They had no way of knowing how would the Russians respond; as such they can only really keep in place to guard the coast against a possible Russian attack on the capital itself.
If they were so worried about Russia why even start the attack in the first place... besides they had Turkey covering them...
And they were so successful American tanks nailed more of their own than the enemy did. That says quite a lot to the effectiveness of thermals that the enemy can't even compare even when they were trying.
It says a lot about the limitations of thermals in otherwise ideal conditions in terms of identifying targets properly.
But not night vision devices for their line infantry.
Ratnik includes night vision and they have deployed Ratnik 2 so far.
Better a few hours on the depot and hundreds of thousands of dollars of early replacement for parts than burning husks with dead bodies inside.
But it means you need to invent mobile moving depots...
Then again, the Soviets are still limited by their logistics; they can't very well just unleash artillery barrages at every defensible position can they?
They don't need to shell everywhere at random and hope, they could simply send their armoured forces forward and shell anything that forms up to meet them.
Through longer ranged rocket artillery and air power of course.
HATO never had an advantage in rocket artillery range...
And if you are throwing tactical nukes around expect the same going your way as well.
It will be western europe so fill your boots. Soviet tanks were all able to operate in NBC environment... HATO not so much.
Before the Russians got their hands on Western thermal sights their ATGM teams were at a significant disadvantage.
During the day time when the Russians would be coming their thermal sights would not be so useful, and ATGM teams can reach out and touch... hell Konkurs can reach out and touch to this day and take out Abrams.
The tanks could see them just fine at ranges further than they can hardly spot the tank.
Even today tanks have problems spotting ATGM teams.
No guidance system is perfect; evasive maneuvers would still work to some extent but in combination with other means of protection like soft kill systems the chances of successfully dodging an attack would only improve.
The fact you suggest it means you probably don't properly appreciate the problem... a 60 ton tank can't leap to one side at the last second... most of the time they won't even know it is coming let alone when to jump.
Greece compared a t-80 unit with nato tanks. It's on the web. T-80 faired poorly but it wasn't used the way soviet would use tanks.
The T-80s they bought are not upgraded modern versions, and I doubt they used new ammo for them either.
T-90s gun can't penetrate chobram beyond 2000 m.
Love the confidence... but wonder why they upgraded Chobham armour multiple times since it was first revealed in the early 1980s...
Didn't get what you meant by "take cover during engagements". Compared to T-90 the M1A2 has superior armor (1200mm KE{kinetic energy/APFSDS-T}/ 1800mm CE {chemical energy/ HEAT-FS-T}).
Where are you getting your numbers from dude?
Russia can't afford to spend as much on defense as NATO does. Ergo, can't afford expensive weapons. Even if you compare by PPP, Russia is way below US and Germany
Russia does not spend as much on defence as most HATO countries, but it can afford expensive weapons... the S-400 is not cheap, and nor is TOR or Pantsir to buy... in fact there are no HATO equivalents to any of those weapons, but Russia has got quite a lot of them.
U.S electronics systems including range finding, sights, and fire control (meaning gun control not fire suppression) are MUCH superior to the Russian ones.
So you say, but Combat approved videos show multiple hits on T-64 targets from 5kms range including while moving with unguided rounds suggests they are good enough.
T-90s ATGM is not as effective in mobile combat. It can't be fired on the move. It has to stop and then fire.
What makes you think that?
The missile is laser beam riding like the Kornet which can be fired on the move.
It is also supersonic so it does not take long to get to its target anyway.
To sum it up, we can see, the Russians field much greater numbers of tanks compared to the U.S. Russian Armored Vehicle Doctrine reflects what the Allies learned in WWII against superior German Armor and Guns:
To sum it up you are not paying attention, HATO under the CFE agreements are entitled to have rather more tanks than Russia, but Russia has withdrawn from it because HATO is not following the rules.
In most ways German armour and guns were inferior to their Soviet equivalents.
The tactics and crew layout were superior but their guns and tanks were not that great.
Massed vehicles in greater numbers are the ONLY way to defeat superior quality vehicles, weapons, and crews.
Not at all... in fact having too many tanks was probably a problem for the Soviets by the end of the cold war... WTF did they need 50K tanks for?
Current American doctrine follows (somewhat) the ideas of German WWII Armored and Combined Arms Doctrine, speed, accuracy, high vehicle quality (meaning strength, survivability, and quality of components and not necessarily reliability), independent and creative thinking by the crews, and higher quality/better trained but generally fewer numbers of personnel.
Of course... put them in super tanks and let them fight by feel and their better training and creative thinking will win the day...
HAHAHA.
The Germans might boast the "better" tanks, but they had no answer to superior Soviet operational art and got rolled up all the way to Berlin.
The Soviets could have made better tanks, they chose not to because their better appreciation of what they are for and how long they will likely last in the real world... there was no need to make Panther tanks to a quality level that they will be running in 40 years time... in 40 years time they will be obsolete... making them much cheaper and able to last 10 years to a quality where they could make 60,000 instead of 6,000 and they might have won the war.