acrashb

Interesting concept. I would argue though that the "Hunter" vehicle seems overengineered and you'd get more bang for the buck by mostly substituting it with  lots and lots of Toyotas and quad bikes carrying portable missiles, small loitering munitions and micro UAVs.

Just like the Russians support anti-nuclear organizations in the West. The Chinese probably get the most bang for their buck focusing on “human rights” in the coming war.
 

Flashes could be missed due to shutter/frame speed but the puffs of smoke from actual detonation would be the final proof,  I guess? 

Technically,  he doesn't - in the film at least. The Battle at the gates happens outside the gates, commonly understood as the "border" for want of a better word. 
Hello,  I'm your self-nominated Pedant Of The Day. 

"Show me on the map where the Russians touched you."

That pretty well sums it up @Beleg85, time to re-focus on Ukraine’s current nazi (aka Z-Russian) problem. 

https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/house-speaker-anthony-rota-resigns-over-nazi-veteran-invite-1.6577796
 

Maybe maybe not. Note the linked article says the Polish education minister has said he is considering starting extradition proceedings.
Hummm there is a lot in that sentence that make this seem more like musings than actual action.

Well, this is rapidly becoming much more complicated than I anticipated on Sunday when I first read about it. Also, I have to admit, that unsettling feeling when both Steve and The Capt both acknowledge the complexity and historical context of the situation and then proceed to argue that holding the view that this isn’t a big deal politically is, in fact, a big deal politically makes me question my own shoot from the hip response to said issue.
 
An interesting discussion regardless. 

Speaking of Canadian politics and the war I'm reminded of this story. When the Canadian Prime Minister just told Putin to his face that he needs to get out from Ukraine, at the G20 summit in Australia. Hard to believe this was almost 10 years ago back in 2014 when the annexation of Crimea happened.
World leaders take Putin to task over Ukraine at G20 in Australia (CNN)
 

As much as I would love a "Let's talk aboot Canadian politics thread, eh?", a few points and then I have no doubt everyone will move on:
- If the Liberals take Trudeau as leader into the next election, they are done like dinner. Canadians resent any leader who is office for too long.
- Our conservatives are nowhere near as conservative as those in the US.  I wish I could say that extreme right did not exist in Canada but it is very much on the margins, for now.  We definitely have it in the DNA, but we are also addicted to our social programs and liberalist high ground.
- With respect to this war, it won't matter which party gets into power the support will still flow from our end.  Even the NDP (far left) would have to stay in the game at this point - they might balk at some weapon systems but...  Which political party is in power is nowhere near as critical to support to the Ukrainian war effort as it is in the US right now (and frankly I am not even sure where the US would really go).
Beyond looking like a bunch of disconnected rubes in this last gaff, we are very much a "Rules Matter" bunch and Russians invasion is just too far outside the global order for Canada to accept.

If they didn't bother to do a wiki search, it was administratively stupid.  If they knew and thought "shouldn't be a problem", it was politically stupid.  Outcome is the same regardless.  Right now the Chief of Defence Staff and Commissionaire of the RCMP are on camera next to the guy clapping and smiling - not a good look.  

My understanding is that they are highly directional and therefore difficult to pick up unless your sensor is exactly in the right place though - happy to be corrected if I am wrong though. 

Of all the back and forth, left and right here so far, that sentence makes the most sense to me so far. 

When I was active duty back in 2021 my brigade did a rotation at NTC. The SIGINT team I was in charge of was attached to a Stryker infantry company defending the mouth of a pass. We were attacked by an OPFOR armor battalion and we just straight up murdered them. They took like 70% casualties and the rest slinked away under a heavy smoke screen. I often wonder how that AAR went.

Ok, let me present The_Capt's theory of the trajectory of the tank.  And then maybe we can tie this one off and just wait and see.
1.  Denial - Western militaries will simply ignore the data from this war.  They will rest easily in the certainty that "we will do it better".  Then we will have a major failure.  If we are lucky it will be in training.  The idea of tanks and even heavy mech will hit a major and unavoidable wall that we cannot rationalize away.  This will likely be a long process after we spent billions on next gen tanks.
2.  Anger - We will try to protect the tank, just so we can keep it viable.  Layers upon layers of systems, R&D, new tank variants and just obscene amounts of money.  No one is going to tell us we can't use the tank!  Some may work for awhile but eventually the pressure against this capability will become too much.
3.  Bargaining - We will narrow the employment of the tank.  We will save it for very specific points in a campaign.  We will tie them to decision points in order to preserve the value of the tank.  Eventually pressure will continue to mount as someone else does what a tank is designed for, with something else for much less.
4.  Depression - We will push the tank back.  Someone will figure out how to put a big HE PGM round on a tank and we will employ the thing like we see in Ukraine today.  10kms back, a heavily armoured SPG lobbing shells in the space between infantry and artillery.  This weird work will continue until someone points out that we already have systems to do all this.  
5.  Acceptance - A sad vestige of another age, some bureaucrat is going to do the math on the cost/benefit of the old girl and time for museums. The worm will turn and every "visionary" will claim they knew the tank was done "way back in 2022".  Staff college papers will be written and the world will keep on spinning.
We gotta keep the rotation going.  I think we should have Canada bashing day based on that stunt we just pulled in Parliament as we hosted and celebrated a proud veteran of the Waffen SS.

I am not arguing that guns are dead, drones are king. I am arguing that I struggle to see the relevance of a 120mm high velocity gun when there are a lot of other systems that will do the same thing at reduced weight, cost and risk to the operators. Smart mortars for the big bang, javelin or spike (and their replacements) for dedicated anti tank, brimstone for long range bang and fpv drones (and their ai guided replacements) for being a persistent threat everywhere. 

While there is obviously a benefit for a 3000kph projectile, one that goes around corners does not need to catch a fleeting target. It will just hunt it down. The target can go turret down or try to run but the guided projectile can always catch it. 
And a tank moves at 40kph. It is only the last part that goes really fast.

No it wasn’t.  It was about victory.  If they wanted to stop the killing they could have done it much sooner any number of ways.  Or here is a crazy idea, don’t start the war in the first place.
The tank was not about the preservation of human life on the Western Front, it was about breakthrough and killing more Germans.  It was about winning.  Both sides had spent millions of lives in that useless war by 1917 and it wasn’t compassion or sanctity of human life that drove them to create the tank, it was the fact that they were afraid they were running out before the other side would.
They saw humans as a resource they were at risk of running out of so they needed to break the deadlock, breakout and yield a victory.  Victory is all that mattered and why they were slaughtering a generation in the first place.  The idea of “hey we need a machine because too many lads are dying.  Huh, oh yes send them over the top again for now” is absurd.
In any war one tries to reduce loss of human life for largely resource reasons.  A human being is extremely replaceable…we have a lot of them.  And once wars of this scale start it is all about preserving resources because resources equal options.  The value of human life in war rests solely on its utility to prosecute the war and drive it towards winning - this is the harsh calculus I keep talking about. Does anyone think Ukraine is going to hit a magic number of 18 year olds, do some math on their lifetime earning power and go “oops that was the one too many…we surrender”? Or that is some basement they have done the maths on how many they would have lost under Russian rule and when they cross that line they will also quit….no freakin way.  

You guys all wanna be pro-Ukrainian hawks?  No comprise, no surrender?  Well welcome to the harsh reality of the business.  Of course the UA should not throw their people’s lives away - no professional military should.  But do not think for a second they won’t spend those young people toward victory for as long as they can.  Until it breaks the Ukrainian will to fight (which is pretty far off as of now) or Ukraine runs out of fighting aged adults - and plenty of nations have then gone on and sent in children and old people.
In war people are no longer people.  They are part of a big machine smashing and grinding away at another machine.  They are fuel we keep feeding into those machines.  How efficient the machine is on burning them up is based on how professional a military is or how desperate the situation is.  
Take any high minded thoughts about “humanity” and save them for when the war is over, and then really remember them so we don’t keep doing this (but we will).  This is about more Russians dying faster than Ukrainians until the Russian military organization breaks.  And only military capabilities that can make that happen are going to continue to thrive and survive on the modern battlefield.

The nice thing about being FA is that we stay out of all that branch rancor because we know we just support. In fact our DIVARTY motto was "We Support."
I know on occasion moving with the barrel facing rear is as mentioned, protection from damage, especially maneuvering in close quarters like city or town streets where no enemy contact is expected. Hard to get around corners with that main gun leading the way. Hit something hard and your gun is toast. Hit something soft and the soft thing (wooden building) is toast. Let the gun follow and you can tweak the turret to follow around the corner and not swing into something. 

Dave
 

That’s what we are talking about. What’s the point of direct fire when you have a munition that can go around corners, decide meh maybe not let’s try the other side? And it’s cheap as hell?

Since I have nothing better to do, here is a thought experiment: 
The latest western tanks cost $10m and weigh 70t. They have a crew of 4 and at least half that again in dedicated sustainers so say 6 soldiers. They have an annual operating cost of $1m (according to Google, don't quote me on that!), and fire rounds that cost $3k each.
Will that system defeat 6 infantry soldiers armed with $1k fpv drones with a range of 5-10km? Or a UGV with a smart mortar, some drone scouts and 6 maintainers/operators? 

Has the potential of becoming an iconic photograph of this war. Showcasing the bravery of individual members of the AFU, back when much of the world already wrote them off as having no chance of defending their country.
 
 

A carrier does not provide the same capability as a battleship, nor does a tank provide the same capability as heavy cavalry (also, heavy cavalry disappeared long before the tank was invented). We should stop bemoaning the death of the tank and concentrate on its role in the wider system. 
Direct fire to 2km - what is that for? Why do we want direct fire? It is not about capabilities it is about the overall effect on the enemy. Heavy cavalry probably always wanted longer and sharper lances but their role does not exist any more so who needs a lance? 
A system designed to break through the enemy line and destroy enemy logistics? Great until you realise that it will be likely be spotted and destroyed before it gets into range, especially if you mass them into useful numbers. Artillery can hit a tank from 40km, himars from further, drones from anywhere. And wont a swarm of ai directed drones attacking logistics routes have a similar effect without the need for a breakthrough? 
So the tank gets relegated into penny packets acting as assault guns, but then why not go for a cheaper system which are harder to spot and more capable of navigating difficult terrain (i.e. lighter)? 
The tank defenders need to tell us how a system designed for the 20th century is supposed to fit into a battlefield that is much more transparent and deadly. 2km direct fire means nothing when a tank company can be spotted and engaged 10km before they reach the enemy. Edit: to give another analogy, a breech loading rifle did not just replace a musket - the whole system had to change. 
 

Yes, if you fight abroad for someone else or an idea.
No, if the Russians march into <your country>. Or anyone else, but in this context it's the Russians.
A misconception which was the downfall of many a dictator.