Spino
03-09-2007, 22:02
I bring you yet another wacky 'uber-gizmo of WW2' thread. There are endless discussions regarding the best rifle/plane/tank of WW2 so I'll touch on the subject of guns...
What I mean by gun is something large, made of metal and goes boom when it fires a round at the enemy. We're talking about artillery of all flavors, anti-tank guns, mortars, etc. Yes, tank guns can be included in the discussion but you need to argue the benefits of mounting that particular gun to a specific platform, not the other way around.
So how do we classify 'best'? Potential kills/round, decisive impact upon a given engagement or total kills or any other criteria you can think of.
Speaking in terms of potential kills/round you have to consider the Gustav, that German monstrosity that took weeks to set up and could only be moved into firing position (fully assembled) on dual rail tracks. However for all its potential the Gustav took too long to assemble, was a terrible waste of manpower and resources (it required 500 men to operate!) and was really only designed to take out bunkers and emplacements, not inflict damage over a large area (although it could). So I'm going to have to go for the large caliber naval guns of the time which served effectively in both the fire support and anti-ship roles; either the Yamato class' 18" guns or the Iowa class' excellent 16" guns (which had the luxury of being coupled with state of the art fire control radar) get my vote.
In terms of decisive impact upon a given engagement the famous German '88' certainly has to be considered as one of the deadliest guns of the war. The 88 was remarkably effective against aircraft, vehicles, ships, infantry and hard cover. The fact that the 88 could be towed by a halftrack or truck made it extremely cost effective and its early war adoption as an anti-tank/direct fire support weapon made a huge impression on those unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of its rounds.
As far as total kills (overall effectiveness?) are concerned I'm sure there are a number of towed artillery pieces or mortars which chalked up some impressive kill rates and totals during the war. However because of the nature of indirect fire it is difficult to determine how effective a given piece was. Variables to consider would be accuracy, time to deploy, reliability, weight, available arsenal, etc. I'm guessing the winner would be either an ~80mm mortar or ~105mm howitzer.
What I mean by gun is something large, made of metal and goes boom when it fires a round at the enemy. We're talking about artillery of all flavors, anti-tank guns, mortars, etc. Yes, tank guns can be included in the discussion but you need to argue the benefits of mounting that particular gun to a specific platform, not the other way around.
So how do we classify 'best'? Potential kills/round, decisive impact upon a given engagement or total kills or any other criteria you can think of.
Speaking in terms of potential kills/round you have to consider the Gustav, that German monstrosity that took weeks to set up and could only be moved into firing position (fully assembled) on dual rail tracks. However for all its potential the Gustav took too long to assemble, was a terrible waste of manpower and resources (it required 500 men to operate!) and was really only designed to take out bunkers and emplacements, not inflict damage over a large area (although it could). So I'm going to have to go for the large caliber naval guns of the time which served effectively in both the fire support and anti-ship roles; either the Yamato class' 18" guns or the Iowa class' excellent 16" guns (which had the luxury of being coupled with state of the art fire control radar) get my vote.
In terms of decisive impact upon a given engagement the famous German '88' certainly has to be considered as one of the deadliest guns of the war. The 88 was remarkably effective against aircraft, vehicles, ships, infantry and hard cover. The fact that the 88 could be towed by a halftrack or truck made it extremely cost effective and its early war adoption as an anti-tank/direct fire support weapon made a huge impression on those unfortunate enough to be on the receiving end of its rounds.
As far as total kills (overall effectiveness?) are concerned I'm sure there are a number of towed artillery pieces or mortars which chalked up some impressive kill rates and totals during the war. However because of the nature of indirect fire it is difficult to determine how effective a given piece was. Variables to consider would be accuracy, time to deploy, reliability, weight, available arsenal, etc. I'm guessing the winner would be either an ~80mm mortar or ~105mm howitzer.