A 155 mm artillery shell fired by a United States 11th Marine Regiment M-198 howitzer during training – public domain image in Wikipedia “Artillery”

(6) ARTILLERY WARFARE

“The god of war” according to Stalin – generally providing the majority of the total firepower for modern armies as well as causing the majority of combat deaths in the Napoleonic Wars and world wars.

“Artillery consists of ranged weapons that launch munitions far beyond the range and power of infantry firearms” – “since the introduction of gunpowder and cannon, artillery has largely meant cannon, and in contemporary usage, usually refers to shell-firing guns, howitzers, and mortars…and rocket artillery”.

Hence, artillery is a large part, if not the primary part, of the firepower that transformed infantry warfare and made cavalry warfare obsolete in modern history – although with some caveat that infantry firepower has also been transformed in ways that matches or eclipses historic artillery, such as RPGs or rocket-propelled grenades.

As we have seen, it has also transformed naval warfare, by becoming the predominant means of that warfare as opposed to the boarding or ramming of ships that preceded it – as well as coastal artillery to defend against ships.

And it is only apt that artillery warfare is the next entry after siege and urban warfare – “early artillery development focused on the ability to breach defensive walls and fortifications during siege and led to heavy, fairly immobile siege engines”.

“Although not called by that name, siege engines performing the role recognizable as artillery have been employed in warfare since antiquity. The first known catapult was developed in Syracuse in 399 BC. Until the introduction of  gunpowder into western warfare, artillery was dependent upon mechanical energy, which not only severely limited the kinetic energy of the projectiles, but also required the construction of very large engines to accumulate sufficient energy. A 1st-century BC Roman catapult launching 6.55 kg (14.4 lb) stones achieved a kinetic energy of 16 kilojoules, compared to a mid-19th-century 12-pounder gun, which fired a 4.1 kg (9.0 lb) round, with a kinetic energy of 240 kilojoules, or a 20th-century US battleship that fired a 1,225 kg (2,701 lb) projectile from its main battery with an energy level surpassing 350 megajoules.”

With lighter and more mobile artillery through technological improvement there came feild artillery – usually horse-drawn prior to the steam and internal combustion engines that saw railway guns, the largest artillery ever conceived, and the artillery, both offensive and defensive, of the next two entries.

Such is the modern importance of artillery that it is typically its own arm of service within modern armies – as well as navies and air forces for coastal and anti-aircraft artillery respectively, although organization and practice varies.

Technological improvement of artillery not only involves the delivery systems or “engines” as well the projectiles or munitions fired or launched by them, but also target acquisition and techniques or “fire control”.

RATING:

A-TIER (TOP TIER)