Re: [FT] Weapons Cost for firing every other turn

My grandfather served with a tank unit during the war.	The three most
common mg postions were;

1.  Bow (next to the driver) for killing infantry specifically.  In
those days infantry had to get close to use an anti-tank weapon.  Most
modern tanks don't have them today since infantry can stay outside
effective mg range and still kill the tank.

2. Co-ax (next to the main gun) used for range finding.  It's much, much
better to fire a few tracer bullets into the distance than to use up
main gun ammo.	Besides, some vehicles could be destroyed with heavy mg
fire.  Most modern tanks tend to use lasers next to the main gun for the
same reason.  

3. Cupola (typically on the tank commanders turret) used for
anti-aircraft purposes.  Its use against infantry is tantamount to
suicide since you have to stand on top of and mostly out of cover of the
tank making you a very good target for anyone with a gun.  Guderian (a
very competent german panzer gereral) said that a good tank commander
keeps his head outside the armour at all times.  Unfortunately this
tends to get them killed.  The safest place for the crew against infanty
is inside the armour however this makes them almost blind and thus open
to anti-tank weaponary of the period.  Modern tanks still have this gun
even though they replace most of the others.  The US tends to make them
usable from INSIDE the tank while russia, etc still requires them to be
used OUTSIDE the tank.	Modern weaponary tend to make tank MGs less
useful than they were since most modern weaponary is longer ranged or
vastly quicker than an MG.

By way of a humourous point, check out the internet for the WW2 russian
KV-1 and KV-2.	A serious case of over-arming if ever I saw one.