mm howitzer, not the M4A3 Sherman, not their doctrine (which they re-evaluated after the war). The main thing I look to is that things on the tactical level afect things on the strategic level. A German soldier failing to get to a detonator because of suppressive fire means the bridge survives, the bridge surviving allows heavy armour across, heavy armour across means forces can smash the hard point. It's a butterfly effect, even the most minor things on a battlefield that seem trivial to people who haven't seen combat can have a major life changing consequence.

Lol, what? You're not just taking Patton's thowaway quote (and pretending it's a "primary source") at face value, are you?

If your primary sources are claiming that the Garand is more important than the 105mm howitzers or other forms of artillery then they are most likely myopic infantry-centric sources that, as usual, forget that they are part of a much larger conflict. Or they are simply written by gun nuts who likewise have no sense of perspective, which is also sadly common among military writers. Any serious strategic writer of the Second World War knows how much more important artillery was than small arms; and are very dismissive of useless sources who keep trying to conflate their own role in the war when the statistics are extremely clear-cut in this case: Artillery > Small arms. By an enormous landslide.

First of all, anyone who thinks that small arms are awesome forget that less than 20% of infantrymen apparently ever bothered to actually shoot their small arms anyway; whereas the tonnages of shellfire delivered by artillery is pretty much unquestioned. Most infantrymen, of all nations, quite frankly ultimately decided that they would not cross the line of murder. It wasn't until Vietnam that methods were found to force infantrymen to shoot their weapons all the time, and all that resulted were countless cases of unresolved PTSD.

Secondly, statistics have been compiled for casualties inflicted by artillery - and artillery in fact killed more than all types of small arms combined. In fact mortar casualties (a subtype of artillery) alone accounted for more casualties in Normandy for the US Army than any kind of small arm, which I think is more reasonable than the British version. Because equivalent British studies indicate as much as 80% of their casualties were caused by mortars (the Germans being very short of heavy artillery) - and that is seriously not a typo. The British seriously claim that mortars killed four times more men than all other types of weapon systems combined in Normandy.

Quite simply, anyone who thinks that small arms are a big deal in World War 2 are simply plainly wrong and the strategic level statistics have proven it a long, long time ago. The reality is that you're not affecting the strategic level by pettyfogging small arms; much like Hitler's insistence on the StG44 this is just people conflating very minor and very irrelevant things into strategic war-winners that they never were as a placebo for the much more real problems of the real battlefield.

Both the First and Second World Wars were artillery wars. It bears the title "God of War" for a reason.

====

And this is all before the simply plainly wrong assertion that the US Army didn't think the Sherman was good (they evaluated it was better than the Panther by a factor of 3:2), or that the doctrine was flawed. Those shortened the war far more than any small arms pettyfogging by measurable amounts.

Sure, there was a change of doctrine in the Cold War, but that's a result of the prevalence of nuclear weapons and the US Army trying to excuse its utterly retarded Cold War era doctrine by pretending the WW2 doctrine was bad since so few people are actually knowledgeable about doctrine.

In reality the US Army's warfighting doctrine against the Nazis was in fact quite good - it hit upon the correct strategy from the get-go and executed it properly, with only minor misses like the Tank Destroyers. Their Post-War doctrine was by contrast utter insanity. Forward Defense? Netrocentric fighting? The former was a formula for rapid certain defeat while the latter was old generals not understanding how computers worked and tried strapping them on to soldiers to make them look cooler.

Want to contest that? Then explain to me why the Wedemeyer Plan - or more popularly called the Victory Plan - was wrong then.

 

[xXAgeOfPeopleXx]

Lol, what? You're not just taking Patton's thowaway quote (and pretending it's a "primary source") at face value, are you?

Have you read any of the previous posts? I'm using the United States military's post war analysis of World War Two. Jesus you probably just read the OP and jumped right in not taking into account the massive 7 pages of info since then...

I'm not using historians as most have no clue about military science and those that do need to balance it with staying in the field of history. Artillery they assessed would be useless without superior firepower and thus their mentality was the most important thing on the battlefield was the riflemna and guess what, the Korean war confirmed their hypothesis when the Semi Automatic equipped US went up against massed charges armed with plenty of soviet made automatic weapons. Their lack of automatic weaponry got them pushed back significantly forcing the US Army to switch from the M1 Garand and to start looking into improving it to add a fully automatic mode. This is sourced United States Military Handbook "Operations in Korea 1950-53" published 1955.

The idea that infantrymen don't shoot back is so incredibly ignorant it's mind blowing as soldier who doesn't shoot a rifle in combat is going to have his squad chew him out for being useless and a risk to their own lives, ask any veteran. You refuse to fire in combat for no reason other than "I don't wanna be a murderer" your squadmates are going to take serious offence. But ok, please, give me the source that less than 20% of infantry on the front lines n world war two shot their rifles please. I'd understand if it's a book you can't show it but I may have it as I studied Military Science and have plenty of them. - I'm not saying artillery is any less important but saying that artillery is the more important is inaccurate. An Army can fight without Artillery it cannot fight without weapons

The fact artillery killed more is irrelevant as the priority is to wound and capture people not kill them.

Again you argue against the late and post war analysis conducted by the United States Army from members of all branches, but ok, I'm sure historians know more about war than military professionals.

I never said that they said the Sherman was bad, I actually said they thought it was good enough to win the war. Something they did follow until they decided to send the M26 in small numbers. I never said the Sherman was disliked by the US Military it was deemed "good enough" just like the Panzer 4.

NetCentric Warfare has a viable point that sadly is ahead of it's time. The idea that soldiers have more situational awareness than ever before is a great idea, it'sd just that technology is not at the point where we can have soldiers with HuD's displaying information quickly and cleanly instead as it is now the equipment is bulky and old.

 

[Mabzie555]

I think people are forgetting about suppressive fire from small arms.

Yeah, small arms may not kill as many people as artillery, only like 50 people have brought up that point. That point is also pretty much irrelevant to this discussion.

This is about how small arm development should be in the game, and it should be. This game should be detailed.

Anyway not only do small arms kill people, but they offer suppression. Semi/fully automatics mean more shots downrange which equals more of the enemy cowering in fear.

Suppresses:
-Other infantry
-Precious mortar teams (in LOS)
-AT guns

Allows you to move without getting killed.
Suppression is KEY to infantry warfare.

Some of the things people are saying are just absurd.
You'd almost think if you said "The US army could still be using krag-jorgenson rifles and Chauchats in 2014 without any strategic impact on the outcome of wars" that they would agree.
Just rediculous.

If it doesn't make a difference, why develop SMGs, Semi-Autos, Assault Rifles, and Battle Rifles at all? We can just use bolt actions for everyone, forever... And it won't make a difference.
Yeah..... Makes perfect sense.

There is a reason nations develop new small arms.

That being said, yes I would love to see this in the game.
Rifle/SMG/LMG/HMG development would be great.

 

[Novacat]

If your primary sources are claiming that the Garand is more important than the 105mm howitzers or other forms of artillery then they are most likely myopic infantry-centric sources that, as usual, forget that they are part of a much larger conflict. Or they are simply written by gun nuts who likewise have no sense of perspective, which is also sadly common among military writers. Any serious strategic writer of the Second World War knows how much more important artillery was than small arms; and are very dismissive of useless sources who keep trying to conflate their own role in the war when the statistics are extremely clear-cut in this case: Artillery > Small arms. By an enormous landslide.

Artillery was relatively unimportant in the second world war. The second world war was about infantry, tanks, and air power. Artillery and Cavalry saw an enormous decline compared to the first world war.

Secondly, statistics have been compiled for casualties inflicted by artillery - and artillery in fact killed more than all types of small arms combined. In fact mortar casualties (a subtype of artillery) alone accounted for more casualties in Normandy for the US Army than any kind of small arm, which I think is more reasonable than the British version. Because equivalent British studies indicate as much as 80% of their casualties were caused by mortars (the Germans being very short of heavy artillery) - and that is seriously not a typo. The British seriously claim that mortars killed four times more men than all other types of weapon systems combined in Normandy.

Yay for unsourced bullshit.

Quite simply, anyone who thinks that small arms are a big deal in World War 2 are simply plainly wrong and the strategic level statistics have proven it a long, long time ago. The reality is that you're not affecting the strategic level by pettyfogging small arms; much like Hitler's insistence on the StG44 this is just people conflating very minor and very irrelevant things into strategic war-winners that they never were as a placebo for the much more real problems of the real battlefield.

Hitler hated the StG 44, and had attempted multiple times to shut it down. It only survived because the resulting rifles ended up being really, really popular in the Wehrmacht. source

Both the First and Second World Wars were artillery wars. It bears the title "God of War" for a reason.

You do realize that the whole reason the Allies got their asses kicked in the opening of the Second World War was because the Allies ran into it thinking that the second world war was going to be another artillery war, and then the Germans kicked their asses with combined arms.

And this is all before the simply plainly wrong assertion that the US Army didn't think the Sherman was good (they evaluated it was better than the Panther by a factor of 3:2), or that the doctrine was flawed. Those shortened the war far more than any small arms pettyfogging by measurable amounts.

The question is who are you asking? If your asking the pencilpushers over at High Command sitting in the US who think the Sherman should not be fighting tanks and that towed guns were plenty enough to deal with German tanks, than yeah, the Sherman is better than the Panther. If your asking the common tanker/infantryman, or even the people immediately above them, you are likely to get a far different opinion. Given, the Sherman was a good tank for what it was designed to do, which was support the infantry. Where things went pear-shaped is when the Shermans encountered enemy tanks that the Sherman could not handle, the British solved this problem by incorporating Fireflies into their Sherman squads, but the US never did anything similar until the very end of the war.

In reality the US Army's warfighting doctrine against the Nazis was in fact quite good - it hit upon the correct strategy from the get-go and executed it properly, with only minor misses like the Tank Destroyers.

US Army's warfighting doctrine was a complete disaster. Aside from the Tank Destroyer not being a minor miss, there were a number of issues with US doctrine at the time.

 

[Emperor of Europe]

The only reason to equip soldiers with any kind of small arms, is to give them some sense of control, while the heavy weapons do the actual killing.

Modelling any small arms beyond the basic categories of SMG and rifles makes no sense in an operational and strategic level war game.

Oh: And no counters, really?!

rgds/EoE

 

[keynes2.0]

but the US never did anything similar until the very end of the war.

Well there's the M10. Yes it proved to be a mistake to think that M10s and M4s should be different vehicles but all the same they had plenty of AFVs that could fight tank.

 

[Novacat]

Well there's the M10. Yes it proved to be a mistake to think that M10s and M4s should be different vehicles but all the same they had plenty of AFVs that could fight tank.

Which lacked both the penetration and the armor to perform its job well. American tank destroyers for the most part relied on flanking opponents which was simply suicide in any combined arms situation.

You are right, they are not different vehicles. The M4 Sherman was for the most part a competant vehicle that did what it was designed to do well. The M10 Wolverine, on the other hand, could not even perform its job adiquately.

The M4 Sherman probably would have had a much more positive reception if it was not constantly forced into an ad-hoc tank-killer role because the tank destroyer doctrine was a complete disaster.

 

[keynes2.0]

Which lacked both the penetration and the armor to perform its job well. American tank destroyers for the most part relied on flanking opponents which was simply suicide in any combined arms situation.

Um... they did fine in North Africa. Kasserine went pear shaped but the campaign as a whole was very successful. By the time of overlord the M4(76) is rolling out. Now here people generally say that most M4s weren't M4(76) but I'll just skip ahead and point out that more M4(76) and M4(105) were out there then Panthers.

 

[Kovax]

But ok, please, give me the source that less than 20% of infantry on the front lines n world war two shot their rifles please. I'd understand if it's a book you can't show it but I may have it as I studied Military Science and have plenty of them.

While I agree that the effect of small arms should be kept fairly minimal (not TOTALLY irrelevant, but not a major factor as in previous HOIs), the statement about 20% of infantry never firing their weapons is probably roughly accurate, but not for "infantry on the front lines" as the reply goes. Far more troops were involved in transport and other services behind the lines than were actually fighting, and many of the units on the line never really encountered the enemy. Out of the ones who actually did end up in combat, there were a few (not all that many) who refused to shoot at another human being, whether they were berated for it later or not.

I once heard some ridiculous comment about how a "veteran" soldier must have killed dozens of enemy soldiers, and any "regular" must have killed a few. If every soldier in each army, on average, had killed only ONE enemy soldier, most armies in the war would have been exterminated to the last man. Quite simply, the majority of men in an army have never killed or injured another person. Most have never fired a weapon except during training.

The doctrines on "suppression" also help mask the grim possibility that you MAY end up hitting an opponent and perhaps even kill them. According to the principle, you're not actually aiming at them, so if a bullet does hit them, it's an "accident", and not your fault. Artillery also deals damage indirectly, so the men firing the weapons at "coordinates" aren't haunted by the certainty of having killed another person, since it practically never happens within sight.

The point about "small arms" is that countries develop doctrines, then order weapons which fulfill the needs of those doctrines. The US placed primary importance on the firepower of the individual, then ordered weapons to increase it, whereas the Germans placed primary importance on the firepower of the trained machinegunner, and developed a much better machinegun than the American squad automatic weapon counterpart. SMG distribution also varied from army to army and changed as doctrines developed, with the US and GER issuing 1-2 per squad, and the Soviets equipping entire platoons with them. Total firepower under a range of conditions was similar on average, but distributed differently, and utilized differently by each army. If the game allows you to develop the independent items separately, and ahistorically choose the "best" of each with 20-20 hindsight, then either the AI is going to be unfairly hampered against an overpowered player, or else the AI will be designed to optimize its research and produce a totally non-historical game with all countries using "super-weapons".

Assault weapons were dependent both on the technological development of the weapon and on the development of infantry doctrines which saw a need and drove that development. Note that the first major deployment and use of assault weapons by Germany was a disaster, when the paratroops on Crete found themselves seriously outranged by British troops in the hills using regular rifles. The bonus, if any, should be situational (+1 in woods and urban), and come with a corresponding negative in another situation (-1 in plains).

 

[Taishair]

the statement about 20% of infantry never firing their weapons is probably roughly accurate, but not for "infantry on the front lines" as the reply goes. Out of the ones who actually did end up in combat, there were a few (not all that many) who refused to shoot at another human being, whether they were berated for it later or not.

Quite simply, the majority of men in an army have never killed or injured another person. Most have never fired a weapon except during training.

The doctrines on "suppression" also help mask the grim possibility that you MAY end up hitting an opponent and perhaps even kill them. According to the principle, you're not actually aiming at them, so if a bullet does hit them, it's an "accident", and not your fault.

You don't understand anything about combat or tactical employment of weapon systems at all. Let me address each of your arguments here.

You state that you believe that twenty percent of infantry never fire... well your wrong all infantry in combat WILL fire at the enemy. While supply units and transportation troops make up the majority of an army and they MAY never fire at an enemy soldier, they are NOT infantry. Go tell an infantryman (WW2 veteran or not) that a truck driver is "Infantry" and you will not see the next sunrise. Infantry exist to fight the enemy, that is their job, that is what they do.

Your interpretation of suppression is absolutely 100% wrong. Suppression is not meant to alleviate you "Responsibility" for killing an enemy soldier. Suppression is meant to force the enemy to take cover and allow assault troops to close with and destroy the enemy or allow artillery to engage them with indirect fires. Suppression does NOT mean firing wildly in a general direction it is rapid aimed fire upon a known enemy position. You don't fire your weapon at a town you fire at an enemy held position. So get that erroneous theory of suppression out of your head.

Now my thoughts here. I believe that

1. Advancments in Infantry equipment need to be represented in HOI 4.

2. Simply producing more generic "Infantry Kits" as units upgrade does not really accurately represent the choices involved in equipping your Infantry.

3. Neither does a linear Infantry 1, Infantry 2, ect upgrade tree show the design choices and doctrinal advantages/disadvantages.

So I suggest

That Infantry Equipment be given differing names based on what you are actually producing. Different kits should be unlocked by doctrinal research which sets a dynamic upgrade path. So if you started with no doctrine you would have no infantry upgrades available and your infantry kit would just be vanilla Infantry Kit 1.

Now say you decide to take your infantry down a superior individual firepower doctrine path. Well first your research the doctrine tech. This would unlock upgrades (using exp like the variant system) to the infantry kits. Replacement and equipping would work like tanks (old units do not automatically upgrade, can send to rear to be retooled (?)) So maybe the first upgrade in this path represents equipping your soldiers with semi auto rifle. You spend the experience and your Infantry Kit (Semi Auto) is now available for production. You can set which type a battalion uses and it gives various bonuses based on the doctrine type and specific upgrade. Now this continues down the doctrine tree with each specific form of infantry doctrine giving bonuses and unlocking upgrades that can be added for additional bonuses. This takes advantage of exisiting variant systems without adding the intense minute of X number of LMGS/Battalion ect...

Thoughts? Suggestions?

Sorry for spelling or unclearness I am quite tired. I will answer any questions as best I can.

 

[Novacat]

Assault weapons were dependent both on the technological development of the weapon and on the development of infantry doctrines which saw a need and drove that development. Note that the first major deployment and use of assault weapons by Germany was a disaster, when the paratroops on Crete found themselves seriously outranged by British troops in the hills using regular rifles. The bonus, if any, should be situational (+1 in woods and urban), and come with a corresponding negative in another situation (-1 in plains).

Um... neither the StG 44 or the FG42 were in service during the battle of Crete. German paratroopers at the time were using the MP-40 which is a submachinegun and NOT an assault rifle. The first deployment of the Stg 44 was on the eastern front.

Um... they did fine in North Africa. Kasserine went pear shaped but the campaign as a whole was very successful. By the time of overlord the M4(76) is rolling out. Now here people generally say that most M4s weren't M4(76) but I'll just skip ahead and point out that more M4(76) and M4(105) were out there then Panthers.

Yes, they did fine against the older German designs (which is largely what the Afrika Korps had) which the M4 Sherman could adiquately handle by itself, but they were a miserable failure against Tigers and Panthers. The problem with the M10 is that anything it could kill, so could the M4 Sherman. Considering that the M10 was supposed to be the primary tank destroyer, should it not be able to do a better job at it than the Sherman, an infantry support tank?

 

[xXAgeOfPeopleXx]

Yes, they did fine against the older German designs (which is largely what the Afrika Korps had) which the M4 Sherman could adiquately handle by itself, but they were a miserable failure against Tigers and Panthers. The problem with the M10 is that anything it could kill, so could the M4 Sherman. Considering that the M10 was supposed to be the primary tank destroyer, should it not be able to do a better job at it than the Sherman, an infantry support tank?

Indeed, it took the US to start deploying the M36 Jackson before they could seriously start engaging Panthers and Tigers with Tank Destroyers. Once the M36 arrived however the Germans had already started to use the King Tiger thus the allied Tank destroyers always lagged behind the Germans heaviest tanks. (Though they wrecked Tigers and Panthers look up some footage it's pretty cool).

 

[keynes2.0]

I was just pointing out that the US did in fact equip it's troops with AFVs with anti-tank weapons since before they landed in North Africa. Operation Torch was late 1942. American forces wouldn't face Tiger II in Normandy until September 1944. I don't really see the importance the performance of the earliest of these AFVs against a rare tank twice it's weight that wasn't even faced for another 18 months. The point is to understand if the US was listening to troops on the ground. Unless these troops were clairvoyants they wouldn't have been saying anything to high command about facing Tiger IIs. Even early Panthers were very rare in North Africa for US forces.

 

[Beagá]

Artillery was relatively unimportant in the second world war. The second world war was about infantry, tanks, and air power. Artillery and Cavalry saw an enormous decline compared to the first world war.

Yay for unsourced bullshit.

Care to post the source of YOUR first statement? Because last time I checked small arms didn´t cause even 10% of casualties...

 

[D Inqu]

Have you read any of the previous posts? I'm using the United States military's post war analysis of World War Two. Jesus you probably just read the OP and jumped right in not taking into account the massive 7 pages of info since then...

You might want to be careful using immediate post war analysis. The amount of information avaliable to make that analysis was not that great, as most of it was still being archived and processed.

For example, Soviet post war analysis analyses the German 1941 tactics, praising the German implementation of combined arms noting the "active usage of combined arms: using deep armor thrusts, supported by the airforce and active use of tactical paradrops behind enemy lines"

The problem is, the Germans never used large scale paratroop drops on the Eastern Front. The post-war analysis (which mind you, affected soviet post war doctrine) was base on real reports from the troops, but the troops themselves misinterpreted what they were seeing.

Troops on the ground are not always right, in fact they are often not sure of what they are seeing. It's always good to check with modern information.

 

[Novacat]

Care to post the source of YOUR first statement? Because last time I checked small arms didn´t cause even 10% of casualties...

Which is kind of funny considering that even the manipulated statistics posted a few pages back has small arms and MGs doing 10% casualties, and this is considering the fact that the British included casualties outside of ground combat... the real question is how many casualties do bombs, artillery, tank shells, etc. all do seperately, and weither they are substantially higher than the 10% of bullets.

 

[D Inqu]

Artillery was relatively unimportant in the second world war. The second world war was about infantry, tanks, and air power. Artillery and Cavalry saw an enormous decline compared to the first world war.

And contrary to this glorified myth, the vast majority of divisions in ww2 were infantry, with artillery as main killing weapon. Armor divisions (which still had a lot artillery, mind you) were important in making encirclements, but were few and very vulnerable when without infantry support.

If you look up the actual number of artillery pieces produced, instead of posting "unsourced bullshit", you may find that production of artillery pieces and artillery munitions was far greater in WW2 than WW1. So much for "decline".

Hitler hated the StG 44, and had attempted multiple times to shut it down. It only survived because the resulting rifles ended up being really, really popular in the Wehrmacht. source

And Hitler was right. The logistical load to introduce a new type of cartridge in the middle of the war was just not acceptable. Sticking to the G43 would have been better.

You do realize that the whole reason the Allies got their asses kicked in the opening of the Second World War was because the Allies ran into it thinking that the second world war was going to be another artillery war, and then the Germans kicked their asses with combined arms.

And once again, if you look up facts, you will find, that combined arms required a powerful artillery to work. The Germans expended far more artillery shells than in WW1. All majors produced more arty and used more arty in ww2 than in ww1.

The revolution was just more subtle than in tanks. It wa not the guns which changed, it was their usage. Motorised transport allowed redeployment and concentration of artillery. Fire-on-demand allowed low level commander to ask for the destruction of individual targets by radio.

 

[Novacat]

And contrary to this glorified myth, the vast majority of divisions in ww2 were infantry, with artillery as main killing weapon. Armor divisions (which still had a lot artillery, mind you) were important in making encirclements, but were few and very vulnerable when without infantry support.


If you look up the actual number of artillery pieces produced, instead of posting "unsourced bullshit", you may find that production of artillery pieces and artillery munitions was far greater in WW2 than WW1. So much for "decline".

I said relatively unimportant. In WW1, Artillery was king, it defined trench warfare. In WW2, it was just another cog in the machine that was combined arms. Still important, mind you, but no longer king of the battlefield.

 

[Axe99]

I said relatively unimportant. In WW1, Artillery was king, it defined trench warfare. In WW2, it was just another cog in the machine that was combined arms. Still important, mind you, but no longer king of the battlefield.

I'd say 'relatively less' rather than just 'relatively', very different meanings . Artillery was still incredibly important, and not having it would put a position in a very precarious position indeed. Far more precarious than if they didn't have semi or full-auto rifles (relative to bolt-actions), that's for sure!

 

[Secret Master]

I may have missed it earlier, but the only bullshit I want to see discussed is bovine fecal matter.

And since bovine fecal matter is not on topic for the conversation, I expect everyone to remain civil.