Main Battle Tanks for the DF

OS119

Judt wrote:

OS119, the reason why we have our light tanks is mainly the good old step-up doctrine we have, so that we can train on tanks when world war 3 breaks out. We don't need MBT's when we can tape a gun on top of our existing fleets of light vehicles. Yes a MBT is handy to scare someone, but at the end of the day you do need a while lot more to actually deploy and maintain and operate a handful overseas. That disadvantage far outweighs any advantages when they're a luxury, not a desperate requirement. Waltering indeed...

step-up doctrine is utter ****. its never, ever worked for anyone else whose tried it because there is never enough time between convincing the bean-counters that there's a threat and getting the new kit into service before that threat arrives on your doorstep - regardless of where you choose to put your doorstep.

if you think you can 'bolt on' an MBT capability to a non-MBT vehicle then you are sorely mistaken. along similar lines to "stick an AIM-9X on a PC-9 and you can defend your skies against all-comers".

pretty much every other army in the world thinks that MBT's are a requirement for successful peacekeeping, how odd that Ireland is so 'special' that it alone can buck the trend...

so sad to see future intentions framed by current capabilities, rather than how every other fcuker does it.

micdug

Maskhadov wrote:

health ? what about all the money they are spending at the moment with little improvement.

40 - 50 tanks would be nothing to purchase. they would have to buy those truck transporters to move them around ireland and any overseas deployment would have to be done via ship probably. Hardly a major problem to deal with. The DF lands at the moment are too small for the APCs so nothing new there.

Could you deploy MBTs with the pirhana III (with a 30mm cannon ) in a convential armoured thrust ? Or do you really need the likes of the bradly ?

Lets compromise lads - get Tanks but size them for Ireland......:)

micdug

OS119 wrote:

Kosovo was about as benign as any credible peacekeeping operation has been, yet many participants saw the need for, and provided, MBT's to allow their forces to complete their PK tasks most effectively. the Germans, Canadians, French, Brits, Americans, everyone on that op saw MBT's as an inherant part of the PK's toolbox - and used them to ensure that brick-throwing demo's didn't turn into something much worse, and if it did to stop said unpleasentness in its tracks (pun).

how about some of these

much cheaper with same effect......

darkman2

Ive said this before but I do believe that IF investment is not to go into the air corps then we should go all out on ground armaments. We cant have it both ways. We must provide a realistic defence somehow. If heavy tanks are nessacary then by alll means aquire them in my view.

elvis jaffacake

If you take a look at Ireland and compare us to let's say Singapore, you can really see the difference, 1 country (Singapore) lavishes it's military with money and kit, the other (Us) does not, they spend 6 billion a year on defence, and with that they have a military thats capable of carring out multiple missions, they have a strong airforce, F-16's, F-15's, Apaches, Chinooks ect, Navy, stealth frigates, amphibs, sub's, ASW helo's, and Army, MBT's, very sophisticated intergrated electronics, future soldier systems, SPH ect, alot of which is developed inSingapore,their economy is similar in size to our's, their population too, I'm not saying we should spend 6 billion a year here, but damn if we couldn't afford more then we are now, it's at just about 1 billion now, even with an extra 500 million a year, we could do a lot more.....sorry for the rant:(

newby.204

Do any of you actually think logistics when you think up these little "we should have" threads. Right lets go off and buy 20 MBT's at 2mill so thats forty million for twenty. Now lets recruit all the xtra bods we need to man these MBT's, feed them clothed them and pay their wages. Right lets fill the tanks with fuel and bring them on an exercisce, "no cant bought the tanks nothing in the budget to cover the fuel!!" OH **** my engine broke down well just drop it into the mechanics. Oh no wait the army is still recruit all the xtra mechanics it needs to service them, as they dont have enough mechanics as it is. "Oh bollox" i broke the 90mm cannon sure the armourer will fix it, oh wait **** no were still recruit/training them?? Ah ****e we have recruited way too many and the army has grown above a sustainable size, we will have to funnel more money into(that we dont ****in have anyway cough health service) it. Sure we will retire all the older soldiers, vcrap gotta start dollin out that pension their entitled to. etc etc etc if anybody has a solution to the catual logs of buying these o so marvelous MBT's id love to hear it!! And no givin more money wont work cause it aint aver gona happen!!
RANT OVER:)

Maskhadov

the maintainence on new vehicles is zero. 40 - 50 tanks wouldnt require that much effort to accomodate.

MooseJam

we don't need tanks, if we should buy anything it's a few modern jets, the army is fine as it is but the airforce is a joke

MooseJam

on the subject of tanks check this out, a flying abrams, who would have thought it http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=a8d_1177770635

testicle

Maskhadov wrote:

the maintainence on new vehicles is zero. 40 - 50 tanks wouldnt require that much effort to accomodate.

I'm nominating you for an award. Walt of the year! You deserve it.

Maskhadov

thanks for the nomination. Im right about the maintainence though.

Judt

Maskhadov wrote:

the maintainence on new vehicles is zero. 40 - 50 tanks wouldnt require that much effort to accomodate.

How's life up there on planet mars? I went through all the logistical headaches above, and newby .204 has done a good job at summarizing them also. Tanks require huge effort to accommodate. If you're talking about buying them then talk about the logistics, because it's no good getting the tanks and crippling the rest of the DF for the sake of them.

The Singapore example is a good one of what you can do with 6 billion quid. Of course we currently spend 1/6 of that, and don't have conscription, which makes up for 40,000 of Singapore's 72,000 troops (a conscripted army being a totally different prospect to a professional one.) Of course Singapore also has some interesting neighbors while it sits in a strategic part of the world.

Frankly, we have no need to spend six times more than we do. I honestly think that at least in the bad old days the DF didn't have so much of this lofty idea of itself. A few years with DPM on issue and suddenly people think we should be kicking down doors and taking names all by our lonesome overseas.

testicle

Maskhadov wrote:

thanks for the nomination. Im right about the maintainence though.

No you're not. New tanks don't stay new for very long.

Zambia

Maskhadov wrote:

the maintainence on new vehicles is zero. 40 - 50 tanks wouldnt require that much effort to accomodate.

An M1 takes 6 litres of petrol just to turn on. Most other tanks lag behind but still eat fuel.

I assume you are never going to fire the huge gun and spend ammo

Besides for the price of 40 - 50 Mbt's I could say we could equip every RDF soldier with there own Anti - tank Missile

jmayo

Didn't anybody read my previous post???
We will have loads of unemployed dozer drivers after the building stops.
Sure they are half way to being tank drivers.
We can convert some of them to being gunners etc.
Now there will be loads of low loaders knocking around and if they can haul a Catepillar 365 then they can carry a tank.

Fuel might be a bit of problem all right but Willy O'Dea has a plan.
We will run them on bio-diesel from all the chippers in Limerick.
Donkey Fords or Friar Tucks used to produce enough for 10 tanks at least.
As for mechanics, there will be all the lads left over from servicing Catepillars, Komatsus, Hitachis, JCB and sure they can't be that much of a difference.
And as we all know new tanks don't need any maintenance.

So who thinks the above proposal is that much more far fetched than the idea that we will have our troops fighting a last stand against some marauding foe in the middle of Africa and we will have a MBT tank group up the road with 5 MBTs to send down and dispatch the enemy back into the jungle??

newby.204

Judt wrote:

How's life up there on planet mars? I went through all the logistical headaches above, and newby .204 has done a good job at summarizing them also. Tanks require huge effort to accommodate. If you're talking about buying them then talk about the logistics, because it's no good getting the tanks and crippling the rest of the DF for the sake of them.

The Singapore example is a good one of what you can do with 6 billion quid. Of course we currently spend 1/6 of that, and don't have conscription, which makes up for 40,000 of Singapore's 72,000 troops (a conscripted army being a totally different prospect to a professional one.) Of course Singapore also has some interesting neighbors while it sits in a strategic part of the world.

Frankly, we have no need to spend six times more than we do. I honestly think that at least in the bad old days the DF didn't have so much of this lofty idea of itself. A few years with DPM on issue and suddenly people think we should be kicking down doors and taking names all by our lonesome overseas.

thank you Judt for agreeing with me i thought i was largely on my own( i realise there are more level headed fellows on the board too before anyone gets offended)

Manic Moran

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zl6uaq7DTdg

Swedes having some fun with one of their Leos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xhbBWNcV5dA

Tank drifting. (?!)


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d67JEKrqdCo
Danish video. Pretty soggy range.

NTM

BostonB

We could use a few for May Day Riots.

Hard Larry

Nah you don't need tanks for that.

We could just re-commission that Garda Donal Something-or-other

the guy who went rasher on the Emo kids at the reclaim the streets rally a few years back

testicle

Hard Larry wrote:

Nah you don't need tanks for that.

We could just re-commission that Garda Donal Something-or-other

the guy who went rasher on the Emo kids at the reclaim the streets rally a few years back

Should have got a medal.

therecklessone

Hard Larry wrote:

the guy who went rasher on the Emo kids at the reclaim the streets rally a few years back

Crusties aren't emo.