"Radios and Jeeps" Topic

An interesting issue came up a couple of days ago. My modern French have "La Jeep" with radio (basically a Willys Jeep or a Franken Willys/Hotchkiss M201) with radio. Now assuming its like the Landrover FFR the radio stays in the Jeep. The crew can get out with a Machine gun in scout sections or an Milan in the Anti-Tank section. Problem is if they get out they leave the radio. So for clarity when do they lose the use of the radio? We Ummed and Arred and decided it was usable only when the troops were mounted or debussed but in contact with the vehicle perhaps a bit generous but probably just OK. What's your opinion?

Foe what its worth a gratuitous picture of the offending force including the jeeps.

Would the driver not normally stay with the vehicle? Or does it just get abandoned?

Don't know about the French army, but a similar set-up in the US Army would always come from the commo room with a manpack harness. It would take an extra "turn" to remove the radio from its vehicle mount and put it into backpack mode, but certainly it should then be able to move in the dismounted role.

So for clarity when do they lose the use of the radio?

It depends.

The M201 was a workhorse vehicle over a few decades, so many variants and many modified. Saying "a M201" is a little like saying "a M113 APC".

However, from the beginning, the radio was removable and carryable as Eumelus describes. In the 50's it would be for adedicated radioman (if you have one) who would be severly limited in riflery. They would still carry a rifle, but the pack was delicate (well, easy to break) and heavy.

By the (mid) 60's it had a generic power harness, and a lot of different equipment (including different radios) could be mounted in the jeep.

When you lose radio depends on the specific outfitting, as appropraite for your scenario.

Your effects could range from the radio being assigne to one tema member who does nothing else and ends with the battery life or the operator's life through a small, standard device that everyone can operate, hard to break with a tactically infinte battery life to a satphone.

UshCha, I don't know anything about the French; is this an HQ type jeep, or does every jeep have a vehicle mounted radio?

Driver stays with the vehicle, operates the radio. Unless you are doing a skirmish game then the driver may abandon his post if he is under fire and fails morale.
But the radio is his "weapon" and so he needs to stay with it.
Bunkermeister

Eumelus – turns out the French used the same radios as the US just built under licenece.

etotheipi the period is the early 1980s specifically the reconnisance lot who have scout jeeps and an anti tank section with Milan.

Even I was hoping to not have to get to the level of detail I have now to attempt. Looks like 2 man teams in the jeeps so can a 2 man team carry a MG and it's ammo and an 1980's radio?

For 1980s technology – the weight of a 7.62mm MG and 300 rounds of ammo is about 20-25 kilos, and the weight of a manpack radio and 300 rounds is about the same. So definitely can be carried without too much trouble for fit young men (hopefully your scouts are the pick of the litter!).

Now start adding tripod, extra barrel, more ammo, NVG, entrenching tool, etc etc and it becomes impractical for a 2-man team. But presumably the scouts aren't deploying to do major fighting, only to see, report, and, if necessary, shoot and scoot.

Someone who knows better than me can speak to the Milan, but I'd be surprised if a 2-man dismount section would carry more than 3 missiles between the two of them? Again, not a problem if the team isn't venturing too far from their jeep. And of course the itty-bitty jeep can be concealed in any culvert, garden shed, behind a dumpster, etc etc.

early 1980s specifically the reconnisance lot

So it is still very specific, but under that general description, unless you are modeling a very specific organization that has a very specific reason to be way behind the state of the art of their peers, the probability of losing comms would be very, very low.

They would most likely be using satcom, which would be moderately hard to detect and jam by a 1980's peer adversary. Even a state adversary would need to make some type of deliberate decision to focus those resources.

Just a general description of the state of the art. It all depends on the very specific specifics.

etotheipi The French were not using sat phonea s far as I can discover in around 1982 for uour fairly basic lot in "La Jeep". Even the Brits were using Clansman.

Eumelus – you are a guy I would love to play. You have a basic grip on the situstion.

Our teams are allowed in to carry 3 Milan and the Fireing post, as that is what we figured was a sensible load. For ease of play and not beeing too much of a strech we will let tham take the radio based on your suggestion, I was leaning that way and at least one other person suggesting it is not too much of as strech is enough to convince me. The jeep could have upto 5 Milan in it. However they would need to go back for tyhe rest in a separate trip.

Thanks everybody for the help.