Author Archives: parvusimperator

M&P 2.0 Range Reports

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Alas, I am not (yet) an important member of the Gun Media to warrant getting my hands on weapons that are so new as to be unreleased yet. But I have friends who are. Let’s look at what Top Men think of the M&P 2.0. My overview of the design can be found here.

Our sources really liked the new grip texture. They said it was good enough to not require modification out of the box. Your mileage may vary, since everyone’s tastes are different, but that’s a big improvement. The stock M&P 1.0 pistols have pretty slick grips.

The trigger was always going to be the $64,000 question. And our sources say it’s much improved. Likely totally redesigned. It’s got a very “Apex-like” feel, with much less of a mushy feeling, and a crisper reset. It also felt lighter than an M&P 1.0 trigger. They also got some time on a Performance Center version which had an even nicer trigger and a red dot. This version performed very well.

Accuracy at distance, even with wind, was good. Small sample size, but this is a good sign that S&W has fixed the accuracy issues. We can certainly hope.

I’m hoping S&W gets its act together and makes a good pistol. Competition drives market improvements. Also, note that the M&P series is second only to Glock in terms of aftermarket support, and whoever’s in third place doesn’t come close. M&Ps have a pretty decent lineup of accessories and training aids. So it’s good if they can keep their product solid.

Design Compromises: A Case Study

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Every design is a compromise. There are no free lunches. And trying to work out the why can be very informative. So let’s take a look at one of my favorite tanks, the M1 Abrams, and look at some design compromises, and their results. Since it’s very nearly equivalent, and designed at about the same time, I will use the Leopard 2 as a point of comparison. The Leopard 2 is somewhat more conventional internally in a few subtle ways.

The most obvious difference is the engines. Both designs have 1,500 hp engines, but where the Leopard 2 uses a pretty conventional twin-turbo V12 diesel, the Abrams uses a gas turbine. This gives the Abrams better acceleration, but also necessitates a greater internal fuel capacity. Where the Leopard 2 can get away with 1,200 L of fuel stowage, the Abrams needs about 1,900 L to meet its (shorter) range requirements. More fuel means more space. We can note that the Abrams has fuel tanks on either side of the driver, in addition to in various other places. The Leopard 2 does not have fuel stored up front in the hull.

The hull front on the Leopard 2 is used to store ammo in a pretty conventional rack. There’s not much in the way of blast venting provision here, so a penetration would be extremely bad news. That said, this is a pretty common place to store reserve ammo1, and hull hits are much less likely than turret hits. Still, from a survivability perspective, this is clearly not ideal.

The Abrams designers were able to shoehorn a few (six 120mm rounds, more of the smaller 105mm rounds) into a compartment aft by the engine, because of the shape of the gas turbine power pack. This rear ammo compartment has blow-out panels and a heavy door to isolate it from the crew compartment, but it’s not a lot of reserve ammo. The Abrams carries the vast majority of its ammo in the turret bustle. On the one hand, this makes subdivision easy. It’s a simple engineering exercise to add blow-out panels to the bustle, and this makes the Abrams among the most survivable tanks in the world.

Storing 34 120mm rounds in the bustle has its disadvantages. It forces a wide turret. Turret height is determined by the desired maximum gun depression, and a wide, tall turret means the armored volume is correspondingly large. The Abrams has considerably more armored volume than the Leopard, both in relative terms (i.e. crew space), and in absolute terms. Because so much of the Abrams’ ammo load is in the turret, there’s a significant amount of armor protecting the side of the turret bustle. More volume means it takes more weight to provide the same level of protection. Or, you have to use more expensive exotic materials (like depleted uranium).

On the other hand, more internal volume is another survivability gain. Armor penetrations are less likely to cause significant casualties or destroy enough systems to score a mission kill simply because there’s more volume to deal with, and volume leads to dispersion, which is the enemy of the shaped charge jet.

To be honest, on these grounds I prefer the survivability over protection. Protection can be added, but it’s much harder to do a redesign in favor of survivability.

We can see another difference in the guns on the latest models. Since the M1A1, the Abrams has been equipped with a license built Rheinmetall 120mm/L44 gun, just like Leopard 2s up to the A5 model. Subsequently, the Germans went to a longer L55 gun for more penetrating power. The Americans have not. So what gives?

Recall that Americans like their depleted uranium. The Germans don’t. Something something environment or something. Anyway, depleted uranium makes awesome armor. It also makes awesome armor piercing rounds. The Americans have done a good job of sinking plenty of R&D funding into new depleted uranium APFSDS rounds. They’re up to a fifth iteration of the design with the M829A4 round. So when adapting a longer barreled gun proved more costly than anticipated in the 90s due to stabilization issues, the US Army quietly dropped the project and stuck with their fancy rounds.

I don’t know if the Leopard 2 didn’t have the same stabilization issues as the Abrams with the longer gun, or if the Germans were just unwilling to change round composition. Regardless, the Germans adapted a longer gun. It means they can use tungsten-based APFSDS rounds, but it also means they will have somewhat more restricted mobility in urban environments.

For this one, six of one, half a dozen of the other. I’m indifferent here, provided both are available. I do wonder if the DU rounds will also perform better in the L55 gun, or if they’re optimized for the L44.

I suppose I should also comment on the engines. I strongly suspect that the Germans made the right choice here with the conventional V12 diesel, though I would strongly prefer an air-cooled model like the AVDS-17902. It’s possible the gas turbine just hasn’t gotten enough development funds, but a diesel engine company can push research into the civilian sector to recoup costs there, in addition to the military. I also approve of forward fuel tanks, and don’t approve of forward ammo stowage. Remember, well-designed fuel tanks provide reasonable supplemental protection.

1.) It’s also used on the Leclerc, K2, and Challenger 2, among others. Doesn’t mean I like it.
2.) Early versions powered the M60 Patton, and the 1,200 hp variant powers the Namer. A 1,500 hp variant is available.

Hudson H9

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For a little bit on Hudson’s no-show at SHOT 2019, and court documents relating to same, go read this article.

It’s being teased, and it’s coming at SHOT, so let’s talk about it. The Hudson H9. Or, what happens when a 1911 and a Glock get drunk one night.

It’s a striker-fired, metal-framed, double-stack pistol. It’s got a sliding trigger, which should feel good. It has an ambi slide release, may have an ambi safety variant (prototypes had one, all the teaser shots don’t), and a conventional rotating takedown lever. And it’s got a weird front end. It appears (and patent drawings seem to back up this) that the really low dustcover and bizarre front end is to put the recoil spring assembly and rotating take-down lever in front of the trigger rather than above it. This would lower the bore axis, which would lower the recoil vector to be more in line with your hand.

And now, a brief aside to step into one of the many minefields of gun discussions, bore axis. Bore axis is how far the center of the barrel is from the web of your hand. It’s also commonly either overblown into “GUNZ WITH A HIGH BORE AXIS ARE TEH UNSHOOTABLE!!1!” or ignored with a “GIT GUD, N00b!!!!” As usual when morons get to keyboards, both parties should be ignored. Clearly, physics tells us there is something to bore axis worth thinking about. It’s why we try to get a grip as high as possible up on the gun. To be closer to the recoil force vector. That works. Every reasonably good pistol shooter knows that works. So all things being equal, a lower bore axis is better. But it’s not a huge deal, because even guns that commonly are called out for a “high bore axis” are still pretty shootable. A higher bore axis will put more emphasis on your recoil control technique in your grip, if you care about fast follow up shots. It’s a thing, but it’s not the be-all, end-all of pistol design.

So a super low bore axis, because we’ve moved some important operating components out of the way, is going to be good for quick follow up shots and gamer-ness. Sweet. Plus, that metal (steel?) frame is going to soak up recoil like a sponge. Again, great for the gamers. And sliding triggers feel really good, and are easier to push straight back to the rear, all other things being equal. Presuming it’s not a stupid-heavy trigger, that should also be great.

Oh, and it’ a proper double-stack, single-feed magazine. You know, like a Glock, or just about any other full-size pistol that isn’t a 1911 these days. It’s a rather fat looking magazine too. List capacity is 15 rounds, at least according to the website. I was hoping for more before going to extenders, maybe 20. Oh well. I’ll live.

From an engineering standpoint, this thing looks like a real winner. So let’s talk outstanding questions:

  1.  Magazines. They’re a new design. Are they reliable? Will they be easy to come by? What will they cost?
  2. Sight Dovetails. Is this a new design, or something established. Hopefully it’s a standard dovetail so we don’t have to wait to see if the pistol is popular before looking for other sight options.
  3. Grip panels. Basically everything I said about dovetails. Are these a new grip panel design? Grips are a bit cheaper to fab, I think, so maybe those designs will come quicker if this is a new thing.
  4. Reliability. Hello 800 lbs. gorilla in the room. Have you done your homework, Hudson? Does this damn thing run and run and run? Or do we have an heir apparent to the Throne of the Feedway Stoppage?

So on the one hand, color me skeptical. On the other hand, I don’t know Hudson’s financial backing or engineering team. So I don’t know what kind of backing we’re looking at. On the one hand, pushing the envelope has gotten us things like Kel-Tec, makers of impossible-to-find vaporware guns, Boberg nonsense that pulls bullets apart, and the ‘recall all the things’ Caracal.

On the other hand, let’s also not forget that Glock was once revolutionary and weird for trying to make a frame out of plastic, and look where it’s got them.

There are a lot of ‘revolutions’ in the gun world that have gone nowhere. And a few that have taken off, and some that just kinda hang around unnoticed. We’ll see what this one brings.

As for my opinion of the H9, well, I am a cynical sort. I’ve already got a lot of really nice pistols. I’ll wait for the initial reviews and reserve judgment. I do like flat-shooting guns, but I generally don’t like being a beta tester. So we’ll see.

See more on range reports from SHOT here!

S&W M&P 2.0

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It may have lost the US Army’s competition, but it’s coming to a gun store near you! The Smith and Wesson M&P M2.0 is being teased with videos and press coverage.

Offhand, it looks like they took the M&P that everyone loved and fixed the major gripes. Let’s review:

  1. The M&P had a stupidly smooth grip texture. No more! The M2.0 has a properly aggressive looking texture
  2. The M&P factory trigger is crap. Parts from Apex are required to bring it to the level of a *factory* Glock. NO MORE! The M2.0 is teasing a better trigger.
  3. Users who like pushing their pistols beyond 10 yards sometimes complained of poor accuracy. No more! S&W is teasing accuracy improvements
  4. Users like front cocking serrations, but the M&P didn’t have them, necessitating expensive custom milling. No more! The M2.0 has front cocking serrations from the factory

Admittedly on 2 and 3 we have to take their word for it until review copies drop. So I wouldn’t buy this without looking at a bunch of reviews from places that don’t mind being critical. It still has the option of a manual safety, if that’s your thing, and it has those great M&P ergonomics.

That said, it’s facing a lot of stiff competition from the VP9, PPQ, P320, and the new CZ P10. Plus, the Glock 17M/19M that won the FBI contract are likely to be dropping this year too.

As with any other pistol, I would be reluctant to buy the first few copies. I prefer to let other people find bugs that slipped past initial testing if at all possible. But that’s me.

UPDATE: Read about early reports from the range here.

Litmus Testing

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As an armchair military theorist, I am not burdened by an obligation to tradition or entrenched interests. Similarly, I do not have an actual army to test ideas on with exercises or actual combat. And there’s always the temptation to think ourselves (as armchair theorists) better than the real staff officers of the world.

We may or may not be. But I think there’s something to be said about conventional wisdom. Conventional wisdom is conventional for a damn good reason. Just as cliches are cliches for a damn good reason too. In both cases an idea has survived repeated testing over time. We can conclude that it should be pretty good. Maybe not great, but certainly not bad.

So while the temptation to think we are the Basil Liddell Hart reincarnate, and that we somehow Know Better (TM) than every other military in the world is great, when we do we’re almost certainly being delusional. Avoid the temptation!

I’m often a conventional sort of guy, and there’s nothing wrong with that. Often, if you put a little effort into it, you can often come up with some of the same reasons real armies stay with the boring. Let’s look at a couple of our crazier ideas:

Heavy Infantry Fighting Vehicles. This one is dangerous. Both the US and German armies had designs for heavy (about 62 tonne) IFVs in the early 90s. Both moved away from that plan, likely on cost and deployability grounds. So, much as I like this one (it’s even mine), it’s suspect on those grounds. Cost is annoying because it’s so hard to get a handle on cost at the best of times. Do note that the (US) Government Accountability Office study into the GCV and alternatives rated the Namer as considerably more expensive than the already costly Puma, to the point where even though you’d need more Pumas for a platoon, going with Pumas is the cheaper option.1

Fishbreath’s Ka-50. Yes, the Ka-50 is fun to fly in DCS. But the Russians haven’t been willing to put money into the single seat version, Kamov has made two-seat versions for the export market, and even those haven’t sold. So I strongly suspect that there are fundamental issues there, though I’m not enough of a helicopter expert to precisely identify them.

So there you have it. We’re not immune. We all think we’re brilliant. It’s totally fine to think outside the box, but do your homework. And be suspicious of ‘brilliant’ innovations that no one else has gone for.

As a side note, this is why I was so happy to hear these news updates. Time to see how some of my theories turn out in the real world.

1.) GAO reckoned that Pumas would cost $6.9 million and Namers would cost $11 million, and that each US Army mechanized platoon would require either four Namers or five Pumas. Personally, I’d go with three Namers or four Pumas, but either way, the fantastically expensive German IFV winds up cheaper, presuming the cost estimates are correct. Also note that the GCV was more expensive than either at $13.5 million, which probably bodes ill for the affordability of a heavy IFV, seeing as it needs weapons and fancy optics like the Puma and tons of armor like the Namer.

On Squad Automatic Weapons

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When equipping that base unit of infantry, the squad, with automatic weapons for support fires, there are two schools of thought. These are the magazine-fed ‘automatic rifle’ vs. the belt-fed ‘light machine gun’. In World War 2 terms, this might be seen as the BAR/Bren vs the MG-42. We can see the same question being asked today, with the US Marine Corps using the M27 IAR, and the US Army using the M249. Let’s look at these options.

First, the M249. Made by FN, this is a belt-fed weapon. Unlike the M240, the M249 is chambered for the same 5.56×45 mm round as the squad’s M4s. It is also generally considered to be operable by one man. No assistant gunner required. It has a quick-change barrel to facilitate sustained fire and help deal with heat buildup. It can be operated from 100 or 200 round belts. It weighs 17 lbs empty and 24 lbs loaded with a 200 round belt in a plastic box (sans optics). It has an integral bipod, and is most effective when fired from the prone position with the bipod for stability and support.

Second, the M27. Made by HK, this is a magazine-fed weapon. It is also intended to be operated by one man. While it has a relatively heavy barrel profile, it lacks a quick change barrel. It can only be loaded with standard detachable box magazines. While there are some higher capacity magazines on the market1, the US Marines currently only issue the standard 30 round box magazines. These are the same as what the rest of the squad uses for their M4s, so there’s some commonality there. Weight is 7.9 lbs empty, and a bit less than 9 lbs loaded with a 30 round box magazine (again, sans optics or other accessories).

Note that both weapons fire the same 5.56 mm round. So effective range and lethality are roughly equivalent. Specifics will depend on the skill of the shooter and the round being fired. I will not discuss this further.

It is also true that the M249 has a greater capacity for sustained fire than the M27. Even the M27’s proponents agree there.

A more useful question is “Is the greater suppressive capability of the M249 outweighed by what you give up?” The M27 is less than half the weight of the M249 (even after we add appropriate optics and other accessories to each weapon). The M27 is a more accurate weapon than the M249. The M27 can be used in a stack for room clearing, whereas the M249 cannot due to safety concerns stemming from its open bolt mechanism and the bulk of the weapon. Weight and bulk also means that the M249 gunner is harder pressed to keep up with the other members of his squad.

Let’s also briefly talk ammo weight. The basic load of a SAW gunner is 1,000 rounds, or five 200 round boxes, which comes out to about 35 lbs. It takes thirty four 30 round magazines to get about the same number of rounds,2 and that weighs about 34 pounds. Note that by-the-book loads for the M27 IAR gunners in a USMC squad vary from 16 to 21 magazines (480-630 rounds). Variance due to the weapon being new, and TTPs being worked out. That’s 16-21 lbs of ammo. This neatly side steps the question of weight of the spare barrel assembly for the M249, but I can’t find its weight. Assume several more pounds of weight for the barrel assembly, if it is carried. If it is not carried, then the quick-change barrel feature is not useable, and sustainable rates of fire will be lower. However, they will still be significantly higher than those of the M27.

There’s also a temptation we should avoid when considering infantry tactics. While it is easiest to ponder loadouts one organizational level at a time and build from the smaller levels to the bigger ones, we should remember that the smaller ones don’t fight alone. A squad is not going to be running around the battlefield on its own. Ad hoc room-clearing units can be assembled from the manpower from a few squads in a platoon without difficulty. If flexibility is desired, additional carbines can be stowed aboard the squad’s organic transport.3 We have lots of assault rifles already, which look an awful lot like the automatic rifles in question.

The most important matter, whether the greater sustained fire rate of the M249 means it is a more effective suppression weapon than the M27, is not something I have the means to test. I would question most tests of suppression on the grounds of failing to adequately simulate combat. Setting aside the intangibles, not having a belt-fed weapon in the squad does not have a good historical record for staying power. Let’s review it:

  • In World War 2, the US Army and US Marine Corps both had BARs as their squad-level automatic weapon. They considered a new Automatic Rifle version of the M14, but declined, and switched to the belt-fed M60 (and later the M249).
  • In World War 2, the British Army had the Bren gun, which is also more or less an automatic rifle, being fed from a magazine. The replacement for the Bren Gun was the L7, which is a licensed version of the FN MAG.4
  • In the 1980s, the British attempted to put a new 5.56 mm automatic rifle, the L86, into service to compliment their new 5.56 mm assault rifle. Caliber commonality. They were dissatisfied with the loss of firepower in the squad, and switched to using the FN Minimi as the squad automatic weapon.
  • The Germans had plenty of experience fighting American troops equipped with BARs in World War 2. The German soldiers were armed with the MG42. The American soldiers wanted MG42s instead of their BARs. The German soldiers agreed with them. They did not think the grass was greener on the other side of the fence, and stuck with the MG42 (rechambered for 7.62×51 mm NATO as the MG3).
  • The Russians built a belt-fed 7.62×39 mm machine gun, the RPD, to compliment the AK-47. It lacked a quick-change barrel, and proved to be unsatisfactory. They replaced it with the RPK, an automatic rifle version of the AK-47. They stuck with it through the caliber change to 5.45×39 mm. The Russians are very doctrinally disciplined. Once the Russians hit actual combat in Afghanistan, again the automatic rifle proved unsatisfactory and soldiers exchanged their RPK-74s for belt-fed PKMs (chambered in 7.62x54R mm). This happened again in combat in Chechnya. The belt-fed weapon was favored over the magazine-fed weapon for support purposes, even though it was heavier and bulkier. Russia is moving (albeit slowly, for want of money) towards equipping mechanized forces with PKP machine guns as squad support weapons. In the meantime, the PKM sees lots of service in that role.

There is a clear trend towards real combat driving the use and purchase of belt-fed weapons at the squad level. The US Marine Corps is bucking the historical trend, which gives me pause. The US Marine Corps tends to favor large, 13-man squads, and doesn’t fight mechanized. This might influence their decision somehow. The US Army, which uses 9 man squads (more similar to other powers at present), and does fight mechanized, has not followed the Corps in switching out M249s for M27s. Given the firepower and limited dismount capacity of the M2 Bradley, this switch would seem attractive for them. Perhaps they don’t agree with the conclusion of the USMC tests which said the M27 was better at suppression.

Without knowing the details, I could not possibly comment on the tests. Offhand, we’d want to make sure we weren’t favoring the M27s in test parameters, or putting new M27s against old, well-used, and worn-out M249s.

Here the Corps and I part ways. I much prefer a belt-fed machine gun or two at the squad level. Given the choice between the M27 and the M249 to support a squad, I’ll take the M249 every time. Belts all the way. Sometimes heavy is best.

1.) Magpul makes a 40 round box and a 60 round drum magazine, and Surefire makes a 60 round and a 100 round quad-stack box magazine. There are a bunch of others, but these come to mind first for being quality. That said, when the M27 was adopted, the USMC did not find any existing 100 round magazines to be reliable. I am unsure of their test protocol or which magazines were tested (or if 40/50/60 round magazines were considered).
2.) This works out to 1,020 rounds, but mais n’enculons pas des mouches.
3.) Admittedly I’m a big fan of mechanized infantry, but is there any army worth talking about that doesn’t provide some form of motorized transport for its infantry units?
4.) The American M240 is also a licensed FN MAG.

More Conclusions From Gun School

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Some more not so night-oriented follow ups. For the first part, go here. These are from two separate classes, because I’ve had some busy weekends of late.

Overall, I was really happy with the equipment I had. I had added the Vickers extended mag catch to my Glock 34 and it worked great. I had no problems with mags falling when I didn’t want them to, and it was much quicker to drop the mag. Also, love the Warren fiber optic sights on it. These got some compliments from other students.

I expected that having brought good night gear, and having managed to avoid fondling the IDPA Master Class shooter’s 2011, I would not come home wanting more stuff. As you might have guessed, this was incorrect.

I got some time with some other people’s custom Glocks. One of the instructors had a G19 with the grip professionally reduced and stippled. The finger grooves were removed. I don’t ordinarily find the Glock finger grooves all that objectionable, and I like the standard Gen4 texture, but this customized 19 felt even better. I was really impressed. Guess some Glocks might get sent out. He got his worked on by Fire 4 Effect weapons. This is one of those things that I really had to feel to be convinced of.

The other thing that was around that I wanted to try was a flat-face trigger. The specific trigger in question was the Apex Flat Glock trigger. Again, I never would have thought enough of one to try, even though a bunch of friends like theirs. But getting some time with one makes me want to give one a try. I found it helped with consistent trigger finger placement, and a consistent, correct trigger press.

Last Time at Gun School, I learned firsthand that full size guns shoot easier than subcompacts. The sort of thing that you always knew, but it’s nice to have demonstrated. This time, we had a female student with small hands have trouble getting a good grip around her Glock 19. Her hands were rather small for the gun, and this made shooting from a draw tricky. A good grip reduction, or a pistol with a smaller grip size might have been helpful here. I didn’t get much details on this one, so I can’t comment on what could have helped beyond that.

We had a student change guns on day 2 because he felt like it. Feelings, ugh. Anyway, he changed from an M&P9 without a manual safety to a SiG P226 SAO with a manual safety. Yup, you guessed it, he forgot to disengage it a bunch. I don’t really have much opinion on the manual safety one way or another, but it’s better to be consistent in your training one way or another. If you want to “try” something new, take it to the entire class.

We did some drills with other people’s guns. This was mostly uneventful, except for the one guy who brought an FNX-45. My hands were big enough that I had no problem reaching everything. It’s a double action semiautomatic, so there were two trigger pulls to mess with. I found the double action pull to be long, heavy, and annoying. A strong grip helped me fight through it. The transition to the shorter, lighter single action pull (with much less trigger reach) was the more problematic part, interestingly. Between the lame trigger that I’m not used to and the big .45 rounds through a polymer-framed gun, my times went all to hell with the FNX. Was it usable in “fight with what you find” drills? Sure. Still not my preference, though this is hardly an outstanding example of the type. It might have been a different story with the CZ Shadow that someone brought but didn’t use. In general, one should try to stick with what one knows.

Another student had a PPQ with the longslide and the 5″ barrel. For the drills we were doing with strict, challenging par times and tough accuracy requirements, the PPQ excelled. Coming off of the FNX and going to the PPQ was like a revolution. It made the drills seem easy. The PPQ’s trigger is remarkably tolerant of slackening grip. However, when you bear down on it properly, the “flippiness” that I noticed in my review turns into fast times back into battery.

There were many Glock 17s and an M&P9 with aftermarket triggers. Also very nice. I’m starting to see a pattern here. Jeff Cooper said perhaps the first thing we should ask of a carry gun is that it should be unfair.

My second class had some real crappy weather to it. Day one was about 48 degrees, and rainy, with the temperature dropping and the rain eventually turning to snow around 1430. Day two was about 27 degrees, with light snow all day. The ground didn’t have a chance to freeze overnight, so what was a quagmire on day one turned into the Argonne on day two. I need better water-resistant cold weather gear, better boots, and some shooting gloves. While Grandpa didn’t need no gloves at Bastogne in ’44, I’m sure he would have liked some. One can make do, and I’m proud I did. It is better to be prepared.

Remember the 7th

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Seventy five years ago today, the United States Naval Base at Pearl Harbor was attacked by the Empire of Japan.

I could say a lot more on the matter, but I am merely an amateur analyst. Instead, listen to the stories of some men who were there, courtesy of C-SPAN.

Stories, Part 1

Stories, Part 2

Perhaps they are the lucky ones to have survived. Perhaps not–they lost a lot of friends that day.

Let’s spare a thought and a prayer for the men who gave their lives that day. And for those who had to wait so long to see their brothers in arms again.

BVRAAM

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The Beyond Visual Range Air to Air missile is a critical munition in any air force arsenal. At first it might seem easy for a western air force. Call Raytheon, order up the latest version of the AIM-120 AMRAAM, and then call it a day and have a beer. Is it really that easy? Let’s take a look.

The AIM-120 AMRAAM was the world’s first missile with an active radar seeker, and it has become the world standard. It was designed to replace the AIM-7 Sparrow semi-active radar homing missile. It features improved range, and a way-cool seeker. The Sparrow’s semi-active radar seeker requires an external source of radar to illuminate the target, usually the firing aircraft. So the aircraft has to keep flying more-or-less towards the target while the Sparrow is in flight. This strongly limits the evasive maneuvering possibilities of the launch aircraft. If the radar lock is broken, the missile becomes a useless ballistic projectile.

The AMRAAM is different. It has an inertial guidance component for the initial run towards the target. It can be updated by radar from the launch aircraft. Then, when it gets close enough to the target, it turns on the active radar seeker. This has it’s own radar, so the launch aircraft is free to turn away from the target aircraft. It’s a big improvement. The seeker can also home on jamming if the target aircraft tries to jam it.

Okay, so that’s cool. The rest of the AMRAAM is pretty typical: it’s a single-pulse solid fuel rocket. So once you light it, it burns until the fuel is gone, and only burns once. This means that during most of the intercept it’s coasting. There are also dual-pulse rockets which relight later, which helps chase down a maneuvering target. But those are more expensive, and while there’s been a lot of discussion about putting one on the AMRAAM, that still hasn’t happened yet. The AIM-120D gets its improved range from improved guidance algorithms and GPS-aided navigation. Cool. The question becomes: can we do better.

We’ll need to take a brief interlude here to define a term: the no-escape zone. This is the range in which a target can’t escape a missile by outrunning it. Outside of the no-escape zone, a fighter can turn away and light afterburners and the missile will be unable to catch it. Within the no-escape zone is not a guaranteed kill, it merely forces the fighter to maneuver aggressively to force the missile to miss.

Anyway, the Europeans have designed something nice for once in an effort to do better, and are actually getting it to market in a sort of timely fashion. This is the MBDA Meteor AAM. It’s noteworthy for two reasons. First, it has a datalink for midcourse guidance updates from the launch aircraft, which improves the accuracy of the midcourse phase of the flight at longer ranges. More importantly, it has a snazzy new engine. This is a “throttleable ducted rocket” also known as an “air-augmented rocket,” but it’s easiest to think of it as a hybrid solid-fuel rocket/ramjet motor. Like a rocket, it can give useful thrust from zero speed. Like a ramjet, it can also pull in outside air, and has no moving parts. This means it gets way more burn time from its motor, which means that it has a much bigger no-escape zone. Even the way-cool guidance algorithms in the -120D can’t get around the fact that the Meteor has a more advanced engine that provides more oomph. The Meteor isn’t that much bigger than the AMRAAM either, at least as far as length and weight. It might take some doing to get it certified for internal carriage on the F-35 though.

So where does that leave us? The Meteor is the better missile, with the bigger price tag. We’d say it’s worth it though, especially to get those early shots in on Flankers. We’ll have to spend some money to get it qualified on legacy platforms, but that’s totally worth it for the leg up on potential enemies. It’ll be interesting to see if the AMRAAM ever gets that improved motor.

CAS Aircraft Throwdown: A-10C vs. Su-25T

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Fishbreath and I have spent lots of time studying these aircraft and flying them in DCS. They represent two different philosophies for air support, the clash between ‘push’ from the top and ‘pull’ from the bottom. Plus, they represent some different design philosophies. We’ve talked about these two planes already, but let’s break everything down and see how they compare directly. Features are in no particular order.

WEAPONS:
We’ll break these down by type, and then tally up an overall score for this section.

GUN: A-10C
This is no contest. The A-10C has the GAU-8A, which is the most powerful flying gun around. It’s got better AP rounds than the GSh-30-2, and more than five times as many rounds in the magazine (1,174 rounds as opposed to 250). The A-10C has some nifty pilot aids to stabilize the aircraft on a gun run too, but the Su-25T just leaves you to your own lack of skill. Interestingly, the Su-25T also doesn’t have enough dispersion built into it’s gun. The A-10’s designers recognized that being exactly on target is very hard, so the gun has some built in dispersion to give you a margin of error, which makes it a lot easier to hit things.

ROCKETS: Su-25T
This is also no contest. The Russians like their rockets, and have a wider variety of sizes available. Even if we restrict to the standard small rockets (Russian 80mm S-8 and American 70mm Hydra 70), the Russians have a wider variety of warheads available, including exotics like thermobarics.

UNITARY BOMBS: A-10C
Both have the ability to drop laser guided bombs, plus plenty of dumb bombs. The A-10C can drop JDAMs (GPS guidance). The Su-25T can’t drop Russian GLONASS-guided bombs, but they do have the ability to drop bombs with the Electro-optical guidance system (they have a -Kr suffix). That said, the A-10C has glide bomb options, and the Su-25T doesn’t, giving the ‘Hog some excellent cheap standoff attack options. Glide bombs rock.

CLUSTER BOMBS: A-10C
Both have a lot of cluster bomb options, but (for now, at least), the Americans do cluster bombs better. The CBU-87 doesn’t really care at what altitude/airspeed it’s dropped at, and drops bomblets that combine antipersonnel, anti-armor, and incendiary effects in each bomblet. That’s pretty cool, and is a big logistics simplifier. It’s compatible with the wind-corrected munitions dispenser add-on kit, which isn’t really guidance, but it does ensure that the bomb dumps the submunitions where you intended, rather than get all mucked up by the wind. The CBU-97 Sensor fused weapon is also pretty sweet. It’s designed to scatter smart anti-tank munitions that will search for a tank beneath them as they fall, and then fire an explosively-formed penetrator at it if a tank is detected. The Russians don’t have such fancy anti-armor measures, and they don’t have fancy wind correction kits. They also don’t combine effects frequently in their bomblets. And altitude matters for the dispensers.

MISSILES: Su-25T
Given how much tech the Americans like to fight with, this might be a shock. Both aircraft can carry older WVR AAMs on the outermost pylons that can’t do much else. The A-10C can also carry a bunch of Mavericks, and that’s about it. The Maverick is a great air to ground missile, with a variety of guidance options. The Su-25T can carry the Kh-25 “Maverickski”, and the Kh-29, which is something like a bigger Maverick with a bigger warhead. It can also carry 16 9K121 Vikhrs ATGMs, so it ends up with more anti-tank capable missile capacity. You can also add an ELINT Pod and antiradiation missiles for SEAD missions. The A-10C has no such capability. The A-10C would certainly benefit from being able to sling Hellfires.

WEAPONS SCORE:
A-10C: 3
Su-25T: 2

MOBILITY: TIE
I’m not actually going to break this one down. Either way you look at it, it’s a tie. The Su-25T is faster. The A-10C has more range. The Su-25T was designed to be sent out from a forward airbase towards a given concentration of enemies. So it’s superior speed is more useful in that doctrinal role. It’s designed to go out, kill some stuff, and go home. Loitering is not called for, so plenty of range isn’t needed. The A-10C was intended to loiter near the battlefield until called for or it’s out of ammo. So range is good, because range translates into loiter time. Since it’s supposed to start in the air close to where the action is, it’s inferior speed isn’t a great handicap. Each does one thing better, and each has an attack doctrine built around its strengths.

DURABILITY: TIE
Both have a whole bunch of design features to make them tougher. Absent some kind of common destructive testing, this one is too close to call.

OTHER:
The category for random things that I can’t think of another place for.

LOCATING TARGETS: A-10C
This one’s almost not fair. The A-10C has a bubble canopy to provide good, all-around visibility. Plus, the A-10C has the LITENING pod, and this makes the Shkval look like a cardboard tube duct-taped to the cockpit. The LITENING has way more zoom, more resolution, a nearly-all-around field of view, and remembers what you were looking at if you have to make some turns, or if some part of the plane gets in the way during a turn.

SCORE TALLY:
A-10C: 6
Su-25T: 4

So the A-10C is better.

Or at least, in this simplified metric evaluation, the A-10C is the better plane. Really, the more relevant question is “Which doctrine do you prefer/buy into?” and to a lesser extent “Whose weapons are you buying?” since those questions will determine which will work for you, and if you’ll have to pay a bunch of annoying weapons integration costs and do some testing. Better electronics would go a long way toward improving the Su-25T, especially in the target acquisition phase.