Posted on 12/13/2008 2:58:30 PM PST by neverdem
The remote control turret changed the battlefield more than you might think. It all began three years ago, when the U.S. Army realized that new remote control gun turret designs actually worked, and suddenly they could not get enough of them. The army ordered over 9,000 CROWS (common remotely operated weapon stations), but for a while could only get 15 a month. By the end of 2006, there were about a thousand CROWS in service by the end of the year.
The main issue was that the enemy was no longer able to knock out the turret gunner, early in a firefight, and take away a lot of the vehicles firepower. Because of that, once the enemy opens fire, they are in trouble. The remote turret tends to begin delivering accurate fire right away, and is much more immune to enemy fire than a human gunner. If the vehicle is a Stryker, the enemy will soon find themselves dealing with half a dozen or so heavily armed infantry, who get out of the vehicle and come at the ambushers. Iraqis don't like that. They also don't like how some of the CROWS turret equipped vehicles will come after them. All those accurately aimed bullets coming their way, and no enemy soldiers in sight, is demoralizing.
The idea for CROWS has been around for nearly half a century. Years of tinkering, and better technology, eventually made the remote control gun turret effective and dependable. CROWS is a real lifesaver, not to mention anxiety reducer, for troops who drive through bandit country a lot, and have a turret mounted gun (usually in a hummer). The guy manning the turret mounted machine-gun is a target up there, and too often, the bad guys get you. Not with CROWS. The gunner is inside...
(Excerpt) Read more at strategypage.com ...
It's excerpted because I can't capture the links in the fourth and fifth paragraphs when I copied the text from the source code.
The accuracy of the fire, and uncanny speed with which the CROWS gun moves so quickly and deliberately, is due to something few officers expected. The guys operating these systems grew up playing video games. They developed skills in operating systems (video games) very similar to the CROWS controls. This was important, because viewing the world around the vehicle via a vidcam is not as enlightening (although a lot safer) than having your head and chest exposed to the elements, and any firepower the enemy sends your way. But experienced video gamers are skilled at whipping that screen view around, and picking up any signs of danger. Iraqis are amazed at how observant CROWS is. Iraqis tend to just wrote this off as another example of American “magic.”
Many Iraqis, especially the bad guys, get distressed while watching a CROWS turret being exercised by some video game addict inside the vehicle. That’s because the most noticeable part of CROWS, as it swivels and “looks” around, is the machine-gun. Many Iraqis don’t even recognize the vidcam and other sensors. They think the machine-gun is, well, sort of R2D2 with a bad attitude and a license to kill.
The cure for urban traffic jams.
And crowded parking lots.
Indeed, and car-jackers might consider picking a different victim.
How can it be that the vehicles are all covered in mud but not the CROWS?
Thanks for the pic.
Don’t you know? You always keep your weapon clean! And that includes your gun!
wicked pic, stoat.
Your eye for detail is impressive :-)
Perhaps it has to do with the "American Magic" that the article refers to?
Quite a good question....they do look magnificently clean, don't they?
Looks like the ammo tray/belt is pretty exposed. Is this the way the operational unit is rigged?
should be the right medicine for raghead terrorists -- and bass-thumpin' dummycars... '-)
You would have to be a pretty good shot to hit that ammo belt at 300 yards... especially with this thing barking at your forehead to the tune of 450 rounds a minute
OH YEAH
The most interesting thing about that picture is the way the ammo belt has a kink in it but can still feed into the receiver. I would have thought it would have been designed in such a way that the belt was aligned perpendicular to the weapon.
Actually- somebody will correct me if I’m wrong, I think that the ammo belt moves through a protective metal duct, which is what we are seeing here. You could probably dump a bucket of mud over it and it would work fine, less any mud obscuring the video lens.
The lead vehicle seems to have a MK19 grenade launcher on the CROWS. That’s even cooler than the .50, I think.
>> [Iraqis] think the machine-gun is, well, sort of R2D2 with a bad attitude and a license to kill.
Classic! I love it!
I’ll do a treadhead and Stryker ping later if no one beats me to it, have to run to see the godchild in The Nutcracker for now.
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