November 3, 2016

Films in Focus: My Honor was Loyalty, 28 Men

Co-opting the slogan of the Waffen SS, My Honor was Loyalty (German: Meine Ehre heisst Treue) is a new independent film directed by Alessandro Pepe that follows the paths of three soldiers who enlisted in the 1.SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler. Spoken in German with English subtitles, the film attempts to portray what it was like to serve in one of the most feared yet despised units in the German Army during the latter stages of the War, as seen through the eyes of the Deutsches soldaten.

Meanwhile, if you like your war films with subtitles, then you won’t want to miss the Russian-made film, 28 Men. If you believe the tale, The Panfilov Division’s Twenty-Eight Guardsmen (Russian: Двадцать восемь гвардейцев дивизии Панфилова), commonly referred to simply as Panfilov’s Men (Russian: Панфиловцы, Panfilovtsy), were a group of soldiers from the Red Army’s 316th Rifle Division who took part in the defense of Moscow during World War II. According to official Soviet history, they were all killed in action on November 16th, 1941, after destroying 18 German tanks. The Twenty-Eight were collectively endowed with the title Hero of the Soviet Union. An investigation by Soviet authorities in 1948, since declassified, revealed that the description of the events was exaggerated. Six of the soldiers were still alive, including one who was arrested in 1947 on charges of high treason and confessed to having “voluntarily” surrendered to German troops and later joined a German police force. The findings were kept secret, and the Twenty-Eight Guardsmen were considered national heroes until the collapse of the USSR.

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Product Spotlight: Going Down with his Flagship

“Searches by my carrier planes revealed the presence of the Northern carrier force on the afternoon of 24 October, which completed the picture of all enemy naval forces. As it seemed childish to me to guard statically San Bernardino Strait, I concentrated TF 38 during the night and steamed north to attack the Northern Force at dawn. I believed that the Center Force had been so heavily damaged in the Sibuyan Sea that it could no longer be considered a serious menace to Seventh Fleet.”

– Admiral William “Bull” Halsey in his dispatch after the battle of Leyte Gulf to CINCPAC, October 24th, 1944

One of the Eaglemoss warships that we just received and has been selling unexpectedly well is the IJN battleship, Yamashiro (EMGC54), the flagship of Admiral Shoji Nishimura at the Battle of Surigao Strait in October 1944.

Near the end of the war in the Pacific, Nishimura was named the commander of the “Southern Force” in “Operation Sho-Go”, which was aimed at a final and decisive naval battle against the United States Navy in the Philippines. Nishimura′s Force “C” consisted of battleships Fuso and Yamashiro, heavy crusier Mogami, and destroyers Shigure, Michishio, Asagumo, and Yamagumo.

Launched in 1915, Yamashiro was an aging warship, although she was modernized between 1930 and 1935, with improvements to her armor and machinery and a rebuilt superstructure in the pagoda mast style. Nevertheless, with only 14-inch guns, she was outclassed by other Japanese battleships at the beginning of World War II, and played auxiliary roles for most of the war.

By 1944, with the prospects of defeat for the Imperial Japanese Empire looming, Yamashiro was forced into front line duty despite its shortcomings. In the Surigao Strait between Leyte and Dinagat Islands on the evening of October 24th, 1944, Nishimura’s force came into contact with the US 7th Fleet under Rear Admiral Jesse Oldendorf, which consisted of six battleships, eight cruisers, 29 destroyers, and 39 motor torpedo boats. Nishimura′s force was crushed when the Americans crossed the Japanese “T”, thereby enabling the US forces to deliver crushing salvos against the Japanese fleet while minimizing their own exposure to enemy action. Nishimura was killed during the battle when his flagship, the Yamashiro, was sunk after being hit multiple times from the U.S. battleships by torpedoes and naval gunfire.

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Calibre Wings Hints at the Devil in the Details

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Perhaps riding atop a wave of enthusiasm since revealing the first product photos of their upcoming F-14s, Calibre Wings hinted at the seventh version of their 1:72 scale Tomcat, no doubt due out some time in early 2017. Earlier today, the manufacturer posted an image of “Satan in the Cross Hairs” on their Facebook page, likely indicating that VF-74 “Be-Devilers” would be their next choice for an F-14 replica. Before being disestablished in 1994, after 50 years of service, VF-74 served as an aggressor squadron that was pitted against various US Navy and Air Force squadrons. So, we don’t think its a stretch to conclude that an aggressor livery will likely be chosen to commemorate this illustrious squadron, perhaps one designed to resemble a Russian-built Su-27 fighter.

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Mobile Protected Firepower: Big Guns, Slimmer Waistline

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Its no secret the US Army has faced the challenge of bringing firepower to bear anywhere around the globe within an acceptable period of time. If a regional conflict should erupt, the Army must either preposition heavy assets within protected enclosures for unforeseen periods of time or attempt to move them from one location to another, a timely, expensive and unrealistic option that could spell doom for a friendly ally.

Enter the Mobile Protected Firepower Program (MFP). According to The National Interest, “With the resurgent threat of Russia and the growing power of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army Ground Forces, the U.S. Army is working on developing ways to increase the firepower resident within its infantry brigade combat teams (ICBT).

One such effort is the Mobile Protected Firepower (MPF) program, which aims to provide a company of vehicles—which the Army adamantly does not want to refer to as light tanks—to brigades from the 82nd Airborne Division or 10th Mountain Division that can provide heavy fire support to those infantry units. The new vehicle, which is scheduled to enter into full-scale engineering and manufacturing development in 2019—with fielding tentatively scheduled for around 2022—would be similar in concept to the M551 Sheridan light tank. The Sheridan used to be operated the Army’s airborne units unit until 1996, but was retired without replacement.

The Army does not want a “new” vehicle per se, rather, the service wants something that it can quickly put into production in the shortest amount of time at the lowest possible cost. “What we have said in MPF is: We’re not willing to wait for you to go through a lengthy bottom-up design process,” Maj. Gen. David Bassett, the Army’s program executive officer for Ground Combat Systems told reporters at the Association of the United States Army annual meeting on Oct. 5. “What we are willing to do is to give you some time on your own to get a design ready to compete and then we’ll evaluate that into a fairly rapid engineering, manufacturing development phase.”

The Army has not quite fully figured out what kind of resources it has available for the MPF program, but the service is focused on keeping the cost and schedule under control using the Marine Corps’ Amphibious Combat Vehicle (ACV) program as a model, Bassett said. The key is to have at least two competing designs. Ideally, the Army would benefit from having multiple contractors competing for the program. And there are already indications that the competition to secure the MPF tender will be fierce.”

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The Army is currently field testing a number of potential candidates that could fill the role of a lighter weight tank, one that could stand toe-to-toe with a number of adversarial vehicles from around the world until heavier and more capable ground systems could be brought to bear. (Images courtesy of Defense Technology Review)

Since mobility and air transportability would be key, whichever MPF system is chosen will mean the requisite use of lighter materials, including strengthened aluminum, much like the M551 “Sheridan” AR/AAV light tank employed by the US Army during the Vietnam conflict or the Bradley family of infantry fighting vehicles. Such vehicles have very thin armor so a similarly conceived vehicle designed to meet the MPF program would likely have to rely upon an active protection system to defend itself against a litany of direct-fire threats. It would also likely be rigged for low-velocity airdrop from the back of a cargo plane using a Low Altitude Parachute Extraction System (LAPES).

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