The race for long-range fires, Is the US army outranged? - missiles, cannons & Long-range precision

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Army artillery and missile systems have been some of the most critical weapons of the war in Ukraine.

Traditionally the US military has relied heavily on air assets to deliver heavy fires at very long ranges, with army artillery and missile units doing their best work in comparatively closer.

But on a massively networked battlefield, and with allies and competitors rushing to field longer-ranged army missile systems, the US army is now pushing ahead with a massive modernisation program to extend its reach.

This episode asks how the US army fell behind in range, whether that matters, and what they plan to do about it.

Patreon:

Caveats/Corrections:
As well as all normal caveats I want to stress that range and performance figures in public domain are a real...inconsistent mixed bag and caution should be applied when using them.

notes/sources:

Department of Defense Fiscal Year (FY) 2024 Army Missile Procurement

FY 2024 Air Force Missile Procurement Justification Book

US 2024 Program Acquisition Cost by Weapon System

Assessing the feasibility of the SLRC

CRS report on LRPF

CRS report on MRC

Leonardo - Vulcano 155mm

RUSI - Preliminary lessons in conventional warfighting in Russia's invasion of Ukraine

Australian Defence Business Review on PrSM testing

Lockheed Martin - PrSM

Ballistic and Cruise missile threat report 2020

PLA deploying PHL-16

Global times on deployment of PCL-181

PCL-181 in 71st GA

RAND: Outnumbered, Outranged, and Outgunned: How Russia Defeats NATO (included as a reference for the Milley quote, as is often the case this is not an endorsement of content)

HCoC

CSIS profile on KN-25

Reporting on KN-25

Reporting on Army Futures Command view of the range gap

Reporting on Typhon delivery:

USNI news on Marine NSM carrier

HEL TVD datasheet and reporting

CSIS missile threat project

LRPF

Timestamps:
00:00:00 — Long Range Artillery & MLRS - Is The US Army Outgunned?
00:02:37 — What Am I Talking About?
00:03:34 — Sponsor: Ground News
00:04:33 — Long Range Fires
00:10:59 — The Long Range Fire Role
00:12:41 — Lessons From Ukraine
00:16:54 — The Big-gun Competition
00:20:52 — Ground Launched Missiles
00:26:18 — Why Did The US Fall Behind?
00:34:09 — Long Range Precision Fires
00:36:50 — Extending Gun Reach
00:43:29 — Next Generation Missiles
00:58:56 — Changing Force Design
01:01:13 — Counters & Implications
01:04:48 — Conclusions
01:06:02 — Channel Update
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I'd also like to extend a special thanks to those who provided input into this episode. These features benefit greatly from these kinds of contributions. They also of course benefit from the support of all of you in providing the audience and support that underpins them.

As mentioned in a recent poll, I thought it was important to step away from Ukraine for a week or two in order to allow the information space to clear up somewhat, and so I hope you will enjoy looking a bit and the R&D, doctrinal and procurement side of the problem of generating long-range precision fires on the modern battlefield.

I'd like to note that the programs covered are not exhaustive and that all performance characteristics (especially ranges) on all systems should be treated with general scepticism unless well evidenced.

PerunAU
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I for one support Perun's Grandfather in his efforts to supplement our indirect fire capability

AnimarchyHistory
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"If you want to get to those critical but difficult to reach places, there's no substitute for length." Absolute poetry.

ScFirestorM
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Admittedly, as a USAF veteran, i may be biased, but I do somewhat agree with the notion that beyond a certain range, making stuff blow up is the air force's job. That being said, as an american, i do thoroughly belive that our capabilities in every domain of combat should be so developed that the other domains should be redundant. Because "overkill" is just another term for thoroughness

christiangrantz
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Proof that Perun deeply understands our American minds in one quote: "When [the arms industry] asked [the Army] what sort of weapons and systems they wanted on their new infantry fighting vehicle, the response seems to have been 'yes.'"

zetsubouda
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As a Swede, every time someone mentions Gripen and especially the DIY factor of it, I become a bit proud.

alterthough
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Perun's discussion of the historic value of infantry forward observers reminded me of a conversation I had with a S. Korean special forces soldier who served in Vietnam. He said if you came across a platoon of enemy soldiers, the first one you want to kill is the guy carrying the radio.

qdav
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"America, pure opinion and real talk for a minute. If your big gun on tracks is as complicated as a super-cruising stealth fighter, then someone somewhere may have gone just a little bit overboard."

honestlyreed
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A fun fact about the *Crusader* cannon was that a few in the Pentagon also pointed out that deploying a big gun with _that name_ in Iraq might not have gone down well with the locals.

Alqida were actually disappointed the program was cancelled, even though they would have been on the receiving end - just cause they really wanted to use it in a PR campaign.

casbot
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Outstanding as always! A superb presentation. I am a retired Air Force intelligence officer. The one thing I will say is that the Ukraine war is showing how the Russians operate differently than the United States and the United States Air Force in particular. They do not intend to project power. Russians operate and fight on their periphery. Generally their Air Force is an extension of army artillery. Yhe United States Air Force supports the army for their needs from close air support to joint integrated prioritized targeting lists and prosecuting those targets for the Joint Force Commander who also incorporates the land force component commanders priorities and targets into the overall effort. Put simply the Russians fight differently than us. The US Air Force more than fills the gap and that is why we have a disparity in the ground based long range fire systems. It is up to the Joint Chiefs of staff in Congress to determine future weapons systems and they are all well aware of these facts. Things are set up the way they are now and how we have been fighting and continue to tweak our doctrine to continue to fight reflects this.

sonnybully
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US Air Force: We can put a bomb anythere in the world
US Marines: We are the tip of the spear that will go anywhere, anytime
US Army:
We have a cannon that will bomb:
The dude that fires at you
The command center that gave the order
The ammo depo that gave the ammunition
And, if we are really pissed, the factory deep behind the enemy lines that built the bloody thing

Perun comedy is absolute poetry

portmoneul
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"But they [the Russians] found an interesting loophole in the treaty, namely that if you simply ignore the agreement, design and field the weapons anyway, and then just allegedly lie about their range, then amazingly the piece of paper itself has no magical ability to stop you"

honestlyreed
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Just realised I'm now structuring my Sundays around a 1hr powerpoint by a bloke on the other side of the planet and not even finding it weird.

AKbamoida
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My dad was a cold war USMC artillery officer. He said the Soviet guns always outranged us because they were willing to accept the harm caused to their artillerymen by massive local overpressure.

OvertravelX
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The US approach to employing indirect fires is much more selective on choosing targets. It also heavily relies on a merging of gun, missile, and air platforms. Howitzers and MLRS focus on tactical targets but can suppress enemy air defenses in order to allow the Apache and fighter-bombers to go in and hit the critical target.

We saw a version of this in Desert Storm. The air war opened with cruise missile strikes on command and control. Apache lead the way and hit SAM sites that then allowed the air forces to penetrate into the interior to crater airfields. Weeks of airstrikes followed before the ground war kicked off. MLRS spent a lot of time hitting Iraqi artillery while howitzers would hit entrenched troops just before the tanks and brads assaulted.

I witnessed a 155mm battalion drop DPICM on an Iraqi position. It didn't deliver the iconic splash of an HE impact. As the artillery popped above the target area and dispersed it's load of DPICM...it sounded more like firecrackers. You could see small flashes but then the impact area slowly turned completely black with the occasional gout of flame. As an FO I'd called a lot of conventional rounds in training. But I'd never seen effects like that before. For most of the Infantry guys we were attached to...they'd never really seen artillery effects at all and were even more awed than I was.

chrishooge
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41:12 Absolutely love the Supreme Commander reference you slipped in there!

CeladonHairExtraordinaire
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THE POWER POINT GOD HAS BLESSED US AGAIN

toomanyblocks
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I think it's high time that Pavel and his mates got some sort of commendation for all of their activities.

hansandersen
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Perun: 'There's no substitute for length'

Me: **cries**

kokomo
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Artillery is definitely one way that the USSR really focused where America didn't, and much of that can be down to where both sides felt the wars would be. Both believed that World War 3 would be fought primarily in Europe, and it's much easier for Russia to roll land based vehicles West than it is for America to ship ground based artillery to Europe. Artillery for the US is much less the broad use hammer, and more of a specific use tool, while for the USSR was the bread and butter.

America basically built the artillery capabilities into their Air Force as ground attack planes because it is logistically simpler to build attack aircraft and fly them to Europe than building ground based artillery and shipping it to Europe. Though that does make it more difficult for us to be a premiere artillery supplier to Ukraine. Even South Korea, who has been preparing for war with North Korea since the armistice has arguably better artillery than the US, because artillery is so important for a potential war with North Korea.

johnsanko