Posted: Mon May 05, 2014 6:37 am Post subject:
Tanks, Tanks, Tanks
so...i've recently delved more into the subject of military and tank types and always stumbled on leopard 2's and abrams as the "top tanks" in the world right now.
But i've been noticing that in a lot of listings the newer T-90 models are missing, some say it's crap and "bad manufacture" and others say "it's actually a hard rival to for example, the leopard due to it's firing range and upgrades, but i don't know for sure, what do you think?
Personally i think the T-90 is not a bad tank and the comparison would be stupid because both tanks are specifically constructed for different combat situations and environments. While in my opinion the T-90 would have an edge through it's effective firing range of anti tank rockets it can load (which is nearly double the range of the Leo 2's smoothbore 120 mm cannon). which ultimatively has to rely in my opinion on infantry support and good recon.
The Leo has the superior mobility and surveillance aswell as threat awareness. it's can stay highly mobile while engaging in combat and could even rely on it's hunter-killer system and engage multiple tanks at once, but then again, distance and environemnt would play a big role.
Honestly - I don't think civilians can yet make any good conclusions. I'm pretty sure most of the stuff used in tank armor is classified, so we can't really guess. Nevermind that these tanks haven't actually fought in FAIR armored engagements like tanks in the '40s did. The Abrams, for instance, is praised for it's successes in the gulf wars, but it fought a bunch of Soviet monkey models with poorly trained crews, and now it deals with urban warfare.
I speculate that the Abrams is superior to the T-90 though, or the U.S. would be rushing to pay for an upgrade, while our bridges go to shit.
*Yes I'm aware that a fight between a Tiger II and an M4 as not a 'fair' fight, but I simply mean a fight between tanks built of the same time period to counter oneanother, not a situation where Soviet tanks from the 1950s and 1960s are fighting modern Merkava tanks or Abrams tanks. _________________ Victory! QUICK_EDIT
From this standpoint your only guess to get an idea of the machines is to read statistics or watch them in "arms tournaments" like in saudi arabia, where the T-90 actually did pretty well.
Afaik didn't the abrams get a relatively new composite armor upgrade? _________________ Hydraw Art on Facebook QUICK_EDIT
The Leopard 2A5 (and newer), T-90A, AMX Leclerc, Challenger 2 and M1A2 Abrams are the "best" and most modern tanks in service today.
All have their weaknesses and strengths. The T-90A is the cheapest of them it has the lowest profile and can fire ATGM's from its gun. The Leclerc has a good rate of fire, but its otherwise big and expensive (2nd most expensive tank in the world after the K2 Black Panther tank).
The Challenger 2 seems to be heavily armored judging from it's combat performance in Iraq taking on multiple RPG hits and surviving, but such things should be taken with a grain of salt.
The Challenger 2 uses the L30 gun which is rifled while this gives it arguably better accuracy the rounds it fires are "in low demand" and as such are more expensive. The British military has several times thought of replacing the L30 with the smoothbore Rheinmetall L/44 used in the Leopard 2(A1/A2/A3/A4/A5) and M1A1/A2 Abrams for cheaper ammo and better integration with NATO standards.
The M1A2 Abrams' greatest weakness is the fact that its turbine engine uses a lot of fuel causing it to need a lot of support vehicles to keep it fueled. The Abrams is the only tank in service today that uses a turbine engine aside from the "T-80UD" used by the Ukrainian military.
The Leopard 2 (all versions) is seemingly a all round good tank.
Some of the armor arguments are hard to make because the armor thickness and composition (especially Chobham armor) of most modern MBT's are classified.
New versions of these tanks are expected to be revealed/put into service soon such as the T-90AM, Leopard 2A6/A7 (with the L/55 gun) and there are rumors of the M1A3 Abrams. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
About the armor, i don't know how effective the T-90 armor is, all i know is that it uses Reactive armor pellets that are used on all T-Tank types back to T-72 Models. one could argue about the effectiveness of it, but it seems to have been proven valuable for the russian army so that it got dragged on to the newest models. But that is a mixed bag, there are upgraded T-72 tanks in service today for the syrian army and fielded for nearly 2-3 years with only field maintenance and repairs without seeing a garage. Tho i've seen a lot of videos where the reactive armor has its use and saves the tankcrews asses, but newer Tow missile systems or even Kornet missiles are problems. the other downside is that the protected area isn't protected after a hit.
I would really like to know how useful those Reactive armor pellets are. _________________ Hydraw Art on Facebook QUICK_EDIT
Explosive Reactive Armor (ERA) is effective towards older missiles, rockets and other HEAT warheads, but against APFSDS and modern tandem-charge missiles and rockets such as the Kornet, Javelin, Hellfire, Vikhr it is not as effective, though most modern MBT's still use ERA or similar reactive protection. _________________ QUICK_EDIT
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Tanks, Tanks, Tanks
