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Does the Tank Have a Future?

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Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#51

Post by vorpalhex »

CamperBob2 wrote: post #41
breadloaf wrote: post #16

Yes it does. See "The Chieftain: No, The Tank Is Not Dead" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI7T650RTT8 TLDW: Tank has a task on a battlefield and fact that you can easily kill it won't take that task away. Same goes for infantry and they are not going away either. On the other hand we don't see battleships anymore, because big guns were replaced by precise missiles with much more range.

The only reason you'd use tanks or infantry in a modern war is that you don't have enough drones and missiles. Maybe you're willing to climb into a tank after what we've seen in Ukraine recently, but that's all you, pal.

You can't occupy an objective with a drone or a missile. You can't control a city with a drone.

Infantry and AFVs that support them will never go away. They may change but war isn't just about destruction.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#52

Post by whimsicalism »

the_af wrote: post #28
mike-the-mikado wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Arguably the war is happening because we had prepared for it insufficiently.

It's hard to understand how "we" could not have prepared sufficiently. This conflict in Europe isn't a spur of the moment thing. Arguably it could have been in the making since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but even if you don't go that far back, then at least from 2014. It certainly didn't come out of the blue! I'll make my comment more assertive: I think "we" (for almost any value of "we") prepared for this.…

If war was the predictable outcome, Ukraine should probably have been more dovish towards Russian-speaking Ukrainians in the East, ie. not banning Russian language, not shelling cities.

Obviously what Russia has done is reprehensible, but if Ukraine saw war as incoming I don't see why they took these aggravating steps.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#53

Post by CamperBob2 »

sokoloff wrote: post #48
CamperBob2 wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only reason you'd use tanks or infantry in a modern war is that you don't have enough drones and missiles. Maybe you're willing to climb into a tank after what we've seen in Ukraine recently, but that's all you, pal.

If you want to occupy territory, you've got to do that on the ground.

Tanks and soldiers are used to occupy territory, but in the face of a well-equipped enemy and/or a motivated populace, they can't hold it.

Not everybody likes wars of attrition. Russia is an outlier in that regard. Copying their doctrine and tactics is a bad idea, as is citing them as a successful example of how to accomplish anything. They are great at beating up on unarmed civilians, but against a modern armed force they wouldn't stand a chance... and no amount of tanks and soldiers will change that.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#54

Post by lapsed_pacifist »

secondcoming wrote: post #25
prometheus76 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say it the other way around, but the complexity of the electronics in the anti-tank weapons have proven to be difficult to produce in large quantities because of the chip shortage, but also because of the high level of experience and knowledge required to continue to make them. Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. The US…

Have you watched any of the Ukraine footage? Tanks are being blown up from bombs dropped from COTS drones. Longer range semi-autonomous drones seem to be the future.

Much of this has to do with Russian tank doctrine and the lack of sufficient infantry to provide mutual support to armor.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#55

Post by bombcar »

the_af wrote: post #47
dragontamer wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Small drone warfare? The Ukraine / Russian conflict has degenerated into trench warfare with thousands of 155mm / 152mm artillery being shot into each other's positions per day. These are the kinds of conditions where tanks excel. Humans who try to walk at 3km/hr get blown up by shrapnel, even 100m away is "close enough" to cause a significant injury and take a human out of a fight. Tanks? They pretty much ignore eve…

In support of your statement, I'm impressed that Russian doctrine seems to rely so much on good ol' trusty massive artillery, of the dumb kind. I guess, if it works...

Puts the whole Seoul situation in a new light - there's something about just massive amounts of shells being thrown that's hard to deal with.

And dumb is cheap. Cheap can be king, especially if you can keep making them. The US had the same thing in WWII, the Panzer tanks were better than the Shermans in nearly every way - except cost and repairability.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#56

Post by kansface »

kashkhan wrote: post #40
msla wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We've had enough of the european way of war. So trying another region's way of war would be an improvement, then?

Not many continents imposing war on europe past millennium. Europe imposed war on everyone and tried to exterminate everyone else. Do better.

Ignoring Africa, Asia and North America more recently, sure!

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#57

Post by metabagel »

prometheus76 wrote: post #14
metabagel wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could say it the other way around - once the tank stocks are depleted, anti-tank weapons can still play a devastating role (against other armored or unarmored vehicles).

You could say it the other way around, but the complexity of the electronics in the anti-tank weapons have proven to be difficult to produce in large quantities because of the chip shortage, but also because of the high level of experience and knowledge required to continue to make them. Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. The US…

Yeah, no. This defies credulity. Tanks are complex systems too, with very high cost and long lead times. Javelin production is currently 2,100 per year and ramping up. I don’t know what NLAW production is, but some 24,000 have supposedly been produced in the lifetime of the weapon. Russia started the war with about 3,000 tanks.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#58

Post by prometheus76 »

horsawlarway wrote: post #50
prometheus76 wrote: post #7

Judging by the current situation, it seems that there are more resources for building tanks than there are for building anti-tank weapons. Once the anti-tank weapon stocks have been depleted, tanks still play a devastating role in warfare. EDIT: I'm just relaying what I read in several articles about the difficulties in making anti-tank weapons because they rely on rare-earth minerals and because they rely on silicon…

I don't understand this comment. The anti-tank weaponry is an order of magnitude less expensive than the tank (some is several orders). The M1A2 Abrams has a unit cost of around 10 million USD (numbers from 2016, so likely higher now). The drones currently destroying tanks in Ukraine (Bayraktar TB2) had a unit price of around 5 million, although some estimates are as low as 1-2 million per unit delivered to Ukraine a…

It's the scarcity of the parts, not the overall cost. Javelins require rare-earth minerals (which largely come from Russia) and rare silicon chips that are in short supply worldwide. I edited my original post to include a link to an article about the difficulties in replacing the diminishing stock of anti-tank weapons.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#59

Post by kashkhan »

skylanh wrote: post #45
kashkhan wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe war shouldn't have a future and not a role. We've had enough of the european way of war.

This is sort of my reference point from a salient and personal perspective on why government's have departments of defense. TEDxAmsterdam: Peter van Uhm: Why I chose a gun: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjAsM1vAhW0 Link to TED profile: https://www.ted.com/speakers/peter_van_uhm "Peter van Uhm [was from 17 April 2008 until 28 June 2012] the Netherlands' chief of defense" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_van_Uhm

A government needs to wage war at some level to exist.

To eliminate war the motives for war created by governments need to be addressed. There is only one logical outcome, once you decide you don't want war.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#60

Post by pclark »

It seems like the future of warfare is longe range (eg: firing missiles at tanks from across the horizon) or hyper short range (eg: troops clearing cities block by block) — anything else seems like it'll get wrecked by either the precision of long range or the precision of short range stuff.

A tank isn't hyper mobile, isn't hyper accurate and isn't hyper long range. I don't get it's role — especially when it costs tens of millions and can be destroyed with either a $5k anti-armor launcher or from a missile fired across the horizon.

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