Germany Says 'Nein' On Tanks At Allies' Big Ramstein Meeting

So you think if Putin ends the war with Donetsk and Luhansk that won't be a win for Russia? Granted Putin is paying a much higher price than he planned, but he still gets something out of the war and Ukraine loses something.

 

I'm not sure how 41 tanks is much of an escalation. In a military sense it's not significant but I guess it's a major political issue.

 

It could be just the beginning. It could also open the doors towards better air support.

 

I guess by air support you mean fighter aircraft. Although aircraft in a ground support role might be useful, if you were to start today it might take 2 years to get Ukrainian pilots training not only in new aircraft, but how to function in a combined arms ground support role. I'm hoping the war isn't still going on two years from now.

 

If Putin succeeds in holding the Ukrainian territory he had before, it will definitely be a win for him.

 

Abrams carry a TOW (Tube -launched, Optically tracked, Wire guided missile). These Viet Nam era holdover weapons are pretty good at killing tanks but have a 2750 meter rang limitation and, even worse, must be guided to the target by the gunner. This means that the Bradley is vulnerable during the time-of-flight of the missile. And yes, the Bradley must stop to fire TOW. The 25mm Bushmaster gun of the Bradley is hardly a tank killer. Its way too small. You may note that the 30mm gun of an A-10 does indeed kill tanks. It does this, however, by setting up harmonic vibrations at the target that literally tear the tank apart. It does this by firing so fast that the vibrations destroy the enemy tank. The 25mm Bushmaster cannot do this. It fires much more slowly.
Tanks remain the best weapons to use against tanks... although JAVELIN seems to be the league-leading tank killer these days. Its a real game changer.

 

Ukrainian pilots have been training on the F-16 and F/A-18 for the last half year or so.

 

I hope the war is over quickly too. If it lasts another two years, we'll have nothing to fend off the Chinese with but clubs and spitballs.

 

Oh ok, so it sounds like the TOW missiles are a "use if you really must" deal. The pentagon did tout Bradleys as tank-killers, so a bit of a misnomer there.

Probably the best approach is to use the Bradleys to unload troops carrying Javelins. Agree that they are amazing despite $250,000 a pop.

What would be interesting is a form of Javelin mounted to a Bradly.

 

I can't see why you would mount a Javelin on a Bradley. To fire from the inside would seem problematic. Systems allowing a gunner inside a vehicle to remotely fire an appended weapon is possible, of course. The CROWS (Common Remotely Operated Weapon System) has been around a long time and allows a gunner sitting inside a HMMWV ("HUM-V") and other vehicles to fire cupola mounted machine guns and more from inside the vehicle.
But why one would want to do that eludes me. The M2 Bradley is primarily a troop carrying vehicle. So if its the troops you have, why not just dismount them and give the Javelins? I'd much rather be a gunner hiding in a thicket and unseen than be a target inside a big target like a Bradley.

The Army has experimented with mounting hand-held weapons on the Bradley before, and they all failed. Mounting Stinger on a Bradley was tried and dubbed LINEBACKER. It never caught on.

A $250,000 investment to kill a $5 million tank with near certainty... ain't bad.

 

I'm sure you meant M-2 Bradley's. TOW's are exceedingly good at killing tanks. The missiles are semi-automatic like similar Stugna P's. One only needs to aim the scope at the target. The missile does the rest. The Army cancelled fire and forget because it wasn't really needed.

The imaging system for TOWs are especially important.

No, it doesn't.

This is pure fantasy.

An F-35 would be best to take out another tank. Javelin lags behind Stugna P and NLAW - it's not a bad system though.

Tanks are rarely taken out by other tanks. Tanks are used for mobility and taking ground. Although they can destroy other tanks, their purpose is to assault and take ground.

 

Not really true. I am in regular contact with a US Logistics specialist who has noted a run down in certain weapons and munitions systems mainly Javelin, 155mm artillery munitions and smart fuses for same but the response has been to reactivate and expand production. Chip issues will mean it's going to take longer than he'd like to get certain items back to pre-war levels but arty shells themselves and other ammo is already leaving the factory even if they wont be back to previous supply levels any time soon (think 12 months or so). Other NATO members are doing the same - boosting production as and when they can.

Other equipment? Think Bradleys & Stingers etc are a sunk cost i.e, the army has either already phased them out of front line service or is in the process of doing so . In fact the vast majority of the large capital items being delivered to Ukraine is older stuff from storage e.g towed M777s were available because towed artillery is no longer a major US army requirement. (Still there but in many cases smart fuses let one gun do today what a battery was required for 20 years ago. Result? Fewer active towed artillery batteries and fewer guns.

But the main reason I believe your wrong?

Ukraine is fighting a ground war, any war between China and the US will primarily fought in the air and at sea. At least initially. And US stockpiles of naval and air weaponry have been virtually untouched by shipments to Ukraine. Some (again elderly) ground to air systems but that's about it. Even in terms of aircraft the talk is about sending F-16s and the US hasn't (from memory) taken delivery of a new one of those since about 2005! In fact the hard part will be finding spare parts for any F-16s that are sent. The US could, I suppose decide to fund the purchase of more modern aircraft at some point in the future, think SAAB Gripen as an example but that wouldn't deplete US current stocks and it certainly can't send the most modern aircraft available because of technology issues and the length of time needed to get the Ukrainians up to speed on maintenance etc. So quit worrying, the US is not crippling its defenses by sending aid to Ukraine. It is however crippling Russia.

 

In the context, good value indeed.

 

That would be incredibly silly. The infantry might carry AT-4's which are light and able to be carried and possibly an NLAW. Javelins are far too bulky for the interior of an M2. The TOW system is very effective and works perfectly fine with a better range than the Javelin.

 

The reason the M1 doesn't carry a javelin is doctrinal. Bradley fighting vehicles have javelines and are supposed to fill that function.

 

Great response. But i do have some specific issues.
I had a career as a US Army Artilleryman and understand artillery issues. I followed that with a second career in defense where I learned about the real delays involved with logistics: Contracting, funding and long-lead items.

You are correct on the artillery items. Most fuses are fairly simple affairs (Time, VT, PD, etc.). And artillery shells are fairly simple constructs. Once you have a "hot" assembly line, you can produce many. But Stingers are different. When Stinger was first introduced (STINGER BASIC) isn't a lot different than its predecessor, REDEYE. Attack was only capable facing the rear of the aircraft and it was susceptible to IR countermeasures. Then STINGER POST (Passive Optical Sight Tracker) came along, and forward attack was possible. Finally, STINGER RMP (Reprogrammable MicroProcessor) was fielded, allowing the tracker head seeker characteristics to be changed at will, allowing Stinger to defeat current and future countermeasures. When this ability to adapt to future countermeasure, along with its speed and range, Stinger will be around a long time. And Stinger, unlike artillery, has some very long lead components like crystal arrays that must be grown... still being grown with limited yields. So stinger will be around for a long while... certainly not before any war with China is over... probably.

There are currently five competitors in the Bradly replacement program. First prototypes are expected in 2025 with LRIP predicted for 2026. In any case, Bradleys won't be replaced before any war with China is over... probably.

Now... as to that war. Let me point out that no war in history has been won from the air... without the use of nuclear weapons. As the GREAT BARD once said, "Unoccupied enemy territory is still enemy territory." I am also reminded of the words of an Iraqi Battalion Commander who said, "I came to Kuwait with 54 tanks. After 100 days of Coalition bombing I had 50 tanks. After twenty minutes against American M1 tanks... I had none." (You'll find that quote hanging on walls all over our Army.)

Air combat will not decide the outcome in any war with China, but I agree it will be a big player. I don't see advanced aircraft being given to friendly indigenous forces as much help either. It takes a BOATLOAD of training to make them an asset. (It takes TWO YEARS to train an Apache pilot!) Sending fast movers to our friends and expecting them to win wars with them in any reasonable time frame is like sending scalpels to our friends and expecting them to perform brain surgery. Its just not that simple.

As you say, we may be crippling Russia with our aid to Ukraine, but we are surely crippling ourselves. And I don't worry much about war with Russia... they'd have a much bigger war on their hands trying to get to us. But China? They scare the bejeesus out of me.

And if the shootin' starts... Iran will be in the mix... OMG!

 

I bet you'll find Javelins strapped to the decks of M1's in the next war. In Iraq we came upon an M1 stuck on a bridge just west of Ba'aquba. It had outrun its Infantry support and was all alone, stuck on a bridge blocked at both ends by bad guys. Boy! Were they glad to see us!

 

I would note that I did say the initial phases of any such war war would be fought at sea and in the air. But I haven't spoken to or seen any statements by with one military expert who believes the US should or for that matter even could fight a prolonged conventional ground war on the Chinese mainland. Given the only foreseeable cause for any such war would be an attempted invasion of Taiwan by Beijing that almost certainly means the US and its Allies primary mission would be securing the maritime approaches to Taiwan and interdicting attempts by China to reinforce and supply any forces it manages to land on the island. That necessitates large scale naval and air engagements as a starting position.

Every single military profession I've ever spoken has stated that any involvement by US ground forces would be restricted to reinforcing critical bases in Japan and Korea (and almost certainly the Philippines) and secondly large scale deployments (if required) onto Taiwan itself in order to assist in driving the Chinese back to their beachheads or alternately to help prevent successful landings in the first place. But the point that's always been emphasized was that such deployments by the US and it's allies would never happen unless the US is confident that it as gained air and sea superiority over China first. Because the last thing planners want is to commit American troops to a theater where they can be cut of from resupply and have to be abandoned. NOT going to happen - ever!

As for Iran? Can't see the point in it involving itself. Not only would it have nothing to gain by doing so the current regime is barely holding on as it is. Were it to be so stupid as to involve itself in a Sino-US war it would require very little effort on the part of the US and it's allies to bring the country to it's knees, including little in the way of military resources.

 

I think we're agreeing on a conflict with China. We're merely discussing scheduling, not the major components of the war. I think we're agreeing on its conduct. I just hope we have something besides spitballs to shoot them with by then.

Iran has no worldly reason to join into such a major conflict. The problem is that their motives have to do with PARADISE, not the world. Killing infidels (non-believers) is the key to entering PARADISE... and joining into a larger conflict is a unique opportunity to kill lots more infidels than they could independently.

 

The Iranian governments main motives however are, in no particular order of importance, getting richer and staying in power not spreading Jihad. This is because spreading the latter would almost certainly cost them both of the former. In any event most of the Jihadist terrorist movements in the wold are Sunni not Shia. And from their perspective they're just as happy to blow up Shia Muslims as they are infidels.

 

I do not believe that the Iranian government has any interest in money or power. They have very little interest in this world in any way. As my "I-T" (Interpreter-Translator) in Iraq told me... "radical islam is not looking for anything in this world. It is all about getting to PARADISE. They view this life as a simple gateway ("foyer" was the word he used) to get to PARADISE. That's why islamist terrorists can put bombs on their own children and send them off to kill infidels. They are not killing their children, they are sending them to PARADISE. Yup, and Shia are infidels to Sunnis and Sunnis are infidels to Shia. You don't have to be Christian to be an infidel. Buddhists are infidels, Taoists are infidels and so on.
But what really worries me about Iran is that could could put nukes on lots of commercial vessels, coordinate their simultaneous arrival at various American ports... and... BANG.

 

Ahahaha....
It is the West that needs to worry about the fact that the West may be left without trade with Russia.
By the way, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Green said on social networks that the Russian Federation, which was under heavy sanctions from Western countries, is currently demonstrating to the whole world that neither the dollar nor American friendship is needed for prosperity and trade.

 

Ahahaha .... Google to the rescue. You can easily find the original..... Or is it an impossible task for you?

 

I have always been amused by arguments like yours from representatives of those countries whose hands (countries) are up to their elbows in blood from the murders of representatives of other peoples.
You yourself are not funny from your comments?
Look at the main "democrat" since its inception - For example, the massacre of Native Americans. For all Europeans who love cowboys, the Indian is a wild villain.
The United States has made 251 military interventions since 1991 and 469 since 1798.
According to official figures from the Congressional Research Service (CRS), a U.S. government agency, published on March 8, 2022, in a document titled “Instances of the use of the United States military forces abroad, 1798-2022.” Since 1798, the US military has made 469 foreign interventions.
– 218 US military interventions between 1798 and 1990
– 251 US military interventions between 1991 and 2022
– 100 US military interventions between 1991 and 2004, this number rose to 200 military interventions between 1991 and 2018.
The report shows that since the end of the First Cold War in 1991, under the unipolar hegemony of the United States, Washington's military interventions abroad have increased significantly.
The Military Intervention Project of Tufts University's Center for Strategic Studies documented even more interventions - "Since 1776, the United States has undertaken more than 500 international military interventions, almost 60% of which were carried out between 1950 and 2017, with more than a third of these missions carried out after 1999".
The USA is a metastasis of England. France, along with Lafayette, Rochambeau and others, contributed to the birth of the monster.
But you keep making me laugh with your ridiculous comments about "evil Russia".

 

Yup. And in so doing we saved France from the NAZI, saved France from the Kaiser, saved Holland from the Nazis, saved Belbium from the Nazis, saved Italy from Mussolini, liberated Dachau, liberated Bergen-Belsen, freed the Phillipines from the Japanese, freed Japan from Tojo, freed Panama from Noriega, the list goes on and on.... "Interventions"... how freedom is established