Helicopter Operations

[rotorwash]

In Vietnam I was in an AML, the typical UH-1 unit. We had two platoons of UH-1D/H, 10 each, 8 UH-1C/M gunships, a HQ UH-1 and a maintenance UH-1. There was a Huey company assigned to each brigade and a Chinook company at division in GS role.

The next TO&E for division units pulled the gunships from the UH-1 companies and put them in their own co. replacing them with more D/H models.

Your TO&E for air cav is valid. OH aircraft were not in their own company, the were distributed to brigade aviation sections.

An ACR had a HQ aviation section with 10 UH-1D/H, each AC squadron had a section of 4 aircraft and there was an air cav troop.

Each company had a Transportation Corp maint detachment, an avionics detachment and a medical detachment attached.

Because the companies operated out of the bde firebase, usually fuel and maintenance were located there and were easily accessible. If a temporary refueling point was needed, it was operated by battalion.

After aviation units were assembled in brigades, the mission structure changed. No longer were ground commanders in charge of the air misson, now the aviation brigades largely determined what missions were supported.

My young cousin, who was in Iraq commanding an AH-64 co. and Afghanistan as air co-ordinator (S-3 air) for a bde of the 82 feels that the change in mission made aviation less responsive to the needs of the ground commander, in affect limiting the capabilities of the ground unit.

Marine air in Vietnam was controlled by III MAF HQ, which strangled a lot of their missions requiring pre-approval before even the simplest mission. Now they operate more like the Army did in Vietnam, they learned, the Army didn't.

Rotorwash

[craven]

Originally Posted by ipser

That seems reasonable. Now obviously you only need the helos when there is a fire but how long would you guess that helos could operate (allowing time for refueling and crew change/rest) before they needed major maintenance beyond what could be done overnight in the field?

barring major issues for weeks at a time. I think 100 hours flight time is a major maintence check but I could be wrong

[Freightshaker]

Originally Posted by ipser

Thanks again, everyone. I had previously dealth in a very simplistic way with ammo resupply (and punted on fuel and others) but with helicopters it is more immediately relevant to the conduct of longer scenarios.

But per Stryker's comment, I do want to apply this more generally.

Slightly off-topic question: I am very surprised by the number of helicopters sources give for US heavy battalions (1973 onwards, an aviation "brigade"):

OH6 60
AH1 60
UH1 54

HMW Aviation Brigade

(Other nations, e.g. Russia, tend to hold helos at the corps or above.)

Is that really the standard complement? What % would be operational in a high-intensity war at any given time? From the description so far it would seem that division helos are mostly avaialable with minimal downtime for refueling and rearming, though obviously crews would need rest.

Is it reasonable to think of the aviation brigade as being available similarly to artillery units? That is, the average heavy battalion would have a company of helicopters (more at the point of attack).

This should help you a little: FM 101-10-1/1, http://cgsc.cdmhost.com/cdm/compound.../id/395/rec/13.

The physical copy is huge, around 5" thick and contains EVERYTHING the unit is suppose to be equipped with, down to pistols and radios.
FM 101-10-1/2 has logistical planning data.

In peacetime, any commander with less than a 90% OR rate tends to lose their command. Wartime, that might be allowed to go down to 80%.

As for LOGPACs; didn't we discuss those in a previous thread a few years back?

[rotorwash]

Intermediate inspectins were required every 25 flight hours, periodic inspections at 100. This was the standard for all aircraft. An intermediate was performed by the crewchief and usually only took an hour or two, a periodic usually took a couple of days depending on what needed to be done. Time before overhaul (TBO) items were critical and could lengthen a periodic. Stateside unit readiness was measured by the length of time before TBO items were to be replaced.

Barring combat damage we held about a 75% flyable rate in Vietnam, at one time having 100% for about an hour.

One thing you need to look closely at for gunships (and you probably have) for your game is time on station. One reasons the companies were spread out among the brigades was to decrease time to trouble and increase time on staton. We felt we could be airborne and in radio contact with the requesting unit in 3 minutes, this is much longer for the AH-64. Time on station was limited by fuel to about an hour but we could expend our ordinance in about ten minutes of combat.

Rotorwash