Author Topic: TOW gunner (Read 214 times)

davidpt40 · « **on:** January 09, 2003, 07:50:31 PM »

Got a call from my high school buddy tonight. We are both 19. He is in the Marine reserves and said he is deploying to the Gulf tonight. He also mentioned that the Marines changed his MOS in December from Admin to TOW gunner on a humvee. Can anyone tell me anything about the duties of a TOW gunner?

I know in the first Gulf War that the TOW missle wires were prone to breaking, and also the gunner had no armor plating while firing the missle. Not very reassuring. I told my budy this and I also told him I wouldnt want to be in a humvee when those T-72s come rolling in. He said he hadnt had ANY training on the TOW system yet and also he hadnt even met his crew.

hawk220 · « **Reply #1 on:** January 09, 2003, 07:54:20 PM »

they get to blow toejam up from a distance. I wouldn't worry a whole lot about our armor and tactics vs their armor and tactics.

davidpt40 · « **Reply #2 on:** January 09, 2003, 07:57:40 PM »

Roger that, but I know of at least two occassions when Iraqi armor ambushed U.S. armor. On one occassion a Bradley was destroyed, killing the entire crew, on another, an M1 Abhrams was destroyed, wounding the crew.

funkedup · « **Reply #3 on:** January 09, 2003, 07:59:28 PM »

I'm not an expert on TOW but my dad used to shoot them and has talked about them. It's a defensive weapon. Your buddy is not going to be out there hunting tanks with this thing. The idea is to kill enemy armor with air and friendly armor, but sometimes a recon unit or other non-armor unit will run into enemy armor and that's what the TOW is for. Ideally they are used beyond small arms range, so I don't think protection for the gunner matters too much. Biggest threat would be the enemy tank or APC firing some HE at their position.

Here's a link: http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/tow.htm