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East Africa 1930: An ORBAT Quest

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OK, so, we have a lot of problems and not a lot of time/attention.

I think that our two big problems are logistics and training. Under training we also have ethnic tensions that need to be resolved. Logistics has several issues - including relying on oxen and having differing cartridges and weapons.

I think we need to fix training. It's a bit of a chicken/egg situation - good training won't do us good without logistics, logistics doesn't help if our troops aren't well-trained or more focused on the local rather than the country. So we do need to sort out which one we want to fix first - or try to tackle both in different ways, but that might mean we get half measures.
 
Potato Anarchy said:
I am very interested in integrating the military/militaries in the long term, but I absolutely think that is a huge political lift (and risk) in the short term. Most strong-institution-building measures like that (or a massive education system, or serious anti corruption campaigns) are high risk, high cost, high reward measures. If we were a rich, established country with a bunch of state capacity to fall back on, they'd be no-brainers, sure, because we could eat the costs. I don't think the Reewin military has that much support to work from yet.
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Agreed.

It's also worth pointing out that we are not the military. We're the civilian government ministry that's telling them what to do and which guns to purchase. If we over-play our hand, the entrenched Somali officer corps could just say "nah, we're not doing that", and now we've got to deal with a big political mess.

Rat King said:
OK, so, we have a lot of problems and not a lot of time/attention.

I think that our two big problems are logistics and training. Under training we also have ethnic tensions that need to be resolved. Logistics has several issues - including relying on oxen and having differing cartridges and weapons.

I think we need to fix training. It's a bit of a chicken/egg situation - good training won't do us good without logistics, logistics doesn't help if our troops aren't well-trained or more focused on the local rather than the country. So we do need to sort out which one we want to fix first - or try to tackle both in different ways, but that might mean we get half measures.
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If we actually used oxen for everything, they aren't terrible for logistics. There's several advantages they have over horses, even if they are slower (but they're just as fast as soldiers marching so not a problem unless we're trying to use cavalry). The problem is that most of our logi tail is being carried by human porters instead of working animals.
 
Potato Anarchy said:
I am very interested in integrating the military/militaries in the long term, but I absolutely think that is a huge political lift (and risk) in the short term. Most strong-institution-building measures like that (or a massive education system, or serious anti corruption campaigns) are high risk, high cost, high reward measures. If we were a rich, established country with a bunch of state capacity to fall back on, they'd be no-brainers, sure, because we could eat the costs. I don't think the Reewin military has that much support to work from yet.
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You are right, but if we don't start NOW this will be a way in which our enemies can attack us: by raising ethical tensions to create distrust among our people. Better do it now than after when the new government has cemented and any significant change will require much more political capital.

grimely said:
This vote is explicitly for long term goals though?
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Yes:
FrangibleCover said:
Once again, this vote will determine your broad, long-term objectives. The process of implementing these objectives–also your responsibility–will be covered across turns that cover a number of weeks or months of in-story time dependant on the exact circumstances involved. We will always be clear about how long the next turn will last. While you are welcome–and in fact encouraged–to detail your plan beyond these options, the implementation of those details will still be voted on in later turns. Inclusion is not guaranteed, and this should be expected.

For example, suppose as part of choosing to focus on standardising a single cartridge for the military, you drag out the NATO symbols and create a full TO&E for Reewiin's new model rifle battalion. In that case, the QMs will almost certainly be willing to include the plan as the Defence Council's proposal for battalion reform, alongside other options presented by other parties during the relevant turn vote. If nothing else, it means far less work for us!
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Another thought - fixing training issues is likely to be a bit cheaper in the short term and help us lay the base work for a better logistics base. Easier to get troops to do logistics properly if they've been trained properly, after all! And we can import trianers for relatively little cost and then do the "train ten guys, then they train another ten" thing.

WRT to cartridge, I think we should stick with the 6.5mm Arisaka; changing away from it is likely to be very pricey.
 
To be clear - this is to be your guiding requirements over the next few years. We'll probably have at least two other similar vote events before 1940, if not more as things... change.

ETA: Obviously the decisions you make here will affect Reewiin for decades to come. No one is going to disestablish the new Naval academy for instance.
 
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That makes sense. My preference would be to try to get logistical problems solved and political support built over this set of years (logistics upgrades wins support from the army, in addition to the carabinieri reforms winning support from the ruling party), and then in the next set of high level objectives try to attempt something more politically dicey once we have some support, credibility, and basics under our belts.
 
Rat King said:
OK, so, we have a lot of problems and not a lot of time/attention.

I think that our two big problems are logistics and training. Under training we also have ethnic tensions that need to be resolved. Logistics has several issues - including relying on oxen and having differing cartridges and weapons.

I think we need to fix training. It's a bit of a chicken/egg situation - good training won't do us good without logistics, logistics doesn't help if our troops aren't well-trained or more focused on the local rather than the country. So we do need to sort out which one we want to fix first - or try to tackle both in different ways, but that might mean we get half measures.
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Logistics can be better addressed when we have a better officer and NCO cadre to help us do it right.

Rat King said:
Another thought - fixing training issues is likely to be a bit cheaper in the short term and help us lay the base work for a better logistics base. Easier to get troops to do logistics properly if they've been trained properly, after all! And we can import trianers for relatively little cost and then do the "train ten guys, then they train another ten" thing.
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Greatly explained!

Rat King said:
WRT to cartridge, I think we should stick with the 6.5mm Arisaka; changing away from it is likely to be very pricey.
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It will be more costly to stick to it and then need to change it in the middle of the quest.

I think is better to go for the Carcano: this cartridge could carry us well into the '70-'80.

Potato Anarchy said:
That makes sense. My preference would be to try to get logistical problems solved and political support built over this set of years (logistics upgrades wins support from the army, in addition to the carabinieri reforms winning support from the ruling party), and then in the next set of high level objectives try to attempt something more politically dicey once we have some support, credibility, and basics under our belts.
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For me is better to address the officer and NCO cadre training pipeline first so as to use it to resolve other problems later: the issues i want to resolve in my plan are better to address them now with the new government that needs our support (remember: they are the NEW GOVERNMENT and their basis are still unstable) than later when they are consolidated and WE are the ones that need their support.
 
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4WheelSword said:
To be clear - this is to be your guiding requirements over the next few years. We'll probably have at least two other similar vote events before 1940, if not more as things... change.
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Is there risk of war before ~1940? Are we looking at an Italo-Ethiopian War scenario?


IMO, if this is a three-year plan, we should lay the groundwork for integration now, then try and do integration during the mid-'30s.
Rat King said:
Another thought - fixing training issues is likely to be a bit cheaper in the short term and help us lay the base work for a better logistics base. Easier to get troops to do logistics properly if they've been trained properly, after all! And we can import trianers for relatively little cost and then do the "train ten guys, then they train another ten" thing.

WRT to cartridge, I think we should stick with the 6.5mm Arisaka; changing away from it is likely to be very pricey.
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The problem with too much training is that our manual of arms may change if we adopt new infantry equipment (especially if we switch to a domestically-produced rifle, which we probably want to), and things like artillery NEED to be modernized. Training people on guns from before WWI could be a lot of wasted effort.
 
C_Z said:
Is there risk of war before ~1940? Are we looking at an Italo-Ethiopian War scenario?


IMO, if this is a three-year plan, we should lay the groundwork for integration now, then try and do integration during the mid-'30s.

The problem with too much training is that our manual of arms may change if we adopt new infantry equipment (especially if we switch to a domestically-produced rifle, which we probably want to), and things like artillery NEED to be modernized. Training people on guns from before WWI could be a lot of wasted effort.
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At least I don't mean manual arms training: what we really need is to train our Officers and NCO cadre in the technical and operational aspects of the warfighting.
 
ILSergenteSalv said:
At least I don't mean manual arms training: what we really need is to train our Officers and NCO cadre in the technical and operational aspects of the warfighting.
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Sure, but then we can cut out "infantry school" and just have an officer school, which frees us up to pick one other thing. Same applies to artillery unless we want to be using Krupp guns from 1900 during the war.
 
C_Z said:
Sure, but then we can cut out "infantry school" and just have an officer school, which frees us up to pick one other thing. Same applies to artillery unless we want to be using Krupp guns from 1900 during the war.
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Ok for the infantry school, but for the artillery one my plan is to build an ORDNANCE school that will help our R&D effort. The artillery can be built or purchased later.

Moreover, the schools are an integral part of a plan to increase the number of people that volunteer for service as they will learn abilities that will help whit life after the military service.
 
ILSergenteSalv said:
it's a Semi-Rimmed type case: it will get difficult to use it in a belt feeded system. We will need a replacement in the middle of the quest. The 6.5 Carcano is rimless and exists at least two variants with a spitzer bullet. Plus, the spitzer Carcano has a similar ballistic to the 6.5 Creemore and will be ok as an GPMG/LMG cartridge: see the NGSW program of the US army.
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This... isn't true. TL;DR: There are other important values for a bullet than the caliber. Also, regarding rimmed ammo and belt feeds, one of two candidates for the most successful belt fed GPMG of the modern world, the PK, uses 7.62x54R, a rimmed round.

Long version: The first spitzer you linked doesn't even have a boat tail, it's a 6.5mm version of 7.62mm M2 AP, and while the second one has a decent tail and nose, the rim for the crimping is not going to help one bit, and it's just overall a bit short compared to the sort of rounds that Creedmoor is designed around fitting into an AR-10 action length. That's just the issues I've pointed out that I can see, I did not dig out the calipers to measure the ogive, but that nose is much, much more rounded than the sort of modern extra-long secant ogive bullets that 6.5 Creedmoor's reputation is predicated on. Honestly, it doesn't even look as fine as a tangent ogive, which is saying something. These differences are really important, too, like it is entirely possible for two different bullets in the same caliber that are both of modern design with a spitzer and boat tail and all the modern accoutrements like a nice small meplat and secant ogive where the better one loses speed at only 66% the rate of the worse one!

Then there's the whole 6.8 NGSW thing and machine gun effectiveness, which I can't get behind either. NGSW is designed to put a huge premium on an absolutely silly amount of muzzle velocity for a large bullet, and is made with all the ballistics advantages we've made since the 1930s. The only consideration in its design that isn't optimizing for ballistics is being able to load a tungsten cored round for body armor penetration. It's also designed to be used with an expectation of a scope that can magnify up to 10x, and can laser rangefind and calculate elevation for targets on the fly. The reason I bring this up is because historically, tracers have been very important to machine gun employment, and that's a historic weakness of 6.5mm range bullets.

6.5mm carcano is neither 6.5 Creedmoor nor 6.8 NGSW even if you assume a limited run of cartridges made with imported bullets from sweden is representative of what we'd get, but honestly, the latter two aren't all that similar either.
 
xthetenth said:
This... isn't true. TL;DR: There are other important values for a bullet than the caliber. Also, regarding rimmed ammo and belt feeds, one of two candidates for the most successful belt fed GPMG of the modern world, the PK, uses 7.62x54R, a rimmed round.

Long version: The first spitzer you linked doesn't even have a boat tail, it's a 6.5mm version of 7.62mm M2 AP, and while the second one has a decent tail and nose, the rim for the crimping is not going to help one bit, and it's just overall a bit short compared to the sort of rounds that Creedmoor is designed around fitting into an AR-10 action length. That's just the issues I've pointed out that I can see, I did not dig out the calipers to measure the ogive, but that nose is much, much more rounded than the sort of modern extra-long secant ogive bullets that 6.5 Creedmoor's reputation is predicated on. Honestly, it doesn't even look as fine as a tangent ogive, which is saying something. These differences are really important, too, like it is entirely possible for two different bullets in the same caliber that are both of modern design with a spitzer and boat tail and all the modern accoutrements like a nice small meplat and secant ogive where the better one loses speed at only 66% the rate of the worse one!

Then there's the whole 6.8 NGSW thing and machine gun effectiveness, which I can't get behind either. NGSW is designed to put a huge premium on an absolutely silly amount of muzzle velocity for a large bullet, and is made with all the ballistics advantages we've made since the 1930s. The only consideration in its design that isn't optimizing for ballistics is being able to load a tungsten cored round for body armor penetration. It's also designed to be used with an expectation of a scope that can magnify up to 10x, and can laser rangefind and calculate elevation for targets on the fly. The reason I bring this up is because historically, tracers have been very important to machine gun employment, and that's a historic weakness of 6.5mm range bullets.

6.5mm carcano is neither 6.5 Creedmoor nor 6.8 NGSW even if you assume a limited run of cartridges made with imported bullets from sweden is representative of what we'd get, but honestly, the latter two aren't all that similar either.
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In this moment i'm eating my dinner, give me some time and i will explain better why i'm advocating for the 6.5mm Carcano and why used the terms I used.
 
I think sticking with 6.5mm Arisaka is our best bet, both from a political and logistical perspective.

We can buy it in bulk from the Japanese (who will be happy to let us do so or let us buy the license to produce it in our own country) and we can start standardizing on it.

I simply don't see the need to try and fix all of our training and our logistics AND change our small-arms supply all at the same time.
 
ILSergenteSalv said:
For me is better to address the officer and NCO cadre training pipeline first so as to use it to resolve other problems later: the issues i want to resolve in my plan are better to address them now with the new government that needs our support (remember: they are the NEW GOVERNMENT and their basis are still unstable) than later when they are consolidated and WE are the ones that need their support.
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I don't really understand the political calculus you're using here. Why do we have political capital and leverage now that we will have less of later?

For one, we do not have leverage on the new government. We are effectively a subunit of the new government - we are their MOD, or rather a significant part of it. They are not the people we are trying to persuade of this! We are trying to get the military itself to listen to us, and connected parts of the general populace across multiple ethnic groups.

And a huge problem like ethnic integration does not get easier to solve because you try it sooner or faster. It's a procedural problem as much or more as it's an issue of initiative and political capital. It will require buy-in (at least to the level of non-resistance) from many different parts of the military, which currently know very little about us. If we can demonstrate to them that we are an effective, pragmatic, and reliable source of policy and coordination, and raise support by doing a good job at things they care about, it will be easier to get them to go along with harder things.
 
xthetenth said:
This... isn't true. TL;DR: There are other important values for a bullet than the caliber. Also, regarding rimmed ammo and belt feeds, one of two candidates for the most successful belt fed GPMG of the modern world, the PK, uses 7.62x54R, a rimmed round.
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Yes, the PK was a great GPMG, but imagine how simpler and lighter can have been if Kalashnikov wouldn't have to add a system to remove rimmed ammunition from the belt.

xthetenth said:
Long version: The first spitzer you linked doesn't even have a boat tail, it's a 6.5mm version of 7.62mm M2 AP, and while the second one has a decent tail and nose, the rim for the crimping is not going to help one bit, and it's just overall a bit short compared to the sort of rounds that Creedmoor is designed around fitting into an AR-10 action length. That's just the issues I've pointed out that I can see, I did not dig out the calipers to measure the ogive, but that nose is much, much more rounded than the sort of modern extra-long secant ogive bullets that 6.5 Creedmoor's reputation is predicated on. Honestly, it doesn't even look as fine as a tangent ogive, which is saying something. These differences are really important, too, like it is entirely possible for two different bullets in the same caliber that are both of modern design with a spitzer and boat tail and all the modern accoutrements like a nice small meplat and secant ogive where the better one loses speed at only 66% the rate of the worse one!
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This things can be relatively corrected, correcting the Semi-Rim of the 6.5 Arisaka will be more complicated from a logistical and technical standpoint.

xthetenth said:
Then there's the whole 6.8 NGSW thing and machine gun effectiveness, which I can't get behind either. NGSW is designed to put a huge premium on an absolutely silly amount of muzzle velocity for a large bullet, and is made with all the ballistics advantages we've made since the 1930s. The only consideration in its design that isn't optimizing for ballistics is being able to load a tungsten cored round for body armor penetration. It's also designed to be used with an expectation of a scope that can magnify up to 10x, and can laser rangefind and calculate elevation for targets on the fly. The reason I bring this up is because historically, tracers have been very important to machine gun employment, and that's a historic weakness of 6.5mm range bullets.
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The thing I was advocating is that the Carcano cartridge was a more term solution, and with minimal modifications can be adapted to carry us well into the '70-'80. Moreover, they will be used in our short to medium-range weapons, while a bigger cartridge will be used in our sniper rifles and MMG. (as is done today and even better if really want to get arrogant: Reewiin could consolidate on only two calibers, while our Armies today has to use 5.56 NATO, 7.62 NATO and .338 Lapua or something else)

xthetenth said:
6.5mm carcano is neither 6.5 Creedmoor nor 6.8 NGSW even if you assume a limited run of cartridges made with imported bullets from sweden is representative of what we'd get, but honestly, the latter two aren't all that similar either.
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I wasn't saying that they are the same, I was only trying to put the 6.5mm Carcano in a certain context: that while an old cartridge, put the base for modern concepts.

Rat King said:
I think sticking with 6.5mm Arisaka is our best bet, both from a political and logistical perspective.

We can buy it in bulk from the Japanese (who will be happy to let us do so or let us buy the license to produce it in our own country) and we can start standardizing on it.

I simply don't see the need to try and fix all of our training and our logistics AND change our small-arms supply all at the same time.
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While I disagree with the use of the 6.5mm Arisaka, I agree on the fixing of this problem can be resolved in the next long-term poll. In fact, in my plan, i left out the choosing of a new cartridge.

Potato Anarchy said:
I don't really understand the political calculus you're using here. Why do we have political capital and leverage now that we will have less of later?

For one, we do not have leverage on the new government. We are effectively a subunit of the new government - we are their MOD, or rather a significant part of it. They are not the people we are trying to persuade of this! We are trying to get the military itself to listen to us, and connected parts of the general populace across multiple ethnic groups.

And a huge problem like ethnic integration does not get easier to solve because you try it sooner or faster. It's a procedural problem as much or more as it's an issue of initiative and political capital. It will require buy-in (at least to the level of non-resistance) from many different parts of the military, which currently know very little about us. If we can demonstrate to them that we are an effective, pragmatic, and reliable source of policy and coordination, and raise support by doing a good job at things they care about, it will be easier to get them to go along with harder things.
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@4WheelSword , is this right?
 
Also at the end of the day, the difference between a 6.5mm and a 7.92mm is going to be academic, because artillery is going to be the big killer. Getting better guns and artillery fire control will give us more killing power than trying to figure out a wunder cartridge.
 
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Rat King said:
Also at the end of the day, the difference between a 6.5mm and a 7.92mm is going to be academic, because artillery is going to be the big killer. Getting better guns and artillery fire control will give us more killing power than trying to figure out a wunder cartridge.
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On this, I agree with you. So the part with the Artillery & Ordnance school I put in my plan.
 
Rat King said:
Also at the end of the day, the difference between a 6.5mm and a 7.92mm is going to be academic, because artillery is going to be the big killer. Getting better guns and artillery fire control will give us more killing power than trying to figure out a wunder cartridge.
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Yup, which bolt-action rifle you choose is kinda pointless, as long as you can make enough of them and they're all using the same ammo. Artillery is much more important.

As an aside, it might be interesting to develop a primitive recoilless rifle given our rough logi situation - a 75 mm RR could be a cheap way to provide significant fire support in places where you can't tow a field gun?
 
C_Z said:
Yup, which bolt-action rifle you choose is kinda pointless, as long as you can make enough of them and they're all using the same ammo. Artillery is much more important.

As an aside, it might be interesting to develop a primitive recoilless rifle given our rough logi situation - a 75 mm RR could be a cheap way to provide significant fire support in places where you can't tow a field gun?
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We need to contact the swedes on this or spend a significant amount of time designing a domestic piece.
 
I'm tentatively leaning toward:

[ ] Establish a Council-controlled Information and Analysis Office
[ ] Establish an officer training school
[ ] Choose a single cartridge for the military
[ ] Reform the Army
[ ] Establish an artillery training school
[ ] Establish a Remount Service to supply horses to the Army

As my top picks.

For the quest runner, what does "army" or "Caraberini" reform entail in this case?
 
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ILSergenteSalv said:
@4WheelSword , is this right?
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You are a sub-unit of the government, a Defence Council formed to advice and set policy. You are not part of the military.
The rest is well-written speculation on your political position.

Rat King said:
For the quest runner, what does "army" or "Caraberini" reform entail in this case?
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It is fundamentally up to you - it can look like many things but we wont be making changes without pinning down what it means to you, the Council.
Army reform might be a single organisational system spread across the three regiments rather than having 3 unique force organisations. Carabinieri reform may, as has been suggested in this thread, be about equipment standardisation and logistical support. But that's not certain by any means.
 
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