From: Steve Grammont (islander@midmaine.com)
Date: Tue Oct 07 2003 - 20:01:20 PDT
>Well I too a Historian, spend countless hours researching the History of
>the Line Haul in Vietnam and the "Gun Trucks" they used.
I am sure your knowledge of Gun Trucks, as used in Vietnam, dwarfs my
kowledge of their use. But keep in mind I am not talking about their use
in Vietnam.
> I am currently
>in the process of replicating 3 of them so their history and there
>lessons learned wont be fogotten.
A noble and just cause. These vehicles are obviously very near and dear
to your heart. But perhaps this is coloring your judgement about their
possible uses in Iraq?
>I doing so I foreward all the posts to
>a Veteran friend who served on Gun Trucks and this is what he had to say.
Well, your friend emailed me the same thing so I might as well include my
response to him. As it turns out, you are the person I am reffering to
in this email. I mean no disrespect towards you, only to challenge your
logic and claims. So far you have not refuted my statement that Gun
Trucks will not have an impact on the bomb attacks or that small arms
attacks (i.e. similar to what the VC did) are what are today causing
Coalition forces casualties in Iraq, yet you keep saying that these
trucks would make a big difference in terms of what is going on there
right now. Before you do anything else you have to address this issue
otherwise I don't think there is much point in having a debate with you
since this is the central issue to be discussing.
Steve
Email is as follows...
----Hello Larry,
>STEVE MY NAME IS LARRY FIANDT--I WAS ON A FIVE TON GUN TRUCK AND TAKE >EXCEPTION TO YOUR HISTORIAN APPROACH
I honestly don't think we disagree. I was arguing against someone who is convinced of 2 things:
1. That Gun Trucks are a major need for Iraq right now. Four more died in Iraq today... from remote control bombs. Gun Trucks would not have saved those men, nor the dozen or so that have died and more injured in the last couple of weeks.
2. That Gun Trucks would absolutely, without any question of a doubt, have saved the supply convoy that Jessica Lynch was a part of. Knowing what we know about that one particular ambush, I don't think it would have. You can disagree, but neither of us can be proven either way since they weren't there.
>-THESE PEOPLE WERE SCARED OF THESE >TRUCKS AND TO SAY YOU CAN'T PLUCK FROM HISTORY-
You misunderstand. I said you can not simply say "this worked there, as is, so it will work here, as is". Especially when our guys are getting killed by things which Gun Trucks would have zero impact on. Again, this was my argument against someone who appears completely convinced that Gun Trucks are some sort of magical weapon. He even went so far as to state that no Gun Truck ever failed to acheive its protective mission in Vietnam. Another poster already disputes that.
>SHOULD HAVE BEEN USED AFTER THE FIRST WORLD WAR---WRONG STEVE--YOU TAKE WHAT >WORKS AND IMPROVE ON IT--I'LL TELL YOU RIGHT NOW THAT THESE GUY IN IRAQ >ARE JUST >STARTING OVER, THEY HAVE FORGOT THE LESSONS LEARNED STEVE, AND WHEN YOU >FORGET WHERE YOU BEEN YOUR DOOMED TO MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES,
We have no disagreement here. If you reread my emails you will see that I am clearly in favor of effective Gun Trucks. But I am in no way shape or form deluding myself that this is going to reduce the friendly body count we are seeing because convoys apparently aren't having serious problems with small arms ambushes now.
>AND ONE MORE >THING---THE ONLY REASON A AMBUSH WORKS IS BECAUSE OF POOR DEFENCE--STEVE >I CAN'T TELL >YOU THAT THIS OR THAT WOULD HAVE MADE A DIFFERENCE AT A PARTICULAR TIME OR >INSTANCE BUT I WILL TELL YOU THIS---IN VIETNAM THE VC AND NVA WERE EATING >US ALIVE >IN CONVOY--JUST AS THE ENEMY IS OUR TROOPS NOW IN IRAQ, BUT WHEN THE CONVOYS >WERE MANNED WITH THE GUN TRUCK AS WE KNOW IT THEY BEGAN TO FAIL--AND FAIL >BIG,
The thing that is "eating us alive" now in Iraq are remote controlled bombs or one guy with an RPG (who fires once and runs away before anybody knows what happened). We have yet to find any bad guys to shoot at. You could have a convoy of nothing BUT Gun Trucks... and what good would they do when there is nothing to shoot at? You scold me for not learning from history, but I think you are not learning from current events. The enemy is not playing the same game as the VC. If anything it is the enemy that has learned from the past and instead of getting themselves all shot up they are triggering attacks from a distance where they are nice and safe. That means we need to adapt and come up with something new that works instead of applying something old that clearly will not work. At least for the bomb attack ambushes, which is what we are hurting from.
>--AND MAYBE RETHINK THINGS IN YOUR HISTORIAN WAY OF THINKING
I don't see anything to rethink. I said before and I say now to you... Gun Trucks will not stop the nearly daily friendly body count we are seeing in Iraq. If there is no enemy to shoot, Gun Trucks can't be effective in any way. I welcome any train of logic that you can come up with to refute this rather obvious point. Having said that, there should be Gun Trucks in theater because ambushes they could counter could start up at any time.
Steve
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