Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Does the Tank Have a Future?

economist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

181–190 of 490 posts

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#181

Post by nradov »

paxys wrote: post #172
happyopossum wrote: post #161

What we’ve seen in Ukraine is far from modern tanks fighting with modern tank doctrine. Yes, technically some of those tanks are ‘modern’, but many of them appear to have fake reactive armor, are poorly built, and they are being deployed without infantry, air, or logistical support. It’s the perfect recipe to lose all of your tanks.

Most of what you have mentioned are inherent shortcomings of tanks in a modern battlefield. They are fuel intensive. They need massive logistical support. They are vulnerable to targeted attacks, like from drones. None of this is unique to the Ukraine situation. It is very hard for tanks to be effective in the age of cheap UAVs.

Right. There were similar discussions about whether the tank has a future after many of them were destroyed in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The main issues were crappy Russian equipment and poor tactics.

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/...

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#182

Post by paganel »

aetherson wrote: post #30
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.

What would your current advice be for the Ukraine?

Not the OP, but they should seek for peace as soon as possible, that will reduce the number of dead Ukrainians and also the amount of territory that they might further lose.

Ideally the Zelensky regime should have gotten the message and should have left for the West as soon as the Russian paratroopers landed at Gostomel. The Czechoslovaks in '68 and the Hungarians in '56 had done exactly that. Yes, that would have probably meant a couple of decades of a Russian-backed puppet regime in Kyiv but the future would have been open for anything. As things stand right now Ukraine has almost no access to the Black Sea anymore, about 7 million people have left their homes, not to mention the tens of thousands of civilians dead in this war.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#183

Post by paganel »

brokencode wrote: post #71
kashkhan wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Getting more tanks ain't it. More war also not it. Russian empire needs to be dismantled. But unlikely UKR waging war on russia will do it.

So basically you have put no thought into this except that you don’t like war. I think most people will agree with you that war is bad. But if you get attacked, then all you can do is either give up or defend yourself. Afghanistan chose to give up to the Taliban, and now their rights are being taken away. Ukraine chose to defend themselves, and the jury is still out on whether they’ll be successful and what the cost…

The Talibans are the Afghanistan, or a bit part of it.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#184

Post by nimbius »

734129837261 wrote: post #160

It's easier to make a weapon that takes out a tank, than it is to make a tank that can defend itself to it. Javelin missiles are just one thing, but cheap drones with simple rockets on them should be able to take out a moving force of numerous tanks. Imagine having an arsenal of 20 tanks storming your city. Now imagine having about 100 drones ordered from Amazon, outfitted with RKG-3 anti-tank grenades. One each. You…

>It's easier to make a weapon that takes out a tank, than it is to make a tank that can defend itself to it.

This has been a fact of warfare for almost a century. in fact it was so easy the US Government published a warfighter training video on how to do it, and it didnt even fill 15 minutes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taHFUKKKmJM

Tanks had shock and awe value in nineteen sixteen. for the first time on the battlefields you had an imposing, lumbering, seemingly unstoppable juggernaut of forged iron that if left to its means, could obliterate hard targets like buildings and bunkers without much effort and keep advancing seemingly endlessly. if you could reason to stop them, the thought was perished by the overwhelming terror alone they imposed.

by WWII most antitank technology had reached horrors unimaginable; being a tanker was objectively near suicide. the swedish bofors sabot rounds could not only pierce most german armor, but cook the occupants alive with a shower of boiling steel before they invariably detonated the ordinance on board. even smaller mines like the TM41 were enough to blow the road wheels through the driver and out the hatch. And if all that proves too technical, the Japanese tactic in WW2 was to simply hose tanks in petrol and light them ablaze.

the only shock and awe of a 21st century tank is watching your tax dollars propel something with 0.6mpg

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#185

Post by aerostable_slug »

throwaway1492 wrote: post #126
aerostable_slug wrote: post #108

Tanks used correctly and in sufficient mass produces something called the Shock Effect of Armor . Smart munitions are getting more and more effective, but it's really hard to calmly lob missiles at a charging unit of tanks supported by artillery, infantry, CAS, etc. " Principle: armor in strength produces decisive shock effect The psychological shock effect that comes to troops on the receiving end of a massed armore…

Former US Army 19k here. Tanks are expensive to build, expensive to maintain, expensive to operate, hard to transport and require certain levels of infrastructure to operate in theater (bridges to support their weight). With current threats they are bound to become even heavier (and require more fuel). While I am all for seeing the rise of Bolo's, and I love shock effect as much as the next enthusiast, the ability of…

I don't think the commodity drone approach is going to work very well against a competently-run military with electronic warfare capabilities the Russians seem not to be employing.

To defeat capable EW, you'd need self-directed swarms of drones, and we don't have those yet (especially not at Best Buy). I agree that remotely-piloted commodity drones would likely make a terrible mess of something like an African army with T-55s and not much else, and of course today's Russia (I never thought I'd write that sentence).

I concur on the cost of armor, but it comes with significant benefits, hence the investment we've made in logistics to support them. It's only preposterous when the situation makes it so, like a highly mobile island hopping campaign. They worked pretty well in Iraq. Twice.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#187

Post by cturner »

int_19h wrote: post #103
trhway wrote: post #100

Russian tanks aren't a representative of a modern tank as among other things they have crappy active defense - it is all about electronics. Israel's is a good one, and their tanks survive multiple shots by actively killing incoming RPG warheads and the likes. Also Russian tanks are on the light side as they can't manage a powerful enough engine required, ie gas turbine of 1500hp+. The best they have so far managed is…

Have Israeli tanks ever faced Javelins tho?

Not a direct answer, but an advantage of Israeli armour is that they only need to deploy locally. This means less penalty for armour than US systems which are designed to be carried in air transports for foreign deployment, or Russian units designed around train transport. The Israeli Namer IFV weighs more than twice as much as a Bradley IFV, and can carry more troops.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#188

Post by ksidudwbw »

nradov wrote: post #181
paxys wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of what you have mentioned are inherent shortcomings of tanks in a modern battlefield. They are fuel intensive. They need massive logistical support. They are vulnerable to targeted attacks, like from drones. None of this is unique to the Ukraine situation. It is very hard for tanks to be effective in the age of cheap UAVs.

Right. There were similar discussions about whether the tank has a future after many of them were destroyed in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The main issues were crappy Russian equipment and poor tactics. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/...

There isnt a silver bullet for every situation and condition, but a moveable metal box that can target heat-emitting targets in its line of sight is useful. As long as its potential is fully utilised like machine assisted target aquisiton and liquidation (ai assisted optics + firing)

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#189

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

paxys wrote: post #172
happyopossum wrote: post #161

What we’ve seen in Ukraine is far from modern tanks fighting with modern tank doctrine. Yes, technically some of those tanks are ‘modern’, but many of them appear to have fake reactive armor, are poorly built, and they are being deployed without infantry, air, or logistical support. It’s the perfect recipe to lose all of your tanks.

Most of what you have mentioned are inherent shortcomings of tanks in a modern battlefield. They are fuel intensive. They need massive logistical support. They are vulnerable to targeted attacks, like from drones. None of this is unique to the Ukraine situation. It is very hard for tanks to be effective in the age of cheap UAVs.

Infantry are vulnerable to literally everything, and yet no one besides some dingbats that watched terminator too many times are suggesting the age of infantry is over. Aircraft are vulnerable to missiles. Is anyone suggesting the age of aircraft are over? Drones, particularly consumer quadcopter adopted out of convenience are vulnerable to missiles, autocannons, and electronic warfare. Does not the very same logic being offered as proof of the end of tanks apply to drones as well?

This whole argument is stupid and predicated on a vast misunderstanding of how combined arms operations work. Systems are not discard because they're vulnerable, if they can be employed in a way that min/maxes their impact vs vulnerability.

There is nothing new about this conflict as far as tanks and ATGMs. Everything happening here happened in the Yom Kippor war, in Grozny, in Syria, and in Yemen.

You just have a bunch of lazy bloggers and journalists making a sensationalized claim to sound like something exciting and dramatic is happening, at the cost of grossly distorting the actual reality.

What will change is future tanks will likely prioritize active protection systems and sensors over bulk armor. But the basic concept of combing firepower, mobility, and protection is not going away any time soon.

Example, Rheinmetall just announced their new tank prototype this week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE

A couple key features:

* an active protection system specifically for top attack munitions like Javelin

* a remote weapons station with a machine gun specifically for engaging small low altitude drones like quad copters

* flexible manning, including looking at autonomy and remote control

* ability to host drones for its own situational awareness

* a loitering munition that's being co-designed, launched by the big gun

Maybe the era of the T-72 is over. But the people confidently predicting the era of tanks and armored fighting vehicles in general are over, cuz missiles, cuz drones, frankly, have no clue what they're talking about.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#190

Post by AtlasBarfed »

dragontamer wrote: post #83
kashkhan wrote: post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. When did the US last win a war? Even with unlimited weapons, nobody wins any more. Sure you can destroy governments like Saddam and Gaddafi, but you don't win the hearts and minds, and eventually you lose.

So do what Russia does. Deport the unfavorable people to Siberia. Then import the willing population into Ukraine. Given the Russian "tactics" and "strategy" for its war in Ukraine, it is clearly a threat of cultural genocide. Russia aims to destroy the Ukrainian people and their history, and disperse them into Siberia where they won't be able to become a threat. --------- USA tries to "win hearts and minds" because…

Well, financially (and logistically) the Russians are fighting a losing war of morale and economics. Every day the Ukrainians effectively resist the Russians is a victory for Ukraine and the West.

The West will HAPPILY fund the Ukrainians to proxy destroy the Russian military, and proxy bankrupt them.

We'll see how long Putin lives with cancer. The speed of deployment and assumed schedule for victory would point to very fast cancer.

Post reply on HN