Hi!

I played a bit with Mission Editor setting-up various playable platforms. At the end I was stuck with IFVs. Those playable are armed with 25, 30, 35 and 40 mm cannons. As for 25 and 30 mm guns there is no difficulty because I can choose only basic AP(DS/FSDS) and HE projectiles. Yet for 35 and 40 mm cannons situation looks much different! I discovered many unique projectiles with basically similar application:

- 35 mm munition: APFSDS, APDS, FAPDS - all being anti-armor stuff so which one is better? ABM projectile with many potential target types - anti-armor, too?

- 40 mm munition: three APFSDS rounds, which is better? PFPPX and PPHE rounds with the same anti-aircraft application?

So what ammo types should I load for specific mission because I am very confused now?

25mm:

APDS (M791) Moderate penetration. Older round.
APFSDS (M919) Higher penetration long-rod, with longer effective range. More modern round, uses DU, so not available to Australian vehicles etc.
HEI-T (M792) Weak incendiary tracer, poor accuracy

35mm

APFSDS High penetration - more modern (concept) than the earlier APDS types.
APDS Moderate penetration - older round type.
FAPDS Moderate penetration, enhanced lethality* as round fragments after first impact (so long as target is not heavy/spaced) - modern alternative for aircraft/APC targets to ensure destruction with fewer rounds (IRL, haven't done too much comparison of effects in SB).
HEI - large capacity HE round, most useful against soft vehicles and dismounted troops in the open or within light structures.
ABM (airburst munition) a 'Shrapnel' round, modest HE capacity, but heavy tungsten fragments ejected. Similar to AHEAD designs. Can be used on timed fuses to burst before a target, saturating it with multiple hits, or hit with delay to penetrate the target similar to the FAPDS round.

40mm - The 'model number' gives an indication of in-service sequence.
APFSDS Two are insenstive munitions, one of these has enhanced penetration characteristics. Slpprj 90 is the older round, with the Slpprj 90LK/97 being the same projectile with insensitive propellant (lower explosion risk on CV90 receiving damage). The Slpprj 95LK/05 is the later insensitive round with a larger more effective projectile.
Slgsr 90 is a standard impact fused HE round. This has a large charge.
Kulsgr 90 is the pre-fragmented proximity fused HE round, suitable for use against aerial targets, or for impact mode use against ground targets - the HE load is smaller and the case weaker/thinner, but there is a plastic matrix with tungsten pellets giving a much higher fragment lethality and density than the Slsgr 90 round.
Kulsgr 95LK is the insensitive munitions, 3P round. This has multiple fuse modes, allowing more flexible (but complex) employment against virtually all targets (except MBTs, which can only suffer optics or radio and exposed crew damages).


Might be a little out of date, but the ammunition data from the previous version was here:
SB Wiki: Ammunition_Data

Wasn't it withdrawn from US service? I have noticed M791 is still default Bradley armament in SBPro PE.



Supposedly very effective round - now almost 20 years old. Maybe US still use 25 mm cannons because APFSDS-DU rounds overcome this quite small caliber deficiencies? Don't you think it is high time to make M919 default round in SBPro PE?



Clear, but this is round to play with unarmored targets.



As I understand APFSDS is always better than APDS but I am not sure about FAPDS. It has lower penetration than APFSDS but I'd like to know if it is effective against enemy PCs in SBPro PE? It should be devastating...



Those "classic" HE rounds are standard for all cannons in SBPro PE. Old school...



So ABM programmable munition can destroy enemy infantry, ATGM squads, hovering choppers, unarmored and lightly armored vehicles? Very versatile concept!



So the latter is the best - Slpprj 95LK/05 rules!



Another HE ammo. We know very well how to use it!



So this round is useless in ground engagements. Good to have it if choppers are nearby...



Yeah, I have just tried it a bit! Very interesting ammo with plethora of firing modes. AFAIK this is indigenous Swedish design being some ABM counterpart but I think it's better. What I observed is this round destroys PCs very easily in "time spread" mode. Even those potent 40 mm APFSDS rounds are worse in this work! Oddly enough...

Don't confuse 'range' results against what is effectively a 'plywood' target set to be 'killed' with the first 'effective' hit, and the need to obtain a hard-kill on a real APC/IFV when it is firing back... here the certainty of a hit isn't as important as the certainty of a through-penetration into fuel/ammunition/crew rather than a barely adequate penetration of the first skin of the target.

OTOH, striking the roof of a vehicle that may be open-topped or have roof hatches open, and will have the weakest armour on the vehicle exposed even when closed down, does somewhat make up for lower penetration potential...

Personally I'd select APFSDS against any non-trivial armoured threat though - you don't want to get hit by a PG-15 round while you mess around trying to finesse that BMP-1... really embarrassing that one, even for MBT that can be a costly mistake...


(As for in service dates or ammunition, and defaults... the M791 would still have been the most common round when the M2A2 ODS was introduced to service, and it is trivial to select all M2/M3 platoons and swap over the M919 - either is adequate against Soviet APCs, and neither will be useful against the frontal aspect of an MBT... improving the lethality against an MBT flank is about the only significant improvement for 'historically based' scenarios. I don't know if M791 has been discontinued - certainly some users will use this round or possibly a WHA long-rod as relatively few nations use DU in their anti-armour rounds). The 'correct' ammunition natures for other vehicles will also differ somewhat from 'the best' particularly for minor nations, or for earlier scenario dates. Choosing a lesser ammunition can also partially simulate an up-armour package on the target vehicles.

Unfortunately I also discovered 40 mm APFSDS are very inaccurate i.e. their dispersion is huge. I am only able to score less than 50% hits against stationary targets at 2000 meters! Well, CV9040 does not carry relatively much ammo, thus I prefer 3P rounds as "proximity ammo" detonating above PC which give me much faster kills. I am not worried about PG-15 rounds because BMP-1 does not fire them at longer ranges (as BMP-2 does not fire its 30 mm cannon is such situation), but it launches ATGMs instead...

Yes, for historical scenarios M791 is good but isn't it too week for PCs and that's why M919 round was issued as a replacement? Nonetheless there are APFSDS tungsten 25 mm rounds produced by non-US manufactures, aren't they? Maybe you should introduce those into SBPro PE?

In the "Docs" folder (find it in the Start menu/Steel Beasts program folder), there's a document about ammunition by Andrew Jaremkow, which is a good primer on ammo in general. The M919 was fielded but quickly withdrawn from service. While it had superior penetration performance, the price to pay was excessive barrel wear. Therefore the M791 is still the default round in the Bradley.

Another thing; we have recently discovered a conversion error for some dispersion figures, resulting in too much dispersion for most rounds in SB Pro. This will be corrected with the next update, probably in February.

I'd love to. Do you have firing tables to share?

- Was really M919 withdrawn from US service? Wasn't it in use during OIF? Not sure but M791 has crappy penetration to fight current threats. It would be strange if US Army still used such inefficient round. Problem with excessive barrel wear caused by M919 was later solved.
- It looks like 25 and 30 mm cannons have good dispersionat least in rapid fire mode (H). Yet 35 and 40 mm cannons are abysmal!
- Firing tables?

Dunno, M791 will make swiss cheese of any BMP at 1500-2000m without any real trouble... although the round will be stopped while killing the engine or transmission, or may be deflected at high obliquity. If you are hitting often enough and in the right general areas with at least some rounds you will find kills will not be very hard to obtain. M919 opens up useful angle of impact a little, but accuracy requirements mean that maximum range is not that much longer, and against heavy armour both rounds will be useless. Only when fighting Western IFV will the difference between 60(+)mm and 100(-)mm be very meaningful.

BMP 1 & 2 armour is only designed to stop low velocity 20-23mm AP and 50 cal AP ammunition, it will not be enough to defeat the higher velocity 20mm rounds, or anything in 25mm + IFV type cannons. MT-LB & BTR 60-80 armour is only intended to defeat 7.62mm AP and 12.7mm Ball at best.
BMP-3 isn't modelled in SB, but the protection of the basic vehicle isn't that much better, only starting to cause problems to smaller calibre AP/APDS when the heavy applique/ERA packages are fitted.

- that's true BMPs armor is weak but they have very high obliquity of frontal armor plates and engine placed forward. US started to work on M919 somewhere in mid-1980s. Maybe M791 was not seen as capable to destroy BMPs in all circumstances?

- I have found such data about M919 utilization during OIF:



- Why did Swedish Army field IFV with 40 mm L/70 cannon then? Assuming they worried mostly Russians such cannon looks like total overkill according to your opinions about BMP armor protection! FYI even old German 20 mm cannon mounted on Marder IFV should kill BMP.

About the 40mm PFPPX.
http://www.dtic.mil/ndia/2003gun/boren.pdf

The Swedes probably picked the 40mm autocannon due to it being locally available, variants of it have been in use since 1934.

What TankHunter said and probably because it can take on just about any IFV, some old MBTs, structures, and the side armor of the T-72. It does pack a lot of punch in both terms of the armor penetration and the size of the HE round compared to other autocannons. It'll also knock out Russian light armor at much longer ranges and I'd imagine a bit more accurate than the 20-25mm guns (although things are a bit odd in SB at the moment as Ssnake mentioned).


It's huge by ifv standards (40x364R). 25x137 is what the 25mm bushmaster shoots.

While it might be a good midpoint between a proper cannon and an more common smaller autocannon, it does seem to suffer a bit from being a jack of all trades, master of none. Low ammo count and volume of fire compared to the smaller guns, but also lacks the proper tank stopping power of a cannon (at least from my Steel Beasts experience, I tend to prefer the 30mm or 35mm versions of the CV90).

They literally had still several hundred if not thousands of unused Bofors L/70 guns in storage with the corresponding amount of ammo. It was originally designed as an AAA weapon, and when it became technologically obsolete, Sweden decided to build an IFV around them. Fundamentally, it was an economic choice for Sweden (not so much for other countries, which is why Sweden is the only CV90 user nation with this 40mm gun configuration).

It's really strange if I look at dimensions of projectiles of various IFV cannons present in SBPro PE! It is not certain to me if Sweden picked up old and obsolete Bofors 40 mm AAA cannons stored for decades in reserve. I wonder if such old guns are now fully reliable. But I think Swedes could produce brand-new 40 mm L/70 guns for their CV9040s because they also developed completely new 40 mm ammo (APFSDS, 3P) and the latter requires interference in gun construction due to need of programming ammo before fire.

I think 40 mm L/70 gun was chosen because:

- Swedish CV90s lack ATGM launcher and potent 40 mm APFSDS round can substitute it to some degree. I also suppose terrain conditions in Sweden are not well suited for long range ground engagements and quite often enemy tanks can be attacked from sides.

- Sweden needs strong anti-aircraft and coastal defense. Thus 40 mm L/70 is very good as anti-aircraft stuff with modern proximity fuzed munitions (PFPPX, PFHE) because there is Swedish AAA system being CV90 derivative and moreover entire CV9040 fleet can fill this task, too. Also destroying enemy landing crafts close to Swedish coast is more effective with 40 mm L/70 gun.

- yet it disadvantages are really huge (low rate of fire, small ammo loadout, frequent ammo reloadings) and that's probably why other countries do not purchase it. Bofors 40 mm L/70 gun meets Swedish specific requirements only.

- of course 40 mm anti-armor round is more potent than 25, 30, 35 mm rounds but not to a such extent as many can think. It is still too week to destroy tank and heavy IFV frontally while overall performance against lighter armored vehicles (PCs, SPGs etc.) is comparable with smaller caliber rounds. Maybe its philosophy of firing is different because 40 mm cannon relies on "one shot - one kill" scenario while smaller cannons fire short but high rpm bursts against enemy armored threats.


Also Ssnake wants some "firing tables" for 25 mm tungsten rounds. I have found something like this:

Penetration of 25 mm and 30 mm APFSDS rounds:

target: AMROX 370S steel plate - hardness 310 HB, angle of obliquity 60 degrees

- 25 mm PMB090 round: 51 mm - 0 m, 47 mm - 500 m, 44 mm - 1000 m, 40 mm - 1500 m, 36 mm - 2000 m
- 30 mm PMC287 round: 60 mm - 0 m, 56 mm - 500 m, 52 mm - 1000 m, 48 mm - 1500 m, 43 mm - 2000 m

I'm not worried about terminal performance data. It's about time of flight, superelevation, etc at various ranges...

About an ATGM for the 9040, there is a prototype with the Bill 2 in a box launcher on the side of the turret. However it is only a prototype. Since the vehicle came out in 1993 the risk of a major European war was essentially non-existent and the major operations that the country was involved were or would be involved in were peacekeeping operations. So it is likely that there wasn't much necessity seen for an ATGM launcher.

Export CV90 variants also don't have ATGM launchers so it can be a viable explanation. However some other new Western IFVs have or will have ATGM launchers: German "Puma", Italian "Dardo", Romanian MLI-84M. Yet there are large reductions in European ground forces (especially in their heavy component). So do you think conventional ground war in European perimeter is now out of question and SBPro PE scenarios are not very realistic today? No tanks and heavy stuff is needed in XXI century so all NATO armies rely on aviation and light rapid reaction forces? For instance US Army premiere units: 82nd and 101st Airborne, 10th Mountain, 3rd Infantry - only Humvees, MRAPs, Strykers. Are Abrams and Bradley needed on military parades only? Maybe heavy tracked gear is already outdated?

You seem to be close to present military development so what is the future? Is any heavy gear comeback possible here?

Let me just quote from an email that came in today:

Isn't U.S. Cavalry & Armor Association some dinosaur lobby? War in Libya was won by NATO aircrafts and insurgents' technicals against heavily armed Qaddafi's army. A thousand of regime armored vehicles was destroyed from air.

I have yet to hear a single argument of technological obsolescence against heavy armor that wouldn't also apply to light vehicles. Yet at the same time heavy vehicles still offer the best survivability. If M1s are so useless, why after several years of combat have the US troops suddenly brought M1s into the Afghan theater in 2010? Why are Canada and Denmark bringing Leopard 2s to the fight? Why is the Bundeswehr using Marder IFVs - comparatively weakly armed, but still heavily armored? If heavy vehicles are useless in urban combat, why did they play a decisive role in the battles for Fallujah and Basra, why are the Israelis using them all the time?

Heavy forces aren't the solution to everything, but you can't solve every possible war without them either. Libya was the exception to the rule. We were very lucky there, that the incompetence of the rebels was more than matched by the incompetence of Ghaddafi's mercenaries and the inability of the regular army to adapt to the conditions of aerial attacks from NATO aircraft. And even then it was a slow victory that was at times agonizingly close to defeat.
Hands up - who here truly believes that Libya should be considered as a template for future engagements?

It is true that western nations seem to somewhat neglect the advancement of heavy armor technology. But many other nations don't - look at Turkey, and everything east of it to the Pacific. Iran, Pakistan, India, China, Korea: They are all working on new MBTs. At the moment it's still a bit of a catch up, but that will quickly change. Somehow these nations do not believe that the seemingly anachronistic days of territorial disputes solved by massed employment of heavy forces are over. If they don't have ambitions of their own, they at least want to defend against it.

The US Army is the only army in the world whose doctrine is based on the assumption of fighting under conditions of air dominance, if not air supremacy. For everyone else the concept of annihilating a large part of an adversaries' armored core from the air is the kind of optimism that you cannot afford when the existence of your nation is on the line. Look at the pitiful performance of a relentless, high intensity NATO air campaign against Serbia. Does anyone believe that in weeks of heavy bombardment and daily attacks from heights no less than 15,000 ft more than 10% of the armored vehicles of Serbia were reduced? The only thing that we denied Serbia was the capability to perform offensive operations, and to credibly threaten it with critical losses to its infrastructure. The air defense however was sophisticated enough that it worked as an effective deterrence against ground attack flight profiles that would have promised a higher rate of success.
We were smashing a lot of decoys on the ground, what a magnificent victory!
And if there's one thing that you can really believe, it is that countries like Iran were watching very closely what Serbia did, and how, because for them it had template character how to neutralize a limited air campaign waged by the US Air Force.

If both can do about the same - light vehicles are better because of being cheaper.



Why did Soviets quickly withdrew vast majority of tanks from Afghanistan during intervention in 1980s? Because Afghan terrain is not suited for tank warfare. NATO did not introduce tanks there for the same reason and that reason has not fundamentally changed so far. Now fielding small number of tanks is nothing groundbraking, because Soviets also had some tanks all the time.



Rather bad employment of armored vehicles in urban combat is main drawback, not such vehicles per se. Abrams & Bradley would have been identically massacred in Grozny like T-80 & BMP-2, if they had been identically employed. Simply during urban combat heavy vehicles are almost identically vulnerable as light vehicles assuming defending forces have reasonably modern anti-tank weapons (not 1960s junk or homemade stuff like in Palestine, Iraq etc.). In urban combat armored vehicles are forced to expose their weakest points to enemy fire. The only viable solutions are APS, passive armor kits but you can mount them on both categories of armored vehicles.



My hands up!

I really believe we saw a breakthrough here! I think rebels were much more incompetent than Qaddafi's army, they did not have heavy gear, proper military training, logistics, communication - they were amateurs. Without NATO airstrikes they would have been wiped-out very quickly. However NATO air power allowed them to win because it neutralized completely Qaddafi's heavy forces. They became useless because no movement, maneuver, open combat were possible. Yet Qaddafi's army had to attack to win but no attack was possible in such circumstances. Later constant bombardment weakened regime army POLs, logistics etc. and rebels could strike back.



That's true those countries are engaged in hostilities with neighbors and thus possibility of major ground war there is higher than in today's Europe. However majority of them are technologically backward vis-a-vis West and what I think is now the West has such technological edge in the air that Western armed forces can crush enemy ground offensive solely by aviation means.



Kosovo War was different case for several reasons:

- it took place 13 years ago when some critical Western aviation assets available now did not exist

- Serbian Army situation was very different than Libyan Army. Serbian Army did not have to carry out offensive operations while Libyan Army had to because otherwise it was doomed. So all Serbs had to do was to hid their ground forces and heavy gear in Kosovo and wait until NATO hopefully backs down. Without any viable ground opposing force Serbian tactics was quite good because Serbian Army was not forced to fight in the open and being slaughtered by NATO air-raids in this process. That was possible because NATO openly stated ground invasion was out of question.

- Serbian air defense was totally neutralized by NATO. Western planes could bomb whatever they chose all across Serbia. Serbs were able to shot down only...two NATO planes during third months long air operation. This isn't strange because Serbia had 1960-70s vintage air defense assets. You are right Western planes did not fly below 15000 ft but due to aforementioned Serbian Army tactics this did not matter much.



I don't believe "Serbian lesson" can have any practical impact on hypothetical military action against Iran. US/Israeli/whatever air strikes would target Iranian nuclear complexes buried deep underground and other stationary infrastructure. No hunt for Iranian tanks is needed.

So you argue that "good employment" makes armor viable in urban combat (I agree), but that tanks are useless in Afghanistan, no matter whether they are employed well or not?
I can neither subscribe to that logic, nor does the practical experience match your opinion. Canada was ready to abandon its entire tank fleet five years ago, and now have more and heavier tanks than ever, simply because the LAV fleet proved inadequate in their area of operations. Denmark is very happy with the presence of Leo 2s in the Afghan theater ... and so are the British forces that operate together with the Danes in Helmand. The Bundeswehr was very reluctant to send heavy forces in the beginning; now that they are in theater, they don't want to let them go but have rather inflated the number of vehicles there - and not for a lack of naysayers that predicted that they would be worse than useless because of the associated maintenance needs.

It may be possible to put almost as much firepower (105mm guns) on light vehicles (Stryker MGS), but at what pains! Just look at this debacle:

1. The rationale to introduce the Stryker was to increase strategic mobility of forces by using a platform that was air transportable by C-130
2. The lightest vehicles of the Stryker family - with no crew, no troops, no fuel, and no ammo on board (and nearly no air in the tyres to fit it into the Hercules - can indeed be flown by a fully fueled Hercules ... at sea level, for a whopping 100 kilometers range.
   Any of the heavier variants cannot be transported by Hercules at all. C-17 or C-5 are needed.
3. This wasn't the result of incompetent engineers - well, to some extent overambitious Pentagon vehicle specifications can be blamed - it was because even with the latest and greatest in armor technology you couldn't keep the weight significantly under 19 tons. And all that you get for it is a measly 14.5mm AP protection and RPG-7 (not even RPG-7L).
4. Speaking of the mobile gun system, any vehicle commander exceeding 1.73m (5ft 8") in height can not keep his head upright while the hatches are closed. WTF?!
   How's that supposed to jive with the idea of ergonomic workplaces? Will you recruit only dwarves now?
5. Even with all these massive tactical limitations, the Stryker can fire only 18 rounds 105mm, it doesn't have the punch of a 120mm smoothbore gun, and its armor can be defeated even by 20mm APDS, arguably the weakest autocannon caliber around.
6. The tactical mobility of wheeled vehicles will never match trat of tracked vehicles, thereby forcing them in difficult terrain to road-bound maneuver, hence increasing the vulnerability against IEDs and anti tank mines

Given that the original goal of improved operational mobility has simply failed, I really wonder what the big benefits of fielding this system are. Hm: On the plus side, driving the Stryker on roads costs less fuel. I'm not sure how quickly the US Army will reach the break-even point at a system price of approximately three million dollar per unit. Also, the vehicle is relatively silent, that can be a plus in some situations, e.g. when raiding a suspected insurgent's dwelling at night. Overall, the Stryker is suitable for peacekeeping purposes, but I don't see it even remotely as a substitute for a heavier vehicle.

A light vehicle may eventually reach a somewhat comparable firepower, it will offer better road-bound mobility. In terms of survivability and tactical mobility however I just don't see them ever being a match for the heavies.

WRT to the conclusions that we draw from past conflicts, I suppose we have to agree to disagree. We can probably agree on the fact that in order to stop armor from the air, you need to have air supremacy and a very high tech airforce with precision guided munitions. We can probably also agree on the fact that to date there is but a single military organization where it is justified to expect fighting under conditions of air dominance in all conflicts.
Without air dominance, the threat to armored vehicles is manageable in the context of a combined arms environment with suitable air defense around. All other factors being equal, where two forces meet where one is based on light vehicles and the other had MBTs and heavy IFVs, I will always place my bets on the heavy force.

Israel is probably another nation that can expect to operate with tactical air supremacy, if not strategic. However they firmly believe in heavy armor, and have used it well in a variety of urban areas. Lighter vehicles offer several advantages, and I think they do function well as APC's in a lot of situations. I think they also make very poor fighting platforms, due to their low survivability against almost all man portable anti-armor systems. For an APC I think we can do a lot better for a lot cheaper.

-Jenrick

And yet you apply other examples (Afghanistan, Grozny, Libya) and extrapolate the truism that the end of tanks has come from that?

This is all rather incidental- one conflict doesn't necessarily prove what will happen in another, otherwise you run into the problem that's popped up for the US Army a number of times: preparing to win the next war based on what was presumed to have went right on the last one.

You can argue what happened based on one conflict and assume general trends of course, but the danger in that is an opponent that has taken notes- as if no one else is watching what you do.

The Iraq war in the post Ba'athist phase is a great example. War planners had repeatedly said that the enemy that showed up was not the one that they had fought wargames against. In that case, Rumsfeld's plans of accomplishing everything on the cheap with leaner, lighter forces had got mugged by reality, and that enemy didn't even have armor by the time the insurgent phase shifts into gear and the situation was beginning to look dark.

What do you mean "war"? You have mistaken war with post-war occupation. Iraqi war (conventional engagement with regular Iraqi Army - direct "competitor" of Libyan War and Kosovo War) lasted about 2-3 weeks and was won by the US very easily and mainly due to air dominance. Later period was only COIN operation taking place in urban environment. Here as I pointed out above heavy or light armored vehicles will be equally good if properly employed and equipped.

Yet IDF main troop transport vehicle is still...M113 APC fielded in thousands pieces! Israeli Army does not use IFVs at all. In fact Israelis developed very unique heavy APC concept but overall not many of them are in service in comparison to M113. They are mainly used as engineer vehicles and troop transport platforms in several elite units. As for large Israeli tank fleet as addition to powerful IAF forces I think Israel is specific country with very unique military needs: Israeli doctrine is founded on belief that any ground war with Arabs should be won very quickly and decisively so combat must be quickly moved to enemy territory and human losses must be as low as possible because Israel's manpower resources are low. That's all secret of Israeli "airplane+tank" mix. Also it explains why newer Israeli armored vehicles put strong emphasis on crew protection. I would say in respect to Hamas fighters offensive capabilities that's even overprotection but situation looked different during Lebanon War in 2006 where Israeli tanks faced quite advanced Russian anti-tank weapons in Hezbollah hands. Then Merkava-III/IV tanks protection proved to be very important.

Of course tanks can be used in Afghanistan if someone really wants that but there are not many good occasions to employ them in combat as they should be employed. As I pointed out earlier Afghan terrain is not suited for armored maneuver operations - the Soviets tried such tactics against insurgents at the very beginning of their intervention but quickly abandoned it as fruitless and withdrew majority of tanks from that country. Remaining tanks were used as stationary fire support stuff, convoy escort but that's not normal tank role. However now this has even less sense because advances in armored technology allowed to design special light vehicles very well suited for that role (MRAPs) and light APCs with additional advanced armor technologies (APS, anti-IED electronic jamming devices, light UAVs/UGVs employed in support role). Both are cheaper than modern MBTs also being easier to transport.



However you must take into account that sending small number of MBTs to Afghanistan by some Western armies does not proof anything. As I said tanks can be usable there but marginally. In the same time you should notice NATO armies vastly reduce their tank fleets (Germany - 225 tanks, France - 252 tanks, England - 250 tanks (?), Italy - 200 tanks, Denmark - 51 tanks, Switzerland - large reductions, Holland - abandoned MBTs entirely (sic!) etc.). Why? Because NATO countries know very well no other country on this planet can match NATO air superiority and thus NATO air forces can decimate enemy armored units. Therefore large quantities of MBTs are not needed anymore and lightly armorer vehicles are preferred as better optimized for distant missions.



Yet USAF has quite large C-5 and C-17 fleet but aerial transport of MBTs is practically out of question so only sea transport is the only realistic option for heavy tank units. In sum US Army Stryker BCTs can be deployed anywhere in several days as very good entry force altogether with light units from XVIII Corps. With help of powerful US air power this is enough to stop any attack of heavy forces of any potential enemy. That's also exactly what I try to show you.



Not true - APS can defeat any RPG-like threats. Also wheeled PCs can be up-armored with additional modular armor shipped to theater of military operations separately so their allowable transport weight is not constrained.



Ask Russians.



That is also not true. Modern light armored vehicles possessing very advanced weapons, protection and C4I system could defeat enemy heavy units even without air dominance.



Yes, that organization is NATO and that's why NATO armies move away from heavy units doctrine. Of course some Asian countries with weak/outdated air forces and "hot borders" have to put larger emphasis on heavy units.

Moreover I think our discussion is a bit "off-centered" by the fact in SBPro we have only Western and now also Russian playable stuff.

What's the price of red herring going for these days? Sounds like a bargain the way you keep serving it up. You're not actually making a case against the fact that armor was used in Iraq both in the invasion phase and insurgent phase, you're trying to define whether it was a war or not. Personally, I don' t care in this discussion, that's a different debate for a different topic. But you've done nothing but divert the issue by doing that.

Spearfish, I have no intent to change your opinions which seem to be set in stone anyway. You asked for an opinion whether or not MBTs will go a way entirely (or be resurgent at some point), and my opinion is that Yes, heavy forces are still needed. Take it for what it's worth.

Active Protection Systems work only if there's a minimum of passive armor to stop the debris of the incoming round... and if they can boost the protection of light and medium vehicles, so can they also protect heavier vehicles. So their survivability still trumps anything that is lighter. There will always be a pressure by public opinion to equip the troops with the best material that industry can deliver, so the long-term trend favors the highest vehicle weight that still meets the basic mobility requirements (both tactical, operational, and strategic). Whether a medium vehicle with APS offers "sufficient" protection, is open for debate.

No matter what, light vehicles will never be able to absorb the same recoil impulse than a heavier vehicle can, that's not a matter of opinion but of fundamental physics. Therefore, given the same technology, heavier vehicles will always be able to bring more firepower to the fight. Whether less firepower is still "sufficient" in a given conflict is open for debate, of course.

Tracks offer the best tactical mobility, period. They also require the least volume (=leave most space for the vehicle itself and its protected crew and transportation space). Rail transportability (weight and load dimensions) is always the upper limiter for strategic mobility. Therefore a vehicle designer's freedom is already quite limited - must fit through tunnels while in a flatbed rail car. As a consequence, wheeled vehicles can never offer the same protection level as a tracked vehicle with the same technology and comparable load dimensions. That will remain so until someone develops a technology that eliminates the need to have wheels or tracks, and that is not an air cushion under vulnerable rubber skirts. These basic facts are not open for debate. They are mandated by laws of nature and engineering.

It may well be that against a low tech enemy like the Taliban an MRAP is good enough. Good luck invading Iran with these school buses.

The US may for a while continue to be able to fight under conditions of air dominance. But the whole debate whether the heavy ground forces are needed or not, rests on but a single argument: That the US and its allies will have air dominance. Should this condition not be satisfied for whatever reason (carrier groups sunk, cyber attack, bad maintenance, Godzilla), nothing will save the light force from being cut to pieces by a heavier force.

Even air dominance doesn't answer every question, or else the insurgent phase of OIF would have been settled by it alone.

There's no rational argument in the idea that the Coalition partners could have hiked on foot into Baghdad or into Basra, or trucked in unfazed, and once the Iraqis had melted into urban areas and waited to trip the next phase into counter-insurgency warfare, armor was certainly used to quell the groups when it shifted into particularly gnarly street fighting. Some of the worst resistance came from the Fedayeen forces who weren't even necessarily the best trained, but the most ideologically committed, and as much trouble as they gave, if adopted better strategy could have probably held up Coalition timetables even more- and that's with armor sent in.

Ask yourself this: suppose you are an army chief of staff. Are you sure you would take the risk both with your own career and reputation and the fate of your countrymen and forgo the use of armor? Sure you would feel 100% confident with that decision? How would you explain that one if your decision turned out to be wrong?

As it was in Somalia a decade earlier.