After months of pressure and moving the goal posts, Germany has finally
caved and it's official, the Leopard is going hunting on the killing fields of
Ukraine. Joining it are a handful of British Challengers and soon,
nearly three dozen American Abrams- with more likely to come shortly after.
The war in Ukraine is heating up as Russia faces the very real possibility of losing
against its much smaller neighbor- so how is the Russian Federation going to
avoid catastrophic defeat and beat western tanks?
The three tanks being sent- Leopard II, Challenger 2, and Abrams- are three of the best tanks in the
world, widely considered in fact to be the best three tanks in existence. Each tank has its own
strengths, but all three are formidable challenges to Russia's aging tank forces.
The Leopard takes a more middle-of-the-path approach, providing both excellent mobility,
protection, and firepower. It is widely seen as the best tank in the west overall
right now because of its ease and low cost of operation, maintenance,
widespread availability of replacements and replacement parts. In a grinding war
of attrition, the Leopard is going to hang around while other western models
may face a significant challenge with resupply and replenishment.
The Leopard is sort of the west's answer to the Soviet Union's philosophy of building a good,
but not excellent, tank in huge numbers- only the Leopard is built
to western standards and far outstrips any Russian counterpart in capability.
The Challenger 2 is a British built main battle tank which has never seen a loss in combat to
enemy action. When building their own tank the British decided that the best way to win a tank
battle was to just outsurvive everyone else. What it might lack in other areas- and it lacks very
little- the Challenger makes up for in defense. During character creation, the British put all of
the Challenger's extra points into armor class, because the Challenger's top secret Chobham,
or now Dorchester, armor is unrivaled anywhere in the world. While many Leopards have been lost
in combat operations, not a single Challenger was ever destroyed by enemy action. It even
outmuscles the American Abrams in weight by around 2 tons with its full armor packages installed.
Next up in Russia's list of impending headaches is the US's Abrams. This tank has a reputation
for being as lethal as it is difficult to keep operational. The Abrams shares a lot
with the British Challenger in terms of armor given that the British and Americans share the
technical challenge of developing new tank armor. It's most famous feature may be the
inclusion of depleted uranium in both offense and defense. DU armor plating
gives the Abrams significant protection- at a cost. Many American tankers and even
some infantry blame the US government's use of depleted uranium munitions and
armor plating for the mysterious 'gulf war syndrome' that occurred after Desert Storm.
Desert Storm is where the Abrams earned its legendary fame though, with- like the Challenger-
not a single tank lost to enemy action. This should be of special concern to Russian tankers,
because the Abrams went up against many of the same tanks Russia is using today,
and absolutely chewed them to pieces. But America was hesitant to provide Ukraine
the Abrams for one very specific reason: it's an absolute bastard about maintenance.
Like much American technology, it's extremely capable to the point of science fiction,
and also a logistics and maintenance nightmare. Instead of a diesel engine, the US installed a
gas turbine engine which monstrous output of 1500 horsepower. That's well and great given
that the latest model Abrams is now so heavy that it can't cross most road bridges- but the
engine also requires intense maintenance from specially trained personnel. Ukraine has proven
that a farmer with a good knowledge of diesel engines and access to a machine shop can get a
Russian tank back in service on the side of the good guys, but that's not going to fly with the
Abrams. Because the Americans wanted to be snowflakes, they ditched diesel in favor of
what's basically a jet engine. This means that in the case of large scale war, American tanks
couldn't even share fuel with their European counterparts, let alone replacement parts.
Not exactly a great strategy in a high attrition conflict.
So how's Russia going to win against Western tanks?
Well, Russia has proven to be far from a military strategy genius,
but they at least aren't sharing their most confidential strategies with the world. However,
we can gleam some insights from their past and current behavior as well as common sense.
For weeks Russia has been using largely unsupported infantry assaults across the
eastern front. Operating a Russian tank anywhere near a Ukrainian position has
become a very high risk activity thanks to the proliferation of western anti-tank missiles,
but many western observers believe that Russia is consolidating its armored forces and training
new batches of tank crews to launch a massive offensive in the next few weeks. By that time,
a number of Leopards should be in the country, and it's almost certain that
Russia will try to concentrate its armor wherever western tanks are being used.
Right now about a hundred western tanks have been promised, and Ukraine will likely have
about 70 or so of these by late spring. That's entirely too few to conduct large
scope operations with, and Ukraine will be best served by concentrating these numbers
into select areas on the battlefield. Russia will likely respond in kind,
putting as much firepower as possible directly opposite Ukrainian Leopard and Challenger tanks.
One on one, if both sides have equally trained crews, Russian T-72s, T-80s,
and T-90s don't stand a chance against a Leopard II. Most analysts believe that the Leopard will
be able to shrug off one or two hits in the same vicinity, specially from the front. Meanwhile,
the Leopard's cannon combined with far superior sensors and fire control computer
will be able to bring the hurt from outside the effective firing ranges of most Russian
tanks. Defeating western tanks will become a numbers game- with Russia flooding the
battlefield with its own inferior tanks so it can overwhelm Leopards and Challengers.
The strategy is similar to that used in World War II against the Germans by the west, and while it
resulted in terrible losses for western armor, it worked. We can expect similar results in Ukraine
due to one simple fact- Ukraine will not be able to use these western tanks in the same way that
the west would. And whatever tanks the west sends to Ukraine are going to suffer for it.
What do we mean by this? Well, in the west tanks are meant to operate as parts of combined arms
operations, with the support of aerial platforms and precision artillery. This is how the US and
its partners defeated Iraq in the first Gulf War, and how the US did it again ten years later
despite facing a nearly 10 to 1 disadvantage in numbers. The problem for Ukraine is that it cannot
match the capabilities of the US and its allies, and it'll be forced to use tanks with far less
support than they normally would have. And this is the crux of the problem,
because as formidable as western tanks are- and they truly are- there's only so much armor one can
put on a vehicle, and it can't be armored equally from all sides. Western armor beats the pants off
Russian armor, but physics is still king and one can only push materials science so far. Leopards,
Abrams, and Challenger tanks will face significant losses in Ukraine, even if operated perfectly by
their crews- though the Russians will pay a heavy price for every destroyed western tank.
That's why Russia's best strategy for defeating western tanks is to prevent them from being
supplied at all. It lost the first round in this battle, but it hasn't lost the war.
Germany has little appetite for continuing to send heavy combat equipment to Ukraine,
and in fact its own army is in pretty dire straits. Other countries are more willing,
but the fact of the matter is that the promised 100 tanks for Ukraine are in
no way enough. The west needs to commit to the continuous resupply of tanks to Ukraine
for the duration of the war to have a real impact- and this is a very dicey proposition.
Ukraine fatigue has begun to set in, as well as fears of escalation. Russian disinformation and
bluffs have done a great job of either getting westerners to question support for Ukraine,
or to be so afraid of quote- escalation- that they refuse to support sending heavy combat
equipment. Conspiracy theories about Democrats in the US using the Ukraine war to launder money
target the gullible and willing to widen the political divide in the US, while in Germany
Russia beats a never-ending drum of 'escalation' rhetoric to fan fears of a wider conflict.
Russia is incapable of widening this conflict, and if it picks a fight with a NATO country it's
basically guaranteeing its own suicide. Using nuclear weapons would have a similar result,
and there's always the fact that the west also has its own nukes- and they're
probably in better working condition. The truth is there is no 'escalation',
this is merely rhetoric Putin's intelligence agencies have employed to make westerners afraid.
And it's working given the massive delays in providing decisive aid to Ukraine. So
the best way to beat western tanks turns out to be not on the battlefield, but on the airwaves.
Now go check out Why Putin Is Scared of West Sending Tanks To Ukraine,
or click this other video instead!