NATO return to Cold War force structure

[James1978]

1 hour ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

As has been pointed out, if they want Abrams, they can buy them back from several places. The armour is an excuse, because I don't personally believe its much more advanced in that area.than Challenger 2.

Big assumption that any non-US M1 operators have any interest in parting with their most modern tanks . . .

Somehow I don't see Egypt, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, or Iraq leaping to effectively donate their M1s to Ukraine.

Though I suppose Australia might be willing to part with their M1A1s since they've already ordered new M1A2s.

 

[Stuart Galbraith]

Lay money down on the counter, and promise to make it right. Besides, you dont need to take ALL the tanks from any of them. They all have similar specs. Just buy a company back from all of them, should be more than enough.

I warrant its going to be a lot quicker than dearmouring M1A2's and refitting them. Which I strongly suspect is just a canard for not sending tanks.

[glenn239]

6 hours ago, Stuart Galbraith said:

 

I warrant its going to be a lot quicker than dearmouring M1A2's and refitting them. Which I strongly suspect is just a canard for not sending tanks.

Harvard summary on the effects of depleted uranium on civilian populations.  Keep in mind that Gulf War was very short, so the total amount of DU was probably small in comparison to what you are talking about.  

https://hir.harvard.edu/depleted-uranium-devastated-health-military-operations-and-environmental-injustice-in-the-middle-east/#:~:text=Depleted uranium may pose a,polluting local water and agriculture.

This article discusses the problems of data collection and assessing real environmental risks in the abstract.  But the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal is not so abstract, so the question is whether or not under Russian doctrine the mass employment of DU is considered to be a WMD or not.  Having just typed that sentence I did my first google search ever on what the Russian attitude is, and this is the first result on the list,

https://eurasiantimes.com/russia-warns-against-dirty-bomb-depleted-uranium/

Gavrilov added that Russia would consider it as using a “dirty bomb” if NATO supplies Kyiv with such shells for “heavy military equipment”

 

[Josh]

19 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

Harvard summary on the effects of depleted uranium on civilian populations.  Keep in mind that Gulf War was very short, so the total amount of DU was probably small in comparison to what you are talking about.  

https://hir.harvard.edu/depleted-uranium-devastated-health-military-operations-and-environmental-injustice-in-the-middle-east/#:~:text=Depleted uranium may pose a,polluting local water and agriculture.

This article discusses the problems of data collection and assessing real environmental risks in the abstract.  But the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal is not so abstract, so the question is whether or not under Russian doctrine the mass employment of DU is considered to be a WMD or not.  Having just typed that sentence I did my first google search ever on what the Russian attitude is, and this is the first result on the list,

https://eurasiantimes.com/russia-warns-against-dirty-bomb-depleted-uranium/

Gavrilov added that Russia would consider it as using a “dirty bomb” if NATO supplies Kyiv with such shells for “heavy military equipment”

 

I’d agree with the Russians on that point, were DU used on their territory. Which none of pre 2014 Ukraine is. That said the US has never exported DU to anyone , even Australia, who has no shortage of raw uranium IIRC.

I personally am not a fan of the U.S. policy of using DU as a projectile, especially in auto canons. I can appreciate the superior penetration but I feel it’s not worth the political costs.

[urbanoid]

16 minutes ago, Josh said:

I’d agree with the Russians on that point, were DU used on their territory. Which none of pre 2014 Ukraine is. That said the US has never exported DU to anyone , even Australia, who has no shortage of raw uranium IIRC.

I personally am not a fan of the U.S. policy of using DU as a projectile, especially in auto canons. I can appreciate the superior penetration but I feel it’s not worth the political costs.

Looks like there's a first time for everything, as we apparently ordered more than 100 thousand M829A2/A3/A4.

https://www.dsca.mil/press-media/major-arms-sales/poland-m1a1-abrams-main-battle-tanks

[urbanoid]

46 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

Harvard summary on the effects of depleted uranium on civilian populations.  Keep in mind that Gulf War was very short, so the total amount of DU was probably small in comparison to what you are talking about.  

https://hir.harvard.edu/depleted-uranium-devastated-health-military-operations-and-environmental-injustice-in-the-middle-east/#:~:text=Depleted uranium may pose a,polluting local water and agriculture.

This article discusses the problems of data collection and assessing real environmental risks in the abstract.  But the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal is not so abstract, so the question is whether or not under Russian doctrine the mass employment of DU is considered to be a WMD or not.  Having just typed that sentence I did my first google search ever on what the Russian attitude is, and this is the first result on the list,

https://eurasiantimes.com/russia-warns-against-dirty-bomb-depleted-uranium/

Gavrilov added that Russia would consider it as using a “dirty bomb” if NATO supplies Kyiv with such shells for “heavy military equipment”

Finding non-DU APFSDS to send to Ukraine is going to be easier than finding non-DU armored M1s, the US is apparently mostly worried about the latter.

[Pavel Novak]

2 hours ago, glenn239 said:

Harvard summary on the effects of depleted uranium on civilian populations.  Keep in mind that Gulf War was very short, so the total amount of DU was probably small in comparison to what you are talking about.  

https://hir.harvard.edu/depleted-uranium-devastated-health-military-operations-and-environmental-injustice-in-the-middle-east/#:~:text=Depleted uranium may pose a,polluting local water and agriculture.

This article discusses the problems of data collection and assessing real environmental risks in the abstract.  But the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal is not so abstract, so the question is whether or not under Russian doctrine the mass employment of DU is considered to be a WMD or not.  Having just typed that sentence I did my first google search ever on what the Russian attitude is, and this is the first result on the list,

https://eurasiantimes.com/russia-warns-against-dirty-bomb-depleted-uranium/

Gavrilov added that Russia would consider it as using a “dirty bomb” if NATO supplies Kyiv with such shells for “heavy military equipment”

 

USSR didn't have problem with DU export for ammunition production or with direct export of warheads with DU in 1980s and Russia complains how evil it is now? OK I see the argument that Russia is not USSR but then Ukraine is not Russia.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Pavel Novak

[glenn239]

5 hours ago, Josh said:

I’d agree with the Russians on that point, were DU used on their territory. Which none of pre 2014 Ukraine is. That said the US has never exported DU to anyone , even Australia, who has no shortage of raw uranium IIRC.

I personally am not a fan of the U.S. policy of using DU as a projectile, especially in auto canons. I can appreciate the superior penetration but I feel it’s not worth the political costs.

Agreed, provided that by political costs we mean to include dead civilians due to radiation poisoning.  The US army should have built about half of its M1A2 fleet without DU armor or shells.  I'd say, the designers never anticipated using these tanks in a war inside the Russian near abroad.

[Josh]

I think the use of DU in Cold War designs reflected the fact that everyone expected the big war to go nuclear anyway.

[glenn239]

2 minutes ago, Josh said:

I think the use of DU in Cold War designs reflected the fact that everyone expected the big war to go nuclear anyway.

Immediate reaction to that is doubt.  If tanks are fairly useless in a nuclear war it follows that the design of tanks should be tailored for conventional conflicts, since in the nuclear environment they are the love children of wallflowers and also rans.

[urbanoid]

If it was the US military using the tanks against the Russians, they wouldn't give a flying fuck about the DU, whether inside the armor or going out of the tank gun. If the war was a nuclear one, technical secrets wouldn't matter that much and if it was conventional... it's laughable to even think that the Russians would control any portion of the battlefied long enough to capture and evacuate the destroyed/immobilised US equipment.

Oh... and tanks would be very useful during the nuclear war, it's not a coincidence that during the Cold War both sides equipped tens of thousands of tanks with NBC protection. 

[Sardaukar]

As to topic, Finland never stood down.

Russia was and always is a threat to us. 

Thus, we maintained our military (unlike some) and nowadays boosted it a lot.

Back in days:

“Only Finland – superb, nay, sublime – in the jaws of peril – Finland shows what free men can do.” - Churchill

Nobody respects a country with a poor army, but everybody respects a country with a good army. I raise my toast to the Finnish army - J. Stalin

[Stuart Galbraith]

On 2/11/2023 at 3:00 PM, glenn239 said:

Harvard summary on the effects of depleted uranium on civilian populations.  Keep in mind that Gulf War was very short, so the total amount of DU was probably small in comparison to what you are talking about.  

https://hir.harvard.edu/depleted-uranium-devastated-health-military-operations-and-environmental-injustice-in-the-middle-east/#:~:text=Depleted uranium may pose a,polluting local water and agriculture.

This article discusses the problems of data collection and assessing real environmental risks in the abstract.  But the Russian tactical nuclear arsenal is not so abstract, so the question is whether or not under Russian doctrine the mass employment of DU is considered to be a WMD or not.  Having just typed that sentence I did my first google search ever on what the Russian attitude is, and this is the first result on the list,

https://eurasiantimes.com/russia-warns-against-dirty-bomb-depleted-uranium/

Gavrilov added that Russia would consider it as using a “dirty bomb” if NATO supplies Kyiv with such shells for “heavy military equipment”

 

Yeah, but you know, is Ukraine. I think they have already had the worst done to them, you know?

[Stuart Galbraith]

On 2/11/2023 at 9:05 PM, glenn239 said:

Immediate reaction to that is doubt.  If tanks are fairly useless in a nuclear war it follows that the design of tanks should be tailored for conventional conflicts, since in the nuclear environment they are the love children of wallflowers and also rans.

Glenn, please do yourself a favour and read up WHY the Soviets built so many tanks, specifically because they expected a nuclear war.

 

[Rick]

On 2/11/2023 at 10:24 AM, Josh said:

I’d agree with the Russians on that point, were DU used on their territory. Which none of pre 2014 Ukraine is. That said the US has never exported DU to anyone , even Australia, who has no shortage of raw uranium IIRC.

I personally am not a fan of the U.S. policy of using DU as a projectile, especially in auto canons. I can appreciate the superior penetration but I feel it’s not worth the political costs.

How much better is D.U. than whatever else is used?

[Ssnake]

Up to 10% penetration limit in the case of long rod projectiles, at lower impact velocities (ca. 1100m/sec). The advantage over tungsten based long rods shrinks disappears at ca. 1600m/s impact velocity, and I think that the 10% advantage is based on older designs; Rheinmetall claims that its WHA IV alloy shows adiabatic shear characteristics similar to dU, which suggests that the actual difference is much smaller these days.

 

You can see the difference yourself if you enter the dimensions of a penetrator in Willi Odermatt's calculator, and then just change the material from tungsten to dU:

http://www.longrods.ch/perfcalc.php

 

Can't say anything about the characteristics of dU as an armor material. Maybe, if you ask in the Armor Scientific subforum, TTKCiar knows papers that discuss them. Even then, you would learn only how it behaves in certain lab configurations. How the configuration in an actual tank's armor array is set up would remain, of course, secret.

[seahawk]

And then there is the price factor.....

[Martineleca]

On 2/11/2023 at 9:51 AM, Stuart Galbraith said:

I warrant its going to be a lot quicker than dearmouring M1A2's and refitting them.

I have read that the main reason they moved from tungsten to DU sabots and later plating is that the US had more excess uranium than they knew what to do with, it's surprising that with their emphasis on nuclear energy France and Japan haven't done the same, at least for tank armor.

Edited February 14, 2023 by Martineleca

[bojan]

Tungsten is AFAIK not used as armor material.

France uses DU in their sodium cooled breeder reactors, way better use than shooting it at tanks.

 

[Josh]

The DU is free, a byproduct. But I assumed that the costs of working it into projectiles and armor are still very substantial giving the nature of the material; I can’t see it as a cost saving measure.

[Martineleca]

18 hours ago, bojan said:

Tungsten is AFAIK not used as armor material.

 

Yes I know it wasn't used for armor, the penetration capacity of DU is very close to modern tungsten sabot. However when applied to frontal and side plate on tanks it is superior to the composite or spaced configurations found on other models, even third generation Chobham.

[sunday]

19 hours ago, bojan said:

France uses DU in their sodium cooled breeder reactors,

All decommissioned now, did not know they used DU in shielding, but it is very reasonable.

[Martineleca]

11 hours ago, sunday said:

All decommissioned now, did not know they used DU in shielding, but it is very reasonable.

Well that's the issue, France did not leverage their atomic energy prowess to improve the protection of their tanks that was mostly inadequate prior to the Leclerc. Had they done so, an AMX 40 with DU armor would have been formidable to this day.

[bojan]

38 minutes ago, Martineleca said:

Well that's the issue, France did not leverage their atomic energy prowess to improve the protection of their tanks that was mostly inadequate prior to the Leclerc.

Because, just like with Leo 1, it was "inadequate" by design choice.

Quote

 Had they done so, an AMX 40 with DU armor would have been formidable to this day.

One of the best jokes on TN this year.

That would require DU to have some magical properties, and (at least AFAIK) DU is not magical, and as far as we know only US used it as an armor material.

[Martineleca]

12 minutes ago, bojan said:

That would require DU to have some magical properties, and (at least AFAIK) DU is not magical, and as far as we know only US used it as an armor material.

Of course it's not magic, but the US Army very rapidly outfitted the Abrams of all front line formations with DU inserts over their regular composite armor just before going into Desert Storm, believing the extra weight and cost to be well worth it.