Most cost effective weapon

Terry D's last post is a good argument in favor of the sniper rifle. It cost's more that the regular service rifle but in the hands of a well trained sniper it can do much more and cause more harm than any number of ordinary service rifles. Many of the latter, even if issued, often were shot very little in combat. Even if shot, very few of those shots were hits. The sniper rifle in trained hands can hold up a considerable number of enemy soldiers and make them go to ground.

 

I would have thought that a lot of rifles were what we consider cost effective, but thank you for that insight Terry D.

 

I am afraid that isn't quite the argument I was trying to make, nor (if I understand you rightly) do I really agree with it. Snipers can certainly help (targeting officers, lines of communication, key points, etc), but they are not a substitute for ordinary infantry. Accuracy is important, yes, especially at longer ranges, but the whole history of modern infantry combat in the last 100 years suggests that volume of fire is still more important. If this were not so, then the US Army would never have adopted the Garand and the Garand would never have been so successful. It takes a lot longer to train a man to be a highly skilled shot than it does to teach him to be an adequate shot, and in wartime armies simply can't spend any more time than they absolutely have to on training. That was certainly the case in WWII. Snipers can delay (I have read about this RE Normandy), but however skilled a sniper team may be I don't think it can compete for very long with a larger and reasonably well-armed, reasonably well-trained, and reasonably well-led body of ordinary riflemen. Effective though German snipers were in Normandy, they could not stop the Allied advance any more than Jap snipers could do the same in the Pacific. As Napoleon put it, only numbers can annihilate and snipers can't whittle the numbers down fast enough.

I do agree that within their proper sphere (see above) sniper rifles were and are well worth the investment in equipment and training. So were units like the commandos, but snipers, sniper rifles, and commandos don't win wars; the riflemen, tankers, and gunners in the main force divisions do that,

 

The Finns used in Winter war the Molotov cocktail with good results. First killing all the infantry and then using the cocktail was very effective.

One weapon that was pretty cheap was trees. In Winter war we cut some big trees almost down and put a wire between them, and once a Red Army tank went between the trees the tank stopped because the weight of the trees was too much for the tank to continue. Then pour some fuel inside the tank and the crew would come out and you would not need to set fire even so you could take the tank to your own use. Also logs were put in the tank tracks to stop them.

Otherwise I must admit the mines are very effective. Also in Normandy the Germans used in the bocage mortars with precision, first they had checked that the ammo would hit the certain area, then they set phone cables everywhere, and once the Allied reached a certain area in Bocage, the Germans phoned to fire to this position and heavy losses were caused.

 

Which ones, I wonder ? The seven-page listing of contractors in Sharp/Bowyer's 'Mosquito' doesn't seem to list any boatbuilders or associated contractors at all. Nearly all the woodwork-associated subcontractors were situated in the High Wycombe-North London areas which makes sense due to proximity to the main Mosquito production facilities.......

 

How are we defining cost effective? Is it interms of what it can do in a one on one case or overall?
For instance

Would this be the case if we looked at the number of 88's produced as well as all the ammo procuded for them then looked at the actual damage they did?

Mines are another interesting case. For naval mines how if at all do you account for the cost of the delivery systems? For land mines there's also the impact of having the mine fields covered by fire so they tend to make other systems more effective and other systems tend to make them more effective. How to account for this?

The average V1 that was actually launched caused what something on the order of a dozen casualties? Most of them civilians with little or nothing to do with the war. From what I recall that number was only as high as it was becuase there was one caused a couple of hundred casualties.

The problem I see with this (and I think it's already been noted) was that AA guns primary purpose was to protect the targets in the area where they were deployed. Actually damaging or destroying an opposing aircraft was a plus but if they prevented the targets in their area from being hit then they were successful. Not sure how to evaluate this though.

Is a sniper rifle much if at all more effective than a regular rifle without someone trained to use it? If not do you include the cost of training the sniper?

 

That's the other rub right there: "Well Trained". How much did it cost to train him? what is the aggregate value of the person/device employing the weapon; or are we just taking about the bullet? A .30-06 round runs about $1.00.

So if you spend $30,000.00 training a guy to fire a $1.00 bullet out of a $1,000.00 rifle at a $50,000.00 target is that more effective than an Atom bomb or an Aircraft Carrier?

 

I've waited to comment because so many good arguments were presented for different weapons. I think though in reading all the comments, I'd have to agree that the mortar was the most cost effective weapon, at least on the ground in the war of the infantryman. In so many engagements it is the mortar that blunts the attack. A well sited mortar unit is invisible to the enemy, yet he's right there able to adjust fire instantly with great accuracy. Without exposing himself to direct fire he can take out snipers, he can take out machine gun positions, he can bring infantry to the ground and even take out armor with a bit of luck. He's under the direct control of a company or even a platoon commander so there's no chance of his support being relegated to another area as is the case with larger artillery.

 

I would say that depends on what you are trying to do. If you are in a ground war where nuclear weapons cannot be employed, then investing in a large infantry force armed with rifles makes sense. Not every weapon can be used, or used to best advantage, in every conflict. Of course you would rather have something and not need it than need it and not have it, but defense planners have to set priorities. My own feeling is that the Germans got their priorities wrong. They spent a lot of effort, money, and time on expensive, technologically advanced weapons that were actually of limited utiity (Tiger II, V-1, V-2, Gustav guns, etc) and not enough on the humbler but more versatile types they needed if they were going to survive a war of attrition (semiautomatic rifles, heavy bombers, a tank that wasn't impossibly complex).

 

Terry D misunderstood me. I never said that a sniper would replace all the rest of the infantry. What I was trying to get at even though said rifle costs somewhat more and somewhat more yet when you factor in the cost of training, it produces more results than an average infantry rifle. The psychological domination of the of the battlefield by snipers is well documented. With that scoped rifle the sniper can pin down a whole company-something a regular rifleman couldn't do. So therefore, while the average rifleman is certainly needed, the scoped rifle in competent hands is a much greater force than regular infantry rifles.

 

That is the problem right there, we have not got all the numbers and we have not set any criteria. So far this thread is by guess and by God. Informed guesses, yes, but still...

 

Sorry if I misunderstood you. I don't think I am fully convinced that snipers are of themselves "a much greater force" than a superior force of infantrymen (not for long, anyway), but snipers are still very useful and a small number of them with good sniper rifles is certainly worth the investment. The British found this out in WWII. Sniping was neglected between the wars, but by 1944 every British infantry battalion had at least a section of snipers.

 

Quote from KodiakBeer

"I've waited to comment because so many good arguments were presented for different weapons. I think though in reading all the comments, I'd have to agree that the mortar was the most cost effective weapon, at least on the ground in the war of the infantryman. In so many engagements it is the mortar that blunts the attack. A well sited mortar unit is invisible to the enemy, yet he's right there able to adjust fire instantly with great accuracy. Without exposing himself to direct fire he can take out snipers, he can take out machine gun positions, he can bring infantry to the ground and even take out armor with a bit of luck. He's under the direct control of a company or even a platoon commander so there's no chance of his support being relegated to another area as is the case with larger artillery."



My answer to the quote:

Personally, although I was the doctor of a medical team in SFOR, I took part in a practice session where we fired an 80 mm mortar, and I was doing aiming, loading and holding onto the damn thing to stay in place during separate sessions. Firing five rounds each time was pretty shocking to see the effect as we practically smashed the old car that we had as our target. If you had been there as an enemy soldier instead, thinking after the first round that it was over you could not be more wrong. Four more was coming with two seconds apart practically in the same place. Ouch!

 

A friend who was USMC in Vietnam once told me of the horror they had of mortars. They were always pre-sighted with precision and that first one would inevitably kill or maim several people before anyone could get down. You couldn't hit them back and it was rarely followed by a open fight. The mortar team would just shoot and then scoot after dumping a dozen or more rounds.

 

Sadly, its been years sicne I saw the reference ;( It was to do with the competing time and labour reequirements for those boatbuilders with heated water tanks for soaking/heating wood before clamping/shaping.

 

That was just an example and a question, not an argument for or against.

 

That probably says more about Russian tanks than it does about the molotov cocktail! I do know that by mid-war at least....they specifically tested it for it...all British tanks were proof against molotov cocktails. It was a relatively simple task to redesign engine covers and hatches, provide better guttering for them, redesign air intakes etc. I'd be suprised if - given their Spanish experience with PzIIs etc. - the Germans weren't working towards that end very soon into WWII...

I'm really not sure about the cost effectiveness of things like battle rifles, whatever make/nationality, After all....they weren't really that effective at all unless you paid for the training and equiping of an ARMY of men with them...! They'd still kill the enemy, one-on-one...but you need to be able to defeat him, not just kill him off one at a time...

EDIT: and it can take three fortunes to get a rifleman to where he can do some good...!

 

I was a mortarman [ see my Vesuvius thread ]...very easy to set up, man portable[ not that light when you are humping them! old bi-pods about 42 pounds IIRC], quick, ''precise'' to adjust, but you need the transport to get rounds [ military jargon ] to you, at least the 81s [ for significant fire ].....81s are battalion level [ can be attached to smaller units ]' 60s company level....I'd say the 60s were the go to for the small unit actions....my Uncle said the Germans could really zero in on you with their mortars....
Kody, great pic, thanks..I loved the mortars....had the old type you see in my pic, then they went to the new one as I was getting out, around 89/90? these bipods were lighter and it had a little better range...I remember this clearly, [ easy number to remember ] old mortar range 4737m [ for all you Columbos out there, that number will be in my head forever! it '' sings''] so come up with any number you want, that's the range we were given

 

Having read about British and Australian adventures with the sticky bomb, I am skeptical of Molotovs.

As to the effectiveness of rifles, the classic answer is (was?) that MGs provided the bulk of firepower in the infantry but that riflemen (who double as grenadiers) are the manuever element. Firepower can kill the enemy, but firepower and manuever together will defeat him. From the time of the M1 Garand riflemen also began to get rifles that could also put out a fair volume of fire to supplement the MGs. Massed rifle fire alone proved very effective even earlier, as descriptions of Mons, 1st Ypres, Gallipoli, and the Boer War show.