I am not a particularly knowledgeable or active amateur military historian. I read some books when I can. I have been through a lot of the Ambrose books on WW2. And I have also read up on some battles/areas/theatres when the need has arisen, i.e. Chosin Reservoir, Operation Nordwind, etc.

I have no first hand knowledge of tactics or the various weapons used.

And I am totally fascinated by mortars. I would very much like to see one explained in some detail, set up, zeroed in and fired. Lots, if possible. Hands on, if possible.

Is such a thing possible for a civilian in this day and age? I have a CHL so I would probably check out as for as any sort of "risk". Anyone ever hear of demonstrations for civilian nobodies like me?

Thanks for any advice.

Join the Employers in support of Guard and Reserves.

When I was in the Guard, they would host these folks at tank gunnery to witness the tank training.

Not sure if they let them fire them or not but I know they were allowed to go in them and check them out. They also were allowed to mull around the TOC and piss me off something fierce.

TOC?

So you wanna be an 11C? Is that the MOS still for Infantry Indirect Fire Specialist still?

Ask to be the guy that lights the excess charges off some evening. Trust me.

11C's are still around, there is just something wrong with an infantryman who likes math.

Getting hands on with mortars is going to be tough if not impossible. Unless of course you join the army as an 11C or become an infantry officer and go to Mortar Leaders Course.

TOC - Tatical Operations Center

The place where Battalion Operations and Intelligence set up the field command post.

The Senior Officers and SNCOs would be there giving these folks tours of the area. It would be 100 freaking degrees in the shade but whenever they showed up, we had to put on our full combat gear, sweat, and put on a dog and pony show.

One really cool thing that happened was that the Corps Commander stopped in unannounced to watch our training. I was the shift leader and he asked me to brief him on the daily training events and then polietly asked me if he could use the battalion radios to call something in. I replied, "well, General, I imagine that just about everything here is cleared for your use!" He chuckled, shook my hand and gave me the frequency channel he needed. That was then 3 Star General Eric Shinseki!

Link to ESGR page:

http://www.esgr.org/site/

[This message has been edited by Say Chowdah (edited 2/4/2011 8:49p).]

When I was active duty, I got to go watch the mortar platoon go to the range. The Mortar Platoon leader told me that they were short on track drivers and seeing as I had a M113/577 license, he asked if I wanted to go.

Two words: HELL YES!!!

Asked my NCOIC if he'd let me go for a couple of nights of live fire exercises and he didn't mind (actually he was jealous). Got to hang a couple of 105's (including an illumniation round). I didn't do any of the calculations but it was fun!

Our mortar platoon was quite busy during my first OIF tour (2003-2004). They had both 81mm and 120mm. The latter left no doubt as to who had the bigger guns between us and the "****sticks" as the Bn CDR liked to call them.

After reading your response Lobotomy, I decided to look up the Mortars our unit (2-37 Armor) had.

It was actually the M30, 107MM shells mounted in the M106 (basically an M113 convertible). When you dropped those shells, the whole back of the track just pounded into the ground! I wouldn't want to be the permanent driver one one of those. Track maintenance must be a biatch!

Seeing as it wasn't my MOS, just getting the chance to experience it was well worth it. Cross training on other equipment was always fun!

[This message has been edited by Say Chowdah (edited 2/5/2011 8:43a).]

The ole 4.2" mortar. The one I had in my Cav Plt way back in the '70s (It was in a gasser M106) was older than the kids who were manning it. Once we made the mistake of ground mounting it on the monster baseplate hanging on the side of the track. Of course it rained. That was fun digging it up after a day of firing. Being that it was a rifled tube the round kinda curved in flight. Illum rounds were fun, but that is another story. Also firing WP. Nice.

Never got to spend time on the newer 120mm but I would expect fire control has greatly improved since we had that round plastic map deal whose name I forget to compute the firing data for the crew. Aiming stakes, sights, all that analog stuff. Amazing we ever hit anything we aimed at, really.

I'm 51. I can't join anything except the AARP. Which I'm not going to do.

I've got pretty good experience with mortars. 81s and 60s. Mortars are pretty simple and responsive depending on the section you are dealing with. Best bang for the buck is 60s they can be used in the handheld and rapidly employed. As far as zeroing a mortar it's pretty simple you use a foresight placed on the tube and check it against the data on the gun essentially. As far as civilians getting to use them that is doubtful. Aligning the mortars is done by a plotting board or an lhmbc and adjustments and corrections are done by an obswrever. Drawbacks to mortars are that they are all high angle fire thus if you are suppressing a target you want air to hit you have to take some precautions so as not to hit your cas as well. Again a squad with mmgs and 60s in the handheld have plenty of firepower.

The 107mm (4.2" a.k.a. four-deuce) was brought into service in WW I as a delivery device for chemical rounds and was used for over fifty years before it was retired.

As an artilleryman it kills me that the Marine Corps adopted a smooth bore French 120mm as the EFSS (expeditionary fire support system) instead of a 105mm howitzer. The 120mm projectile is very potent but to rely on that weapon presumes that your enemy does not have good radar and counterfire capability because the time of flight for a 120mm at long ranges is huge and the max ordinate is unnecessarily high unless you are firing over mountains. A counterfire radar can paint it easily and a good counterfire battery can have rounds in the air headed for the mortars before that 120mm even impacts its target.

As long as we were going to buy a 120mm mortar there were better alternatives to the one we got that have a higher rate of fire and longer range and fire either rifled or fin stabilized projos. The Dragon Fire II (the TDA 2R2M) was a far better choice and was mounted in a LAV instead of towed behind a glorified 21st century reincarnation of the jeep. Just hope that no one is so uncivilized as to employ an IED against a mortar platoon moving down the road equipped with these "Carolina Growlers."



[This message has been edited by Ulysses90 (edited 2/5/2011 4:53p).]

It seems like the whole point there is to be expeditionary. A mortar in an LAV isn't going to get airlifted in a helicopter.

Build a potato gun. Shoot it.

81s in an lav are a good commodity. The 120 is nice and I agree about the smooth bore not being the best. As far as expeditionary you can't beat 60s 81s and mk19 in indirect. The mk19 is an expedient indirect resource. No matter how you cut it arty is a dying art with himars and Excalibur on the scene. Don't get me wrong both weapon systems are great but arty units are losing their edge. The reliance on manpack mortars only grows due to the responsiveness of the systems. 120s take up too much air and arty can't travel in certain terrain.

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It seems like the whole point there is to be expeditionary. A mortar in an LAV isn't going to get airlifted in a helicopter.

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That's the party line but it does not pass the sniff test. Moving tubes by vertical lift obligates one to supply the ammo by the same means indefinitely (not to mention fuel, water, food, and infantry to defend the guns). Emplacing guns or mortars by helicopter is a raid tactic. If we can land them via helicopter within range of the target perhaps we could get an LZ close enough to use 81s instead of 120s and forget about air transport of that POS jeep which will not pull itself or the mortar through a mud puddle.

Hilltop firebases are not a tactic that achieved anything of operational significance for us in Vietnam and it should be shocking that a towed ground fire support system is designed with heliborne or Osprey-internal insertion as a KPP. The Osprey mafia imposed the same idiocy on the LW155 howitzer (M777) in stipulating that it had to weigh less than 9000 pounds so that it could be sling loaded under and Osprey. Why the hell would you ever want to do that? Putting a $3 million gun under a $78 million aircraft is STUPID on the face of it not to mention that another bird has to carry the crew and ammo. There was not even any pretense of airlifting a truck to pull the LW155 after it was emplaced by the Osprey.

If we can get and Osprey to deposit a mortar battery at a support by fire position without getting its $78 million airframe shot down could we not risk fewer lives and just put a Harvest Hawk or better yet a Spectre up there to shoot from the air? A surface fire support system justifies itself by being able to shoot when and where an aircraft cannot and answering calls for close support more quickly. You can't pretend or contrive a situation in which a mortar (or howitzer) emplaced by vertical lift can perform a fire mission that an assault aircraft could not.

I am a big believer in all weather surface fire support but the EFSS can't provide that without trains that make it look like a 155mm battery. If the weather is too inclement to fly ground attack aircraft it is probably also going to adversely impact any fin-stabilized mortar round as well to the point that accuracy will be seriously degraded. Forgetting for a moment how you get the tube into position, a spin stabilized 105mm howitzer can pump out rounds faster and farther than a mortar with a much lower CEP when there is significant wind. Besides which, that mortar battery is not going to by flying its own MET balloons to correct for the meteorological conditions.

If a heavy mortar was the pre-ordained solution for the EFSS capability a rifled (spin stabilized) mortar mounted on a LAV or other rolling chassis would have overcome the problem of rapid emplacement and displacement after firing that is so important with a high angle weapon when there is a counterfire threat. It would also have less drift than the fin stabilized projo.

I really like mortars. They are great fire support tools when employed correctly and not given tasks that should be assigned to howitzers. We got sold a bill of goods with the EFSS.

http://www.mca-marines.org/gazette/article/expeditionary-fire-support-system

http://www.marinecorpsgazette-digital.com/marinecorpsgazette/200907/?pg=57#pg57

I enjoy your viewpoint, U90. Good thoughts. 'illegimati non corborundum' You get the main idea.

Drive by post here, but the EFSS was bought off by the Marine Corps because we sold our souls with the Osprey. It was the procurement rendition of falling in love with the plan.

The death of Artillery is greatly exaggerated.

There is a lot to be said for a section of M777s that shoot long, fast, and accurately.

Excalibur is a million dollar technology experiment with only limited uses that justify its per round cost.

HIMARS is fine if you have the time and convenience to clear a Division's worth of airspace between the platform and target.

We shot about 3k rounds of 155mm in Afghanistan, and 10k+ rounds of 120mm and 60mm (and a few 81mm.)

Big fan of each in the proper tactical situation.

If you want to make a close approximation of a Mortar, buy a steel piledriver (a heavy pipe with a heavy welded cap and two U shaped Handles.) You can buy them at farm supply stores that sell fencing material.

Then weld on an Angle iron bipod -- or if you want to get tricky, fashion one out of a car jack for elevation adjustments.

Drill a hole in the pipe, about a half inch above the cap.

You shoot coke cans filled with pebbles, using black power for a charge and a firecracker as a fuse/primer.

Works like a charm.

[This message has been edited by Trinity Ag (edited 2/7/2011 8:26p).]

Now this may seem counterintuitive, but I was watching a show on the Military channel about the use of Arty over the years. The one point that was universal was the fear effects arty creates. It was one thing to be standing in front of your enemy and know that you are in danger because you can, by proper training etc, protect yourself. Arty, however, is completely random in its victims. One guy lived, another died. The shell landed that way, this one went off, this one was a dud, etc. Arty created a huge amount of combat stress on those who were being shelled. It broke morale better than anything else because unlike infantry, armor, or air, you couldn't fight back at all. You just waited to see if it was your turn.

My point: by creating more and more sniper like arty, are we removing the fear factors from our enemy? These smart bombs are definately surgical but I wonder if they create the same fear effects as hearing the shells and then panicking until it is over (maybe 20 minutes later). And then having shell shock by having the exact same thing happen in a couple of days and then the next day and then in an hour after (complete randomness).

[This message has been edited by Say Chowdah (edited 2/8/2011 7:53a).]

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Ask to be the guy that lights the excess charges off some evening. Trust me.

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THIS!

Was both a company 81mm platoon leader & bn heavy mortar platoon leader (back then it was 4.2 inch) with 3-32 Infantry, 7th ID. Lighting the excess charges was definitely a highlight of going to the range to fire.

Best time I ever had was once at Ft Irwin, we were supporting the CAARNG, providing illumination for a tank bn doing night gunnery. They were equipped with M-60 tanks with no night sights, and required illum. They had sheetloads of illum rounds, so we did a range-lateral spread (four rounds in the air, in an "X" pattern) stacked five tiers high. One of the coolest things I ever saw - we had that desert lit up like it was daytime.

[This message has been edited by BoozerRed78 (edited 2/8/2011 10:09a).]

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My point: by creating more and more sniper like arty, are we removing the fear factors from our enemy?

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It depends on the circumstances. Sometimes (most times) precision fire and minimal damage around a target is desirable. However, in a high intensity combat environment where the objective is to cause the enemy to flee and destruction of all buildings and infrastructure is acceptable or desired then area fire may be appropriate. It's easy to switch from a precision guided "one point target, one gun" mode to an circular sheaf of airbursts that will severely damage or destroy everything in 200m diameter that lacks ballistic protection.

From another perspective, since you have to buy and haul everything that you shoot precision guided weapons may be preferred just because you don't have to fire as much to neutralize a specific target.

And to answer some of the OPs questions..... As mentioned, ESGR would be a great way to be able to visit a mortar platoon on the range. Otherwise, you just might have to "know somebody". You might have a shot at seeing a platoon lay in, in a dry fire scenario, and perhaps on a range during live fire. You might also even to be able to watch them fire. I doubt seriously if you would be allowed on the firing line.

I have no idea how it's done now - maybe it's all digital. I learned the analog way - using an aiming circle - setting a direction of fire with it, then laying in each gun by checking the angle between the aiming circle and the sight on the gun, and adjusting the guns until they were in perfect alignment. Pretty cool process, and mortars can be extremely accurate with a well trained platoon.

we still use the aiming circle and the old plotting boards we have a computer to back it up but a good mortar section can get the rounds out from a call for fire in no time. Also my faith in arty is dwindling due to the new precision ordinance just last week was working with a battery and had a round go about 900 meters off target all the other cannons were on target. Repeatedly they were slow the new precision ammunition is dwindling core skills. This was not the first battery i have seen this from. I have a strong faith in my mortars i see them operate and they are grunts and understand how to support manuever very well. due to roe's in a lot of places we are forced to use the precision ordinance so it is a double edged sword.