Vulnerability of tanks, aircraft to lower TL attacks

On Mon, 29 Jun 1998 17:08:47 -0500 Thomas Barclay
<Thomas.Barclay@sofkin.ca> writes:
>
>
> The ability to manipulate gravity for
>> propulsion implies the ability to manipulate gravity as some sort of
>> weapon; if nothing else, some sort of glorified mine.  (To take a 
>page
>> from David Weber; a mine that enhances the efficiency of a 
>propulsion 
>> gravity field in a localized area of the field.  Yeow.)  
>
>Like a push-pull? Enhance the gravity in the nose and tail, reduce 
>the gravity in the middle - tear the vehicle apart with gravitic 
>stresses? Yeow indeed.
Or just to make the grav drive REAL efficient. The mine goes off, and
all
of a sudden that little bit of anti-gravity force is a whole lot of
anti-gravity thrust. Then you have a grav tank in orbit. Or, at least
really, really high up. And when the effects of the mine wear off, well,
tanks usually don't come with parachutes.

>I think the point (if you will) was about whether infantry without 
>modern combat gear (second line or poorly supplied) could take on 
>armour. The answer is "it depends on your TL and your armour." I 
>believe at some point, armour may become unassailable (just as I 
>personally believe aircraft action drills executed by rifleman are 
>just to make the rifleman feel good and maybe to scare the pilots - 
>not to actually damage air vehicles) to poorly equipped infantry. Of 
>course, if your setting allows cheap ass grav mines.... well that's 
>another situation.  
I suppose. I concede that modern aircraft are probably pretty close to
invulnerable to attack from infantry that's too much below TL. Afghan
guerilla's only managed to harm Soviet aircraft when they started
gettingthe CIA supplied Stingers. Comperable TL I should think. But what
about civil war infantry fighting Hinds? I don't know that the infantry
could do much to the Hinds. But then, they can't get anywhere near it.

As for tanks, look at the extreme. What would a Roman legion do to stop
an M1? Consider it a one-on-one duel. Well, I imagine the tank would
kill
an awful lot of Romans. Possibly it would get bogged down in all the
bodies? :-) Is it concievable that enough Romans piling on the tank
could
manage to stick a log in its tracks? I'm not so sure, but this is sort
of
the thing we want to think about. Then shift it a few TL--both sides.
Now
you've got grav tanks and WW2 infantry, say. 

At the very least, it could be an interesting discussion.

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