Multiple Weapons for Armoured Vehicles

[Weaver]

That usage of the CDL makes me wonder what other non-lethal devices might be of use on an urban warfare tank. I like the idea, mentioned in the wiki article on the subject, of flicking the light on and off at irregular intervals so that the opposition's eyes didn't have time to adapt to either the light or the dark...

Blinding searchlight

Loudspeaker? (What would you broadcast? High-pitched squeal maybe?)

Non-lethal anti-personnel grenade. It consists of a box full of rubber balls with a small charge behind them, mounted around the hull. If a crowd clusters around the tank, the grenades can be fired to disperse them, with roughly the effects of rubber bullets (and yes, I know that rubber bullets can be lethal, but the point is they usually arn't..).

As above, but with pepper spray or some other irritant.


I've got an idea for an urban tank for my Patchwork world background, which is basically an old MBT converted for the role. In the manner of the Achzarit, it's old, space-wasting engine is replaced by a more compact and modern one that only uses 2/3 of the width of the original engine bay. However, rather than being used for a rear door, this space is used for an extra crewman who can watch the vehicle's rear and sides though a low-profile cupola and also drive the tank in reverse in an emergency.

[rickshaw]

Personally I would take a fifty cal.  Has anyone here tried to service or reload a 20mm.  The fifty is easier to load and it has single shot capability.  Also you can carry more ammo,  we use to fold up the seats in our M113 and fill the floor with fifty and 7.62 cal ammo cans.

Also anyone think of using a SPG?

Yes.  My suggestion was a casemented vehicle with a fixed, large calibre gun for demolition work in the front with two turrets with MGs to the rear on top in turrets.  Either a .50cal or a .30cal (as this was the late 1950s originally).

Weaver, the use of chemical weapons is generally, politically unpalatable (pun intended) for most nation's, particularly those which are signatories to the various Chemical Weapons Conventions.   As we have seen in Iraq and now Syria, even if used internally (which oddly is legal BTW under those conventions), it is considered somehow dirty/underhanded/unclean.   We all have an aversion to being poisoned, even if with so-called "non-lethal" weapons.

[Weaver]

Weaver, the use of chemical weapons is generally, politically unpalatable (pun intended) for most nation's, particularly those which are signatories to the various Chemical Weapons Conventions.   As we have seen in Iraq and now Syria, even if used internally (which oddly is legal BTW under those conventions), it is considered somehow dirty/underhanded/unclean.   We all have an aversion to being poisoned, even if with so-called "non-lethal" weapons.

I'm talking about pepper spray or tear gas as WIDELY used by police forces all over the world without any serious objection.

[rickshaw]

Weaver, the use of chemical weapons is generally, politically unpalatable (pun intended) for most nation's, particularly those which are signatories to the various Chemical Weapons Conventions.   As we have seen in Iraq and now Syria, even if used internally (which oddly is legal BTW under those conventions), it is considered somehow dirty/underhanded/unclean.   We all have an aversion to being poisoned, even if with so-called "non-lethal" weapons.

I'm talking about pepper spray or tear gas as WIDELY used by police forces all over the world without any serious objection.

Yes, but they are police, you're talking about a military force.  It's at best a grey area.  Under the Protocol for the Prohibition of the Use in War of Asphyxiating, Poisonous or other Gases, and the Bacteriological Methods of Warfare, use of chemical weapons in international conflicts is banned, however that Protocol is generally considered flawed, 'cause it doesn't prohibit their use in internal conflicts/insurrections/rebellions/etc. or production and stockpiling of the weapons for ostensibly "defensive purposes".  It also didn't ban the use of "non-lethal" chemical agents by police or military forces.   Which is why the US claimed it was allowed to use CS and CN agents in Vietnam on the battlefield and why Iraq was also able to claim legal use of lethal agents when they attacked the Kurds.  In both cases they were not, in their opinions engaged in international conflict.  In both cases (and the use of chemical agents by Egypt in Yemen in the 1960s, and other cases), world opinion held otherwise.

The Convention of the Prohibition of the Development, Production, Stockpiling and Use of Chemical Weapons and on their Destruction which replaced it, plugged most of those loopholes.  It banned the production, stockpiling and use of chemical agents by nations.  It also banned the military use of non-lethal agents on the battlefield.  Perhaps most importantly it covered the destruction of existing stockpiles (although, I note that both Russia and the US have failed to meet their 2012 deadlines on complete destruction).   Police use of non-lethal agents are also regulated.

That's in real life of course.   In patchwork world, perhaps there are no or different restrictions on chemical weapons?

[Weaver]

Still plenty of wriggle room there: what about the situation in Iraq after the 2003 invasion? The US was the "occupying power" with responsibility for civil order and the war was "over" so was a response to a riot in a street in Mosul a "military action on a battlefield" or a "police action to preserve law and order"? In either event, I'll bet a pound to a penny that the Iraqis involved would rather have been tear-gassed than machine-gunned.....

Have to say that I find the prohibition on the "military use of non-lethal agents on the battlefield" a bit perverse: are they saying that they'd rather an army shot their opponents or blew them to pieces than made their eyes sting a bit, 'cos that's the only option they're leaving a tank crew surrounded by a hostile but civilian crowd.... 

In Patchwork World there are very few international treaties and they only have as much force as the signatories find to be in their self-interest. There are certainly no rules on chemical weapons, but on the other hand the technology has never had much money spent on it because war in PW is much more pragmatic than apocalyptic: the stakes are rarely thought high enough to employ WMD.

[rickshaw]

Still plenty of wriggle room there: what about the situation in Iraq after the 2003 invasion? The US was the "occupying power" with responsibility for civil order and the war was "over" so was a response to a riot in a street in Mosul a "military action on a battlefield" or a "police action to preserve law and order"? In either event, I'll bet a pound to a penny that the Iraqis involved would rather have been tear-gassed than machine-gunned.....

Have to say that I find the prohibition on the "military use of non-lethal agents on the battlefield" a bit perverse: are they saying that they'd rather an army shot their opponents or blew them to pieces than made their eyes sting a bit, 'cos that's the only option they're leaving a tank crew surrounded by a hostile but civilian crowd.... 

In some ways the whole anti-chemical weapons issue is riddled with inconsistencies and is based a lot on emotions than reality.  Does it really matter how we kill one another?  We still end up dead.  The pro-Chemical Weapons groups (yes, they do exist) often point out that chemical weapons caused fewer casualties for the amount of ground captured than did conventional weapons in WWI.  However, there is a general public abhorrence at the use of poisons of all kinds and it's particularly prevalent in those societies that suffered the most in WWI from chemical weapons which tend to be the biggest supporters of control treaties on the issue (social memories tend to be long and the lines of chemical casualties blinded and choking still stick in many memories).   Even Hitler it is claimed as a victim of gas in WWI was unwilling to use it in WWII because of his personal abhorrence.

As I said, the military use of non-lethal agents is a grey area and there are allowances for military forces to use them in quelling civil disturbances.  So, you could claim that your urban battlewagon was doing that, rather than engaging in a battle with insurgents but that might be quibbling.

In Patchwork World there are very few international treaties and they only have as much force as the signatories find to be in their self-interest. There are certainly no rules on chemical weapons, but on the other hand the technology has never had much money spent on it because war in PW is much more pragmatic than apocalyptic: the stakes are rarely thought high enough to employ WMD.

My understanding is that there never was an equivalent to WWI as no grand alliances have formed, which resulted in an major, existential war, so it is unlikely that you'd see resorting to WMDs.   However, in such a situation, all that is required is for one despot to decide that the stakes were high enough to resort to them and as there are no constraints on such use, they could be quite devastating.   However, weaponising chemical agents is harder than it looks, during WWI both sides only found effective agents through trial and error. 

If you can find a copy of Al Palazzo's excellent work, "Seeking victory on the Western Front: the British army and chemical warfare in World War I", I'd highly recommend it.  It explains in some detail the processes that the British went through to develop what was by the end of the war the most effective chemical attack and defence systems of any of the combatants.   There are some surprising case studies such as a German dug out which was captured after an attack which was overcome with gas and in it the bodies of the occupants were found, each in a successive stage of alarm, response and death as the gas reached them.   One by the entrance without a gas mask, the next attempting to pull his mask from it's container, the next putting his mask on and the last with it on but still overcome by the concentration of gas.  Quite moving really.

[Old Wombat]

Just popping back to the original Centurion-based "urban renewal" tank for a moment...

I've been thinking that a Centurion armed with a 25-pounder gun with redesigned fixed-charge, attached-case ammunition and fitted with a commanders cupola similar to that of the 1953 M48A1 with a .50 cal. (or even a 20 mm firing ball ammo?) anti-sniper weapon would be highly effective in this role. I would be a bit loath to use a vehicle without a turret because tight urban environments could mean an inability to turn the vehicle (&, hence, the gun) fast enough or sufficiently enough to deal with threats or targets located down side streets & alleys.

With this set-up you could engage at least 2 targets simultaneously (a building or crowd with the main gun & a sniper or crowd with the .50 cal/20 mm).

Just a thought; you could also use a breech-loaded mortar as your main weapon, too.



Guy

[rickshaw]

The M48 cupola is one of those good ideas which was let down in execution.   

Designed after the experiences of Korea where tank commanders suffered heavy casualties from Communist small arms when attempting to man their cupola MGs (a lesson which had to be re-learnt in Vietnam for APC commanders), it's problem was that it couldn't have a standard .50cal so they designed a new "shortened" .50cal, the M85 which was once described to me online by a very experienced US tanker in rather uncomplimentary terms.  Apparently it suffered from being impossible to reload in the confined space of the cupola and couldn't lift the ammunition belt anyway, if you did manage to reload it, on top of which it was nearly impossible to cock.   In Vietnam, they often welded a standard .50cal mount on top of the cupola or simply didn't bother with it and replaced the standard co-ax with a .50cal.

Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of giving the tank commander protection when operating his cupola weapon but the M48/M60 cupolas aren't very good (they also added significant height to the vehicle, but that isn't that big a problem in MOUT).  The M1 had a completely different design, with the weapon mounted completely externally which is a better method but still needs to expose the commander to reload.   On reflection, for MOAT I'd go with something like the "penthouse" they had on the M551 Sheridan with overhead cover.  Allows a standard .50cal and plenty of room to operate it and still have protection, particularly from overhead where it's most needed.

[Sauragnmon]

I've a slight suggestion... why does the cupola need to be so restrictive?  Modify the turret ring to fit something akin to the dorsal turret off of something like the Beaufighter, with some armored protection instead of the glass - you can host a machinegun, get rotation and coverage, and far fewer problems.  I think they were worried with the M48 design about silhouette, but if you're in an urban combat situation, that doesn't really matter for a whole hell of a lot.  Alternately, a periscope-equipped early remote-mount might be an option.

[Weaver]

My Patchworld World streetfighter is basically an M10 with much thicker armour and a roof, with an cupola, possibly an M60A2 one, for the commander.

[crudebuteffective]

When i was thinking up street fighter ( hunter VC)the commanders copola was one of the first things that i sorted

hence the spare turret from a saracen which fitted the 1960s time and the job along with the "quick modification" of the story

[Patron Zero]

I did notice the mention of chemical weapons and one type of agent-aerosol was not discussed.     I believe it was in the late 1970s-early 1980s that a program was looked at by the DoD to develop aerosol agents that would clog air filters and turbine assemblies of armored vehicles and helicopters.

Again, no direct material to reference but the concept was a shell was fired from either artillery or armor units to 'fog' the area an advancing enemy would enter, contact with  aerosol agent would gunk up said unit's engines to the point of loss of motive power or cause complete seizure of the power-plant itself.

In my opinion that would be a very welcome 'stand-off' weapon to have in one's inventory in the battlefield.

[royabulgaf]

I remember one idea from a sci-fi story, maybe one of the Hammer's Slammers?  The idea was that the commander would man a weapon from the turret hatch.  At any sign of danger, he would press a panic button, and the seat he was in (presumably belted in) would drop as a spring under tension expanded, drawing the hatch closed. 

[rickshaw]

I did notice the mention of chemical weapons and one type of agent-aerosol was not discussed.     I believe it was in the late 1970s-early 1980s that a program was looked at by the DoD to develop aerosol agents that would clog air filters and turbine assemblies of armored vehicles and helicopters.

Again, no direct material to reference but the concept was a shell was fired from either artillery or armor units to 'fog' the area an advancing enemy would enter, contact with  aerosol agent would gunk up said unit's engines to the point of loss of motive power or cause complete seizure of the power-plant itself.

In my opinion that would be a very welcome 'stand-off' weapon to have in one's inventory in the battlefield.

I could see problems with such an agent.  How do you make it only work on the intakes of vehicles/helicopters and not on the intakes of humans or their gas masks or NBC systems on the vehicles/helicopters?    I cannot see how you'd make an agent only clog mechanical intakes....

[Sauragnmon]

I have a feeling it Would jam those intakes... but they conveniently didn't mention that part, because it's a little bit evil and sadistic, to clog up somebody's gas mask filter and make them choke to death.