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East Africa 1930: An ORBAT Quest

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So I wrote up a long effortpost that I was planning on posting before this vote went up, but it seems the QMs are faster than me (to both my chagrin and delight)
To follow in esteemed footsteps, I'd like to present:

Long Term Plan: Carabinieri

Apologies, it's nowhere near as snappy as Horse, so just imagine there's some nice graphics on the imaginary slides running through your head to make up for it. How did the Defence Committee get a slide projector? That doesn't matter. What matters is that we're about to finish the second-last of the non-write-in improvements for the Carabinieri. While this could be seen as an opportunity to free up that point to go towards the Army or other reforms, I think there's still actions we can take that exceed the opportunity cost. The Carabinieri should be considered very important in a future war, and investment in using them to tackle weaknesses of our Army makes sense.

To start with, the last-remaining vote option we have (except for shuffling funding) is to establish Wilderness Rangers to patrol the interior. While the military advantages of this at first might seem minor - it's just a few guys patrolling the bush - there are some technologies showing up that could turn them into a viable weapon with further point usage. When discussing the licensing of the ZB vz. 26/30, ZB asked if we were interested in some trucks as well. If we modified the trucks for high off-road speeds and long range, the Wilderness Rangers could quickly pivot in wartime to a high-speed force capable of navigating through the deserts and scrubland of Reewiin's interior to raid and reconnoiter the enemy's rear. Effective wilderness patrol in peacetime can translate to wartime reconnaissance, for little more than the cost and maintenance of a half-dozen trucks and a few years of pre-war practice.

Meanwhile, the recent fighting in Ethiopia and China has shown that aircraft will be very influential in warfare. While Reewiin cannot afford a proper air force, the Wilderness Rangers would be able to cover much more terrain from the air. A liaison/observation aircraft could cover in a single flight what it takes a squad a week to patrol. The Carabinieri Air Patrol would also provide an opportunity to train mechanics and pilots in advance of future growth. Likewise, Reewiin's Northern border follows the Dawa and Jubba rivers. Shallow-draught river monitors could act as mobile border forts while, again, providing a training opportunity for future naval forces.

We could also use that slot to improve our communications. While the new rail line is a vital link between Reewiin's interior and Kismayo, a single point of failure is less than ideal for the kind of guerilla warfare that a defence of Reewiin will likely involve, and the distances of Reewiin's interior are too great to be handled by messengers. If the Carabinieri were to set up a network of relatively few radio stations dotted throughout Reewiin, messages could be quickly transmitted to and from the local headquarters and then messengers sent over the much shorter distances to units in the field. These relay stations could additionally be prepared ammo caches in the event something touches off. Otherwise, we risk an enemy sabotaging the critical rail link (like the purported attack on the Manchurian railway) and then cutting off the army in Kismayo and Burgaabo with an attack along the coast before the Carabinieri can be told they need to mobilize.

Lastly, the Carabinieri is currently fairly out of date. We should do a pass over the entire force to make sure they get the benefit of the new weapons, uniforms, training, etc. that the Army's received, even if in a watered down version. Many parts of the force are presumably still using very outdated gear, and once we've got production lines running for the Army, keeping them running to supply the Carabinieri makes sense. Things like machine guns for the border fortifications, light mortars, helmets, and standardized rifles would go a long way to improving their effectiveness and esprit de corps in a future conflict. It also makes them more useful as a possible recruitment pool/reserve, seeing as they'd already be familiar with kit and tactics.

Assuming 9 months for the Wilderness Rangers and 3 months to buy a few trucks for them, a year each for the Carabinieri Air Patrol and Carabinieri Riverine Patrol, a year for the relay stations/arms caches, and a year for "overall modernizations" to follow in the path of the army, we're looking at 1937-1938. That's later than I'd like, but I think this is an area of investment that could really pay off if Reewiin needs to fight a defensive war.
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TL;DR:
  • There's more stuff we can do with the Carabinieri beyond the listed options and I have ideas
  • Let's get some trucks for our wilderness patrols in preparation of turning them into a Reewiinite version of the LRDG
  • While we're at it, let's create a Carabinieri Air Patrol to help monitor the borders - planes move faster than soldiers with donkeys and it's good practice for a later air force.
  • Look at this photograph
  • The attack on the Manchurian railway highlights how vulnerable our single line of communication is; we should set up some radio stations so that the Carabinieri don't find out we're at war after it's already lost.
  • Let's remember to improve the equipment and training of the Carabinieri too
  • This'll probably take until around 1938
As for the update:
FrangibleCover said:
Kismayo-Turkana Line:
Progress, Kismayo-Marsabit: 100% (Est. completion June 1932)
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Hell yeah I love trains. Trains trains trains.
FrangibleCover said:
Type 3 HMG Project:
Progress, Reverse Engineering: 60% (Est. completion March 1933)
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While we're at it, we should see if there's anything we can learn from the ZB vz. 30 to incorporate into this design without violating patents. I don't know enough about guns, but one's a 40 year old design and the other's brand new, so there might be improvements.
FrangibleCover said:

Reports

Report From the Commission For Purchase Of Military Equipment In Czechoslovakia
Negotiations are ongoing with the Zbrojovka Brno company of Czechoslovakia for the purchase of a licence and tooling for the production of their model 1930 light machine gun. It will be rechambered in the 6.5 mm Arisaka calibre and manufactured in Reewiin. They seem positive towards this prospect, though our representatives stated that it would be easier to secure an order if they could give ZB a solid estimate for how many weapons they'll receive royalties for in the immediate future.
[...]
How many ZB vz.30s are we intending to build?
[ ] Enough to equip every platoon with two in a weapons squad.
[ ] Enough to equip every squad with one.
[ ] Enough to double the size of the army and equip every squad with one.
[ ] Enough to triple the size of the army and equip every platoon with two.
[ ] Write in
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I think the second option is best for now. Yes, this is a lot of guns, but the LMG is the most important weapon in the squad - much more powerful than the rifles used by the soldiers. If we want squads to be effective fighting units on their own, then they need a LMG. Other people who are better at infantry tactics, though, pls provide input.
FrangibleCover said:
Further inquiries with ZB have resulted in the delivery of a demonstration model of a typewriter to the Council secretarial staff. Since it only types Latin letters, it's not very useful for most of our purposes, but our correspondence with Europeans now looks very slick when we take it to the telegraph office to be sent. They have also offered their Z 9 ½-ton truck, which competed in the Monte Carlo Rally last year. They have further suggested that if we want to purchase any larger vehicles, we should deal with their Czechoslovak colleagues at Tatra. While in Brno, our representatives also acquired a licence for the vz.32 helmet from the manufacturers Gottleib Brothers and Brauchbar.
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Is there a reason that ZB is directing us specifically to Tatra and not Praga? The Praga RND, being diesel engined (and thus easier to supply fuel for) is appealing, although the Tatra 72 seems nice as well. I don't want to piss off our new friends if there's some sort of rivalry, though!

As for the actual vote:
[ ] Organisational Reform: Wilderness Rangers - The Carabinieri is responsible for massive tracts of rural land. A specialist ranger unit trained in long-distance patrol and survival would be useful to the force as a whole. (9-Month Investment.)
-[ ] Write-in: Give them a single Z 9 truck to experiment and report on using motor vehicles in Reewiin's interior as well

Is that an acceptable write-in?
 
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C_Z said:
Is there a reason that ZB is directing us specifically to Tatra and not Praga? The Praga RND, being diesel engined (and thus easier to supply fuel for) is appealing, although the Tatra 72 seems nice as well.
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Honest answer, I just picked one of the two for flavour text. Obviously you can buy trucks from Praga, or whoever else you like, without annoying ZB.

Perhaps it's because Tatra is Moravian and Praga is Bohemian?
 
I want to use the ship as an actual ship and strongly oppose the plans to scrap it for parts. Prestige is easy to underrate when you're in a rich country overflowing with it; for Reewiin it's essential to cultivate where we can.

Besides, a strong brown water force is going to be essential to securing our bordes and holding out against potential foes. Wherever we end up housing that force organizationally, it's something we need to prepare for and having training opportunities for. I favor making it part of the Carabinieri.

But I don't think it's something we can spend a point on right now compared to more urgent concerns, so it can wait a bit.
 
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I'm very cautious about sinking too much money into a project solely on the basis of prestige. Fixing up a several decade old ship will be challenging, and it doesn't fit our doctrine particularly well. It's also a significant opportunity cost since we could use the 6" guns for coast defence, the 3" guns for a brownwater force, and the armour steel for gunboats or tanks.

Reewiin's eventual navy, in an ideal world IMO, is brownwater gunboats patrolling the rivers and lakes, plenty of motor torpedo boats, a handful of torpedo boats/very small DDs, some auxiliaries like minelayers, and maybe a DL or two to fill the cruiser role (see the US peace cruisers or the British use of the Tribals). A light cruiser doesn't fit our strengths, and putting money into fixing it up purely because "it sounds impressive" isn't smart IMO.

Edit: to elaborate on this:

  • I am assuming that, within the decade, Chikuma will need her machinery replaced if intend to use it as a combat vessel and not just "look at the big ship we have".
  • Machinery overhauls are very expensive. You're cutting through the armour deck to get there; it's a significant portion of the cost of a new ship.
  • In wartime, Reewiin will be too weak to contest significant portions of the Indian Ocean on its own. Instead, we should leak into our advantageous terrain and deploy (relatively large numbers of) minelayers and motor torpedo boats to protect the coast. They're cheap, and where we are, very effective. A PT boat can pop out from a hidden anchorage, fire torpedoes, and disappear.
  • The long range recon role performed by cruisers can be more cost effectively done by 2-3 flying boats. Flying boats are also cool.
  • If we want large surface combatants we'll want a couple of destroyers (even if they're small, ~1200 ton things). During peacetime, these can fulfil the fisheries protection role. A new destroyer/torpedo boat in this size range will likely cost less than refitting our obsolete cruiser as well.
  • If we're dead-set on a larger navy after that point for prestige reasons, you could make a ship that is more combat capable than a Chikuma on half the displacement (e.g, a slower, tougher Dubrovnik). It would also have far lower operating costs, bring new and small. A new, Reewiin-built ship (we have a shipbuilding industry apparently!) would be far more prestigious than a Japanese hand-me-down.
  • This frees up recycled high-quality steel for new programs, and the 3" guns can be used on a riverine force. The 6" guns could also be useful protecting Kismayo's port.
 
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honestly we should go for the two per platoon since giving out one per squad may lead to supply issues for us and our military. Additionally perhaps something like two per platoon and enough for doubling our military seems like a reasonable compromise
 
AFAIK squad MGs are pretty fundamental, like it looks like everyone had at least one per squad, even the Italians and Japanese who were otherwise short on everything.

They might add to supply consumption but would be worth it.

Additionally, ZB is more likely to go for the deal if they're being offered more royalties out of it, and if we're spooling up a factory from scratch, we may as well make the things in bulk - most of the cost being upfront and all that. Might even be able to flog some off to the Japanese as well, it being pretty similar to the Type 96 which they probably won't have as many as they'd like - at least until they decide they'd rather go to 7mm.

Speaking of MGs... hadn't the pre-existing Type 3s been swapped to the Caribineri to unify cartridges with the Italian MGs? It seems to have been a vote option but i'm not sure if it was picked at some point - turn 5 had the line Reports from when the Army still used the Type 3 were positive, as it is lightweight, reliable, and does not require carrying water for cooling. which suggests it was. Might need to move them back over at some point once there's enough to fully replace the Fiats.
 
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Pyrelight said:
AFAIK squad MGs are pretty fundamental, like it looks like everyone had at least one per squad, even the Italians and Japanese who were otherwise short on everything.

They might add to supply consumption but would be worth it.

Additionally, ZB is more likely to go for the deal if they're being offered more royalties out of it, and if we're spooling up a factory from scratch, we may as well make the things in bulk - most of the cost being upfront and all that. Might even be able to flog some off to the Japanese as well, it being pretty similar to the Type 96 which they probably won't have as many as they'd like - at least until they decide they'd rather go to 7mm.

Speaking of MGs... hadn't the pre-existing Type 3s been swapped to the Caribineri to unify cartridges with the Italian MGs? It seems to have been a vote option but i'm not sure if it was picked at some point - turn 5 had the line Reports from when the Army still used the Type 3 were positive, as it is lightweight, reliable, and does not require carrying water for cooling. which suggests it was. Might need to move them back over at some point once there's enough to fully replace the Fiats.
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My understanding of the question is similar - ZB's asking "how many of these are you making so we can figure out if it's worth developing the gun for you", with higher numbers resulting in a higher likelihood of them signing the deal/giving us a lower licensing fee per gun. However, if we say "give us a fee based on us making 2000 guns" and we only make 200 in a decade, they'll probably not be happy.

After thinking about it, I think we should go for one rifle per squad for an army twice as large as our current one. Yes, that's a lot of money going into gun production, but it possibly means a lower cost per gun and having those machine guns is important. For a rough idea of what it'd entail, a Bren Mk.1 cost 40 pounds, whereas a Lee-Enfield No.4 cost 7.75 (so just over 5 rifles per LMG). Using our current production rate of Arisakas as a baseline for what "one production line" can do, and assuming costs are representative of the effort involved, that translates to a production rate of around one LMG every two days. Using @Rat King's math, we'd be able to equip a full brigade in a year and a half after production hits "full" pace (so around 3 years from now, based on how quickly we started making Type 38s), and a second brigade in another year and a half after that. I think that's a good production pace, it'd likely decrease the licensing fees, and I don't think we'd have severe problems if we didn't quite meet that. I also think 1 light machine gun is more valuable than 5 rifles, tbh.

As for the Type 96, we'd be beating Japan to the punch, actually - the Type 96 doesn't show up until '36, so if we can start mass production of a functional vz. 30 in Japan's service cartridge before then, there's a chance Japan could buy some from us before they develop a domestic alternative. Of course, this'd also be reliant on the Czechs approving of this, which they very well may not - Japan isn't making friends with the international community right now.
 
I think the rifle factory is still in low-rate production until the Japanese sign off on them as good
not sure how much of that is legitimate issues and how much is the Japanese playing silly buggers
 
Pyrelight said:
AFAIK squad MGs are pretty fundamental, like it looks like everyone had at least one per squad, even the Italians and Japanese who were otherwise short on everything.

They might add to supply consumption but would be worth it.

Additionally, ZB is more likely to go for the deal if they're being offered more royalties out of it, and if we're spooling up a factory from scratch, we may as well make the things in bulk - most of the cost being upfront and all that. Might even be able to flog some off to the Japanese as well, it being pretty similar to the Type 96 which they probably won't have as many as they'd like - at least until they decide they'd rather go to 7mm.

Speaking of MGs... hadn't the pre-existing Type 3s been swapped to the Caribineri to unify cartridges with the Italian MGs? It seems to have been a vote option but i'm not sure if it was picked at some point - turn 5 had the line Reports from when the Army still used the Type 3 were positive, as it is lightweight, reliable, and does not require carrying water for cooling. which suggests it was. Might need to move them back over at some point once there's enough to fully replace the Fiats.
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The Type 3 uses the same 6.5mm Japanese that the rifles use, so I don't think they would have swapped to the Carabinieri.
 
It also depends on how exactly we want our rifle squads to operate, do we go for the German doctrine of squads being built around the mg gunner? Having one mg per squad will allow our troops to maneuver a fair bit more on the battlefield than if we had just 2 per platoon as other squads would be able to support each other with support fire.
 
What alternatives were there to the German model of building a squad around the machine gunner?
 
C_Z said:
What alternatives were there to the German model of building a squad around the machine gunner?
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Alternatively we could do what the Americans did, center our firepower in the squads around the riflemen rather than the mg gunner, though that runs into the issue of needing either semi automatics (very unlikely that we somehow get our hands on an M1 Garand clone) or a fully automatic weapon (STG-44 for example).
Though if we could somehow pull of an M1 Garand Clone, then we wouldn't have the deficiencies of the BAR so in theory our squads should perform better.

There is another alternative, pulling a USSR and having 1/3 of all squads be armed with an mg and sub machine guns, though this too runs into the issue of a lack of an inexpensive smg (such as a Sten/PPS-43/Grease gun). Also for obvious reason said squads would mostly be useful in either an assaulting role or city fighting.
 
DegenWeeb said:
Alternatively we could do what the Americans did, center our firepower in the squads around the riflemen rather than the mg gunner, though that runs into the issue of needing either semi automatics (very unlikely that we somehow get our hands on an M1 Garand clone) or a fully automatic weapon (STG-44 for example).
Though if we could somehow pull of an M1 Garand Clone, then we wouldn't have the deficiencies of the BAR so in theory our squads should perform better.

There is another alternative, pulling a USSR and having 1/3 of all squads be armed with an mg and sub machine guns, though this too runs into the issue of a lack of an inexpensive smg (such as a Sten/PPS-43/Grease gun). Also for obvious reason said squads would mostly be useful in either an assaulting role or city fighting.
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The problem there is that the US found that the lack of a machine gun wasn't made up for by semi-automatic riflemen and their weight of fire in practice was less than a squad with an LMG. Post-war, the US moved to putting an MG in every squad.
 
Artificial Girl said:
The problem there is that the US found that the lack of a machine gun wasn't made up for by semi-automatic riflemen and their weight of fire in practice was less than a squad with an LMG. Post-war, the US moved to putting an MG in every squad.
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Correct me if wrong, but wasn't the main issue that the BAR was just an awful LMG choice? In theory, an average US infantry squad equipped with M1's was close to say a German rifle squad in terms of firepower, but the main difference was that American firepower would drastically decrease with each rifleman combat loss while a German squad's firepower wouldn't take as much of a hit due to being centered around the mg gunner with a good general purpose mg?
 
DegenWeeb said:
Correct me if wrong, but wasn't the main issue that the BAR was just an awful LMG choice? In theory, an average US infantry squad equipped with M1's was close to say a German rifle squad in terms of firepower, but the main difference was that American firepower would drastically decrease with each rifleman combat loss while a German squad's firepower wouldn't take as much of a hit due to being centered around the mg gunner with a good general purpose mg?
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Yeah. The BAR had the potential to be a decent LMG, but the US just didn't do shit to make it fit the role the way the Poles and Belgians did. But yeah, a squad of riflemen with an automatic rifle pressed into an LMG role will be inferior to a squad of rifelmen with an LMG or GPMG since the MG adds so much firepower can in theory be operated by anyone else in the squad even if the gunner is hit.
 
Okay, since it seems less than 1 LMG per squad is pretty significantly suboptimal (trusting you guys on this), and I think we'll need to eventually expand the army if we want to not die in a war (6000 troops just aren't enough against any of our neighbours), I'm going to vote:

[X] Enough to double the size of the army and equip every squad with one.

Also, for the regularly-scheduled vote:

[X] Organisational Reform: Wilderness Rangers - The Carabinieri is responsible for massive tracts of rural land. A specialist ranger unit trained in long-distance patrol and survival would be useful to the force as a whole. (9-Month Investment.)
 
Side note, does anyone know how effective bicycles would be in Reewiin? It might be worth it to invest in them to give the Carabinieri some extra mobility or even to have a cheap but still decently fast infantry division.

If it worked for the Japanese in Singapore, it might work in East Africa?
en.wikipedia.org

Bicycle infantry - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

[X] Enough to double the size of the army and equip every squad with one
 
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