comment: >
  
  Ukraine on the other hand is currently creating their founding myth.
context: Western tanks will outclass & outgun anything the Russians can put up against them.. >
  
  No joke I think only one of our challenger 2 has been destroyed in combat, Correct me if I’m wrong but it took 3 anti tank missiles and 14 Rpg rockets and was back in service after 12 hours of repair. >
  
  One blue on blue in Basra.
  Challenger 2 is always called outdated by Russians. 4th Gen tank that was upgraded in 2008 and 2014. Ironic for the guys driving 1960s and 1970s tanks into battle.
  Like The Chieftan and Mark Hertling said. It has the optics and thermals etc to be the first one to get off a shot. It's armour is more than capable of taking multiple 125mm shots and fighting on at 100% capability. The Russian armour will not be afforded the same luxury from it's 120mm.
  This assumes a well trained crew. Challenger 2 will clap Russian armour senseless.
  It's main issue will be amassed artillery and lack of air superiority.
  Oh and it has a Rifle cannon with HESH for fucking up entrenched troops from afar. Russian armour due to losses has being used as makeshift howitzers which they struggle with. The Challenger 2 has it as part of its design. >
  
  I think it has a unique armour system to, with plates that can be quickly replaced when damaged. >
  
  Challenger armour is still highly classified but has Chobham armour which is pretty much the base for UK/US armour protection. Highly capable and then the European standard version has a number of ERA playes to assist with warding off different types of attack weapons.
  The drawback of the Challenger is it is a chonky boy. Heaviest of all MBTs in the West with only the SEPv3 Abram being close. But it's drawback is also it's strength. It's weight is largely just armour. 
  Leclercs are incredible tanks - Fast and lethal
  Leopard 2 - amazing all rounders and most importantly there is a massive infrastructure in Europe for them.
  Challenger 2 is the heavy weight boxer of the European tanks. Its design philosophy was only directed at its ability to fuck up Russian or similar tanks in principle.
  But large issue will be Massed Artillery, Lack of Air Superiority and small number. >
  
  Conventional artillery is very limited in its effectiveness against main battle tanks.
  MLRS is more effective, but it’s still extremely difficult and costly to attack armour with indirect area weapons.
  Doctrinally in the west we don’t even consider tanks a viable target for conventional artillery. Wasteful and generally ineffective unless as a specific part of an offensive or defensive operation (fixing in kill zones, supporting break-contacts before withdrawal/delay, etc). >
  
  Does cheap and plentiful drone reconnaissance impact this doctrine at all?  I don’t know how any of this works, but I’d expect an MBT has to stop moving at some point and ubiquitous forward recon seems like it’d make artillery more of a threat. >
  
  Sure. But first round direct hits with artillery are pretty hard, and there’s a pretty significant degree of randomness (called “probable error”) unless using extremely expensive precision munitions.
  When the first round lands nearby, that tank commander has a pretty good idea he’s being adjusted on and observed in some way, and can be moving within seconds. 
  In the event of a direct hit, as long as the tank is “hatches down” the damage will probably be limited to optics/firepower and odds of a catastrophic kill (destruction) are still low unless you get a sweet spot. >
  
  That makes a lot of sense, thanks man! >
  
  Battle doctrine matter more than equipment. Nike's don't magically make kids into Micheal Jordan, but Jordan wearing better gear helps he be a better Micheal Jordan.
  Ukrainian soldiers have better moral and cause worth fighting for, but wars grow longer morale drops. Western tanks, can help that moral and fill in gaps caused by battle losses.
  At the end of the day though, Ukraine is going to have the most complex logistics network to support all this. And logistics wise western tanks need more intensive work shops to repair and refurbish. Easy for western nations, difficult for Ukraine. Soviet tank designs were more field maintenance friendly iirc, but it could just be internalize propoganda. >
  
  Can anyone help me understand, from a tactical point of view, why tanks are so valuable? I mean, I thought they were pretty vulnerable and outdated with drones and artillery in the mix, the tanks themselves having a relatively short range. It feels like the trouble of protecting one is not worth it, but I'm probably missing the point of tanks. Don't you need ground and air protection to go along with it? >
  
  
  Don't you need ground and air protection to go along with it?
  
  If you isolate any military item you'll find its surprisingly vulnerable. We still use tanks because there is nothing that can replace them in their role (heavy direct fire support and mobile heavy fire) and to be away with them is to go without those capabilities. >
  
  People tend to forget that while tanks indeed are death traps, everything is a death trap in modern war. Sometimes, it's better to have something that can "only" be utterly destroyed by 20 pct of the enemy's capability rather than 80 pct of it. >
  
  Can someone eli5 why we still haven't sent the god damn tanks yet? >
  
  Yeah, just giving a bunch of guys a tank and saying “have at ‘er” is a really poor use of a sophisticated part of combined arms tactics. 
  If you look at the first tank battles in WW1, before any tactics had been developed, Early tanks would not be supported by infantry, and when they broke through enemy lines, the crews felt invincible and kept advancing deeper and deeper into enemy territory. They were effective for a single day, then ran out of Gas and the Germans just captured them or knocked them out with massed infantry. 
  As the other commenter alludes to, you need to train crews on how to repair,  make sure you have all the supplies for repair, extra armaments, crews that know how to drive effectively…AND…there also needs to be a plan in place on how to actually use these weapons effectively. 
  The common narrative right now is that the Russians are going to have a massive spring offensive with a new conscript army. As an armchair general, I’d be saving up all my advanced armour (leopards, challengers, Abrams and Bradley’s) and preparing a counteroffensive force for the Spring. 
  The dream of any general, and something which countless Russian armies have fallen victim to, is a double envelopment. Use flaking forces on both the left and right to completely encircle a force distracted at the “front”. Advanced tanks with sufficient mobile infantry support would be super useful in this kind of maneuver. >
  
  Yes because attacking during the mud season worked so well the first time, surely a second try will be even more effective!
  /s >
  
  We could send 10,000 Toyotas as support for these tanks and start another Toyota war.
  In the summer time, on the flat ground of Eastern Ukraine, thousands of new light trucks with guns accompanied by a few tanks would be terrifying. >
  
  Eh, won't work here. As much as the Russians suck, they aren't as bad as the Libyans. The Chadians requested those specifically because it fit their style of warfare and their relative lack of experience in doing maintenance with heavy armor. Ukraine needs a lot more though, plus they're already comfortable with using heavy armor themselves. >
  
  A lot of good comments here about how the challenger and leopards are purpose built to fight Russian tanks, but they are also some of the heaviest mbt's out there and the bridges in Ukraine were specifically built to hold the lighter t-series tanks.
  I'm worried these tanks will make it to the front and not be able to cross bridges without the bridges being reinforced, which just gives away to the Russians where your tanks are going to come from. >
  
  Not all fronts looks the same,and my guess would be they will be grouped with marders and bradleys in convoys using manpads and alot of infantry just like how they protect the himars,they wont risk them.this in contrast of how russia sent in single tanks to just get blown up. >
  
  But why I keep reading the same announcements over and over again while nobody delivers?
  Can someone finally deliver those tanks to Ukraine, please?
  Forgive me my ignorance, but is it so hard to send tanks to Ukraine? >
  
  The delay is probably training up the crew and maintenance people. No point sending stuff into a war zone that can’t be used >
  
  And fking politics. I hope they trained crews already, bc im not sure that you can effectively train a skilled crew in just a few months. For repairs they just need to know basic stuff probably, western countries will set up repair workshops in poland with people who have years of experience working on them. >
  
  The British army have been rotating Ukrainian forces through training for months. Mainly infantry, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they had armoured units ahead of the announcement >
  
  Are these tanks are still impacted by the soft boggy ground that affected the Russian tanks? >
  
  Yes...they are heavy 75-80 tons each..but i have to assume ukraine understands its own mud and how to move around it...if one gets stuck it will be horrible to try and get it out,im not even sure a t72 could pull it out. >
  
  Thanks >
  
  It really is time for russia to go home... if they still haven't taken a hint after 10 months, maybe this will drive it home for them. >
  
  I don't know why this is an issue. The West need to stop being kittens, grow some nads, and show the Russians you really mean business and don't give a fuq escalating the conflict. Russians only recognize violence and power. So, teach them a lesson. >
  
  Can we just give them some legit, top of the line modern equipment so they can just drive Russia out and we can end this thing. 
  Russia can't withstand modern western equipment. At all.
  Putin gets disgraced, maybe has an accident, and the new Russian leader can end the war to build out their new regime. Perhaps try to extend an olive branch to the west. We can get back to trading, and focus on global prosperity.
  Come on people. There is money to be made. >
  
  Ukraine is still Ukraine in spite of the Reddit narrative that Russia has invaded Sweden or something.    Once the war is over nobody wants to see their high end shit sold off to Africa >
  
  Let them join NATO and it won't be. >
  
  Man, Russia is doing the west all kinds of favors by invading Ukraine in a fucked up kind of way. We're getting to test out a lot of our weapons systems at basically no cost. Sucks for Ukraine but man Russia's extraordinary fuck ups have been a net gain for the west.