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Speaking as a fellow Artilleryman, I say "HELL YEAH"!!

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FIAA: Color Guard

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FIAA: Color Guard

I second the "Hell Yes" !

God bless every man and woman serving for the United States Armed Services !

My favorite quote was from a marine buddy who commented on the war by saying "Kill 'em all, let God sort them out"

God Bless America !

-Austin

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1975 Chevy LUV Rockabilly Stepside:
Satin Black, V-8 Traditionally Named "Dean"

Being a Viet nam vet and a former track/wheel vehicle mechanic for an M110 8 inch self-propelled howitzer battery, I can definitely relate.

Here's a couple of pic's of what an M110 looked like back in the day:



This was our battery commander's favorite picture:



Thank you for all of you that are serving now..and thank you for all of you that have served before them.

Hoo-ahh Taz,
Looking at that second pic, I hope someone got that collimator sandbagged before that bad boy went off

The 8" was and still is a bad muthah. We had an 8" SP Battalion that trained with us regularly... some of the best time I ever had was a few short duties cross training as forward observer overlooking the impact area at Camp Roberts in CA.

Nothing wakes up the neigborhood like a sweep and zone or expend all ammo fire mission from 2 105 battalions backed by an 8" battalion.

I salute you and our other "brothers in arms" here for your service. And wish those still on mission, a safe return home.

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FIAA: Color Guard

motovation? yeah I got that.... I have an ammo can sitting next to me FULL of arty and overseas pics.

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I have that same picture, framed. Our Btry Commander gave all us NCO's one as a "going away" gift signed by all the officers and NCO's, before we all left, after they deactivated 7/15 FA.....and the rest of the 7th ID with it.

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FIAA: Color Guard

There was a little known trick you could do with an eight inch gun battery if you were in danger of being over-run. If you kept your left over powder charge packs soaking in a barrel of diesel, then when the enemy got too close, you could load all four guns with as much of them as you could cram into them, set all 4 guns at ground level, and fire off all 4 guns at once with no round - just all of the left over diesel-soaked powder charges.

A full battery "fire for effect" involving all 4 guns firing at the same time in the same direction would send a fireball out about 100 yards wide and about a quarter of a mile out that was about equal in temperature to an acetyline cutting torch. I only saw it once, but once was enough.

But for a big 32 ton track-mounted ugly hunk of junk that could travel along at about 45 mph, stop suddenly for an emergency "hip shoot" call, dig in it's back blade and pop off a 250 pound tnt round out 24 miles within 12 inches of where it was aimed in about 3 minutes, that left an 80 meter crater where ever it hit - they were pretty badass for their time.

Now you pretty much only see them in military museums and old vet's pictures.

Damn, that would be brutal!

Do you know if the 8" had a beehive munition? THAT would clear out a frontal assualt

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FIAA: Color Guard

We have done direct fire before... never with just poweder tho.

Saw a self-propelled howitzer in Barstow, when we had some of our guns painted just before deployment. I think they were 155's tho. Pretty cool stuff.

One thing I learned about the powder, if they give ya a super 8 charge dont ever fall a sleep when the fire that thing. It will rock your world, especially without ear plugs.

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Yep...and I don't recommend sitting on the trails either especialy during high or max QE.

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FIAA: Color Guard

The 8 incher had beehive, white phosphorous, HE (high explosive), and tactical nuclear rounds.

We had white and green powder bags and we used to fire a lot of charge 8's, some seven's, and a few 6's. Stateside, when my unit was out in the field, I got to throw the old unused bags into a big hole and torch them once - now that sure as hell lit up the sky!

The nose cone detonator on an 8 inch round could be set for "fuse quick" (explode on impact), or "fuse delay" (Timed detonation for up to 7 seconds before or after impact).

Rounds could be timed to go off in the air to maximise the blast wave, the spread pattern (for white phosphorous and beehive), or to bury themselves and then go off (for buildings and underground compounds), and we had a special team for nuke rounds that pretty much stayed to themselves and never discussed it with anyone else. Their job was to take over the 8 inch, assemble the nuke round, load it, and fire it.

Most of them were on our red-eye team too, which helped to keep the MIG's away, because when we started firing off rounds, the enemy had a tendency to want to find us quickly and let us know we weren't very welcome. We also had a quad 50 mounted on an old duece-and-a-half that was draped in armor plate to help protect our perimeter that was surrounded by a big ditch full of waste flamables.

BTW..I can remember falling asleep in the ammo carrier parked right next to a 8 inch while all of the guns were firing, and even with ear plugs - my ears are still a little screwed up from it.

I'm with ya on the hearing loss. Still have about 30% loss inmy left ear.

When I was Gunner on a M119 105mm, I would always use a plug for my right ear, but would leave the left unplugged so I could hear the fire commands, then right before I fired I would usually plug the left ear with my finger.

Forgot to several times while concentrating on listening for commands, taking up sight displacement and caught up in the exitement of gettin my rounds downrange.

Was painful as hell during the charge 7 FFE missions, or expend all ammo

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FIAA: Color Guard

We used alot of white and green bags... they had an experimental round called the copper head...im sure its not experimental anymore..... but it had some gizz-mo in the top of the round and fins that would deploy after it spun so many times... . then it could guide so many degrees to a laser sighted target or be programed for it

The super 8's wernt used very many times... but they had a rocket propelled round and in the night sky you could see a quick dot of light when it lighted up... maybe for 3 or 4 seconds

I personally dont know that much, but I was the truck/ trailer mech for an arty battery for the full time of when I was in. So I had to drive a gun and help them all the time.... until something broke down or needed fixed.

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Ah, that would be the RAP round, rocket assisted projectile... we fired some of those on one outing just to free up space at the Ammo supply.

Their pretty cool at night

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FIAA: Color Guard

Just remember, when you are having a bad day call on us Air Cav boys, we love our Apachee's. The first Sand Box war we had a blast playing around, too bad they would not let us get serious and finish the job when we had the chance. Like you gentlemen we did as ordered. 1/18 Air Cav.

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Certified pilots, looking down on people since 1903.

I've shot a 12 gauge before... Just kidding, real interesting stuff. my hat is off to you all.

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If you think no one cares, try missing a couple of payments...



FIAA!

SFPP!

yeah.. the RAP round...I had forgotten what it was called

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We used to stick a chunk of a c-ration can top in the tip of the round where the nose cone/detonator cap went on. When you fired the round it let off a high pitched shrill whistle as it went through the air, especially during it's final descent to it's intended target.

We thought it sounded pretty cool - but I'm sure it wasn't appreciated much by the enemy as they were listening to it come down on them.

I was a wheel/track vehicle mechanic too - but everybody did a bit of everything, especially when things got busy or someone got wounded.

I've drove'em, fixed 'em, loaded 'em and fired 'em - and so did everyone else, even the cooks and medics got their turn when they had to.

MOS's don't matter much in a combat zone when the fertilizer hits the ventilator - you do whatever you can and what needs to be done to keep you and your fellow soldiers safe.

My battery commander was real big on cross-training everyone to do just about everything there was to do, and I tried to ask a lot of questions and listen to the old-timers that had already done a tour or two as much as possible. I figured they must have learned something usefull if they went through it already, and then they re-upped or volunteered to go back because they felt like they could handle it successfully again.

But that was back when a draftee only did 2 years total time in service, and an new enlistee only did 3 years total time in service.

So if you did your one tour in Viet Nam which was normally 12-16 months - you were done, and the only way they sent you back to a combat zone was if you re-enlisted or volunteered to go back.

If not, then they usually sent you to Germany, Korea, and later somewhere stateside to finish out your time untill your ETS date.

Now...well it's definitely a different situation - that's for sure.

And BTW..I have a lotta fondness for the Air Cav guys. Their Hueys and Cobras were a welcome sight when all hell broke loose, that's for damn sure.

I got to fly with a Cobra pilot stateside once when he was gettin' some mandatory stick time. I puked all over my feet by the time that ride was over...lol