LoTR force addition

[Acclamator]

The fellowship and the various "good guys" armies from LOTR suddenly get supplemented via a wormhole with:

• 1,000 US Army
• 200 USMC

The army is equipped with:

• 50 M1A2 Abrams main battle tanks.
• 30 AH64 Longbow attack helicopters

The individual armament/equipment and squad-level armament for both the army and marines is as normal (it's what these US military personnel would be sent out with in a typical real-life operation today).

Both the army and the marines have enough humvees, army trucks etc. to enable the entire force to be vehicularly moved at once. Additionally, they have four CH-53D Super Stallion heavy transport helos (army) and six CH-47D Chinook medium transport helos (marines).

They turn up at the coast. Also present close to where they arrive is an ultra-large-crude-carrier (ULCC) converted to serve as a fuel storage ship, with a capacity of one billion gallons, but which has been subdivided to hold different fuel types:

400 million gallons of fuel for the tanks,

400 million gallons for the helicopters,

200 million gallons for the various other vehicles

(i.e. enough to keep them running for YEARS AND YEARS, and therefor enough to shut up the people who always complain in these debates "they'll run out of fuel and then they'll be fucked"). There are also a number of land-based tankers that can keep a supply chain going, plus tanks of the sort that can be carried by helicopter and dropped as fuel caches along a route taken by ground vehicles.

There is also a large 80,000 ton bulk cargo ship packed with ammunition.

There is also a similar ship packed with spare parts for every type of vehicle they have, plus spare rifles and spare parts for rifles, magazines, and other similar-scale equipment that needs parts replacing.

Also, a ship full of construction equipment - cranes, buldozers, excavators, coring, drilling tools, etc. to allow for the laying of fortifications, trenches, etc. (Since construction vehicles as a general rule use deisel, their fuel will come out of the 200 million gallons designated "other vehicles")

Anyway, they arrive on the coast nearest the Shire, about the time of The fellowship of the ring. They're fighting on the side of the good remember.

So what happens?

[The Yosemite Bear]

In order to maintain his overwhelming force advanatage Sauron summons forth

The Entire WWII Axis armies. With Full upgrades to today's tech base.

[Mr Bean]

Good bob the Tanks allow, the Crewers would probably drown in Orc-blood before the first day ended such the slaughet would be

[spongyblue]

hell call in the Air force. Sauron has no Air defense except for 9 nazgul. Call in 10 Ac-130's,70 A-10 worthogs, 70 f-15, 70 f-16, 12-f-117, 4 b-2. A They'd be done in a month.

[Sea Skimmer]

You know, all M1 series tanks normally burn Diesel as well, though anything from pure alcohol to JP8 jet fuel will work. And you have who uses what helicopter reverse.

Anyway, the tanks and vehicles are going to take a couple weeks to traverse the terrain from the Shire to Gondor, and ten helicopters would be very hard pressed to resupply them for the trip. How about adding a few hundred navy guys with a bunch of LCM's to haul them around?

Doesn’t matter though. I'd just grab the ground troops and dismount the tank machine guns, then pick up Frodo and company before steaming south. Once within range of Mordor it’s a simple matter of sending a helicopter with the ring to Mt. Doom.

Then just have a couple Marines shoot Frodo and throw him into the Lava.

[Gunner]

If the tanks are to be moved from the region of the Shire down to the Gondor/Mordor area, I'm not moving them overland. (With the given assets for getting fuel from the ship to the tanks, keeping them supplied the whole way down would be a logistical nightmare, unless only small batches of them were being moved at a time)

The other vehicles such as trucks could move overland - they don't have the rediculous appetite of the M1A2 and therefore could be supported over that distance much more easily.

I'd deal with the problem of the tanks by using the construction equipment ship - loading the tanks onto it using the cranes you so kindly provided for the scenario, and then sailing it down the coast to the destination area. (Assuming that Middle Earth harbors are large and deep enough for a vessel such as this. If they aren't, that construction equipment may be required to create a decent landing platform.)

Aside from that, I don't forsee much of a difficulty with these forces getting around etc.

As for their effect - my estimation of the effect they might have on "how things go": Drastic.

Sauron would be overthrown in short order. This force could potentially defeat the hordes of Mordor on its own, and even if it couldn't (because of that annoying thing about quantity being a quality all of its own), as a unit spearheading and leading the actual armies of middle Earth in the assault against Sauron's forces, they would have a great effect.

I don't really think there's anything that could be done to stop a tank, or a helicopter. Even if they run out of ammo the M1A2s could just drive around in the thick of the Orc horde with Orcs going squish by the dozen. By the hundred even. The thousand.

There's also the fact that Sauron's army could simply be bypassed by transport helicopters loaded with troops flying over them.

In the end the ring will be captured much more quickly than it historically was, and then just drop it in mount doom from a chopper.

[Enforcer Talen]

course, sauron was throwing lots of charm spells on his people; presumably he could do the same on all the nasty invaders. a few rogue tanks at the time could do a great deal of damage.

[Howedar]

I don't recall seeing that in the book. Can you provide a quote?