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Self-propelled Anti-aircraft
An anti-aircraft vehicle, also known as a self-propelled anti-aircraft gun (SPAAG) or self-propelled air defense system (SPAD), is a mobile vehicle with a dedicated anti-aircraft capability. Specific weapon systems used include machine guns, autocannons, larger guns, or missiles, and some mount both guns and longer-ranged missiles (e.g. the Pantsir-S1). Platforms used include both trucks and heavier combat vehicles such as armored personnel carriers and tanks, which add protection from aircraft, artillery, and small arms fire for front line deployment. Anti-aircraft guns are usually mounted in a quickly-traversing turret with a high rate of elevation, for tracking fast-moving aircraft. They are often in dual or quadruple mounts, allowing a high rate of fire. In addition, most anti-aircraft guns can be used in a direct-fire role against surface targets to great effect. Today, missiles (generally mounted on similar turrets) have largely supplanted anti-aircraft guns, but they m ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Birch Gun
The Birch Gun was the first practical British self-propelled artillery gun, built at the Royal Arsenal, Woolwich in 1925. Despite proving itself a practical proposition the Birch Gun was never highly regarded by the British High Command, not for any particular defect or capability issue, but due to the belief that such an innovation was unrequired, expensive and unnecessary.Named after General Sir Noel Birch, who was Master General of Ordnance at the time, the Birch gun comprised a Vickers Medium Mark II tank chassis originally fitted with a QF 18-pounder (83.8 mm) gun. This remained the armament in all the models, although the latest version, generally called the Mk III, had limited elevation. Birch Guns were used in the Experimental Mechanized Force manoeuvres of 1928, but by 1931 they had been removed from service and political pressure was applied to prevent any plans to complete the third revision of the weapon. Armament The armament for the original Birch Gun consi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bofors 40 Mm L/60 Gun
The Bofors 40 mm Automatic Gun L/60 (often referred to simply as the "Bofors 40 mm gun", the "Bofors gun" and the like, see name) is an anti-aircraft autocannon, designed in the 1930s by the Swedish arms manufacturer AB Bofors. The gun was designed as an intermediate anti-aircraft gun, filling the gap between fast firing close-range small calibre anti-aircraft guns and slower firing long-range high calibre anti-aircraft guns, a role which previously was filled by older outdated guns. The Bofors 40 mm L/60 was for its time perfectly suited for this role and outperformed competing designs in the years leading up to World War II in both effectiveness and reliability. It entered the export market around 1932 and was in service with 18 countries by 1939. Throughout World War II it became one of the most popular and widespread medium-weight anti-aircraft guns. It was used by the majority of the western Allies and some Axis powers such as Nazi Germany and Hungary. In the pos ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Avalon Hill
Avalon Hill Games Inc. is a game company that publishes wargames and strategic board games. It has also published miniature wargaming rules, role-playing games and sports simulations. It is a subsidiary of Hasbro, and operates under the company's "Hasbro Gaming" division. Avalon Hill introduced many of the concepts of modern recreational wargaming, including the use of a hexagonal grid (a.k.a. hexgrid) overlaid on a flat folding board, zones of control (ZOC), stacking of multiple units at a location, and board games based upon historical events. History The Avalon Game Company Avalon Hill was started in 1952 outside Baltimore in Catonsville, Maryland by Charles S. Roberts under the name of "The Avalon Game Company" for the publication of his game ''Tactics''. It is considered the first of a new type of war game, consisting of a self-contained printed map, pieces, rules and box designed for the mass-market. Other war games published over the prior half-century, which Rober ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Advanced Squad Leader
''Advanced Squad Leader'' (ASL) is a tactical wargames, tactical-level board wargame, originally marketed by Avalon Hill Games, that simulates actions of squad sized units in World War II. It is a detailed game system for two or more players (with solitary play also possible). Components include the ASL Rulebook and various games called modules. ASL modules provide the standard equipment for playing ASL, including geomorphic mapboards and counter (board wargames), counters. The mapboards are divided into hex map, hexagons to regulate fire and movement, and depict generic terrain that can represent different historical locations. The counters are cardboard pieces that depict squads of soldiers, crews, individual leaders, support weapons, heavy weapons, and vehicles. Combined with the sales of the original ''Squad Leader'', ''Advanced Squad Leader'' sold over 1 million copies by 1997. Introduction Fifteen core modules provide representations of nearly every troop type, vehicle, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
2 Pounder
2-pounder gun, 2-pounder and QF 2 pounder or QF 2-pdr are abbreviations used for various guns which fired a projectile weighing approximately 2 pounds (0.91 kg). These include: * QF 2 pounder Mk II & Mk VIII "pom-pom" Vickers 40mm naval anti-aircraft autocannon of the First World War and the Second World War * QF 2 pounder Mk XIV Rolls-Royce 40mm gun of the Second World War * QF 2 pounder Mk IX and Mk X British 40mm tank and anti-tank gun of the Second World War {{SIA Field artillery ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cannone Da 90/53
The Cannone da 90/53 was an Italian-designed cannon used both in an anti-aircraft role and as an anti-tank gun during World War II. It was one of the most successful anti-aircraft guns to see service during the conflict. The designation "90/53" meant that the gun had a 90 mm caliber and a barrel 53 caliber-lengths long. History Naval version In 1938, after a development period, the Ansaldo company produced a new heavy AA gun for the Regia Marina, to replace the obsolescent Škoda 10 cm K10 and K11 used for that role on Italian warships; initially 48 calibers long, it was eventually brought to 50 calibers. The Cannone da 90/50 Ansaldo Model 1938 and OTO Model 1939 had an autofretted monobloc barrel with a screwed-on breech ring containing the horizontal sliding breech block and seatings for the recoil and run-out cylinders. The most interesting part of the weapon was the single quadriaxal mounting designed for it: those were pre-stabilized, with a complex system contro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wirbelwind CFB Borden 2
The ''Flakpanzer'' IV "''Wirbelwind''" (Whirlwind in English) was a German self-propelled anti-aircraft gun based on the Panzer IV tank. It was developed in 1944 as a successor to the earlier ''Möbelwagen'' self-propelled anti-aircraft gun. In the first years of World War II, the German military forces had less interest in developing self-propelled anti-aircraft guns, but as the Allies began to gain air superiority, the need for more mobile and better-armed self-propelled anti-aircraft guns increased. During the early summer of 1944, SS-''Hauptsturmführer'' Karl Wilhelm Krause with the 12th SS Panzer Division ''Hitlerjugend'' came up with the concept of the ''Flakpanzer'' IV ''Wirbelwind''. He presented the concept to SS-''Obersturmbannführer'' Max Wünsche, commanding officer of the 12th SS Panzer Regiment and it was approved by Adolf Hitler. The Panzer IV's turret was removed and replaced with an open-top, nine-sided turret that housed a 2 cm ''Flakvierling'' 38, a quad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Flakvierling
The Flak 30 (''Flugzeugabwehrkanone 30'') and improved Flak 38 were 20 mm anti-aircraft guns used by various German forces throughout World War II. It was not only the primary German light anti-aircraft gun but by far the most numerously produced German artillery piece throughout the war. It was produced in a variety of models, notably the Flakvierling 38 which combined four Flak 38 autocannons onto a single carriage. Development The Germans fielded the unrelated early 2 cm Flak 28 just after World War I, but the Treaty of Versailles outlawed these weapons and they were sold to Switzerland. The original Flak 30 design was developed from the Solothurn ST-5 as a project for the Kriegsmarine, which produced the 20 mm C/30. The gun fired the "Long Solothurn", a 20 × 138 mm belted cartridge that had been developed for the ST-5 and was one of the more powerful 20 mm rounds. The C/30, featuring a barrel length of 65 calibres, had a fire rate of about ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Light Tank Mark VI
The Tank, Light, Mk VI was a British light tank, produced by Vickers-Armstrongs in the late 1930s, which saw service during the Second World War. Development history The Tank, Light, Mk VI was the sixth in the line of light tanks built by Vickers-Armstrongs for the British Army during the interwar period. The company had achieved a degree of standardization with their previous five models, and the Mark VI was identical in all but a few respects. The turret, which had been expanded in the Mk V to allow a three-man crew to operate the tank, was further expanded to give room in its rear for a wireless set. The weight of the tank was increased to , which although heavier than previous models actually improved its handling characteristics, and an engine was added to the model to increase its maximum speed to . It had the Horstmann coil-spring suspension system, which was found to be durable and reliable, although the fact that the tank was short in relation to its width and that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Franco-Thai War
The Franco-Thai War (October 1940 – January 28, 1941, th, กรณีพิพาทอินโดจีน, Krṇī phiphāth xindocīn; french: Guerre franco-thaïlandaise) was fought between Thailand and Vichy France over certain areas of French Indochina. Negotiations with France shortly before World War II had shown that the French government was willing to make appropriate changes in the boundaries between Thailand and French Indochina, but only slightly. Following the Fall of France in 1940, Major-General Plaek Pibulsonggram (popularly known as "Phibun"), the prime minister of Thailand, decided that France's defeat gave the Thais an even better chance to regain the vassal state territories that were ceded to France during King Chulalongkorn's reign. The German military occupation of Metropolitan France rendered France's hold on its overseas possessions, including French Indochina, tenuous. The colonial administration was now cut off from outside help and outside su ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
