Question for the tank and/or artillery guys

Teach

I'm wondering how many 105 Howitzer or main tank gun rounds will fit into a backpack? Since one of the ways the dope smugglers get their merchandise across the southern border is by making the illegals carry backpacks full of drugs, would it be too much of a stretch of the imagination to think future IED's might find their way into the country the same way? The ragheads are really good at setting booby traps, and we've been very generous at providing them with plenty of ammo- - - -all they have to do is make the Iraquis run off and leave it for the taking! Think about even a medium-sized HE round or two getting detonated in a crowded shopping mall. Not even Gecko 45 and his quick-response team would be effective in that situation, if they could break away from their primary mission of keeping the mayor's nephew from getting sodomized!
Jerry

breamfisher

I think that weight might be a more critical issue. A quick google search indicates that HE howitzer rounds weigh about 42 lb, with the projectiles weighing 33 lb.

Big Chief

Almost all US Howitzer ammo/projectiles is propelled by a separate bagged charge of powder. Exception is 105mm self contained "Shell" and M-1 Abrams 120 mm tank ammo is the same all in one cartridge.

I've humped old M-60 tank ammo on detail back in the 70s and it came 2 rounds in a wooden box, heavy stuff. But hey if they can smuggle thousands of pounds of dope across the border, it wouldn't be that hard to get explosives across in vehicles or small batches on their backs.


I've seen deactivated Soviet artillery/mortar shells/projectiles daisy-chained together to make IEDs the EOD guys showed me in Iraq before they pile them up to be blown up in a "Controlled Detonation".

Big Chief

Oh they are inventive, like setting up a mortar tube in a field using ice for delayed firing, place it at night and when the sun comes up and the ice melts the mortar round drops down the tube and goes off.

breamfisher

You know, it really wouldn't take a lot of shells (or explosive, period) to make an impact. Just one or two areas crowded full of people being hit would probably be enough...

Big Chief

breamfisher wrote: »

You know, it really wouldn't take a lot of shells (or explosive, period) to make an impact. Just one or two areas crowded full of people being hit would probably be enough...

And even a bottle of harmless baby powder slung everywhere in a crowed area (like a football stadium/airport) screaming some Islamic gibberish would cause a panic attack from hell....stampede.

They evacuated an entire building complex on Redstone Arsenal last year when an unknown suspicious powder was spotted by an employee.............it turned out to be make-up powder from a compact that fell/spilled from a woman's purse!

Teach

Well, with the Border Patrol busy rolling out the welcome mat for trainloads of illegal kids and changing diapers, I think it's pretty likely they would miss seeing a mule train of middle eastern terrorists with backpacks full of nasty stuff making their way across the border.
Jerry

jbp-ohio

Wouldn't need the whole shell. Can you get the explosives out? They can get plenty of shrapnel on site

Big Chief

jbp-ohio wrote: »

Wouldn't need the whole shell. Can you get the explosives out? They can get plenty of shrapnel on site

Naw, latest plan I hear might be feed the future bombers several bowls of Mexican Chili/Beans in Mexico then send them across the border and give them a Zippo lighter to detonate themselves using the self contained Stinky Bomb to go get their 72 Virgins. :tooth: :rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao:

snake284

Big Chief wrote: »

And even a bottle of harmless baby powder slung everywhere in a crowed area (like a football stadium/airport) screaming some Islamic gibberish would cause a panic attack from hell....stampede.

They evacuated an entire building complex on Redstone Arsenal last year when an unknown suspicious powder was spotted by an employee.............it turned out to be make-up powder from a compact that fell/spilled from a woman's purse!

One of em tries that around here and we will find out real quick who is breaking the law. Because I guaranty everybody that is packing will open up on him. Football stadiums are Gun Free Zones, however I know many people that conceal carry at games and I don't think being a gun free zone would stop people from opening up on them. I don't think any local politicians or LEOs would want to try to prosecute them for carrying in a gun free zone either, and if they did no jury around here would find them guilty of anything. In Texas at least that would be a very dumb move for a terrorist, but he would get to see allah real fast.

tennmike

I have no idea what the explosive is in the rounds now, but the ones I'm familiar with were filled with TNT. The liquified TNT was poured into the shell/bomb casings and allowed to cool and solidify. That's how the MOAB explosive charge is made. It wouldn't be a job for anyone who wanted to 'live long and prosper' to be digging out that solidified explosive from the casings. That being the case, I'd say give them a 4 lb. hammer and long steel chisel, and let them have at it! :rotflmao:

BigDanS

All of this is way too complicated. Look at what the Tsarnaev's accomplished in Boston with powder harvested from fireworks.

There exist lots of ways to acquire nitrates and to improvise fairly high yielding explosives. While the actors have a high probability of arriving through our porous borders, it is more likely their already in country operatives are gathering what they need, secretly.

Stay vigilant.

D

Antonio

None of the IEDs and car bombs planted everywhere by our local branch of Maoist terrorists used stolen artillery shells as explosive, even though military ordnance has never been hard to get over here. Almost all used a mix of fertilizers, dynamite and other market-available explosive compounds, pretty much the same used against the Murrah building in OK (Almost lost the wife to one of those in '92). Some variants used in Colombia are Propane gas tanks from assorted sizes rigged with TNT and homemade shrapnel.

Artillery shells are usually very hard to come by in S.A.; hand grenades, small mines, small mortar rounds, rifle grenades & RPGs maybe, but not the usual "big stuff" available in the Middle East, where by the way different factions razed military depots at will, abundant big scale conflicts with extensive artillery use, and absurdly huge amounts of military equipment (Specially Eastern Bloc) dumped with apparently little logistical control among all fighting sides.

Add the fact that carrying around a 105mm or so shell isn't easy nor safe, and I sincerely doubt they'll get in such big amount of trouble to do what can be achieved with affordable, available "household" components.

NN

Why carry mil ordnance, just get/bring some semtex and build an IED out of a pipe or some junk

KSU Firefighter

The reason they use the artillery rounds for IED's is because that is what they have on hand to use. Over here their options are not nearly so limited.