The Noble (but Doomed) M551 Sheridan in Vietnam

[Cedric]

We had A1s with LRF by the time I arrived in the 2d ACR in May of '76. IIRC they said the LRFs arrived in '75. The local German newspapers opined that US forces were now equipped with death rays.

Speaking of the M60A2, had a family member who was a warrant officer up in Warren, MI working on the A2. He said it was the most slipshod development process he ever saw. The solution to problems became just hang another electronic box inside somewhere which may or may not impede crew functioning. A real mess. Eventually, M60A2s were consolidated into one battalion in each division were it became a defacto tank destroyer battalion.

 

[Ascout]

We had A1s with LRF by the time I arrived in the 2d ACR in May of '76. IIRC they said the LRFs arrived in '75. The local German newspapers opined that US forces were now equipped with death rays.

Speaking of the M60A2, had a family member who was a warrant officer up in Warren, MI working on the A2. He said it was the most slipshod development process he ever saw. The solution to problems became just hang another electronic box inside somewhere which may or may not impede crew functioning. A real mess. Eventually, M60A2s were consolidated into one battalion in each division were it became a defacto tank destroyer battalion.

Speaking of "death rays", when I was on the "Hot Pants" M60A1 track skirt project, we had just finished the Hughes LRF test and still had the vehicle, as well as it's array of "Danger-LASER Light" signs. The idea was floated to stuff some impressive pipe into the cupola, hang the LASER signs on it and run an uncaptioned photo in Armor Magazine just to get the Russians jumping through their ass trying to figure out what it was.
I was on the M60A2 Initial Production Test at the Armor Board in 1973, which was ongoing when the October War broke out. Guess what contributed to the acceptance of the A2 when POTUS promised to make good the IDF tank losses in the first couple of days.
The archival collection of the M551 & M60A2 development from the named GS-13 below at Combat Dev. Cmd. came into my hands years ago...it's a very sordid story.

 

[Cedric]

Speaking of "death rays", when I was on the "Hot Pants" M60A1 track skirt project, we had just finished the Hughes LRF test and still had the vehicle, as well as it's array of "Danger-LASER Light" signs. The idea was floated to stuff some impressive pipe into the cupola, hang the LASER signs on it and run an uncaptioned photo in Armor Magazine just to get the Russians jumping through their ass trying to figure out what it was.
I was on the M60A2 Initial Production Test at the Armor Board in 1973, which was ongoing when the October War broke out. Guess what contributed to the acceptance of the A2 when POTUS promised to make good the IDF tank losses in the first couple of days.
The archival collection of the M551 & M60A2 development from the named GS-13 below at Combat Dev. Cmd. came into my hands years ago...it's a very sordid story.

And ironically, the October War showed that in spite of long range fields of fire, gun tube to gun tube engagements still occurred in which the A2's missilery would have been useless.

 

[SL66]

I love hearing from the Veterans in our forum about their personal experiences when an article like this is posted. I am eternally greatful for your service and proud to call you friends. Thank you all for your service/sacrifice.

 

[Ascout]

And ironically, the October War showed that in spite of long range fields of fire, gun tube to gun tube engagements still occurred in which the A2's missilery would have been useless.

 

[Cedric]

Thank goodness these eggheads and their weapons eventually went the way of the dodo.

 

[Ascout]

Thank goodness these eggheads and their weapons eventually went the way of the dodo.

Their legacy lives on. Thanks to British and German defense planners, they each designed the major weapon systems on our main battle tanks from the L7 105mm (M68 is U.S. service) and ultimately the Rheinmetall 120mm smoothbore.
We have not designed a main gun adopted by our front-line Armor since before Korea.
Speakers notes to the Armor community leadership. The speaker was the invited tank historian, the late Richard Ogorkiewicz, author/consultant to any number of Western powers. The text is from one of his several books, then in preparation. From the archives of a Combat Dev. Cmd. member, I do not know whether the speaker or the audience member made the notations.
They loaded in opposite order....read the second attachment first.

 

[Cedric]

Their legacy lives on. Thanks to British and German defense planners, they each designed the major weapon systems on our main battle tanks from the L7 105mm (M68 is U.S. service) and ultimately the Rheinmetall 120mm smoothbore.
We have not designed a main gun adopted by our front-line Armor since before Korea.
Speakers notes to the Armor community leadership. The speaker was the invited tank historian, the late Richard Ogorkiewicz, author/consultant to any number of Western powers. The text is from one of his several books, then in preparation. From the archives of a Combat Dev. Cmd. member, I do not know whether the speaker or the audience member made the notations.
They loaded in opposite order....read the second attachment first.

Not to mention fog, rain, obscuration of IR tracking flares of both TOW and Shillelagh. All of this reeks of pure McNamara type analysis. Not to mention the infantry community jumped on the "we need a fire and forget weapon system." We've had one for decades, it's called a tank gun.

 

[Ascout]

Not to mention fog, rain, obscuration of IR tracking flares of both TOW and Shillelagh. All of this reeks of pure McNamara type analysis. Not to mention the infantry community jumped on the "we need a fire and forget weapon system." We've had one for decades, it's called a tank gun.

There really wasn't an issue with the "gun" specifically...it was that existing FCS could not cope well with ranges of 2K and above. Entirely reasonable ranges for European combat, but our hit rate with 105's was not great beyond 1,500 meters (The Army's own figures for first round hit probability were from .27-.38).
The language of the day did not include "fire and forget", it was expressed in missilery as "homing", which was recognized to be limited by technology to at least 10 years (it turned out to be 30).
The default, and the great limitation, was to accept command guidance. And it didn't help that the time-of-flight was obscene. It was the one parameter that the Army was willing to accept on the M551 just to get it into production, but rejected it out of hand for the future MBT project (at the time, the MBT-70). In the event, we did exactly that with no modification or improvements (nor would there be any...the R&D team for the MGM-51 dissolved in 1971 when it was fully commoditized.

 

[Cedric]

There really wasn't an issue with the "gun" specifically...it was that existing FCS could not cope well with ranges of 2K and above. Entirely reasonable ranges for European combat, but our hit rate with 105's was not great beyond 1,500 meters (The Army's own figures for first round hit probability were from .27-.38).
The language of the day did not include "fire and forget", it was expressed in missilery as "homing", which was recognized to be limited by technology to at least 10 years (it turned out to be 30).
The default, and the great limitation, was to accept command guidance. And it didn't help that the time-of-flight was obscene. It was the one parameter that the Army was willing to accept on the M551 just to get it into production, but rejected it out of hand for the future MBT project (at the time, the MBT-70). In the event, we did exactly that with no modification or improvements (nor would there be any...the R&D team for the MGM-51 dissolved in 1971 when it was fully commoditized.

Official language was not fire and forget, yet that phrase popped up consistently in the anti-armor community.