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Does the Tank Have a Future?

economist.com

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Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#271

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

hinkley wrote: post #226
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.

The Abrams A1 got like half a mile to the gallon didn't it? How many miles can they move before you have to park them next to a giant, unarmored gas can?

US armor formations are based around a 12 hour resupply cycle. This is why an armored brigade is not just the tanks and such, it's also all the logistics equipment they need to sustain operations. That said, logistics is a strength of the US military, and something that is a severe challenge in Ukraine atm.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#272

Post by yks »

paganel wrote: post #175
CamperBob2 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 forc…

>, but against a modern armed force they wouldn't stand a chance. They seem to be doing quite well against the modern army of Ukraine, NATO-trained for 7-8 years now.

The line of engagement barely moved in 3 months all the while Ukraine is hopelessly outgunned, Russians are doing quite well indeed /s. In reality UAF wasn't even a really modern army, just more modern than Russia, and all their "NATO" training in effect started in 2014.

Where do people get the impression that Russian army is strong and capable is beyond me, they just throw people into the meat grinder and sit on top of the infinite Soviet arsenal of old equipment.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#273

Post by 323 »

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…

Tanks also rely on silicon chips. Many more than in an anti-tank weapon.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#274

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

formerkrogemp wrote: post #253
aaronblohowiak wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the abrams had a 500 gallon tank, so... pretty far?

Sounds like a pretty big explosive to carry on hand.

Not really. The tanks are outside the armor and just blow up if they get a direct hit. Shockingly enough the people who design gas tanks for tanks thought of the possibility the tank might get shot by something.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#276

Post by dragonwriter »

remarkEon wrote: post #247
dragonwriter wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But if it happens, does anyone seriously believe that US could avoid re-instituting the draft? The US no longer has a draft law because the US determined that the draft was bad both from a military manpower perspective and from a domestic politics perspective as to maintaining national will to continue a conflict. The US will not reauthorize a draft for an overseas war while the US remains a major power. If the US…

>The US no longer has a draft law because the US determined that the draft was bad both from a military manpower perspective and from a domestic politics perspective as to maintaining national will to continue a conflict. Nixon got rid of the draft for reasons that had to do with the unpopularity of the Vietnam War and his presidential election. The argument was that the AVF wouldn't negatively impact force readiness…

> The argument was that the AVF wouldn't negatively impact force readiness, not that the draft was "bad" from a military manpower perspective

The argument for the AVF has evolved over time; the issue wasn't once and done, and the importance of longer service terms in a wide range of specialties has been increasingly cited in arguments for maintaining the AVF. But even in the original Gates Commission report, the AVF was not, contrary to your description, painted as merely non-harmful, but as a more efficient means of meeting military requirements, with extensive supporting analysis.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#277

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

bergenty wrote: post #254
jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 b…

Aircraft are fast, have actual deterrents against attacks and can fire from a distance. Tanks need to be close to attack, are slow and completely vulnerable to drone attacks.

For ground combat tanks are very comparable. They can have an effect on any target within 2km or more within single seconds of spotting it. Tanks also have deterrents, such as the basics of combined arms tactics, but also smoke screens, etc.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#278

Post by dgfitz »

hinkley wrote: post #226
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.

The Abrams A1 got like half a mile to the gallon didn't it? How many miles can they move before you have to park them next to a giant, unarmored gas can?

I’ll see if I can find a link, but there’s a small program the army is running for unmanned tanks, and the RCV-M is electric with a diesel genset to charge the batteries, range of ~450 miles I think?

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#279

Post by yks »

remarkEon wrote: post #255
jacquesm wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of voices that seem to believe that isolationism is the way to go and that this will protect their 'lifestyle' from being impacted by the war in Ukraine. It's interesting how apparently some of history's lessons are impossible to learn, the exact same thing happened in 1938 and the end result was a much bigger war. Also, the degree to which the world economies are now interconnected make it next to im…

I'm not a fan of our (US + NATO) current Ukraine policy, but that isn't because I'm an isolationist. I think it's just dumb policy, on several different dimensions. The version of the criticism you're leveling right now can be inverted very easily. That the people arguing for escalation in Ukraine, that it's "the exact same thing [that] happened in 1938" (it isn't), and that unless we do things like a NFZ it leads to…

You either accept a moral responsibility to protect sovereign nations from elimination, and elimination at this point was stated by Russian officials and media as a goal numerous times, or you accept the Russian position of "lands and peoples belong to the strong men" and we're back to the age of conquest, but now with nukes. Not only the former position is morally right, but it also prevents or at least postpones the nuclear proliferation.

This is not only about Ukraine, this is about the whole Eastern Europe, and literally about post WW2 order that you seem to be enjoying the fruits of, if only by hanging out on Hacker News.

Re: Does the Tank Have a Future?

#280

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

russellbeattie wrote: post #210
2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always thought that battleships were ursurped by carriers. Aircraft killed the battleships.

And now advanced self-targeting hypersonic intercontinental ballistic missiles are going to soon usurp carriers. Just a few dozen launched from land will easily overwhelm any defense a carrier has. You know how everything in our lives is slowly becoming smart? This goes for all the weapons too. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-ship_ballistic_missile

Surprisingly enough, the AEGIS Anti Ballistic Missile variant is in fact designed to intercept the name on the tin. That a handful of lazy journalists write "carriers are dead" articles with some regularity doesn't mean the actual Pentagon is clueless and asleep at the wheel vs it being a superficial take of a much more complex topic.

A couple years back the Navy asked congress for funding to demonstrate taking down an inbound saturation attack of 500+ missiles, probably as a deterrent to China. Congress declined.

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