Some unrelated recent military procurment storiess since I am getting bored of Ukraine

[conon394]

I think you missed the point there...

Those tanks are big heavy white elephants as far as defending continental Australia goes... Australia is the same size as the US. With a population not much larger than metropolitan New York's. It can't be defended by 75 tanks. The only real purpose they serve, is as a commitment to someone else's power projection capability.

Depends what and where you plan on defending now does it not? So I grant maybe Northern Australia is not tank country but that does not mean an invasion from that direction is going to be sans tanks as well. Serbia proved even without air cover you could in fact hide your tanks so if you pick your place to fight on the defensive not on the beaches of Northern Australia some armor of top grade could come in handy. Mind you I would bulk up on anti missile and air defense as well.

[antaeus]

Depends what and where you plan on defending now does it not? So I grant maybe Northern Australia is not tank country but that does not mean an invasion from that direction is going to be sans tanks as well. Serbia proved even without air cover you could in fact hide your tanks so if you pick your place to fight on the defensive not on the beaches of Northern Australia some armor of top grade could come in handy. Mind you I would bulk up on anti missile and air defense as well.

OK, put it like this... how many tanks and soldiers were required to hold front lines in World War 2?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Even with 5000 tanks, an enemy could just walk around them. You don't seem to understand the sheer scale of unpopulated space in this country. Last time I flew to Singapore, 2/3 of my flight was over empty desert. There are individual farms in Australia as big as some European countries.

In the Australian context, tanks are not for defence. They are for offence, offshore, as part of someone else's battle group.


Edit: I'm not joking.

[conon394]

My counter point would you don't need defend most of that just key places at the right time. You make the same argument for not buying anything. Second point is you by in large don't get the choice to buy or produce MBTs or similar products if you find yourself needing them. Third even a detached platoon of good tanks is a nice force multiplier on defense. also why EUrope in the places where is virtualy nobody. Spin that map and jam it to the eastern coast and your point is less firm.

[Cyclops]

My counter point would you don't need defend most of that just key places at the right time. You make the same argument for not buying anything. Second point is you by in large don't get the choice to buy or produce MBTs or similar products if you find yourself needing them. Third even a detached platoon of good tanks is a nice force multiplier on defense. also why EUrope in the places where is virtualy nobody. Spin that map and jam it to the eastern coast and your point is less firm.

The only military in the world that could transport tanks/conventional inf to Oz is the US. Prior to the 1941 Singapore sliding door it was the UK. We have been a dominion of each of those powers for those periods.

To get to Australia you have to get past our airforce and navy and those of our allies. If they have been defeated we have already changed sides.

Space bats the Chinese land in force without nuking us or us surrendering, then its still an air war before its a tank war. Armour is possibly the last component needed for defence behind airforces, surface and sub fleets, and rapid deployment and conventional inf.

[conon394]

Space bats the Chinese land in force without nuking us or us surrendering, then its still an air war before its a tank war. Armour is possibly the last component needed for defence behind airforces, surface and sub fleets, and rapid deployment and conventional inf.

War is weird thing. Your perception of how they play out is rarely the reality of what happens (seems some Prussian dude said something like that). Up shot again Just MTS are useful and likely to remain so, particularity good ones. Not everywhere nor all the time. But you can't as I said buy them on the quick.

[Cyclops]

War is weird thing. Your perception of how they play out is rarely the reality of what happens (seems some Prussian dude said something like that). Up shot again Just MTS are useful and likely to remain so, particularity good ones. Not everywhere nor all the time. But you can't as I said buy them on the quick.

I quite agree. Still the likelihood here is we are purchasing systems to send a diplomatic message that the anglophone bloc is solid, not that we're expecting visitors

[antaeus]

I quite agree. Still the likelihood here is we are purchasing systems to send a diplomatic message that the anglophone bloc is solid, not that we're expecting visitors

A multi-billion dollar gift bag for after the birthday party.

[conon394]

I quite agree. Still the likelihood here is we are purchasing systems to send a diplomatic message that the anglophone bloc is solid, not that we're expecting visitors

I also agree on your point as well.

[Condottiere 40K]

I suspect the tanks are meant more to complicate an invasion, in that you'd have to bring in additional equipment to deal with them.

Also, if you don't have them, you tend to lose combined force expertise.

[Morticia Iunia Bruti]

Germany intends to buy F-35 stealth military jets — reports | News | DW | 14.03.2022

Makes sense, as other Nato members have bought it too.

[conon394]

Germany intends to buy F-35 stealth military jets — reports | News | DW | 14.03.2022

Makes sense, as other Nato members have bought it too.

Certainly the rate of purchases has driven the unit cost down, and the US is the only country really paying for the silly concurrent production ideal so a good buy now - since the US worked out most of the bugs at a heavy price. Now Biden needs to order the navy to stop building the Literally (useless) combat ship and redirect that money to restarting F-22 production. I would not stopping the Fords and restarting the Nimitz CVs and use the money saved for more air wings. Kinda pointless to build CVs for ~100 planes and than just park half that on them.

Per the link not seeing the not picking the F-18 is a blow to Boeing. The F-18 is not a really a good airplane is more or less meh at everything at best. Besides Boeing got the Upgraded F-15 contract and might shop that around as well.

[Basileos Leandros I]

Well this thread title has aged... rather special.

[conon394]

You know I thinking about the irony of that myself (Just a little before the Russian build up I was thinking about not being so lazy and figuring how to change the name, but now well ...)

[Cyclops]

So about those "Beyraktar" drones, do they really work or are they a cover story for US drones in the battlespace? They certainly look like the best deal done in recent times if they actually work.

[conon394]

So about those "Beyraktar" drones, do they really work or are they a cover story for US drones in the battlespace? They certainly look like the best deal done in recent times if they actually work.

I think they are the real deal. Turkey is good at arms... Their performance for Ukraine seems to be on par with what Azerbaijan achieved and there can be no doubt they were using Turkish product and against what Armenia says was the best off the shelf Russian jamming gear. What really baffles me is as somebody who is a drone skeptic is that I would have assumed Russia knowing they were there had the jamming and hacking and medium AA to swat them one way or the other. I am really surprised Ukraine can still operate them with seeming impunity.

[antaeus]

I think the Beyraktar drones must be getting deployed particularly carefully. They might be cheap hardware compared to an Su-34, but you still wouldn't get much change from a trade in for a Aston Martin Valkyrie, and their PR value is priceless so they can't afford for too many to be seen in pieces across the ground.

I'd suggest they're used for low risk targets of opportunity, and otherwise for their long range thermal/optics/loiter time for guiding artillery at ranges on the edge or beyond of MANPADS capability. Now that the Russian air defences are more formalised - particularly in the south, we're seeing more off-the-shelf disposable drone footage guiding artillery and far less footage of Beyraktars killing tanks.

But yeah... the Russians should have seen them coming... but deploying air defences effectively would have negated the speed required for their initial rush for a fait accompli. A flawed tactic that gave up control of the drone narrative. But things have balanced out a little since then.

[Cyclops]

I think they are the real deal. Turkey is good at arms... Their performance for Ukraine seems to be on par with what Azerbaijan achieved and there can be no doubt they were using Turkish product and against what Armenia says was the best off the shelf Russian jamming gear. What really baffles me is as somebody who is a drone skeptic is that I would have assumed Russia knowing they were there had the jamming and hacking and medium AA to swat them one way or the other. I am really surprised Ukraine can still operate them with seeming impunity.

Thx to you and Ant for this info, I know so little of modern warfare.

So the Armenians and Azeris were going at it with drones and all? I guess they are relatively young militaries and have had an opportunity to explore new techs and tactics, despite relatively smaller economies.

[Condottiere 40K]

The Armenians were trained by the Russians, the Turks were cut off from Western arms suppliers, and the Azeris were desperate to change the facts on the ground, and had a lot of cash.

It should also be noted that the Israelis helped out as well; for cash.

The real surprise was that special forces and drone warfare was effective even at a low cost, by a low level military power, as long as all levels involved were well trained and motivated.

[Love Mountain]

Azerbaijan won because they have a lot more money, that's really all there is to it. At the end of the day, no amount of tactical brilliance can overcome an overwhelming advantage in men and material.

On the subject of TB-2 drones, they did not win the war single-handedly, but they sure did help. TB-2 Drones use weak engines, they have a wing-span of 40 feet, and their munitions have a typical firing range of 3-15km (though Turkey is working on better ones, obviously). They're not particularly difficult to detect, nor to shoot down. Systems most optimized against this kind of threat would be the Pantsir, Tunguska, and Tor systems. The trouble is, Ukraine is the largest country in Europe, Russia has decided to attack all along the front. Co-ordination of all this air defense is obviously a monumental task and as you can tell by the logistics effort, the Russian army is over-stretched and is, I believe, in the middle of re-organization of the entire effort. This provides many, many holes for Ukraine's drones to go through and to attack isolated convoys.

TB-2 aren't some magic bullet, despite the great marketing. Oryx from Twitter is Turkish, people often forget that but note that Ukraine is trying to publicize as much success as they can. There isn't a whole TB-2 footage, but it's obvious that Russia does not control Ukrainian airspace. The majority of Russian aviation is still being un-used, as are it's EW assets, at least from what we can tell. Current coverage of the conflict is incredibly one-sided, we need to understand that. This isn't like Syria or Nagorno-Karabakh where we are relatively un-interested actors who can relatively neutrally cover and witness the conflict. So don't be too overawed by the TB-2 footage and praises being sung, there actually isn't a whole lot of conclusive evidence of its success. Quite a few of these were shot down in Libya by an enemy that's ready for them.

What I've really learned, is that regardless of how much technology you put into soldiers' hands, it's ultimately men, not machines, that do the fighting. Russia's limited success is a by-product of the fighting condition of Russian and Ukrainian soldiers and officers, as it is of all the weapons they have. It isn't just training, corruption, or perceived incompetence. One side, is clearly motivated and prepared, whereas the other side wasn't even aware that this was going to be a war.

[conon394]

Not saying the Turkish drone is a magic bullet. What is odd is a Russia seemed unprepared from drone warfare when really it should had the ability to seize the airspace. The Turkish option certainty did up the Ukrakrain options and at a cheap price.

Oryx is a really great site for data. They weed through the public data, toss out stuff is impossible to identify or old footage re labeled as new etc. But they have a lists now for TB-2 kills, overall equipment losses and aircraft losses. One interesting fact a reporter (I can't recall whom) crunched their numbers on vehicles and right now Ukraine is a net positive more captured Russian tanks than it has lost.


https://www.oryxspioenkop.com/

"perceived incompetence"

I think 6 dead flag officers in 2 weeks (out 20 who were sent into the Ukraine) (and 6 dead Colonels) [That is a really a lot senior officers(*)] defines actually incompetent - when that happens in 2 weeks against I will use the conservative 7000-8000 military dead. Compare over the entirety of WW2 the USSR lost 416 flag officers out 6750000 overall military dead. You can divide the flag officer total against either time or overall losses and the fact is nether result is good for Putin's army in comparison. It certainly says that the senior Russian commanders probably cannot command their battle space unless they are at the very front lines, and likely have both poor communication and no solid corps of senior NCOs and junior officers who can make independent decisions (or are expected too or trained to).

* the US lost 8 Flag officers in Nam over the entire to enemy action. Again give a comparison to time or overall casualties the result is bad for the current Russian army. Add in the Gulf war and all the War Terror wars I get only 2 more US generals (cant find good data since you seemingly can add 2 for accident and suicide and some lists do)