Infantry Discussion Thread part 11: Gallas Razor edition.

[NeuPolska]

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

[Vassenor]

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

Armoured ride in APCs. Mechanised ride in trucks.

[Laywenrania]

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

one has three mechanised regiments and one armoured regiment, the other one vice versa? (depending on the nation in question etcetc)

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

Armoured ride in APCs. Mechanised ride in trucks.

that is mechanised (APC/IFV) and motorised (Trucks).

[Puzikas]

A bullet does not carry enough DU or other heavy metal to cause poisoning. The locational similarly matters little in regards to heavy metal poisoning. I had a patient a few weeks ago who admitted to eating about a teaspoon of copper a day-I don't know why-and he claimed to have been doing so every day for the last six years, and had only now just started to develop symptoms of copper poisoning.

Interesting on not carrying enough. What would you consider to be enough?

Also that last bit, makes you think that the concept of Social Darwinism is right.

Exposure to Uranium can cause both substance and radiological toxicity. I assume since we are talking about bullets the radiologic absorption is negligible at best. If someone were to sit there and eat a DU bullet every day for their service, they would contract Uranium poisoning. They would, however, squire medical issues far before this.

Symptoms of uranium poisoning usually begin to present themselves with a fever. At this point a bloodworkup and urine analysis would reveal the patient has β2 elevations and would have nephrotoxicity, based on levels of microglobulin, BUN/Non-protein nitrogen, and glucosuria, proteinuria, tubule degeneration, lesions and cell necrosis. Depending on the vector this may be accompanied by non-malignant resperatory disease.

Renal failure may kill the patient. There have been two studies (not tests-an important distinction) in 2002 and 2006, that point to that Uranium intake may be perfectly safe in small doses, and the cytotoxic effects or Uranium ingestion may be an abnormality of non-body substrate isolation tests. These studies survey the health of 193 individuals whom ingest approximately 0.078 micrograms of Uranium in well water daily, with the mean timespan being 16 years, and found the individuals had no significant abnormalities from uranium ingestion, or at least non that could not be easily explained by other, more common causes.

Well yeah, you ingest enough of anything and it can kill you. From toothpaste to uranium.

What's particularly interesting is that it's not enough, whereas you hear that DU will poison someone once it's in them in popular media. Although this does bring up another subsection within this topic.

If a DU bullet penetrates some unlucky conscript's body armor, knowing of the armor piercing capabilities of DU and its pyrotechnic nature, couldn't the resulting pyrotechnics and self-sharpening be enough to cause long-term issues? I'm hypothesizing that the self-sharpening properties will allow enough fragmenting of DU to cause long-term issues, assuming that he managed to survive the initial contact.

Being shot basically always develops some sort of long term issue. Usually chronic pain. From fragments it's more or less the same depending on size.

There is no "enough", it varies person to person and AFAIK a L₅₀ of Uranium has not been established.

the LD50 for acute intake in humans has not been well established. Large acute doses of uranium can produce death from chemical toxicity in rats, guinea pigs, and other small experimental animals, with variation in sensitivity among species. However, there has never been a death attributable to uranium poisoning in humans, and humans seem to be less sensitive to both acute and chronic toxic effects of uranium than other mammalian species studied.

The article later goes on to postulate 5 grams of pure Uranium is the LD₅₀. It notes that this is based on sparse information.

[Rhodesialund]

Interesting...

Thanks Puz for your input!

[Puzikas]

That will be $1,489.72.

Would you like an itemized bill, or a standard charge receipt?

[Husseinarti]

but in communism everything is free!

[Kazarogkai]

but in communism everything is free!

Nothing is free, everything requires someone to pay. Whether the payer in question is the state, the collective community(public funding), or individually funded(private funding) notwithstanding.

[Puzikas]

Are you on some sort of mission to miss all the jokes?

[Dostanuot Loj]

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

Whatever you want it to be
The answer varies from country to country and decade to decade.

[Gallia-]

What's the difference between armored divisions and mechanized divisions?

Armoured ride in APCs. Mechanised ride in trucks.

Wrong.

The actual answer is "it varies" or "how long is a piece of string".

[NeuPolska]

Well alright then.

Also, I'm going to be talking to a recruiter soon. I might still just go to university but the Army's got a shit ton of benefits that universities don't give you. I won't have loans and be broke, for example If I do join, I'll be joining the Army, as the earlier sentence implied. I should do good on that test they give you considering I did great on my academic test scores (ACT). So I'll be going in as a photographer. I'll have to ask plenty of questions about that specific route but I'm saving that for the recruiter. Any questions I should ask, or any tips from any military veterans?

And yes, I know being a photographer could land me in some combat shit and I'll have to shoot dudes and get shot at or be on the lookout for IEDs but at least I'm not as likely to do that as an actual regular soldier.

[Puzikas]

POG as fuck
Dying ain't so bad

[Gallia-]

real men are tankii

[NeuPolska]

Lol I always said if I had to fight in combat I'd do everything to be part of a tank crew

But POG means...?

[Gallia-]

Personnel Other than Grunt.

[Dostanuot Loj]

Unless things have changed, you'll go in what they tell you to. You can list your preferences but that doesn't mean you will get it.

[Taihei Tengoku]

Lol I always said if I had to fight in combat I'd do everything to be part of a tank crew :p

But POG means...?

personnel other than grunt

just be a good dude and a fit dude and you will do alright

Unless things have changed, you'll go in what they tell you to. You can list your preferences but that doesn't mean you will get it.

The US Army contracts people into specific MOS before they join. Some have five-figure signing bonuses.

[NeuPolska]

Unless things have changed, you'll go in what they tell you to. You can list your preferences but that doesn't mean you will get it.

I've heard that scoring highly on the ASVAB or whatever will let you have a choice of what career you'll have, it's just that you can't choose your location, only list prefs for that. Definitely asking the recruiter about that though.

Personnel Other than Grunt.

Ah

[NeuPolska]

Lol I always said if I had to fight in combat I'd do everything to be part of a tank crew

But POG means...?

personnel other than grunt

just be a good dude and a fit dude and you will do alright

Unless things have changed, you'll go in what they tell you to. You can list your preferences but that doesn't mean you will get it.

The US Army contracts people into specific MOS before they join. Some have five-figure signing bonuses.

I'd say I'm a good dude, and I can be a fit dude if I wanted to. I did a lot of weight lifting sophomore year but then I moved and went to a new school that didn't have a program for it so I said fuck it and just did the basic running and push-ups. I wouldn't mind working out again and having to become big strong man.

That sounds quite nice.

[Free-Don]

Tips from a cadet and security guard:
Do everything good the first time so you won't have to do it three to twenty more times because your trainer is being funny.
Get everything in writing and then write down you got it in writing.
When you're being shot at it's best to stay down and look for a way to run. Don't just start running unless you have cover.
Everyone else is a piece of shit, just hold your own and carry those you can.
Shut the fuck up unless you have something immediate.
Don't lie you blue falcon shit.
Cursing is a form of love.

---

Moving away from that:

I was put into a situation where I was required to using a pretty high powered scope. Which is extremely different from my ironsights only approach. So I didn't find the scope very useful and ended up just trade weapons.

Would a long eye relief scout setup work much better for me or should I just get used to using a scope with practice. Likewise what would be better in a modern setting? Scope cups?

[Gallia-]

Personnel Other than Grunt.

Ah

Always relevant.

Unless things have changed, you'll go in what they tell you to. You can list your preferences but that doesn't mean you will get it.

I've heard that scoring highly on the ASVAB or whatever will let you have a choice of what career you'll have, it's just that you can't choose your location, only list prefs for that. Definitely asking the recruiter about that though.

Here is how it works:

1) Go to MEPS.
2) ASVAB. If you score high enough they will make you do more tests.
3) Medical things.
4) Talk to a guy. He pulls up a big list of things you can sign for on his computer and gives you shipping dates. You can usually tell him if you have a specific job in mind and he'll be able to see if there's a need for that type of personnel at the time or sometime in the future. No promises you will get the job you want but they are generally accommodating and try to see if they can make it work, so have several jobs in mind when you go.
5) You sign your contract for 2-6 years, depending on your job and branch, and you're done. It's actually an 8-year contract because the Individual Ready Reserve, but that's kind of whatever.
6) You get a shipping date where you're supposed to go the recruiter's office and you're taken to basic training in a bus or van, or whatever.

[Gallia-]

holy moley the second paragraph of the blog

Firing the semiautomatic M4 is horrifyingly disappointing, menacingly weak, and very very easy. It bruised my ego the first time I shot one, it was as loud as a 5.56 caliber cannon, and I had mild PTSD for the rest of the day whenever someone would show me much cooler fully automatic assault rifles in movies.

"bruised my ego" fukin ded

[Fordorsia]

If I'm not mistaken if you want to be a photographer in the army you already need to have a background in photography, or how it is in the British army, you already need to be serving to switch over to that.

[Gallia-]

unlike the British, the US Army actually trains their soldiers