Will the battle tank become obsolete?

I don't see it happening anytime in the near future. Yes there are a great number of proven weapons that can "take out" a tank but most of those weapons are not usable by infantry. As much as Hollywood loves the RPG it normally takes 4 or 5 shots to achieve mobility kill. Of course it's not invulnerable but it is a huge force multiplier that can make the infantry's job much easier by being a huge bullet sponge. While everybody is shooting at the tank, the infantry can get in close and kill the enemy. Without the tank the infantry are taking all of those shots. Also what is often neglected is the psychological impact of amour. It takes a lot of courage to stand up to a moving pill-box. The tank as we know it will be around for a long time. In desert warfare, there is nothing better to take ground, beat up strong points and keep infantry KIA low. Air power and heavy mobile armor is the killing machines of choice.
 
GHR said:
I don't see it happening anytime in the near future. Yes there are a great number of proven weapons that can "take out" a tank but most of those weapons are not usable by infantry. As much as Hollywood loves the RPG it normally takes 4 or 5 shots to achieve mobility kill. Of course it's not invulnerable but it is a huge force multiplier that can make the infantry's job much easier by being a huge bullet sponge. While everybody is shooting at the tank, the infantry can get in close and kill the enemy. Without the tank the infantry are taking all of those shots. Also what is often neglected is the psychological impact of amour. It takes a lot of courage to stand up to a moving pill-box. The tank as we know it will be around for a long time. In desert warfare, there is nothing better to take ground, beat up strong points and keep infantry KIA low. Air power and heavy mobile armor is the killing machines of choice.
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Yep, they said all that sort of stuff about the battleship too.
 
Tanks are unlikely to become extinct however. They will remain heavily armed and armored, mobile weapon platforms that support infantry action and until the individual infantryman carries a weapon that can easily defeat a tank, then there will still be a place for tanks on the battlefield. On the drawing boards are tanks with smaller and faster turrets and smaller crews. Future tanks will likely have a crew of one or two, video cameras that will help the crew see more clearly, targeting computers and various anti-missile and anti-personnel defenses. With all the new systems and the smaller crew, tanks are more likely to become like aircraft. A small crew to operate the vehicle in combat and a support crew to help maintain and repair it.
 
They may not become extinct, just as the US pulled several battlewagons out of mothballs for Vietnam etc., but you will notice that they are not building any new ones.

You miss the point completely. It is not necessary for every infantry man to carry an anti tank weapon just as it is not necessary for every sailor to be able to sink a battleship.

The facts are that tanks are a enormous investment in time money and crew compared with the forces needed to take it out. Economics and speed of deployment will prevail in the end, they require a huge logistical effort to relocate whereas thousands of ATMs can be moved in hours to almost any point on the face of the earth.

Your arguments are identical to those who said that we could never survive without the battleship.

It takes months to train a tank crew and a day to train a reasonably effective ATM crew.

You live in a small country, what would you do if you thought that you were going to be attacked by a neighbour with huge numbers of tanks,.... try to equal his forces or focus on destroying his? It's a no brainer.

I know it's dated information, but remember how things turned about for the Israelis in the Sinai when the Egyptians were armed with Saggers, as old and crude as they were, they just decimated the Israeli forces, and things have improved greatly since that time, especially in regard to fire and forget missiles. Small crewed tanks with better weaponry make no difference if they are hit with an ATM they probably just won't burn as spectacularly, and being more technologically superior their building training and operating costs will also escalate out of sight.
 
senojekips said:
They may not become extinct, just as the US pulled several battlewagons out of mothballs for Vietnam etc., but you will notice that they are not building any new ones.

You miss the point completely. It is not necessary for every infantry man to carry an anti tank weapon just as it is not necessary for every sailor to be able to sink a battleship.

The facts are that tanks are a enormous investment in time money and crew compared with the forces needed to take it out. Economics and speed of deployment will prevail in the end, they require a huge logistical effort to relocate whereas thousands of ATMs can be moved in hours to almost any point on the face of the earth.

Your arguments are identical to those who said that we could never survive without the battleship.

It takes months to train a tank crew and a day to train a reasonably effective ATM crew.

You live in a small country, what would you do if you thought that you were going to be attacked by a neighbour with huge numbers of tanks,.... try to equal his forces or focus on destroying his? It's a no brainer.

I know it's dated information, but remember how things turned about for the Israelis in the Sinai when the Egyptians were armed with Saggers, as old and crude as they were, they just decimated the Israeli forces, and things have improved greatly since that time, especially in regard to fire and forget missiles. Small crewed tanks with better weaponry make no difference if they are hit with an ATM they probably just won't burn as spectacularly, and being more technologically superior their building training and operating costs will also escalate out of sight.
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The semi-pro Guerilla types are not getting the sponsorship by the USSR they once did. Yes,there's lots of the basic RPG's out there but that's not gonna poke a hole in Chobham armour. A FEW times a guy would run out and get a close in shot on a slow mover in an urban situation when there was a neglect to cover against that.

In Iraq 2...we all saw on CNN when a vast arms depot was captured enroute to Bagdad full of sidearms,RPGs,howitzer rounds..mortars...a few days later...CNN passed by again, nobody was guarding all that,nor had that arsenal been destroyed, so the Fedayeen were pulling up in pickup trucks to grab everything. That's the main source of IUD's...152 mm howitzer rounds.

BIG mistake.

You see Strykers with that rebar cage, that's a cheap and easy defense against most man portable weapons. Also good...experience. You have your armour and infantry cover each other.

A full tank,like an Abrams...is a ***** to transport. The Strykers are mobile,modular,cheaper and if the other side has no tanks...quite effective.

Odds are whatever is the next hot spot, the Strykers and air power will be the main players. Most conflicts will tend to be a matter of getting gear in place fast.
 
Tanks were originally developed to end the static warfare in WW1. The tendancy to dig in under heavy fire. In these days of weak political will to endure heavy losses, it`s not just the Infantry digging in. High Level Commanders also are increasingly reluctant to venture out into the cross hairs. Maybe a tank crew`s life expectancy is short, But we absorb the focus while our Infantry gets into position to react. And the effectiveness of our fire control is superb. That Ant Team better kill first shot because he`s not getting a second. Unless you plan to occupy forts like the Cowboys and Indians you need to be able to move. The increased mobility offered by a tracked force is un-parraleled by any other ground force. Add to this engineering impliments and you have multiplied the capabilities of your man power far more than the restraints caused by Logistics drains. Modern Armies still have Tanks for a reason. Until we develope a helicopter that can take a hit, Tanks will remain the biggest punch on the Battle Field.
 
1.The tank has been able to adopt/adjust to changing conditions admirably. There are tanks that ford/swim. In the desert sand and heat, in the humid tropics, jungles, snow - and practically for all conditions we have dedicated tanks. We have tanks that can be lifted by a chopper or carried by an aircraft.

2. No, the Queen is going to stay on. It will always be replaced by a better version. But the basic thing will survive.

3. Unmanned tanks? Well I doubt we will call them tanks. There unmanned vehicles operating already. Because there will be no crew this vehicle will be very small. But replacing the manned real thing - never?
 
Iraq showed that the age of the armored dinosaur was not over after all.
It was the 70-ton M1s and 34-ton M2 Bradley infantry carriers that spearheaded the Iraq invasion -- not only by racing across the open desert but also by pushing deep into downtown Baghdad, shrugging off the same RPGs that had destroyed the Russians in Grozny a decade before. And once the insurgency began, the nimble 2.6-ton Humvees that the Pentagon preferred for "low-intensity" operations proved fatally vulnerable to ambush by rocket-propelled grenades and improvised explosive devices. It was the 70-ton Abrams that plowed through IEDs and RPGs as coalition forces retook Falluja and Najaf.
 
Only problem is powering the beasts in the future, the age of oil can't last forever.

Interesting thoughts on how that problem will surely be overcome.
 
Yossarian said:
Only problem is powering the beasts in the future, the age of oil can't last forever.

Interesting thoughts on how that problem will surely be overcome.
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Nah, it's just a question of money actually.
There's no problem making synthetic diesel, but regular diesel is a whole lot cheaper.
Armoured warfare will be more expensive in the future, but not obsolete.
 
84RFK said:
Nah, it's just a question of money actually.
There's no problem making synthetic diesel, but regular diesel is a whole lot cheaper.
Armoured warfare will be more expensive in the future, but not obsolete.
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I am not so sure. I just don't see the cost effectiveness of a $4 Million a copy M1A2 tank vs the $40,000 cost of a Javelin anti-tank Missile.

There will always a need for a support unit to backup the infantry, but in my mind it would be more sensible to make cheaper disposal units (probably robotic) as the crew and the needs of the crew (compartments, fresh air, A/C, armor protection, etc) in the tank consume cost and space within the vehicle than the expensive high-tech human manned behemoths that can be easily destroyed/disabled with basic IEDs.

Think how the US or Russians in WWII. They didn't win by having the best technological tank like the Germans had. They won by having thousands inexpensive replacements, so that when a tank was destroyed 5 more would take its place.
 
mmarsh said:
I am not so sure. I just don't see the cost effectiveness of a $4 Million a copy M1A2 tank vs the $40,000 cost of a Javelin anti-tank Missile.

There will always a need for a support unit to backup the infantry, but in my mind it would be more sensible to make cheaper disposal units (probably robotic) as the crew and the needs of the crew (compartments, fresh air, A/C, armor protection, etc) in the tank consume cost and space within the vehicle than the expensive high-tech human manned behemoths that can be easily destroyed/disabled with basic IEDs.

Think how the US or Russians in WWII. They didn't win by having the best technological tank like the Germans had. They won by having thousands inexpensive replacements, so that when a tank was destroyed 5 more would take its place.
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The Germans was technically advanced, maybe to advanced I'd say since they suffered from lack of interchangability and over-complicated solutions that hampered maintainance and field repair.

The Soviets T34's efficiency wasn't just due to the massive amounts of them, but the sound thinking behind the design and the simple solutions they incorporated in them.

The idea of robotics is still Sci-Fi, there are plenty of examples allready in use (drones and UAV's like the Reaper) but still the idea of building F-35's has prevailed.
 
mmarsh said:
I am not so sure. I just don't see the cost effectiveness of a $4 Million a copy M1A2 tank vs the $40,000 cost of a Javelin anti-tank Missile.

There will always a need for a support unit to backup the infantry, but in my mind it would be more sensible to make cheaper disposal units (probably robotic) as the crew and the needs of the crew (compartments, fresh air, A/C, armor protection, etc) in the tank consume cost and space within the vehicle than the expensive high-tech human manned behemoths that can be easily destroyed/disabled with basic IEDs.

Think how the US or Russians in WWII. They didn't win by having the best technological tank like the Germans had. They won by having thousands inexpensive replacements, so that when a tank was destroyed 5 more would take its place.
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actually, the allied tanks were more of an equal match with the standard Panzer 4 tank, (by far the most numerous of the German tanks.)
as far as the panther, tiger, and tiger II went, in a tank to tank conflict, the allied forces suffered some startling setbacks even when they had hordes of tanks faced by just a few of the top tier German tanks.

however, when the weather was clear, its the typhoon, and thunderbolt (and in the east, the Il II sturmvic) that ruled the battle field.
 
84RFK said:
Nah, it's just a question of money actually.
There's no problem making synthetic diesel, but regular diesel is a whole lot cheaper.
Armoured warfare will be more expensive in the future, but not obsolete.
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Not so easy. Biofuel has an extremely low EROEI.
 
MBT's becoming extinct?? Naaaaaaaaaaah, inovations are being made all the time

fortress_tank.jpg
 
Unless you could build hover tanks and more agile mechs/heavy gears, tanks will not become obsolete. There are always situation where excessive firepower and armor shielding required to protect foot soldiers in capturing strongholds. Without tanks in areas where choppers and aircraft have limited access, tanks will be called. Else the soldiers will be gunned down.
 
Canada played that game, Retired the Leo 1 C2, then we rolled into afghanistan. We had to lease Leo 2'S A6M from the dutch. Then end up buying A4's.
 
Tanks are obsolete. In fact airplanes should also be obsolete if right now a developed nation started to divert funding from aircraft and put it towards ground based missile technology. Need some recon of an area? Use a satellite. Got the recon? Attack hostile area with precision guided munitions from ground based missile system. Job done.

Missile platforms is where the pie is. They could do it all making everything obsolete.

Finally why would you need to hold an area? It's not about holding an area. It's about not letting the enemy hold an area. Achieve that and you just won the war.
 
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