78 ms·

Does the Tank Have a Future?

191 points by martincmartin 4y ago

dibujante 4y ago
Yes, it's still valuable to be able to move a heavily armored computer onto the battlefield, even if you need to be more cautious about exposing it to direct fire now.
- cestith 4y ago
  They're cheaper and making them quite so heavily armored is less important if there are no humans in them, too. That's a whole different can of worms when the calculus changes from blood and treasure to just treasure though, especially if only on one side.
metabagel 4y ago
Fantastic visuals accompanying the article!
- causi 4y ago
  They're slick but not terribly accurate. For example, the top-attack angle for the Javelin is depicted as far more vertical than it actually is. It's actually only about 50 degrees, which means it doesn't perform as much better than the NLAW as the specs would suggest thanks to the NLAW's 90 degree top attack.
  - calcifer 4y ago
    It's an article meant for the general public. I think the visuals demonstrate the "it comes from above" nature of it quite well enough.
ramesh31 4y ago
Tanks are not going anywhere. Especially depending on your definition of "tank". The initial Russian push to Kiev was a disastrous blunder as they ran into unexpected resistance; no one just rolls unsupported tanks into a city they are expecting to have to fight for. But taking (and holding) a city means taking (and holding) the streets, which is impossible for the infantry alone without direct fire and armor support. You will be decimated by sniper and indirect fire otherwise. If anything, this conflict underscores just how crucial armor is to modern warfare. With GPS guided artillery, and omnipresent drone threats, the days of infantrymen defending trench lines in the open are over.
- adolph 4y ago
  > no one just rolls unsupported tanks into a city they are expecting to have to fight for An example counterpoint is the Iraq war "Thunder Runs." Of course the US had air superiority, etc, etc. However, sometimes the resistance level cannot be known in ways other than getting out there and seeing if your unit draws fire. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Baghdad_(2003)#Thunder_Runs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Baghdad_(2003)#Thund...
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > the US had air superiority, etc, etc. Thunder runs were limited incursions designed to test Iraqi defenses. Beyond air superiority, which is huge, the American tanks also had active defenses and well-trained crew.
- hutzlibu 4y ago
  " With GPS guided artillery, and omnipresent drone threats, the days of infantrymen defending trench lines in the open are over." But you aware, that there are currently many infantrymen digging and defending trenches in the ukraine? (partly allmost equipped like in WW2) What little russia has of precisiom ammunition is reserved for more valuable targets, than infantry. They just get shelled by dumb artillery. Lots of it.
metabagel 4y ago
New German tank aims to be harder to kill. https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a40277518/new-german-tank-kf51-panther/ https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a40277518/...
- metabagel 4y ago
  Here’s an article with no paywall. https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/rheinmetall-unveils-new-tank-design-kf51-panther/ https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/rheinmetall-unveils-new-...
  - nerpderp82 4y ago
    For profit, "for export" weapons systems are morally reprehensible.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
    - lapsed_pacifist 4y ago
      Without for profit, for export, weapons, smaller entities that cannot support the industrial base to produce the means for their own defense would be at the mercy of any power who could. Self defense is a right, and the means of self defense should be widely available. Ensuring the vulnerability of the weak is morally reprehensible.
      - nerpderp82 4y ago
        I didn't say the weak should remain vulnerable. That is putting words in my mouth. How are the weak going to protect themselves with this German tank, they can't afford it. If we cared about the weak, we would ensure they aren't harmed. The world isn't interested in that. For profit weapons systems aren't interested in the weak, they are interested in the well funded. How much conflict has the low cost AK47 (7$ on the world market) enabled?
- deleted 4y ago
bpodgursky 4y ago
A lot of people are asking whether tanks are survivable anymore, but nobody is asking whether unarmored infantry are any more survivable in the era of small-drone warfare. It's all relative.
- metabagel 4y ago
  Infantry can more effectively hide, disperse, and bring down aerial drones.
  - bpodgursky 4y ago
    This is very terrain-dependent. It worked around Kyiv because it's forested and hilly, it works in cities with large soviet apartment blocks, but isn't working well at all in flat Donbas farmland. It's also a 100% defensive strategy. Unsupported infantry have almost no ability to retake dug-in positions.
- 1123581321 4y ago
  A lot of money is being invested in anti-drone tech.
- dragontamer 4y ago
  Small drone warfare? The Ukraine / Russian conflict has degenerated into trench warfare with thousands of 155mm / 152mm artillery being shot into each other's positions per day. These are the kinds of conditions where tanks excel. Humans who try to walk at 3km/hr get blown up by shrapnel, even 100m away is "close enough" to cause a significant injury and take a human out of a fight. Tanks? They pretty much ignore everything except a direct hit (within 2m) of the target. All that shrapnel just bounces off the tank. We've gone full circle back to WW1 trench/artillery warfare, where tanks were invented to break through the stalemate. Other vehicles (even armored cars) don't have thick enough armor to survive the shrapnel reliably. APCs, IFVs, Humvees still get shredded by artillery and air-burst munitions. ------- How do you beat artillery? You travel at 50km/hr, so you're hard to aim (a 20km shot takes 1.5 minutes to land. Easy to kill a human who can only travel a hundred meters in that timeframe, especially since its +/- 100m target size since the shrapnel blast is so huge). Tanks / vehicles on the other hand, move too fast to be targeted by dumb artillery. Smart artillery still kills you, but its relatively rare on the battlefield (due to the high costs of computer parts needed to make a smart shell). The vast majority of these holes are dumb artillery. --------- https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2022/06/15/e17c824a-4d23-46cb-b1bd-37f5d0caebf4_dc435f47.jpg https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/... This isn't the landscape of "drone warfare". This is WW1 style dumb-artillery wars.
prometheus76 4y ago
Judging by the current situation, it seems that there are more resources for building tanks than there are for building anti-tank weapons. Once the anti-tank weapon stocks have been depleted, tanks still play a devastating role in warfare. EDIT: I'm just relaying what I read in several articles about the difficulties in making anti-tank weapons because they rely on rare-earth minerals and because they rely on silicon chips, which are in short supply worldwide. Here's one of the articles I read: https://news.clearancejobs.com/2022/04/26/managing-the-dod-stockpile-replenishing-javelins-and-stingers/ https://news.clearancejobs.com/2022/04/26/managing-the-dod-s...
- metabagel 4y ago
  You could say it the other way around - once the tank stocks are depleted, anti-tank weapons can still play a devastating role (against other armored or unarmored vehicles).
  - prometheus76 4y ago
    You could say it the other way around, but the complexity of the electronics in the anti-tank weapons have proven to be difficult to produce in large quantities because of the chip shortage, but also because of the high level of experience and knowledge required to continue to make them. Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. The US Defense Dept. has said it will take at least ten years to rebuild the stock of anti-tank weapons that have been used in Ukraine in the last five months.
    - the_af 4y ago
      > Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. I don't disagree with your overall comment, but note the modern main battle tank is a really complex beast, both in sensors, gun control, and also defensive systems. Even Russian tanks are very complex (their current high losses notwithstanding), but Western tanks are incredibly complex. They are not meant to sustain heavy losses, they are designed to survive. If modern weapons strongly reduce the survivability of tanks, at least the future of Western tanks may be in question.
edmcnulty101 4y ago
I never understood why the tank tracks weren't targeted. They look easy to immobilize.
- mike-the-mikado 4y ago
  I believe that tank tracks break frequently and the tank will carry the spare parts required to make a repair.
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Also if you look at a tank it's basically a shell around the treads - you have to hit it directly on the side or a small opening on the front, both of which may not disable the tread.
- mrguyorama 4y ago
  Why do you think tank tracks aren't targeted? Unless you can directly pen/destroy a tank in one shot, in which case why would you not do that, "tracking" a tank is a common tactic to make it combat ineffective.
  - edmcnulty101 4y ago
    That entire article was about attacking the tank everywhere but the tracks.
- chrisseaton 4y ago
  They're relatively easily replaced and repaired.
- mtnGoat 4y ago
  this just makes the machine immobile it doesn't lessen its lethality. Also those tracks are pretty dang well designed as they have used across both military and industrial applications for a long time now.
- dredmorbius 4y ago
breadloaf 4y ago
Yes it does. See "The Chieftain: No, The Tank Is Not Dead" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI7T650RTT8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI7T650RTT8 TLDW: Tank has a task on a battlefield and fact that you can easily kill it won't take that task away. Same goes for infantry and they are not going away either. On the other hand we don't see battleships anymore, because big guns were replaced by precise missiles with much more range.
- kashkhan 4y ago
  Maybe war shouldn't have a future and not a role. We've had enough of the european way of war.
  - mike-the-mikado 4y ago
    Arguably the war is happening because we had prepared for it insufficiently.
    - the_af 4y ago
      It's hard to understand how "we" could not have prepared sufficiently. This conflict in Europe isn't a spur of the moment thing. Arguably it could have been in the making since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but even if you don't go that far back, then at least from 2014. It certainly didn't come out of the blue! I'll make my comment more assertive: I think "we" (for almost any value of "we") prepared for this. Some assumptions were proven wrong, like it often happens with war. But a lot of it is playing out like many assumed it would, or at least, it's playing out so that some factions can observe what modern war fought with modern weapons looks like.
      - vorpalhex 4y ago
        I think EU specifically dropped it's defense and R&D budgets and became too weak, making land grabs by Russia possible. There's a reason Russia feels good blustering about attacking Finland.
pclark 4y ago
It seems like the future of warfare is longe range (eg: firing missiles at tanks from across the horizon) or hyper short range (eg: troops clearing cities block by block) — anything else seems like it'll get wrecked by either the precision of long range or the precision of short range stuff. A tank isn't hyper mobile, isn't hyper accurate and isn't hyper long range. I don't get it's role — especially when it costs tens of millions and can be destroyed with either a $5k anti-armor launcher or from a missile fired across the horizon.
- jopython 4y ago
  Long range missiles are expensive. ATGMs require you to be closer (2 miles or less) to the target which means the operating crews are vulnerable to the same tanks and other mortar fire which they are trying to kill. I think long range artillery (> 50kms) is the solution.
  - int_19h 4y ago
    There's also drones to consider.
- Tsiklon 4y ago
  A tank is certainly more useful in the middle distance than at extreme range, or in tight spaces, there’s better choices of tool for those jobs guided artillery/rockets at distance and heavy auto-cannon clad infantry fighting vehicles like in the city. But not all warfare exists in either of those ranges. Tanks are great at assaulting enemy hard points, taking fire away from supporting infantry who can move in and cleanup the position after the tank has suppressed it or broken it open. It’s a heavy weapon of mobility and manoeuvre on the field. A tank’s role is that of heavy cavalry, designed to intimidate and break defensive lines in a charge across contested territory and to provide immediate direct fire on a target in support of advancing infantry. As the modern rifleman company is the descendant of line infantry of old, the tank is the descendant of the Cuirassier.
bell-cot 4y ago
Does infantry have a future, given what WWI taught us about their vulnerability to artillery and machine guns? Do (naval) ships have a future, given what WWII taught us about their vulnerability to torpedoes? Do air defenses or air forces have a future, given what happened in Mole Cricket 19 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19 )? Do... Zzz.
topspin 4y ago
Tanks were created to cope with two dominant threats: small arms and artillery shrapnel; the WW1 battlefield of machine guns and massed artillery. They've been improved to cope with some new threats since, but the number of threats are multiplying rapidly. The cost and complexity of tanks is exploding trying to deal with all of militarized model airplanes (Bayraktar et al.), guided artillery rounds (BONUS), long range armor seeking missiles (Brimstone), guided mortar rounds (XM395), intelligent anti-armor mines (PTKM-1R), man portable antitank weapons (Javelin/NLAW/Stugna-P/...), improved RPGs, etc. In a world where there is a Stugna-P "behind every blade of grass" tanks become a liability. I think they'll be scaled back to niches; there will probably always be a need for a big chunk of metal to push through and blow holes in things. Going forward though, the German Blitzkrieg model or Russia's Horde Of Armor doctrine is dead when the combatants are not greatly asymmetric.
- ckozlowski 4y ago
  I think that's a slightly skewed way of looking at it. While there's some nuggets of truth there, the better way to look at a tank is that it provides highly mobile firepower, combined with enough protection to get in there and do it's job. And that job is to support the infantry by, as you stated so well, "blow holes in things" (Quickly, might add!) But it never was meant to operate on it's own. And when it did, it was either lost in large numbers (Russian tank charges in WWII) or was in all actuality a fluke (Your Blitzkrieg example. See The Chieftan's video on the Battle of France in WWII on why this was such a reckless thing to do, followed by reading on the Battle of The Bulge on why it didn't work a second time.) Tanks unsupported by infantry are a liability. However, infantry, unsupported by tanks, can be a liability as well when attacking an opponent who's well fortified and/or has heavy weapons. When tanks, infantry, and artillery work together (combined arms theory), then the danger posed by ATGMs and the like is greatly reduced. Armies have been reminded of this numerous times last century, and each time a renewed emphasis on combined arms fixes the balance. Lastly, and I feel this point is missing in a lot of arguments: ATGMs like Javelin, mines, guided mortars, etc and all but the heaviest drones are defensive and supporting weapons. For ATGMs and RPGs, these weapons exist to prevent infantry from being overrun. (And as the Russians are being reminded, they can be quite good at this.) They are not offensive weapons. That is the reason the tank remains. It's offensive.
FinanceAnon 4y ago
Tanks Considered Harmful?
trhway 4y ago
Russian tanks aren't a representative of a modern tank as among other things they have crappy active defense - it is all about electronics. Israel's is a good one, and their tanks survive multiple shots by actively killing incoming RPG warheads and the likes. Also Russian tanks are on the light side as they can't manage a powerful enough engine required, ie gas turbine of 1500hp+. The best they have so far managed is 1000hp diesel on may be 200 tanks by now, the rest is old one 800hp. Thus their tanks have armor lighter and of older type than say Abrams. And there is huge area of discussion about integration of all weapons on the battlefield - without such integration any weapon loses its efficiency tremendously - and Russian military is very bad at integration, and tanks in isolation are much weaker target as opponent much easily finds the window opportunity.
- int_19h 4y ago
  Have Israeli tanks ever faced Javelins tho?
  - aerostable_slug 4y ago
    They have faced formidable ATGMs including Kornet E, and have suffered losses. Time will tell how effective their hard-kill countermeasures will prove to be.
  - cturner 4y ago
    Not a direct answer, but an advantage of Israeli armour is that they only need to deploy locally. This means less penalty for armour than US systems which are designed to be carried in air transports for foreign deployment, or Russian units designed around train transport. The Israeli Namer IFV weighs more than twice as much as a Bradley IFV, and can carry more troops.
  - trhway 4y ago
    Javelin is on a higher end. A most advanced Russian tank - T-90M - available in the army (while T-14 "Armata" is supposed to be more advanced it isn't available in the army really) was taken out by a side hit from a much lighter/simpler/cheaper "Carl-Gustaf" which a good modern active protection system should be able to shoot down relatively easy.
cestith 4y ago
This is an excellent question that's asked every five to ten years since 1916 and so far always ends up answered "yes".
aerostable_slug 4y ago
Tanks used correctly and in sufficient mass produces something called the Shock Effect of Armor. Smart munitions are getting more and more effective, but it's really hard to calmly lob missiles at a charging unit of tanks supported by artillery, infantry, CAS, etc. "Principle: armor in strength produces decisive shock effect The psychological shock effect that comes to troops on the receiving end of a massed armored assault is terrific. This effect radiates from the point of attack in concentric semi-circles, as do the waves from a stone dropped in the water near the edge of a millpond. If the attack is in strength, these shockwaves reach to the enemy division, corps and army headquarters. Shock effect gives armor part of its protection and hastens the disintegration of the enemy force attacked. The shock effect of the mass employment of armor varies as the square or cube of the number of tanks used. Attacking with armored strength too small to produce decisive shock effect often results in great losses and inconclusive results." https://www.benning.army.mil/armor/earmor/content/Historical/Principles.html https://www.benning.army.mil/armor/earmor/content/Historical... Simply put, they are pants-soiling terrifying spectacles of death and they prove overwhelming. Once significant momentum of a well-executed armored attack has been gained, they are difficult to slow or stop. Drone swarms may make this tactic obsolete, but we're not there yet.
- throwaway1492 4y ago
  Former US Army 19k here. Tanks are expensive to build, expensive to maintain, expensive to operate, hard to transport and require certain levels of infrastructure to operate in theater (bridges to support their weight). With current threats they are bound to become even heavier (and require more fuel). While I am all for seeing the rise of Bolo's, and I love shock effect as much as the next enthusiast, the ability of a $500 drone with the equivalent of a RKG-3 grenade to take one out is really the only relevant part of the question. Tanks are dead. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RKG-3_anti-tank_grenade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RKG-3_anti-tank_grenade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolo_universe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolo_universe Edit to add; "expensive to operate" was a bit of an understatement, the logistical support required for a tank company is tremendous, totally preposperous; 1000s of gallons of fuel a day, 3 types of ammo, support equipment and personnel.
Melatonic 4y ago
I am still waiting for when we get individual tank like things or tank suits. Lots of SciFi and Anime has talked about it for years but I feel like there has to be some efficient middleground between a bunch of dudes in a modern tank vs just running around as infantry with body armor. I am not necessarily talking about an Iron Man like thing - just something much more nimble.
syntaxfree 4y ago
I expected this to be about Shark Tank somehow.
2OEH8eoCRo0 4y ago
The USMC got rid of their tanks. The closest thing to a tank they still have is a Light Armored Vehicle.
- ranger207 4y ago
  The USMC decided it's going to fight a different kind of fight, being dropped off on small Pacific islands with antiship missiles and artillery to produce a set of distributed antiship bunkers. Their divestment of the tank is not because they thought the tank is obsolete, but because the tank doesn't fit with the fight they're planning for. Most armies, including the US's, still plan to have fights where tanks make sense. Of course the question of whether or not those kinds of fights are likely to happen is a valid question, but is orthogonal to the question of whether or not drones and ATGMs make tanks obsolete
- mellavora 4y ago
  And some people in the USMC hotly debate if this was a good idea or not
- gherkinnn 4y ago
  They got rid of their tanks because the Army will provide them. It says so in the 2030 doctrine document. How is that so hard to understand?
734129837261 4y ago
It's easier to make a weapon that takes out a tank, than it is to make a tank that can defend itself to it. Javelin missiles are just one thing, but cheap drones with simple rockets on them should be able to take out a moving force of numerous tanks. Imagine having an arsenal of 20 tanks storming your city. Now imagine having about 100 drones ordered from Amazon, outfitted with RKG-3 anti-tank grenades. One each. You can fly low, you can fly through the woods, and you can fly each individually operated drone right up to the top part of a tank, and boom. No clever software automation. Just a drone that can lift something like 1 kg worth of anti-tank grenade. You have 20 drone operators. You'll have 5 drones per tank. One after the other. Skip the already defeated tanks. Attack the tanks that will create a barrier when destroyed first, take natural barriers into account. Your tanks can have all the power and shock and awe you might think they have, but any 12-year old will be able to take you out as if they were playing a video game.
- amluto 4y ago
  Because solo tanks storming a city isn’t what tanks are for. https://acoup.blog/2022/05/06/collections-when-is-a-tank-not-a-tank/ https://acoup.blog/2022/05/06/collections-when-is-a-tank-not... edit: for example, I would not want to be a drone operator controlling a drone in real time anywhere near a modern army. RF direction finders are a thing.
- jimmytidey 4y ago
  Your broader point might be correct but an anti tank grenade would not be likely to knock out a modern tank.
- earthbee 4y ago
  I think every half way capable military on the planet is seeing the news and videos coming out of Ukraine and thinking, hmm, must invest in anti-drone technology. A decade from now what's happening in Ukraine won't work against most major military powers. The drones we're seeing are very slow and very low but modern anti-aircraft systems aren't optimised to detect things this small and low so are getting away mostly untouched, but there's no significant technological hurdle against modifying existing systems or developing new ones that work against this type of threat.
happyopossum 4y ago
What we’ve seen in Ukraine is far from modern tanks fighting with modern tank doctrine. Yes, technically some of those tanks are ‘modern’, but many of them appear to have fake reactive armor, are poorly built, and they are being deployed without infantry, air, or logistical support. It’s the perfect recipe to lose all of your tanks.
- paxys 4y ago
  Most of what you have mentioned are inherent shortcomings of tanks in a modern battlefield. They are fuel intensive. They need massive logistical support. They are vulnerable to targeted attacks, like from drones. None of this is unique to the Ukraine situation. It is very hard for tanks to be effective in the age of cheap UAVs.
  - nradov 4y ago
    Right. There were similar discussions about whether the tank has a future after many of them were destroyed in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The main issues were crappy Russian equipment and poor tactics. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/armor-attrition-in-nagorno-karabakh-battle-not-a-sign-us-should-give-up-on-tanks-experts-say/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/...
    - ksidudwbw 4y ago
      There isnt a silver bullet for every situation and condition, but a moveable metal box that can target heat-emitting targets in its line of sight is useful. As long as its potential is fully utilised like machine assisted target aquisiton and liquidation (ai assisted optics + firing)
  - jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
    Infantry are vulnerable to literally everything, and yet no one besides some dingbats that watched terminator too many times are suggesting the age of infantry is over. Aircraft are vulnerable to missiles. Is anyone suggesting the age of aircraft are over? Drones, particularly consumer quadcopter adopted out of convenience are vulnerable to missiles, autocannons, and electronic warfare. Does not the very same logic being offered as proof of the end of tanks apply to drones as well? This whole argument is stupid and predicated on a vast misunderstanding of how combined arms operations work. Systems are not discard because they're vulnerable, if they can be employed in a way that min/maxes their impact vs vulnerability. There is nothing new about this conflict as far as tanks and ATGMs. Everything happening here happened in the Yom Kippor war, in Grozny, in Syria, and in Yemen. You just have a bunch of lazy bloggers and journalists making a sensationalized claim to sound like something exciting and dramatic is happening, at the cost of grossly distorting the actual reality. What will change is future tanks will likely prioritize active protection systems and sensors over bulk armor. But the basic concept of combing firepower, mobility, and protection is not going away any time soon. Example, Rheinmetall just announced their new tank prototype this week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE A couple key features: * an active protection system specifically for top attack munitions like Javelin * a remote weapons station with a machine gun specifically for engaging small low altitude drones like quad copters * flexible manning, including looking at autonomy and remote control * ability to host drones for its own situational awareness * a loitering munition that's being co-designed, launched by the big gun Maybe the era of the T-72 is over. But the people confidently predicting the era of tanks and armored fighting vehicles in general are over, cuz missiles, cuz drones, frankly, have no clue what they're talking about.
openasocket 4y ago
The war in Ukraine doesn't provide sufficient evidence that modern combined arms operations are outdated. Russia deployed combat troops significantly short on man power, leading to a situation where attacks had far more armor than infantry. See https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-russian-militarys-ill-fated-force-design/ https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-... for example. It's been known since the Spanish Civil War that tanks are vulnerable to anti-tank teams when not properly supported by infantry, especially in adverse terrain. WW2-era tanks were effectively countered by anti-tank gun teams in entrenched positions, which is why they worked in concert with infantry, artillery, and close air support to suppress anti-tank guns and enable the tanks to advance. Or they could bypass these well-defended positions and attack at weaker points, taking advantage of the tank's superior tactical mobility. While it is possible that drones and modern ATGM teams could effectively counter traditional combined arms operations, the evidence from the war in Ukraine is largely inconclusive at this time. If Russia were to correct their manpower issues, or at least be able to conduct traditional combined arms offensives in certain areas, then we'd have more solid evidence. Notably Ukraine still sees value in the tank, since they've been repeatedly requesting tanks (along with a variety of equipment) from the West. Personally, I think we'll see an adjustment to the balance of military forces, but the tank will continue to play a pivotal role. Active protection systems will continue to improve, we'll see the expansion of short range air defenses and doctrine to counter drones (and even longer-ranged ATGMs), increased teaming of drones alongside infantry and armor (in doctrine acting as a sort of middle ground between artillery and air power), and the usage of novel indirect fires for tanks like the KSTAM.
- duxup 4y ago
  It’s hard to get a feel for what is happening overall, but the amount of video of Russian armor of all types operating alone ( no infantry support) has been pretty shocking.
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  - ggm 4y ago
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bozhark 4y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE
danboarder 4y ago
Lost in the discussion is the idea that the tank should not have a future, and neither should most weapons of war, because they are brutal inhumane killing machines from a past era that have no place in future societies - this is my view as a pacifist. My hope is that humans can move past the idea of war for settling conflict, otherwise what is the point of social norms like privacy, respect, and courtesy between people, when the same people in society can condone killing of their youth in war? In my view tanks are are a tool of war against the progress of society and I don't see that changing in the future.
halffaday 4y ago
The tone of the article is a little hard to take seriously given that the legacy media are mostly now admitting that a Ukrainian surrender is necessary and that all Russian territorial objectives are likely to be met. The more interesting question is if having the US as a credible security partner has a future.
- vba616 4y ago
  If the US is not a "credible security partner" then what the media thinks about a Ukrainian surrender is utterly irrelevant. Even if is is a credible security partner, the same is true. It's...I don't know what to call it except intriguing, the way you flip from a picture of the US as a totalitarian monolith with tentacles controlling everything, to the US as an utterly impotent former empire in shambles, unable to even be a "partner", within two sentences. It's kind of an echo of the way Russia has been portrayed in the last few years.
  - halffaday 4y ago
    It's...I don't know what to call it except intriguing, the way you conclude anything I wrote means the US is a totalitarian monolith.
    - vba616 4y ago
      It's only two sentences, so I assumed neither of them were fluff...I interpreted "the legacy media" being mentioned adjacent to your personifying the US as someone carrying out foreign policy as implying they are closely related. If you didn't mean it that way, ok, but I think it's a common view and common to express it like this. If the media is an arm of the establishment, the rulers of the country, with a singular purpose of supporting it regardless of policy changes, that is what I'd call a totalitarian monolith. Now if you don't view things that way, fine, but it seems like maybe half of the politically aware US public is more or less on board with that worldview, except that they identify the "monolith" with the left. Literally every day recently, I hear, on the radio that is always playing in a convenience store I go to, an ad for a famous person's new show on Newsmax, that is somehow rebelling against (I forget the exact phrase) major media outlets. I guess the phrase "mainstream media" is tired, but the concept seems to remain. The baseline here is the assumption that there is no free press, that there is no diversity of opinion, and I see that sort of claim made everywhere, every day. By, you know, the brave dissenters. I wonder if it's so ubiquitous that you have stopped seeing it as a background?
wildmanx 4y ago
It's clear that this is an exciting topic for techies. But keep in mind what this all is made for: Destroying and killing. We are talking about war machinery, and technical discussions about those tend to romanticize all that technology much too often. If we'd only pour 10% of the investments that today goes into war machinery into peace research and conflict prevention, then this world would be a much safer place. There would be less toys to play with and less "fascinating" discussions about tanks and guided missiles and strategy and artillery and infantry and fighter planes, which may sadden the technically inclined, but in the end these are not toys. These are devices to destroy and kill, and designing, building and maintaining them has enormous costs even in peacetime.
- TulliusCicero 4y ago
  > If we'd only pour 10% of the investments that today goes into war machinery into peace research and conflict prevention, then this world would be a much safer place. If you get everyone to decide this, yes. But if you do this and your aggressive neighbor doesn't, your decision to forgo military spending can make the world less safe. Some parts of Europe are remembering this now.
  - wildmanx 4y ago
    You seem to have missed the "investment into peace research and conflict prevention" part of my post. Ironically, that's the part that you quoted.
    - SubiculumCode 4y ago
      oh so another military program. only half kidding
    - fvdessen 4y ago
      Thousands of years of peace research have shown that some conflicts can only be prevented by the peaceful side being better prepared for war.
citizenpaul 4y ago
A comically silly question. I bet 99% of HN has played a game with Class called or refered to as "tank." Its not a matter of do tanks have a future just what the format will be. Even in a made up fantasy games the concept of a military unit with heavy armoring is always going to have a place. Same as real life.
- serf 4y ago
  fantasy worlds rarely have an equivalent of a 'rods from god' type weapon. the future of warfare , according to most of the RAND papers i've read, is in cheap/commodity available 'nodes' , part of a 'system of systems' that can all interconnect cheaply and provide good data without being valuable assets themselves. in a future where any group can destroy any one thing quickly and without hopes of defense (hypersonic missiles, for example) it becomes increasingly more risky and less valuable to shove a lot of effort and value into a single strong piece of equipment -- 'distributed warfare' is going to become increasingly common, and it's one of the few strategies that remains viable in a future without sufficient anti-air defenses.
  - citizenpaul 4y ago
    >fantasy worlds rarely have an equivalent of a 'rods from god' type weapon. I don't have a compendium of every game ever but they usually throw some OP weapon in. Doesn't invalidate the tanks. There is not in the game or real life an infinite supply of the god rod. On a side note I'm surprised there is no weapon called the god rod yet. Heavy armor will always have a place in battle. What happens when someone makes a slightly better armored swarm and you have to make a more armored swarm to take out their more armored swarm? Yep, escalation leads to escalation and eventually you end up with a......tank. Then you use the god rod to take out the tank and start over again. Battle is not a fixed state.
citboin 4y ago
There are small robotic “wingman” tanks under development right now. Crewed tanks will be fielded with robotic escorts in the future.

191 points by martincmartin 4y ago

Yes, it's still valuable to be able to move a heavily armored computer onto the battlefield, even if you need to be more cautious about exposing it to direct fire now.

cestith 4y ago
They're cheaper and making them quite so heavily armored is less important if there are no humans in them, too. That's a whole different can of worms when the calculus changes from blood and treasure to just treasure though, especially if only on one side.

metabagel 4y ago

Fantastic visuals accompanying the article!

causi 4y ago
They're slick but not terribly accurate. For example, the top-attack angle for the Javelin is depicted as far more vertical than it actually is. It's actually only about 50 degrees, which means it doesn't perform as much better than the NLAW as the specs would suggest thanks to the NLAW's 90 degree top attack.
- calcifer 4y ago
  It's an article meant for the general public. I think the visuals demonstrate the "it comes from above" nature of it quite well enough.

ramesh31 4y ago

Tanks are not going anywhere. Especially depending on your definition of "tank". The initial Russian push to Kiev was a disastrous blunder as they ran into unexpected resistance; no one just rolls unsupported tanks into a city they are expecting to have to fight for. But taking (and holding) a city means taking (and holding) the streets, which is impossible for the infantry alone without direct fire and armor support. You will be decimated by sniper and indirect fire otherwise. If anything, this conflict underscores just how crucial armor is to modern warfare. With GPS guided artillery, and omnipresent drone threats, the days of infantrymen defending trench lines in the open are over.

adolph 4y ago
> no one just rolls unsupported tanks into a city they are expecting to have to fight for An example counterpoint is the Iraq war "Thunder Runs." Of course the US had air superiority, etc, etc. However, sometimes the resistance level cannot be known in ways other than getting out there and seeing if your unit draws fire. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Baghdad_(2003)#Thunder_Runs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Baghdad_(2003)#Thund...
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > the US had air superiority, etc, etc. Thunder runs were limited incursions designed to test Iraqi defenses. Beyond air superiority, which is huge, the American tanks also had active defenses and well-trained crew.
hutzlibu 4y ago
" With GPS guided artillery, and omnipresent drone threats, the days of infantrymen defending trench lines in the open are over." But you aware, that there are currently many infantrymen digging and defending trenches in the ukraine? (partly allmost equipped like in WW2) What little russia has of precisiom ammunition is reserved for more valuable targets, than infantry. They just get shelled by dumb artillery. Lots of it.

metabagel 4y ago

New German tank aims to be harder to kill. https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a40277518/new-german-tank-kf51-panther/ https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a40277518/...

metabagel 4y ago
Here’s an article with no paywall. https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/rheinmetall-unveils-new-tank-design-kf51-panther/ https://breakingdefense.com/2022/06/rheinmetall-unveils-new-...
- nerpderp82 4y ago
  For profit, "for export" weapons systems are morally reprehensible.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
  - lapsed_pacifist 4y ago
    Without for profit, for export, weapons, smaller entities that cannot support the industrial base to produce the means for their own defense would be at the mercy of any power who could. Self defense is a right, and the means of self defense should be widely available. Ensuring the vulnerability of the weak is morally reprehensible.
    - nerpderp82 4y ago
      I didn't say the weak should remain vulnerable. That is putting words in my mouth. How are the weak going to protect themselves with this German tank, they can't afford it. If we cared about the weak, we would ensure they aren't harmed. The world isn't interested in that. For profit weapons systems aren't interested in the weak, they are interested in the well funded. How much conflict has the low cost AK47 (7$ on the world market) enabled?
deleted 4y ago

bpodgursky 4y ago

A lot of people are asking whether tanks are survivable anymore, but nobody is asking whether unarmored infantry are any more survivable in the era of small-drone warfare. It's all relative.

metabagel 4y ago
Infantry can more effectively hide, disperse, and bring down aerial drones.
- bpodgursky 4y ago
  This is very terrain-dependent. It worked around Kyiv because it's forested and hilly, it works in cities with large soviet apartment blocks, but isn't working well at all in flat Donbas farmland. It's also a 100% defensive strategy. Unsupported infantry have almost no ability to retake dug-in positions.
1123581321 4y ago
A lot of money is being invested in anti-drone tech.
dragontamer 4y ago
Small drone warfare? The Ukraine / Russian conflict has degenerated into trench warfare with thousands of 155mm / 152mm artillery being shot into each other's positions per day. These are the kinds of conditions where tanks excel. Humans who try to walk at 3km/hr get blown up by shrapnel, even 100m away is "close enough" to cause a significant injury and take a human out of a fight. Tanks? They pretty much ignore everything except a direct hit (within 2m) of the target. All that shrapnel just bounces off the tank. We've gone full circle back to WW1 trench/artillery warfare, where tanks were invented to break through the stalemate. Other vehicles (even armored cars) don't have thick enough armor to survive the shrapnel reliably. APCs, IFVs, Humvees still get shredded by artillery and air-burst munitions. ------- How do you beat artillery? You travel at 50km/hr, so you're hard to aim (a 20km shot takes 1.5 minutes to land. Easy to kill a human who can only travel a hundred meters in that timeframe, especially since its +/- 100m target size since the shrapnel blast is so huge). Tanks / vehicles on the other hand, move too fast to be targeted by dumb artillery. Smart artillery still kills you, but its relatively rare on the battlefield (due to the high costs of computer parts needed to make a smart shell). The vast majority of these holes are dumb artillery. --------- https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/2022/06/15/e17c824a-4d23-46cb-b1bd-37f5d0caebf4_dc435f47.jpg https://cdn.i-scmp.com/sites/default/files/d8/images/canvas/... This isn't the landscape of "drone warfare". This is WW1 style dumb-artillery wars.

prometheus76 4y ago

Judging by the current situation, it seems that there are more resources for building tanks than there are for building anti-tank weapons. Once the anti-tank weapon stocks have been depleted, tanks still play a devastating role in warfare. EDIT: I'm just relaying what I read in several articles about the difficulties in making anti-tank weapons because they rely on rare-earth minerals and because they rely on silicon chips, which are in short supply worldwide. Here's one of the articles I read: https://news.clearancejobs.com/2022/04/26/managing-the-dod-stockpile-replenishing-javelins-and-stingers/ https://news.clearancejobs.com/2022/04/26/managing-the-dod-s...

metabagel 4y ago
You could say it the other way around - once the tank stocks are depleted, anti-tank weapons can still play a devastating role (against other armored or unarmored vehicles).
- prometheus76 4y ago
  You could say it the other way around, but the complexity of the electronics in the anti-tank weapons have proven to be difficult to produce in large quantities because of the chip shortage, but also because of the high level of experience and knowledge required to continue to make them. Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. The US Defense Dept. has said it will take at least ten years to rebuild the stock of anti-tank weapons that have been used in Ukraine in the last five months.
  - the_af 4y ago
    > Tanks are much less reliant on complex electronics and manufacturing capability in order to be effective on the battlefield. I don't disagree with your overall comment, but note the modern main battle tank is a really complex beast, both in sensors, gun control, and also defensive systems. Even Russian tanks are very complex (their current high losses notwithstanding), but Western tanks are incredibly complex. They are not meant to sustain heavy losses, they are designed to survive. If modern weapons strongly reduce the survivability of tanks, at least the future of Western tanks may be in question.

edmcnulty101 4y ago

I never understood why the tank tracks weren't targeted. They look easy to immobilize.

mike-the-mikado 4y ago
I believe that tank tracks break frequently and the tank will carry the spare parts required to make a repair.
- bombcar 4y ago
  Also if you look at a tank it's basically a shell around the treads - you have to hit it directly on the side or a small opening on the front, both of which may not disable the tread.
mrguyorama 4y ago
Why do you think tank tracks aren't targeted? Unless you can directly pen/destroy a tank in one shot, in which case why would you not do that, "tracking" a tank is a common tactic to make it combat ineffective.
- edmcnulty101 4y ago
  That entire article was about attacking the tank everywhere but the tracks.
chrisseaton 4y ago
They're relatively easily replaced and repaired.
mtnGoat 4y ago
this just makes the machine immobile it doesn't lessen its lethality. Also those tracks are pretty dang well designed as they have used across both military and industrial applications for a long time now.
dredmorbius 4y ago

breadloaf 4y ago

Yes it does. See "The Chieftain: No, The Tank Is Not Dead" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI7T650RTT8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lI7T650RTT8 TLDW: Tank has a task on a battlefield and fact that you can easily kill it won't take that task away. Same goes for infantry and they are not going away either. On the other hand we don't see battleships anymore, because big guns were replaced by precise missiles with much more range.

kashkhan 4y ago
Maybe war shouldn't have a future and not a role. We've had enough of the european way of war.
- mike-the-mikado 4y ago
  Arguably the war is happening because we had prepared for it insufficiently.
  - the_af 4y ago
    It's hard to understand how "we" could not have prepared sufficiently. This conflict in Europe isn't a spur of the moment thing. Arguably it could have been in the making since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but even if you don't go that far back, then at least from 2014. It certainly didn't come out of the blue! I'll make my comment more assertive: I think "we" (for almost any value of "we") prepared for this. Some assumptions were proven wrong, like it often happens with war. But a lot of it is playing out like many assumed it would, or at least, it's playing out so that some factions can observe what modern war fought with modern weapons looks like.
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      I think EU specifically dropped it's defense and R&D budgets and became too weak, making land grabs by Russia possible. There's a reason Russia feels good blustering about attacking Finland.

pclark 4y ago

It seems like the future of warfare is longe range (eg: firing missiles at tanks from across the horizon) or hyper short range (eg: troops clearing cities block by block) — anything else seems like it'll get wrecked by either the precision of long range or the precision of short range stuff. A tank isn't hyper mobile, isn't hyper accurate and isn't hyper long range. I don't get it's role — especially when it costs tens of millions and can be destroyed with either a $5k anti-armor launcher or from a missile fired across the horizon.

jopython 4y ago
Long range missiles are expensive. ATGMs require you to be closer (2 miles or less) to the target which means the operating crews are vulnerable to the same tanks and other mortar fire which they are trying to kill. I think long range artillery (> 50kms) is the solution.
- int_19h 4y ago
  There's also drones to consider.
Tsiklon 4y ago
A tank is certainly more useful in the middle distance than at extreme range, or in tight spaces, there’s better choices of tool for those jobs guided artillery/rockets at distance and heavy auto-cannon clad infantry fighting vehicles like in the city. But not all warfare exists in either of those ranges. Tanks are great at assaulting enemy hard points, taking fire away from supporting infantry who can move in and cleanup the position after the tank has suppressed it or broken it open. It’s a heavy weapon of mobility and manoeuvre on the field. A tank’s role is that of heavy cavalry, designed to intimidate and break defensive lines in a charge across contested territory and to provide immediate direct fire on a target in support of advancing infantry. As the modern rifleman company is the descendant of line infantry of old, the tank is the descendant of the Cuirassier.

bell-cot 4y ago

Does infantry have a future, given what WWI taught us about their vulnerability to artillery and machine guns? Do (naval) ships have a future, given what WWII taught us about their vulnerability to torpedoes? Do air defenses or air forces have a future, given what happened in Mole Cricket 19 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mole_Cricket_19 )? Do... Zzz.

topspin 4y ago

Tanks were created to cope with two dominant threats: small arms and artillery shrapnel; the WW1 battlefield of machine guns and massed artillery. They've been improved to cope with some new threats since, but the number of threats are multiplying rapidly. The cost and complexity of tanks is exploding trying to deal with all of militarized model airplanes (Bayraktar et al.), guided artillery rounds (BONUS), long range armor seeking missiles (Brimstone), guided mortar rounds (XM395), intelligent anti-armor mines (PTKM-1R), man portable antitank weapons (Javelin/NLAW/Stugna-P/...), improved RPGs, etc. In a world where there is a Stugna-P "behind every blade of grass" tanks become a liability. I think they'll be scaled back to niches; there will probably always be a need for a big chunk of metal to push through and blow holes in things. Going forward though, the German Blitzkrieg model or Russia's Horde Of Armor doctrine is dead when the combatants are not greatly asymmetric.

ckozlowski 4y ago
I think that's a slightly skewed way of looking at it. While there's some nuggets of truth there, the better way to look at a tank is that it provides highly mobile firepower, combined with enough protection to get in there and do it's job. And that job is to support the infantry by, as you stated so well, "blow holes in things" (Quickly, might add!) But it never was meant to operate on it's own. And when it did, it was either lost in large numbers (Russian tank charges in WWII) or was in all actuality a fluke (Your Blitzkrieg example. See The Chieftan's video on the Battle of France in WWII on why this was such a reckless thing to do, followed by reading on the Battle of The Bulge on why it didn't work a second time.) Tanks unsupported by infantry are a liability. However, infantry, unsupported by tanks, can be a liability as well when attacking an opponent who's well fortified and/or has heavy weapons. When tanks, infantry, and artillery work together (combined arms theory), then the danger posed by ATGMs and the like is greatly reduced. Armies have been reminded of this numerous times last century, and each time a renewed emphasis on combined arms fixes the balance. Lastly, and I feel this point is missing in a lot of arguments: ATGMs like Javelin, mines, guided mortars, etc and all but the heaviest drones are defensive and supporting weapons. For ATGMs and RPGs, these weapons exist to prevent infantry from being overrun. (And as the Russians are being reminded, they can be quite good at this.) They are not offensive weapons. That is the reason the tank remains. It's offensive.

FinanceAnon 4y ago

Tanks Considered Harmful?

trhway 4y ago

Russian tanks aren't a representative of a modern tank as among other things they have crappy active defense - it is all about electronics. Israel's is a good one, and their tanks survive multiple shots by actively killing incoming RPG warheads and the likes. Also Russian tanks are on the light side as they can't manage a powerful enough engine required, ie gas turbine of 1500hp+. The best they have so far managed is 1000hp diesel on may be 200 tanks by now, the rest is old one 800hp. Thus their tanks have armor lighter and of older type than say Abrams. And there is huge area of discussion about integration of all weapons on the battlefield - without such integration any weapon loses its efficiency tremendously - and Russian military is very bad at integration, and tanks in isolation are much weaker target as opponent much easily finds the window opportunity.

int_19h 4y ago
Have Israeli tanks ever faced Javelins tho?
- aerostable_slug 4y ago
  They have faced formidable ATGMs including Kornet E, and have suffered losses. Time will tell how effective their hard-kill countermeasures will prove to be.
- cturner 4y ago
  Not a direct answer, but an advantage of Israeli armour is that they only need to deploy locally. This means less penalty for armour than US systems which are designed to be carried in air transports for foreign deployment, or Russian units designed around train transport. The Israeli Namer IFV weighs more than twice as much as a Bradley IFV, and can carry more troops.
- trhway 4y ago
  Javelin is on a higher end. A most advanced Russian tank - T-90M - available in the army (while T-14 "Armata" is supposed to be more advanced it isn't available in the army really) was taken out by a side hit from a much lighter/simpler/cheaper "Carl-Gustaf" which a good modern active protection system should be able to shoot down relatively easy.

cestith 4y ago

This is an excellent question that's asked every five to ten years since 1916 and so far always ends up answered "yes".

aerostable_slug 4y ago

Tanks used correctly and in sufficient mass produces something called the Shock Effect of Armor. Smart munitions are getting more and more effective, but it's really hard to calmly lob missiles at a charging unit of tanks supported by artillery, infantry, CAS, etc. "Principle: armor in strength produces decisive shock effect The psychological shock effect that comes to troops on the receiving end of a massed armored assault is terrific. This effect radiates from the point of attack in concentric semi-circles, as do the waves from a stone dropped in the water near the edge of a millpond. If the attack is in strength, these shockwaves reach to the enemy division, corps and army headquarters. Shock effect gives armor part of its protection and hastens the disintegration of the enemy force attacked. The shock effect of the mass employment of armor varies as the square or cube of the number of tanks used. Attacking with armored strength too small to produce decisive shock effect often results in great losses and inconclusive results." https://www.benning.army.mil/armor/earmor/content/Historical/Principles.html https://www.benning.army.mil/armor/earmor/content/Historical... Simply put, they are pants-soiling terrifying spectacles of death and they prove overwhelming. Once significant momentum of a well-executed armored attack has been gained, they are difficult to slow or stop. Drone swarms may make this tactic obsolete, but we're not there yet.

throwaway1492 4y ago
Former US Army 19k here. Tanks are expensive to build, expensive to maintain, expensive to operate, hard to transport and require certain levels of infrastructure to operate in theater (bridges to support their weight). With current threats they are bound to become even heavier (and require more fuel). While I am all for seeing the rise of Bolo's, and I love shock effect as much as the next enthusiast, the ability of a $500 drone with the equivalent of a RKG-3 grenade to take one out is really the only relevant part of the question. Tanks are dead. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RKG-3_anti-tank_grenade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RKG-3_anti-tank_grenade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolo_universe https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bolo_universe Edit to add; "expensive to operate" was a bit of an understatement, the logistical support required for a tank company is tremendous, totally preposperous; 1000s of gallons of fuel a day, 3 types of ammo, support equipment and personnel.

Melatonic 4y ago

I am still waiting for when we get individual tank like things or tank suits. Lots of SciFi and Anime has talked about it for years but I feel like there has to be some efficient middleground between a bunch of dudes in a modern tank vs just running around as infantry with body armor. I am not necessarily talking about an Iron Man like thing - just something much more nimble.

syntaxfree 4y ago

I expected this to be about Shark Tank somehow.

2OEH8eoCRo0 4y ago

The USMC got rid of their tanks. The closest thing to a tank they still have is a Light Armored Vehicle.

ranger207 4y ago
The USMC decided it's going to fight a different kind of fight, being dropped off on small Pacific islands with antiship missiles and artillery to produce a set of distributed antiship bunkers. Their divestment of the tank is not because they thought the tank is obsolete, but because the tank doesn't fit with the fight they're planning for. Most armies, including the US's, still plan to have fights where tanks make sense. Of course the question of whether or not those kinds of fights are likely to happen is a valid question, but is orthogonal to the question of whether or not drones and ATGMs make tanks obsolete
mellavora 4y ago
And some people in the USMC hotly debate if this was a good idea or not
gherkinnn 4y ago
They got rid of their tanks because the Army will provide them. It says so in the 2030 doctrine document. How is that so hard to understand?

734129837261 4y ago

It's easier to make a weapon that takes out a tank, than it is to make a tank that can defend itself to it. Javelin missiles are just one thing, but cheap drones with simple rockets on them should be able to take out a moving force of numerous tanks. Imagine having an arsenal of 20 tanks storming your city. Now imagine having about 100 drones ordered from Amazon, outfitted with RKG-3 anti-tank grenades. One each. You can fly low, you can fly through the woods, and you can fly each individually operated drone right up to the top part of a tank, and boom. No clever software automation. Just a drone that can lift something like 1 kg worth of anti-tank grenade. You have 20 drone operators. You'll have 5 drones per tank. One after the other. Skip the already defeated tanks. Attack the tanks that will create a barrier when destroyed first, take natural barriers into account. Your tanks can have all the power and shock and awe you might think they have, but any 12-year old will be able to take you out as if they were playing a video game.

amluto 4y ago
Because solo tanks storming a city isn’t what tanks are for. https://acoup.blog/2022/05/06/collections-when-is-a-tank-not-a-tank/ https://acoup.blog/2022/05/06/collections-when-is-a-tank-not... edit: for example, I would not want to be a drone operator controlling a drone in real time anywhere near a modern army. RF direction finders are a thing.
jimmytidey 4y ago
Your broader point might be correct but an anti tank grenade would not be likely to knock out a modern tank.
earthbee 4y ago
I think every half way capable military on the planet is seeing the news and videos coming out of Ukraine and thinking, hmm, must invest in anti-drone technology. A decade from now what's happening in Ukraine won't work against most major military powers. The drones we're seeing are very slow and very low but modern anti-aircraft systems aren't optimised to detect things this small and low so are getting away mostly untouched, but there's no significant technological hurdle against modifying existing systems or developing new ones that work against this type of threat.

happyopossum 4y ago

What we’ve seen in Ukraine is far from modern tanks fighting with modern tank doctrine. Yes, technically some of those tanks are ‘modern’, but many of them appear to have fake reactive armor, are poorly built, and they are being deployed without infantry, air, or logistical support. It’s the perfect recipe to lose all of your tanks.

paxys 4y ago
Most of what you have mentioned are inherent shortcomings of tanks in a modern battlefield. They are fuel intensive. They need massive logistical support. They are vulnerable to targeted attacks, like from drones. None of this is unique to the Ukraine situation. It is very hard for tanks to be effective in the age of cheap UAVs.
- nradov 4y ago
  Right. There were similar discussions about whether the tank has a future after many of them were destroyed in the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The main issues were crappy Russian equipment and poor tactics. https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/armor-attrition-in-nagorno-karabakh-battle-not-a-sign-us-should-give-up-on-tanks-experts-say/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/09/30/...
  - ksidudwbw 4y ago
    There isnt a silver bullet for every situation and condition, but a moveable metal box that can target heat-emitting targets in its line of sight is useful. As long as its potential is fully utilised like machine assisted target aquisiton and liquidation (ai assisted optics + firing)
- jasonwatkinspdx 4y ago
  Infantry are vulnerable to literally everything, and yet no one besides some dingbats that watched terminator too many times are suggesting the age of infantry is over. Aircraft are vulnerable to missiles. Is anyone suggesting the age of aircraft are over? Drones, particularly consumer quadcopter adopted out of convenience are vulnerable to missiles, autocannons, and electronic warfare. Does not the very same logic being offered as proof of the end of tanks apply to drones as well? This whole argument is stupid and predicated on a vast misunderstanding of how combined arms operations work. Systems are not discard because they're vulnerable, if they can be employed in a way that min/maxes their impact vs vulnerability. There is nothing new about this conflict as far as tanks and ATGMs. Everything happening here happened in the Yom Kippor war, in Grozny, in Syria, and in Yemen. You just have a bunch of lazy bloggers and journalists making a sensationalized claim to sound like something exciting and dramatic is happening, at the cost of grossly distorting the actual reality. What will change is future tanks will likely prioritize active protection systems and sensors over bulk armor. But the basic concept of combing firepower, mobility, and protection is not going away any time soon. Example, Rheinmetall just announced their new tank prototype this week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE A couple key features: * an active protection system specifically for top attack munitions like Javelin * a remote weapons station with a machine gun specifically for engaging small low altitude drones like quad copters * flexible manning, including looking at autonomy and remote control * ability to host drones for its own situational awareness * a loitering munition that's being co-designed, launched by the big gun Maybe the era of the T-72 is over. But the people confidently predicting the era of tanks and armored fighting vehicles in general are over, cuz missiles, cuz drones, frankly, have no clue what they're talking about.

openasocket 4y ago

The war in Ukraine doesn't provide sufficient evidence that modern combined arms operations are outdated. Russia deployed combat troops significantly short on man power, leading to a situation where attacks had far more armor than infantry. See https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-russian-militarys-ill-fated-force-design/ https://warontherocks.com/2022/06/not-built-for-purpose-the-... for example. It's been known since the Spanish Civil War that tanks are vulnerable to anti-tank teams when not properly supported by infantry, especially in adverse terrain. WW2-era tanks were effectively countered by anti-tank gun teams in entrenched positions, which is why they worked in concert with infantry, artillery, and close air support to suppress anti-tank guns and enable the tanks to advance. Or they could bypass these well-defended positions and attack at weaker points, taking advantage of the tank's superior tactical mobility. While it is possible that drones and modern ATGM teams could effectively counter traditional combined arms operations, the evidence from the war in Ukraine is largely inconclusive at this time. If Russia were to correct their manpower issues, or at least be able to conduct traditional combined arms offensives in certain areas, then we'd have more solid evidence. Notably Ukraine still sees value in the tank, since they've been repeatedly requesting tanks (along with a variety of equipment) from the West. Personally, I think we'll see an adjustment to the balance of military forces, but the tank will continue to play a pivotal role. Active protection systems will continue to improve, we'll see the expansion of short range air defenses and doctrine to counter drones (and even longer-ranged ATGMs), increased teaming of drones alongside infantry and armor (in doctrine acting as a sort of middle ground between artillery and air power), and the usage of novel indirect fires for tanks like the KSTAM.

duxup 4y ago
It’s hard to get a feel for what is happening overall, but the amount of video of Russian armor of all types operating alone ( no infantry support) has been pretty shocking.
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- ggm 4y ago

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bozhark 4y ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTBA5tQsDbE

danboarder 4y ago

Lost in the discussion is the idea that the tank should not have a future, and neither should most weapons of war, because they are brutal inhumane killing machines from a past era that have no place in future societies - this is my view as a pacifist. My hope is that humans can move past the idea of war for settling conflict, otherwise what is the point of social norms like privacy, respect, and courtesy between people, when the same people in society can condone killing of their youth in war? In my view tanks are are a tool of war against the progress of society and I don't see that changing in the future.

halffaday 4y ago

The tone of the article is a little hard to take seriously given that the legacy media are mostly now admitting that a Ukrainian surrender is necessary and that all Russian territorial objectives are likely to be met. The more interesting question is if having the US as a credible security partner has a future.

vba616 4y ago
If the US is not a "credible security partner" then what the media thinks about a Ukrainian surrender is utterly irrelevant. Even if is is a credible security partner, the same is true. It's...I don't know what to call it except intriguing, the way you flip from a picture of the US as a totalitarian monolith with tentacles controlling everything, to the US as an utterly impotent former empire in shambles, unable to even be a "partner", within two sentences. It's kind of an echo of the way Russia has been portrayed in the last few years.
- halffaday 4y ago
  It's...I don't know what to call it except intriguing, the way you conclude anything I wrote means the US is a totalitarian monolith.
  - vba616 4y ago
    It's only two sentences, so I assumed neither of them were fluff...I interpreted "the legacy media" being mentioned adjacent to your personifying the US as someone carrying out foreign policy as implying they are closely related. If you didn't mean it that way, ok, but I think it's a common view and common to express it like this. If the media is an arm of the establishment, the rulers of the country, with a singular purpose of supporting it regardless of policy changes, that is what I'd call a totalitarian monolith. Now if you don't view things that way, fine, but it seems like maybe half of the politically aware US public is more or less on board with that worldview, except that they identify the "monolith" with the left. Literally every day recently, I hear, on the radio that is always playing in a convenience store I go to, an ad for a famous person's new show on Newsmax, that is somehow rebelling against (I forget the exact phrase) major media outlets. I guess the phrase "mainstream media" is tired, but the concept seems to remain. The baseline here is the assumption that there is no free press, that there is no diversity of opinion, and I see that sort of claim made everywhere, every day. By, you know, the brave dissenters. I wonder if it's so ubiquitous that you have stopped seeing it as a background?

wildmanx 4y ago

It's clear that this is an exciting topic for techies. But keep in mind what this all is made for: Destroying and killing. We are talking about war machinery, and technical discussions about those tend to romanticize all that technology much too often. If we'd only pour 10% of the investments that today goes into war machinery into peace research and conflict prevention, then this world would be a much safer place. There would be less toys to play with and less "fascinating" discussions about tanks and guided missiles and strategy and artillery and infantry and fighter planes, which may sadden the technically inclined, but in the end these are not toys. These are devices to destroy and kill, and designing, building and maintaining them has enormous costs even in peacetime.

TulliusCicero 4y ago
> If we'd only pour 10% of the investments that today goes into war machinery into peace research and conflict prevention, then this world would be a much safer place. If you get everyone to decide this, yes. But if you do this and your aggressive neighbor doesn't, your decision to forgo military spending can make the world less safe. Some parts of Europe are remembering this now.
- wildmanx 4y ago
  You seem to have missed the "investment into peace research and conflict prevention" part of my post. Ironically, that's the part that you quoted.
  - SubiculumCode 4y ago
    oh so another military program. only half kidding
  - fvdessen 4y ago
    Thousands of years of peace research have shown that some conflicts can only be prevented by the peaceful side being better prepared for war.

citizenpaul 4y ago

A comically silly question. I bet 99% of HN has played a game with Class called or refered to as "tank." Its not a matter of do tanks have a future just what the format will be. Even in a made up fantasy games the concept of a military unit with heavy armoring is always going to have a place. Same as real life.

serf 4y ago
fantasy worlds rarely have an equivalent of a 'rods from god' type weapon. the future of warfare , according to most of the RAND papers i've read, is in cheap/commodity available 'nodes' , part of a 'system of systems' that can all interconnect cheaply and provide good data without being valuable assets themselves. in a future where any group can destroy any one thing quickly and without hopes of defense (hypersonic missiles, for example) it becomes increasingly more risky and less valuable to shove a lot of effort and value into a single strong piece of equipment -- 'distributed warfare' is going to become increasingly common, and it's one of the few strategies that remains viable in a future without sufficient anti-air defenses.
- citizenpaul 4y ago
  >fantasy worlds rarely have an equivalent of a 'rods from god' type weapon. I don't have a compendium of every game ever but they usually throw some OP weapon in. Doesn't invalidate the tanks. There is not in the game or real life an infinite supply of the god rod. On a side note I'm surprised there is no weapon called the god rod yet. Heavy armor will always have a place in battle. What happens when someone makes a slightly better armored swarm and you have to make a more armored swarm to take out their more armored swarm? Yep, escalation leads to escalation and eventually you end up with a......tank. Then you use the god rod to take out the tank and start over again. Battle is not a fixed state.

citboin 4y ago

There are small robotic “wingman” tanks under development right now. Crewed tanks will be fielded with robotic escorts in the future.