Re: Lynn’s six star list (or top ten list) in Sep tember 2023

On 11/27/2023 3:22 PM, Lynn McGuire wrote:
> On 11/27/2023 3:54 PM, Dimensional Traveler wrote:
>> On 11/27/2023 11:24 AM, Lynn McGuire wrote:
>>>
>>> You can never have too many guns.  Just ask General Custer who left 
>>> his Gatling guns behind for his last march.
>>>
>> They wouldn't have made a difference at Little Big Horn.
> 
> Why not ?
> 
Custer's command was split into multiple sub-units, allowing them to be 
defeated in detail.  (Except one which had the good sense to bug-out 
ASAP after their first contact.)  Also much of the battle was a running 
battle, the "fixed position" bit didn't occur until the very end by 
which point the US Army units were surrounded and massively 
out-numbered.  Gatling guns can't fire on the move and even when set up 
(which takes time) they didn't have a rate of fire comparable to current 
automatic weapons and didn't have enough munitions to have tipped the 
balance.

About the only way I can see Gatling Guns saving Custer and his command 
was by slowing them down enough that the Native Americans had simply 
left by the time the 7th Cavalry reached Little Big Horn.  That was why 
Custer left them behind in the first place.

-- 
I've done good in this world. Now I'm tired and just want to be a cranky 
dirty old man.