NS Military Realism Consultation Thread Type 08

[Tule]

snip

I'd base my doctrine on a highly speedy style of warfare; larger armies are more powerful, but they take time to get underway. In case of war, rush your enemies as quickly as possible with tanks, mechanized infantry, and air forces, so they capitulate before they can bring their power to bear. Just don't get bogged down in conflict ever.

I don't believe fixed defenses really have a place in modern combat, BTW. With small-diameter bombs being able to go through the thickest of defenses(and plain ol' reinforced concrete will hardly be a good defense against most HEAT rounds), they are easily defeated, plus the nature of them means that they can't move to respond to threats. Take Hitler's Atlantic Wall, for example. Theoretically it was a very tough defense; he spent years building it up. But it was breached in less than 24 hours, and all that effort spent building it up, and all those men it took to man the entire thing, became irrelevant very quickly. If you really want to, you might try concentrating defenses in natural choke points(a small valley between two impassable mountains for example) but even then they can be defeated with airborne troops. Instead, try to not ever allow yourself to be put on the defensive, because as soon as that happens then you lose all initiative and the enemy can dictate battles on his own terms. Make them react to you.

You do have well thought out ideas, though. That's better than 90% of the people on this site.

A third world country facing other third world countries doesn't really have to worry much about BLU's dropped from strike eagles. Or Airborne troops.

Also, third world countries don't tend to support small, highly mechanized forces very well. Or air power for that matter. Your advise would be good for a small, developed country. But It's completely unrealistic for a third world country in his position.

High speed is a good thing, but in his case he'd be better off attaining it with equipment that is less complicated to maintain and less logistics intensive.

His air power should be limited to liason aircraft, COIN aircraft and some light fighters. On land he should stick to motorised infantry, artillery and some tanks for counter-offensives.

Larger armies aren't necessarily harder to mobilise. An infantry-based army is in fact superior to a mechanised army when it comes to strategic mobility. Sending an infantry battalion to the front by train is a lot easier than loading a whole tank battalion on the same train.

[Forenet Skandinavien]

Each of the three countries is recieving large amounts of support from either a superpower or a secondary power, which includes military presence. There will be advanced technologies coming into play. Also, each of the three countries are being modernised by their backing power, so there's bound to be just as many people living in third world conditions as there are people whose conditions of life are improving or are already better.

So, quick wars are always better than defense? That makes sense. The terrain is largely divided between open farmland and jungles, the former of which I can easily send heavy vehicles through, but the latter of which I'm stuck on what to use. Infantry would be able to move through the jungle the quickest, but they would be without armored support if they went alone. Are there any types of vehicles that are designed for use in jungles, because those seem like the most logical choice to use.

I'm guessing my naval strategy (strike first and blockade) and aerial strategy (ensure air superiority) are both good ones, correct? As for the size of my military, does a standing army of 150,000 with an extra 500,000 in reserve sound good? This country's population is slightly over five million. As for my land strategy, am I right to say that blitzkrieg (or some variant of it) would be best for this scenario?

Also, urban warfare is hell, and there are a total of eleven enemy settlements large enough to call cities. Is there any quick and effective way to take them without having to spend time besieging the city? I'm guessing that such a way would involve armor and artillery, since infantry would be out in the open for snipers to get in cities.

[The United Remnants of America]

Hypothetically, would a magnetic launch system move an aircraft fast enough for scramjets to activate?

Hopefully, without killing the pilot.

[The Akasha Colony]

snip

I'd base my doctrine on a highly speedy style of warfare; larger armies are more powerful, but they take time to get underway. In case of war, rush your enemies as quickly as possible with tanks, mechanized infantry, and air forces, so they capitulate before they can bring their power to bear. Just don't get bogged down in conflict ever.

I don't believe fixed defenses really have a place in modern combat, BTW. With small-diameter bombs being able to go through the thickest of defenses(and plain ol' reinforced concrete will hardly be a good defense against most HEAT rounds), they are easily defeated, plus the nature of them means that they can't move to respond to threats. Take Hitler's Atlantic Wall, for example. Theoretically it was a very tough defense; he spent years building it up. But it was breached in less than 24 hours, and all that effort spent building it up, and all those men it took to man the entire thing, became irrelevant very quickly. If you really want to, you might try concentrating defenses in natural choke points(a small valley between two impassable mountains for example) but even then they can be defeated with airborne troops. Instead, try to not ever allow yourself to be put on the defensive, because as soon as that happens then you lose all initiative and the enemy can dictate battles on his own terms. Make them react to you.

You do have well thought out ideas, though. That's better than 90% of the people on this site.

Field fortifications have tremendous use in warfare even today. The problem is that armchair generals treat them like defensive structures in an RTS that are supposed to stop an enemy army entirely.

Fortifications aren't usually intended to stop the enemy permanently. They're designed to buy time and require the attacker to invest significantly more resources than the defender in assaulting the fortification. This can make all the difference in a situation where the powers would otherwise be evenly matched in a head-on engagement. Yes, the Allies breached the Atlantic Wall, but it took an extreme allocation of manpower, resources, and time to do so. Luckily for the Allies, they had such a margin of industrial superiority over Germany that this expenditure didn't mean all that much.

Field fortifications are extremely useful; a handful of infantry in a trench or behind a wall of sandbags/dirt will be very hard to root out without the use of disproportionate force. Yes, you can call an air strike or artillery or whatever, but it means the attacking force has to stop, put in a call for a fire mission, and wait until that mission can be executed before advancing. All because a couple of guys with a machine gun happened to be in a trench. And by the time the strike arrives, they may well have already fallen back to their next prepared fortification.

Each of the three countries is recieving large amounts of support from either a superpower or a secondary power, which includes military presence. There will be advanced technologies coming into play. Also, each of the three countries are being modernised by their backing power, so there's bound to be just as many people living in third world conditions as there are people whose conditions of life are improving or are already better.

So, quick wars are always better than defense? That makes sense. The terrain is largely divided between open farmland and jungles, the former of which I can easily send heavy vehicles through, but the latter of which I'm stuck on what to use. Infantry would be able to move through the jungle the quickest, but they would be without armored support if they went alone. Are there any types of vehicles that are designed for use in jungles, because those seem like the most logical choice to use.

I'm guessing my naval strategy (strike first and blockade) and aerial strategy (ensure air superiority) are both good ones, correct? As for the size of my military, does a standing army of 150,000 with an extra 500,000 in reserve sound good? This country's population is slightly over five million. As for my land strategy, am I right to say that blitzkrieg (or some variant of it) would be best for this scenario?

Also, urban warfare is hell, and there are a total of eleven enemy settlements large enough to call cities. Is there any quick and effective way to take them without having to spend time besieging the city? I'm guessing that such a way would involve armor and artillery, since infantry would be out in the open for snipers to get in cities.

Offensive operations are good if you can execute them properly. But often third world militaries do not have the organizational skill or experience to do so properly, and mostly have to hope that their opponent is even more inept at defense to make any headway. A proper offensive requires being able to make new decisions in response to changing conditions on the fly, and having commanders skilled enough to act under a constantly changing environment. The Iran-Iraq War is a good example of what happens without this, even if advanced weapons are involved: offensives rapidly bog down and turn into bloody stalemates as neither side has the organizational capability to exploit weaknesses in the other's defenses and instead resort to ponderous pre-planned attacks with little flexibility or ability to adapt to unexpected situational changes.

[Forenet Skandinavien]

To be clear, for my puppet state, the vast majority of the officers will be Scandinavian (i.e. from a first world superpower), The air force is largely made up of Scandinavian pilots flying Scandinavian planes, and the navy is almost entirely Scandinavian sailing Scandinavian-built ships. It's only the army that, despite having its supplies be Scandinavian-made, is made up almost entirely of local people.

As for strategy, quick wars always go the best, so I'll likely want to have a quick war, but I also definitely shouldn't neglect defenses. Most of the border is in a hilly jungle terrain, which would be easy to defend in naturally, but there is a valley in between the hills at one point full of farmland; that I expect to be a weak point in defenses.

[Tule]

Each of the three countries is recieving large amounts of support from either a superpower or a secondary power, which includes military presence. There will be advanced technologies coming into play. Also, each of the three countries are being modernised by their backing power, so there's bound to be just as many people living in third world conditions as there are people whose conditions of life are improving or are already better.

So, quick wars are always better than defense? That makes sense. The terrain is largely divided between open farmland and jungles, the former of which I can easily send heavy vehicles through, but the latter of which I'm stuck on what to use. Infantry would be able to move through the jungle the quickest, but they would be without armored support if they went alone. Are there any types of vehicles that are designed for use in jungles, because those seem like the most logical choice to use.

I'm guessing my naval strategy (strike first and blockade) and aerial strategy (ensure air superiority) are both good ones, correct? As for the size of my military, does a standing army of 150,000 with an extra 500,000 in reserve sound good? This country's population is slightly over five million. As for my land strategy, am I right to say that blitzkrieg (or some variant of it) would be best for this scenario?

Also, urban warfare is hell, and there are a total of eleven enemy settlements large enough to call cities. Is there any quick and effective way to take them without having to spend time besieging the city? I'm guessing that such a way would involve armor and artillery, since infantry would be out in the open for snipers to get in cities.

Giving advanced equipment to third world countries with poor infrastructure, corruption and poorly educated populations just doesn't work.

The power of armies is not determined by "quantity or quality". Adding more personnel or newer equipment does nothing to improve your military by itself.

Do your enemies have any rail roads? Paved roads? Without infrastructure, mechanized forces will have terrible strategic mobility. Can they afford to supply their fancy new tanks and IFV's with ammunition and fuel? Can they train their soldiers to be proficient with said IFV's and tanks? How are they going to make sure they are led by competent officers that aren't corrupt either?

Modern wars tend to be quick due to the speed of mechanized units and the difficulty of replacing losses. (Modern military equipment is HARD to produce)
But when two relatively underdeveloped countries clash, the result can be a very long war. Just look at the Iran-Iraq war.

EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M29_Weasel

For jungles.

[Dostanuot Loj]

On the topic of the LAV-III, how do turret crews work in that vehicle? Wiki says they have a two-man crew but goes no further; is there a gunner and a commander? I would assume as much because the Bushmaster is a chain gun, but from what I've heard the linkless feeds on those autocannons are hella complex and require someone to be constantly vigil during operation.

Gunner and commander, the gun is easily accessible to either.
It's been a few years since I've been in one, but they are surprisingly roomy.
Some nice footage here.

[The Kievan People]

So, quick wars are always better than defense? That makes sense. The terrain is largely divided between open farmland and jungles, the former of which I can easily send heavy vehicles through, but the latter of which I'm stuck on what to use. Infantry would be able to move through the jungle the quickest, but they would be without armored support if they went alone. Are there any types of vehicles that are designed for use in jungles, because those seem like the most logical choice to use.

As usual the answer is: tank-infantry teams.

Also, urban warfare is hell, and there are a total of eleven enemy settlements large enough to call cities. Is there any quick and effective way to take them without having to spend time besieging the city? I'm guessing that such a way would involve armor and artillery, since infantry would be out in the open for snipers to get in cities.

Wot is this the 19th century? City fighting is a fact of life, it cannot be avoided and you shouldn't try to.

And the answer is once again: tank-infantry teams.

[New Vihenia]

And the answer is once again: tank-infantry teams.

So.... modern urban combat with tank = Armata MBT+Armata IFV+ Armata IFV's dismounted Infantry.

is it ?

[The Akasha Colony]

To be clear, for my puppet state, the vast majority of the officers will be Scandinavian (i.e. from a first world superpower), The air force is largely made up of Scandinavian pilots flying Scandinavian planes, and the navy is almost entirely Scandinavian sailing Scandinavian-built ships. It's only the army that, despite having its supplies be Scandinavian-made, is made up almost entirely of local people.

As for strategy, quick wars always go the best, so I'll likely want to have a quick war, but I also definitely shouldn't neglect defenses. Most of the border is in a hilly jungle terrain, which would be easy to defend in naturally, but there is a valley in between the hills at one point full of farmland; that I expect to be a weak point in defenses.

That only partially addresses the problem. Where do the senior enlisted personnel come from? Who bridges the gap between your officers and their enlisted men? This is also something that third world countries often get wrong. Good armies have effective means to bridge the gap between officers and enlisted men, to get them to be willing to fight together as a team without issue. Poor armies don't bridge this gap well and as a result enlisted personnel are often not very inclined to follow orders from their officers. And this is before considering the even wider gap that would arise from having local enlisted men listen to orders from foreign officers.

[The Kievan People]

So.... modern urban combat with tank = Armata MBT+Armata IFV+ Armata IFV's dismounted Infantry.

is it ?

We have a winner!

[New Vihenia]

Looking at RPG-29, RPG-32 and perhaps the LAW Which using tube. Got me thinking... Can we make mortar out of them :3 ?
Giving it baseplate and tripod..seems doing the trick.

So basically a "universal tube" capable of firing RPG and lobbing mortar after given a baseplate and appropriate sight..or perhaps the RPG sight can double up as mortar sighting.

Thus basically giving anti tank team some sort of indirect fire capability.

[Connori Pilgrims]

Looking at RPG-29, RPG-32 and perhaps the LAW Which using tube. Got me thinking... Can we make mortar out of them :3 ?
Giving it baseplate and tripod..seems doing the trick.

So basically a "universal tube" capable of firing RPG and lobbing mortar after given a baseplate and appropriate sight..or perhaps the RPG sight can double up as mortar sighting.

Thus basically giving anti tank team some sort of indirect fire capability.

AFAIK, RPG launch tubes aren't nearly as strong as mortar (or any kind of gun arty) barrels, so I'm not entirely sure if such a setup would survive its first mortar shot if you're using normal RPG tubes.

On the flipside, RPG tubes strengthened to be usable as mortars might add some more weight than would be usual...

[Rich and Corporations]

So.... modern urban combat with tank = Armata MBT+Armata IFV+ Armata IFV's dismounted Infantry.

is it ?

We have a winner!

Armata IFV is too expensive. It's probably best to use a mix of HIFV, tanks, and APCs.

[Questers]

I'd base my doctrine on a highly speedy style of warfare; larger armies are more powerful, but they take time to get underway. In case of war, rush your enemies as quickly as possible with tanks, mechanized infantry, and air forces, so they capitulate before they can bring their power to bear. Just don't get bogged down in conflict ever.

I don't believe fixed defenses really have a place in modern combat, BTW. With small-diameter bombs being able to go through the thickest of defenses(and plain ol' reinforced concrete will hardly be a good defense against most HEAT rounds), they are easily defeated, plus the nature of them means that they can't move to respond to threats. Take Hitler's Atlantic Wall, for example. Theoretically it was a very tough defense; he spent years building it up. But it was breached in less than 24 hours, and all that effort spent building it up, and all those men it took to man the entire thing, became irrelevant very quickly. If you really want to, you might try concentrating defenses in natural choke points(a small valley between two impassable mountains for example) but even then they can be defeated with airborne troops. Instead, try to not ever allow yourself to be put on the defensive, because as soon as that happens then you lose all initiative and the enemy can dictate battles on his own terms. Make them react to you.

You do have well thought out ideas, though. That's better than 90% of the people on this site.

A third world country facing other third world countries doesn't really have to worry much about BLU's dropped from strike eagles. Or Airborne troops.

Also, third world countries don't tend to support small, highly mechanized forces very well. Or air power for that matter. Your advise would be good for a small, developed country. But It's completely unrealistic for a third world country in his position.

High speed is a good thing, but in his case he'd be better off attaining it with equipment that is less complicated to maintain and less logistics intensive.

His air power should be limited to liason aircraft, COIN aircraft and some light fighters. On land he should stick to motorised infantry, artillery and some tanks for counter-offensives.

Larger armies aren't necessarily harder to mobilise. An infantry-based army is in fact superior to a mechanised army when it comes to strategic mobility. Sending an infantry battalion to the front by train is a lot easier than loading a whole tank battalion on the same train.

Iraq had a very large mechanised Army. It wasn't very good at using it, but it was pretty big.

[Forenet Skandinavien]

Each of the three countries is recieving large amounts of support from either a superpower or a secondary power, which includes military presence. There will be advanced technologies coming into play. Also, each of the three countries are being modernised by their backing power, so there's bound to be just as many people living in third world conditions as there are people whose conditions of life are improving or are already better.

So, quick wars are always better than defense? That makes sense. The terrain is largely divided between open farmland and jungles, the former of which I can easily send heavy vehicles through, but the latter of which I'm stuck on what to use. Infantry would be able to move through the jungle the quickest, but they would be without armored support if they went alone. Are there any types of vehicles that are designed for use in jungles, because those seem like the most logical choice to use.

I'm guessing my naval strategy (strike first and blockade) and aerial strategy (ensure air superiority) are both good ones, correct? As for the size of my military, does a standing army of 150,000 with an extra 500,000 in reserve sound good? This country's population is slightly over five million. As for my land strategy, am I right to say that blitzkrieg (or some variant of it) would be best for this scenario?

Also, urban warfare is hell, and there are a total of eleven enemy settlements large enough to call cities. Is there any quick and effective way to take them without having to spend time besieging the city? I'm guessing that such a way would involve armor and artillery, since infantry would be out in the open for snipers to get in cities.

Giving advanced equipment to third world countries with poor infrastructure, corruption and poorly educated populations just doesn't work.

The power of armies is not determined by "quantity or quality". Adding more personnel or newer equipment does nothing to improve your military by itself.

Do your enemies have any rail roads? Paved roads? Without infrastructure, mechanized forces will have terrible strategic mobility. Can they afford to supply their fancy new tanks and IFV's with ammunition and fuel? Can they train their soldiers to be proficient with said IFV's and tanks? How are they going to make sure they are led by competent officers that aren't corrupt either?

Modern wars tend to be quick due to the speed of mechanized units and the difficulty of replacing losses. (Modern military equipment is HARD to produce)
But when two relatively underdeveloped countries clash, the result can be a very long war. Just look at the Iran-Iraq war.

EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M29_Weasel

For jungles.

So, do you have any advice for not repeating the Iran-Iraq War? Infrastructure isn't too good, but it's being improved. This conflict is effectively being paid for by the superpower puppeting the third world country, so costs aren't too much of an issue.

To be clear, for my puppet state, the vast majority of the officers will be Scandinavian (i.e. from a first world superpower), The air force is largely made up of Scandinavian pilots flying Scandinavian planes, and the navy is almost entirely Scandinavian sailing Scandinavian-built ships. It's only the army that, despite having its supplies be Scandinavian-made, is made up almost entirely of local people.

As for strategy, quick wars always go the best, so I'll likely want to have a quick war, but I also definitely shouldn't neglect defenses. Most of the border is in a hilly jungle terrain, which would be easy to defend in naturally, but there is a valley in between the hills at one point full of farmland; that I expect to be a weak point in defenses.

That only partially addresses the problem. Where do the senior enlisted personnel come from? Who bridges the gap between your officers and their enlisted men? This is also something that third world countries often get wrong. Good armies have effective means to bridge the gap between officers and enlisted men, to get them to be willing to fight together as a team without issue. Poor armies don't bridge this gap well and as a result enlisted personnel are often not very inclined to follow orders from their officers. And this is before considering the even wider gap that would arise from having local enlisted men listen to orders from foreign officers.

The senior personnel come from the same country that puppets the enlisted men's country. That country is often viewed by the enlisted men (and others in the country) as a liberator and a helper, since they toppled a corrupt, weak government and they're working to modernise the third-world country. Also, some of the soldiers are from the senior personnel's country.

[Fasnova]

What are the average support ratios for the following:

Fighter Aircraft
Strategic Transports
Cargo Helos
Multi-Mission Helos
Tanks
AFV
Artillery
Mobile SAMs
Infantry

[Crookfur]

What are the average support ratios for the following:

Fighter Aircraft
Strategic Transports
Cargo Helos
Multi-Mission Helos
Tanks
AFV
Artillery
Mobile SAMs
Infantry

What precisely do you mean?

[Fasnova]

What are the average support ratios for the following:

Fighter Aircraft
Strategic Transports
Cargo Helos
Multi-Mission Helos
Tanks
AFV
Artillery
Mobile SAMs
Infantry

What precisely do you mean?

Support staff per item, if applicable

I believe that someone said that fighter jets have like a 1:30 support staff ratio

[Immoren]

When it comes to fortifications...
I'd still rather spend my night in the well camoflaged prefab dugout rather than tent.

[Mansuriyyah Islamic State]

Hi,

I've been trying to set up my nation's armed forces structure and organization, and so far I2ve come with the following setup. I know there are still many things to add (and probably thngs to change). Do you guys have any feedback for me?

Armed Forces
MIS Armed Forces are divided into three branches: Army, Navy and Air Force. Each branch is divided into three main components: the active forces (all personal currently serving, Professional and conscript), the operational reserve (a volunteer reserve corps, formed by people who finished their active service but volunteered for an extended period as reservists, with monthly and annual training) and the Home Guard (formed by people who completed their military service in the past five years, they are subject to a yearly two-weeks refreshment training).

Army
Ranks:
Enlisted: Private; Private First Class; Corporal; Corporal First Class
NCOs: Third Sergeant; Second Sergeant; First Sergeant; Master Sergeant; Sergeant Major; Senior Sergeant Major
Officers: Second Lieutenant; First Lieutenant; Captain; Major; Lieutenant Coronel; Coronel
Generals: Brigadier General, Major General, Lieutenant General, General, Marshal
Army Divisions (active):
2 Mountain Divisions; 3 Airborne Infantry Divisions; 5 Mechanized Infantry Divisions; 5 Armored Divisions
Operational Reserve:
1 Mountain Division; 2 Airborne Infantry Divisions, 4 Mechanized Infantry Divisions; 3 Armored Divisions
Home Guard:
30 Home Guard Divisions (90 Brigades – combined arms)

Navy
Organization:
4 Active Fleets and 2 reserve fleets. The Navy also maintains administrative control over the Marine Corps.
Every fleet contains a carrier group, one amphibious assault group, two strike groups and two submarine groups.
The Marines are divided into 6 Marine Divisions (4 active, 2 reserves, each one assigned to one fleet command)
Rank (Navy)
Enlisted: Junior Seaman; Seaman; Seaman First Class; Senior Seaman.
NCOs: Petty Officer Third Class; Petty Officer Second Class; Petty Officer First Class; Master Petty Officer; Senior Petty Officer.
Officers: Ensign; Sub-lieutenant; Lieutenant; Lieutenant Commander; Commander; Captain.
Generals: Commodore; Vice-Admiral; Rear-Admiral; Admiral; Fleet Admiral
Ranks (Marines)
Enlisted: Private; Private First Class; Corporal; Corporal First Class
NCOs: Third Sergeant; Second Sergeant; First Sergeant; Master Sergeant; Sergeant Major; Senior Sergeant Major
Officers: Second Lieutenant; First Lieutenant; Captain; Major; Lieutenant Coronel; Coronel
Generals: Brigadier General, Major General, Lieutenant General, General

Air Force
35 Active Wings; 20 Operational Reserve Wings
Ranks:
Enlisted: Junior Airman; Airman; Airman First Class; Senior Airman
NCOs: Third Sergeant; Second Sergeant; First Sergeant; Master Sergeant; Sergeant Major; Senior Sergeant Major
Officers: Second Lieutenant; First Lieutenant; Captain; Major; Lieutenant Coronel; Coronel
Generals: Brigadier General, Major General, Lieutenant General, General, Air Marshal

[Tule]

So, do you have any advice for not repeating the Iran-Iraq War? Infrastructure isn't too good, but it's being improved. This conflict is effectively being paid for by the superpower puppeting the third world country, so costs aren't too much of an issue.

Get yourself some Artillery and some Tanks, but especially artillery. The tanks should be fairly easy to maintain and operate, something like the Centurion.

Iran was tactically proficient, but suffered greatly in the war because it had very limited fire support.

[Scandinavian Nations]

Support staff per item, if applicable
I believe that someone said that fighter jets have like a 1:30 support staff ratio

Around that order of magnitude.

There are no firm ratios because it's fairly complex, it's not 30 or 100 guys sitting around one fighter, it's people across the flight line, direct and general support, depots, logistics, training, C4I, down to basic management functions.
If you just take some air forces and divide their totals by their operational (not total) aircraft, you'll get a rough guideline like this. To get into more specifics you have to look it up per aircraft model.

A lot of the work is done by civilian contractors, supporting ops involves a lot of people and the guy taking care of the copy machine used for the paperwork for the supplies for maintaining the depot for the trucks that deliver the spares between aircraft depots on home soil won't normally be a soldier, but the level at which the work is outsourced varies greatly between the militaries. In a strong market economy it can be worthwhile to outsource everything short of actual wartime ops and even much of that (IRL PMC), while in a less free state some of what the draft scoops up is only good for changing toner.

[Husseinarti]

So, do you have any advice for not repeating the Iran-Iraq War? Infrastructure isn't too good, but it's being improved. This conflict is effectively being paid for by the superpower puppeting the third world country, so costs aren't too much of an issue.

Get yourself some Artillery and some Tanks, but especially artillery. The tanks should be fairly easy to maintain and operate, something like the Centurion.

Iran was tactically proficient, but suffered greatly in the war because it had very limited fire support.

The biggest issue with the Iran-Iraq war was that both sides had incompetent leadership.

[Padnak]

structure isn't too good, but it's being improved. This conflict is effectively being paid for by the superpower puppeting the third world country, so costs aren't too much of an issue.

Do everything in your power to improve communications between units and across services, the biggest problem (besides totally incompetent leadership on the side of the Iraqis and somewhat incompetent leadership on the side of the Iranians) that both sides faced in the Iran-Iraq war was a lack of cooperation between units and services. If ground units can work in concert with each other and with supporting elements like aircraft, they are vastly more likely to accomplish their objectives then if they are acting as disparate and uncoordinated individual units. Officer training is another area I would work as hard as possible to improve.

On equipment, as you were asking before, I've got this:
(Finally a topic I can talk with some confidence on lol)

Don't go for needlessly advanced equipment. You're at most expecting this puppet state to fight a large scale regional war against similarly underdeveloped nations, not in a 1984 Fulda Gap style balls deep mechanized zergrush. The main things you should be focusing on are trucks, tanks, command and control and artillery. Lots and lots of artillery. I base my army of FM 100-63 and for the situation that you're describing it seems like basing your puppets military off of it might be the best option.

What you're going to want to do is to have as many motorized infantry units as you possibly can given that motorized infantry are logistically light, easy to field, easy to equip and easy to train. For motorized infantry units you're going to want lots of simple 6X6 utility trucks to move infantry, lots of (most likely towed) artillery to support infantry and lots of tanks to reinforce the infantry. The key to successfully employing motorized infantry in the context of a third world state is to move them rapidly by truck before dismounting them and supporting them with tank and artillery. This is best accomplished with good communications and units designed to give motorized infantry the most advantageous position possible. Motorized infantry fight dismounted from their vehicles, given that they're riding around in utility trucks this shouldn't come as a surprise, and as a result are generally unable to assault enemy positions on their own or to meet enemy forces in the open on their own without support, this is where the artillery and tanks come it. Fighting with an army that is comprised mostly of motorized infantry units requires a strange mix of defense and offensive to be effective, along with the careful employment of supporting assets, commandos, air power and intelligence gathering.

Focus your equipment acquisitions on trucks, artillery, communications equipment and tanks. Employing large numbers of tanks supported by large amounts of artillery and backed up by huge numbers of dismounted infantry with a good deal of communication between all of them is the key to success on the third world battlefield.