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Artillery

Artillery

:For the thrash metal band, see Artillery (band) Historically, artillery refers to any engine used for the discharge of projectiles during war. The term also describes ground-based troops with the primary function of manning such weapons. Sometimes known as "The King of Battle". weapon weapon]]

Modern Artillery

Modern artillery is distinguished by its large calibre, firing an explosive shell or rocket, and being of such a size and weight as to require a specialized mount for firing and transport. Weapons covered by this term include "tube" artillery such as the howitzer, cannon, mortar, and field gun and "rocket" artillery. The term "artillery" has traditionally not been used for projectiles with internal guidance systems, even though some artillery units employ surface-to-surface missiles. Recent advances in terminal guidance systems for small munitions has allowed large calibre shells to be fitted with precision guidance fuses, blurring this distinction.

Types

The types of tube artillery are generally distinguished by their ballistic trajectory. Cannons or guns (such as infantry support guns or those on a naval ship) are typically longer-barreled, low-trajectory weapons designed for a direct-fire role. Typically the length of a cannon barrel is greater than 25 times its caliber (inner diameter). Howitzers are typically shorter- and thinner-barreled. Capable of both high- and low-angle fire, they are most often employed in a close indirect-fire role, operating in defilade. Typically the length of a howitzer barrel is between 15 and 25 times its caliber. Mortars are smaller, very short-barrel, high-angle weapons capable of only high-trajectory fire at a relatively short range compared to the other types. Typically the length of a mortar barrel is less than 15 times its caliber. Modern field artillery can also be split into two other categories: towed and self-propelled. As the name implies, towed artillery has a prime mover, usually a jeep or truck, to move the piece, crew, and ammunition around. Self-propelled howitzers are permanently mounted on a carriage or vehicle with room for the crew and ammunition and capable of moving independently in order to move quickly from one firing position to another - to both support the fluid nature of modern combat and to avoid counter-battery fire. There are also mortar carrier vehicles, many of which allow the mortar to be removed from the vehicle and be used dismounted, potentially in terrain the vehicle can't get to or in order to avoid immediate detection.

Sub-types

counter-battery fire Types of artillery:
- Field artillery - mobile weapons used to support armies in the field. Subcategories include:
- infantry support guns - directly support infantry units (mostly obsolete).
- mountain guns - lightweight weapons that can be moved through difficult terrain.
- howitzers - capable of high angle fire.
- gun howitzers - capable of high or low angle fire with a long barrel.
- mortars - lightweight weapons that fire projectiles at an angle of over 45 degrees to the horizontal.
- Self-propelled artillery - typically guns, mortars or gun howitzers mounted on a vehicle.
- Naval artillery - cannons mounted on warships and used either against other ships or in support of ground forces. The crowning achievement of naval artillery was the battleship, but the advent of air-power and missiles have rendered this type of artillery largely obsolete.
- Coastal artillery - Fixed-position weapons dedicated to defense of a particular location, usually a coast (e.g. the Atlantic Wall in WW II) or harbor. Not needing to be mobile, coastal artillery can be much larger than equivalent field artillery pieces, giving them longer range and more destructive power. Since World War II, however, modern weapons and tactics have made them largely obsolete.
- Anti-aircraft artillery - weapons, usually mobile, dedicated to attacking aircraft from the ground.

Projectiles

Anti-aircraft artillery.]] All forms of artillery require a propellant to fire the projectile at the target. A number of different configurations have been developed, each with varying characteristics. They include:
- Tube fired - utilise the pressure of burnt propellant inside a barrel to force a projectile out of the mouth of the barrel.
- Spin stabilised - Use helical grooves or ridges on the inside of the barrel to impart a rotation to the projectile as it is travelling in the barrel.
- Fin stabilised - Use fins at the rear of the projectile in the airflow to maintain correct orientation.
- Inverted tube - Some weapons have been built with the tube built into the projectile and fitted onto a rod fitted to the carriage.
- Recoilless - A tube fired weapon with a breech designed to perforate a bursting disk at firing, and permit a mass of burnt propellant gases with momentum equal to the projectile to exit from the rear of the barrel, to prevent recoil from affecting the weapon.
- Rocket propelled - Tube or rail launched - A reaction propulsion system mounted to the projectile provides continuous thrust for an initial period of the flight.
- Rocket assist - A combination of tube fired and rocket propelled - uses a rocket motor in the base of the projectile to extend the range by about 30%.
- Base bleed - Similar to a rocket assist projectile, uses a small pyrotechnic charge at the base of the projectile. The charge introduces sufficient combustion products into the low-pressure region behind the base of the projectile responsible for a large proportion of the drag to substantially (> 30%) increase range. Like a rocket assist projectile, trajectory is changed to non-ballistic, which may complicate counter-battery location.

Ammunition

High-explosive; shrapnel, dual purpose improved conventional munitions (DPICM)- bomblet; canister or anti-personnel; illuminating or star-shell; armour-piercing; incendiary (white phosphorus, "Willie Pete"); gas or aerosol, chemical or biological; smoke; nuclear and non-lethal (developing area - includes High Power Microwave HPM, and NL payload carrier shells).

Fuses

Quick or super-quick; delay; hardened-delay or concrete-piercing; timer; proximity.

Modern artillery operations

drag near Sarajevo in 1996.]] Sarajevo Depending on the calibre of the weapons, artillery is used in a variety of roles. Mortars fire relatively short range and small- to medium-calibre (up to about 120 mm) projectiles. Modern mortars, because of their lighter weight and simpler, more transportable design, are usually organic to infantry and armor units, allowing greater responsiveness and negating their shorter range. Howitzers are generally used in direct support of infantry and armor, where the guns of a battery or even a battalion will be massed to fire simultaneously onto a single point or area target. Howitzers are usually between about 105 mm and 155 mm in calibre.

Counter-battery fire

Attacks aimed at enemy artillery rather than infantry or fortifications are known as counter battery fire. Radar coupled to computers can accurately track a projectile in flight back to its firing point. This can be used as targeting information for an enemy artillery site. When artillery fire is directed via radio by a forward observer (FO), the location of FO's transmitter can be calculated and attacked with artillery as well. If successful, this counter-attack will limit the effectiveness of the FO's artillery fire. Radar also improves the all-weather flexibility of modern artillery. The rise in counter-battery abilities has driven field artillery to adopt "shoot-and-scoot" tactics emphasizing constant maneuver within a designated position area, usually from hide point to firing point and back again. This has required reliance on sometimes temperamental technology and increased the cost of modern field artillery systems.

Field artillery team

Modern field artillery (Post-World War I) has three distinct parts: the forward observer (or FO), the fire direction center (FDC) and the actual guns themselves. The forward observer observes the target using tools such as binoculars, laser range finders, designators and call back fire missions on his radio. The FO deals solely with the FDC, of which there is usually one per each battery of six guns. The FDC computes firing data, fire direction, for the guns. The FDC will transmit the fire order to the guns, specifying the number of volleys, shell and fuze combination, charge, deflection and quadrant elevation, and any special instructions.

MRSI

It is possible for modern computer-controlled artillery to fire more than one volley at a target and have all the shells arrive simultaneously, which is called MRSI (Multiple Rounds Simultaneous Impact). This is because there is more than one trajectory for the rounds to fly to any given target - typically one is below 45 degrees from horizontal and the other is above it, and if you can vary the amount of propellant with each shell, you can create more trajectories. Because the higher trajectories cause the shells to arc higher into the air, they take longer to reach the target and so if the shells are fired on these trajectories for the first volleys (starting with the shell with the most propellant and working down) and then after the correct pause more volleys are fired on the lower trajectories, the shells will all arrive at the same time. This is useful because many more shells can land on the target with no warning. With traditional volleys along the same trajectory, anybody at the target point will have a certain amount of time (however long it takes to reload and re-fire the guns) to run away or take cover between volleys. In addition, if guns in more than one location are firing on one target, with careful timing it can be arranged for all their shells to land at the same time for the same reason. Examples of MRSI guns are South Africa's Denel G6-52 (which can land six rounds simultaneously at targets at least 25 km away) and Germany's Panzer Haubitze 2000 (which can land five rounds simultaneously at targets at least 17 km away). The United States Crusader programme (now cancelled) was slated to have MRSI capability. When an effect similar to that of MRSI is achieved using separate batteries of traditional artillery, using varying fuses to account for the variant distances or trajectories to cause all shells to detonate on the target at the same time, it is called TOT (Time On Target). The logic behind this practice is the same as that for MRSI: to surprise the enemy and to sow confusion when guns heard to be firing at different times nonetheless result in deadly explosions in the same instant. An additional wrinkle can be added when some or all of the shells are set for airburst, meaning they explode in the air above the target instead of upon impact. This is a very effective tactic against infantry and light vehicles because it scatters the shrapnel over a larger area and prevents the blast shockwave from being blocked by terrain, but usually proves ineffective against troops or equipment protected by even rudimentary fortifications. However, airbursts are probably more likely to impact units protected by trenches and revetments, since the shrapnel can enter them from above, while a ground-burst nearby would simply cause the shrapnel to impact the walls or fly overhead.

History

revetment revetment The word as used in the current context originated in the Middle Ages. It comes from the Old French atellier meaning "to arrange", and attillement meaning "equipment". From the 13th century an artillier referred to a builder of any war equipment, and for the next 250 years the sense of the word "artillery" covered all forms of military weapons. Older engines like the catapult, onager, trebuchet and ballista are artillery, but the modern term really dates from the mid 15th century with bombards and then cannon. Bombards are the earliest of gunpowder artillery, distinguished by their lack of a field carriage, immobility once emplaced, highly individual design, and noted unreliability. The use of the word cannon marks the introduction of a dedicated field carriage with axle, trail and horse-drawn limber - this produced mobile field pieces that could move and support an army in action rather than being found only in siege and static defences. Cannon were always muzzle-loaders, casting technology having standardised and removed the often dangerous breech-loading design. Cannon operation was still a complex technical task, often undertaken at high-speed and in stressful conditions, where a mistake could easily be lethal. The field carriage eased movement in general, but traverse and elevation were still very limited and slow - the crew ramming levers, handspikes, to force a movement of a few degrees. Larger movements were by brute force shoves of the entire unit, as was repositioning after recoil, an extremely enervating task. The combining of shot and powder into a single unit, a cartridge, occurred in the 1620s with a simple fabric bag, and was quickly adopted by all nations. It speeded loading and made it safer, but unexpelled bag fragments were an additional fouling in the gun barrel and a new tool - a worm - was introduced to remove them. Shells, explosive-filled fused projectiles, were also developed - problems with the fuses were extremely common. The development of specialised pieces - shipboard artillery, howitzers and mortars - was also begun in this period. More esoteric designs, like the multi-barrel ribaudequin, were also built. The 17th century book by Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth inventor Kazimierz Siemienowicz "Artis Magnae Artilleriae pars prima" ("Great Art of Artillery, the First Part". also known as "The Complete Art of Artillery") was one of the most important contemporary publications on the subject of artillery. For over two centuries this work was used in Europe as a basic artillery manual. Europe Oddly the development of cannon almost halted until the 19th-century, improvements in metallurgy, chemistry, manufacturing, and so on, did not alter the basic design and operation of a cannon. From the 1860s artillery was forced into a series of rapid technological and operational changes, accelerating through the 1870s and on. The main impetus was the improvements in small arms, which certainly had not spent 200 years in the doldrums. Artillery could no longer be deployed in the battle line, the large crews and stocks of ammunition were vulnerable to rifle fire, but had to either become smaller, lighter, more mobile and stay with the troops or get much further away. The second type, using indirect fire, forced the development of the technologies and doctrines that produced modern artillery. technical - metal, propellant, recuperation, manufacturing - obturation, etc. doctrine - direct vs indirect fire, predicted fire, observed fire - forward observation, pre-planned fire - registered fire, barrage, creeping barrage, STOP (simultaneous time on top)

Quotations

- "God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon Bonaparte. Another version of this quotation is: "God is on the side of the stronger battalion."
- "I do not have to tell you who won the war. You know, the artillery did." - Gen George S. Patton
- "Our artillery... The Germans feared it almost more than anything we had." - Ernie Pyle "Brave Men", 1944 A.D.
- "Artillery is the god of war." - Stalin
- "Contrary to popular belief, we at artillery command do not believe we're God. We merely borrowed his "Smite" button." - Anonymous
- "The Mission of the Artillery is to give some class to what would otherwise be merely a vulgar brawl." - Some Redleg (American Artilleryman, since their dress blue uniforms have red stripes). This quotation has also been attributed to Frederick the Great.
- "Without support the infantry won't move." (In Hebrew it rhymes) - The motto of the Israeli Artillery Corps.
- "Infantry err, infantry die. Artillery err, infantry die." -IDF black humor slogan
- "The bombs land with awesome explosions, the earth trembles, the upcast of craters jets in the air, the troops are shocked by the blast waves, many bleed from noses or perforated ear drums, they are terrorized into apathy or outright panic. But unless the enemy is nearby and ready to advance immediately, the moment passes." - Edward Luttwack
- "Since infantry is considered the 'Queen of Battle', and artillery the king, I had inscribed my personal banner "Balls for the Queen". Granted, high explosive 150 millimeter shells aren't exactly cannonballs, but hey, why spoil a perfectly good motto?" - Tommy Franks, while an artillery lieutenant in Vietnam.
- "An artillery barrage is a terrifying thing." - Erich Maria Remarque

External Links

- [http://www.ussmissouri.com/VDO_on_demand.aspx?Name=TurretOps_GunRoom.wmv Video: Inside one of Missouri’s 16" gun room, about 1955. (Windows Media File)] Category:Artillery ko:대포 ja:大砲

Thrash metal

Thrash metal is a subgenre of heavy metal music. The origins of thrash metal are generally traced to the late 1970s and early 1980s, when a number of bands began incorporating the sound of the NWOBHM with elements of Hardcore Punk, thus creating a new genre, Thrash Metal. This genre is much more aggressive as compared to its relative in Speed Metal. Beyond this, thrash metal has proven somewhat difficult to categorise. Some fans and musicians have a firm concept of genre and subgenre, but others reject such categorisation as limiting or useless. There is often significant crossover from one metal category to another, and the influence of non-metal genres, including classical music and jazz is not uncommon. Generally, the musical base of thrash metal is composed of fast paced time signatures, and low-register, fast or complex guitar riffs, sometimes layered with high-register guitar solos, often in combination with palm muting to create a "chugging" sound. The speed and pacing of the songs is usually what defines basic thrash metal. The music tends to have a viceral, propellant feel to it due to the often intense drumming, most commonly utilizing the snare drum on the 1/2 beat, or the 2nd and 4th beats of the measure. Frantic bass drum use is also common. (Thrash drummers often use two foot-pedaled bass drums, known as "double bass").

Beginnings

1981 is seen by some fans as a critical year, though others cite earlier influences on the genre: The first riff of Black Sabbath's "Symptom of the Universe" (1975) is possibly one of the first thrash riffs, though their "Into the Void" and "Children of the Grave" (both 1971) were influential as well. Some point to another early example, Queen's "Stone Cold Crazy" (1974) (from their Sheer Heart Attack album), which was unusually heavy and fast for its time (and indeed for Queen as well), and ultimately covered many years later by Metallica. Speed metal pioneers Judas Priest had some thrash ideas on their Stained Class LP (1978), including the punkish counterpoint riff on "Saints in Hell" or the general structure of "White Heat, Red Hot". Also, the live version of "Tyrant" on 1979's Unleashed in the East is very close to thrash metal, combining new drummer Les Binks's uptempo delivery with a more distorted guitar sound than the 1976 studio version (from the classic Sad Wings of Destiny album). Scott Ian of Anthrax cites Dave Mustaine as "the inventor of Speed/Thrash Metal" in the liner notes of the booklet to the reissue of Megadeth's Killing is my Business... and Business is Good! album. Others suggest that Motörhead's Overkill LP (1979) would give the name to a New York band that would write what is often considered the first thrash metal song in 1981: "Unleash the Beast Within." Soon thereafter, the short-lived Southern California band Leather Charm would write "Hit The Lights." This band would break up, but the primary songwriter's next band, Metallica, would feature this song. The band Metal Church recorded a few rehearsals in 1980-81, which were similar to the early Metallica and Overkill efforts, though not quite as thrashy. Interestingly, Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich was offered a spot in Metal Church in 1980 but then later kicked out again. 1980 A highly influential band, Venom, would release its album "Welcome To Hell" in 1981. Venom would continue to be a heavy influence on the development of thrash metal. The first thrash metal demo may very well be Metal Church's Red Skies from late 1981. An instrumental demo that combined thrash, speed, and power metal, it did not receive much circulation, and was overshadowed by their October 1982 Four Hymns demo. Chronologically, though, Metal Church were probably the first. Metallica were second on the scene (the Power Metal demo, April 1982, and then No Life 'til Leather in July) and the first with a studio LP (Kill 'Em All, July 1983). Meanwhile, in Europe, Artillery recorded a demo in November, 1982. Their We Are The Dead took a more Black Sabbath oriented direction, resulting in a thrash metal form that was not quite as fast as that of Metallica but had similar riff ideas.

Take off

Thrash metal took off in 1984 or so, with Overkill releasing their second demo (Feel the Fire), and Slayer's seminal Haunting the Chapel EP, which featured the song 'Chemical Warfare'. This led to a darker and heavier sounding thrash, which was then reflected in Exodus's Bonded by Blood and Slayer's Hell Awaits in 1985. Outside of the U.S. in 1985, the German band Kreator released their debut album Endless Pain and Sepultura released their EP Bestial Devastation. In Canada, Eudoxis who performed live in full body armor, metal spikes, and the legendary six-foot long stainless steel bass drums released the "Metal Fix" demo in 1985. This was followed by the 1986 EP Attack From Above and the 1991 LP Open Fire. Also, Artillery debuted with We Are The Dead in 1985, as did Megadeth, formed by former Metallica axeman Dave Mustaine. Megadeth combined the riffs of thrash metal with the more fancy soloing of speed metal à la Judas Priest, and their sound would become best realised on 1990's Rust in Peace. Rust in Peace 1986 was a landmark year for thrash metal, with some of the greatest thrash albums of all time being released in this year. Dark Angel put out the generally underrated Darkness Descends, which is one of the heaviest and fastest thrash albums ever. Slayer's Reign in Blood is universally acclaimed as a classic, and also the German band Kreator had Pleasure to Kill, which set new standards for brutality and would be a heavy influence on the death metal genre. Megadeth put out the complex, technical Peace Sells... But Who's Buying?, Metallica had Master of Puppets, which had a few staple thrashers and some more complex pieces that moved away from the genre, and Nuclear Assault debuted with the punkish Game Over — an album stripped to its bare riff essentials. Hobbs' Angel Of Death emerged from Australia, playing a brand of thrash metal drawing heavily on early Slayer, yet geared towards the European market. Thrash metal developed in the mid 1980s to split into many subgenres and influence a lot of bands like Death and Possessed. Possessed were among the first death-metal bands, making a demo in mid-1984 of a more dark-sounding thrash metal. This sound would be called death metal, and perhaps the first example of it would be the death-thrash classic 'Seven Churches', from 1985. Some bands combined speed metal and thrash metal, like the aforementioned Megadeth, and also Helstar, Testament, and Heathen were known for their flashy lead guitar work. Watchtower's Energetic Disassembly (1985) set new standards in technical, jazzy songwriting, which would later be further developed by the thrash metal band Coroner and also the technical death metal bands Atheist and Cynic, as well as later efforts by Death. Cynic By 1988 or so the genre was quite saturated with new bands, but classic albums would continue to be put out. Sepultura's third album, Beneath the Remains (1989) earned them mainstream appeal as it appeared on Roadrunner records. Vio-lence, a relative latecomer to the Bay Area thrash metal scene put out an acclaimed debut in Eternal Nightmare (1988), combining relentless riffage with a hardcore punk vocal delivery. However, the genre was also filled with many bands that were not attempting to expand on the style. Rust in Peace (1990) by Megadeth is sometimes thought to be the last good classic thrash metal album, and to this day it is still thought to be Megadeth's finest work.

Evolution in the 1990s

Soon, post-thrash metal bands with a newer sound would continue the more innovative direction, whilst those that played classic thrash metal were seen as throw-backs, though the 1990s had some excellent thrash metal, for example Iced Earth's Night of the Stormrider (1992), which combined power-metal and thrash metal. Many bands, however, opted for a slower, more groove-oriented sound, including Machine Head and Pantera who were strongly influenced by Exhorder. This would give rise to many 1990s-metal bands. Thrash metal has seen something of a comeback in the late 1990s with European bands like Hypnosia (sounding much like Pleasure to Kill) or Carnal Forge, a fast death-thrash hybrid. Some bands also combine Swedish death-metal riffs and punk influence, like The Haunted, but these stray too far from the original ideals to be really called thrash metal bands. Meanwhile, other bands soldier on — including Overkill, who have recently put out a 14th studio album, Relixiv, and Destruction, whose The Antichrist (2001) is a staple of modern thrash metal — updated production values, and a classic riff sound. The recently released Exodus album, entitled Tempo Of The Damned, is another recent highlight of the genre, as is Megadeth's 'comeback' album, The System Has Failed. The latter, while not 'true' thrash, is a complex hybrid of thrash and power metal, reminiscent of Rust In Peace. Indeed, the opening track Blackmail The Universe shares much in common with Rust In Peace's opening track, the seminal Holy Wars. The album's cover art also seems like a cross between 1986's Peace Sells... But Who's Buying? and Rust In Peace. More importantly, the album met with strong commercial success, reaching #17 in the United States. Interestingly, Exodus opened for Megadeth on their 2004 Blackmail The Universe tour.

Key artists

See also List of thrash metal bands. Often considered the four most important bands in this genre (especially in the US, and generally called the "Big Four Of Thrash") are:
- Anthrax
- Megadeth
- Metallica
- Slayer As well as the "Big Four Of Thrash," the three most important bands in Teutonic Thrash, are:
- Destruction
- Kreator
- Sodom Other crucial thrash metal bands include:
- Annihilator
- Artillery
- Celtic Frost
- Coroner
- Dark Angel
- Death Angel
- Exodus
- Nuclear Assault
- Overkill
- Sadus
- Sepultura
- Stormtroopers Of Death
- Testament
- Vio-lence
- Voivod

External links

- [http://www.metal-archives.com/browseG.php?g=thrash List of Thrash metal bands]
- [http://www.darklyrics.com/ Dark Lyrics] Lyrics about Thrash Metal bands and others
- [http://www.thrashlist.com/ The Thrash List] List of many Thrash Metal bands als:Thrash Metal ja:スラッシュメタル

Artillery (band)

Artillery is a Danish thrash metal band that was active during the 1980s and participated in the early development of the genre. Their highly energetic, riff-centric and often fast-paced music is similar in style to that of Slayer and Metallica from the same era.

History

The band formed in 1982 in Taastrup, a suburb to Copenhagen. The members were guitarists Jørgen Sandau and Michael Stützer, bassist Morten Stützer, drummer Carsten Nielsen and singer Carsten Lohmann. The group recorded the demos Shellshock and Deeds of Darkness in 1984. 1984 Carsten Lohmann left in 1985 and was replaced by Flemming Rönzdorf. Later the same year, Artillery recorded a third demo, Fear of Tomorrow, signed with Neat Records, and released their first album, also titled Fear of Tomorrow. Their second album, Terror Squad, was released in 1987. Guitarist Jørgen Sandau left the band in 1989. Bassist Morten Stützer took over his position, lending the bass to recruit Peter Thorslund. Their third album, By Inheritance, was released in 1990 on both LP and CD, by Roadrunner Records. Artillery disbanded in 1991, some of the members pursuing musical projects of their own during the rest of the 1990s. Following the 1998 release of an Artillery compilation CD, Deadly Relics by Mighty Music, featuring a mix of old demo recordings and two songs from a 1989 promotional tape, the band had a reunion to record a fourth album, B.A.C.K, which was released in 1999 by Diehard Music.

Discography

- 1982 – We Are The Dead – demotape
- 1984 – Shellshock – demotape
- 1984 – Deeds Of Darkness – demotape
- 1985 – Fear Of Tomorrow – demotape
- 1985 – Speed Metal Hell – compilation LP/MC (New Renaissance)
- 1985 – Satan's Revenge – LP/MC (New Renaissance)
- 1985 – Fear Of Tomorrow – LP (Neat)
- 1987 – Terror Squad – LP (Neat)
- 1989 – 1989 promo – promo tape
- 1990 – Khomaniac – 12" EP (Roadrunner Records)
- 1990 – By Inheritance – LP/CD (Roadrunner Records)
- 1990 – Fear Of Tomorrorw/Terror Squad – CD (Roadrunner Records)
- 1998 – Fear Of Tomorrow – reissue CD (Axe Killer)
- 1998 – Terror Squad – reissue CD (Axe Killer)
- 1998 – Deadly Relics – CD (Mighty Music)
- 1999 – B.A.C.K – CD (Diehard Music)

External links

- [http://www.mightymusic.dk/audio/ARTILLERY_Khomaniac.mp3 Khomaniac] - free demo MP3 (6.3 MB) of the song Khomaniac from the album Deadly Relics (originally the 1989 promo tape), provided by [http://www.mightymusic.dk Mighty Music]
- [http://www.diehardmusic.com/band_artillery.html Artillery at Diehard Music] Category:Danish musical groups Category:Thrash metal musical groups Category:Danish heavy metal musical groups

War

A common perception of war is a series of military campaigns between at least two opposing sides involving a dispute over sovereignty, territory, resources, religion or a host of other issues. A war to liberate an occupied country is sometimes characterised as a "war of liberation", while a war between internal elements of the same state may constitute a civil war.

History of war

:Main article: History of warfare War seems as old as human society, and certainly features prominently in the recorded histories of state-cultures. But it is a complex issue. Some hunter-gatherer societies engaged in skirmishes over territory and resources, although many did not. The earliest city states and empire in Mesopotamia became the first to employ standing armies. Organization and structure has since been central to warfare, as illustrated by the success of highly disciplined troops of the Roman Empire. As well as organizational change, technology has played a central role in the evolution of warfare. Inventions created for warfare have also played an important role in other fields. The continued advance of technology has led to an increase in the destructiveness and cost of warfare throughout human history. The study of warfare is known as military history.

Morality of war

military history Throughout history war has been the source of serious moral questions. Although many ancient nations and some more modern ones viewed war as noble, over the sweep of history concerns about the morality of war have gradually increased. Today war is almost unanimously seen as undesirable and morally problematic. Many now believe that wars should only be fought as a last resort. Some, known as pacifists, believe that war is inherently immoral and no war should ever be fought. This position was passionately defended by the Indian leader Mohandas K. Gandhi (called "Mahatma" or "Great Soul"). The negative view of war has not always been held as widely as it is today. Many thinkers, such as Heinrich von Treitschke saw war as humanity's highest activity where courage, honour, and ability were more necessary than in any other endeavour. At the outbreak of World War I the writer Thomas Mann wrote, "Is not peace an element of civil corruption and war a purification, a liberation, an enormous hope?" This attitude was embraced by many societies from Sparta in Ancient Greece and the Ancient Romans to the fascist states of the 1930s. The defeat and repudiation of the fascist states and their militarism in the Second World War, combined with the unquestioned horror of nuclear war have contributed to the current negative view of war. Today, some see only Just Wars as legitimate, and it is the goal of organizations such as the United Nations to unite the world against wars of unjust aggression.

Limitations on war

At times throughout history, societies have attempted to limit the cost of war by formalizing it in some way. Limitations on the targeting of civilians, what type of weapons can be used, and when combat is allowed have all fallen under these rules in different conflicts. Total war is the modern term for the targeting of civilians and the mobilization of an entire society. While culture, law, and religion have all been factors in causing wars, they have also acted as restraints at times. In some cultures, for example, conflicts have been highly ritualized to limit actual loss of life. In modern times, increasing international attention has been paid to peacefully resolving conflicts which lead to war. The United Nations is the latest and most comprehensive attempt to, as stated in the preamble of the [http://www.un.org/aboutun/charter U.N. Charter], "save succeeding generations from the scourge of war." A number of treaties regulate warfare, collectively referred to as the laws of war. The most pervasive of those are the Geneva Conventions, the earliest of which began to take effect in the mid 1800s. Treaty signing has since been a part of international diplomacy, and too many treaties to mention in this scant article have been signed. A couple of examples are: Resolutions of the Geneva International Conference, Geneva, 26 October-29 October 1863 and Geneva Convention relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War, 75 U.N.T.S. 135, entered into force 21 October 1950. It must be noted that in war such treaties are generally thrown to one side if they interfere with the vital interests of either side; some have criticised such conventions as simply providing a fig leaf for the inhuman practice of war. By only illegalising "war against the rules", it is alleged, such treaties and conventions, in effect, sanction certain types of war.

Redefining "war" for legal reasons

Sometimes the term "war" is restricted by legal definition to those conflicts where one or both belligerents have formally declared war. This has resulted in wars (in the sense defined in the introduction to this article) without formal declaration and combatants who officially choose terms other than "war," such as:
- "armed conflict";
- "state aggression by armed force";
- "police action";
- "crime against international peace". For example, the United States Government referred to the Korean War as a "police action", and the British Government was very careful to use the term "armed conflict" instead of "war" during the Falklands War in 1982 to comply with the letter of international law. Sometimes the term "war" will not be used in order to circumvent national constitutions which restrict the power of the executive to wage war without the agreement of other branches of government.

Causes of war

There is great debate over why wars happen, even when most people do not want them to. Representatives of many different academic disciplines have attempted to explain war.

Historical theories

Historians tend to be reluctant to look for sweeping explanations for all wars. A. J. P. Taylor famously described wars as being like traffic accidents. There are some conditions and situations that make them more likely but there can be no system for predicting where and when each one will occur. Social scientists criticize this approach arguing that at the beginning of every war some leader makes a conscious decision and that they cannot be seen as purely accidental.

Psychological theories

Psychologists such as E.F.M. Durban and John Bowlby have argued that human beings, especially men, are inherently violent. While this violence is repressed in normal society it needs the occasional outlet provided by war. This combines with other notions, such as displacement where a person transfers their grievances into bias and hatred against other ethnic groups, nations, or ideologies. While these theories can explain why wars occur, they do not explain when or how they occur. In addition, they raise the question why there are sometimes long periods of peace and other eras of unending war. If the innate psychology of the human mind is unchanging, these variations are inconsistent. A solution adopted to this problem by militarists such as Franz Alexander is that peace does not really exist. Periods that are seen as peaceful are actually periods of preparation for a later war or when war is suppressed by a state of great power, such as the Pax Britannica. If war is innate to human nature, as is presupposed by many psychological theories, then there is little hope of ever escaping it. One alternative is to argue that war is only, or almost only, a male activity and if human leadership was in female hands wars would not occur. This theory has played an important role in modern feminism. Critics, of course, point to various examples of female political leaders who had no qualms about using military force, such as Margaret Thatcher or Indira Gandhi. Other psychologists have argued that while human temperament allows wars to occur, they only do so when mentally unbalanced men are in control of a nation. This extreme school of thought argues leaders that seek war such as Napoleon, Hitler, and Stalin were mentally abnormal. A distinct branch of the psychological theories of war are the arguments based on evolutionary psychology. This school tends to see war as an extension of animal behaviour, such as territoriality and competition. However, while war has a natural cause, the development of technology has accelerated human destructiveness to a level that is irrational and damaging to the species. We have the same instincts of a chimpanzee but overwhelmingly more power. The earliest advocate of this theory was Konrad Lorenz. These theories have been criticized by scholars such as John G. Kennedy, who argue that the organized, sustained war of humans differs more than just technologically from the territorial fights between animals. In his fictional book Nineteen-Eighty-Four, George Orwell talks about war being used as one of many ways to distract people. War inspires fear and hate among the people of a nation, and gives them a 'legitimate' enemy upon whom they can focus this fear and hate. Thus the people are prevented from seeing that their true enemy is in fact their own repressive government. By this theory, war is another 'opiate of the masses' by which a totalitarian state controls its people and prevents revolution.

Anthropological theories

Several anthropologists take a very different view of war. They see it as fundamentally cultural, learned by nurture rather than nature. Thus if human societies could be reformed, war would disappear. To this school the acceptance of war is inculcated into each of us by the religious, ideological, and nationalistic surroundings in which we live. Many anthropologists also see no links between various forms of violence. They see the fighting of animals, the skirmishes of hunter-gatherer tribes, and the organized warfare of modern societies as distinct phenomena each with their own causes. Theorists such as Ashley Montagu emphasize the top down nature of war, that almost all wars are begun not by popular pressure but by the whims of leaders and that these leaders also work to maintain a system of ideological justifications for war.

Sociological theories

Sociology has long been very concerned with the origins of war, and many thousands of theories have been advanced, many of them contradictory. Some use detailed formulas taking into account hundreds of demographic and economic values to predict when and where wars will break out. The statistical analysis of war was pioneered by Lewis Fry Richardson following World War I. More recent databases of wars and armed conflict have been assembled by the Correlates of War Project, Peter Brecke and the Uppsala Department of Peace and Conflict Research. So far none of these formulas have successfully predicted the outbreak of future conflicts. A detailed study by Michael Haas found that no single variable has a strong correlation to the occurrence of wars. One correlation that has found much support is that states that are democracies do not go to war with each other, an idea known as the democratic peace theory. Many sociologists have attempted to divide wars into types to get better correlations, but this has also produced mixed results. Data looked at by R.J. Rummel has found that civil wars and foreign wars are very different in origin, but Jonathan Wilkenfield using different data found just the opposite. Sociology has thus divided into a number of schools. One based on the works of Eckart Kehr and Hans-Ulrich Wehler sees war as the product of domestic conditions, with only the target of aggression being determined by international realities. Thus World War I was not a product of international disputes, secret treaties, or the balance of power but a product of the economic, social, and political situation within each of the states involved. This differs from the traditional approach of Carl von Clausewitz and Leopold von Ranke that argue it is the decisions of statesmen and the geopolitical situation that leads to war.

Information theories

A popular new approach is to look at the role of information in the outbreak of wars. This theory, advanced by scholars of international relations such as Geoffrey Blainey, argues that all wars are based on a lack of information. If both sides at the outset knew the result neither would fight, the loser would merely surrender and avoid the cost in lives and infrastructure that a war would cause. This is based on the notion that wars are reciprocal, that all wars require both a decision to attack and also a decision to resist attack. This notion is generally agreed to by almost all scholars of war since Clausewitz. This notion is made harder to accept because it is far more common to study the cause of wars rather than events that failed to cause wars, and wars are far more memorable. However, throughout history there are as many invasions and annexations that did not lead to a war, such as the U.S.-led invasion of Haiti in 1994, the Nazi invasions of Austria and Czechoslovakia preceding the Second World War, and the annexation of the Baltic states by the Soviet Union in 1940. On the other hand, Finland's decision to resist a similar Soviet aggression in 1939 led to the Winter War. The leaders of these nations chose not to resist as they saw the potential benefits being not worth the loss of life and destruction such resistance would cause. Lack of information may not only be to who wins in the immediate future. The Norwegian decision to resist the Nazi invasion was taken with the certain knowledge that Norway would fall. The Norwegians did not know whether the German domination would be permanent and also felt that noble resistance would win them favour with the Allies and a position at the peace settlement in the event of an Allied victory. If in 1940 it had been known with certainty the Germans would dominate central Europe for many decades, it is unlikely the Norwegians would have resisted. If it had been known for certainty that the Third Reich would collapse after only a few years of war, the Nazis would not have launched the invasion at all. This theory is predicated on the notion that the outcome of wars is not randomly determined, but fully determined on factors such as doctrine, economies, and power. While purely random events, such as storms or the right person dying at the right time, might have had some effect on history, these only influence a single battle or slightly alter the outcome of a war, but would not mean the difference between victory and defeat. There are two main objectives in the gathering of intelligence. The first is to find out the ability of an enemy, the second their intent. In theory to have enough information to prevent all wars both need to be fully known. The Argentinean dictatorship knew that the United Kingdom had the ability to defeat them, but their intelligence failed them on the question of whether the British would use their power to resist the annexation of the Falklands. The American decision to enter the Vietnam War was made with the full knowledge that the communist forces would resist them, but did not believe that the guerrillas had the capability to long oppose American forces. One major difficulty is that in a conflict of interests, some deception or at least not telling everything, is a standard tactical component on both sides. If you think that you can convince the opponent that you will fight, the opponent might desist. For example, Sweden made efforts to deceive Nazi Germany that it would resist an attack fiercely partly by playing on the myth of Aryan superiority, and by making sure that Hermann Göring only saw Elite troops in action, often dressed up as regular soldiers, when he came to visit.

Economic theories

Another school of thought argues that war can be seen as an outgrowth of economic competition in a chaotic and competitive international system. That wars begin as a pursuit of new markets, of natural resources, and of wealth. Unquestionably a cause of some wars, from the empire building of Britain to the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union in pursuit of oil this theory has been applied to many other conflicts including the Iraq invasion of the United States. It is most often advocated by those to the left of the political spectrum who argue that such wars serve only the interests of the wealthy but are fought by the poor.

Marxist theories

The economic theories also form a part of the Marxist theory of war, which argues that all war grows out of the class war. It sees wars as imperial ventures to enhance the power of the ruling class and divide the proletariat of the world by pitting them against each other for contrived ideals such as nationalism or religion. Wars are a natural outgrowth of the free market and class system, and will not disappear until a world revolution occurs.

Types of war and warfare

Smaller armed conflicts are often called riots, rebellions, coups, etc. When one country sends armed forces to another, allegedly to restore order or prevent genocide or other crimes against humanity, or to support a legally recognized government against insurgency, that country sometimes refers to it as a police action. This usage is not always recognized as valid, however, particularly by those who do not accept the connotations of the term. "Conventional warfare" descibes either:
- A war between nation-states
- War where nuclear or biological weapons are not used. (Compare with unconventional warfare and nuclear warfare.) A war where the forces in conflict belong to the same country or empire or other political entity is known as a civil war. Asymmetrical warfare is a conflict between two populations of drastically different levels of military mechanization. This type of war often results in guerrilla tactics. The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is a common example of asymmetrical warfare.

Geographic warfare

The terrain over which a war is fought has a big impact on the type of combat which takes place. This in turn means that soldiers have to be trained to fight in a specific type of terrain. These include:
- Arctic warfare
- Ski warfare
- Desert warfare
- Jungle warfare
- Naval warfare or Aquatic warfare
- Sub-aquatic warfare
- Mountain warfare (sometimes called alpine warfare)
- Urban warfare
- Air warfare
- Space warfare

References

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External links

- [http://www.warcrimes.info/ Documents and Resources on War, War Crimes and Genocide]
- [http://www.umich.edu/~cowproj/ Correlates of War Project]
- [http://cow2.la.psu.edu/ Correlates of War 2]
- [http://www.inta.gatech.edu/peter/PSS99_paper.html Article by Peter Brecke]
- [http://www.d-n-i.net/fcs/4th_gen_war_gazette.htm The Changing Face of War: Into the Fourth Generation]
- [http://www.pcr.uu.se/ Uppsala Department of Peace and Conflict Research]
- [http://www.unesco.org/shs/human_rights/hrfv.htm 1986 Seville Statement on Violence]
- [http://www.culture-of-peace.info/ssov/title-page.html The Seville Statement on Violence: A Progress Report]
- [http://www.culture-of-peace.info/myth/title-page.html The Myth That War Is Intrinsic to Human Nature Discourages Action for Peace by Young People]
- [http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat1.htm Rough estimates of the number of deaths in various wars and conflicts]
- [http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/war/ Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy entry] War Violence ms:Peperangan ja:戦争 simple:War

Weapon

:The following article refers to the instrument of fighting or hunting. For other uses, see Weapon (disambiguation). See military technology and equipment for a comprehensive list of weapons and doctrines. military technology and equipment and spearpoint.]] A weapon is a tool which can be used during combat to kill or incapacitate, to destroy property, or to otherwise render resources non-functional or unavailable. It may be used to attack and defend, and consequently also to threaten. The use of weapons has been recorded since the advent of cave painting, and the process has been formulated resulting in both martial arts and strategic doctrines. Metaphorically, anything used to damage (even psychologically) can be referred to as a weapon. A weapon can be as simple as a club or as complex as an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

History

The weapon is any tool or object that is used to increase the range and power of a human hand. From the earliest traces of mankind up to our modern civilization, weapons have been a facet of human development. Weapons development has accelerated along with other areas of technology in more modern times. In ancient times, from the dawn of humanity through the Classical civilizations of Greece and Rome, weapons were primarily extensions of an individual's strength, essentially making up for the human body's lack of natural weapons such as claws. These weapons allowed the bearer to be substantially more lethal than a similar human without such a weapon. The Medieval period, including the Middle Ages, marked a period of distinct advancement in weaponry. Due to some of the unique influences of the period, weapons revolved around two major areas. First was that of knights. These horsemen required new weapons, as well as promoting development of weapons to defeat them. Second was that of castles. The building of castles on a large scale necessitated new weapons to help defend and attack them. The Renaissance marked the beginning of the implementation of combustion based devices in warfare. The most long-lasting effect of this was the introduction of cannon and firearms to the battlefield, where they are still at the core of modern weaponry. However, many other machines of war were experimented with. From the American Revolution through the beginning of the 20th Century, human-powered weapons were finally excluded from the battlefield for the most part. Sometimes referred to as the Age of Rifles, this period was characterized by the development of firearms for infantry and cannons for support, as well as the beginnings of mechanized weapons such as the machine gun. World War I marked the entry of fully industrialized warfare, and weapons as well were developed quickly to meet wartime needs. Many new technologies were developed, particularly in the development of military aircraft and vehicles. World War II however, perhaps marked the most frantic period of weapons development in the history of humanity. Massive numbers of new designs and concepts were fielded, and all existing technologies were improved between 1939 and 1945. Ultimately, the most powerful of all invented weapons was the nuclear bomb. After World War II, with the onset of the Cold War, the constant technological development of new weapons was institutionalized, as participants engaged in a constant race to develop weapons and counter-weapons. This constant state of weapons development continues into the modern era, and remains a constant draw on the resources of most nations.

Ancient Weapons

The basic tasks a weapon must perform have not changed since ancient times. All weapons do one or more of the following: #Concentrate pressure: the sharp end of a broken stone or pointed stick will apply more pressure, and do more harm, than the blunt end. A material's hardness determines its ability to apply or resist pressure. #Store energy: an object accumulates kinetic energy as a person accelerates it, and releases this energy in a much shorter time frame upon impact, thus magnifying a person's power. #Project force: a thrown rock or long stick allow a person to affect an adversary from a distance. As shown by the preceding examples, even simple items such as rocks and sticks can often serve these functions better than the human body. The usefulness of such tools made their development of paramount importance for a humanity consisting of small, thinly spread, hunter-gatherer communities. The first known traces of weapons are from the stone age with flint knives, handaxes and heads for large darts. There is no evidence for handaxes being thrown, but very good evidence for them having been used to butcher animals. Instead, darts seem to have been a powerful projectile weapon: anthropologists have thrown reconstructed darts through several inches of oak using atlatls. The broad, leaf-shaped heads penetrate deeply, and easily cut arteries. arteries Some weapons are probably much older than the dart, although little early evidence for them exists. These include the sling and the spear. Even though these weapons are quite simple, they were a major military weapon at least until Roman times; a unit of fast-moving skirmishers could be equipped with them at very little cost. Lack of early evidence is understandable, as slings are prone to decay, and it would be difficult to prove that a particular stone has been used as ammunition. Similarly, there is less incentive to put a stone point onto a spear than a dart. A weighted spear point is a liability rather than an asset, and the greater momentum imparted by stabbing makes sharpness less critical than toughness, so that points of bone, antler, or even fire-hardened wood can make more effective spear points. Once metal became available, its toughness made spears and pikes the core of most infantry forces. Some of the earliest evidence for arrows are from ca. 20,000 BC in the Levant (the so-called 'Geometric Kebaran' period), made with several very small sharp pieces of stone embedded in an arrowshaft. Here again, far earlier examples may have been subject to decay: for instance, some cultures make weighted arrow points by cutting a hollow reed diagonally and filling the end segment with clay. Archery and swords have been crucial for warfare. Archery, because of the large amount of energy that can be easily stored and released using a bow, and short swords because of their lethality in close combat. Far greater energy can be stored in a composite bow than a wooden bow of the same weight due to clever mechanical design and choice of materials, but militarily such weapons were mostly limited to use in dry climates. Traditional designs are held together by animal glue (chemically similar to gelatin); moisture would weaken the glue and damage bows of this design. The long bow makes up for less exotic materials with its larger size. In another tradeoff, short swords can be optimized for either stabbing or chopping; the former focuses on pressure, the latter on energy. The gladius hispaniensis could slip through openings in armor, and Roman doctrine held that a stab wound as shallow as one inch could be lethal. The hatchet-like Greek kopis, by contrast, seems built to dismember, but its point-heavy balance might make it clumsy against comprehensive armor. The most effective defense to traditional weapons was a fortress. The doctrines to support fortresses in the age of edged weapons may have greatly influenced medieval and noble history. Medieval siege weapons were used in countervailing doctrines, but the stave-sling and even the bow often had superior range, making them unsafe to use.

Combustion-powered weapons

Firearms are qualitatively different from earlier weapons because they store energy in a combustible propellant such as gunpowder, rather than in a weight or spring. This energy is released quite rapidly, and can be restored without much effort by the user, so that even early firearms were much more powerful than human-powered weapons. They became increasingly important and effective during the 16th century to 19th century, with progressive improvements in ignition mechanisms followed by revolutionary changes in ammunition handling and propellant. During the U.S. Civil War various technologies including the machine gun and ironclad warship emerged that would be recognizable and useful military weapons today, particularly in lower-technology conflicts. In the 19th century warship propulsion changed from sail power to fossil fuel-powered steam engines. steam engineThe age of edged weapons ended abruptly just before World War I with rifled artillery, such as howitzers which are able to destroy any masonry fortress. This single invention caused a revolution in military affairs and doctrines that continues to this day. See Technology during World War I for a detailed discussion. An important feature of industrial age warfare was technological escalation - an innovation could, and would, be rapidly matched by copying it, and often with yet another innovation to counter it. The technological escalation during World War I was profound, producing armed aircraft and tanks. This continued in the period between the end of that war and the next, with continuous improvements of all weapons by all major powers. Many modern military weapons, particularly ground-based ones, are relatively minor improvements on those of World War II. See military technology during World War II for a detailed discussion.

Nuclear Weapons

The most notable, development in weaponry since World War II has been the combination and further development of two weapons first used in it—nuclear weapons and the ballistic missile, leading to its ultimate configuration: the ICBM. The mutual possession of these by the United States and the Soviet Union ensured that either nation could inflict terrible damage on the other; so terrible, in fact, that neither nation was willing to instigate direct, all-out war with the other. The indiscriminate nature of the destruction has made nuclear-tipped missiles essentially useless for the smaller wars fought since. However computer-guided weaponry of all kinds, from smart bombs to computer-aimed tank rounds, has greatly increased weaponry's accuracy.

Information Warfare

In modern warfare, since all redoubts are traps, maneuver and coordination of forces is decisive, overshadowing particular weapons. The goal of every modern commander is therefore to "operate within the observation-decision-action cycle of the enemy." In this way, the modern commander can bring overwhelming force to bear on isolated groups of the enemy, and "tactically" overwhelm an enemy. Traditional military maneuvers tried to achieve this coordination with "fronts" made of lines of military assets. These were formerly the only way to prevent harm to friendly forces. Close-order marching and drill (a traditional military skill) was an early method to get relative superiority of coordination. Derivative methods (such as "leapfrogging units to advance a line") survived into combined arms warfare to coordinate aircraft, artillery, armor and infantry. Computers are changing this. The most extreme example so far (2003) is the use of "swarm" tactics by the U.S. military in Iraq. The U.S. had instantaneous, reliably encrypted communications, perfect navigation using GPS and computer-mediated communications to aim precision weapons. In swarm tactics, small units pass through possible enemy territory. When attacked they attempt to survive by calling down immediate overwhelming showers of precision-guided air-dropped munitions for armor, and cluster bombs for enemy troops. To consolidate such a region, nearby artillery begin bombardment, and ground units rush in on safe vectors through the bombardments, avoiding them by computer-mediated navigation aids. Thus in modern warfare, satellite navigation systems, digital radios and computers give decisive advantages to ordinary military personnel armed with weapons that are otherwise unremarkable.

Types of weapons

There are essentially three facets to classifying weapon types: who uses it, how it works, and what it targets. Who uses it essentially determines how it can be employed:
- Personal weapons are designed to be used by an individual person.
- Crew served weapons are larger than personal weapons, requiring more than one crew member to operate correctly.
- Fortification weapons are designed to be mounted in a permanent installation, or used primarily within a fortification.
- Mountain weapons are designed for use by mountain forces or those operating in difficult terrain and harsh climates.
- Vehicle weapons are designed to be mounted on any type of military vehicle.
- Railway weapons are designed to be mounted on railway cars, including armored trains.
- Aircraft weapons are designed to be carried on and used by some type of aircraft, helicopter, or other aerial vehicle.
- Naval weapons are designed to be mounted on ships and submarines.
- Space weapons are designed to be used in or launched from space. How it works refers to the construction of the weapon and how it operates:
- Archery related weapons operate by using a tensioned string to launch a projectile at some target.
- Artillery are large firearms capable of launching heavy projectiles (normally explosive) over long distances.
- Biological weapons spread biological agents, attacking humans (or livestock) by causing disease and infection.
- Chemical weapons spread chemical agents, attacking humans by poisoning and causing reactions.
- Energy weapons rely on concentrating forms of energy to attack, such as lasers, electrical shocks, and thermal or sonic attack.
- Explosive weapons use a physical explosion to create blast concussion or spread shrapnel.
- Firearms use a chemical charge to launch one or more projectiles down a rifled or smoothbore barrel.
- Incendiary weapons rely on combustible materials and an ignition mechanism to cause damage by fire.
- Non-lethal weapons are used to attack and subdue humans, but are designed to minimize the risk of killing the target.
- Magnetic weapon is one that uses magnetic fields to accelerate and propel projectiles, or to focus charged particle beams.
- Mêlée weapons operate as physical extensions of the user's body and directly impact their target.
- Missiles are rockets which are guided to their target after launch. This is also a general term for projectile weapons.
- Nuclear weapons use radioactive materials to create nuclear-fission explosions above a target ("air-burst") or at ground-level.
- Primitive weapons make no use of technological or industrial elements, instead being purely constructed of easily obtainable natural materials.
- Ranged weapons cause a projectile to leave the user and (ideally) strike a target afterwards.
- Rockets use chemical propellent to accelerate a projectile (usually with an explosive warhead) towards a target and are typically unguided once fired.
- Suicide weapons are typically explosive in nature and exploit the willingness of their operator to not survive the attack to reach their target. What it targets refers to what type of target the weapon is designed to attack:
- Anti-aircraft weapons target enemy aircraft, helicopters, missiles and any other aerial vehicles in flight.
- Anti-fortification weapons are designed to target enemy installations, including bunkers and fortifications.
- Anti-personnel weapons are designed to attack people, either individually or in numbers.
- Anti-radiation weapons target enemy sources of electronic radiation, particularly radar emitters.
- Anti-ship weapons target enemy ships and vessels on water.
- Anti-submarine weapons target enemy submarines and other underwater targets.
- Anti-tank weapons are primarily used to defeat armored targets, but may be targeted against other less well armored targets.
- Area denial weapons are designed to target territory, making it unsafe or unsuitable for enemy use or travel.
- Hunting weapons are designed particularly for use against animals for hunting purposes.
- Infantry support weapons are designed to attack various threats to infantry units, supporting the infantry's operations.

Weapons by era

- Ancient
- Medieval
- Military technology during the Napoleonic wars
- Technology during World War I
- Military technology during World War II
- Military technology of the late 20th century
- Modern weapons
- All eras

External links

- [http://www.higgins.org Higgins Armory Museum]
- [http://world.guns.ru Modern Firearms Encyclopedia] Category:Military equipment Category:Security
- ko:무기 ms:Senjata ja:武器 simple:Weapon th:อาวุธ

Modern era

: Modern world

Shell (projectile)

A shell is a projectile, which, as opposed to a bullet, is not solid but contains an explosive or other filling, though modern usage includes large projectiles without a filling. These objects of weaponry are generally large rounds fired by artillery, armored fighting vehicles (including tanks), and warships, such as battleships. Most shells are aerodynamic and hence, tend to have similar shapes to bullets—that is, a cylinder topped by an ogive shaped nose, possibly with a tapering base—but some specialised types are quite different.

History

For the most part explosive shells do not appear to have been in general use before the middle of the 16th century. About that time hollow balls of stone or cast iron were fired from mortars. The balls were nearly filled with gunpowder and the remaining space with a slow-burning composition. This method was fairly ineffective as the charge was not always ignited by the flash from the discharge of the gun, and moreover the amount of composition to burn a stipulated time could not easily be gauged. The shell was, therefore, fitted with a hollow forged iron or copper plug, filled with slow-burning powder. It was impossible to ignite with certainty this primitive fuze simply by firing the gun; the fuze was consequently first ignited and the gun fired immediately afterwards. This entailed the use of a mortar or a very short piece, so that the fuze could be easily reached from the muzzle without unduly endangering the gunner, in turn implying low muzzle velocities and vertical, elliptical trajectories. In 1823, the first shell guns were invented by the French General Henri-Joseph Paixhans. Paixhans guns were the first guns to combine explosive shells and the flat trajectory of cannons. The guns were adopted by various Navies from the 1840s, thereby triggering the demise of wooden ships, and the iron hull revolution in boat building. Cast-iron spherical common shell were in use up to 1871. For guns they were latterly fitted with a wooden disc called a sabot, attached by a copper rivet, intended to keep the fuze central when loading. They were also supposed to reduce the rebounding tendency of the shell as it travelled along the bore on discharge. Mortar shell were not fitted with sabots. Cast iron held its own as the most convenient material for projectiles up to the end of the 19th century, steel supplanting it, first for projectiles intended for piercing armour, and afterwards for common shell for high-velocity guns where the shock of discharge has been found too severe for cast iron. During the First World War, shrapnel shells inflicted terrible casualties on infantry - accounting for nearly 70% of all the casualties of the war. Shells filled with poison gas were used from 1917 onwards. Frequent problems with shells led to many military disasters when shells failed to explode, most notably during the 1916 Battle of the Somme.

Calibre

The calibre of a shell is its diameter. Depending on the historical period and national preferences, this may be specified in millimetres, centimetres, or inches. Care should be taken as the length of gun barrels is frequently quoted in terms of calibre. Due to problems of manufacture, the lower size limit for shells is a calibre around 20 mm, used in aircraft cannon and on armoured vehicles. Smaller explosive projectiles exist, but they are rare. The largest shells ever fired were those from the German super-railway guns, Gustav and Dora, which were 800 mm (31.5") in calibre. Very large shells have been replaced by rockets, guided missile, and bombs, and today the largest shells in use are 203 mm (8 inches). Guns of that size are uncommon; 155 mm (6 inches) is the largest calibre in common use. Gun calibres are standardized around a few common sizes, especially in the larger range, mainly due to the uniformity required for efficient military logistics. Shells of 105, 120, and 155 mm diameter are common for NATO forces' artillery and tank guns. Artillery shells of 122 and 152 mm, and tank gun ammunition of 100, 115, or 125 mm calibre remain in use in Eastern Europe and China. Most common calibres have been in use for many years, since it is no small feat to change over ammunition stockpiles. The weight of shells varies greatly. A 150 mm (6") shell weighs about 50 kg, a 203 mm (8") shell weighs either 100 kg or 146 kg (concrete demolition variant). Of the largest calibres, used exclusively on battleships, a 280 mm (11") shell weighs about 300 kg, and a 460 mm (18") shell weighs over one and a half tonnes. The two types of projectiles used with the Nazis' Dora mega-gun measured 5 and 8 tonnes, respectively.

Old-style British classification by weight

Historically, shells were often described in pounds in the UK, e.g., as "two-pounder ammunition", or "2-pdr". Usually this refers to the actual weight of a high explosive (HE) shell, but confusingly, this was not always the case. Some were named after the weights of obsolete shell types of the same calibre, or even obsolete shell types that were considered to have been functionally equivalent. Also, shells fired from the same gun, but of different weight, were took their name from the gun. Thus, conversion from "pounds" to actual barrel diameter requires consulting a historical reference.

Types

There are many different types of shells. The principal ones include:

High explosive (HE)

The most common shell type is high explosive, commonly referred to simply as HE. HE shells have a strong steel case, a bursting charge, and a fuze. When the fuze initiates the shell, the bursting charge shatters the case and scatters hot, sharp fragments of steel at high speed. Most of the damage is caused by being struck by these fragments, rather than directly by the blast. Depending on the type of fuze used the HE shell can be set to burst on the ground, in the air above the ground, or after penetrating a short distance into the ground (either to transmit more ground shock to covered positions, or to reduce the spread of fragments).

Armour-piercing (AP)

In naval warfare and older anti-tank shells, the shell had to withstand the shock of punching through armour plate. Shells designed for this purpose had a greatly strengthened case with a specially hardened and shaped nose, and a much smaller bursting charge or even no bursting charge for smaller calibres. A further refinement of the design improved penetration by adding a softer metal cap to the penetrating nose giving APC (Armour piercing - capped). The softer cap took away some of the initial shock that would otherwise shatter the round. However the best profile for the cap was not the best for flight. To restore aerodynamics a further hollow cap was added to give APCBC (APC + Ballistic Cap). Explosive AP shells were sometimes distinguished by appending the suffix "-HE" or "/HE". Solid shot AP projectiles were so uncommon, that for unnecessary repetition the suffix "-HE" is usually not used; all projectiles can be assumed to have even small explosive charge. Plain AP shell is now very rarely seen except in naval usage, and is uncommon even there. See also: Armor-piercing shot and shell

Armour-piercing, discarding sabot (APDS)

APDS was developed by the United Kingdom and put into British service in March 1944 with their 6 pdr and 17 pdr anti-tank guns. For increased penetrating power a high velocity round was required, this in turn required a stronger material (such as tungsten) to withstand the greater shock of impact. Such a shot was too heavy at full bore to be accelerated to a sufficient muzzle velocity, so a lightweight outer carrier, the Sabot, (French shoe) which filled the barrel was fitted around the smaller-diameter shot. This gives the projectile a higher acceleration in the gun's barrel, due to the larger surface area for the gases to impinge upon relative to its weight. Once outside the barrel, the sabot is stripped off by a combination of centripetal force and aerodynamic force, giving the shot low drag in flight. For a given caliber, this type of ammunition can effectively double the anti-tank performance of a gun over those using "simple" shot. A kinetic energy penetrator that is a cross between APDS and APFS (armour-piercing, fin-stabilized) is APFSDS (armour-piercing, fin stabilized, discarding sabot). In this the projectile is made long and thin to increase its sectional density and thus penetration. However once a projectile is more than about ten times longer than it is wide, spin stabilisation becomes ineffective, so the projectile is instead stabilised by fins attached at its base, and is fired from an unrifled barrel. An APFSDS projectile looks like a big metal arrow. APFSDS projectiles are often made from tungsten alloys, but depleted uranium offers greater penetration. APDS, APFS, and APFSDS rounds are solid "shot" and contain no explosive charge and are not therefore "shells".

Armour-Piercing, Composite Rigid (APCR, APCRBC)

Developed around the same time as APDS. A solid high-density metal core (eg tungsten surrounded by a full bore shell of lighter material. This gave a full size bore for the purposes of giving the shot velocity in the barrel but at the point of impact the weight (and hence kinetic energy) was concentrated in the narrow core which struck the vehicle armour - the outer core generally left outside the armour. A futher enhancement was to add a ballistic cap to the front of the shell over the core, to give the round a better ballistic shape and thereby lower drag and increase terminal velocity. This was referred to as APCRBC, for APCR Armour-piercing, Composite Rigid, Ballistic Cap The same shell structure was used for "squeeze-bore" gun rounds. The softer outer core was compressed in the tapered section of the gun barrel resulting in a thinner projectile with better aerodynamic properties. See also Littlejohn adaptor.

High explosive, anti-tank (HEAT)

HEAT shells are a type of shaped charge used to defeat armoured vehicles. They are extremely efficient at defeating plain steel armour but are becoming less useful with the growing prevalence of composite and reactive armour. The power of the shell is independant of the velocity of the shell and is as effective at 1000 metres as at 100 metres. A HEAT charge is most effective when detonated at a certain, optimal, distance in front of the target and HEAT shells are usually distinguished by a long, thin nose probe sticking out in front of the rest of the shell, e.g., PIAT bomb.

High explosive, squash head (HESH) or high explosive, plastic (HEP)

HESH is another anti-tank shell based on the use of explosive. Developed by the British inventor Sir Charles Dennistoun Burney in WW2 for use against fortifications. A thin case contains a charge of a plastic explosive. On impact the explosive flattens against the face of the armour. The fuze then detonates. Energy is transferred through the armour plate. When the compressive shock reflects off the air/metal interface on the inner face of the armour, it is transformed into a tension wave which spalls a "scab" of metal off into the tank damaging the equipment and crew without actually penetrating the armour. HESH is completely defeated by spaced armour (provided that the plates are individually able to withstand the explosion), but remains popular because not all vehicles are equipped with spaced armour, and it is also the most efficient weapon for demolishing brick and concrete.

Cluster shells

Like cluster bombs, an artillery shell may be used to scatter smaller submunitions, including anti-personnel grenades, anti-tank top-attack munitions, and landmines. These are generally far more lethal against both armor and infantry than simple high explosive shells, since the multiple munitions create a larger kill zone and increase the chance of achieving the direct hit necessary to kill armor. Most modern armies make significant use of cluster munitions in their artillery batteries. Artillery-scattered mines allow for the quick deployment of minefields into the path of the enemy without placing engineering units at risk, though artillery delivery may lead to an irregular and unpredictable minefield with more duds than if mines were individually emplaced. Signatories of the Ottawa Treaty have renounced the use of artillery-scattered mines.

Chemical

Chemical shells contain just a small explosive charge to burst the shell, and a larger quantity of a chemical weapon such as a poison gas. Signatories of the Chemical Weapons Convention have renounced such shells.

Non-lethal shells

Not all shells are designed to kill or destroy. The following three types are designed to achieve particular non-lethal effects on the battlefield. They are not completely harmless, however; smoke and illumination shells can accidentally start fires, while all three types can cause minor damage (or potentially kill) if property or a person is unlucky enough to be struck by the discarded carrier.

Smoke

The smoke shell is designed to create a smokescreen. The main types are bursting (usually filled with white phosphorus, WP) and base ejection (a shell which scatters smoke grenades).

Illumination

Another non-lethal shell type is illumination. An illumination shell has a fuze which ejects the "candle" (a pyrotechnic flare emitting white, coloured, or infrared light) at a calculated altitude, where it slowly drifts down beneath a heat resistant parachute. These are also known as starshell.

Carrier

The carrier shell is simply a hollow carrier equipped with a fuze which ejects the contents at a calculated time. They are often filled with propaganda leaflets (see external links), but can be filled with anything that meets the weight restrictions and is able to withstand the shock of firing. Famously, on Christmas Day 1899 during the siege of Ladysmith, the Boers fired into Ladysmith a carrier shell without fuze, which contained a Christmas pudding, two Union Jacks and the message "compliments of the season". The shell is still kept in the museum at Ladysmith.

Fireworks

Aerial firework bursts are created by shells. In the United States, consumer firework shells may not exceed 1.75 inches in diameter.

Unexploded shells

The fuze of a shell has to keep the shell safe from accidental detonation during storage, (possibly rough) handling, and violent launch through the barrel, then reliably detonate it at the correct time. To do this it has a number of safety mechanisms which are successively withdrawn under the influence of the sequence of firing. Sometimes, one of these safety mechanisms is not disabled during the shell's flight, and the shell fails to detonate on impact. Such a shell is called a blind or unexploded ordnance (UXO). The older term, "dud", is discouraged because it implies that the shell cannot detonate. Blind shells often litter old battlefields (sometimes burrowed a short distance into the earth), and remain extremely hazardous. For example, antitank ammunition with a piezoelectric fuze can be detonated by a shadow passing across it on a hot day, and most types can potentially be detonated by even a small movement. The battlefields of the First World War still claim casualties today from leftover munitions. If a blind shell is discovered, it should be avoided, other people warned of its presence, and it should be reported to the local police or armed forces for safe destruction. Category:Artillery Category:Projectiles

External links

- [http://members.home.nl/ww2propaganda/spread5.htm WW2 propaganda leaflets]: A website about airdropped, shelled or rocket fired propaganda leaflets. Example artillery shells for spreading propaganda.

Howitzer

A howitzer or hauwitzer is a type of field artillery. The name comes from the Czech houfnice, denoting a 15th century cannon used by Hussites. Howitzers are distinguished from other types of