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[Lord Shonus]

There's a big leap between sending essentially the same kit they're already using (Morocco sent T-72s) and wholly different vehicles. Retraining is a real thing, and an entire logistics train has to be created ex nihlo. The already pledged (in some cases, delivered) Western tanks are also far from too little (a few hundred latest-gen vehicles is an incredibly potent fighting force) and certainly isn't too late - Ukraine still stands, and won't be launching the kind of major offensives that need tanks for a couple more months (Russia's horrifically failed assaults near Вугледа́р recently underline that the ground isn't ready).

[EuchreJack]

I would speculate the German factory will at first be servicing the tanks that Germany is sending.

Not to bash you fellas too much, but right now Morocco have done better w/r to sending MBTs than the UK. All the 'western tanks' promises look like a joke to me. Too late, too little.

Considering how many countries traded in their old stuff in exchange for newer stuff from the US/UK/etc, this is actually fails to properly convey the level of Western support.  I'm frankly appalled that the US will send 'western tanks' to literally anyone BUT Ukraine.  How long before Reputinists start asking to send M1 Abrams to Russia in exchange for them sending T-72s to Ukraine!?

[Lord Shonus]

M1 Abrams have been pledged. It will take time to actually provide them because even pulling from desert stores will require refurbishment.

[EuchreJack]

M1 Abrams have been pledged. It will take time to actually provide them because even pulling from desert stores will require refurbishment.

I was about to say "hey why not pull them from our Allies?", but the countries that gave the Soviet tanks to Ukraine also got pledges in exchange...

[Il Palazzo]

Retraining is a real thing, and an entire logistics train has to be created ex nihlo.

Come on. They somehow managed to start using Krabs and HIMARS with remarkably little preparation. I fail to see how training on new tanks is such a qualitative difference from artillery. As far as I can see the delays are almost entirely political.

The already pledged (in some cases, delivered) Western tanks are also far from too little (a few hundred latest-gen vehicles is an incredibly potent fighting force)

What? Has anything been delivered apart from the 14 Leopard 2s from Poland? I'm honestly asking, it's hard to keep up with all the info.
Also, how do you count few hundred latest-gen tanks? If you don't count the Leopard 1s (and you really shouldn't), there's maaaybe two brigades worth - less than a 100 pieces - of pledged vehicles. Pledged. FFS. With deliveries spread out across months. This is maybe replacement rate, not creating potential.
Even among those the 'last-gen' is arguable, as e.g. half the L2s are of older variants.

[Lord Shonus]

Retraining is a real thing, and an entire logistics train has to be created ex nihlo.

Come on. They somehow managed to start using Krabs and HIMARS with remarkably little preparation. I fail to see how training on new tanks is such a qualitative difference from artillery. As far as I can see the delays are almost entirely political.

HIMARS is literally a standard truck with tubes on the back. Training somebody who already knows how to operate and maintain a truck is only a little more complicated than "you make these connections when the missile pod is replaced, this is how you punch the coordinates into the computer". The vehicle component of Krab is a very conventional armored vehicle, and it was still months between the agreement to send them and the first combat use - that was the time spent training.

A modern MBT (and every model of Leopard 2 or Challenger 2 is fundamentally modern) is a very complex vehicle. Actually driving the thing is something where familiarity with T-XX tanks helps, but every other crew position has essentially nothing in common with the older tank - a T-72 gunner dropped into an Abrams won't be quite as clueless as you would be, but still wouldn't be able to operate it. That takes time. And once you know the technical operation of the new equipment, it takes a lot of time to learn the details of the capabilities and how to use them in combat - a Challenger might well be able to score a first-round hit on a moving target 2km away while the Challenger is moving at full speed, but that ability does you no good if you don't know you can do that.

And that isn't even the important part of training. The bigger issue is maintenance - all those fancy electronics need servicing, especially when the tank starts taking shock damage from nearby explosions or collisions. The engines (and the turbine in an Abrams is a very special engine indeed) need constant babying because throwing that much mass around in those conditions is hard. Even the tracks don't change the same way as what you're used to. It takes time to learn how to do all that, and even more time to set up the network to move all the spare parts that are not currently in your logistics system.

[EuchreJack]

Considering the computer brains for US tractors came from Ukraine when John Deere forbid their sale in the US, I don't think the "technical shortfall" is as big as you think..

[Il Palazzo]

See, Shonus, I don't believe you. You make these pronouncements like you know anything about operating any of those vehicles.

[Lord Shonus]

I know several tankers, including some that have done comparison training. What's your source?

[Starver]

All this talk of how much the US (and the more directly in line NATO members) can do, and in what ways, again reminds me of Red Storm Rising. Except, of course, that at that time Kiev (etc) was a 'them', not on our side of the ideological divide.

I mean, Clancy was very much into uplifting "Hoo yah, 'Murica[1]!" Combat Porn in so many ways, but I think he represented the relative strengths. I'll have to pick up my copy, to be sure, but the bits with the air and ground counter-attacks against the Russian Hordes/armies encroaching upon Germany seemee to be very air-orientated (and mechanised units) from the US, with more local forces going the full gamut of ground attack.

(Though my favourite theatre, in that book, was always the Iceland one... Involving the Air Force/Marine ragtag unit (and civilian) on the ground, for the most part, between the initial attack and the local denoument.)


...but the conversation has moved on, I see.

[1]  ...and its allies, wherever applicable. Gives a sparse nod or three to the RN, etc...

[Madman198237]

Pulling tanks from US military stores represents more than an issue of refurbishment---the whole armor package must be completely rebuilt before any Abrams can be shipped out, because US military versions (and ONLY those vehicles specifically in service with a US military branch) use depleted uranium inserts in the composite array, and various US regulations absolutely positively forbid the export of depleted uranium without a billion different forms. Oh, and that DU gives an edge to US tanks and they don't want details about it falling into anyone's hands.

See, Shonus, I don't believe you. You make these pronouncements like you know anything about operating any of those vehicles.

I highly recommend watching some episodes of Inside The Chieftain's Hatch. You'll see just how different these things are. In particular, he's got "Switchology" videos and I think he's done both the Abrams and at least one model of T-72, so you can see exactly how different things are.


The difference between operating one MBT and another is far different than what a videogame or stat card might be trying to tell you. A warmed-over Soviet MBT is not the same as a Western one; they must be used in different tactics and they have different crew positions and duties (good luck finding a loader to put into a Western MBT in a T-72 tank crew).

If you've got to engage a target, the buttons you use to do so are completely different. The tank doesn't have to come to a halt to engage the target, because Western stabilizers are light-years ahead of most Soviet-era ones; the vehicle has a functioning reverse gear and usable gun depression, so you might start running a berm drill that a Soviet tank would be unable to actually depress for, or you can just start running and nail targets on your way through, etc.

Knowing how to, to give a very Chieftain example, tension a track on a tank does not make you proficient enough to do it fast enough in conditions where your life depends on getting that track back in working order now. Knowing that your tank is X fast and turret spins at Y degrees per second and your (sufficiently trained? insufficiently trained?) loader loads Z rounds per minute when fresh...is all great information to have, but translating that into good tactical use of the tank is a LOT different than anything else sent their way so far. The IFVs get close to this level of difference. But comparing HIMARS to a tank? HIMARS is an artillery system; you fire and then pack it up and move. Maintenance is easier, tactics are easier, training is easier. But it's the tactics that really make or break a training regimen.

[EuchreJack]

For a ray of hope, the US is probably training those Tank crews now.

It's doubtful, but the top brass might just be smart enough NOT to say they can't send the tanks yet because the crews ain't done training.
Even more doubtful, the White House MIGHT just be waiting to announce the tanks & crews when both are ready to go. Perhaps even being as smart as to hold off on announcing it until AFTER they start work in Ukraine.

From what little I understand of US military doctrine, the first guys are the Special Forces and get the best (longest) training.  They're not gonna run them through a "crash course", if they can help it.  Of course, this not being an Election year helps immensely.

[Il Palazzo]

What's your source?

My source for what? Being incredulous? You're the one with a claim. And a somewhat damaged credibility after those 'few hundred latest-gen tanks' of yours.


And yeah, Madman, I watch the Chieftain. I don't think it makes me particularly knowledgeable about this though (not any more that I am about gangbangs).

Look, I don't find it hard to believe that learning to use new gear is not immediate. I'm finding it hard to believe it's somewhat sufficiently harder with these tanks, than it was with other systems earlier, to justify the delays. New buttons, new chassis, new tracks, new gun, new communications, foreign labels, logistics for the entire thing - that's all true of artillery that's been in use since Spring last year. Modern fire control system - they've been using PT-91s since June.
And even if you won't grant me any of that as valid, because new tactics or something, how about this: Poland has already sent a company of Leopards! With other pledges we're talking anywhere from this spring to by the end of the year. The war may be over before they all arrive. Somebody explain to me why these 14 are easy to use and the other identical or nearly identical ones require months to train.

Hear me out - since this is the emotional thread - I feel like this narrative about the immense complexity, and this being such high-tech gear, and it taking so much time to organize logistics, and having to train how to be a loader, is greatly exaggerated and mostly just a story the Western governments are selling, that lets them pat themselves on the back, promotes complacency, and also happens to be incredibly patronising to the Ukrainian armed forces. (yes, that's a single sentence)
In any case, it's a trickle.

[Lord Shonus]

What's your source?

My source for what? Being incredulous? You're the one with a claim. And a somewhat damaged credibility after those 'few hundred latest-gen tanks' of yours.

You ARE making a claim. You're claiming that the West could easily provide lots and lots of tanks with no obstacles so they must be doing it on purpose. Meanwhile I'm getting information from people who actually drive tanks for a living that are saying "Putting a T-72 crew in a Leopard without lengthy training is just straight up murder". A retired Marine who spent his entire career thinks that the bare minimum transition time is five or six weeks for existing armor crews, three to six months starting from scratch.

Ukraine has been promised over a hundred Challenger 2s, over a hundred Leopard 2s, and close to fifty Abrams. All of these are latest-gen tanks, and there are a few hundred of them. How is that damaged credibility?

[Il Palazzo]

Promised by whom? When? I have UK now saying 28 Challengers, up from 14 just a couple days ago so that's an improvement. As of two weeks ago Leopard 2s: 14 from Poland, 18 from Germany, around 10 each from Norway, Sweden, Spain, and Canada, and 3 each from Portugal and Finland.