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The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

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Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#151

Post by hef19898 »

Beltiras wrote: post #109
simonh wrote: post #63

The tank isn't dead because armies still need the capabilities the tank gives them. You need a long range direct fire weapon, capable of engaging armoured targets and infantry (canister or airburst rounds), with rapid engagement of multiple targets, low time to target, rapid reloads and follow up shots, and high survivability. Lighter wheeled gun armed vehicles can be cheaper, but they don't have the survivability. T…

The survivability property is the one being questioned right now. If you can attack a tank from 5 clicks away with a high probability of success then air support and infantry have to cover a really wide perimeter inviting the question if the resources spent on the tank can give better capabilities in other form.

>> if the resources spent on the tank can give better capabilities in other form.

That's the point so, there is no other system that can give those capabilities for now. Seriously read the article, it is pretty good on that topic.

In terms of tank usage, they are also quite good in when directly engaging fortified positions, e.g. field bunkers and so on.

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#152

Post by sofixa »

kcb wrote: post #131
greedo wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And here come the F-35 haters... The F-35 is fine. It's designed to be a replacement to the F-16 with a good level of stealth. NO fighter is 100% immune to SAMs, but the F-35 can survive on the modern battlefield against S300/S400 etc just fine. It would be cleaning up in Ukraine right now as long as the airbases it flew from were protected. And what "unmanned fighters" are out there right now? Some low performance d…

There's some silly idea that it's just a numbers game and 20 Cessna 172s would be able to take out an F-35.

How many AA missiles does an F-35 hold, 10? 20 Cessnas would certainly be able to take down a lone F-35 in favourable conditions. Quantity has a quality of it's own.

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#153

Post by greedo »

gonzo41 wrote: post #17
formerly_proven wrote: post #7

People conclude that tanks (sometimes, armour in general) are obsolete because the most modern anti-tank weapons defeat exactly the 70s tanks they were designed to defeat in the 90s. If anything, when someone makes this point, it tells you they are clueless.

It's not that simple though, If you fired a a few Javelins against an Abrams with a Trophy system you'd still be at risk from one of the multiple shots over time. And even if the rounds don't cook off, if the EFP goes through the crew compartment, everyone is toast from blast wounds. I think the main gun on an MBT will be replaced by rocket systems on smaller lighter, faster vehicles like the Boxer CRV family. Edit j…

The secret has been out for 40+ years. The Sagger decimated Israeli tanks in the Sinai in 1973 until the IDF started using combined arms tactics. The TOW (and to a much lesser extent, the Dragon) gave NATO the ability to blunt a potential Soviet invasion of Europe. The Hellfire (and to a lesser extent, the TOW) dominated Iraq during the Desert Storm, and during the Iraq invasion in 2003. The Javelin itself is almost 30 years old in design.

The only reason we're hearing so much talk about the Javelin/NLAW is because of cheap cellphone videos capturing so much of the war in Ukraine. (And extremely poor Russian tactics...)

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#154

Post by [deleted] »

542458 wrote: post #62
DarkWiiPlayer wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think people vastly underestimate the importance of infantry support. A single soldier with an ATGM can take out a tank, but a single soldier with a gun can take out that single soldier and their ATGM. It's easy to forget that reality isn't a third-person shooter. When you're sitting in a steel box with an engine in the back and a cannon on the top, situational awareness will inevitably suffer to some degree, and n…

I guess my dumb question is: with a Ukraine-style conflict where there’s a ton of ATGMs floating around, do even properly-supported tanks actually provide net value or do they just soak up friendly infantry resources that could be devoted to other things? The range on modern ATGMs is huge, measured in KMs - seems like you’d need a ton of infantry support to keep from getting picked off. If your enemy doesn’t have ATG…

[deleted]

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#155

Post by dncornholio »

formerly_proven wrote: post #71
ejolto wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does loading ammunition make humans die quicker from radiation?

It doesn't, the autoloader is right in the crew compartment (which is the whole problem with munition cook offs killing the crew and ejecting the turret). The thing that keeps NBC out while the breech is open for loading is positive air pressure inside the tank. This argument only makes sense if the turret is entirely unmanned.

This argument only makes sense if the entire tank is unmanned..

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#156

Post by UncleMeat »

ChuckNorris89 wrote: post #149
UncleMeat wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the modern day, humans are not necessarily "cheap disposable units." At least for the US, it is not politically feasible to have 50,000-100,000 people die in a war anymore. 4,431 US soldiers were killed in Iraq. The calculus has changed and now dollars are cheaper than lives.

>humans are not necessarily "cheap disposable units" Putin and most of the Russian military doctrine would beg to differ.

"Not necessarily."

It depends on the nation and their political situation.

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#157

Post by Ambolia »

swader999 wrote: post #133
mschuster91 wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't get why you're being downvoted - as a half-Croat I completely understand your point (for the non-Balkan people: former Yugoslavia is your to-go source if you need any kind of weapon if you can't get one legally, there is an enormous amount of stuff from the 90s wars floating around). In the end we are at a trade-off situation: Either we don't send weapons to Ukraine and let Putin take over, raze the country and…

I think we'll have to wait a few years to see what impact this has on civilian air travel.

Good point, I just thought on the impact of the weapons in overall low-level criminality or regional conflicts, but I guess if enough Stingers [1] spill around it could have serious consequences on the safety of air travel all around.

[1] https://science.howstuffworks.com/stinger.htm

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#158

Post by hef19898 »

raducu wrote: post #126
irrational wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But, this doesn’t address his points from the end of the article about cheap drone swarm attacks on the top side of tanks.

Also remote controlled ATGMs and I'm sure remote controlled machine guns and other stuff (the israelis already have a lot of remote controlled machine guns afik). The tank may not be completely obsolete and indeed properly used like the US did and like Russia sadly probably re-learned it is a very useful tool. More defensive automation will put even that "properly used" to the test. I think we've just scratched the s…

>> the missile making dogfights obsolete -- a little early, but true eventually.

Not true so. The US thought that in Vietnam, the F-4 (?) didn't have an on-board canon for that very reason. All new planes again have one, because dog fights turned out to be very much a thing. The Phoenix missile, and the F-14, have been built around the beyond-visual range idea. Both are out of service now. Beyond visual range works when you see the enemy but the enemy doesn't see you. If both parties see each other, the first shot will be beyond visual range, any survivors will find themselves in dog fight after that. And if both side use stealthy fighters, they won't see each other, or be able to engage each other, at distances beyond a dog fight.

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#159

Post by captainredbeard »

alexvoda wrote: post #56
WJW wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are there any air superiority combat drones operational yet? I won't argue that it seems likely that manned dogfights are going to die eventually, but that moment also seems at least a decade away. Until then a F-35 with long range missiles seems to be one of the more lethal things in the air today, even if it is rather expensive. NATO has like 20x the defense budget compared to Russia though, so it's fine not to hav…

The usefulness of long range missiles depends on the rules of engagement. If the F-35 will be allowed to shoot targets over the horizon based only on instruments, it will most probably work as intended. If visual confirmation will be required, it will be a boondoggle.

Air-to-air combat has been beyond visual range (BVR) for ages now.

Re: The tank is dead: Long live the javelin, the switchblade, the ... ?

#160

Post by WJW »

newsclues wrote: post #32
WJW wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trophy and similar weapons work by sending a cloud shard of metal shards in the direction of the target. Given that a presidential convoy will often be in the presence of large amounts of civilians, using active defense system may mean shredding a couple dozen voters (possibly on live television). I can't imagine many politicians being very happy about that. I think DIY weapons would be the more dangerous threat btw.…

I don’t think politicians will really care about staying alive from an attack even if a few bystanders die from the countermeasures.

It's not so much for when it actually happens, but publicly driving around in a car that will kill bystanders when attacked is still a no-no from a PR perspective. Just imagine how many attack ads you could create off that one thing alone.
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