ARMORED WARFARE: Streetfighters Wish List

StrategyPage ^ | March 17, 2005

[Cannoneer No. 4]

See also TUSK to update Abrams for urban battle

[Cannoneer No. 4]

ping

[Kevin OMalley]

read later bump

[Darksheare]

Coolbeans!

[ibbryn]

They seem like reasonable requests to me. I'll sign off on them.

[Uncle Miltie]

"In city fighting, these two machine-guns are often more useful than the tanks 120mm gun."

What if there were an RPG hardened machine-gun nest? Twin .50s on a turret plus some grenade launchers? You could put that on a much smaller profile / cost vehicle, and as long as you don't go up against another tank, you could take care of certain missions well.

Maybe we need a "Tank plus" sqad, of one or two tanks and 5-10 smaller machine gun nests.

(Warning: Ignorant musings of an arm-chair soldier....)

[Gator101]

One idea I had, probably silly, was to remove the main gun and replace it with something much lighter. Something that can still knock down walls but doesn't have to take out a MBT. Use the saved weight for increased armor and gun ammo.

Another advantage of this would be that by losing that long barrel you wouldn't have to worry about obstructions when you traverse in possibly narrow streets.

[Wiz]

Good feedback from the Strykers. I rather see Joint Tactical Radio System implemented which will allow communication between the soldiers using handy communication device out of the MBT and those in the MBT.

[Righty_McRight]

A little snub nose main gun, and high protection gun nest, plus the increased armor, and you get the M1-A3UDV Urban Dominance Vehicle! Ohhh yeah!!

[PzLdr]

Upgrade the TC's .50 to a 25 mm. cannon. Go with the phone and scope for the gunner. Fender skirts will make track repair VERY difficult. Tanks throw tracks all the time. Changing road wheels will be a pain in the ass too. You could put the TC's gun in a cupola (like we had on the '48s and 60s), but that impairs vision. My solution, something like a sturmgeschutz that the Germans used in WWII to support infantry - a dedicated infantry support weapon for urban situations. Tanks have no business in cities - see Stalingrad.

[squirt-gun]

Tank mounted flame throwers, backed up by the large machine gun, are sometimes useful against tough targets in confined areas.

[Gator101]

Another crazy idea: a remote controlled dummy tank that cannot be differentiated from a regular one by appearence. It rolls through town at the head of a column attracting IED's, mines, and RPG's.

I'd armour the engine and drive train like crazy to keep it rolling. The turret and main gun could be steel-looking plastic to allow the extra armour weight. Manned tanks behind take out any resistance that reveals itself. Heck you would even have an animatronic "careless" TC stitting up high to get snipers to reveal their position.

OK...getting back on my meds now...

[Flyer]

Is this the Friday night (big) gun porn thread?

Pics, please!

[TalonDJ]

Interesting and I think worth looking into. You know many of the original WW1 era tanks came in 'male' and 'female' variants. The males had a big gun and the female variants were all machine guns they ended up phasing those out and I am not sure all the reasons why. I think the main thing is that when you need the big gun, nothing else will do. But when you need the machine gun... well one round from the big one might get the job done :D
As and engineer and military-stuff junky I would love to get into armored vehicle design. But I am too entrenched in the Aerospace field.

[Dilbert56]

[TalonDJ]

Why make it a dummy when you can just make it a remotely controlled fully-armed one. Start with an APC, upgrade armor and engine at the expense of crew space. Add several R/C turret and full R/C control. Fill what ever space is left with ammo. Put that puppy at the head of the line.

[snippy_about_it]

The old M60 had the MG in an armored cupola, seems like an idea to bring back.

[SAMWolf]

Marine flame-thrower tank (dragon) firing a load of napalm in to a house that is full of NVA soldiers that have been firing a B-40 rockets, RPG's and sniping at grunts.

Sometimes the old ideas work. ;-)

[Centurion2000]

One idea I had, probably silly, was to remove the main gun and replace it with something much lighter. Something that can still knock down walls but doesn't have to take out a MBT.

Put a pair of vulcan 20mm's on it or perhaps one 30mm rotary cannon from the A-10 Warthog.

[Blueflag]

Sounds to me like there are some easy mods to make on the tank wrt the commander's gun, slat armour for the turbine, sights and comms. Be easy to put together some milspec portable VOIP gear - a la www.vocera.com on steroids so the crews could speak with the dismounts.

But instead of big infrastructure changes on the M1, why not just make tactical changes to the fighting unit. A Bradley has [most of] the weapons you guys wanted to put on the M1. If your wingman is a Bradley, you make a killer team. Just a matter of who's on point.

If the street is so small you can't progress together, then level the street ;-)

All weapon systems are compromises. I'd say the M1-A1 makes very few.