Combat Mission Unit Guide: US Rifle Companies in WW2

[@sproge2142]

It always gets me when I play US forces after playing as or against the Germans, I go "wow no squad MG, I feel totally outclassed, I hate these units without MGs!". But then I play as the Brits and I go "I take back everything bad I said about the US forces, my squads can't kill anything and I think a bayonet charge would be more effective 😭"..... But then you play as the Poles...... Enough said 🤣

[@arial7658]

Do the Poles totally lack MG's? Idk how they differ from commonwealth forces

[@MilesStratton]

One slight issue to pick at. It's a common myth that the US was sued for the development of the Springfield, this is false. The US Government and Mauser worked out a very amicable deal where royalties were properly payed out. The issue started when Mauser's parent company DWM (Deutche Waffen und Munitionsfabriken) tried to get the US to pay over their use of pointed bullets. The US Courts at the time threw the case out because the US proved it had experiments with pointed bullets going far back into the early 1890s long before DWM's patent. So the issue was dropped. DURING WW1 HOWEVER, the US illegally seized DWM's patent, nationalized it, and was sued after the war for illegal seizure for which the US government had to pay damages to DWM for. Beyond this one issue, excellent video as always m8 :D

[@dudududu1926]

Kinda crazy how you can sue your enemy even if you lost the war.

[@MilesStratton]

​@@dudududu1926 the law is the law and once the war was over that sort of thing is totally fair game. 😂

[@usuallyhapless9481]

On the plus side, the myth version can fit into a quick throwaway line and is not 100% inaccurate :P

[@bobbyjewell2188]

🤓

[@M1912TrenchGun]

8:00 Few know this but the XO and his 1911 are the Company's dedicated anti-tank team.

[@zanaduz2018]

So is *that* how Captain Miller managed to take out that Tiger at the end of Saving Private Ryan...?

[@M1912TrenchGun]

@@zanaduz2018 Absolutely. Horvath tried to use a Bazooka and failed, having foolishly thrown away his 1911. Such attention to anti-tank doctrine is why Miller was an officer and Horvath a mere enlisted man.

[@4rnnr_as]

Lmao! Love it!

[@devilin100]

Somewhere out there is a report that our platoon heavy anti tank was myself verbally evicerating Opfor on the radio in the most falsetto voice I can muster.

[@c3aloha]

The cult of maneuverability and the BAR is still very strong in the American mind. The USMC abandoned the M249 SAW to go to the HK M27 IAR basically giving every rifleman a modern BAR!

[@realQuiGon]

I love the unit guide series! I'm hoping for more units guides on the modern titles though.

[@doubleseven1463]

Would love to see a guards motor rifle organization

[@Coddykin]

My favorite infantry company in the WW2 games, the whole formation is just so well rounded and has a little bit of everything you could want in it. The 60mm mortars in particular are so useful.

[@capthawkeye8010]

The games are a bit optimistic about them. Combat Mission doesn't usually portray entrenched enemies with overhead cover that was actually quite common. The 60mm round the M2 fired was too light. That it could fire indirectly was its best gimmick-few other light mortars could do this, but it was on the heavy side as far as infantry mortars went. It wasn't a bad weapon by any stretch-but most Armies were getting away from light mortars during the war and scaling-up to Heavy Mortars as these could actually defeat most entrenchments-and could sometimes even outshoot Division Artillery. The big issue is that 60mm is literally useless against any kind of overhead cover-there were allegedly cases of German troops surviving rounds landing right next to them. Both the Germans and Russians ditched their light mortars during the war or sent them to garrison troops. The British kept their's mainly because they valued the smoke and illumination rounds the 2inch fired.

[@hjorturerlend]

@@capthawkeye8010 Another thing is that Combat Mission kinda fails to portray just how mediocre the BAR was. Low ammo capacity *and* slow reloads puts it behind pretty much all other WW2 LMGs as almost* all the others fulfilled at least one of those criteria. Overall yes, the lack of a proper fortification system in CM diminishes the difference between lighter and heavier artillery. *except the Italian Breda M30 and the Finnish M/26

[@capthawkeye8010]

@@hjorturerlend It doesn't do a bad job at this. The forums were full of guys complaining for years how US Infantry being worthless because of how easily suppressed they were. The real issue that is the games (especially Normandy and Fortress Italy) were following US ToEs exactly when in reality infantry squads were almost always carrying more than one BAR. Army ToEs later changed to reflect reality in late 1944 and Final Blitz gets it right by showing more BARs at squad level. Of course this issue can be fixed in any of the games by just assigning extra BAR teams to Platoon HQs in the editor no one knows how to work. Now there are wooden dugouts in Combat Mission but they can't be linked to each other via underground pathways. This isn't a huge problem-but the major issue is that bunkers in the game distort the terrain mesh and thus can be seen through fog-of-war. So the scenario designers frequently dislike using them because of how hideous they are. There are other issues with the fortification mechanics too-like how barbed wire doesn't actually stop infantry and mines cannot be truly disabled by engineers of any skill level. A lot of this gets into how frequently the game's scenarios and campaigns are just badly designed and scored though. They steer the player far too often into scripted bloodbaths but that's another topic entirely.

[@stratslinger1956]

@@capthawkeye8010 You are correct in stating that the Germans and Soviets gave up the idea of light mortars, you are incorrect on the matter of why they did so. The German 50mm mortar had nearly a pound less of high explosives than did the American 60mm round and the Soviet 50mm round even less. The U.S. Army retained the 60mm round for multiple reasons, the first being that the U.S. light mortar packed a helluva lot more punch than any contemporary equivalents did (excepting the French Brandt mortar which it was largely copied from), and it was easily portable and made to be a company commander's pocket artillery. As for the 60mm round's effectiveness against hardened positions, that was largely irrelevant for the WWII U.S. Army, they only faced those types of fortifications at Omaha Beach and the Siegfried Line. Aside from those types of prepared positions the M2 was fired against field improvised fortifications which, aside from very heavily reinforced log/sandbag fortifications, it could breach and never mind the fact that in most German defensive lines on the Western Front those types of prepared positions were few and far between. After Overlord, Allied troops on the Western Front very rarely encountered hardened defensive positions aside from those on the Siegfried Line and for anything short of those encounters, 60mm was a significant force multiplier. In a fluid, mobile war where the most extensive fortifications are foxholes and trenches, 60mm mortars are exceedingly effective at the tactical level. Had the German and Soviet light mortars packed an equivalent punch, they would have retained them, but they didn't. For 10 lbs more than an M191A4 MMG, the weapons platoon of a U.S. infantry company could carry a light (very light, admittedly) indirect fire weapon that punched considerably above its own weight and results in CM tell the story; if used attached to a platoon, often as direct fire, the M2s are like a light artillery sniper weapon and if used as an infantry company's immediate light artillery they provide a faster and heavier indirect response than anything comparable. The U.S. Army utilized them because they were a unique tool in the kit that no other army of the time possessed

[@stratslinger1956]

@@hjorturerlend Slow reloads? To insert a magazine and pull the trigger again is about as far from a "slow reload" as can be imagined. The M1918 fires from an open bolt, meaning that when the last round of a magazine fires the bolt locks back and you simply insert a new magazine and pull the trigger to send the bolt forward to fire the next round. Slow reloads are most certainly not a deficit of this weapon. What are, however, are the 20 round magazine and the lack of a quick change barrel. The first is nowhere near the deficit that is commonly described in common literature as 20 rounds in a mag as opposed to 30 rounds is not so much different when firing at 500+ rounds a minute, and 20 vs 30 rounds is what we're talking about when the B.A.R. is compared negatively to its contemporaries such as the Bren. Obviously you'd rather have 30 than 20 as when discussing ammunition capacity more is better than fewer always, but again, 10 rounds more at 500 rpm is not a whole lot more. The quick change barrel is far more significant, if you find yourself in a firefight in which you are exceeding the sustained fire rate of the weapon you are in deep shit and the ability to swap barrels quickly is quite important, and as such this is the B.A.R.'s biggest failing. That being said, this failing was alnost never seen in combat in WWII because even at the full fire rate of 550-600 rpm, it takes a lot, LOT of fire to overcome the M1918's very heavy barrel. If you actually need to sustain a fire rate more than the barrel can handle you are in deep shit and, in that case, you more than likely can count on having M1919A4s and M1917A1s to take up the slack. So, therefore, CM's depiction of the effectiveness of the U.S. Infantry squad is not at all out of reality. It also must be said that the U.S.infantry squad is the sum of its parts rather than any individual contribution; ie, while the U.S. squad might have the least impressive S.A.W. for any faction, it is more than made up for by the fact that any one member of the squad has nothing less than a semi-auto weapon

[@seanmac1793]

You know it's a good thing the BAR was kinda underwhelming. Otherwise, these US infantry formations would just kinda be nuts

[@michaelsnyder3871]

Tanks, TDs and AA artilery, along with guns and howitzers of 155mm and up (except for the 12 in the DIVARTY GS Bn) were pooled as Bns at the Army level and distributed as needed. At the very least, an infantry division designated the main effort in a corps could expect a tank Bn (17 M5 light tanks and 54 M4 Shermans) and a TD Bn (Towed 36 3" Gun M5/M6 or SP, 36 GMC M10 3". Thanks to McNair, towed Bns began replacing SP Bns in early 1944 based on experience of the Italian campaign. After his death and the experience in NW Europe, most towed Bns were replaced w/SP GMCs M18 and M36). There might be two or three attached 155mm howitzer bns, motorized engineer bns, additional truck companies and one Auto-AA Weapons Bn w/36 40mm M1 or 36 M15/M16 quad .50s or the M15A1 combo 37mm/twin .50s.). Another attachment might be a chemical mortar bn or co. The Bn had 36 4.2" M2 mortars, firing HE and smoke/WP bombs. The HE bombs were introduced in 1943. Tank and TD bns were often attached by companies to RCTs. This means a rifle company could be reinforced by four M4 tanks, 4 M10 GMCs or 4 3" guns.

[@kennethruns]

Best company, has completely broken my ability to use other WW2 armies because I get annoyed that they’re so inflexible

[@prestongarvey7745]

I don’t know why but these videos are so addictive to me. But I guess you can count on me being here for any future videos like this.

[@Euan_Miller43]

The unit guide series is great, you really provide so much value to CM with all the content

[@fvmarrafon]

I can’t wait for the unit guide series to reach some Black Sea units Thank you in advance

[@Brille_Zwo]

Wonderful video there again, hapless ! One minor adition I have to make here, and I praise battlefront for the attention to detail, is that a Garand with the rifle grenade adapter is a bolt action rifle, simply put. The adapter itself deactivates the gas piston system because of the resulting overpressure due to the bigger charge that is needed to propell the grenade. So every time those soldiers shoot their rifle normally you see that they cycle their weapons after each shot. Just nice to know maybe. :)

[@ravenwargaming5612]

I love these types of analysis videos, talking about different unit formations/how they're structured/how to use them.

[@seankong9733]

Just bought CMBN for myself so this is a welcome guide! Can't wait to get stuck in with my GIs

[@ccccccc95]

Absolutely! I’ve been waiting on this video for a minute. Great analysis and explanations!

[@CCOOKE88]

This series is great man, keep it up. You should do the modern US army mechanized companies!

[@thewitherchannel1053]

the holy word from the Pope of CM himself. Congrats on this steady flow of great content

[@Sky2004-j2t]

This series is hella good man,it would be very interesting to see other infantry companies, like jagers,fusilers, gebirgsjagers etc, etc...

[@MandolinMagi]

A few notes, and yes I'm late Thompson SMG isn't really a squad weapon, but it's good enough, the US never really seemed to issue SMGs to infantry, and they floated around in company level weapons pools and from vehicles There should be at least one and possibly two more rifle grenadiers in each squad. Also, they should each have at least five and possibly 11 grenades each, as the ammo bag would hold 11 grenades. I'd be interested to see a rifle grenadier with 22 grenades and no rifle ammo, but that's just me spitballing. From late 44 the M15 rifle grenade sight is available. The frag rifle grenade was actually phased out in mid-late 1944, the 0.75oz EC powder/guncotton filling was so underwhelming it was dropped in favor of the M9A1 rifle grenade with its 4oz charge of pentolite. Upgraded Mk II frags with TNT fill and projector adaptors eventually showed up from January 1945 far as I can tell. M1A1 vs M9A1 bazooka: M1A1 has iron sights with 100/200/300 yard increments. M9A1 has a bar sight with 50 yard increments to 600 yards and later a optical ring with same increments and lead indicators for 10/20/30/40 mph. M1A1 fires M6A1 rocket with 76mm pen. M6A1 is very sensitive to angles and past 20 degrees probably won't do anything. M9A1 fires M6A3, 100mm pen, good for up to 50 degrees from vertical. M6A5 could show up *very* latewar with 127mm pen. M6A3C/D/F show up at some point and have more sensitive fuzes, which could increase pen but that's getting overly nitty-gritty and A3C replaced A3 in March 1945, so probably too late to matter. D/F are cold weather rockets Bazooka...the carry bag holds 3 rockets, so a single bazooka gunner should have 3-4 rockets and any dedicated assistant 8, or just assume each rifleman is carrying one extra so IDK WP round are available for both bazooka and rifle grenade, though they might get restricted to specialist/engineer units.

[@kondor99999]

These are awesome, thanks!

[@evolve117]

Oh the units Continue can't wait for the next one

[@Palma5025]

What a surprising treat!

[@shawnclarke9414]

Always love seeing your videos!!!

[@masonm9316]

Another excellent video! I love my US rifle company! Had one platoon line abreast is decimating. They also work great with a hammer and anvil strategy.

[@nbr1rckr]

Y'know that post you made about the letter M makes a lot more sense now and I feel stupid not catching on sooner. Mm mm good.

[@PitterPatter20]

I just remembered the Italians existed. Could you do a unit guide on them?

[@Its_shiki_time4876]

This rifle co. Is very similar to the marine TO in CMSF2 with the exception of no burst fire, less lmgs and less grenade launchers but in terms of maneuver would operate the same. I feel like i could hop on this game and intuitively know how to use them considering i use the marines extensively. (I just love the size of marine squads in a modern title, maneuver options and capacity to handle attrition is just unrivaled.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

Yep. 12 is a good number for infantry squads. The modern problem seems to be that it's less of a good number to fit into an IFV

[@Its_shiki_time4876]

@@usuallyhapless9481 that's a good point, but honestly I don't even use tanks when using the marines. I kinda got addicted to developing the battlefield with infantry and artillery + drones and air. The slow burn of movement to contact than a final explosion of contact and last 100 yards is spectacular however difficult to pull off.

[@Ryan-cy7zw]

The springfield rifleman's left hand 💀

[@mjkypta]

Head and soldiers above German companies? I think the wealth of MG series across a kompanie says otherwise, even before the regular rifleman begins to get more flexible weapons than bolts.

[@jondoe6663]

Oh hey, an new Hapless vid.

[@jimmydesouza4375]

Does Combat mission simulate US "last ditch" units. They're a part of the war I never even knew about until I started watching veteran's interviews.

[@renes9966]

I’ve never heard of this concept!

[@MilesStratton]

Red Thunder features Volkssturm formations but thats about as close as it gets.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

There are 'Straggler' units represented in Final Blitzkrieg, which are thrown together remnants of forces. But honestly, 'Last Ditch' stuff is not something I associate with the Allies in late WW2.

[@jimmydesouza4375]

@@usuallyhapless9481 "But honestly, 'Last Ditch' stuff is not something I associate with the Allies in late WW2" Neither did I. That's why it took me by surprise when I found out about it. Conscripting clerical staff with medical exemptions for fighting into assaulting German held bunkers and the like. Kind of thing you'd expect from the Russians.

[@mkeogh76]

@@jimmydesouza4375 Squads with conscript/green experience levels and bad fatigue modifiers can be used to represent such emergency culls of rear echelon cooks and typists.

[@sirfanatical8763]

Didn't you say the video will be broght by the letter "M"? Unless it was MURICA! Besidess, I like the difference in relying on the infantry small arms to put out fire instead of a dedicated machinegun. I incerely hope that they'll make a game in the pacific.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

The M1 Garand, M1918 BAR, M1903A4 Springfield, M7 Grenade Launcher, M1919... etc etc :)

[@sirfanatical8763]

@@usuallyhapless9481 Didn't think that far in haha. BTW could you cover the free french one time? They seem really interesting.

[@breandank3026]

Praying you release a new vid on final blitzkrieg cause I’m getting my ass handed to me with all garand squads 😭

[@dimazaharov8565]

What is a purpose of XO in in-game terms and usefulness?

[@bannerhorde6506]

Are you planning to do the Italians? Wondering just how bad they are

[@CODRD]

Can you cover the American Armoured Infantry Company?

[@abram4806]

Idk but I swear this game was on Mobile before but I can’t find it anymore???

[@artemisfowl7191]

66mm is quite large in comparison to German rifle grenades

[@Stuart-e6y]

No bren no tea no bully beef no thanks

[@gareththompson2708]

Ah yes, American WW2 infantry. The American's definitely had the best universally issued rifle of the war. The M1 Garand is absolutely amazing, basically putting Cold War levels of firepower into the hands of every American rifleman (this statement based on the fact that most NATO armies gave their infantry battle rifles, rather than assault rifles, most of the way through the Cold War). I have mixed opinions on the BAR, and I think the American's may have missed an opportunity with it. On the one hand, as an automatic rifle it definitely cannot compete with a GPMG like the MG-34 or MG-42 in firepower, and isn't even really the equal of a light machine gun like the Bren. But one advantage it did have over those weapons is that it was not a crew served weapon. This means that unlike the Bren or the MG-42, each BAR only eats up one rifleman, not two or three, since there is no need for a loader/assistant gunner. You can really only ever practically have one Bren or MG-42 on a squad, since adding a second of either cuts into your "bayonet power" too much. But two or three BARs on a squad is absolutely practical. An advantage that was completely wasted when the US Army decided to only assign one BAR to each squad. One BAR provides some really anemic automatic firepower to the squad compared to the MG-42, or even the Bren. And it makes up an even smaller proportion of the squad's firepower when you consider that every rifleman has a semi-automatic rifle. But two BARs on a squad might have provided more automatic firepower than the British squad has with the Bren, and three BARs may even have been able to compete with an MG-42. A missed opportunity in my opinion. If you are only going to have one automatic weapon on the squad you are better off going with a true light machine gun like the Bren. And yes, I know that there sometimes is a second BAR (both historically and in Combat Mission), but this was done ad-hoc and was never doctrinal as far as I know (until post-war, when a second BAR was officially authorized (which is something we would get to see if we ever got a Combat Mission game set in Korea)). Up on the company level, I have a high opinion of the M1919 and the 60mm mortars. I feel like the M1919 is the equal of the MG-34/42 in the medium machine gun role. The one thing that the MG-34/42 has over the M1919 is that it is a GPMG, able to transition smoothly from the light machine gun role to the medium machine gun role, whereas the M1919 was just a medium machine gun. I just wish we had a few more of them in the company (I'm not really sure why they couldn't have been a platoon level asset rather than a company level asset). And having those 60mm mortars on the company level is really useful. I go back and forth between keeping them consolidated to fire on company level objectives, and splitting them up to support the platoons (depending on the situation (if there just aren't good sight lines for an FO to direct effective mass fires I will just split the mortars between the platoons so they can more readily fire on targets of opportunity in support of the platoons)), but in either role I think they are more useful than the British 2-inch mortars.

[@usuallyhapless9481]

I probably should have pointed out that the BAR was a one man weapon, didn't even think of that. Good catch!

[@holoween8103]

To be fair MGs arent really required at squad level if you have sufficient firepower on the individual riflemen. German stg organizations are sometimes completely without mgs at squad level. Also visible in the modern titles where loosing the squad mgs is often barely noticable. MGs also have the CM unique disadvantedge of taking forever to recover since the original carrier has to be fully medically treated before another soldier grabs the weapon.

[@gareththompson2708]

@@holoween8103 Not required doesn't mean they wouldn't still benefit from it. I definitely feel that the STG squads suffer for not having an MG (an STG-44 is no replacement for an MG-42). Even with the modern titles, the MG doesn't make much difference at close range, but is increasingly important at longer ranges when the riflemen switch to semi-automatic fire. At close range a squad armed with SMGs or assault rifles has enough firepower that an MG won't be missed. What the MG provides isn't just automatic fire, but stable and accurate automatic fire out to long ranges.

[@sirfanatical8763]

Ye, I agree that each platoon should have had one. Comparable to the M240Ls in modern platoons.

[@grapeape7284]

Snipers and marksmen are generally pretty useless in CM

[@Palma5025]

Not for spotting IMHO.

[@Brille_Zwo]

I would say that you deploy them wrong then. The squad embedded marksman don´t stand out that much but he enables a squad to rach enemies that are further away. Sole sniper teams stand out more in that matter but they cannot be used that offensively or they die pretty early. Better put them at the edge of the front and out of small arms reach and in good concealment. Let them do their thing, without giving them direct target order whom they have to shoot. Often they need some ranging shots but when they are on target they are dangerous. The game changer here is their experience and their position. A well placed sniper team can annihilate a weaponsteam or just a simple infantry squad from a save distance what a normal squad couldn´t do at range. So better buy them at least on veteran or even better. Regulars or worse are not that special....those are really just some dudes with a scoped rifle. :D

[@capthawkeye8010]

Marksmen are just like other rifleman-they scored higher than the other guys in firing drills and that's why they got a rifle with an optic. Snipers in theory wouldn't even be present in the average CM scenario. Three hundred plus guys in a tiny km x km grid square fighting a pitched battle would be way too much traffic for the average sniper-who thrive in low-intensity environments. The issue is CM scenarios always encourage bloodbaths-and funnel the player into high casualty confrontations with entrenched enemies on overpopulated maps. Most Snipers would evade the typical company scale engagement of CM battle-there's just too many guys around who could notice you.

[@c.j.3404]

Pretty funny lissoning to the praise on this unit considering how quickly the us army got rid of this organization for one closer to Germany after the war.😂

[@usuallyhapless9481]

It's funny how often people start copying the people they just beat

[@c.j.3404]

@Usually Hapless well the us armys reasoning was that the three team structure was to complicated for a squad (someone should tell the marines)and they felt light machine guns added more fier power then the the bar did, so they bilt the squad (and this was the lay out from 1946 to pentomic) around 2 lmg fier teams. 😆

[@olivesandgrapesareok9324]

Sooooo?……….. Red Army and Italian Army Next 😂