The only successful force structure from the Vietnam war was the light tracked armored 11th ACR with M113 Gavin ACAVs rumbling all over the 720 degree, non-linear battlespace with superior mobility, firepower and armor protection.
Air-mobile helicopter units aka "Air Cavalry" without light tanks were better than constantly foot-slogging marines--but were still dismal failures--after air delivery, fighting the enemy even or at a disadvantage with crap helicopters overhead whose weak MG and rocket armaments could not suppress--much less-evict VC/NVA hiding in closed, vegetated terrains. LTG Hal Moore told us the M551Sheridan AR/AAV was overweight because armor branch tankers insisted on the 46% inefficiency of a turret. Result: no tanks at his LZ X-Ray battle and constant desperation fixed-wing HE bomb air strikes to prevent the 7th Cavalry from being over-run--again like Custer.
As GREAT as the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment (ACR) was, the Army bureaucracy supplying them turreted light M551 Sheridans and medium M48 Patton tanks is/was questionable and shows the mental disconnect between The Battle Against the Earth/The Battle Against Man (TBATE/TBAM) that continues to the present day.
Instead, if a M113 Gavin-based chassis were utilized for the AR/AAV with a turretless STUG 105mm gun the ACAVs acting as "female" MG light tanks the 11th ACR would have had a "male" tank firing a BIG HE GUN with the same excellent cross-country mobility--but without the 46% turret complexity and vulnerability of the M551 Sheridans and terrain limitations of M48 Patton medium tanks.
Light M114 recon tracks were sized right--but whose hull frontal overhang and gas power doomed them to getting retired. WHY DIDN'T WE USE A REDUCED SIZE, DIESEL, RELIABLE, NOT-GET-STUCK M113 1/2 LYNXes LIKE THE CANADIAN ARMIES DID?
USAF C-130 STOL transports and Army CH-54 SkyCrane VTOL helicopters could have lifted the entire M113 Gavin-based ACR around the 720 degree battlefields with the Airborne/Air Assault operational 3D maneuver futurists wanted--but once on-the-ground, COMBAT OVERMATCHING mobility, armor protection and firepower.
As great as the M2 .50 caliber Heavy Machine Gun is, had the ACAVs had been instead armed with 30mm autocannon shooting exploding HE shells, the ACRs would have winkled out hiding VC/NVA far better than just KE bullets that don't explode. 30mm autocannon could have been fitted to O-1 Bird Dogs with a pair of 250 pound bombs with upgraded turbine engines--STOL Combat Grasshoppers---like the Italian Army has to render 24/7/365 air surveillance/attack that suppresses/evicts enemies from closed, vegetated terrains better than crapola UH-1 Huey helicopters that are too complex to fly often or long enough.
[ Ссылка ]
Regardless, the tracked-tank-based, 11th ACR of Vietnam would kick-the-ass of today's pathetic U.S. Army road/trail-bound, wheeled truck, tankless light IBCTs, Stryker Clintonistic permissive peacekeeping, pussy wagon brigades and the also easily-ambushed, truck-hopping USMC foot slogsters.
