Mortars: 51 mm, 60 mm, 81 mm, 120 mm & more

[Old Sweat]

Jesus wept! This thread has been going since 2001 and we are no closer to finding a practical solution now then we were before 1 RCHA sent a mortar platoon with 3 PPCLI to Afghanistan in 2002. Frankly if I was a very senior army type, I would have been largely satisfied with the way the compromise no one really likes is working out. The infantry retained all its companies, the gunners (and sappers) appeared to have filled the vacancy, although I suspect that is more because the Taliban are the third least effective enemy we have ever fought with first and second place going to the Fenians and the Metis. We might have got away with it against the Boers and the various Balkan brigands and the Somalis, but this solution would not have worked so well against the Germans or the Japanese or the Chinese and North Koreans.

So far all I have seen that could be classified as executive action is a plan to use the mortars to make up for the equipment failures with the LG1s and the C3s, and that probably was a grasp at the expediency when doing nothing was finally no longer an option. However given the magnitude of the challenges facing the army leadership, this must rank just above reinstating the swagger stick for officers. In my opinion, LGen Devlin et al have made the best of a frigging bad situation and I challenge you to come up with a py neutral solution that preserves our ability to react to an unforeseen situation while not embarrassing the government and senior levels of the CF and DND by slashing the existing establishment.

To my mind the challenge is beyond solution without a reallocation of personnel from outside the combat arms back to the infantry, and that is as likely as winning the lottery. We now seem to be getting perilously close to double tasking our reserve gunners to augment both the regular field regiments and to field mortar platoons with the same people. In the best traditions of Canadian military intellectual fuzzification we have worked ourselves into a box and locked the lid from the inside and then broke the key off in the lock - and some of this may flow from the I wanna C16 and I have to give up something syndrome.

What have I missed?

 

[Kirkhill]

OS....

Give the LAVs, all 651 of them, with their 1953 Gunners, Drivers and Vehicle Commanders to the RCAC, together with the demand for logistics and mechanics and put those 1953 bodies back into the pool of PYs allocated to the Infantry.  I believe the total infantry allocation is something like 5400 PYs.

1953/5400 = 36%

I find it incredible that the Infantry is allocating 36% of its strength to Motor Transport and Direct Fire Support.

5400 Infanteers are few enough.

An infantry force with less than 1800 riflemen is .... (words do not fail me but polite ones do, especially when that means there are more people riding than on their feet).

 

[Old Sweat]

There is an excellent reason for the infantry not wanting to give the 651 positions to the RCAC and that is the effect on the rank pyramid for both groups. The 651 positions given to the RCAC would be 217 positions per regiment, which would inject a bunch of CWOs on down, not the corporal/privates and a few up that logic would dictate. (That is based on what I saw in the bad old days when even a few people being given to a branch would cause a proportional increase on the walls of the pyramid and not the base.) The RCIC would loose - leaving out ERE and the school, etc - 72 positions per battalion if we treated the 3rd battalions with the others.

That may not be icily logical, but I submit that is how the world works.

And how, by the way, how does that really alter the conundrum of the missing mortarmen and pioneers?

 

[ArmyRick]

Kirkhill,

Not to continue to attack you, but once again your doing number crunching. You are not stepping back and looking at the whole picture. Its more than just number crunching. There is a lack of real will power in the CF to address mortars or assault pioneers for the infantry...

 

[Sprinting Thistle]

I would offer that some of your assumptions are off. 

Not all LAV IIIs are crewed by the infantry.  Only two of three Inf Bns in each of the three Regts have LAV.  Therefore, less than 300 are in use in the Bns.

Some CCs are in fact officers - CO, DCO, OCs, Pl Comds, Coy 2ICs, LAV Capts.

Afghanistan demonstrated that Rifle Coys can and do go into combat without the vehicles - on foot and heli-borne.  In these cases the vehicles were parked in FOBs and the drivers, gunners and crew commanders reverted back to the primary role - dismounted infantry.   

 

[Kirkhill]

Thrust Advisory Group... sounds like an association of porn movie directors.  ;D

Do you know if anyone's looked at the Commando 21 orbat as a possible option? I assume it's too expensive in both weapons and manpower, or something like that. Maybe there's someone on here that saw the RM use it in AFG who can comment on its effectiveness:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_21

http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA509029

D&B:

I think you have to rethink Cdo 21 after the RM formed the RM Armoured Support Group within the 539 Assault Squadron.

The Vikings were tasked out to support the Army as well as the Marines before the Army bought those Singaporean beasts, along with all that Force Protection gear and formed their own Armoured Transport Groups based on the Warthogs and Mastiffs.

The Crews were all Armoured.  The Infantry were just the Pax in the backs.

 

[Kirkhill]

Wow, while I was away it appears that people read what I posted. 

OS - I get what you are saying about logic and reality.  No worries there.

However I was not proposing turning any positions over to the RCAC.  I was merely proposing turning the LAVs over to them and have the RCAC employ them as their primary vehicle.  Full Stop.  This would be in place of the TAPVs and would be complementary to the CCVs and Leo 2s.   

As Sprinting Thistle pointed out I erred on the high side in terms of bodies - arty and engrs get LAVs, some are in the trg system, some are in stock etc.  Equally though, that means that the RCAC doesn't need to find 1953 new bodies to man the LAVs. 

Rick, my comment to D&B with regards to all the Force Protection vehicles in British Service.  They were being used exactly the same way the Royal Marines used the Vikings, the US Marines use their AAVs and the Aussies used to use their M113s.  The Guys in front own their vehicles.  They and their vehicles are attached to infantry units to supply transport as necessary. 

OS, Rick and Thistle,

By my reckoning, even assuming the bill is only for 45 vehicles for each of 6 battalions that represents 135 positions that could be allocated to a Combat Support Company.

Curiously I seem to recall seeing a 2010 ppt that stated that a 599 man battalion was inadequate to support ADOs (adaptive dispersed operations).  Instead the battalion had to grow by 135 to 734 PYs.

Equally interesting is a posting that I can't find just now where the US Airborne was lamenting the amount of gear they had to carry .... a situation made worse because they were only working with 28 man platoons instead of the doctrinal 40 man platoons.

The problem is not unique to us.  Solutions are out there.  They do require new doctrine and TTPs but......

Anyway. 

 

[Old Sweat]

Kirkhill

With all respect, you seem to be doing some single-entry accounting by transferring the responsibility to crew the LAVs to the RCAC, but not providing them with the spaces to come up with the faces to carry out the task. Everything else being equal, I suspect most of us would prefer to see the RCAC do what it is supposed to do - fight in tanks and recce vehicles - rather than providing transport for the GIBs. (For whatever it's worth, over a century ago there was a somewhat parallel debate going on over the role of mounted troops, which I describe as trying to decide if the horse was an infantry carrier or a fighting vehicle.)

The part that we seem unable to resolve is that we do not have the PYs to man dedicated mortar platoons and thus it becomes a secondary duty for the gunners. We can juggle establishment positions, come up with schemes for the reserves to convert to mortars because their guns are broken and all sorts of other stop gap measures, but the cold reality is that we are in a bind. One would also hope that some steely-eyed bean counters would not dig out a document that somebody high up in the food chain signed saying to the effect that the purchase of the C16 will allow us to retire the mortars, which require x positions and are obsolete in any case.  This, of course, would free up a bunch of positions, vehicles, radios etc. (Quite a few years ago I did hear the word obsolete used to describe mortars by a very senior officer, by the way.)

 

[vonGarvin]

The math to allow the infantry to revert to a flexible, combat capable model without wishing away problems to other corps or branches exists.  It is PY neutral, but would be entirely unacceptable due to political reasons.  Without getting into the details the solution would mean going from nine to six regular force battalions.

 

[KevinB]

How about abandoning the regimental approach.

I can find a FY neutral way to grow by making combined arms entities and getting rid of a lot of the admin and staff positions associated with the regimental system...

 

[Sprinting Thistle]

More PY reductions are coming next year.  Sadly, within the Army, the largest target for reductions is the Inf Corps.  C4ISR, Bde and BG HQs, and other combat enablers all need to be PRICIE'd, and resourced if needed. 

Coincidentally the RCAF is seeking a rather large number of PYs.  If they get them, these PYs will have to come from another environment. 

 

[dapaterson]

The RCAF has been directed to provide certain capabilities (Chinooks, an expeditionary air wing, UAVs) and is now being provided the PYs to do so from a variety of sources - including divestments ordered under the strategic review.  No nefarious plan there.

The Army on the other hand, was given a significant number of new PYs when the Reg F expanded but never came up with a "good enough" plan, instead doling them out in drips and drabs, constantly tinkering around the edges, making it difficult to recruit and train, since the full picture was never out there - and as always the more technical trades were the last to be identified.  In good project speak, the long-lead time items were identified last.

The expansion of the Army is large collection of lessons learned for how not to do things.

 

[Kirkhill]

Continuing

ST:

Find attached below a vehicle distribution plan (obsolete - it refers to the TAPV (Recce and GU)) that makes your case wrt the actual allocation of vehicles.  I agree.  1953 PYs is high.  But there are at least 240 x 3 = 720 PYs to be gained - 864 if the 48 CCVs are also included.  More if the 14 Tonne TAPVs, which cannot be lifted by Chinook, in the Light Battalions are included.

OS:

And I expect there were some Egyptians muttering amongst themselves about having to climb into Ramses's wicker work contraptions and go and face those solidly built wood and iron Hittite chariots that carried an extra man. And that were back 3300 years ago.  "We're all gonnae die" is not a new concept. 

Yes.  I am expecting the RCAC to pick up the PYs.  But, according to the same planning document cited above, and attached below it appears that I am not the only one who believes the RCAC is short of vehicles for their available PYs.  You say the RCAC should be driving Tanks and conducting Recce.  I couldn't agree more.  But the plans described below call for the RCAC to be reduced to 2 Tank squadrons and 3 or 4 Recce squadrons.  Up to 7 Squadrons are described, even with their share of the TAPVs, as having NO Eqpt.

Meanwhile the infantry is mucking around in 35 Tonne CCVs, 25 Tonne LAV-Ups and 14 Tonne TAPVs that weigh as much as the existing LAVs and more than the Bisons.

I will accept that that was a now ancient planning document but it demonstrates, to my mind, a confused mindset and an inefficient allocation of resources. 

I would also point out that, as T2B, has noted, even with current plans the RCAC is planning on fielding mixed patrols that are Half and Half LAV and TAPV. Why not just use LAVs through out?  What does a TAPV supply that a LAV / LAV-LRSS can't?

Further, the RCAC Reserves are cooling their heels trying to figure out what to do with themselves.  Why can't LAVs, apparently they are easy to operate (infanteers can do it as a part-time job  > ) and maintain (infantry battalions apparently don't need the echelon that the RCAC considers essential), why can't LAVs be held at the ATCs for Reserve use?

The LAV would supply the RCAC with a fully functional Recce platform that would equip all of their squadrons, would engage their reserve troops AND could be used by the RCAC as expedient transport for the infantry.

The CCVs (and possibly BvS10s) could be acquired as alternate mounts for the RCAC to be employed depending on environment.


TV:  So the DS solution is to create a CA of 9 Lt Armd Regts, 6 of whom will wear Infantry capbadges and occasionally get out of their vehicles to fight on foot?  I can't see how that contributes to a full spectrum force.  If nothing else, who is going to get into the back of all those wonderful Chinooks we just bought?  Isn't this the same set up that led to getting rid of the original Chinooks in the first place?

And ST....

With respect to additional PY losses by the CA in general and the infantry in particular...............disregard all previous. 

"We're all gonnae die" (With apologies to George MacDonald Fraser in Quartered Safe Out Here).

Edit:  Conversely military history is replete with examples of people doing "more with less" - both through battlefield and political attrition (British Army campaigns of 1917 demonstrated both types of attrition).

 

[PPCLI Guy]

How about abandoning the regimental approach.

I can find a FY neutral way to grow by making combined arms entities and getting rid of a lot of the admin and staff positions associated with the regimental system...

The Regimental HQs are PY neutral, as the PYs come out of the Bns.

 

[dapaterson]

LAVs at ATCs = need for more maintainers at ATCs.  (And we're already short at the ASUs - need more there as well).  Where shall we source those PYs from?

 

[SeaKingTacco]

NDHQ?

And who says maintainers at an ATC need to be military?  Or even DND employees? 

Yes- I know all to well he pitfalls of contractors.  I'm just saying that the elephant in the roomis the use of the C2 element in Ottawa, in proportion to the rest of the CF.

 

[dapaterson]

From what I have seen there is intense awareness of the size of the military component of NDHQ and a desire to bring it more into line.

And DND is in the midst of shedding contractors as well as public servants - so PYs of some sort need to be repurposed (Mil or Civ); hiring more contractors is not a viable COA.


...or appetites need to be suppressed and a realistic, supportable force model needs to be designed, that will not be all-singing, all-dancing.

 

[Old Sweat]

:deadhorse:


And what do the last few posts tell us about the chances of freeing up the PYs to bring back the mortar and pioneer platoons anytime soon?


:deadhorse:

 

[KevinB]

The C2 or C4I or C4ESI or whatever nodes need to be trimmed everywhere not just Ottawa as well.

 

[SeaKingTacco]

My point is:

With a strength of Reg Force strength of 68,000 ( more or less), maybe we could be a bit more general combat power focused and a bit less " boutique capability" focused.