Artillery

Artillery

The term artillery refers to any mounted gun or weapon that discharges missiles. The first example of artillery can be traced back to the Stone Age when there is evidence that prehistoric people used slings (probably made of animal hides or vines) to hurl rocks at prey. Another form of primitive artillery, the bow and arrow, was first used widely by the ancient Egyptians around 5000 b.c.

During the Middle Ages, catapults were used to attack walled cities and castles. Catapults operate on the same basic premise as bows and slings; each consists of a large arm that is restrained with a trigger mechanism. When the mechanism is released, the arm flings forward, hurling its ammunition at the target. Early catapults were capable of projecting a 180 lb (82 kg) shot up to 650 ft (198 m) away.

Probably the best known type of artillery is the cannon, or "firetube," which first appeared in the fourteenth century. These early cannons were made of circular bundles of iron bars held together with rings or hoops. They shot arrows, iron bolts, or round stones. Cannon made of cast iron or bronze appeared by the end of the fourteenth century. The fine gunpowder used in early cannons tended to burn slowly, but around 1425 it was discovered that wet powder, passed through a sieve, formed granules, which, when dried before igniting, provided a more powerful explosion. By the fifteenth century, huge cannon called bombards were built, which were capable of devastating castle and city walls. One famous bombard used against Constantinople in 1453 was so heavy it took sixty oxen and 200 men to move it. It took two hours to load it with a 1,600-pound (726 kg) stone ball, and could hit a target about a mile (1.6 km) distant.

Cannon design improved over the centuries, leading to smaller but more powerful, mobile and accurate weapons. Cannons of a Swiss design became prevalent in the eighteenth century, made from a bored-out piece of solid cast metal. The barrel of this kind of cannon was more uniform than earlier models, which were cast around a hollow core. Cannon accuracy also improved as military leaders gained greater understanding of the scientific principles underlying trajectory, projectile flight, and air resistance. The early nineteenth century also saw many innovations in cannon shot. Heavy iron balls were in many cases replaced by exploding shells filled with small shot. In 1851, John Dahlgren (1809-1870), an American naval officer, created an 11 inch (28 cm) gun (called the Dahlgren gun) which gained a well-deserved reputation during the American Civil War. He came up with a design in which the barrel wall was no thicker than necessary to contain the pressure of the expanding gases within the barrel. To do this, Dahlgren trimmed a great deal of the weight from the barrel of the cannon, giving the weapon a bottle shape.

Another type of artillery is the howitzer , a device that fires shells in a high arc. It was first used near the end of the seventeenth century by Anglo-Dutch armies. The name itself comes from the Dutch word, houwitser, meaning "slingshot." The mortar is another artillery piece that fires high-arcing projectiles. Early mortars were metal pots secured to a timber base used to fire large stone balls that, having fallen from a great height, were capable of inflicting extensive damage on their targets. Wilfred Stokes developed the modern 3 in (8 cm) mortar for the English Army during World War I.

Another type of artillery to emerge in World War I was the infamous " Paris Gun," a giant weapon with a firing barrel that was over 100 feet long. It was capable of firing its 250 lb (114 kg) shells a record-breaking distance of 75 mi (120 km). This much-feared piece of artillery was used by the German army to shell Paris over a 140-day period in 1918.

During World War II, the United States military introduced the 2.36 in (5.6 cm) rocket launcher, nicknamed the bazooka by American GIs. The bazooka weighed about 10 lbs (4.5 kg) and was operated by two people; one positioned it on his shoulder and fired while the other loaded the ammunition. Primarily used as an antitank weapon, the bazooka could hit a target up to several hundred yards away with great accuracy.

A lesser-known artillery piece is the recoilless rifle, first developed by the Germans around 1840 and used extensively during World War II. It could fire shells the size of small-caliber artillery shells, but it was much lighter than other artillery pieces. Its 4 in (105 mm) shell could reach over 7,000 yd (6,398 m), yet the gun, mounted on a gun carriage, weighed only 855 lbs (388 kg). With the rise of small missiles, the recoilless rifle has nearly disappeared.

After World War II, the most important artillery pieces became principally rockets and guided missiles. These are vastly more powerful and accurate than any earlier artillery. Modern field artillery uses radar, computer guidance systems, acoustic locators, and other sophisticated technology to locate targets. These precision-guided munitions can home in on enemy signals from a great distance, and some can be re-programmed in flight. The pin-point accuracy of such weapons makes it possible to remove enemy artillery with minimal damage to surrounding, non-military targets, though this has not always been the case in actual battle practice.

The advent of nuclear weapons at the close of World War II threatened to make all other weapons obsolete. American official policy was that of ÒMutual Assured Destruction,Ó that is, the development of weapons with such intolerable destructive force that no one would dare to use them. The United States, Soviet Union, and several other countries concentrated their weapons programs on massive nuclear bombs. Nevertheless, during the 1950s and 1960s, American military scientists experimented with small nuclear warheads that could be deployed on the battlefield. Scientists in other countries also apparently developed similar weapons. Nuclear field artillery is assumed to exist in the late 1990s. These battlefield warheads are based on nuclear fusion using tritium, and are thought to be able to kill troops with radiation at several hundred meters distant, yet not contaminate the side that uses them.