David/Betis,
Sorry for my late reply, but it took me some time to think about a good answer. I hope you don't mind me combining my answers to some of the issues you both raised.
מה ההבדל בין חי"ר לחרמ"ש? הכלים והתו"ל שסביבו
The above definition is accurate however I believe that should only be one type of infantry soldier in the IDF. I see hermesh as just another role that the regular infantry trains to perform, just like urban, trench, mountain, helicopter assault etc.
Infantry fighting (i.e. firing) mounted has historically proven mostly ineffective, and frequently even disastrous. Thus the infantry armored vehicle should only be for getting to the objective safely (the battle-taxi role). A vehicle like the Namer simply lets you dismount closer than with an M113.
The best way to utilize the HAPC is like I, and others before me like EL, suggested, in separate units that will ensure that the scarce HAPC are utilized wherever they are needed, complete with a well-skilled crew and organic logistics support.
And of course I fully agree with what Betis nicely expresses here:
ציטוט:
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יחידות החי"ר צריכות לשאוב את צרכי הניוד שלהן מגדודי תובלת סער כבדיםשאנשיהם מיומנים ומאומנים בהובלת כוחות בקרב ע"י נגמ"כ ולא להיות תלוי באופיווחשיבתו של מג"ד חי"ר זה או אחר, שהדרישות ממנו לכשירויות השונות הן רבות ואילוהתקציב והזמן מועטים. זה גם יפתור את בעיית האחזקה והמיומנות.
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That was the short answer. Now for the rest (I apologize in advance for the length and the foreign language).
Let me first explain that my perspective comes from reading in books and online about the IDF hermesh in 67/73, as well as reading about experiences in Afghanistan, Chechnya, and Iraq and especially about American mech units, together with my own experience as a soldier in IDF M113-based units
I could even argue that the Golani battalion (pre Achzarit) and later reserve battalion that I served in could actually be considered hermesh or mech infantry units. However, while benefiting from the (limited) armor protection and mobility provided by the vehicles, there was no doubt that our role is/was primarily as dismounted infantry soldiers. The way I see it, all the IDF infantry brigades, at least in the 80s and 90s when they trained primarily for conventional war, were defacto hermesh units.
I think that the main trouble with "hermesh" units was that they thought that they were tank soldiers, meant to fight from their vehicles, rather than dismounted. Whether for protecting tanks against AT teams or for making an assault, infantry fire from a vehicle, especially one in motion, is quite in effective and only something that you should do if the enemy ambushes you from very close. It can be compared to a tank loader firing his machine gun.
While firing mounted, the infantry squad looses its main advantage of being spread out, with 10 pairs of eyes looking around and difficult for the enemy to locate. The best way for the infantry to protect the tanks is to be deployed scattered between them to protect against close fire or positioned on vantage point on the flanks to protect against longer range ATGM teams.
APC vs. IFV; Heavy Light and Medium Infantry Units
The only difference that I can see with the effectiveness of using a BMP or Bradley-type IFV vehicle compared to a Merkava tank stuffed with four infantry soldiers is that the IFVs carry another two soldiers, but lack the firepower, mobility and armor of the tank.
The US Army had "heavy divisions that consisted of Abrams tank battalions and mech infantry battalions with M2 Bradley, and "light" divisions consisting of infantry, deployed by parachute, helicopters, trucks or by foot. The light infantry wert considered good infantry fighters but suffered from not having any armored mobility. Meanwhile the "heavy" units are severely short on infantry (a mech platoon of 4 Bradley provides no more than 24 dismounts (less in practice and leaves 12 crew onboard) and in these units the infantry fighting skills were considered inferior to those of the "light" units.
So what do they do next? The come up with Stryker brigades which are basically "medium" infantry units that use a wheeled light armored vehicle to bring 9 soldiers that are trained to fight dismounted. This is basically what we already have with the M113.
[And I don't see any advantage to the IDF for using Strykers (nice for driving quickly from Jenin to Hebron) over M113s (better suited for general warfare)]
Successful Accounts of Mounted Warfare
About the only successful accounts of mounted warfare by infantry that I can recall is the usage of the M113 in Vietnam as an Armored Cavalry Assault Vehicle (ACAV)--sort of like a light tank with 3 machineguns. This was originally done by the South Vietnamese army (against the advice of their American advisors), and later adopted by the Americans themselves. However the success of this usage could be specific to the wet terrain or maybe lack of sufficient effective AT weapons by the communist forces...
ציטוט:
Dunstan quotes from a US Army report that M113's sustained approximately, one penetration for every seven RPG hits. Hits in themselves averaged about one in eight to ten rounds fired due to the inherent inaccuracy of the weapon. Statistical analysis reveals that only one vehicle was destroyed for every seven penetrations and casualties were 0.8 per penetration.
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I don't know if this success can be accredited to mounted tactics or because the enemy mostly used the less powerful RPG-2 and not the later RPG7
Mixed versus Pure Infantry and Tank Units
I thought about why after 1973, the IDF did away with the remaining mixed infantry/tank units and converted all brigades to either pure infantry "chiram" or pure tank brigades. Could it be that this is the best organization to produce soldiers that are the most professional in their primary role?
In any case, in combat, units will be mixed into task forces, adhoc per the mission requirements (or availability). This happenned even in the pre-mixed brigades of the IDF in 1967 and even in the US in 2003 with a tank company put under an infantry battalion and vice versa. The Arab armies are organized in mixed units and I don't think that their "combined-arms" coordination was better than ours.
Having hermesh infantry companies or battalions that belong to the Armored Corps make as much sense to me as creating tank companies for fire-support, say out of Merkava2 tanks, that will belong to the Infantry Corps.
Let me put it another way, which tank battalion do you think would contain the more skilled tank crews, a battalion that belonged to a mixed mech infantry brigade or one that belonged to a pure tank brigade?
To illustrate my point, I remember once in the sadir participating as a mounted infantry platoon in a Hativa7 tank company exercise in the Golan. It was lots of fun and very impressive to drive after the Merkavas and watch them in action. After the tanks had finished raining fire over some pita, their commander told us to capture it. I just drove the M113 to the side of the pita, dropped the ramp and a few soldiers got out and after climbing over the side, sat down in the middle of the pita. Over the radio, the tank company commander said "mission accomplished" and kept on going. As far as he was concerned we had performed well and completed our mission. Can you imagine what the level of an infantry unit permanently stationed in this environment would be?
For an example from the other side, during our battalion exercise in Tsaylim last June, a tank company was assigned for support. I admit that I am no tank expert, but while watching them firing long suppressive machine gun bursts that lasted for minutes on the objective from positions on the opposite hilltop, I couldn't help wondering why they weren't moving back and forth from the firing positions to avoid AT fire (and this was a unit that had participated in the war). I commented about this to one of my officers and he told me that others had also noticed this and were going to report this in the final review. But as infantry, what do we know about proper tank tactics? Maybe they had orders to conserve engine hours?
Improved coordination between tanks and infantry is achieved through constant joint exercises, but first of all each has to be profficient in their own role. In the 80s/90s almost every company exercise that I participated in included tanks. And for anyone who fell asleep and didn't read a newspaper over the last year, if we don't train nothing will work anyway.
ראשי
צ'אט
14-09-2006, 11:49
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