British military spending

[ditchman]

looking at what has been happening in Ukraine.......particulary the destruction of russian tanks and APC's.........why do the British insist on purchasing and developing the Challanger tanks..........

if i were to rejoin the army the last regiment i would join is the tank regiment...........ok you are sitting in a nice £5million quid metal box..................but the problem is "out there"...is some lad walking about with a fag hangin' out of his/her mouth...totting a hand held throw-a-way rocket launcher ...that will tear your little motorised gun box apart

when will the military realise that...."tank is king"...is no longer the case

the future is the foot soldier .........a very well equiped foot soldier........or self guiding big field gun munitions

Edited April 1, 2022 by ditchman

[Vince Green]

even during WW2 losses among tank crews was very heavy

[enfieldspares]

I think that the tank will go the way of the dreadnought and the battlecruisers and battleships that came after. It was always a given that tanks can take ground but cannot hold ground and whereas in WWII tank losses were overwhelmingly caused by other tanks, by wheeled anti-tank guns, by anti-tank mines and by breakdown that has changed. Man held anti tank weapons despite what you see in the film Fury were percentage kill wise very low.

Even in the era of the progression from Malkara through Vigilat and on to Swingfire easily man portable but effective long range guided anti tank weapons were a grail that was never achieved. They still had to be stuck on at least a Landrover. Modern miniaturised electronics have changed that as they are reliable and importantly compact and can truly be actually carried by a man.

We have in our own domestic lives to see how the big clumsy desktop early Windows 95 and similar computers in those big cabinets have been surpassed by handheld tablets with the only limit on size being not the processor and circuits but the the fingers and palm dimensions of the user's hands. The cheap miniaturised computer processor and associated circuit board has done for the tank.

[oldypigeonpopper]

Hello, 5 million £s , I thought they were Armour plated , ?? 

[welsh1]

In Ukraine you are seeing tanks with no battle plan, no leadership and no idea.
While a tank can be destroyed fairly easy, you need to get it to a position to do so,Tanks used properly with light armour support and infantry support and air support are very effective, they tend not to drive down the main road, or use the obvious crossing over a ditch or river as you have been seeing in ukraine.

[enfieldspares]

39 minutes ago, welsh1 said:

....tanks battleships used properly with light armour destroyer support and infantry frigate support and air support air cover are very effective....

Fixed it for you maybe? Or that's no doubt what the admirals were saying even into the late 1940s. No I think that game changer is that enabled by accompanying small observer drones these modern weapons such as the Javelin is that its range is now at least that, some 2,800 metres it is said by some sources, of the tank it is designed to kill. Which then IMHO enable enemy infantry to engage them outside the area of the tank's own close infantry protection. And even at some $250,000 cost they are cheaper than a tank and more importantly don't need the diesel or petrol tanker fuel of a tank which as far as I observe now for all intents in the era of the small observer drone supporting these modern A/T weapons is "dead" if it stops moving. The era of "if you can see the tank you can hit it and if you can hit it you will kill hit" has ceased to be reserved to one tank fighting another and can now be achieved by the infantryman also.

Edited April 1, 2022 by enfieldspares

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Light tanks are the way forward;

Like the German Wiesel.

 

 

[welsh1]

22 minutes ago, enfieldspares said:

Fixed it for you maybe? Or that's no doubt what the admirals were saying even into the late 1940s. No I think that game changer is that enabled by accompanying small observer drones these modern weapons such as the Javelin is that its range is now at least that, some 2,800 metres it is said by some sources, of the tank it is designed to kill. Which then IMHO enable enemy infantry to engage them outside the area of the tank's own close infantry protection. And even at some $250,000 cost they are cheaper than a tank and more importantly don't need the diesel or petrol tanker fuel of a tank which as far as I observe now for all intents in the era of the small observer drone supporting these modern A/T weapons is "dead" if it stops moving. The era of "if you can see the tank you can hit it and if you can hit it you will kill hit" has ceased to be reserved to one tank fighting another and can now be achieved by the infantryman also.

While it is more difficult for a tank to operate with the development of anti tank systems, they still have a place on the battle field and to hold ground you have captured are an asset.
We should not judge what is happening in ukraine where russian armour has been shown to be rubbish.  MBT's from the usa uk germany etc  have far more complex systems both within the tank and supporting.
Their time is coming to be obselete, but i do not think that time is here yet.

[Mice!]

1 hour ago, welsh1 said:

In Ukraine you are seeing tanks with no battle plan, no leadership and no idea.
While a tank can be destroyed fairly easy, you need to get it to a position to do so,Tanks used properly with light armour support and infantry support and air support are very effective, they tend not to drive down the main road, or use the obvious crossing over a ditch or river as you have been seeing in ukraine.

Absolutely,  I'm still baffled when I see a column of tanks on the news going through obvious ambush points with no supporting infantry,  it shows how poor their training and leadership are. 

[enfieldspares]

33 minutes ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

Light tanks are the way forward;

Like the German Wiesel.

 

 

Oh no! All very Carden-Lloyd! Is this an April Fool or are we really reinventing the tankette?

[steve s×s]

2 hours ago, ditchman said:

looking at what has been happening in Ukraine.......particulary the destruction of russian tanks and APC's.........why do the British insist on purchasing and developing the Challanger tanks..........

if i were to rejoin the army the last regiment i would join is the tank regiment...........ok you are sitting in a nice £5million quid metal box..................but the problem is "out there"...is some lad walking about with a fag hangin' out of his/her mouth...totting a hand held throw-a-way rocket launcher ...that will tear your little motorised gun box apart

when will the military realise that...."tank is king"...is no longer the case

the future is the foot soldier .........a very well equiped foot soldier........or self guiding big field gun munitions

Nothing like a good old cavalry charge (they don't like it up em) 

[tony1]

Battle tanks may or may not be becoming obsolete on the battle field but are great for controlling objecting voters,???  

[TIGHTCHOKE]

1 hour ago, enfieldspares said:

Oh no! All very Carden-Lloyd! Is this an April Fool or are we really reinventing the tankette?

Not we, the Germans.

I was in CVRTs, 70 MPH in reverse, very handy when sneaking up a hill to have a look for targets!

[B725]

20 minutes ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

Not we, the Germans.

I was in CVRTs, 70 MPH in reverse, very handy when sneaking up a hill to have a look for targets!

I bet the French have a lot of those 😁

[Raja Clavata]

There's no need to put personnel in tanks, the way forward is remote control tanks, then autonomous ones.

[enfieldspares]

The problem with the two man or even three man tank, as the Swedes found with the S Tank, is that there's not enough men to stand sentry, do the maintenance, cook the meals, and all the other tasks that tankies have to do without those men eventually becoming over tired and less efficient. And that's even before the damn thing needs its tracks tensioning or repairing.

Edited April 1, 2022 by enfieldspares

[toontastic]

2 hours ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

Not we, the Germans.

I was in CVRTs, 70 MPH in reverse, very handy when sneaking up a hill to have a look for targets!

I was a scorpion gunner. 

[TIGHTCHOKE]

Just now, toontastic said:

I was a scorpion gunner. 

Good man I was a Rarden Cannon Gunner in the Scimitars.

[udderlyoffroad]

My the PW armchair generals are busy tonight. Here’s some counterpoint from an actual eggspurt 

 

[captainhastings]

Another thing I dont get is soldiers on the news wear face coverings all the time. I have no idea but when shooting the more awareness you have with hearing and vision the better. When your life depends on it even more so. As for a tank you wouldn't want to be any where near one

[welsh1]

15 hours ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

Not we, the Germans.

I was in CVRTs, 70 MPH in reverse, very handy when sneaking up a hill to have a look for targets!

I was a CVR(t) instructor, they were originally developed to go up to 90mph, but it was decided that this was a bit dangerous, so they were limited to 60mph,I did drive a Spartan in reverse at 56mph while training in the yank sector in Germany.

When we did a battle run with the yank MBT's their commander came over to us for a chat and expressed his amazement that our Spartans were so quick and agile and he had expected them to never be able to follow his MBT's over some of the terrain let alone be the first to cross the end of the battle run line.

[TIGHTCHOKE]

2 minutes ago, welsh1 said:

I was a CVR(t) instructor, they were originally developed to go up to 90mph, but it was decided that this was a bit dangerous, so they were limited to 60mph,I did drive a Spartan in reverse at 56mph while training in the yank sector in Germany.

When we did a battle run with the yank MBT's their commander came over to us for a chat and expressed his amazement that our Spartans were so quick and agile and he had expected them to never be able to follow his MBT's over some of the terrain let alone be the first to cross the end of the battle run line.

We used to take the fuse out to allow a bit more acceleration!

Also very handy to warm your meals on the hot exhaust while parked up waiting for the next move.

As an instructor did you stand it on the drive wheels?

We used to teach the trainees to only do what the guy up top wanted, fold the wing mirrors in, engage reverse and get them to follow instructions accurately.

[welsh1]

2 hours ago, TIGHTCHOKE said:

We used to take the fuse out to allow a bit more acceleration!

Also very handy to warm your meals on the hot exhaust while parked up waiting for the next move.

As an instructor did you stand it on the drive wheels?

We used to teach the trainees to only do what the guy up top wanted, fold the wing mirrors in, engage reverse and get them to follow instructions accurately.

A very young me instructing a lad called Todd to go over a knife edge, it doesn't look much but a split second before the pic it was standing on it's nose, Todd had been terrified and it took 20 mins of reassurance to get him to attempt it,he went on to become a very competent driver.No helmet on H&S was not as strict in those days lol.
 

[The Mighty Prawn]

Great pics, I’m guessing if it does go over you get the choices of hunker down and hold on, try to jump clear, get splattered?

[welsh1]

10 minutes ago, The Mighty Prawn said:

Great pics, I’m guessing if it does go over you get the choices of hunker down and hold on, try to jump clear, get splattered?

Duck down ,pray, worry about how you are going to explain it to the Boss.