Tag Archives: Warfare

Warfare for Writers - Irregular Warfare

Warfare for Writers - Irregular Warfare.

In the last post, I looked at the Fog of War and previously discussed Open and Close Units of soldiers. Formal Warfare, the familiar wars, like WWII have been depicted in various media. Also, Irregular Warfare has been popular: Tom Clancy's works are a good example. So, how does Warfare for Writers - Irregular Warfare affect the writer?

These types of units are rarely under efficient direct control of a military commander, which can lead to CHAOS!

Many times, these units of irregular forces come from cultures where  men go armed, all the time and are made up of:

Privateers (navy) with letters of Marque and Reprisal.

Mercenaries are paid units from elsewhere.

Guerrilla Warfare are in support of war, especially by part-timers: The Arab revolt that made T. E. Lawrence famous. (Yes, Lawerence of Arabia was a real person!)

Private units and armies, like Muqtada Al-Sadr's Mehdi Army in Iraq.

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What does this mean for a writer?

If your characters are engaged in irregular warfare, what tensions does it cause for military commanders and the characters themselves? How well are they fitting in?

Note: this information was taken from lectures by Timons Esaias with his permission.

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Warfare for Writers - Officers

Warfare for Writers - Officers covers commissioned and non-commissioned officers, different from the days when one could buy a rank. From a Timons Esaias lecture.

Non-commissioned officers - sergeants and corporals and rarely sergeant-majors - are the foreman of the military.

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Commissioned officers lead companies, or their equivalent, and up. Officers are the quarterbacks of the team, they tell everybody else what to do and are responsible if they don't get it done. If officers work well together, they combine their strengths. If they squabble, they make their weaknesses prominent. Think plot conflicts!

An overwhelming concern for officers in most armies in history, is seniority. Armies, since ancient Rome, have had strict rules on who gets what job based on seniority down to minutes and seconds. If a higher ranking officer shows up, based on seniority, even in the middle of a battle, he assumes command and he can change the battle orders. If your character is an officer in a civilized military, this needs to be on their mind. If your character is a knight in a feudal military, then he is concerned about honor and precedence becoming more important, more complex, and more vexing.

Confusion for writers - in addition to names and official ranks there are positions and brevets. Positions are the jobs officers do, adding meanings to their rank with titles such as: executive officer, quartermaster, master, commander, first mate, officer of the day, and so on. Brevets or field commissions are acting ranks usually awarded doing wartime, giving the power of the rank without postwar privileges and pensions.

The one absolute SIN of an officer in the field, if he commands a unit, is not to reconnoiter his position. (Which is, to find out where other units are, and the nature of the surrounding terrain.) This sin is all too common and is utterly inexcusable!

If you find this post useful, please share and add to your social media platform(s). Thanks, Dameon

 

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Warfare for Writers - Fortifications

Warfare for Writers - Fortifications -- another in the series by Iimons Easisa' lectures with his permission.

There are nine things that tend to be missing when you visit fortifications:

  • The surface
  • The Glacis -- . . . the glacis prevents attacking cannons from having a clear shot at the walls of a fortress, as one usually cannot even see the walls until the glacis is crossed and the ditch, bounded on either side by the smooth, masoned scarp and counterscarp, is reached. Wikipedia
  • Top structures
  • Firing steps
  • Moats
  • Full gate structures
  • Barbicans -- A barbican is a fortified outpost or gateway, such as an outer defense to a city or castle, or any tower situated over a gate or bridge which was used for defensive purposes. Usually barbicans were situated outside the main line of defences and connected to the city walls with a walled road called the neck. In the 15th century, with the improvement in siege tactics and artillery, barbicans lost their significance. However, several barbicans were built even in the 16th century.Fortified or mock-fortified gatehouses remained a feature of ambitious French and English residences into the 17th century.

    Fortifications in East Asia also featured similar structures. In particular, gates in Chinese city walls were often defended by an additional "archery tower" in front of the main gatehouse, with the two towers connected by walls extending out from the main fortification. Called literally "jar walls", they are often referred to as "barbicans" in English.

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  • Original approach roads
  • Firing slit stoppers --
    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

    An arrowslit at Corfe Castle. This shows the inside - where the archer would have stood.

    An arrowslit at Cité de Carcassonne. The wall thickness is reduced to 0.7 m to accommodate the niche and the embrasure widens at an angle of 35º.

    An arrowslit (often also referred to as an arrow loop, loophole or loop hole, and sometimes a balistraria) is a thin vertical aperture in a fortificationthrough which an archer can launch arrows.

    The interior walls behind an arrow loop are often cut away at an oblique angle so that the archer has a wide field of view and field of fire. Arrow slits come in a remarkable variety. A common and recognizable form is the cross. The thin vertical aperture permits the archer large degrees of freedom to vary the elevation and direction of his bowshot but makes it difficult for attackers to harm the archer since there is only a small target to aim at.

    Balistraria can often be found in the curtain walls of medieval battlements beneath the crenellations.

    ...more to come!

 

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Warfare for Writers - 4

Warfare for Writers - 4 is the latest update from the Timons Esaias' workshop. These comments go from medieval to modern times.

You can see arrows and crossbow bolts flying through the air, likewise trebuchet loads. And you can figure out pretty much where they were fired from, as a result. Also, you can hear them. Likewise with musket balls and cannonballs free-vector-download-medieval-weapons-icons-design-by-Utopiaand artillery shells. You can see them, and you can hear them, and because they are subsonic you can hear the shot before the projectile gets to you. If it's close enough you can also probably see the muzzle flash of the gun, not to mention the smoke, and tell where it came from.

This all changed with the modern rifle, though. Modern bullets travel quite a distance at supersonic speed, so you actually hear the sonic boom of the bullet before you hear the shot, if you hear the shot at all. Oh, and the bullet will hit you, or go past you, before you hear it. And you generally can't see the bullet, ever. Because the sonic boom is the main sound you hear, and the bullet is past you before you hear it, the sound cues (unless you're VERY used to this) tell you the opposite of the truth. You will think the bullet came from where it actually went, or 180-degrees from the correct solution. When people hear modern gunshots, they almost always start looking in the wrong direction.

The reason we can be pretty sure there were no shots from the "grassy knoll," is because so many untrained people heard shots coming from the grassy knoll.

So unless your character is very close to the weapon when it discharges, don't have them figure out where the shots are coming from by the sound.

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Warfare for Writers 3 - Don'ts!

 Warfare for Writers 3 - Don'ts! Stuff Not To Screw Up!

In this post, Warfare for Writers 3 - Don'ts!, Timons Esaias debunks things that don't happen in the real world and shouldn't happen in your books.???????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

You cannot pour gunpowder along the ground to use as a slow fuse. I know you've seen it in the movies and on television, but if you pour a trail of gunpowder for a hundred feet and put a match to it, you'll have about two seconds before it all burns.

One cannot close the eyes on a corpse simply by pushing them closed. They go back to whichever way they want to be. They used to put heavy gold coins on eyelids to keep them in place, now we just sew them closed (generally after removing the eyeball). Most readers don't know this, so you can get away with it, but if my wife finds out you've screwed this up she may come hurt you. And she's a physician, so she knows how.

Speaking of medical things, unless you're describing magical creatures or superheroes, resist the urge to knock characters out by blows to the head and then have them regain consciousness with no aftereffects. The typical result of such a blow is nausea, vomiting, dizziness, headache, vision problems, stability problems, and the utter inability to swing a battle-ax with any authority.

There have been, in history, a number of short swords that were made to be drawn over the shoulder, usually by people who fought on horseback. These swords have only one edge, so you don't cut off your ear or slit your own throat; and they are very short, because you simply can't draw a long sword from your back. Now you will see, in the literature, swords called "back swords," and you'll think these are the ones you draw from your back. No, they are usually swords you wear on your back while riding around the countryside, but then hang from your waist if you actually get into a battle.

Don't have people drawing katanas or longswords over their shoulders, or I'll have to come hurt you.

Please avoid another favorite Hollywood bullpuckey device, which is the baton-twirling change of grip on a sword. It looks way cool, but it's the stupidest move on the planet. All somebody has to do is touch that sword while you're not holding it, and presto, you're unarmed. Oh, by the way, that's when they can hit you, too.

Now folks have reversed grip on swords and daggers all through history, it's a common and useful move, but it's almost always done by gripping the blade in your off hand, and then reversing. Folks gripped their own blades a lot, especially when wearing leather or armored gloves. I bet you do it in the kitchen, sometimes, when cutting with a large knife. You can get really wicked action on a sword by holding it in front of you like staff, and suddenly sweeping right or left, with the blade out. You can roll an opponent off your blade and club him with the grip, or go the other way and roll him off, and sweep the point into him, with your arm right on it. If you're quick, you can trap his shield arm.

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Warfare for Writers - Dec. 1, 2014

Bodiam Medieval Castle I attended the World Fantasy Convention 2014 and I was fortunate to attend a presentation by Timons Esaias on Warfare for Writers. He graciously agreed to allow me to use his material for this blog, which covers ancient to modern eras. Timons is a great speaker and he is well known as an expert in the field of Warfare. I can’t thank him enough for his kindness and help. I hope he doesn’t mind my placing a few comments in the material.

Interesting Fact 1: In World War II the German Panzer Divisions were known in books and film as being fast for that type of vehicle. Well, they were. The problem was, the fuel to run them was carried on horse drawn wagons. (I wonder if that is where the phrase, “Hurry up and wait,” came from? DC)

Let’s start with a few definitions and what they mean to writers. You may have heard of some or all of these, but what about your reader? 

skirmishers: It is common to send troops out in "loose order" to cover your flanks and to keep the main body of troops from walking into a trap. This is called "skirmishing out" and the folks who do it are called skirmishers while they are doing it. Basically they spread out so as not to make much of a target, and get away from the main body. If they run into enemy units, they take potshots and see if they can disrupt or drive off the enemy. Often the skirmishers of both sides run into each other, and when they fight it's a, surprise, skirmish. (The French called them tirailleurs, sharpshooters, in the Napoleonic era, and that name is still used.)

light, medium and heavy stuff: You will constantly hear the terms light and heavy used to describe units, warriors, and weapons. Light infantry and heavy infantry, light cavalry and heavy cavalry, light artillery and medium tanks and heavy tanks, and so on. They mean pretty much what you'd think. If it's "light" it weighs less, can take less punishment, can deal out less hurt. On the other hand, "light" often means it's faster, cheaper, and more flexible. Light infantry moves faster, heavy infantry hits harder. Light tanks are cheap and fast, medium tanks are slower but tougher. Heavy artillery packs a bigger punch, but moves like a snail on hashish.

Weapons: The main distinction here is between "individual" weapons, and "crew-served" weapons. Your own sword, shield, spear, shotgun, and laser rifle are personal weapons. Anything that requires two or more people (belt-fed machine gun, trebuchet, 18-lb. culverin) is crew-served.

Garrisons: The soldiers who occupy and defend a fixed location, like a city, town, or fortress, are the garrison of that place.

Reconnaissance: The is the word for the action of trying to find out what the land around your army is like, and where the enemy might be. When you send a unit out to look around, you are making a reconnaissance, or reconnoitering.   The unit is your "reconnaissance force."

Pickets: When one is in camp, it is often wise to put little groups of one or two soldiers in a circle around the camp, who might notice the enemy coming before they get to the camp. These are the guys who say, "Halt, who goes there?" or "Stand and deliver." The little groups are "pickets" and the folks are doing "picket duty." The cavalry equivalent, a guy on horseback, is a vedette.

Engineers: These are the guys responsible for construction projects in the military. They manage building fortifications, bridges, and roads. They may also undermine castle walls.

Pioneers: These folks go ahead of an army, clearing roads and setting up camps.

Reserves: These are the guys on the bench and in the bull-pen. In warfare it is generally wise not to put all your warriors into the line at one time. One keeps a force "in reserve" to use to plug a gap in an emergency, or to throw at the enemy when you've worn them down, or to go around the flank once they are pinned down. A reserve can also cover the retreat of a main army, if things go badly. Reserves are generally to the rear of the front line, for obvious reasons.

Detachments: The bane of all units is the constant need for detachment. You start out with a big army, but then you have to detach 50 guys to cover the bridge behind you. And 200 guys to protect your supply wagons. Another batch to protect the hospital, more to garrison two forts you captured, still more to hold the high ground overlooking your camp. And you've got guys detached to find food, guys detached to bring water, guys detached to guard the supply wagons that are bringing more stuff to your camp. Result, you arrive on the field of battle, look around, and discover that it's just you, your aide, and four other warriors, and two of them have bad head-colds.

There is also attachment which is the adding of units to a unit they don't normally belong to. Your regiment might be given an artillery battery to give it more oomph, so it is "attached" to the regiment and is under the command of the regiment's colonel.

Camp followers: Sometimes this term is used to imply prostitutes, and there's a long history of that, but this is actually not a pejorative term. There's a lot of work involved in keeping an army moving, and it's usually cheaper and more efficient to have civilians do it than to detach soldiers to do laundry, drive wagons, and so forth. "Civilian contractors" is the term we use today, but it's the same old thing. Armies often had an official number of soldiers' wives (British Empire did, and so did the Roman) on the payroll to do such chores; and there would be cooks, officers' servants, clerks, and the list goes on and on. And yes, these folks would physically follow the military camp from place to place, including enemy territory.

 

 

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