Most terrifying weapon for the infantryman

helimachoptor

Was watching some stuff over the weekend and it got me thinking, out of all the weapons used in wars so far there is on which if i was an infantry man would scare the s**t out of me and thats the flame thrower!

In Band of Brothers Easy company lose a lot of men to a pillbox but they manage to get a flame unit up there and take it out. The Germans come out on fire but Easy company let them burn. Must be a horrible way to go.

Another one is an anti personnel mine, getting your leg blown off

So guys if you were an infantry man what weapon would you least like to come up against?

meditraitor

helimachoptor wrote: »

Another one is an anti personnel mine, getting your leg blown off

These nasty things would put the ****s up anyone......

biko

Definitely flame thrower. Bullets and knife wounds don't hurt half as much as burning.

Dinter

Any of the WW1 gases. At least the newer ones are quicker and cleaner.

Poccington

Anything that results in my death, that includes rampaging donkeys.

eroo

Bouncing betty's

Manic Moran

Artillery. Anything else, be it flamethrowers or land mines, I can shoot at or otherwise take active action against. Nothing worse than taking fire and not being able to do a damned thing about it.

NTM

Pyr0

Mines, artillery, and snipers would do it for me !

"Johnson, run out there and draw fire from that sniper shooting at us from somewhere !"

"F*ck that sh1t !"

o1s1n

Those Vietnamese spike pits always scared the ****e out of me...in films.

Corega

Napalm or phosphorous grenades, rolling around on the ground or dousing yourself with water will only make it worse.

Hagar

Russian female infantry put the wind up a fair few Germans. I wouldn't like to face them.

Heckler

helimachoptor wrote: »

Was watching some stuff over the weekend and it got me thinking, out of all the weapons used in wars so far there is on which if i was an infantry man would scare the s**t out of me and thats the flame thrower!

In Band of Brothers Easy company lose a lot of men to a pillbox but they manage to get a flame unit up there and take it out. The Germans come out on fire but Easy company let them burn. Must be a horrible way to go.

Another one is an anti personnel mine, getting your leg blown off

So guys if you were an infantry man what weapon would you least like to come up against?

That was Saving Private Ryan not Band of Brothers. The airbourne didn't land on the beaches.

Heckler

That said you are right. Burning to death is one of my biggest fears.

Poccington

Heckler wrote: »

That was Saving Private Ryan not Band of Brothers. The airbourne didn't land on the beaches.

He didn't mention the beaches.

There was pillboxes in more places than the beaches.

arybvtcw0eolkf

helimachoptor wrote: »

So guys if you were an infantry man what weapon would you least like to come up against?

A sniper's bullet.

Heckler

Poccington wrote: »

He didn't mention the beaches.

There was pillboxes in more places than the beaches.

Theres no scene in Band of Brothers where they assault a pillbox, flamethrow it and let the germans burn. Its clearly one of the scenes from the opening half hour of Saving Private Ryan. I'm not trying to be an asshole correcting him and I'm sorry if i came across as such. Fair enough ?

iceage

friendly fire, of any form, normally lethal.

And silent farts....nothin worse.

helimachoptor

Heckler wrote: »

That was Saving Private Ryan not Band of Brothers. The airbourne didn't land on the beaches.

Poccington wrote: »

He didn't mention the beaches.

There was pillboxes in more places than the beaches.

I must watch BoB again but I was sure it was BoB

Morpheus

www.youtube.com/watch?v=unEHgZrHBgQ

definitely saving private ryan.

most terrifying weapon. M230 chain gun in an apache, ever seen those infrared and night videos? NOWHERE to run and you cant shoot back!!! just one of those rounds will make a mess of you.

iceage

A10 tankbuster..:eek:

Leadership

Lost my career to a Yugoslav PMR 2 antipersonal mine when it removed a large piece of my leg in 1999. Nasty pieces of kit and dangerous to neutralise as they are staked into the ground with a piece of untreated wood. These rot over time and they can go off just by causing vibrations on the ground near them.

So anti personel mines / bobby traps are my feared weapon. Evil things designed to cause horrific injuries and not to kill. Worst mines then are bounding mines. When initiated they jump to testicle height with a small powder charge and then explode. Nasty and evil!!!!!

iceage

Indeed they are Leadeship. Sorry to hear about that, its a tough break thats for sure. Think that really ends the most terrifying weapon for the Infantaryman guys would you agree? There are millions of these devices scattered around the globe that maim and kill indiscrimately. A total nasty bastard of a device to be sure.

the_syco

Mines have to be the worst. Anything else, is shot or thrown at you.

Mines... you could be walking through the French countryside, and get blown up by an American/German/etc landmine. Totally random.

helimachoptor

the_syco wrote: »

Mines have to be the worst. Anything else, is shot or thrown at you.

Mines... you could be walking through the French countryside, and get blown up by an American/German/etc landmine. Totally random.

I was working in Kosovo (telecoms) last year and honestly one thing that scare dme s**tless, walking along the road and you could kick something and your leg would be gone.

Pyr0

You'd have the be the unluckiest guy to step on a mine in ireland, imagine the odds of that ?

Saw a documentary on mines a year or two ago, some serious stuff going on with those alright. Ball bearings, crotch height jumping mines, trip wired explosives, AT mines, wooden mines, nail bombs the works !

Lockstep

Napalm would be an awful way to go.
As well as the widespread landmines (apparently they can be got for as little as $2)

Leadership

kickoutthejams wrote: »

As well as the widespread landmines (apparently they can be got for as little as $2)

In Rwanda I have seen these for sale in a market for $2, if you buy 5 though you get one free! These were old Eastern Bloc mines (PMD's) that the shelf life has expired so really dangerous! Often you could trip one but the trigger device is rusty or seized and in effect what you have then is a time bomb as they could explode at any time or a mine that could go off at any time without being activated.

Leadership

Pyr0 wrote: »

Saw a documentary on mines a year or two ago, some serious stuff going on with those alright. Ball bearings, crotch height jumping mines, trip wired explosives, AT mines, wooden mines, nail bombs the works !

I visited a factory in Bosnia where a group of old women were putting together PMD-6 based wood cased mines. It was like a cottage industry with the whole family getting involved, the men were cutting the timber and building the cases, the children were measuring the explosive and the women were putting everything together and boxing them up.

It was kind of sad really, each mine cost less than a dollar to put together and the family were paid 10cents a mine.

iceage

ffs. news of the Ottawa Treaty obviously didn't reach them then..but in desperation for the misely few cents to feed families.........A different world we live in guys. We can be thankful for that at least.

Leadership

iceage wrote: »

ffs. news of the Ottawa Treaty obviously didn't reach them then..but in desperation for the misely few cents to feed families.........A different world we live in guys. We can be thankful for that at least.

Ottawa treaty is a bit of a joke, with the US, Russia & China refusing to sign up along with the majority of the Asian hot spot countries unfortunately this is a menace that will not go away. Also bobby traps are still included and these are in essence still anti personnel mines and more devious.

meanmachine3

i agree with the flame thower but another weapon i know it's not infantry but it still scared the **** of the germans was the katyusha BM 8 aka stalins organ. i'm reading a good book i got during the weekend called weapons of world war ii. brilliant piece of stuuf and it goes into detail of most of the weapons of that period

iceage

You waaaa? (everybody charges to Wiki, looking for Stalins bits!)I freely admit, I 've never heard of that.

Leadership

iceage wrote: »

You waaaa? (everybody charges to Wiki, looking for Stalins bits!)I freely admit, I 've never heard of that.

I believe they are multiple rockets kind of like MLRS. Thinking about it MLRS is fairly scary, each launcher can take out a grid square in one go.

Flame throwers would have been a powerful tool however these are largely obsolete now.

helimachoptor

Leadership wrote: »

Flame throwers would have been a powerful tool however these are largely obsolete now.

Agreed even if the Afghanistan caves, the caves are to deep to be affected by the FT units. But just from watching old clips of it, it must be a horrible horrible way to go.

Leadership

IMO the I would have expected the operator of the flame thrower to be as scared as the lads in a bunker when firing. Saving Private Ryan has some great shots of these units exploding.

whydave

White phosphorus (WP) bombs

Skyhawk1990

Anything that you can't shoot back at.:o

helimachoptor

Leadership wrote: »

IMO the I would have expected the operator of the flame thrower to be as scared as the lads in a bunker when firing. Saving Private Ryan has some great shots of these units exploding.

I've read some books on Vietnam and in one (the name escapes me) the VC were so afraid of the FC units they would concentrate on taking out the FT man by shooting his tanks and hopefully blowing him up... again a horrible way to go

Frisbee

Definitely a flamethrower for me....

Leadership

whydave wrote: »

White phosphorus (WP) bombs

They look like fire works going off so far too pretty to scare a grunt. Now once you have white phosphor burning into your skin thats a different story :eek:

bunny shooter

An officer with a map

Leadership

bunny shooter wrote: »

An officer with a map

To right, a young officer nearly got my unit wiped out on Gulf War 1 by being 20km's ahead of the main battle group. We were 3 old centurion tanks, a couple of CVRT's and a lorry full of chemical toilets who lost his unit and followed us.

Grizzly 45

The whole Bloody lot of it!!!!Take your pick... It has one purpose to either kill or mutilate your Ass!!!

Duffers

Leadership wrote: »

To right, a young officer nearly got my unit wiped out on Gulf War 1 by being 20km's ahead of the main battle group. We were 3 old centurion tanks, a couple of CVRT's and a lorry full of chemical toilets who lost his unit and followed us.

LMAO

Some great dits from you on this thread Leadership!

I'd have to say the IED or landmine threat would be the one that would get me flapping.

Poccington

Leadership wrote: »

They look like fire works going off so far too pretty to scare a grunt. Now once you have white phosphor burning into your skin thats a different story :eek:

Which is why I hate setting up trip flares.

arybvtcw0eolkf

For me it was coming under small arms fire and not arty or arial bombing, why?

Because anytime I was under either arty or arial bombing it was indescriminate. Sit tight, have a smoke, play charades LOL or whatever.

But small arms fire for me was different. It mean't someone had me in their sights and wanted to kill me.