1982, the Moon. A small force of armored troop
transports crawl along the lunar surface. The vehicles are limited to only two dozen
miles an hour at maximum- any faster and the next bump could send the vehicle and its crew
flying hundreds of feet in the reduced gravity. The lumbering APCs clear a crater and
suddenly come in view of their objective: a Soviet lunar outpost on the dark side of the
moon. Immediately upon clearing the crater's rim, the APCs come under fire from Soviet laser
cannons, but the American vehicles are coated in a highly reflective outer shell that reflects
much of the incoming laser energy. The powerful defensive lasers eventually burn through the
protective shell, but it's been built in layers, granting each vehicle a few minutes of
protection from the withering laser energy. The vehicles launch several dozen canisters
into the air above the Soviet base. Laser fire incinerates many of the canisters,
but a dozen and a half survive. Lofted in a high trajectory over the base, an explosive
charge propels a shower of razor-sharp spikes down onto the moon base, as the canister is
knocked out into orbit by the force of the explosion. The rain of deadly missiles does
nothing to penetrate the Soviet base itself, buried under a few feet of lunar soil, but
for the Soviet troops and laser batteries caught out in the open the attack is deadly.
The small projectiles tear through equipment and rip open men's suits, exposing
them to the freezing vacuum of space. As the vehicles near the lunar outpost though,
it's time for payback. The first vehicle to hit a landmine disappears in a massive plume of dust.
A second and then a third quickly follow. These aren't ordinary landmines though, here on the
moon high explosives are extremely rare- in the reduced lunar gravity even a moderately sized
explosion could send lethal debris into orbit or raining down dozens of miles away, killing
and destroying friendly forces and installations. Instead of a conventional explosive, these
landmines are really nothing more than tiny rocket motors. Attached to a stabilizing plate, the
mines are triggered as a vehicle rolls over it, which activates the rocket motor which in turn
drives the plate into the vehicle from below. With a sixth the gravity of earth, the
small rocket motor at the bottom of the plate has more than enough force to send an
armored vehicle hundreds of feet upwards. Since the mines rarely hit center
mass, the vehicles are sent in wild, parabolic trajectories that are inevitably
lethal to the crews inside. One American APC takes a Soviet mine in the front half of its
body, sending it 300 feet upwards in a trajectory that will see it smash into a crater wall at
dozens of meters a second over three miles away. Only half of the APCs make it
through the minefield and laser fire, and the troops inside quickly disembark.
Instead of traditional EVA suits though, these men are wearing special space suits that
are still technically in the prototype phase. Traditional EVA suits are filled with breathable
gases and pressurized to something close to earth-normal, making each individual look
like a miniature Stay Puft marshmallow man. This severely limits individual mobility, and is
a massive liability as soldiers are vulnerable to punctures and tears that would depressurize
their suits and compromise their air supply. Perhaps as frightening as losing one's air supply
though is what would happen to the body in an unpressurized environment. As the pressure of the
gases inside the body exceeded exterior pressure, the body would begin to swell and expand, causing
severe pain and possibly rupturing organs. Water inside the body would soon begin to boil,
causing further disastrous consequences. To aid in mobility and prevent the dangers
of decompression, each American soldier is equipped with a skin-tight suit that maintains
a healthy pressure environment for the body via mechanical pressure. The suits
are custom-made for each individual, as a tiny deviation in manufacture would mean
disastrous consequences for that soldier, and take a long time to don and doff, but offer
incredibly increased mobility and survivability over normal pressurized suits. They also allow
for the wearing of additional armor plating without too adversely affecting a soldier's
mobility, while traditional 'blow-up' suits are simply too rigid already to bother with adding
much armor. The much lower gravity of the moon also helps maintain mobility even with 24 pounds
of ceramic armor plates over most of the body. Today's US space soldier looks more like a
futuristic knight than a modern infantryman. The vulnerable air supply is worn as a backpack
and it, along with the hoses connecting to the helmet, are armored slightly more than the
rest of the suit. But all this armor isn't to protect from bullets, as the Americans quickly
find out from the surviving Soviet defenders. Each Soviet soldier is equipped with
one of two variations of space guns. The first looks like a typical submachine gun from
back here on Earth, but is anything but. Firstly, it doesn't use nearly as much gunpowder
as a gun on earth would- with a sixth the gravity that much recoil would send a soldier
flying backwards with the first trigger pull. Instead, each bullet has less than a
tenth the gunpowder of a normal bullet, and yet despite this still reaches velocities
upwards of 3,000 to 4,000 feet per second, as much as 1,000 feet per second
faster than a 7.62 round here on Earth. But that much power comes with a price, and
automatic fire is impossible in such low gravity. Instead, the firing soldier must carefully
line up each individual shot before firing, taking the time to re-steady themselves before
each shot. The gun is best for long-range engagements, and the Americans are rapidly closing
the distance with their nimble combat suits. At closer ranges, the Soviets switch to a
different weapon. This one also has a long barrel, but the magazines are actually attached directly
to the sides of the barrel itself. The dual magazines need to be physically manipulated to
push a long, razor-sharp dart into the chamber. Then, a gas cartridge inserted into the butt of
the weapon is activated with a firing trigger, causing it to propel the dart out of the weapon
at several hundred feet a second. The weapon resembles more a modern version of a crossbow than
a Buck Rogers space gun, but is deadly effective in the low gravity and zero atmosphere environment
of the moon, giving it incredible range and accuracy. Unlike on Earth, in space there is
no atmospheric friction or other effects to act on a projectile, so space guns are incredibly
accurate- the only thing limiting the accuracy of each weapon is the difficulty in taking a proper
firing stance while bracing against the recoil, and bringing the weapon's sights up to a
shooter's eyes through the bulky space suit. But the Americans have their own
answer to the lack of accuracy, and it's not just their much sleeker,
ergonomic spacesuits. As an American soldier vaults into a Soviet trench in
the lunar gravity, he flips forward a strange tube mounted on his shoulder and
presses a lever on the side (use image https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/warisboring.com/images/0-OFKb6Wx0MV7NpHNe-1024x747.jpg). This shoulder-mounted weapon is, like most other
space weapons, made out of plastic and various composites, as regular metal or wood would be
impossible to operate on the moon. For starters the extreme temperatures, ranging from 260 degrees
Fahrenheit (127 C) to -280 degrees (-173 C), wreak havoc on normal weapon materials, and the intense
heating could cause ammunition to simply explode. Even if a metal weapon survived the extreme
temperatures, the metal components would inevitably fuse together in the vacuum
of space. This is known as cold welding, and happens when two similar metals are brought
into contact with each other and their molecules mix together. Here on earth a layer of oxidization
prevents it from happening, but in space that layer eventually wears off. If these weren't
enough challenges for a gunsmith to overcome, there's also the fact that lubricants in space
tend to evaporate in the absence of an atmosphere. That means that the American's shoulder-mounted
weapon, just like any other space weapon, is made up of plastic and other composites,
and operates via recoil rather than gas like on earth. But this weapon is slightly different
from others the Soviets have faced so far. As soon as the American astro-soldier presses
the firing mechanism on the side of the strange cylinder, a tiny charge of gas expels three dozen
darts about an inch long. The darts are expelled at a modest six meters a second, but upon firing
a charge at the rear of each dart is ignited. Exactly half a second later, with the darts
now three meters away from the shooter, each charge explodes, propelling the
darts forward with terrible velocity. This weapon is the equivalent of a space shotgun, and meant to shower a small area with
high-speed flechettes. To avoid sending the firing soldier flying backwards and possibly
into lunar orbit from the explosive recoil, each round is designed to be accelerated out of
the barrel of the gun with a small gas charge, while the actual propellant charge is ignited
and calculated to burn for half a second before exploding well clear of the shooter. The gun
isn't very accurate, but it doesn't need to be- the lethal shower of flechettes means
instant death out to a range of a hundred or more meters... one reason why the weapon cannot
be fired with any friendlies in line of sight. Now that the fighting is in the lunar trenches
though, the Soviets bring out their own close quarter weapons. A Soviet soldier lifts up
his personal side arm to defend himself, and the weapon looks almost ridiculously
dainty and fragile. The weapon has a long, very thin barrel, slightly longer than a
revolver's, and a top-mounted magazine. The magazine feeds the weapon with a dozen
razor-sharp darts just over two inches long, and these are propelled by a gas canister
housed within the grip of the strange pistol itself. The gas operated weapon suffers
from the same recoil issues as any space gun, but its smaller size means the Soviet soldier
is able to reacquire his target much faster. Even with just a modest blast of gas, the lack
of atmospheric friction and low gravity means that each dart is still sped up to velocities
similar to those of normal bullets back on earth. Some of the small weapons don't even
use gas at all, but are operated by a spring which is cocked manually before
each firing. Instead of darts they fire ceramic pellets, and reach the same speed
and lethality as a .22 back here on earth. In space though, the best close quarters weapon is
the same as it's been back on earth for thousands of years, and as the fighting drags on the fancy
space guns are quickly discarded after running out of darts, pellets, flechettes, or gas. Now the
fighting is done hand-to-hand with razor sharp knives made out of tough ceramic, but here on the
moon even a tiny cut can be immediately lethal. The American suits with their mechanical pressure
are better able to handle punctures and tears, but first aid in a space environment is practically
non-existent. If a wounded individual doesn't have their wound immediately and thoroughly sealed, it
doesn't matter if the rest of their suit maintains integrity- the vacuum of space will draw out all
liquids it can through the wound very rapidly, turning even a minor stab into a critical injury.
At last the fighting draws to a close, the American troops stand victorious. They
have lost over half their number, but they have succeeded in eliminating the Soviet position
and securing the lunar outpost. Any remaining troops left inside the outpost's buildings
will either surrender or simply be left to asphyxiate as the outer shell of each building is
purposefully breached and the atmosphere vented. But victory is short lived, as suddenly
on the horizon is the tell-tale plume of decelerating spacecraft. The Americans quickly
rush to take up their own defensive positions- Soviet reinforcements are on the way. Thanks
to the low gravity, it's easy and fast to move troops around via pod-like craft that
detach from an orbiting ship's main body- and with a low enough orbit a ship can
orbit the moon every two and a half hours. That time frame can be shrunk even further
for faster orbits, and thus faster response, but comes at the risk of flying at a lower, faster
orbit and being more vulnerable to ground fire. Orbital mechanics are very much in the minds
of the surviving American troops as they watch the deceleration plumes of the incoming drop
pods, as calculating altitude and speed will not just let them know how long until they're
once more under fire, but exactly where each drop pod will land. Maybe, just maybe, if they
manage to ambush one or two of the incoming pods they may have a chance of seeing home
again and breathing in real air once more. Now go check out What If There Was War In Space, or click this other video instead!
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