NS Military Worldbuilding Thread No. 12

[Manokan Republic]

So i found this :

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... telescopes

It's a paper titled : The scaling relationship between telescope cost and aperture size for very large telescopes

It also includes space telescope. The paper basically states that there is a relationship between diameter vs cost for both space and ground based Optical telescope. and We know that Kennen is or may have some technology derived from it to Hubble. I think one can estimate his/her optical spy satellite cost using the relationship presented there.

For space telescope it would be the D^6. So a Spy Satellite with 3 m diameter aperture would cost at least 729 M USD. If we compare it with NRO's statement of 2 Kennen Satellite costs about 5 B USD (so about 2.5 B each) The telescope would be about 30% of the total cost. So if i go bigger and do 6 m diameter scope I am looking at some 46656 M USD or 46B.

I might be misunderstand the General discussion part tho. It discusses the factors that affects the cost. From what i understand the cost element would be :
-The telescope itself which scales as D^2
-Environmental factor, like need to provide cooling etc which also scales by D^2
-Structure, mirror or lens support which also scales as D^2

That's where i conclude the D^6 part.

With the low cost and skill needed for drones these day, it makes more sense to have a large volume of surveillance drones for these purposes and high altitude weather satellites in order to take pictures of the ground, with only a few satellites needed. You could also ironically likely just use google maps which, gives you satellite technology, even though it's commercially available and generally doesn't give you up-to-date information. If all of this was combined together in one database, it would allow for a broad range of forms of surveillance which would be useful. Every soldier could also have a camera recording all the time which would give you, a lot of information.

[Manokan Republic]

So! If going caseless, it makes sense you'd use what is essentially a caseless 6.5mm creedmoor, which is what the military went with in the experimental testing.

No they didn't.

In 2007, the Army’s 5th Special Forces Group approached ARDEC with interest in the 6.8mm Special Purpose Cartridge. ARDEC evaluation deemed the caliber “very effective” in an assault rifle platform, Kowal said.

Roberts wrote in his presentation that testing to develop the 6.8mm looked at bullets including 6mm, 6.5mm, 6.8mm, 7mm and 7.62mm.

The 6.8mm offered the best combination of “combat accuracy, reliability, and terminal performance for zero to 500-yard engagements in an M4-sized package.”

6.5mm was considered and rejected. Military bullets have nothing to do with commercial bullets either. So the two are the "same" in the sense they have different diameters, different pressure ratings, different powder loads, different bullets and different cases. There is however a 6 in the calibre so there is some commonality I suppose.

This is literally a completely different program than the LSAT or various other machine gun programs; the SPC program wasn't about caseless cartridges at all. The SPC has bullets with a roughly 6-8 gram weight that, have a G1 BC of around .35, vs. .5-7 for the 6.5mm and 6mm rounds which is, decidedly a lot less. Considering it has the same recoil and weight, but has worse aerodynamics and a worse ballistic coefficient, it's really not better. If we're talking about different programs, the 6.5mm Creedmoor has been adopted by the U.S. military, in part due to it's compatability with the existing 7.62mm NATO rifles; in theory, all you need is a barrel change to make the weapons work. So to say no 6.5mm round was ever chosen for any program is just silly.

However, the 6.5mm CT and caseless rounds were developed by the LSAT program and Textron specifically, as well as a 6.8mm. [1][2][3] The 6.5mm CT is basically replicating the ballistics of the 6.5mm Creedmoor, but is polymer cased. The CT rounds were developed alongside the caseless rounds, and the LSAT guns were designed to use either one. The newer NGSW-AR and NGSW-R competitions are designed to use a variety of rounds from 6.5mm to 6.8mm, and some have been brass-cased, polymer cased and in various other forms. So! While I don't know what they will be used in or exactly what configuration, replicating the ballistics of the 6.5mm Creedmoor was the final stage of the LSAT program.

[Manokan Republic]

Textron developed a cased 6.5mm cartridge for LSAT but it wasn't anything like described in the wall of text above.

6.8 NGSW cartridges aren't remotely comparable to 6.5mm Creedmor and illustrate the silliness of worrying about small performance gains in the increasingly archaic "assault rifle" concept.

It was exactly as I described, it has the same ballistics. I literally showed a chart and everything. But nonetheless, more than doubling the BC, and having a 75% increase in bullet mass is not insubstantial. The 6mm is more or less objectively superior to the 5.56mm, although as I pointed out with the modern polymer and caseless rounds, you are better off upgrading to that in the modern day. This whole conversation started with me saying that an ak in 6mm PPC would be a fine gun, and then later I explained some of the advantages of it over a 5.56mm. I'd hardly say the assault rifle is an archaic concept, but getting something that matches the capabilities in terms of weight and recoil but is more powerful would provide a lot of advantages.

[Austrasien]

So! While I don't know what they will be used in or exactly what configuration, replicating the ballistics of the 6.5mm Creedmoor was the final stage of the LSAT program.

6.5mm caseless was never going to be adopted by the US military. It was Textron's idea. The military, when it got around to it, came back with a completely different 6.8mm bullet that met their actual requirements for a new cartridge.

[Triplebaconation]

6.5mm caseless was never developed for the LSAT program. 6.5mm came well after caseless was abandoned.

6.5mm LSAT CT and the 6.8mm NGSW are not comparable to 6.5mm Creedmor even though the statistics on Wikipedia may be more or less identical. Both are substantially more powerful. In fact if NGSW succeeds it will be the most powerful infantry rifle - ever.

Navel-gaving about optimum assault rifle cartridges is like worrying about the best cavalry sword in 1908.

[Danternoust]

So, what is the optimal small arms and light weapons load out for the future? Is the below viable, or can there be improvement upon it?

Pistol-caliber carbines shooting steel core bullets, LSAT LMGs for intermediate range, 2B9 Vasilek-type gun mortars with ranged fuses for counter-battery and enemy unit suppression, etc?

Thinking variable proportion of carbines versus LMGs for infantry, depending on expected engagement distances.

[Gallia-]

Don't forget the war mastodons with tactical howdahs and radio flyer trailers for carrying extra water and food.

[Sibauk]

I'm not sure about the availability of commercial satellites, though - in terms of whether one will be free to task when needed, and whether the providers have any issues with the customer using them in a military conflict.

Real time satellite imagery available commercially is already here. Anyone who isn't willing to accept a contract to snap some photos of a particular set of lat/long coordinates for a week is someone who isn't going to be operating a commercial satellite venture for long. The people operating satellite constellations will probably not only know that the satellites are being used militarily, but advertise it explicitly so, as well as for wildfire and university research purposes, to show how broad and diverse their clientele are.

Oh, that's right. People already do that.

Cool, will go with renting satellites then, could choose from a mix of SAR and optical depending on the situation too. The government might subsidise the establishment of a local imaging satellite company that can tap on private/foreign investment and spread costs over other customers, though.

[Gallia-]

Maybe you could say you have a regional branch office of Planet or Spire Global I guess.

[Sibauk]

In retrospect the expertise and technology to start a local company doesn't exist, but using ICEYE which raised $152M from 2012 to 2020 for comparison, I'm thinking the Sibauk government (with energy revenues of $200M+ a year) should be able to afford forming a 50-50 joint venture, with the government holding the rights to capacity over the Southeast Asia region and the partner holding rights everywhere else.

[Gallia-]

6.5mm caseless was never developed for the LSAT program. 6.5mm came well after caseless was abandoned.

6.5mm LSAT CT and the 6.8mm NGSW are not comparable to 6.5mm Creedmor even though the statistics on Wikipedia may be more or less identical. Both are substantially more powerful. In fact if NGSW succeeds it will be the most powerful infantry rifle - ever.

Navel-gaving about optimum assault rifle cartridges is like worrying about the best cavalry sword in 1908.

6mm Unified btfo. ):

[Triplebaconation]

It's still lurking around

[Gallia-]

the king himself

[Arkandros]

So i found this :

https://www.researchgate.net/publicatio ... telescopes

It's a paper titled : The scaling relationship between telescope cost and aperture size for very large telescopes

It also includes space telescope. The paper basically states that there is a relationship between diameter vs cost for both space and ground based Optical telescope. and We know that Kennen is or may have some technology derived from it to Hubble. I think one can estimate his/her optical spy satellite cost using the relationship presented there.

For space telescope it would be the D^6. So a Spy Satellite with 3 m diameter aperture would cost at least 729 M USD. If we compare it with NRO's statement of 2 Kennen Satellite costs about 5 B USD (so about 2.5 B each) The telescope would be about 30% of the total cost. So if i go bigger and do 6 m diameter scope I am looking at some 46656 M USD or 46B.

I might be misunderstand the General discussion part tho. It discusses the factors that affects the cost. From what i understand the cost element would be :
-The telescope itself which scales as D^2
-Environmental factor, like need to provide cooling etc which also scales by D^2
-Structure, mirror or lens support which also scales as D^2

That's where i conclude the D^6 part.

With the low cost and skill needed for drones these day, it makes more sense to have a large volume of surveillance drones for these purposes and high altitude weather satellites in order to take pictures of the ground, with only a few satellites needed. You could also ironically likely just use google maps which, gives you satellite technology, even though it's commercially available and generally doesn't give you up-to-date information. If all of this was combined together in one database, it would allow for a broad range of forms of surveillance which would be useful. Every soldier could also have a camera recording all the time which would give you, a lot of information.

The bottleneck for multiple feeds (like you are describing) ends up being more on the backend though, which can be problematic when trying to piece together a whole picture of a front or AOR with images separated geographically and chronologically, especially when such information is time sensitive. Satellites have the advantage here in that they can take broad strokes pictures, even if they are of fairly low resolution from cheaper or higher orbit satellites, which can then be used to direct further reconnaissance efforts. Satellites will also give an overall view far more rapidly, and likely more cheaply, over time than constant deployment, refueling, repairing, or replacement of drones or other recon assets.

[Danternoust]

The bottleneck for multiple feeds (like you are describing) ends up being more on the backend though, which can be problematic when trying to piece together a whole picture of a front or AOR with images separated geographically and chronologically, especially when such information is time sensitive. Satellites have the advantage here in that they can take broad strokes pictures, even if they are of fairly low resolution from cheaper or higher orbit satellites, which can then be used to direct further reconnaissance efforts. Satellites will also give an overall view far more rapidly, and likely more cheaply, over time than constant deployment, refueling, repairing, or replacement of drones or other recon assets.

And then there are the moments you get some guy drunk, and George Papadopoulos spills the beans on the whole thing and everyone is left scrambling to figure out what is going on.

[Pentaga Giudici]

If the BT tanks could be driven on just the wheels without the treads, and the T-34 has a Christian suspension, does that mean the T-34 could drive without the treads as well?

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

If the BT tanks could be driven on just the wheels without the treads, and the T-34 has a Christian suspension, does that mean the T-34 could drive without the treads as well?

No. That capability was removed iirc.

[Kassaran]

Probably because in war time that would have been a bit too much over-engineering for the actual scenario the tank was designed to operate in.

[Gallia-]

If the BT tanks could be driven on just the wheels without the treads, and the T-34 has a Christian suspension, does that mean the T-34 could drive without the treads as well?

No. That capability was removed iirc.

It wasn't necessary because Russia discovered trains. I'm not sure they ever used BT's swappable road wheels in any serious capacity either. The Christie suspension's, uh, "versatility", was sort of like the Pierre Sprey of 1930: why put a tank on a road or a railroad when you can put two or three, or two or three dozen, on a truck or a train and drive them that way?

People liked it because it didn't require much volume in the tank, torsion bars sucked, and it gave pretty good rides over smooth-ish terrain at high (faster than walking) speed. Which is why you see light tanks using it mostly.

That said you don't need a special anything to do it. You could probably swap the wheels on a T-34 and drive it normally without any significant modification to the hull. The suspension/drive unit would be changed obviously but this is relatively minor: the Christie suspension (and AMX-10RC) only run one drive wheel on either side.

I'm going to draw a 6.5mm Unified-esque super AR-10 I guess for Dumbla for 202X.

[Triplebaconation]

I'm not sure the roadwheels were swappable - I think they just had a chain drive that was connected to the drive sprocket?

T-34 manganese tracks had about 5x the lifespan of early BT-series tracks.

[Gallia-]

Oof ouch my ride quality but solid rubber tires are lindy I guess.

Yeah apparently you just hooked a chain up and it took like 30 minutes.

[Kassaran]

So, quick question for you gun nerds here:

6.8mm rounds, were they settled on for their penetrating power or for reaching power?

[The Manticoran Empire]

So, quick question for you gun nerds here:

6.8mm rounds, were they settled on for their penetrating power or for reaching power?

Probably a bit of both, really.

[Triplebaconation]

So, quick question for you gun nerds here:

6.8mm rounds, were they settled on for their penetrating power or for reaching power?

Primarily the shift in focus to conventional peer-level warfare and the proliferation of body armor.

Effective range will probably be around 600 meters.

The takeaway is that GPC nerds trying to squeeze an extra kilometer or whatever out of an M4 because they read in a blog that the US was outgunned in Afghanistan are stuck in fantasy land.

[Cossack Peoples]

What would the combat in a modern civil war look like if both parties are equivalent in force? I know, probably a shitshow, but I'm having difficulty visualizing some of the moving parts. Like, I'd assume the first thing that would happen is that one side would attempt to secure and maintain air superiority while the other seeks to tear that away from them; whoever gets it decidedly has an advantage for the rest of the war, denying their opponent any sizable armored forces. And what the hell does the Navy do? Fire support? Play Poker?