"About Mortars" Topic

"Over the last several decades, the genre of military science fiction has exploded in popularity across all forms of media. During this time, all manner of weapons systems have been imagined, retrofitted, and redesigned to fit the future battlefields of their creators' imaginations. Despite the vast weapons featured in these far off futuristic armories, there is one weapon systems that is rarely featured: the mortar. Mortars has been a foundation tool of warfare since first being used in the Siege of Constantinople in 1453 that extends to all modern battlefields that are still smoldering to this very day due to its ability to be a form of more flexible and portable heavy firepower. In this article, FWS will be exploring and explaining the mortar, its lack of presence in Military SF, along with the few examples in science fiction.

A metal tube, some shells, and some math are the hallmarks of one of the most deadly and effective indirect fire weapon systems on the modern battlefield. Designed to support offensive and defensive operations, the mortar and the soldiers that feed her are critical to the success of operations that date back to the First World War. The mortar weapon systems does indeed comprise of a simple-looking metal tube, shells in a variety of lethal and non-lethal payloads, and the crew itself to not only muzzle-load the tube with all manner of shells, but also to adjust that tube with math and field intelligence to lob those shells onto the enemy positions with the correct ballistic trajectory.

Unlike its bigger brother, the field artillery cannon and the more sexy close air support aircraft, mortars are controlled by the soldiers that are actually in the that understand the local conditions in both the human and geographic terrain. In addition, the soldiers themselves can get the mortar thudding rounds down range faster and easier than calling in CAS or an artillery strike. Mortars can also be an important psychological weapon that can reap real-world battlefield gains in that enemy soldiers may abandon a position once the steel rain falls in. The enemy would then know that their enemy has this area dialed in and not to be there…"
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Amicalement
Armand

I was an 81mm Mortar PL for a time went I was in a Rifle Co. in the 101. About 1984 or '85 the US ARMY went thru a major TO&E change. And turned in all the 81s. The Mech Inf and Tank Bns still had their 4.2 in mortars in HHC. IIRC 4 Tubes M106s + FDC in M113 …

Striker (1983) and StarGrunt (1996) both have rules for mortars (and in Striker you can design your own), so I'm not sure why the author thinks they're absent from military science fiction.

Weren't there mortars in at least one of the Dorsai stories, too?

I see it mentioned regularly in military sci-fi…..of course its not if the books are mainly dealing with space ship boarding and defence.

I transferred to Mortar Platoon when I was a Corporal and have never looked back. Used properly they are absolutely devastating, they haven't got the range of Artillery (the current 81mm has a max range a shade over three and a half miles) but they are far quicker into action and have a far higher rate of fire. Also due to the low muzzle velocity the HE round has the equivalent explosive impact of a 105. Our Smoke round is way better too!

In the Star Trek Original Series episode "Arena" (the one with the Gorn) we see that the Federation uses mortars with photon warheads. :)

Yes in GW Epic you have Off Board Fire Support from Spacecraft/Orbital Weapons Platforms, distant batteries, etc. Some in Sci-fi call it "Ortillery". Those fires could even be Naval Fire Support.

As Windy mentioned mortars have a fast ROF. We all know about having rounds in the air from the same tube before they hit.

I liked the that STOS with the photon mortar rds. ! Would have liked to have some of those rounds when I was an 81 PL !

I suspect mortars are not seen as exotic and exciting and potent, they don't figure large in the imagination. They're also less well known or understood in the general populace. I suspect that's the reason.

Kinda dumb because mortars are unlikely to go away. s

That's because the majority of the population have (luckily for them) never been on the wrong end of mortar fire. And probably even fewer have seen thirty HE rounds land in an area half the size of a football pitch within the space of about thirty seconds. If they had they might take mortars more seriously!

(smile)

Amicalement
Armand

The majority of the US population knows about the military … For better or worse …

Automatic, belt fed mortars are a real killer.

As the ability to accurately plot mortar fire back reaches the front lines, it might prove to be less brilliant, however.

There's a reason artillery is all propelled these days -- because non-mobile is not great for survival.

I did write up for the background of a sci-fi RPG (over-doing the military hardware as usual), though I'm sure its not an original idea I can claim, light-weight composite self-loading mortars fed by a pre-loaded cassette and fired electronically – crewless and essentially disposable.

There were and are SP Mortars e.g. M106 and M125.

Our armoured and mechanised infantry battalions have the 81 mounted in 432's. They tried a Warrior variant but apparently the recoil smashed the suspension. It's still better than nothing though as manpacking is an absolute bastard!

Yeah humping an 81 can be a real . Carrying the base plate sucked, we'd rotate everything.

The bipod is the worst. It's got spiky bits and bites you when you're not looking. :-D

I don't understand why you would hump 81's. Did you hump the ammo too? How many rounds could you carry or who carried the ammo?

Wolfhag

Sometimes you just have to! The mortar platoon tabs in with the kit and sets up the mortar line, then the attacking rifle companies move through your position on their way to the FUP and dump the ammo.

One of our annual tests is Ex Heavy Carry – six miles in 1 hour 50 mins. Each man carries their own personal kit and rifle, then either the barrel, baseplate or bipod, and two bombs. Sight, aiming posts, barrel brush and tools are shared out between the men of each det. Then at the end of the six miles they're given an action direction and the mortar line has to be set up and ready to fire within two minutes. Great fun!

The bipod is the worst.

LOL !! I remember it all sucked !

Sometimes you just have to!

Yep in the 101, we at one time had M278 Mules left over from Vietnam. So that helped at times.

But they had been rode hard and put away wet too many times, by the time I got there in '80. They were in their last legs … err … wheels.

The Riggers wanted to practice dropping them. We sent about 6. None were in any condition to drive back after the drop. Put what was left in the back on some Deuce & 1/2s. And on to the Cannibalization Pt.

So yes sometimes you had to carry them broken down into the major components. E.g. barrel, base plate, tripod, sight, etc. So in theory, everyone who was not carrying a mortar part would carry a couple of rds.

Even talked about having the guys is the Rifle Plts who were not carrying a heavy weapon would hump some 81 rounds. But generally if you were not packing a heavy weapon you were carrying the ammo for it. So that won't always work either.

We plan/hoped when we landed in the LZ. Ammo would be landed also and we'd set up near the LZ. But that didn't always happen either. So you humped …

I was fortunate I spent most of my time as a Rifle Plt Ldr. But that was no picnic either many times !

In my experience most Scifi is written by people who really haven't a clue where it comes to physics, military history, and military technology.
As a result most space combat relates either to Jutland or Midway.
And when it comes to ground combat they relate to the Hollywood representation of WW2 or Vietnam.
So they don't pay much attention to mortar's simply because they haven't a clue about their importance.
That being said I wonder if there will still be a place for mortars on a really high-tech future battlefield.
I think future combat will be highly mechanized, and that all those vehicles will come equipped with CIWS.
In such an environment all low velocity ballistic projectiles, and a mortar projectile can only be a low velocity affair, are probably ineffective.

In my experience most Scifi is written by people who really haven't a clue where it comes to physics, military history, and military technology.

Amen …

That being said I wonder if there will still be a place for mortars on a really high-tech future battlefield.

Well as I said back in the '80s we had SP Mortar Tracks. E.g. M106s(4.2) and M125s(81mm). I'm sure they still do today. On a variety of vehicles like the newer Strykers and LAVs, IIRC …

As long as there are soft targets e.g. Humans [or Aliens!?]. Mortars will have a place as an Infantry Support weapon … Soft targets don't need high velocity to kill them. Just a bunch of HE, etc.

As I said on another thread – more & more we will see more AI, robotics, drones, UAVs, etc., on the battlefield.
And the 1st World will still be dealing with 3d World insurgencies, etc. Since we can't use all our firepower to fix the "problem". For fear of collateral damage, bad press, etc., etc. So Grunts & AFVs will still need to do be used … effectively and efficiently.

Counter Mortar CIWS:
YouTube link

Could this make traitional mortars obsolete?

Wolfhag

Well at some point its going to turn into a competition between artillery and point defence systems. Smaller mortars may well survive though as being simply too useful particularly in largely infantry versus infantry engagements – and its probably highly likely that for the reasonably foreseeable complex area point defence systems are going to be multi-purpose and high value. Is a battery commander really going to risk lighting up his whizzy multi-million dollar system up for a handful low velocity small calibre mortar rounds aimed at some grunts, assuming a peer or near peer opponent will probably waiting for you to do just that so they can saturate it with kinds of explosive nastiness?

There's an old joke/story about an NVA soldier who is tasked (with the rest of his unit) to porter 4 mortar rounds each to a distant battlefield. Basically, after 3 months of hell, he reaches the mortar unit, which fires off the 4 rounds he carried in as many seconds. Then he's told "Okay, go back and get 4 more."

;-)

ROUWetPatchBehindTheSofa

That is kind of the way I'm looking at … like I said the 1st World will still be dealing with 3d World insurgencies, etc.