Armata soon to be in service.

[ikalugin]

I think it is important to distinguish between irrecoverable losses and losses (vehicles wise). As tanks were repaired multiple times and returned to combat duties.

[Alexey K]

I think it is important to distinguish between irrecoverable losses and losses (vehicles wise). As tanks were repaired multiple times and returned to combat duties.

 

That is some tricky point.

49 lost tanks is irrecoverably losses for sure.

 

But that detailed info about 30 tanks doesn't specify if particular loss was irrecoverable. That 30 tanks might not be completely included in that set of 49 lost tanks, but merely intersect with them.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

The word you are looking for is "adequate" I think. Ie gets the job done, at reasonable cost.

 

The remotely controlled modules (on APCs/IFVs) appear to be the way to go, as they are lighter and provide a better use of protected volume.

 

Pretty much, yeah.

 

Autoloaders. Russians have been designing and fielding autoloaders for both tanks and IFVs for decades. I'd say that their experience gives them a lot of credibility in this field. Autoloader is the only way to go when doing an unmanned turret anyways.

 

Optics redundancy. There is a good example with T-90SM/AM:

 

https://youtu.be/pfGP-dGjjnY?t=7m14s

 

There are four sets of electronic optics on T-90SM/AM:

 

1) commander's panoramic sight;

2) external video observation system;

3) gunners sight;

4) parralel television sight (@ 9m20s).

 

For Armata, I think it would be reasonable to assume that additional set of external cameras for a driver will be added. So that's quite high optics redundancy. As far as I understand, aiming of main gun is possible with both commander's sight, and parallel television sight. So that's 3 separate means.

 

When it comes to internal damage (to the turret), that's the point when vehicle should back off, IMO. But we have yet to see how both T-14 and T-15 turrets are armored. My bet is that T-15/Kurganets-25 turret should be better protected than the model that was shown to us previously. At least optics wise. Because BMP-3/BDM-4M/Berezhok turrets are already better protected.

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[Krasnoarmeyets]

Still dramatic lowball. Most sources point it to be somewhere in the 100-115 on the low side.

One point to keep in mind is that many vehicles with minor damage have been summarily written off for dismantling because any repairs were deemed uneconomical due to the presence of huge numbers of surplus vehicles (with the post-Soviet armed forces reduction and CFE treaty limits). Many observers got the impression that these vehicles vere destroyed, which led to significant overreporting of the numbers of the lost vehicles.

Edited April 3, 2015 by Krasnoarmeyets

[Nerdwing]

 

Armata does not need to be "the most capable tank on the battlefield", in my opinion. It does not need to be "the best tank in the world". It just needs to be "good". Meaning, does it matter which of the following tanks is "best" - Abrams, Leopard 2, Challenger 2, Leclerc? Neither needs to be the best, they just need to be good.

 

 

Would you say Russia needs a Merkava-ski, so to speak?  A tank custom tailored not for WWIII, but for their geographic location etc?

[HUSKER2142]

 

Rehearsal Parade of May 9, 2015  

[L0ckAndL0ad]

Did I just see 21x Kurganets-25 vehicles? 2 groups of 10 plus one stationary. And Boomerang, finally! Just 3 of them, but now we're talking!

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[AttorneyAtWar]

All the toys are coming out of the work shop!

 

[Thewood1]

Where was the Armata?  Did I miss it?

[Alexey K]

Would you say Russia needs a Merkava-ski, so to speak?  A tank custom tailored not for WWIII, but for their geographic location etc?

 

"Geographic" location of Russia is so huge, that "tailoring to it" would make vehicle to be adapted almost to any condition in the world.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

Would you say Russia needs a Merkava-ski, so to speak?  A tank custom tailored not for WWIII, but for their geographic location etc?

 

Not really, no. Honestly, I would've settled for T-90AM really. It's far more crew-friendly than T-90A that's in service. I can't put T-90A in line with before mentioned western tanks. But T-90AM? Sure. But they aren't intending to buy T-90AM. Not yet at least. I imagine that they might go for AM upgrade (or whatever upgrade would be available at the time) when there'd be large amount of T-90A that needs to undergo capital repairs at the factory. Cuz upgrades usually mean that you need to do a capital repair first.

 

I don't expect from Armata MBT anything that hasn't been done in T-90AM really, capability wise. T-90 is based on T-72, so some engineering solutions that had to be made to make it durable could be achieved with less technical problems on a completely new design like T-14. That's the main purpose to go for a completely new tank, as I see it. T-90 wasn't intended for maximum crew defense, T-14 is. That also leads to better/easier future upgrade capabilities in the long run.

 

Some posted info on it's gun, that's suppose to be outstanding for quite a while, which is a good thing if you've ever played with Russian tanks vs Abrams tanks in CMBS. The biggest question would be how seriously have they armored the turret. Cuz that's practically what differentiates an MBT from a TD. T-95 did not look good in that regard, IMO.

 

What I value the most, is the new IFVs/APCs. They've accepted the fact that additional firepower doesn't have to come from onboard 100mm gun. That safety of the passengers is #1 priority. One thing that still worries me tho is that Kurganmashzavod representative said in his interview that Kuragets-25 would be "like Puma, but amphibious". Meaning that default side armor panels are probably for buoyancy. In my opinion, they need to get rid of them, and leave amphibious capability for Boomerang alone.

 

Experience in Afghanistan and Chechnya showed, both times, that they had to come up with additional side armor. This is why new gen vehicles have modular design from the beginning, and those amphibious side panels can be changed for heavier ones if needed. We don't know for sure which ones we're seeing now, but I guess they'd be using amphibious ones by default, and that's a bad idea IMO.

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[ikalugin]

Did I just see 21x Kurganets-25 vehicles? 2 groups of 10 plus one stationary. And Boomerang, finally! Just 3 of them, but now we're talking!

There were 24 Kurganets-24 vehicles contracted for the event.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

There were 24 Kurganets-24 vehicles contracted for the event.

 

So they are serious about them. Do you have a link for those orders? I saw it somewhere, but for the death of me can't find it now.

 

BTW, it just occurred to me that first ten Kurganets-25 have smaller turrets. What the hell?

[akd]

Did I just see 21x Kurganets-25 vehicles? 2 groups of 10 plus one stationary. And Boomerang, finally! Just 3 of them, but now we're talking!

 

The first group had a smaller turret with no apparent weapons.  Maybe an APC variant with 14.5mm RWS?

 

edit: cross-post

 

edit2: I think it is the same turret on the Boomerangs.

Edited April 3, 2015 by akd

[Battlefront.com]

I did cover a topic of numbers quite a few pages back, but I'll reiterate my points:

 

1) Russia have publicly accepted the fact that it cannot compete with NATO on equal terms, thus only capable of making asymmetric answers;

2) Thus Russia does not necessarily need to produce sufficient amount of new vehicles ASAP to be able to fight NATO on the ground, especially knowing that the chances of such conflict are very slim;

3) Knowing how awful (in my understanding) previous vehicle designs were (both MBTs, IFVs and APCs), even if they can't come up with large numbers of such vehicles, but still be able to make vehicles that are "good", it can already be called a success.

I agree. It's the "realist" position, which is sadly very often lacking in discussions about both Soviet and Russian equipment. And that means the discussion goes in directions that it shouldn't. For example, in a previous discussion about Russia's ability to win against NATO I found myself having to point out that Russia is outnumbered, militarily and population wise, because one of our Russian members was quite unaware of the population differences between Russia and NATO, not to mention the relative sizes of the respective militaries. Oddly enough, the point that was being made kinda fell apart after the hard numbers were brought into it

So, with the "nationalist" perspective out of the conversation, your points are quite reasonable. Though I am with you on the T-90AM concept. I think it's a fine tank that is "good enough" to deal with older Soviet type vehicles, such as are being encountered in Ukraine or would be encountered in most non-NATO conflicts. But if the intention is to fight against a foe that has relatively recent NATO tanks, then I'm not sure if the Armata is worth the investment.

It is akin to the housing disaster here in the US. If the bank says you must pay $20,000 to keep your house, and you only have $10,000... then finding another $5,000 isn't very helpful even though it is a 50% increase in what you could give the bank.

 

The most important point in current developments is moving away from bad designs, and starting actually making good designed vehicles.

Agreed. Though as you can see from this discussion, there are skeptics that an unmanned turret is a "good design".

 

Now, lets go back to redundancy. While Kongsberg MCT-30 Remote Turret might not be selected for future Bradley upgrades, there's Puma IFV, which is often mentioned by the creators of Kurganets-25. I take it that Puma is very good at redundancy, isn't it?

I do not know the details of the Puma, but I think the argument is that an IFV that has a weapons problem is still mission capable in that it's primary mission is to transport soldiers. A tank without its main weapon is not mission capable because it's primary mission is to kill stuff (especially other tanks) with it's main gun.

As I said before, and has been reinforced by someone with 1st hand experience, there are downsides to autoloaders. For the most part the West, especially the US, has found those downsides larger than the upsides of reducing crew by one man. Something that nobody pointed out yet, as far as I can see, is that having a crew of 3, 4, or 5 does have an impact on vehicle capabilities in the event of a crew casualty.

 

Hmm. That's very interesting point indeed. Actually I was convinced that IDF is one of most hardened and professional armed forces in the world because they often engage insurgents.

You were not alone in this thinking. For example, the IDF also thought this

 

Nevertheless, IDF in 2006 seems to be an order of magnitude better organized and equipped than Russian Army in 1994.

That is true. Which is another reason it's a bad idea to try and compare Chechnya to Lebanon in the way you are. There's too many variables that are not similar. For example, total force size, duration of combat, etc. All you can do is establish one thing:

Tanks that are improperly employed tend to go boom if the enemy has sufficient AT weaponry and the will to use them.

Steve

[ikalugin]

Lock&Load,

That information is fairly trivial to find:

http://alexeyvvo.livejournal.com/93439.html

 

Note there are Kurganets-25 APCs and there are Kurganets-25 IFVs.

Edited April 3, 2015 by ikalugin

[L0ckAndL0ad]

Lock&Load,

That information is fairly trivial to find:

http://alexeyvvo.livejournal.com/93439.html

 

Note there are Kurganets-25 APCs and there are Kurganets-25 IFVs.

It is, you just need to dive into zakupki.gov.ru to get everything, which is deep as ahem.. as Black Sea I was talking about a compiled list like that one. Thanks.

 

I took some snapshots for comparison. Are these three separate turrets, or are they just messing with false shaping frames underneath?

 

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[akd]

The contours under the tarp varied some between the Kurganets "APCs" (I will call them that for now), but the overal size and shape seem fairly similar to Bumerang turret (tarp stretching out over all of top hull of Bumerang is distorting shape to a degree).

 

Could be something similar to this without the gun mounted:

 

Edited April 3, 2015 by akd

[ikalugin]

My guess is that there are 2 combat modules:

- APC.

- IFV.

Note, that in comparison to the BMP3 it is not all that tall. The confusion about the Kurganets size came from the BMD being next to it (and BMD isn't tall at all, immage is for illustration purposes and may not be precise)

Edited April 3, 2015 by ikalugin

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

 

There you go, its not in Abrams terms is it. T-14 turret is much lighter and smaller. About a third of the weight I would say.

 

 

No.  Even a turret the third the weight of the Abrams is still in the same weight class of moving around a spare BMP on a tractor-trailer.  In terms of forward repairs, it is not practical at all to have a space turret, at best you'll see a few at whatever theater level depot you have (so think the airhead/port facilities in Kuwait for operations in Iraq), but it is not the sort of spare that would follow a tank unit into battle.

 

 

 

So, not a fan of FCS? 

 

The absolute nadir of US vehicle design.  The whole information/sensor exclusive warfare concept the US bought off on was a colossal mistake.  When the rubber hit the road in 2003 it was Cold War era MTOE and updated Cold War era armor that carried the day.  The whole premise of the FCS assumed the vehicle would simply evade incoming fire handily because of sensors and APS etc, etc, while neglecting the ability of a T-55 to appear at the wrong place and wrong time on a chaotic battlefield.  

 

It's just sort of silly.  Any equipment that makes a light vehicle able to hold up on a high intensity battlefield can mount on a conventional MBT/IFV which will still command the traditional firepower/armor advantage over light vehicles.

 

 

That is some tricky point.

49 lost tanks is irrecoverably losses for sure.

 

But that detailed info about 30 tanks doesn't specify if particular loss was irrecoverable. That 30 tanks might not be completely included in that set of 49 lost tanks, but merely intersect with them. 

 

Grozny gets weird with losses.  The picture painted by most accounts makes 30-49 look low.  

 

 

 

Hmm. That's very interesting point indeed. Actually I was convinced that IDF is one of most hardened and professional armed forces in the world because they often engage insurgents.

 

The short of it is Israel was very good at managing a COIN type fight in a persistent "low" (in the military conflict sense) threat.  To that end you had tank crewmen who hadn't been on a tank since entry level training because they'd been needed more to walk patrols and man checkpoints, and were unfamiliar with the finer points of tank operations.  And again, the Israeli doctrine focused mostly on the idea that higher level assets like aviation, information warfare and precision fires would effectively defeat the enemy's will to fight, and the ground forces would largely police up the battlefield afterwards.  It did not well account for a fairly lethal (in terms of ATGMs and RPG-29 type weapons) opposition using a distributed and deep dug defensive network purposefully designed to deny the Israelis the ability to mass fires effectively.  

 

I really wish I had kept the writeup we had to read.  It's hosted on some Benning run forum thing we had to use for CLC that I no longer have access to (or if I do, there's a password and login that I've long forgotten and I'm not even sure where/how to find the address to it).  

 

 

 

Now, lets go back to redundancy. While Kongsberg MCT-30 Remote Turret might not be selected for future Bradley upgrades, there's Puma IFV, which is often mentioned by the creators of Kurganets-25. I take it that Puma is very good at redundancy, isn't it?

 

Word on the street is the Puma is a terrestrial F-35 if you get my drift.  Look how long its been in development, and where it is now.  It also was passed over in favor of more Bradley upgrades (with a manned turret) during the initial GCV trials.  

[ikalugin]

If I remember it right a number of amusing statements were made during those trials, such as how Namer's protection compares to that of a Bradley.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

I don't see why they'd move away from 30mm on APCs now that there are BTR-80A/82As and MT-LBM 6MBs, and they're continuing experimenting with stuff like BTR-88. Oh my, oh my..

 

I do not know the details of the Puma, but I think the argument is that an IFV that has a weapons problem is still mission capable in that it's primary mission is to transport soldiers. A tank without its main weapon is not mission capable because it's primary mission is to kill stuff (especially other tanks) with it's main gun.

As I said before, and has been reinforced by someone with 1st hand experience, there are downsides to autoloaders. For the most part the West, especially the US, has found those downsides larger than the upsides of reducing crew by one man. Something that nobody pointed out yet, as far as I can see, is that having a crew of 3, 4, or 5 does have an impact on vehicle capabilities in the event of a crew casualty.

 

Good point about being mission capable. I've made my points regarding optics redundancy on T-90AM few posts ago. Gun mechanics redundancy is a different matter. It depends on armoring vs damage. This is why I made my comment regarding MBT vs TD difference. We need to see how exactly are they going to go with it.

 

And I haven't seen anyone around here complaining about Russian made autoloaders Anyone around who extensively operated those?

 

As for the crew, it goes both ways. What's gonna happen if your loader gets injured? What if 2 people will get injured? An MBT with autoloader can be operated with minimal crew of two, losing situational awareness of commander's role, but still fire at high ROF. Can Abrams with crew of 2 compete with that?

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[Thewood1]

You have three people who can operate the gun in an M1 turret.  Only two in a T-90/72.  Knock out two people in each turret and see who can still fire.

[L0ckAndL0ad]

If T-72/T-90 is hit hard enough to seriously injure 2 people, it's just gonna blow Armata has a single armored capsule for it's crew, with (theoretically) more protection than classic MBT has, thus less chances of injuries. Then imagine Armata MBT in hull-down.

Edited April 3, 2015 by L0ckAndL0ad

[panzersaurkrautwerfer]

 

 

As for the crew, it goes both ways. What's gonna happen if your loader gets injured? What if 2 people will get injured? An MBT with autoloader can be operated with minimal crew of two, losing situational awareness of commander's role, but still fire at high ROF. Can Abrams with crew of 2 compete with that?

 

Bit of a deceptive question.  The odds of a turret penetration on a Russian tank killing one crewman, but leaving the other crewman, the autoloader, and ammunition contained within the magazine unscathed is pretty low given the small internal space of the turret.  On the the other hand, the larger US type turrets makes loss of multiple crewmen in anything but a vehicle kill level hit much less likely.  If you've lost the gunner and commander the tank is likely damaged enough on that side to call it quits, you lose the loader there's enough space and stuff to make the odds of the same strike killing the commander or gunner doubtful.  You need some final destination level hits, or a catastrophic strike to lose two crewmen in a go.

 

In terms of an injured loader:

 

Short term:

 

Gunner or commander takes over loading.  The Commander's station can replicate all of the gunner's controls, and the CITV can fill in for nearly everything done by the gunner's primary sights (there's only the one LRF for the whole mess, and some other odds and ends).  

 

Long term:

 

Historically it's been stealing tankers from HQs, or even just borrowing non-tanker HQ personnel who are underemployed at the moment.  "loading" is pretty easy, it's just all the extra crap that goes with the care and welfare of the tank that takes a while to learn.  

 

 

 

Then imagine Armata MBT in hull-down.

 

I'm imagining it taking a sabot like any other turret and being a firepower/mission kill.  It'll still be visible enough on thermal, and the FCS on most modern tanks can strike a target of that size just as well as an Abrams sized turret.  Crew might be okay maybe.