British Projects to replace the 25 Pounder field gun

[Tony Williams]

No but that’s what political leaders do. If someone from the future showed up today at the White House with authenticated proof that <insert war/disaster/alien trope of choice here> was to happen in a few years then the Government would move hell and high water to prepare for it or counter it.

Preparing for war is one thing (and the UK didn't really get going on this until around 1938), declaring war because of some future threat as suggested is entirely another. Europe was still suffering the psychological scars of WW1 - in the UK it was said that there was no-one in the country who didn't personally know someone who had been killed in that appalling conflict. The country dreaded the prospect of another war, with the promise of even greater destruction from the air. Chamberlain's efforts to appease Hitler were popular.

In reality it was obvious from 1934-36ish that the Germans were going to start a second World War and HM Govt. made enormous efforts by peacetime measures to prepare for it. Of course there was no foresight onto the specific nature of the war and how military technology would change so many of the weapons invested in were quickly obsolescent. But it’s hard to imagine more preparation within the financial means of the UK at the time.

Indeed - the main thrust of our historian's work in this field would be to spend the money on equipment which would not become obsolete as soon as the war started.

 

[Sea Skimmer]

If the guy is going back in time with a computer, bringing a 15 volume ebook on microwave radar, I have one in my house from MIT in the 1950s that I bet you can download at this point, or a few volumes on active IR night vision would be no big deal. Without highly detailed actionable information that can be tested its hard to see how such a person would ever be taken seriously to any useful degree in the first place. Even if people believe they are from the future, how are they to know that said person is not out to fool them into loosing the war, or just the dumbest guy on the planet expended to test the time machine ect? The skepticism would be overwhelming. The very fact that they are as you say a historian and not a military officer would already be counted against them. A lot of historians don't have the first clue about details of combat even if they know how a war went along.

 

[Tony Williams]

The historians have no advanced warning that they are about to wake up in 1934, so can't prepare anything to take with them. However, the British one is a specialist on the impact of technological developments in WW2, so he will have a range of relevant files on his laptop. The German historian will have been focusing on the impact of Hitler's strategic decision-making on the progress of the war.

After interviewing somebody for weeks, it is not difficult to work out whether or not he is dumb, and whether his story is consistent...some useful photos on the laptop could be convincing, too. So would various predictions of events coming true.

 

[PMN1]

There was also a spin off of the original book that had other countries having their own throwbacks.

The American one and the British one did meet each other.

The Italian one advised Mussolini to stay out of the war and pointed out there was a lot of oil in Libya.

Can't remember what the French one did.

The Japanese one said things the military didn't like....it didn't end well for him.

The Soviet one fell into the hands of Beria....it didn't end well for him.

 

[Rickshaw]

OK but why do you think such a weapon would be needed? As already noted, the 4.5in was designed to fulfil that gap.

If you read my post above, you would see that the 4.5" would not exist, as the job could be done by the 5.5" given the right ammo. The 4.5" was no easier to move around than the 5.5" since it used exactly the same mounting and weighed only fractionally less. So that's one gun and ammunition family which didn't need to be developed.

I think you'll find that it was easy to move around as it needed to be. 4.5in guns do not normally find themselves having to rapidly and closely follow the FLOT. Their range enables them to hang somewhat back and engage in what is nowadays referred to as the "deep battle". Therefore, mounting them on an SP chassis may allow a slightly faster advance or retreat but not excessively so. It does make them less dependent on roads.

I'd suggest that rather than reinvent the wheel, stick with the weapons that were available and increase their production.

It isn't a question of reinventing the wheel - just of providing a 25pr - using the same shells, cartridge and propellant increments (+1) with the option of a longer range.

I think increasing the size of the supercharge may not fit that description.

It would be better to address doctrinal deficiencies which were more important for the British Army than necessarily problems with weapons. Most of the British arsenal (with the exception of tanks) were as good and quite often better than those of the enemy. What was missing was a coherent, well thought out means of employing them on a mobile battlefield with intelligent direction.

You picked the wrong target, since the Royal Artillery's command and control system was better than any other army's in WW2 (although I gather that the US caught up later by copying it). It was the most professional branch of the army.

Actually, I picked the right target (excuse the pun). You're assuming I am aiming at the RA C&C systems. I am actually referring to what would now be called a "doctrine" of all-arms employment, preferrably with an emphasis on armour, rather than artillery. The British views on all-arms employment was one of artillery winning the battle, facilitating the movement of the infantry, supported by armour onto the objective and consolidating their gains. in a set piece battle. This was created at the end of WWI in the Hundred Days and only slightly modified by WWII. The German view by WWII was that the main arm which won battles was armour, supported by artillery and infantry, in a battle of manoeuvre.

Provide Wavell and O'Connor with sufficient men and materiale and have someone sit on Churchill and stop his Balkans obsession. Drive the Italians out of North Africa and prevent the Germans reinforcing them.

Yeah, that happens - along with a number of other strategy changes.

Win Africa (East and North) and the Axis are forced to defend a long, exposed southern flank. It complicates their attacking into the USSR and ensures that Turkey is unlikely to enter on the Axis side.

 

[biscuitsAB]

Hello forum,
According to "The development of artillery tactics and equipment" published by The War Office in 1951, experience in NW Europe
indicated that, against dug in infantry, the number of bangs was more important than the size of those bangs. It was proposed to
introduce a new field artillery equipment firing a 20 lb shell of improved lethality. This equipment was to have a minimum range of
16,000 yds, 360 deg. traverse, provide upper register firing to give an angle of descent of not less than 45 deg and to break down
into loads of not more than 300 lb. Might this have some bearing on the development of the Garrington?

This proposal was not supported by those who had fought in the jungles of south east Asia where the problem of the Japanese
bunker called for long destructive shoots by medium and heavy guns controlled by an FOO deployed well forward. A recoilless
weapon was proposed to deal with jungle bunkers, although no details of this weapon are provided. Perhaps Burneys " shoulder
25 pdr?

Hope this proves to be of some interest.

 

[Abraham Gubler]

Very much so, thanks a lot Biscuits.

 

[Tony Williams]

Thanks from me too - an interesting insight into the differences in thinking!

 

[acorning]

A few points.

I think we can be confident that Garrington was designed to be backwards compatible ammo-wise with 25-pr. There was quite a lot of 25-pr ammo about in the 1950s and HM Treasury abhors waste.

The problem with 25-pr and HA fire was the Probert pattern calibrating sights. These could not be designed to cover elevations above 45 degrees (an expedient fudge was used in WW2). However shortly after WW2 the decision was taken to not use such sights on future guns.

I laughed at the suggestion that SPs were quicker into action than towed guns. On 25-pr unhooking and dropping the platform probably took about 30 secs longer than stopping an SP. Problem is that's the quick bit. What takes time is orienting the guns, and a gun is not in action until oriented. This would probably take at least a few minutes for a 4 gun troop and longer at night, and there would be no difference in time between towed and SP. SPs offer various advantages but quicker 'battery ready' was not amongst them. Of course digital sights have changed that.

4.5 was a pre-1939 gun that replaced the 60-pdr, initially using the same carriage. My understanding that it was at this time that the agreement with the US was reached.

25-pr in UK service was not generally used for CB, not least because the role of most field regts was support to inf and armr with neutralising fire and CB was controlled by the CBO at corps (later sometimes AGRA) or ACBO at div if CB control had been devolved during mobile oprations. Larger calibre guns gave longer range which is usually important for CB. It's useful to note that tanks needed neutralising fire support to deal with anti-tank defences. As Baucham so clearly demonstrated, lots of neutralisation fire against defending forces pre-Z was a winner.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

Does anyone know what gun this this mock up is?

It is described as an anti-tank gun, but as seen in some of the later images, has a relatively high elevation for (presumably) indirect fire.

 

[JFC Fuller]

That isn't the Garrtington gun that used to be at the Firepower Museum but conceptually it looks similar with the housing over the gun breech and crew operating area. The execution is notably different to the Garrington gun though in that the mock-up seems to have a towing carriage for the gun with the hood being a separate piece whereas the hood was the towing hook and integral to the carriage on the Garrington gun. This might be a different solution to the same requirement???

 

[smurf]

Googling for the Garrington gun, but as this thread has been revived not too long ago ....
1. re the recent posts, the general layout of the 40mm anti-tank carriage looks like the 1939 2-pounder, which was 40mm. Also Vickers had a 40mm AT gun of their own on a self-propelled mount based on the Vickers VA D50 Bren carrier prototype.

2. re the 2013 discussion, about 10 years ago I visited the Barrow Library Vickers archives (not the Dock Museum photo collection) looking for info on the guns for the Fiji class cruisers. I found drawings of the 0.661 mg and an automatic version of the naval 5.25in gun - there were early Fiji projects for 5.25s, but the auto was mid wartime, intended for new AA cruisers 1944

Also, though I was busy with naval stuff, and time was short, to my great subsequent regret I didn't look at, let alone photograph, a drawing of what was listed as a land service carriage for the naval 5,25in gun. That would have well outranged the 5.5in howitzer. The 5.25 (133mm) fired an 80lb shell with HE and SAP available. Calibre was L50, range 23,400 yards. I think the idea and its timescale fell foul of 155mm NATO standardisation
http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNBR_525-50_mk1.php. It's a long way to Barrow, but I might contact them again.

 

[Fluff]

Interesting thread - should it be in AH?

Probably/hopefully the book is written, but on the subject of what the UK should do, to prepare for a coming war with Nazi Germany.

For the Army, I'd suggest 'buy American' would cover a lot of the needs, Sherman, self-loading rifle,Priest, Half tracks. If you knew the historical blunders that were going to happen such as on the tank front, would be simpler to build shermans in the UK.

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

@smurf , my earlier post was referring to these mock-ups (VPA.4141, VPA.4142, VPA.4143, VPA.4144, VPA.4145 and VPA.4146.)

 

[Tony Williams]

Interesting thread - should it be in AH?

Probably/hopefully the book is written, but on the subject of what the UK should do, to prepare for a coming war with Nazi Germany.

For the Army, I'd suggest 'buy American' would cover a lot of the needs, Sherman, self-loading rifle,Priest, Half tracks. If you knew the historical blunders that were going to happen such as on the tank front, would be simpler to build shermans in the UK.

The revised version of The Foresight War is not yet written - it's my main priority for next year.

"Buy American" is not that easy, in the mid to late 1930s the US had small armed forces and correspondingly small weapon factories. They were also reluctant to provide arms to anyone, they wanted to stay out of any future European war. Their change of heart came later - as did the M4 Sherman tank.

 

[VIKINGTANK]

Interesting thread - should it be in AH?

Probably/hopefully the book is written, but on the subject of what the UK should do, to prepare for a coming war with Nazi Germany.

For the Army, I'd suggest 'buy American' would cover a lot of the needs, Sherman, self-loading rifle,Priest, Half tracks. If you knew the historical blunders that were going to happen such as on the tank front, would be simpler to build shermans in the UK.

The revised version of The Foresight War is not yet written - it's my main priority for next year.

"Buy American" is not that easy, in the mid to late 1930s the US had small armed forces and correspondingly small weapon factories. They were also reluctant to provide arms to anyone, they wanted to stay out of any future European war. Their change of heart came later - as did the M4 Sherman tank.

Tony, that is really good news; very much looking forward to that. Thoroughly enjoyed the first version.

 

[Hood]

I came across this project the other day over at Tanks Encyclopedia, a Royal Military College of Science design study from 1958 on a future self-propelled gun for the nuclear age.

https://tanks-encyclopedia.com/spartan-105-mm-spg/

The study authors came up with a new 105mm gun to replace the 25pdr and 4.2in mortar. It was to have high elevation with an effective range of 1,500-17,500yds with a rate of fire of eight rounds. The gun would have a 12ft-long monobloc non-autofrettaged barrel. The ammunition with would be HE and HESH but a barrel liner and breech block would allow the use of US 15mm rounds. The new HE round would use Torpex; a 60/30/10 mic fo RDX/TNT/AL mixture with an explosive filler of 6.6lbs. The horizontal sliding breech block would have semi-automatic gear for opening and closing the breach. There would also be an automatic tube loading device with a tube magazine and a gun rammer using compressed air in the engine compartment. The vehicle would stow 210 rounds.

 

[Grey Havoc]

The video accompanying the above article:

View: https://youtu.be/4e8Hxx7AKHk

 

[A Tentative Fleet Plan]

@smurf , my earlier post was referring to these mock-ups (VPA.4141, VPA.4142, VPA.4143, VPA.4144, VPA.4145 and VPA.4146.)

In case the Barrow Museum Archives disappear again, here are the images in question.

 

[Pioneer]

the project was dropped when NATO went for the 105mm instead.

So when did NATO go for the 105 mm calibre? As the Czech website says the Garrington gun was developed sometime in the late 1950s, the NATO's adopting the 105 mm (i.e. American) calibre must have taken place at that time, I suppose.

Piotr

Sorry, perhaps a little off topic, but whilst looking into this 25-pounder replacement topic, I came across the following interesting snippets:

"In the early 1950s, there was a proposal to adopt a special caliber (110mm instead of 105mm and 156mm instead of 155mm)"

"The T195 [M108 SPH] was originally supposed to carry a 110mm howitzer but that was changed to a 105mm relatively soon (in 1956) while the T196 [M109 SPH] was to carry a 156mm howitzer (later changed to 155mm)."

Regards
Pioneer