Brigade and Regiment

[FutureTank]

You may have your doubts but modern IFVs like the Puma are able to attack Helicopters up to 3000m with programable burst rounds.
And tanks up to 4000m with their main gun..

Puma engaging tanks at 4000m?! Its a nice IFV, but...

Now about the infantry on a tank tactic.
Infantry boarded ON tanks is just a nice turkey shooting.
Attached cells would make the tank bigger (More problems in close quarters) and wont be really bulletproof like a APC. Also mounting and dismounting would be slower and more uncovered.
And every western light infantry (As is stated before excluding airborn/airmobile units) has their APC assets. Use them. Modern APCs withstand 30mm frontally, 14,5mm around with good RPG and IED protection. HAPCs even can take more fire..

I don't belive this is correct. Maybe RPG-7, but not some of the more recent weapons of this type. Russians found them dangerous even to their own MBTs (inc. RPG-29 on T-90).

So I state again. If infantry with integrated heavy fire support is needed use mech inf with IFVs. If you have light infantry and need to transport them over quite a distance use their APCs as battletaxis. If it is MOUT go by foot and jump from cover to cover and from house to house with tanks giving heavy fire support, surpression fire, blowing wholes into walls and acting as mobile cover.
If it is heavy wood or very mountaineous regions tanks will go nowhere and you use transportable ATGMs, MGs, or small weapons carriers for fire support.

Thank you Waylander
This, I already knew. Just wanted to suggest something innovative that can add element of surprise or greater flexibility to tactics of light infantry.

 

[Waylander]

You misunderstood this.
The Puma is able to engage helicopters up to 3000m. The ABM ammunition for the 30mm features a programmable ignitor. So the ammo is timed and releases many smaller fragments right before the target if you use it against helicopters.

A modern western MBT is able to engage helicopters up to 4000m. We use KE for this because of the high speed.
And a tungsten penetrator of 5 kg with round about mach 5 hitting your helicopter is nothing you want to feel as a pilot.

As to the armor of APCs and IFVs. The all around armor of the Puma IFV is better than the one of a Leopard II with the Leo being much better armored frontally.
The Boxer APC is also well armored all around which is one of the reasons for its heavy weight. 33t is much for an APC.
For sure a modern RPG-29 or ATGM like Kornet is going to penetrate such a vehicle but I doubt that you could make the extra infantry transport cells of a tank even being able to stop a 12.7mm without making a really heavy and big beast out of the tank which restricts him in a way which is not tolerable.

It is always good to think about new tactics and surprise elements but if I would see an enemy tank with infantry on it or in these cells during close quarter combat I would cry out loud and start with the massacre of the infantry.

 

[rrrtx]

brigade vs. regiment

Here is my 2 cents worth regarding what I view as the significant differences. The thread has deviated from the original topic some so I hope no one minds me sort of going back to the beginning.

Both are units between battalion size and division size.

A brigade:
*is usually larger than a regiment - 3-6 battalions
*tends to be more of a combined arms units in some armies replacing divisions as the primary manuever units
*as such will have supprt units attached such as an artillery battalion, air defense battery, and support units like engineering and logistics companies.

A regiment
*is usually smaller - 2-3 battalions
*tends to be specialized - an artillery regiment with no attached units of any other type (like AA or infantry) or air defence regiment with SAM and AAA only

 

[Waylander]

There was an original topic?

 

[rrrtx]

I'm always late to the party. I have something to contribute - it's just dozens of posts too late to be relevent.

 

[FutureTank]

You misunderstood this.
The Puma is able to engage helicopters up to 3000m. The ABM ammunition for the 30mm features a programmable ignitor. So the ammo is timed and releases many smaller fragments right before the target if you use it against helicopters..

Yes, maybe with 30mm and a much smaller turret traverse then a tank. I understand this.

A modern western MBT is able to engage helicopters up to 4000m. We use KE for this because of the high speed.
And a tungsten penetrator of 5 kg with round about mach 5 hitting your helicopter is nothing you want to feel as a pilot..

And the helo conveniantly doesn't notice an MBT firing at it?! One jerk on the stick will move a helicopter far enough for the tank to miss at 4000m And here I suppose the helo is presenting a flank to the tank! Hitting a helo head on at 4000m is like threading a needle held by a 2year old

As to the armor of APCs and IFVs. The all around armor of the Puma IFV is better than the one of a Leopard II with the Leo being much better armored frontally.
The Boxer APC is also well armored all around which is one of the reasons for its heavy weight. 33t is much for an APC..

What should I say here! As far as I'm concerned 33t is MBT weight. I mean M24 was only 18t, and it had tracks. I really don;t know what application designers had in mind for this vehicle.

For sure a modern RPG-29 or ATGM like Kornet is going to penetrate such a vehicle but I doubt that you could make the extra infantry transport cells of a tank even being able to stop a 12.7mm without making a really heavy and big beast out of the tank which restricts him in a way which is not tolerable..

The idea was to allow infantry to perform a tactical move without their own IFV/APC/truck, but not to actually go into combat riding on tanks. Say from objective to objective.

It is always good to think about new tactics and surprise elements but if I would see an enemy tank with infantry on it or in these cells during close quarter combat I would cry out loud and start with the massacre of the infantry.

And what would you do if you saw tanks and APCs on your flank FIRST. then as you are engaging these, dismounted infantrya nd more tanks suddenly appear elsewhere. It allows a force to do a 'cat'. You know how when a cat is frightened it's fur stands so it looks bigger

 

[Waylander]

The turret traverse of a tank is not slow. Look some videos of M1s, Leclercs, Leo IIs, etc. where they let their turrets go around fast.

You are hitting an IFV or APC at 4000m frontally. A helicopter is not that smaller. If the FCS works correct and the gunner is not dumb the spreading of the gun is minimum.

More later I have to go to university.

 

[.pt]

OMG he actually is studying!!!
400 mt seems a bit stretched to engage an helicopter. And i doubt it would stay put for long enough so that a gunner can take a shot. Its feasable but not likely, in my opinion.
.pt

 

[Waylander]

What else should you do after school and 2 years of serving?


For sure 4000m is a maximum. But within you have the chance to hit.
Nevertheless this remains just an opportunity and emergency shooting which may be constantly trained via simulator or during maneuvers but this doesn't mean tanks and IFVs start to go gunship hunting.

 

[FutureTank]

The turret traverse of a tank is not slow. Look some videos of M1s, Leclercs, Leo IIs, etc. where they let their turrets go around fast.

I need to find out what turret traverse spedd is.

 

[eckherl]

I need to find out what turret traverse spedd is.

On a M1 series tank, it takes 3.5 - 4 seconds to travel 360 dgrees, Russian tanks are not slow either.

 

[FutureTank]

On a M1 series tank, it takes 3.5 - 4 seconds to travel 360 dgrees, Russian tanks are not slow either.

Lible to give the crew a whiplash!!!

 

[Simon9]

In the case of Australia, the Army maintains the British regimental tradition, but has always brigaded the battalions, with only the Royal Australian Regiment having more then two (all other regiments have two battalions because the first battalion was raised for WW1, and the second for WW2).

This is not correct - for example the Royal Queensland Regiment currently consists of four battalions.

To understand what a regiment is in the British tradition you have to go back to the 1600s and 1700s when the standing army was first formed. There is also a difference between a modern infantry regiment and other arms which you have to keep in mind too. It's all rather complicated. But basically:

A regiment was traditionally used for raising battalions. It began as a sort of 'private army' back in Britain in the aftermath of the English Civil War, where a man, usually a nobelman, would raise a body of men under his command and pay and equip them himself. The regiment would be named after its commander.

Then as these units coalesced to form the original British Army, they began to be given numbers, such as the 1st Regiment of Foot. Each regiment would be made up of several battalions, which on the battlefield would be assigned to a brigade. The brigade was thus the tactical formation - the regiment was the organisational formation.

In time regiments began to be associated with a particular area and began to be named after these areas. So most British regiments are named after a county or city, such as the King's Own Liverpool Regiment, or the Royal East Kent Regiment (aka The Buffs). A regiment was commanded by a Colonel, a battalion by a Lieutenant-Colonel.

The battalions of a regiment would be numbered - for instance, the 1st Liverpool or 2nd Buffs. Thus there could be a 1st Buffs, 2nd Buffs, 3rd Buffs and so on, all in existence at the same time. Usually one battalion would be a training battalion and one was the actual field battalion, but as time went on regiments started raising multiple battalions.

In World War I, these battalions would sometimes by brigaded together and then formed into a division of troops from the same area, such as the 18th (Eastern) Division from East Anglia, or the Highland divisions from Scotland. But they could also just be assigned to different brigades and divisions as needed. That's pretty much how things remained in British Commonwealth armies for infantry units.

Now to confuse things, most other arms in British Commonwealth armies actually have regiments which mean the same as battalions. These originally were just the cavalry but now there are armoured, artillery, engineer and SF regiments. In these units, the sub-units are called squadrons instead of companies, and squadrons are divided into troops instead of platoons. These names come from the cavalry days.

It's a bit confusing, especially since an infantry battalion and an artillery regiment will belong to the same brigade, but the infantry battalion will also belong to a regiment.

 

[FutureTank]

This is not correct - for example the Royal Queensland Regiment currently consists of four battalions.

This only semantically correct.
While it is true that the Royal Queensland regiment currently has 4 battalions, same can be said for all state regiments.

The Army site shows them as
9th Battalion - 9 RQR
25th/49th Battalion - 25/49 RQR
31st Battalion (The Kennedy Regiment) - 31RQR
42nd Battalion - 42RQR

However the reality of the situation is that the battalions with exception of the RAR have lineage going back to 1AIF, and in Australia the battalion is a unit in its own right. There a state regimental association, but it has very little practical or administrative role as I understand.

The RQR was formed in 1960 through reduction of all CMF infantry battalions in Queensland. The numerical order of the battalions in the Australian Army for 1AIF and 2AIF was sequential without regard to state of formation, which explains 42RQR. That is there never were 42 battalions in the RQR.

For example in 1985 51st Battalion became independent as a Regional Force Surveillance unit but retained its numerical order for parade.

The 42RQR in fact begun its life after the Federation as the 3rd (Port Curtis) Infantry Regiment.
In 1948 the 42nd Infantry Battalion, The Capricornia Regiment once again became a Citizen Military Force (CMF) battalion and had three companies in Rockhampton with its headquarters in Maryborough. An element of the 31st Battalion was raised in the Mackay/Sarina area and it later transferred to become part of the 42nd Battalion. The unit reorganisation continued with the unit headquarters transferring to Rockhampton in 1957.

In 1960 the Australian Army reorganised along pentropic lines and the 42nd Battalion was absorbed into the 2nd Battalion, The Royal Queensland Regiment (RQR). However this state of affairs was rectified on the 2 August 1965 when the 42nd Battalion RQR was re-raised with the headquarters, a rifle company, an administration company and the support company at Rockhampton, a rifle company at Mackay and further rifle company at Gladstone.http://www.diggerhistory.info/pages-army-today/state-regts/42_rqr.htm


The RAR is therefore a special case, having been formed after WW2 as a non-state regiment without specific lineage other then the 2AIF battalions which were used in the formation.

The battalions of the RAR are numbered sequentially 1 to 9.

It seems to me the original state histroical battalions to bear these numbers are:
1st Infantry Battalion (Commando) (The City of Sydney Regiment)
2nd Infantry Battalion (The City of Newcastle Regiment)
3rd Infantry Battalion (The Werriwa Regiment)
4th Infantry Battalion (The Australian Rifles)
5th Infantry Battalion (The Victorian Scottish Regiment)
6th Infantry Battalion (The Royal Melbourne Regiment)
7th Infantry Battalion (The North West Murray Borderers)
8th Infantry Battalion (The City of Ballarat Regiment)
9th Infantry Battalion (The Moreton Regiment)

However at one time before WW1 there were Federation regiments with these numbers also.

As you said, confusing

 

[Simon9]

This only semantically correct.
While it is true that the Royal Queensland regiment currently has 4 battalions, same can be said for all state regiments.

Okay, I see what you're saying, but I still think it's correct to say that not just the RAR has more than two battalions. : Like you said though, it's just semantics.

I don't know where 9RAR claimed its lineage from, because 9RQR claims lineage from the Moreton Regiment, as well as both the 1st and 2nd AIF 9th battalions, as well as the 9th Militia battalion. Seems a bit greedy to me!

Since it was only formed in 1967, from scratch, perhaps it can't claim any lineage.

 

[FutureTank]

Hi Simon9,

If you look at the digger history, you will see that the original proposal was for RAR battalions to be linked to either the royals or to lications, but this was not accepted.
Since then the battalions of RAR have developed their own distinct identities.
It would be helpfull if battalions were sequentially numbered, but state regimental associations seem to get to pick which battalions are retained, and obviously those retained are retained for a reason.
Essentially you are correct in that the Australian Infantry Corps consists of the RAR, the six state regiments, the university regiments and the independent regiments in the North.
However note the 2AIF unit designations as for example 2/34th. Its not as it would be in UK the second battalion 34 regiment, but rather more like Soviet system of 2nd formation 34th battalion. However the original 34th battalion was formed as 34th Infantry Battalion (The Illawarra Regiment)! In theory IF the 34th was re-raised, the Illawarra would be able to raise more then a single battalion. If the re-raised 34th was called 3/34th, what would the second Illawarra battalion of the 3rd formation become?
The Australian Army would therefore revert to place of raising name. The Illawarra region currently has several such locations:Wollongong, Shellharbour, Kiama, Jamberoo, Gerringong, and Gerroa. There is also the Woolongong University which would form a 'regiment'. All these units would receive new battalion numbers (current highest is the 93rd Infantry (Derwent Battalion) but there was also the 101st Motor Regiment (The Wimmera Regiment) ), which will not be sequential, but numbered in the order of activation. The 34th will retain its Illawarra name, and be used to accept recruits from the Illawarra area in general, while Kiama will for example become 3/107th battalion (The Kiama Regiment).
Now IF Australia retains the British monarch as head of state, the 107th MAY choose to add King's Own to its name because of the association with the UK's 107th regiment
On the other hand they may call themselves The Blow Hole regiment , or the Kiama Blowies nfloorl: