IMHO

I meant that the view of today of US establishment is every country on this planet is bound to act according to US interests irrespective of their own. I implied that a credible threat rather than an action itself may finally make US think about other countries' interests. Due to current economic setup US can hurt Russia's economic interests but not the other way around. The issues that Russia can put on the negotiation table is of this magnitude - nothing of the lesser extent, IMO. It's just contrary to the popular view Russia's foreign policy is more cautios than it's not so Russia avoids to go that far.

What do you mean "covered by security provisions"? Seems like we're speaking different languages. The Treaty is the ban on nuclear tests PLUS the verification mechanism to prove the signatories do no conduct banned test covertly. So yes, you're right testing nuclear rocket engine is not prohibited but the Treaty contains the verification mechanism in the form of monitoring stations to collect data to ensure this one was a rocket engine test and not a A-bomb's. Monitoring stations network surely provide information of intelligence value but that's EXACTLY why they exist. The Treaty does not ban the collection of intelligence information - on the contrary it facilitates it. Like Open Skies treaty exists to provides a legal framework to collect intelligence data not to ban it.

No, you misunderstand the Treaty. It exists not to look after the nuclear tests (they are banned) but to ensure seismic/nuclear events ARE NOT OVER-CRITICAL NUCLEAR TESTS. So monitoring stations network exists exactly to gather seismic and radionuclide data and to use this information to prove that such an event is not a banned test event. PS I'd rather say it's in a kind of limbo. It's not ratified but all the parties took voluntary obligations to observe it. And US's egocentric MAGA-esque behavior can ruin this one as well. US wants to ban sub-critical hydronuclear tests as well. They are allowed as of now.

The problem is this situation is EXACTLY what is covered by the Treaty. Explosion, release of radioactive materials - the monitoring stations network was exactly created to verify events like this do not represent over-critical nuclear tests. So invoking this article is kinda lame IMO.

Monitoring stations are far away - they won't see any dangerous levels of air pollution from one radioisotope engine failure. Russian MoD tries to limit how much information about engine design US can infer from the radionuclide analysis. But disabling stations is clearly against the treaty. It's just US has set enough precedents of "MAGA uber alles!" in international relations by now. I wish Russia would reciprocate one day with transferring rocket/nuclear technologies to Iran/NK. Or selling advanced AA/AD systems to them. THAT could finally make US think before it acts.

Can you quote the exact language of the treaty?

Thanks!

May be we're speaking about different blocks?

The blocks are too large for ERA, imho. Might be NERA or SLERA or glorious rolled homogeneous sheet metal :)

48 was stated as total weight before. Thanks, it's new information and the numbers now look closer to what the weight should be. I guess we'll see a slow weight creep as new systems will finally take shape. But my uneducated guess, it's up to a decade before we'll see Armata the way it was promised to be. If ever... It's hard to imagine an exports market for Armata. The price tag will rival if not exceed Leclerc, K2 and Abrams. Russian tanks are competitive on the market because of the low prices and only when equipped with French thermals. As long as we sell T-90s at half or even one third of the price of Leclerc - these are completely different markets. But it's hard to imagine French will continue supplying their thermals when Armata is gonna be in direct competition with Leclerc. Once Russia shoots into the the premium ladder the questions about the quality of thermals, gun stabilizer, engine will be tabled in no time. And without export sales Armata will always be too expensive for Russian MoD due to low production rates. And European and US producers can always jump ahead of Armata by mere switching to 140mm or electro-chemicals at one tenths of what Russia spent on Armata.

It is a plywood on the turret and on the top. Armata weighs 48 tons - the same as T-90MS. Now compare T-90 dimensions and Armatas'. To fit into the same weight class they had to weaken the armor like hell.

Do you have any videos of Armata shooting with stabilizer on? How do you explain the fact that all other Russian tanks are demonstrated with stabilizer on and only Armata shows no sign of having one? Gun stabilizer is not a breakthrough technology, there's no sensible reason to hide one. According to the information in the open sources Russian industry is unable to produce 2A82 in quantity so far. I believe designers should have thought about higher mounting of the gun BEFORE they built the tank, not after. This wiggling reduces practical ROF by 2-3 times if one times Armata videos vs Abrams. That's a IMMENSE disadvantage in combat. You use convoluted logic like someone constructed a huge aircraft carrier but it would sunk once it set sails because it's huge. Yet it's the best carrier in the world because it's so huge.

May be I missed something but there's not a single video showing Armata with gun stabilizer on. T-80, T-90 - they show them with gun stabilizer but not Armata. Plus have a look at how Armata wiggles when shooting. You can say all these troubles gonna be fixed later on but UVZ may just as well produce and MoD may buy a limited batch of plywood mockups as call it a LRIP. But it's still gonna be no more than a LRIP of plywood

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/12/russia-having-trouble-building-hypersonic-weapon-putin-hyped.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/01/russia-will-make-few-units-of-hypersonic-weapon-putin-bragged-about.html You have a remarkable knowledge of Russian composites industry!

Well seems we have dissenting opinion on this AFAIK it's still a 1'200hp engine and "peacetime mode" is actually normal mode of engine operations at which it passes lifetime requirements. Nizhny Tagil has been struggling with overcoming 1'200 limit for decades. They don't have technological know-how of modern engine building when one tunes engine operation by playing with ECU. So to formally meet 1'500hp criterion they bolted on a powerful turbocharger. But it reduces MTBF beyond comprehension. It's not me who was expecting - it's Russian MoD. The plan was for 2'300 Armatas by 2020 The initial price was 17M USD apiece And that's excluding R&D costs that were under separate contracts. By the beginning of 2019 there were about 80 Armatas produced. Now the plan is to have 132 by 2022. Where do you see the source of massive economies of scale? I'd say even more Armata in its current state is not even designed for mass production - e.g. Russian industry cannot produce 2A82 en masse. Have a look at the production plants participating in Armata programs - they are still in 60s in terms of technology. Armata/Su-57 is not about producing a plane or a tank - they are about building whole new industries. And that's impossible without established positions on the international civilian market. To build 2A82 you need to have high quality steel production plus steel processing plants. These plants cannot subsist producing just a handful of 2A82 tubes per year. So no, the idea of Russia producing next generation weapons en mass was a mere delusion with a 650Bn USD price tag. PS Another example, Japan (not without US involvement ) stopped supplying Toray fibers to Russia. Here comes the end to the current design of Su-57 and Avangard hypersonic. I doubt we will ever be able to catch up with Toray technological level but even establishing production of inferior fibers would take years if not a decade. And this production cannot exist solely for Avangard and Su-57 - it's simply economically unfeasible. Toray supplies its fibers to the whole world, when do you think Russia will start having a significant share on this market? Just as a background Toray generates 9Bn USD in revenue from fibers.

The initial requirement and UVZ promise was to install a 1'500-'1600hp class engine as in modern MTU pieces. In the end they produced an engine that's theoretically capable of reaching 1'500 but at this power output it becomes dead metal in no time. So they limited the engine to 1'200hp - same level as in upgraded T90. Correct me if I'm wrong but there was not a single Armata delivered to MoD in 2018. And remind me how much an Armata costs? It's actually cheaper to buy top notch modifications of Leo2 than to produce Armatas. There are three systemic problem of the Russian military industrial complex. Firstly it lacks scientific base to produce truly next generation weapons except for a very few areas (air defense). Russia is a hopeless **** hole for any sensible scientist willing to develop a world class career. In most technological areas that require mass production Russia is 15-25 years behind the West. Secondly Russian military industrial complex was and is financed too lavishly. They are not used to living on budget, they don't know how to optimize production costs and they see no reason to learn how. And thirdly Russian military industrial complex produce only toys for Russian MoD and it does not have the base of a vastly bigger civilian market to develop and test new technologies unlike MTU, GE, Pratt and Whitney etc. Initial plan of Russian MoD was to quickly move the backbone of the army to the new platforms - Su-57, Armata etc. But now they drastically reduced the purchases of "next generation" platforms and the reason is they are both too expensive and they do not offer drastically improved capabilities when compared to upgraded platforms of previous generation - T-90, Su-30/Su-35 etc.

Oh, propaganda... How many dare to voice a doubt against metoo?

Yes, they are simply inadequate to the task. You know, sometimes the reason is plain and simple. They are capable of a limited upgrade to existing platforms but they cannot design a decent new one. Just comes down to the management, design know-how etc.

They are funded more than enough they are just uncapable of meeting the goals. It's like trying to extinguish a fire with a gasoline.

I was plain wrong - you are right. Rakushka is BMD and I meant they made a (properly) floating BMP-3. Where's the new battleworthy and economically feasible tank platform? Where's the new engine designed by UVZ meeting MTBF goals? May be a new transmission all designed by UVZ?

It did exactly this with Kosovo. Sent NATO little green men to grab a piece of land from a country with borders that had been there for generations. The Western view that Kosovo was an isolated case never to be repeated afterwards is a joke. The world changed forever after Kosovo just like it changed again after Crimea. Not for better in either case. To side with you on the question of the strategic consequences of Crimea, when the decision was being discussed there was not a single person from the Russian political-economic leadership that was for it except for one famous guy.

I'd rephrase it, the inconvenient rear doors are because they took the amphibious tank project - an unsuitable platform for a troop transport - and made an APC out of it with minimal redesign. So now we have an APC that leaves much to be desired except for its "tank heritage" - fire capabilities. Military-industrial complex politics.

It's an Armata turned hinder part before. This awkward lump in the front is because they turned the engine as well. Typical UVZ approach - they sell to the Russian MoD not what it really needs but what's more convenient for UVZ. UVZ has limited (insufficient, inadequate) design capabilities so each new project is an unsurmountable task for them.

It's no more no less than a floating Rakushka (APC on BMP-3 platform). All the pros (not many in my opinion), all the cons. E.g. I wonder what sea state it's capable of navigating in. But it's a proven platform and converting it into a floating one does not look like a huge technological risk.

It's been sold to Indonesia already. Passed their trials.