Comment by GarvielLoken
4 years ago
They won't. Armchair generals think that massive losses of tanks would mean that they are going away. In real life it does not mean that. In ww2 Soviet lost 76% of all tanks they produces during the war, 83,500. And they still choose a tank focued strategic doctrine after this fact during the cold war, and they knew better than anyone else how many tank losses they suffered during ww2. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Equipment_losses_in_World_War_...
So this war, the Yom Kippur, the Syria war, they have no news regarding tank losses. Tanks were never designed to be invulnerable, and their losses have never meant that they don't work. The Soviet and the Russians knows this. The west think that tank's will survive battle fields, but from a historical point of view that is a delusion. Tanks are still the least bad choice, they are faster and hit harder than infantry, which if you think AFV have it though against drone corrected artillery, infantry is a sheit site worse.
They utilized other recent events, including the Marine cooler opting to drop all their tanks (I’ll bet my father was thrilled at that)
But you’re probably right that this is an armchair general making guesstimations. He did have military experience, but not in any capacity that would make him an expert in tank warfare.
FWIW cavalry (as in my analogy) didn’t really die off for a very long time and was still useful in armies for some time, but they were not the symbol and main power of armies that they used to.
The marines are dumping tanks as part of a re orientation to be a true marine island hopping force in the pacific. There's debate over whether this is a viable concept in total, but little debate whether tanks make sense in that environment.
Are you going to climb into a tank, after what we've seen?
Yes.
When there's 152mm 100lb shrapnel artillery bombs dropping all around you, the only safe location is inside of 200mm+ thick steel plates.
Or what? Are you going to hide inside of a trench all day, or get into a thin APC / IFV and get shredded before you even reach the front lines?
Armor still matters. The whole MLRS debate has demonstrated that the powers-that-be are worried about the artillery battle above all else (as is common in war, those 20km guns are called "the king of battle" for a reason).
Advancing, or retreating, to positions while 100lb shrapnel bombs scatter around you is only possible when inside of armor. APCs/IFVs have a bit, but Tanks have the most.
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Walking around, on foot, with only a helmet and some kevlar is nothing compared to the amount of shrapnel that is in play in any of those warzones. The shear number of 152mm artillery rounds being used is insane, and plainly obvious from the terrain in any footage I've seen.
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Tanks also remain the largest direct-fire gun on the battlefield, and have repeatedly proven their usefulness. Drones fly at 50mph and can take 10+ minutes to reach position. (Air Force/support flies faster, but also has 10+ minutes of delay as the pilots prep and launch).
Artillery fires at much higher speeds, but still takes 1 to 2 minutes for the shell to land.
Tank guns? They fire and land near instantly upon the target. If you need immediate fire support, the only solution is a tank. All other forms of support have a significant delay. All other guns are way smaller (ex: Sniper Rifles or Browning Machine Guns can't kill enemy tanks, for example).
> All other guns are way smaller (ex: Sniper Rifles or Browning Machine Guns can't kill enemy tanks, for example).
This seems to ignore the existence of the ATGM?
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A Russian tank using Russian "combined-arms" doctrine that sends me into a city completely unsupported? That's going to be a big "no" from me.
An American tank using American combined-arms doctrine? Well, it's not going to be a risk-free experience, but I'd rather be in the tank than be one of the bullet sponges who are fighting house-to-house to prevent the enemy bullet sponges from sticking an AT-4 out of a window.
As other people have noted, "survivability" doesn't really factor into military thinking so much as capabilities. Bullets are extremely lethal to infantrymen, but we still have infantry because infantrymen have capabilities that other equipment platforms do not have. The existence of machine guns doesn't remove the need for infantry; it just changes how they have to be used (more cover and concealment, more need for air, artillery, and tank support). The same is true for tanks - they have capabilities that no other platform can satisfactorily fulfill, so we will continue to have tanks even if anti-armor weapons become even more effective than they already are.
Would you prefer to climb into a IFV or a pickup-based technical instead?
Even with all the drawbacks and vulnerabilities, tanks have more staying power than other vehicles, and if you need to do an offensive where it's expected that quite a few of you will die no matter if you advance in vehicles or on foot (peer-level war it's not like insurgent control where having casualties implies a mistake or failure on someone's part) then tanks are the vehicles which allow your to continue advancing while taking fire and some vehicles are lost; a APC company or bunch of technicals can only evade and retreat when meeting serious resistance; tanks are needed to be able to punch through.
> Are you going to climb into a tank, after what we've seen?
I wouldn't climb into a T-72 in the Russian Army, but not all tanks are T-72s in the Russian army.