18th century British foot brigade vs 21st century USMC rifle platoon

[removeduser_4536284751384]

I picked the USMC purely because they have the largest platoons and have more of a chance. Anyway, who do you think would win in a battle in terrain like this:



Assuming the forces were composed as follows for the British:

• 1800 line infantry
• 200 light infantry skirmishers
• 4 3-pounder guns
• 4 9-pounder guns
• 2 12-pounder howitzers

And like this for the USMC:

• 21 riflemen with M16 rifles
• 9 grenadiers with M16s and M203s
• 9 SAW gunners with M249 LMGs
• 2 SRAW gunners
• 2 M240 machine gunners
• 4 M4 carbine-armed #2 crew for the above weapons
• 3-man HQ element armed with M4 carbines.

And what do you think would happen if a 60 mm mortar and 3 carbine-armed crew were added to the marine platoon? What about an M2 heavy machine gun? Even worse, a Mk 19?

[CiviC]

Is this a joke?

[removeduser_4536284751384]

Is this a joke?

no it's a copy of thread I saw on another forum that turned into quite an interesting (although also quite pointless) discussion

[Numenor]

Depends at the range they start, but the usmc for me. if i was from the 18th century and saw a gun firing at a rate of 400 shots a minute, i would run like hell...

[Hookah Smoking Caterpiller]

This is by far, the most pants-on-head retarded thread in the Alt Hist section.

[removeduser_4536284751384]

you're disappointing yourselves someone posted this in the BGE forums and it generated 7 pages of discussion

[Hookah Smoking Caterpiller]

you're disappointing yourselves someone posted this in the BGE forums and it generated 7 pages of discussion

Its still stupid.

[Dr. Croccer]

This thread is ball-numbingly stupid.

[Niles Crane]

The British.

[Pious Agnost]

No-one because it was all part of Germany's elaborate ruse.

[Hookah Smoking Caterpiller]

No-one because it was all part of Germany's elaborate ruse.

Those dastardly fiends!

[s.rwitt]

lol, USMC. We're allowed to lay down when getting shot at.

[Poach]

A single dug-in, machine gun armed Italian soldier could annihilate an 18th century British infantry brigade.

[Lord Mandelson]

Well, if we had the fight on Mars, or somewhere equally plausible and red, the British would be camouflaged, and NINJA!! whereas the Americans would be visible and massacred.

The triumph of superior tactics, you see!

Oh damn, the Americans have all the shuttles! Rethink needed.

Can we involve the Russians in this engagement? We can borrow their rockets.

In fact, that crap, can we borrow some Russian nukes?

I declare that we win due to the platoon dying of nuclear gene poisoning.

[Okuto]

A single dug-in, machine gun armed Italian soldier could annihilate an 18th century British infantry brigade.

LOL!

An austro-hungarian soldier has a better chance

[Dr. Evil]

Modern troops, of course. Imagine you're a 17 year-old kid in a line infantry company, and all of a sudden, you hear the pop of a pistol (as opposed to the thump/ripping cloth sound of a musket). You look around, and notice that your officer seems to have fallen off his horse. Then your sergeant starts making a choking noise, you look, and see a hole in his chest, followed by another pop. Okay, so it's rifle-fire. No big deal. It takes 'em a minute to reload, and there's only a couple around, right? And suddenly guys all around you are dropping right and left; one pop equals one guy down. Now, after the 10 or so shots you've heard, there should be a nice big fog bank of powder smoke telling you where your tormentors are. But there isn't. The moorland terrain causes sounds to be dispersed, limiting your sound-localisation abilities to whether they're on your right or left. Anyone who could give you some measure of direction and help the company maintain cohesion is dead, and they are rapidly being joined in the great beyond by everyone else. Are you feeling good yet?

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

lol, and don't forget modern armor is bulletproof, although you'll still end up with a broken rib or arm.

[Poach]

Welcome to the forums Dr.Evil. Don't necro post: last post before yours was nearly a month ago, exercise common sense.

[Dr. Evil]

Welcome to the forums Dr.Evil. Don't necro post: last post before yours was nearly a month ago, exercise common sense.

I was, to my mind.

I don't see anything wrong with contributing a new perspective, even to an older discussion. A month isn't that long. Two months, six months, that's different, though.

[Poach]

A month in a thread still on it's first page, comprised of comments generally ridiculing the topic itself, and to post the obvious is a bit much, in my humble opinion.