T-90 Main Battle Tank #2

Regular's missing the forest for the trees. Persistent surveillance and lightning fast kill-chains broke the battlefield. Its no longer feasible to overrun the enemy's defenses through speed and aggression using armored spearheads. The suicidal Kherson offensives by Ukraine involving entire mechanized brigades should have already dissuaded you from this idea.

Instead what we are seeing are both sides - Russia and NATO fumbling around looking for ways to restore the offensive capability of armor. Indeed Russia's constantly experimenting (BMPT, UGVs, Armata, etc.) looking for smarter ways to break this deadlock and they are getting there; they just need more time. In the meantime there is no need to implement the riskier tactics especially not when there is no real urgency. Ukraine's not getting anymore stronger than they were at the start of this conflict while Russia's only became even more powerful than they were ever.

So GarryB, you think in modern warfare were we have drones for scaning the fields when fight is going,

I don't think recon drones stop operating when your forces are moving forward or are attacking a position.

Where are these videos of Russian tanks being used coming from if not from drones?

you say APS and his radar is problem because enemy will known were are your tanks and what they are doing, because of radar signiture. Well they already know they are because of drones, so why is radar problem then.

APS systems with operating MMW radar signals would allow real time remote passive tracking of Russian armoured forces that would allow ambushes to be planned in advance... even for long range artillery rockets to lay minefields rapidly and for enemy ambush formations that operate all over the place pretending to be civilians to be directed to attack soft targets without tanks attached.

The only reason for them to not widely deploy APS systems is because of the emissions from the detection systems, the cost of the system would be recovered very quickly by defeating incoming threats that would otherwise require tanks to be abandoned and later recovered or lost... saving a dozen tanks would easily cover the cost of the system being fitted to all the tanks.

Let them use new tactics, still you will have advantage ower them, because ATGM will be uselles against tanks because aps will kill it. Mines, you can always put on tanks mine diggers or how you call it and with them mines will be digg and move on side.

ATGM can still be used against other vehicle types and of course against helicopters.

I don't know why they are not deploying them widely... what I am doing is speculating as to why that might be.

They do not fear failure of equipment... it would be better for it to fail in Syria or Ukraine than in Poland or Lithuania... the equipment and weapons are for war, not just parades so getting them battle tested and any problems or issues fixed or solved is important for the Russian military moving forward.

I would think experience probing enemy positions with tanks will have highlighted that BMPTs are useful vehicles because a BMPT and a tank would compliment each other... perhaps eventually a BMPT vehicle and a remote controlled T-72 could be used... when the technology is refined.

APS is future on any combat vechicle, not just on tanks...APS with 360° protection...

I agree, but they need to get them right before they spend big money on them and deploy them everywhere on everything and it wont be until they are widely deployed that their costs will come down and new features added and performance improves even further.

Do I need to be academic to see other than a bad pattern of tank usage? Check videos available from both sides. What I am missing by seeing visual evidence of multiple identical situations that you can see?

Do you glance once at something and then decide its future, or do you bother to gather evidence and find out as much as you can before casting your expert judgement?

See one video and you can fix everything...

Impressive... when you don't even know if anything is even wrong yet.

and yet, multiple footage and interviews state how it is.

The Russian military controls what is released and what is not... do you think you have the full picture, or just what you are allowed to see?

Also, how many times tanks can get shot by ATGMs until APS gives up? What about triggering APS laser detection and not actually engaging? There are so many ways how to defeat APS, it sucks against top attack munitions due to angle.

Love how you talk about APS like it is one system... APS is Drozd or Arena or Afghanits or Standard on Russian vehicles, Shtora is not active, it is passive and tries to blind or jam or hide the tank with lasers or dazzlers or smoke respectively.

First model Drozd and second model Drozd II and Arena could not intercept diving weapons because they were mainly intended for use against RPGs which are the most widely deployed conventional threat to tanks on a modern battlefield... later models of ARENA could intercept diving top attack missiles but the original could always defeat top attack missiles like BILL 2 which overflew tanks and fired warheads down at the roof of the target. That is why the ARENA munitions were fired high up into the air, so they could defeat such missiles as they approached too. (also it meant fragments from the intercept munitions could be fired down into the ground reducing the danger zone for friendly troops... no point in launching munitions that kill 50 friendly soldiers standing near your tank to shoot down an ancient RPG that wouldn't penetrate your vehicles armour even with a direct hit).

Ukraine's not getting anymore stronger than they were at the start of this conflict while Russia's only became even more powerful than they were ever.

Indeed... when the amazing Challenger IIs arrive... a flight of four Hokums with 12 Vikhrs each should be able to deal with them from 8km away...

It is amusing that so many were claiming Russia was open and vulnerable to drones... well everyone is... that is the whole point of drones, but ironically Russia is rather better off than most.

Well when it comes to tanks no other country on the planet has the array of anti tank weapons that the Russians deploy... and they are all modern and very capable... in fact like their land attack precision guided missiles they are actually spoiled for choice.

There are gaps in their range of murder bots, but they are filling those gaps too.

Tanks only drive on roads.

limb wrote:In the ukraine, almost always yes, due to ,minefields and mud. Not even M113s or MTLBs are light enough not to get stuck in the donbass mud, a T-72 would instantly get stuck if it got off a paved road.

The term is canalized. Its a very disadvantageous position to be in no matter what vehicle you have. No amount of reverse speed can save your ass as the most likely indication that you're even under attack is when they took out the rear most vehicle, then the furthest in the front. What, you're going to move forwards and backwards the whole time like street floyd on meth?

That being said, the solutions to mud and mines are not technical but organizational. You simply don't mount "big arrow" mechanized offensives during the mud season, and you actually do your homework and prep lanes through minefields before or as you go along (use MICLICs) so your units can actually properly maneuver.

limb wrote:Idk how you guys gloat about how easy it would be hit the bustle of a leopard from the side, but think its no biggie if a T-72 or T-90 has to expose its back armor when retreating from a killzone, instead of reversing while showing only its frontal and side armor at the enemy..

Not from the side, from the front. Theoretically the profile best protected and statistically the likeliest exposed to enemy fire. Only you put some chink in that armor when you don't have to because German quality lol.

And I imagine getting out of dodge much faster would offer much higher chances of survival than reversing slowly trying to present your strongest armor to the threat. You have no idea where the next attack might come from and your armor is only good for a very limited arc. And you do that by turning and putting it in the fastest gear you can manage.

If they only have to reverse a few metres then reversing might make sense, but if they have to move a kilometre or more then even if it has a fast reverse speed turning around would still make more sense because it can cover that distance much faster moving forward with its turret pointed at the enemy suppressing their positions with fire.

Plus if there is the threat of mines what idiot would drive anywhere in reverse with a mine plough attached to their tank?

The weird thing is if you watch combat videos with tanks in them most of its super slow and methodic movements by armor that can be quickly reversed, if necessary. Tanks advance at the pace of a mild jog because, surprise, surprise the gunner and commander have to scan every possible vantage point for threats. Move too fast you might miss an angle or two and get shot for your sloppiness. The one time a tank was dashing like in WT it got ventilated by a tank it never saw:

Best defence against getting shot by a tank or a missile is smoke not reverse speed... moving quickly under cover of smoke decreases the chance of a lucky hit... remaining stationary or reversing directly back creates the equivalent of a stationary target which is the easiest type of target to hit.

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Beer... the cause of, and solution to, all of lifes problems...
Homer J Simpson.