Should 1:25000 maps be military secret?

[aaglo]

With a sufficient artillery concentration, who needs details

[Sikander]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
Ah yes, the drop shorts.

Only an artillery man would ever think the nine mile snipers were that accurate.

There was a battery in Vietnam that loudly claimed that they were the most accurate in the entire Army. Any doubters were offered proof (and a sizable wager) of the battery's accuracy. A tree was selected as a target, and one gun fired a round at it. Invariably the battery got a direct hit, turning the tree into toothpicks, and collecting a sizable sum from the wagers. It took a long time for those thus robbed of their money to figure out that the tree had been wired with explosives beforehand and detonated by remote control, while the gun fired a blank charge.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse
You don't need maps to plot artillery attacks. You just need an observer to advise fall of shot.

Firemission, 1000m in front of wherever we are.

Great. Thats gonna work.

[Bugs ****ing Bunny]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


Now that's interesting. Why would the Brits do such a thing?

Do what? Do all the mapping, or allow it to be freely available?

[Alexander's Horse]

Originally posted by SpencerH


Firemission, 1000m in front of wherever we are.

Great. Thats gonna work.

It does work. You pick a landmark like a mountain or a big hill and tell them to fire a round at that and you watch the fall of shot. Then you adjust fire down onto the target. Left 500m, right 200, add 300 and so on and then "fire for effect" and they lay down a barrage.

Maps aren't very good for accurate fire. You need an observer.

[Panag]

Originally posted by VetLegion
What do you think?

It just happened in my country that some people have been taken to 'informative talks' (interrogations?) with the police because they own maps of the entire country in 1:25000 scale, on CDs.

These were scanned maps, and server that offered them publicly was also taken down. It was maintained by a bycicle organization.

It appears we have a law that says these maps are military secret because they can be used for calculating artilery attacks

Incredible. I also own a set of these maps on CDs, but so do thousands of other people and ofcourse, the military of all our neighbouring countries

I have to wander how can laws like this exist?


I am interested does anyone here from the former east bloc have simmilar situation in their country... to my knowledge, 1:25k maps are freely available in all western states.

hi ,

maybe those maps had something "special" on them or so , ....

anyway , if those are "illegal" they should also outlaw most GSM's , ......

have a nice day

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse

It does work. You pick a landmark like a mountain or a big hill and tell them to fire a round at that and you watch the fall of shot. Then you adjust fire down onto the target. Left 500m, right 200, add 300 and so on and then "fire for effect" and they lay down a barrage.

Maps aren't very good for accurate fire. You need an observer.

Ever directed arty or mortar fire? I have. Without maps it wont work. The guns need to know where they are, where you are, and the target reference (even approximately) in order to calculate the firing solutions.

Sure, if you could both see a landmark they could take a crack at it and hopefully work their way back. In reality its unworkable without maps because it would take too long.

[Panag]

Originally posted by SpencerH


Ever directed arty or mortar fire? I have. Without maps it wont work. The guns need to know where they are, where you are, and the target reference (even approximately) in order to calculate the firing solutions.

Sure, if you could both see a landmark they could take a crack at it and hopefully work their way back. In reality its unworkable without maps because it would take too long.

hi ,

, not for a trained profeesional crew , .....

imagine a 105 , one for smoke , ( within visual range ) , mabe a second one , then , bang , six a minute with max spread , .....

have a nice day

[CerberusIV]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp


Perhaps, but then again you could just buy an Ordnance Survey map for £5. They were originally intended for military use but have been freely available for over a century. Britain is the most mapped country on Earth, contour by contour.

The joke about British OS maps is what they don't show. RAF Fylingdales radar station is not shown on the OS maps but if you drive across the North York Moors from Pickering to Whitby you can't miss is, especially at night when it is lit up like a Christmas tree.

Presumably it is meant to be secret from UK peace protestors?

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Lazarus and the Gimp
Do what? Do all the mapping, or allow it to be freely available?

Let the maps available for a nominal fee.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by panag


hi ,

, not for a trained profeesional crew , .....

imagine a 105 , one for smoke , ( within visual range ) , mabe a second one , then , bang , six a minute with max spread , .....

have a nice day

One for smoke where? Just fire 'north' (no map at all) and hope someone spots it? In your terrain maybe, but not in my old stomping grounds.

Fire for effect

[Panag]

Originally posted by SpencerH


One for smoke where? Just fire 'north' (no map at all) and hope someone spots it? In your terrain maybe, but not in my old stomping grounds.

Fire for effect

hi ,

a trained crew knows the whereabouts of the target ( visual ) to about 400-500 meters , one for smoke and the rest for effect , .....

mortars is the same , the range of most of them in use is no bigger then plus minus 8 kilometers , ....

need a hit at long range , .....?

use the new exocet

or get some gunships with some 2.75's , ......

have a nice day

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Big Crunch
You can get ariel photo maps of the UK on the net at that resolution.

Bat and Ball

Try this map... (Just click 'n' drag your mouse, to zoom...)

[Alexander's Horse]

Originally posted by SpencerH


Ever directed arty or mortar fire? I have. Without maps it wont work. The guns need to know where they are, where you are, and the target reference (even approximately) in order to calculate the firing solutions.

Sure, if you could both see a landmark they could take a crack at it and hopefully work their way back. In reality its unworkable without maps because it would take too long.

Funny, I was trained to do it. Also to call in artillery by "sound" of fall of shot - like for at night and in close country (jungle warfare).

Sure, its not ideal but you think people have nice maps all the time? Maps are often inaccurate too, even mil style grid maps. They can be out by quite a margin - though less so these days with satellites mapping and such. Also, you cna be worng about where exactly you are, which screws up any map based plotting, lol.

[Dauphin]

Originally posted by ADG


Try this map... (Just click 'n' drag your mouse, to zoom...)

It asks me something about plugins. As I don't read Danish, I'll have to pass for the time being.

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Alexander's Horse


Funny, I was trained to do it. Also to call in artillery by "sound" of fall of shot - like for at night and in close country (jungle warfare).

Sure, its not ideal but you think people have nice maps all the time? Maps are often inaccurate too, even mil style grid maps. They can be out by quite a margin - though less so these days with satellites mapping and such. Also, you cna be worng about where exactly you are, which screws up any map based plotting, lol.

I'm not arguing that experienced observer cant make quick adjustments even by sound (although I've never seen that done myself). Sounds like fun (pun intended).

My point is that in almost every case you either have to have both observer and guns with LOS to the target or some idea (by map or satellites) where the target is, where the guns are, and where the observer is.

Imagine a scenario where your forces have no maps (they dont need em they've got satellites). Unfortunately the satellites are now hors de combat from EMP. So tell me how you would direct fire from your SP155 battery maybe 5-10 mi back that has just finished moving (Your radios were protected from the EMP).

Edit: converted point form ramblings into a sort of english

[SpencerH]

Originally posted by Big Crunch

It asks me something about plugins. As I don't read Danish, I'll have to pass for the time being.

It just says that it's a small program and it'll install automatically with anything newer than ie 4.0.

Not on my PC it wont. Tyvarr.

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Big Crunch
It asks me something about plugins. As I don't read Danish, I'll have to pass for the time being.

Sorry, forgot about that... the plugin is needed to view the maps... just press "Næste" or something like that to install... don't remember exactly what it says...