5 New U.S. Army Company & Battery Organization Graphics
Added 2025-07-18 03:11:29 +0000 UTCI've done my once-a-quarter graphics-making binge, which is also cacheing research and assets to use in future videos.
U.S. Army Separate Airborne Tank Company (Sept 1944) — During WW2 the U.S. Army experimented with notionally airlandable T9/M22 airborne light tanks (nicknamed Locust by the British) to potentially give the airborne mobile protected firepower. These units were the 151st Airborne Tank Company and 28th Airborne Tank Battalion. The baseline TO&E for the 151st should have been the same for the linear companies in the 28th, but the 151st received augmentation (seemingly a slice of stuff that was in the Battalion HHC, the Battalion HHC had 3 howitzers). Ultimately the 151st was inactivated and the 28th was converted into a Medium Tank Battalion in late 1944. I wrote a short companion article with the key dates of the units: https://www.battleorder.org/post/locust-company
U.S. Army Armored Carrier Company, Infantry Division Trans Bn (Feb 1960) — During the Pentomic era, U.S. Infantry Divisions had 2 Armored Carrier Companies in its Transportation Battalion. Each had 57x M59 armored personnel carriers, the predecessor to the M113. Together the two companies could mechanize roughly one Battle Group (about 3 rifle companies per armored carrier company) or carry 120 tons of cargo in one lift. It was very much an aberration of the Pentomic era though and did not survive to ROAD, although some during Vietnam wanted to bring back these sorts of APC units at echelons above division to temporarily mechanize leg infantry units.
U.S. Army Infantry Cannon Company, Infantry Regiment (June 1944) — During WW2 U.S. Army Infantry Regiments had an organic artillery company. Initially in 1942 this was 4x 75mm guns or howitzers mounted on half-tracks and 2x 105mm howitzers on half-tracks as well, but from 1943 this was changed to 6x M3 105mm howitzers developed for airborne use from gliders.
U.S. Army Infantry Cannon Company, Self-Propelled 105mm (May 1944) — The change from self-propelled platforms to towed was somewhat undesirable among combat commanders. The change was largely due to shipping economy reasons and doing so sacrificed the advantages of SPs in the close support role. In some cases Cannon Companies would de facto become the 4th battery in the DIVARTY 105mm battalion tasked in support of a regiment, which kind of defeated the purpose since the M3 was lower performing than the M2 105mm used in the DIVARTY. In the Pacific, particularly during the Philippines campaign, special tables were issued that replaced the towed howitzers with M7 105mm self-propelled howitzers. This company was at times used in a direct-fire anti-structure and anti-tank role as infantry commanders and their cannon company were often more familiar/integrated with each other than attached tank support. This graphic doesn't show the M7s towing M10 ammo trailers because the sources I have don't list them, but they were definitely used in at least some units.
U.S. Army Field Artillery Battery, 155mm Howitzer/4.5" Gun, Tractor-Drawn (June 1944) — Tractor-drawn 155mm howitzers were the general support artillery in Infantry Divisions, with 1 155mm howitzer battalion per DIVARTY. There were also dozens of non-divisional 155mm howitzer and 4.5" gun battalions on the same TO&E. They were towed by the M5 high speed tractor. The 155mm howitzer is not to be confused by the 155mm gun or "Long Tom" which was towed by the M4 high speed tractor.
U.S. Army Infantry Regiment (Medium Tanks) (Oct 1939) — I've already posted this one here, but I've since put together a table of what tank units existed in the U.S. Army during the late 1930s and how they were used to create the early Armored Force. I've also included links to books on the U.S. Army Order of Battle during the Interwar period (free pdfs) and World War II (an online library entry you can borrow for free) https://www.battleorder.org/post/usa-inftanks-mdm
