oh yeah...
Posted on 08/11/2013 5:49:31 AM PDT by Gorilla44
Russia has invited the U.S. to participate in a tank biathlon so that both nations may learn to play nice — with heavy artillery.
The invitation was apparently extended while Secretary of State John Kerry and Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Shoigu in Washington on Friday. The "two-on-two" talks were intended to relieve some of the tension between the two countries, so the suggestion of a little friendly competition — under fire — wasn't out of place.
Defense Minister Shoigu repeated the invitation during a Friday press conference, and according to Russia's , Shoigu says the U.S. agreed.
"'We've invited our American colleagues to participate ... and our invitation was accepted by US Secretary of Defense [Chuck] Hagel,' Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Saturday."
NPR can't confirm this — calls to the Department of Defense went unanswered Saturday — but if such an event does take place, Shoigu says it'll be sometime next year.
(Excerpt) Read more at npr.org ...
“Meanwhile, what is the plan for fighting a real army on some other battlefield?”
Several issues here. The Army had developed plans for the probable wars. (They’re almost always wrong as they’re based on the last war.) But I don’t believe there are any major tank wars projected. That may be one issue. Another is that Israel went into Lebanon with tanks and got their ass handed to them by shoulder fired missiles. (They did it stupidly, but that’s beside the point.) The tanks cost 45 million a copy and missiles cost $10,000 each. It’s a bad trade. Also, air and fire/forget weaponry has tremendously advanced. (That’s it in a nutshell.)
>>>If the Russians offered this, it means they’ve been preparing for some time. This isn’t some friendly little competition. This is about selling tanks around the world and knocking us. You notice they didn’t ask for this when Bush was President. The Russians will use “Ringer” crews and they will cheat. The Americans should require that the crews and vehicles be chosen from regular units the day before the competition. And your competitor chooses for you. We played by the rules for years in the CAT competition and never won. We finally made it a priority and then we cleaned up. The Russians, after DESERT STORM, really have nothing to lose in this. Their tanks are already viewed as being subpar. The Americans better play to win.<<<
In fact Russians are into it for a long time. It is mostly a competition between regiments, tank building companies and also a good show. Friendly foreign nations involved sometimes. US tankmen played it with the Russians to, using Russian equipment under Torgau program (during Bush’s presidency).
I have no problem with using selected crews and prepared vehicles. It is a kind of sports after all.
When Army, any Army, have to support their ground troops, there is no other choice but to involve tanks. Air Force can give limited support against concentrated targets but it’s impossible to do that against single targets with RPG’s on their shoulder. Regarding your statement about Israeli tanks in Lebanon, loses was minimal but most important that military can learn and improve defense of the tanks in the future.
A YouTube moment waiting to happen ;-)
Who puts rear view mirrors on a tank?
oh yeah...
As General Schwarzkopf pointed out, comparing combat to something else is not a good idea. He said something to the effect that comparing war to a symphony didn’t work because in the symphony, no one came charging out of the percussion section with a knife trying to kill you. Tanks are not sports. We didn’t win the CAT trophy for years because, quite frankly, it was irrelevant. The US Army was training thousands of tank crews to win wars, not a few to win a trophy. Hitting targets with the main gun and machineguns on a range is important, but it’s not the only thing. The targets don’t shoot back. I had a friend who was on the American team that won the CAT. That was serious business. I am just not sure that Obama and company would take this seriously, and that would be giving a needless black eye to our military. I’ve been out of the hatch for a while, but I’m pretty confident that as a whole, we still have the best trained tankers in the world. They need to take it seriously or stay out.
it looks to be a Brit SPG so... i guess it's a Brit thing
“When Army, any Army, have to support their ground troops, there is no other choice but to involve tanks”
I worked on the tank for 10 years, but I don’t know anything about tactics. The Army guys I talked to say it’s worthless in Afghanistan; no roads to speak of. They have replaced it with “tanks” built on a 6 ton truck chassis. So, the troops are getting support, just not from 105’s. But they say their engagements are taking place at 100 yards with machine guns. The truck “tanks” can apparently mulch the ground at that range. Target killing is done by drones and circling fighters/bombers and remotely launched missiles. (Hope I’m not getting this wrong. Speak up Army guys.) The real problem with the tank is getting it there and keeping it fed with fuel once it’s there.
The Russians need to sell targets for the US. I say go, let them win. That way our enemies can spend billions on new targets. I would rather our enemies spend the billions on tanks than millions on newer manpads.
Uh ... the Russians won that one ...
I would agree with your post about Afghanistan. Armored Forces are not effective in this setting. I don’t think that there is enough drones and missiles to deal with this problem. Not sure why US military got involved in Afghanistan. They had to learn from mistakes of Russian army.
Obama would have offered a group cycle, with helmets.
Yes, they won but at what price? Soviet top commanders made few tactical mistakes before and during the battle that caused heavy loss in human lives and armament.
The only problem that I see with today’s tank crews is their dependence on computers. It’s all good while it’s working but in likely scenario during combat, computers may be disabled and crew must be involved in the art of war. I remember, few years ago, reading article in Israeli newspaper about shooting competition between current tank crews and reservists in their late 40’s.Reservists used tanks with no computers and no gyroscopes at the range of over 4 kilometers. Reservists won hands down. As expected by me.:-)
Thank you for the insight on the three projects and how the Abrams didn’t work in Afghanistan. I didn’t know. I gave up following a long time ago.
Hope those 6 ton chassis have good armor protection. Granted protection is relative and always a trade for firepower and performance among other things.
I’m reading a history of the battle now. The one thing that seems to be developing is that the Russians were profligate with their troops. I suspect that mentality was behind the jaw-dropping casualty figures. That and the German Tiger 1s.
It’s like the German general said during the early days of Barbarossa when it appeared the Germans would wipe out the Russians.
“It’s a fight between an Elephant and a bunch of ants, the elephant will kill millions of ants, but ultimately the sheer number of ants will eat the elephant down to the bone.”
The Iraq T-72 tanks and the T-72 tanks were and are export versions of the Soviet/Russian T-72s. The export versions are dumbed down models and not a fair example of real T-72s. Russian T-72s had better armor and other capabilities that would have faired well against the early Abrams. Plus, the Russians have upgraded the T-72 and call it the T-90. The T-90 is a better match against even the upgraded Abrams.
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