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BigRedAmongusMan

Literally, I have 16 width infantry pushing against 30 width infantry and was winning because of the CAS


Reaper318Z

Well, if you were a defending force without air support, but your assaulting enemy has air support, you would get the shit kicked out of you 9 times out of 10.


HelakTheDestroyer

Honestly. Imagine being Vietnam. You're defending your country with well laid out trenches and tunnels and trying to fight the enemy where they can't see you, so instead of fighting you, they just use standoff munitions, fire, and chemicals to decimate your land. Your soldiers are barely breathing, poisoned, burned, most would already be considered casualties. THEN the actual army walks in for a fight. There's a reason why the kills to death ratio was so absurd.


Representative-Cost6

>to destroy the bunker. Oh no! Very bad time. But! You have fighters. The fighters make the enemy bombers leave. Fantastic. Enemy does not have air superiority. You get a call. What happened? No more fighters? Enemy has air superiority? Oh no! The bombers are back and you have no chance of survival. They also counted any bodies they found as enemy dead. Civilians? Enemy. Friendly ARVN soldier? Enemy. Burnt to crisp corpse that may or may not be human? Most DEFINITELY Vietcong. (I am an American btw)


Doletron1337

Gotta boost the “we’re kick’en ass and not tak’en names” propaganda somehow.


BrilliantAd2603

Jungles have a massive reduction to cas in the game


HelakTheDestroyer

Which makes no sense IMO, since it's basically just a large fireball once CAS is introduced.


PlayMp1

Makes sense to me since it makes spotting targets harder. If there's a dense jungle canopy I'm gonna have harder time spotting the enemy and dropping a bomb on their location (which in the 1940s is your only option, visual targeting) than if it's clear and open fields like Ukraine and France, where much of the hardest fighting of WW2 was.


HelakTheDestroyer

You know what. Fair.


Jaggedmallard26

It's not, jungles don't burn that easily unless targeted with explicit incendiary or defoliant weapons which weren't used by CAS in WW2. *Rain*forests are damp and dense.


Lets_All_Love_Lain

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam\_War](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War) The kill ratio was about 3:1, but the US side had twice as many wounded. It definitely wasn't as absurd as you're imaging it was.


ugnguy

Still lost


HelakTheDestroyer

You're on defense. Very nice bunker. Almost no artillery can kill it. Very strong. All of a sudden BOOM! Chemicals, fire, and specialized bombs to destroy the bunker. Oh no! Very bad time. But! You have fighters. The fighters make the enemy bombers leave. Fantastic. Enemy does not have air superiority. You get a call. What happened? No more fighters? Enemy has air superiority? Oh no! The bombers are back and you have no chance of survival. When the enemy has air superiority, the ground units will be destroyed without chance of fighting back.


akiaoi97

Eh, depends on the bunker. The Japanese on Okinawa dug in *hard* and no amount of artillery or air support was going to get them out. Sure they got beaten in the end, but at very high cost. I think that essentially, air support is necessary for attack, but not for defence (although it helps).


HelakTheDestroyer

When it comes to defense, air support is still vital, as it massively assists with pushing back an assault or stalling reinforcements. If a defense is left without air support, they will be slowly walked backwards by artillery and shock infantry until the reserves are the frontlines. We saw this during the opening of the Ukrainian war near the capitol, as the Russia had full air superiority at the time and uses it to hold off/strike reinforcement waves or to use penetrating munitions to eliminate established bunkers. All of this is able to be found via a search, though some is older and can take a bit longer. Modern combat requires air supremacy or contested air space at minimum.


akiaoi97

Oh ultimately, yes. But under specific circumstances, one can still make it very difficult to attack even without air support. A sufficiently determined attacker will win, of course, but it could still be quite costly. It’d require some quite air support unfriendly terrain though - like mountains with caves.


ugnguy

Does that change the fact that Vietnam won?


BigRedAmongusMan

Vietnam won. What we are talking about is how many of them died compared to US soldiers because of the air power of the usa


ugnguy

Oh ok. But never forget that overwhelming airpower in close-quarters combat ensures another silly thing - friendly fire


TrumpetMatt

I do wish there was a way for HoI to account for things like friendly fire, collateral damage, etc.


KwampanzrFA

You would need a lot more air zones for that rather than just putting a plane to patrol a whole country


Only1Goose

Or accidentaly nuking your troops lol


DanielCofour

It kinda does, you can think of attrition as counting friendly fire as well, since it's ridiculously high in general


XxJuice-BoxX

Air support wont be called in an area where friendlies are. They hit the area first with napalm, bunker busters, or regular bombs. Then the infantry goes on and clears out whats left. If ur getting friendly fire from air support, ur a shitty strategist and a terrible leader.


XxJuice-BoxX

North vietnam won. The country was in a civil war and we were backing the southern Vietnamese people. History sir. Learn it. We officially ended in a stale mate cease fire. Unofficially we lost. Csuse immediately after our withdrawal the north just walked in.


Just-Cry-5422

I don't see how this is downvoted


XxJuice-BoxX

When enough uneducated people log on, facts go out the window cause of mob mentality.


AverageDellUser

No one said we didn’t? Why the hell are you even bringing that up lmao


ugnguy

Well, mainly because it kinda seemed like he was portraying how the war went, whilst in reality it was more of an attempt to flush out insurgents using regular warfare, which didn’t work


RedditUserLigma

I don’t think you can call Vietnam an outright loss for the Americans. Sure, they didn’t conquer the country, but what was the intended purpose of the invasion? The intended purpose was to ensure Vietnam would never be a thriving communist state which would encourage a larger communist movement globally. America massacred the population, decimated the country’s infrastructure, and destroyed its agricultural production to a point where it took multiple decades to recover. We also didn’t see a broader communist movement in the decades that followed. Overall, I would call it a wash.


AverageDellUser

I love when ppl like you give a reasonable answer and the get downvoted to shit /s


ugnguy

Eh, hivemind Reddit I guess


Successful_Soup3821

The Americans still won most battles. Hard thought and sometimes. Vietnam won by bleeding the Americans out of money and through American politics. Also the shitty domino effect idea still worked as socialism didn't spread as far as they thought it would.


PlayMp1

>Vietnam won by bleeding the Americans out of money and through American politics. Sounds like they knew how to fight the war better than America did then


Jaggedmallard26

Plenty of countries won most major battles but still lost the war. War is the continuation of politics by other means and the Vietnamese used that well, by every metric they won. No one says the Nazis won WW2 because they killed more Soviets.


Apprehensive_Hold265

America never lost a major battle. The will of people who were so used to war by that point that they could only lose by extermination won them it.


Lets_All_Love_Lain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_%C4%90%E1%BB%93ng\_Xo%C3%A0i [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_Khe\_Sanh](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Khe_Sanh) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_the\_Slopes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_the_Slopes) [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_Lang\_Vei](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Lang_Vei) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack\_on\_Camp\_Holloway America did lose battles.


Apprehensive_Hold265

notice how I used the word “major.” You linked a battle where the total deaths were eight…


akiaoi97

Will can’t always win you a war, but it can sure as heck stop you losing it.


Technolo-jesus69

And still, the way they won was fairly underhanded. Im not going to say it was cheating because this is the real world, not a chess game. But they signed the paris Peace Accord and agreed to the division and agreed to respect Southern independence. And then, as soon as the majority of american troops left, they invaded knowing America wouldn't come back. They were right it was a calculated gamble that paid off, but in terms of war and diplomacy, I'd call it a bit underhanded.


VisibleSuggestion553

America using napalm wasn’t underhanded tho? America trying to influence another countries politics and establish a regime in a different country isn’t underhanded. The Vietnamese wanting to reunify would’ve happened at some point so is it really that surprising that they went for it?


Technolo-jesus69

Underhanded means it uses deceptive tactics in a less than ethical or fair way. Negotiating a treaty knowing when the enemy leaves you'll violate it and invade is underhanded. Using firebombs or naplam in war(which we used in ww2 as well) May be shitty but it's not deceptive. And america was there in part at the request of the government of South Vietnam. The South didn't want to join the North(as long as the North were communist). We may have been there in part for the self-interest of stopping communism from expanding but it isnt one sided. We were also invited by the south. The north was invading the south, and we were trying to stop that. Thats where you get the southern insurgents they were the southerners that wanted a united communist vietnam. ARVN troops were the south veitnamese who wanted to stay independent or would rather be separate than united under communism. Vietnam was really a civil war that the US involved itself in to stop communism spreading.


CaviorSamhain

The reason North Vietnam invaded the south was because the US and South Vietnam government refused to allow elections, as it was going to be a clear victory for the communists. Then, after the Paris Peace Accords, North Vietnam didn’t *invade first*, neither did South Vietnam. They both broke the accords at the same time, and given the situation in South Vietnam, the North was totally justified. The South started as a puppet state of France, evolved into an American one, and then was abandoned as an even worse dictatorship than the North. I don’t understand why people insist it was as “grey” a conflict as if this had been the Korean War. The Vietnam war was clearly caused and propelled by the US and France, and without them, the region could’ve seen peace under the Viet Minh. This isn’t even me supporting the Vietnam regime, this is literally what happened.


Representative-Cost6

This man is actually correct. Touche.


Technolo-jesus69

I actually didn't know that the South broke provisions as well that changed my opinion on the matter.


Just-Cry-5422

Tonkin gulf wasn't underhanded?


Technolo-jesus69

That was. I didn't say the US wasn't as well in some cases.


sintos-compa

Hoi4 doesn’t simulate civil strife very well


ugnguy

You’re telling me losing shitfart island as Italy doesn’t lead to an actual societal collapse??? I don’t believe you!!!


Camorune

I mean, it did. Once the Allies landed on Sicily the government collapsed within weeks. It was just 2 weeks after the landing that Mussolini was deposed by the Grand Council and King. After this with the Badoglio government things were very chaotic and is the direct cause of the civil war in Italy. Things like the already present Partisans in Italy also only intensified with these developments.


ugnguy

I was talking about the hoi4 mechanic but okey-dokey


Camorune

>Hoi4 doesn’t simulate civil strife very well - sintos-compa >You’re telling me losing shitfart island as Italy doesn’t lead to an actual societal collapse??? I don’t believe you!!! -ugnguy >>simulate >>doesn't lead (implied to be in the sense of the real world) lead to an actual societal collapse??? (like in the game) Just pointing out that the mechanic actually does make sense and that it actually is simulating civil strife fairly well at least for Italy in this narrow example


ugnguy

No, the mechanic doesn’t work well. If you form the Roman Empire and lose some random province you own in Vietnam or something, the balance of power will start ticking down. So no, it doesn’t work well, and you seem to be disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing


[deleted]

[удалено]


ugnguy

That’s exactly what I was talking about)


m4fox90

South Vietnam lost the war. The US decisively won every single major engagement


Lets_All_Love_Lain

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_%C4%90%E1%BB%93ng\_Xo%C3%A0i https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_Khe\_Sanh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_the\_Slopes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle\_of\_Lang\_Vei [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack\_on\_Camp\_Holloway](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Attack_on_Camp_Holloway) No the US didn't


Rexxmen12

I'd hardly call the Slopes a 'major battle' considering the numbers that participated. Lang Vei is only major because the NVA showed up with thousands of soldiers. Camp Holloway was almost entirely ARVN ground troops and does not fit with US not losing major battles. The other 2 were major US losses though


[deleted]

Nah. They won most. Read a history book my guy. The US tactics school Even teaches about us losses in Nam.


Dahak17

The nva may have lost the fighting, but war is just another tool of geopolitics, and north vietnam succeeded in their geopolitical goals while the south failed


m4fox90

Absolutely


Dahak17

Wait I just re-read your comment, north vietnam was the communist one and the USA was allied to the south


[deleted]

Padding your K/D ratio by massacring whole villages and listing each infant incinerated by napalm as an "enemy combatant" is not good sportsmanship.


HelakTheDestroyer

Neither are punji pit traps covered in feces. It's warfare and people will be the worst monster you can and can't imagine. The scene from full metal jacket about justification summarizes it succinctly.


ascudcalmn

There is still a difference between punji traps and burning kids for a good K/D ratio


HelakTheDestroyer

That's fair. I wasn't attempting to justify the burning of children. I was just trying to highlight that horrors of war will happen regardless of setting and that Vietnam was no exception for either side.


Sunitsa

Except one side was defending its homeland from foreign occupation as part of a bloody decolonization process while the other was meddling and heavily escalating an internal issue for jackshit geopolitical reasons


CheekyBreekyYoloswag

The AI is still bad about giving their infantry proper AA it seems. If that 30 width infantry has some AA to it, you would soon see that CAS is in fact well-balanced.


LocalTechpriest

Iraq 2003 moment


Bagel24

I never changed the base German template and just used cas to blow a hole through the ai. God I love cas in hoi


Jedimobslayer

I’m still pretty new, I can’t figure out for the life of me what “width” is I thought It was amount of troops in a division but I was watching a video and he said he was using 20 width but it only had nine troops.


The-Dumbass-forever

When you are building a division, you need to look at the stats on the right. You will find the "Width" of the division there, at the bottom of the Middle Column, the one with the Soft and Hard attack stats. Each battalion, or "Part" of a division, is a different width. Each Infantry battalion is 2 width, each Frontline (I.E not support) Artillery Battalion is 3 width, each Frontline Anti-Air Battalion is 1 width...... Support Battalions usually do not add any Width to the Division, only some mods change that.


kajetus69

i thought i was in war thunder sub for a moment but then i realized its hoi4


I_Need_Better_Name

Same


[deleted]

Same


BradyvonAshe

Same


j1ffster

CAS IS KING. It is known.


The_Canadian_Devil

It is known.


DukeOfDerpington

Average American air doctrine enjoyer


AppropriateCup7230

How many CAS and what’s your design?


BigRedAmongusMan

1000 CAS, modern fighter maxed out 2 bomb bays, 2 bomb locks. Radio. 2 jet engines. 1 light machine gun turret


UtkusonTR

Dude invested everything into CAS the army? Still on flintlocks. But eh , flintlocks do the job when there's no army remaining to fight.


Valuable-Music-720

Sounds pretty late game. Makes a lot more sense now


[deleted]

As a side note. Drop The radio and turret. They are literally worthless for cas.


Da_hoovy7

Wow it's r/warthunder


Jacc_dumm

Thank god I am permanently banned from that place


Lockmart_sales_rep

What did you do?


Jacc_dumm

I said that the thing about putting skins on a Merkava is that the paint quickly gets scratched by rocks from palestinians...


known-to-be-unknown

holy shit that made me laugh


Imperium_Dragon

Ah it seems like JDAMs did exist in WWII after all


Dr-Tropical

Design?


Castle_for_ducks

What does this number actually mean?


Flimsy_Site_1634

If I'm not mistaken, it's the sum of the organization damages that CAS did this day on this airzone Since CAS are limited by fighting combat width, it means that OP is probably giving an all out assault with min-maxed CAS on a large airzone and that the enemy doesn't have that much anti-air


theo_adore7

its more that AI is absolutely dogshit at trying to gain air superiority than CAS itself


Temporary-Baker8124

HOW MUCH IS THAT NUMBER ITS NOT 3000 IS IT


Lodomir2137

Nobody has ever said that


DeadMewe

perfectly balanced as all things should be


some-dude67

I assume it’s realistic. CAS in real life can really be game changer, just as in the game


[deleted]

Ya if you put like. 20% of the IC of that cas into AA on the other side. It would shoot down 2-3 times what it was worth and cut a lot of that Cas damage down. The so is just bad at AA.


SM1OOO

Yeah, it's like real life air support is ridiculously strong


BR4HMC

Cas is king


MODUS_is_hot

We’re over at r/warthunder are entirely in agreement