Tasked with delivering effective firepower and manoeuvre, the MBT is the central platform of the US Armored Brigade Combat Team (ABCT). In addition, the tanks then need to be shipped from storage in the Russian Far East to Ukraine via rail, and then rigged with explosives and fitted with a remote control system.The US Army’s M1A2 Abrams main battle tank (MBT) is designed to last into the 2030s with sustained upgrades, and a RAND study on peer capabilities assessed that the Abrams ‘is still the best tank in the world given its degree of armour protection and antiarmor capabilities.’ Still the M1A2 System Enhancement Package Version 2, the most widely fielded current variant, is ageing rapidly and the final two planned lifecycle enhancements will only provide marginal improvements. These tanks have been in long-term storage and need at least an overhaul of their engines. Instead, Russia is now filling them with explosives and sending them off as VBIEDs. But a tank doesn’t make a great howitzer: its gun can’t angle high enough to shoot a shell more than 10 miles or so, and its optics don’t allow for long-range aiming.” They at first deployed the T-54/55s along with slightly newer T-62s as short-range, mobile artillery. The tanks have thin armor, basic optics and are armed with a minimally-stabilized 100mm main gun.Īs previously reported, they’re little than more metal coffins to be blunt.Īs David Axe of Forbes noted, “The Russians know this. Of course, 70-year-old tanks are ill-suited for use in combat against a modern army. On paper it allowed the Soviet Union, and later Russia to lay claims of having more tanks than any other nation in the world. Even before the dissolution of the Soviet Union, the leadership in Moscow maintained a “hoarder” mentality. This latest attempt to find a use for the T-54/55 speaks of Russian desperation – not simply to bolster the number of tanks it has employed, but perhaps to justify why the Kremlin kept thousands of the Cold War-era tanks in storage for decades. The T-54/55 Isn’t Suited to the Modern Battlefield Even if it did result in the destruction of one fortified position, it would seem to be a poor use of resources. Though a T-54/55 tank did explode in a violently spectacular fashion in the social media clip, what was accomplished is unclear.
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