Rethinking the Tank - Al Khalid 2 & the Future

[Armchair]

In a future major war, a handful of sophisticated tanks that take a year to build, will be of very little use. History shows us that tanks need to be built enmass, in large numbers, and constantly supplied.

WWII was won by mass production, not by super weapons.

But the trend in the cold war and the new war has been the opposite. This is because wars have been very limited.

If a future WW similar in scale to WW3 happens, all these super weapons will become redundant.

The world needs a simple tank that can be mass-produced. A tank, as noted in this thread, that needs to be designed with ATGMs kept in mind.

ATGMs are a disruptive technology that was not there before. One has to come up with a modification of the modern tank from the ground up, to counter this challenge.

Its quite that simple.

 

[dilpakistani]

The best solution is flying tanks.... Gunships with amazing fire power. Like most ships and destroyers have abandoned Canon as the primary weapon likewise 3000 or 4000 tanks inventory can be replaced with 1000 or less gunships with the combination of LFVs on ground. Tanks are becoming more and more sitting ducks.

 

[Signalian]

YOu ask it to be kept simple and then come up with this

I came up with something which is battle proven, read 1965 and 1971 skirmishes, also which is taught in Infantry School, Quetta and Armour School, Nowshera. Furthermore, the mechanised infantry concept is also based on this, as Pakistan's Infantry to Armor ratio is very high, which means very less tanks compared to Infantry formations.
Previously the armored doctrine was to advance blindly on enemy positions and the most experienced tank crew after Tank commander was the driver, so much so that many times the knocked out Pakistani tanks were found atop or near enemy bunkers since the driver was taught to charge on enemy positions with or without guns blazing.

Base line: Its not wise to send in tanks upfront when the position is known to be defended by enemy ATGM teams. Tanks are used in maximum effect by advancing through enemy weak points, flanking enemy positions and thus causing chaos in enemy lines forcing enemy to retreat.

That is MAJOR fire power sir, committing heavy resources to the strike corps. Moving the artillery along with the advancing strike forces and then spending resources to avoid sabotage attacks on these forces. Plus the infantry forces that will need to advance on to enemy ATGM position (and mind you, these wont be fixed position and many will be infantry men carrying shoulder fired ATGM) will face heavy causalities due to enemy fire and because of lack of cavalry support (the enemy will have tanks in their ranks). Sorry but this seems too much of a daring operation and if it goes wrong, then first you lose your infantry attacking enemy without heavy cavalry and then risk the heavy cavalry as well.

The enemy positions will become fixed when artillery starts raining shells, as it forces enemy to take cover apart from pinning down the enemy, this is a major benefit of pre-attack bombardment. When the bombardment stops and the enemy comes out of cover, own infantry will pick mobile targets very quickly, movement attracts eye- it cant be ignored and where the eye goes, the muzzle points, so enemy will prefer to remain safe and protected in fixed positions. If Tanks are sent in to attack a position defended by enemy infantry, ATGM , armor and artillery, the risk of losing tanks is 50%. If the tanks are sent in to attack the enemy from a position cleared by infantry forming a hole in enemy lines, the risk of losing tanks is 20%.

Another major point, dismounted infantry on foot when charging a position slows down tank advance too. If tanks advance ahead due to speed and mobility factor, they lose infantry cover. If they move along with infantry, they will be slow moving targets keeping pace with infantry and taken out by enemy ATGM teams from a decent distance.

Main point, Coming onto enemy positions, tanks will face two major threats, ATGM team and enemy Tanks. If the tanks start to take out ATGM team, the enemy tanks will target and destroy own tanks and vice verca.
If own infantry takes out at least the ATGM teams, the chances of survival of own tanks will increase and only enemy tanks will be left to counter.

Last point, Tanks have a main gun, a HMG and a 7.62mm gun usually, all require line of sight for taking out target. Infantry has assault rifles, LMG's, grenades, bazooka, ATGM, mortar etc, more hands and more weapons., not all require LOS. Like you pointed out, the defended position has ATGM, tanks and prepared positions as well as mobile assets.
If tanks are sent in with infantry, enemy will find tanks as bigger and primary targets, and will take them out first, ignoring infantry. The tank has been set to fail.
However, if infantry is sent in after artillery bombardment, the array of weapons the infantry has, will keep enemy engaged with them. Infantry can crawl and conceal, more survival factor for infantry, tanks cannot. Constant firing by 100's of weapons of own infantry, will have mowed down or forced enemy mobile forces to take cover, rendering them useless. Infantry can keep enemy occupied and engaged from concealed positions, then start reporting weak points for tanks to enter and advance fast, quick, guns blazing and flank the enemy. This will make two directions of attack instead of one. Now when the tanks roll-in, the pressure lifts off infantry and enemy focus will be shifted in two directions. Imagine the psychological effect on enemy now, this is shock and awe created by tanks.

The trap set by enemy to ensnare own Tanks into prepared ATGM positions has been thwarted.

The best solution is flying tanks.... Gunships with amazing fire power. Like most ships and destroyers have abandoned Canon as the primary weapon likewise 3000 or 4000 tanks inventory can be replaced with 1000 or less gunships with the combination of LFVs on ground. Tanks are becoming more and more sitting ducks.

what about SAM threat. Check the amount and types of Russian SAM systems devised to engage NATO air power.

 

[Armchair]

I came up with something which is battle proven, read 1965 and 1971 skirmishes, also which is taught in Infantry School, Quetta and Armour School, Nowshera. Furthermore, the mechanised infantry concept is also based on this, as Pakistan's Infantry to Armor ratio is very high, which means very less tanks compared to Infantry formations.
Previously the armored doctrine was to advance blindly on enemy positions and the most experienced tank crew after Tank commander was the driver, so much so that many times the knocked out Pakistani tanks were found atop or near enemy bunkers since the driver was taught to charge on enemy positions with or without guns blazing.

Base line: Its not wise to send in tanks upfront when the position is known to be defended by enemy ATGM teams. Tanks are used in maximum effect by advancing through enemy weak points, flanking enemy positions and thus causing chaos in enemy lines forcing enemy to retreat.


The enemy positions will become fixed when artillery starts raining shells, as it forces enemy to take cover apart from pinning down the enemy, this is a major benefit of pre-attack bombardment. When the bombardment stops and the enemy comes out of cover, own infantry will pick mobile targets very quickly, movement attracts eye- it cant be ignored and where the eye goes, the muzzle points, so enemy will prefer to remain safe and protected in fixed positions. If Tanks are sent in to attack a position defended by enemy infantry, ATGM , armor and artillery, the risk of losing tanks is 50%. If the tanks are sent in to attack the enemy from a position cleared by infantry forming a hole in enemy lines, the risk of losing tanks is 20%.

Another major point, dismounted infantry on foot when charging a position slows down tank advance too. If tanks advance ahead due to speed and mobility factor, they lose infantry cover. If they move along with infantry, they will be slow moving targets keeping pace with infantry and taken out by enemy ATGM teams from a decent distance.

Main point, Coming onto enemy positions, tanks will face two major threats, ATGM team and enemy Tanks. If the tanks start to take out ATGM team, the enemy tanks will target and destroy own tanks and vice verca.
If own infantry takes out at least the ATGM teams, the chances of survival of own tanks will increase and only enemy tanks will be left to counter.

Last point, Tanks have a main gun, a HMG and a 7.62mm gun usually, all require line of sight for taking out target. Infantry has assault rifles, LMG's, grenades, bazooka, ATGM, mortar etc, more hands and more weapons., not all require LOS. Like you pointed out, the defended position has ATGM, tanks and prepared positions as well as mobile assets.
If tanks are sent in with infantry, enemy will find tanks as bigger and primary targets, and will take them out first, ignoring infantry. The tank has been set to fail.
However, if infantry is sent in after artillery bombardment, the array of weapons the infantry has, will keep enemy engaged with them. Infantry can crawl and conceal, more survival factor for infantry, tanks cannot. Constant firing by 100's of weapons of own infantry, will have mowed down or forced enemy mobile forces to take cover, rendering them useless. Infantry can keep enemy occupied and engaged from concealed positions, then start reporting weak points for tanks to enter and advance fast, quick, guns blazing and flank the enemy. This will make two directions of attack instead of one. Now when the tanks roll-in, the pressure lifts off infantry and enemy focus will be shifted in two directions. Imagine the psychological effect on enemy now, this is shock and awe created by tanks.

The trap set by enemy to ensnare own Tanks into prepared ATGM positions has been thwarted.


what about SAM threat. Check the amount and types of Russian SAM systems devised to engage NATO air power.

Thank you for that very interesting insight. It matches how the Israelis tried to counter ATGM teams.

What is clear is that ATGMs and SAMs have played a disruptive role in conventional armored warfare.

If you look at WWII, you can see that armor meant something totally different from what it has come to mean for a country like Pakistan or India. These were mass-produced, in vast numbers. T-34s alone had a total production of more than 100,000.

That brings meaning to armor in a way 25 tanks a year production can never mean. This is a big elephant in the room.

Pakistani maneuver warfare has always been in its infancy. True combined arms operations have yet to be achieved, ever, in Pakistan's conventional wars.

Tanks have also taken on a different meaning in the cold war era. Many types of tanks have been completely forgotten.

There has always been a difference between infantry tanks and maneuver tanks.

The scenario that you've described is what infantry tanks were always meant to do. And have always cost less. You don't need a fast tank. A small and simple engine works fine. You can't use a turbine engine, because that harms your own infantry. APS makes no sense, again because of own infantry presence.

If you were to add 20,000 simplified tanks, with a simple 500 hp engine, none of the fancy gadgetry, designed with ATGM defense in mind, what kind of impact would that have for Pakistan? If such a tank can be built for 50,000 dollars, how could that transform the battle?

If tomorrow, WWIII broke out, most third world militaries would quickly be defeated, with nothing left to fight with. All their fancy multi-billion dollar equipment would have been meaningless.

Such a tank would fit in with the very combined arms doctrine you described. Nothing fancy, no blitzkrieg, but more or less does the work.

There are so many other questions to ask - like does a tank today really need a 125mm gun? Because, the guns kept getting bigger to counter the greater armor they faced. But ATGMs have outdated that calculus. One could easily put a 76mm gun and put x8 ATGMs on a tank. When you need to kill an enemy tank, use an ATGM. No need to lumber around with a giant 125mm gun.

Need more infantry support? Put the engine in front and move the tank crew to the middle, open up the rear end for 3-4 infantrymen.

Tanks seem to be stuck in some kind of traditionalist limbo. Somebody needs to redefine armored warfare with guided missiles, airpower and contemporary technologies in mind. Not only for the West, but for local and based on a specific needs assessment.

 

[denel]

Thank you for that very interesting insight. It matches how the Israelis tried to counter ATGM teams.

What is clear is that ATGMs and SAMs have played a disruptive role in conventional armored warfare.

If you look at WWII, you can see that armor meant something totally different from what it has come to mean for a country like Pakistan or India. These were mass-produced, in vast numbers. T-34s alone had a total production of more than 100,000.

That brings meaning to armor in a way 25 tanks a year production can never mean. This is a big elephant in the room.

Pakistani maneuver warfare has always been in its infancy. True combined arms operations have yet to be achieved, ever, in Pakistan's conventional wars.

Tanks have also taken on a different meaning in the cold war era. Many types of tanks have been completely forgotten.

There has always been a difference between infantry tanks and maneuver tanks.

The scenario that you've described is what infantry tanks were always meant to do. And have always cost less. You don't need a fast tank. A small and simple engine works fine. You can't use a turbine engine, because that harms your own infantry. APS makes no sense, again because of own infantry presence.

If you were to add 20,000 simplified tanks, with a simple 500 hp engine, none of the fancy gadgetry, designed with ATGM defense in mind, what kind of impact would that have for Pakistan? If such a tank can be built for 50,000 dollars, how could that transform the battle?

If tomorrow, WWIII broke out, most third world militaries would quickly be defeated, with nothing left to fight with. All their fancy multi-billion dollar equipment would have been meaningless.

Such a tank would fit in with the very combined arms doctrine you described. Nothing fancy, no blitzkrieg, but more or less does the work.

There are so many other questions to ask - like does a tank today really need a 125mm gun? Because, the guns kept getting bigger to counter the greater armor they faced. But ATGMs have outdated that calculus. One could easily put a 76mm gun and put x8 ATGMs on a tank. When you need to kill an enemy tank, use an ATGM. No need to lumber around with a giant 125mm gun.

Need more infantry support? Put the engine in front and move the tank crew to the middle, open up the rear end for 3-4 infantrymen.

Tanks seem to be stuck in some kind of traditionalist limbo. Somebody needs to redefine armored warfare with guided missiles, airpower and contemporary technologies in mind. Not only for the West, but for local and based on a specific needs assessment.

That is very written - for example in our cases, all our ifvs have atgms on them as tank killers while providing capabilities to move 15 people at a time.

 

[Armchair]

That is very written - for example in our cases, all our ifvs have atgms on them as tank killers while providing capabilities to move 15 people at a time.

Hi Denel, thanks. Do you have any info on the Rooikat gun? Its rifled, and fires HESH / Sabot. Would love to know how it compares to HE / Canister / HEAT.

 

[Wolf]

T 80 UDs are the best tanks Pakistan has. Unfortunately, armour has been neglected for 2 long. Al Khalid program has under performed despite promising start. Oplot M or other options are also taking longer than expected. Al Khalid 2 or 3 or whatever are not coming up earlier enough.
Serious efforts needed.

 

[The Terminator]

Tanks have been around since WWI, and have increased in importance, peaking in their importance during WWII. They evolved over time, with different design choices. Russians chose a simple mass production philosophy, which created the T-34, one of the single most important weapons to win WW2.

The Germans, and later the West, went another way. They wanted heavy, sophisticated tanks. Past WW2, things began to change as technology evolved, particularly, lethality of guided missile systems. The RPG and ATGMs began to encroach upon the central importance of tanks.

In most recent years, we have seen even highly expensive and sophisticated tanks like the German Leopard tanks, being blown up in Syria, showing how a simple weapon could take out a 10 million dollar tank.

The problem is that guided munitions have changed the battlefield, and tanks never truly adapted. Tanks are still basically designed the way they always where - with mainly rolled steel armor designed to defeat other tank guns.

There is yet to be a tank to be designed from the ground up to be able to deal with ATGMs as their primary design point.

Everybody talks about straping on cage armor, slat armor, reactive armor, etc. But these are bandaid solutions. Designing a tank from the ground up to deal with modern ATGMs would be a more meaningful way to react to the main cause of tank death in the last 40 years - ATGMs and RPGs.

How would one go about building such a tank?

The main threat of an ATGM is a HEAT round, which, on impact, destroys a tank using primarily kinetic and secondarily thermal force. On impact, a shaped charge is triggered that causes the ATGM warhead to go hypersonic. The ways to deal with this are:

1. The further away the ATGM is triggered, the better, generally speaking.
2. Reactive armor counters this force by pushing away the projectile by an equivalent force.
3. Active protection systems

Problem is, MBTs today are not designed with #1 in mind. They are still living in an older era. Secondly, reactive armor presently is highly damaging to own infantry that would be working closely with the tank. They can also be triggered by small arms fire, like sniper fire, or 0.5 caliber weapons. Again, tanks are not designed today to deal with this reactive armor problem.

Active counter measures, while working great on paper and at test ranges, seldom work as advertised in real world conditions. As many projectiles are constantly flying and a sensitive trigger would start blowing up own forces, such as soldiers, working alongside the tanks.

So what is a possible solution?

The solution is to create a tank from the ground up, to incorporate changes that would solve the ATGM / RPG problem. A tank with layered armor, a kind of layering yet to be designed and incorporated. For instance, A lighter conventional layered armor, over which you would have:

1. Reactive armor with an extended trigger. Over which:
2. Lightly spaced armor with foam / absorbant material to slow down the hypersonic projectile. Over which:
3. Light armor, to keep out up til 12.7 calibre weapons.

With this solution, small arms fire / snipers / HMGs won't penetrate and impact the tank beyond the outer skin.

ATGMs would penetrate, get slowed down and then hit reactive armor, being neutralized. Since the reactive armor is boxed and layered inside absorbant and spaced section, and protected by a light outer armor, the reactive armor would not impact surrounding friendly forces.

Such solutions would give a "bloated" looking tank. But a tank that would be effective against ATGM fire and would be more meaningful in the modern battlefield.

Agree? Disagree?

I don't know what you are talking about. The biggest threat for a modern tank is not ATGM but armor piercing projectiles like APFSDS rounds. ATGMs are getting more and more vulnerable against modern tanks, top attack fire and forget ATGMs might even stand a chance against modern Era tanks. Modern tanks with advanced ERA and hard kill APS systems can withstand multiple tandem shaped charged ATGMs hits with impunity. But Pakistani tanks in their current configuration lack that kind of protection.