obat 34 Italy

[brummbaer]

There are few informations about this system on the net:
http://www.forecastinternational.com.../or/vo0080.htm
and a discussion on an italian forum
http://pub10.bravenet.com/forum/795583276/show/920704
The first states that 10 FIROS have been supplied to Italian Army from 1984 on, and further 20 FIROS 25.
I tend to not believe this, since no evidence can be found about the former in service, while about the latter the FIROS 30 (not 25) was tested by Italian Army, it seems between 1989 and 1990. It was initially planned to equip three groups with it, then two and shortly after it was abandoned. Number of testing systems are either 2 supplied by the manifacturing company, and 20 (!!) which should be the said two plus a Group of 18. But I never found no evidence of such Group when I was compiling the Italian OoB 1989, though the system was showed to the public on the Republic Day parade in 1989 or 1990. My suspect is that it is company propaganda to "push" the system on the market, and that the news still survives here and there.

[kikka]

You may find this doc of interest regarding cluster ammo in European armies. Sorry it's in French...

[brummbaer]

brummbaer said:
Some further corrections:
unit 077 Pzh2000 available from 1/2008, 70 units to be deliverd within 2009;
...

I correct myself:
the PzH 2000 deliveries will start in April 2007, and will be completed in 2008!

[DRG]

brummbaer said:
There are few informations about this system on the net:
http://www.forecastinternational.com.../or/vo0080.htm
and a discussion on an italian forum
http://pub10.bravenet.com/forum/795583276/show/920704
The first states that 10 FIROS have been supplied to Italian Army from 1984 on, and further 20 FIROS 25.
I tend to not believe this, since no evidence can be found about the former in service, while about the latter the FIROS 30 (not 25) was tested by Italian Army, it seems between 1989 and 1990. It was initially planned to equip three groups with it, then two and shortly after it was abandoned. Number of testing systems are either 2 supplied by the manifacturing company, and 20 (!!) which should be the said two plus a Group of 18. But I never found no evidence of such Group when I was compiling the Italian OoB 1989, though the system was showed to the public on the Republic Day parade in 1989 or 1990. My suspect is that it is company propaganda to "push" the system on the market, and that the news still survives here and there.

What I have been able to find ( and I'm still looking when I'm not looking for other things ) is it seems this system was evaluated in the early 80's ( maybe 1980 but it seems no earlier than that ) and 1 group of 22 was formed but once the cold war ended the cost of these things could not be justified so the project was abandoned. That's as far as I've traced. What does seem clear is there were SOME floating around italy during the 80's and had some conflict erupted during that time it seems likely they would have been used

Don

[brummbaer]

Ok, after all playing the italians is already frustrating enough. Let's keep something to fight with.
I'll keep searching.
Errr... any interest for the T-55 thread?

[DRG]

brummbaer said:
Ok, after all playing the italians is already frustrating enough. Let's keep something to fight with.
I'll keep searching.
Errr... any interest for the T-55 thread?

Not really. I've got more than enough to deal with ATM

Don

[brummbaer]

About A-129 Mangusta.
units 503-504-505-907-908-909 Basic version entered service 10/90 (total 45).
Typical weapon configuration was the Attack Helo (unit 504) with 2 missile pods with 8 BGM-71D/E TOW 2 (weapon 175-176)or 6 AGM-114A Hellfire (weapon 178) plus 2 81mm Medusa rocket pods (weapon 185).
12.7mm gun pods for units 503-505 were available since 1/97, though I couldn't find a picture of such configurations, particularly with Stingers. Mistral missile was also implemented, but maybe this is just a duplication for the game.
I found no source about 51mm and 122mm rockets (units 907-908), but 70mm rockets instead yes (couldn't find in inventory).

A-129 EA-1 (units 506-507-508): don't know if this refers to the planned scout version, but this one was deleted from production in the 90s.
Same applies for A-129 EOA-3 unit 484.

New version is A-129 CBT, units 509-510, which entered service in 10/02 with 15 new helos and the older ones upgraded. This is the first version to mount fixed 12.7mm Gatling gun under chin, TOW 2B or Hellfire ATGM and 70 or 81mm rocket pods.

In the end:
units 503-505 unchanged, available 1/97-10/102;
unit 504 W1 8 TOW 2/2A or 6 Hellfire; W2 and W3 2x81mm Medusa, available 10/90-10/102; alternatively 4 Tow or 3 Hellfire in slots W1 and W2 and Medusa in slots W3 and W4;
unit 509 W1 12.7mm (weapon 180); W2 8 TOW 2B or 6 Hellfire; W3 and W4 2x81mm Medusa, available 10/102-12/120;
unit 510 W1 12.7mm (weapon 180); W2 4 TOW 2B or 3 Hellfire; W3 2x81mm Medusa; W4 4 FIM9 2A Stinger, available 10/102-12/120;
old and new version actually cohexisted for some time, but hard to determine how long.
units 484-506-507-508-907-908-909 to be deleted.
Sources: italian defence magazine and Googling "A-129 Mangusta".

Edit: forgotten 12.7mm gatling in slot Weapon 1 in units 509-510.

[brummbaer]

Weapon 165: C90-CR-RB(M3). I can't find a single source saying that Italian Army has this AT rocket (spanish, right?), neither on the army website nor google. Don, any idea where does this come from?
thanks

[DRG]

I have no idea. As far as I can tell that weapon has been in that OOB for years and it's used by 9 units. The guy who originaly drew that OOB up was in the Italian Airforce so if you think it needs to be removed you better be very sure of your info

Don

[brummbaer]

I turned the question to an italian forum, but you can check the internet as much as me. I'll let you know what.