Editor in Chief Bill | 20 Dec 2011 8:56 a.m. PST |
According to Osprey/Ambush Alley Games' Force on Force rules, a squad reacts in the short term more to having wounded members than it does to those which have been killed.
it seemed to us that most soldiers suffer an immediate shock at the loss of one of their comrades
but almost all describe putting the awful reality out of their mind to deal with after the fighting was over. The same accounts present an entirely different view of wounded comrades, though. Soldiers are tremendously concerned about taking care of their own and go to great lengths to keep their wounded safe. Do you agree with this view? |
Mick in Switzerland | 20 Dec 2011 9:08 a.m. PST |
I think Ambush Alley Games talked to a lot of real soldiers during the development of the game. Also I think that I read somewhere (on their forum) that some of the developers have been in combat. I have no experience but I suspect it is true. |
John D Salt | 20 Dec 2011 9:10 a.m. PST |
Yup -- dead men don't scream. In terms of keeping the primary group in the fight, having a member run away may do even more immediate damage than having one killed or wounded. For this reason, André Laffargue recommended shooting those who ran away: "L'exemple du fuyard est contagieux, celui du blessé ne l'est pas" (the runaway's example is contagious, the wounded's is not). All the best, John. |
Irish Marine | 20 Dec 2011 9:16 a.m. PST |
I know that dead Marines really es me off same with any other Marine that is sometimes the fuel that can push home an attack or finish a gunfight. Wounded have in my personal experience always gone done not in cover but in the open and need attention right away. One marine I recall in 2005 ran straight out in the open through fire from a 12.7 to reach his best friend who had his right arm and leg blown off later he said he didn't even notice the machinegun fire and I believed him, both had grown up together and joined the reserves right out of high school. The wounded are not a number for the 1stSgt they are our friends who are still alive and we want to keep them that way. wounded also do something dead men don't do they groan, scream, cry and ask for help thats not something you can block out of you thought with ease. |
epturner | 20 Dec 2011 9:20 a.m. PST |
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Mako11 | 20 Dec 2011 10:33 a.m. PST |
Supposedly, the 5.56mm round was designed to wound, and not kill. Anecdotal reports and theory are that wounding a person takes three out of the fight, e.g. the soldier wounded, plus two others to carry him. Kills take out just one person. Not sure if that is correct, but that is the info espoused from the Vietnam War, onwards. |
FABET01 | 20 Dec 2011 11:57 a.m. PST |
Supposedly, the 5.56mm round was designed to wound, and not kill I'd never heard that. I suspect that was made up (maybe relatively recently?) to explain why the round wasn't taking out the OF like it was supposed to. |
Jovian1 | 20 Dec 2011 12:12 p.m. PST |
Supposedly, the 5.56mm round was designed to wound, and not kill. Tell that to the guys who are dead after being shot with a 5.56mm round. I know that in my reading and research only very callous soldiers ignored wounded and only when they were in such desperate positions that they knew they either fought on or died trying to help someone. In discussing several engagements with Vietnam veterans, they described in detail the great lengths they went to, in order to save wounded comrades. One of them was shot in the process of attempting to save a member of his unit. He was recovered/saved by someone else the unknown "hand of god" reached out and pulled him to safety and he found himself recovering in Saigon next to the guy he was attempting to save. Very compelling story. In WWII, it was common as well. |
Omemin | 20 Dec 2011 12:28 p.m. PST |
The USMC has an unwritten rule that no Marine is EVER left behind. As my dad put it, "NO ONE breaks the unwritten rule." It's hard to get gamers to follow suit, though. Mission over troops is easier to fall into when the men are lead, pewter, or plastic. I enforce a morale loss on the side that fails to care for wounded and evac dead, and a morale gain for any unit whose medicos are attacked (as in, "Oh, yeah? We'll see about THAT."). |
John D Salt | 20 Dec 2011 1:14 p.m. PST |
FABET01 wrote:
Supposedly, the 5.56mm round was designed to wound, and not kill
I'd never heard that. I suspect that was made up (maybe relatively recently?) to explain why the round wasn't taking out the OF like it was supposed to.
I'm surprised you've nver heard that. I think it gets a mention at least twice a year on TMP. Hardy semi-annual tosh. And It was not made up relatively recently. It was made up at least as early as the early 1970s. All the best, John. |
Justice and Rule | 20 Dec 2011 2:42 p.m. PST |
Supposedly, the 5.56mm round was designed to wound, and not kill.Anecdotal reports and theory are that wounding a person takes three out of the fight, e.g. the soldier wounded, plus two others to carry him. Kills take out just one person. Not sure if that is correct, but that is the info espoused from the Vietnam War, onwards. 5.56mm was meant to kill. People presumed that because they went to a smaller round, they were trying to adapt the adage that people associate with the VC: a wounded soldiers occupies more resources than a dead one. However when you are in a conventional battle, a wounded soldier can sometimes still fight. There are more than a few reason why they switched over, though the most obvious would be increasing ammo capacity; 5.56mm is considerably lighter and you can carry considerably more ammo compared to 7.62mm. |
thejoker | 20 Dec 2011 3:29 p.m. PST |
Much of the thinking about how seeing wounded colleagues affects the ability to fight comes from the research that the Germans did after WW1. It also made it clear they were applying this thinking to the effect that the seriously wounded had on those around them. It was not that seeing men killed did not affect others but rather watching or being aware of someone they perhaps knew or liked in severe pain that damaged the ability to fight well. The Germans also came to the conclusion, based on their home front experience that the dead were 'dead and gone' less visible and that the wounded were a visible constant drain on the nation's resources and ate away at morale on the home front. In the context of a war wounding enemy soldiers seems more effective than in the context of a battle. Reminds me in a way of a comment that I think was ascribed to George McGovern, that opposition to the Vietnam war would rise when the coffins and the wounded would start to appear in 'small town U.S.A.' The move to smaller calibre weapons that led to the Stg 44 came from the same tranche of research. |
Dragon Gunner | 20 Dec 2011 3:45 p.m. PST |
"I know that in my reading and research only very callous soldiers ignored wounded" Granted I was in during peace time so I am no authority on the subject. I will comment that during training we would continue our mission and collect the wounded after the fact, especially during assaults. I can't count how many times I heard "mission accomplishment is more important than life itself" and "leave him". I will also add I've seen men go down and command seemed more interested in the weapons and equipment he was assigned. We would pick through the mans kit taking essential gear and leave him where he fell. |
Lion in the Stars | 20 Dec 2011 5:43 p.m. PST |
Yes, for reasons that have already been said. |
Omemin | 21 Dec 2011 9:28 a.m. PST |
One problem reported with the 5.56mm was lack of knock-down power. VC were known to keep going even with multiple 5.56mm hits, but went down with just one 7.62mm hit, even at 3-400 meters. The same applies to 9mm vs .45 cal. in handguns. Not enough power. |
Connard Sage | 21 Dec 2011 9:40 a.m. PST |
One problem reported with the 5.56mm was lack of knock-down power. VC were known to keep going even with multiple 5.56mm hits, but went down with just one 7.62mm hit, even at 3-400 meters.The same applies to 9mm vs .45 cal. in handguns. Not enough power. Velocity and hydrostatic shock will have you off your feet. These are humans we're talking about, not elk. I suspect more urban myth. |
Lion in the Stars | 21 Dec 2011 10:14 a.m. PST |
Well, there have been similar reports from the sandbox about guys taking multiple 5.56 hits and not going down, while anyone hit by even 7.62x39 (AK47 rounds) was down for the count. 9mm versus .45? Don't get me started on that argument, other than to say *IF* you're restricted to non-expanding ammunition, you want the biggest bullet you can get. It's much less of an issue if you can use expanding ammunition. |
Altius | 21 Dec 2011 10:34 a.m. PST |
Mako, I used to work with several former SF members and I recall one of them telling me the same thing, almost verbatim, including the part about wounded men costing the enemy more than dead men. I don't know if he agreed with that POV, but he did say that was the philosophy behind it as was explained to him. But I also know that he operated with heavier weapons as well, so
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Omemin | 21 Dec 2011 11:53 a.m. PST |
"I suspect more urban myth." Except that several Viet Nam vets have reported such directly to me. I suspect that 5.56mm hits with insufficient power, especially at combat ranges and particularly in vegetation. |
Ron W DuBray | 21 Dec 2011 8:19 p.m. PST |
Yes AA is dead on with their statement. |
Justice and Rule | 21 Dec 2011 9:09 p.m. PST |
"I suspect more urban myth."Except that several Viet Nam vets have reported such directly to me. I suspect that 5.56mm hits with insufficient power, especially at combat ranges and particularly in vegetation. Vietnam vets reporting it to you doesn't make it any less of a myth, really. Soldiers are just as guilty of making up myths as anyone else, and there are a host of far, far better reasons justifying the move to 5.56mm than the idea that it is meant to "wound". People are confusing/mixing a guerrilla campaign strategy and the long-standing argument that the 5.56mm lacks killing power, which not nearly as clear-cut as people seem to think it. Hit center of mass, a 5.56mm round tumbling through you will easily cause fatal damage. That might take a few seconds, but if you aren't hitting the head or spine you aren't causing an instant kill anyways. |
Wartopia | 22 Dec 2011 7:35 a.m. PST |
Generally agree as I've read that not only are wounded friends hard on morale even enemy wounded are hard on morale. I've read that hearing enemy wounded screaming and moaning in no-man's land elicits feelings of guilt and fear for one's own life. There are frequent accounts of soldiers trying to put wounded enemies "out of their misery" because of the toll it takes on morale. However, some units have also reported going to extreme lengths to recover the dead and even taking more casualties to do so. This may be more true today given the propaganda value of dead Western troops. Western forces have launched recovery efforts to claim their dead with nearly as much effort as those needed to recover the wounded. In the book Phase Line Green the author, an Lt., tells the story of being chewed out by a veteran marine sgt. for not recovering one of his dead in the middle of a street in Hue. The sgt. decides to recover the body on his own and his entire lower jaw is shot away. He stumbles back to the Lt. trying to hold his own throat together as blood gushes from the wound. |
Just Jack | 27 Dec 2011 11:58 a.m. PST |
Dunno if it's too late to get in on this, but here's my two cents as a Marine that fought in Afghanistan and Iraq: in the overall scheme of things, I didn't see/experience much of a difference between a dead or wounded Marine (I was a SSgt). Whether wounded or dead we got them out of the fight and to the rear as quickly as possible. Along those lines, I personally saw very few Marines that were 'immediately' dead (at least in firefights, IEDs are a separate issue); due to our beloved SAPIs and helmets most guys were alive when we medevac'ed them (Fallujah Apr 2004, my company had 3 killed and 54 wounded, only one of the three KIA was dead on the spot, the other two died hours later). I also didn't see too much of the movie star "walking wounded" continuing the fight (in the same fight they got hit in); you get hit, you get pulled out of the fight ASAP (along with the dead). Depending on your wound you're 1) staying with the battalion at your FOB (maybe a few days light duty then back in the fight), 2) evac'ing to a field hospital in country, or 3) evac'ing out of theater. So in FoF game terms (which I play for some WWII), I agree guys are tremendously concerned about getting their comrades out of the line of fire and medevac'ed, but we might overrepresent the number of 'immediately' dead folks which, in game terms, we are mostly allowed to ignore (I like PBI's morale checks for units with unevacuated casualties). On a side note, regarding the 5.56 vs. 7.62 issue, my experience was that a guy getting hit by ANYTHING goes down, the difference is, does he stay down? By and large I'd give a slight edge to the 7.62 in terms of keeping him down, but hit location also had a lot to do with it. I personally was always amazed with guys taking multiple hits in the torso and still getting back up (when I went through CQB training they actually told us it's more reliable to aim for the pelvic area, though I never tried it – aim small, miss small). But even then those fellas were not overly concerned with holding their position, they were just dragging their butts away. All of the above simply relates MY experiences (or at least how I remember experiencing it; as was pointed out above, soldiers (Marines) "are just as guilty of making up myths as anyone else." I've talked to buddies of mine that were never further than 10m from me in a fight and saw a whole different battle.) insofar as it can be useful for our silly little hobby of playing with toy soldiers (as my wife likes to say). V/R, Jack |