Thread by @DefenceFreedom

I'll try to elaborate on my current post about MBTs./1

First, please make yourself familiar with the concept of opportunity costs. To buy a car for 10k € may look like a good deal, but maybe you could have gotten a better car for 9k €. The 10k € deal suddenly doesn't look so good anymore, right?/2

So when you compare 14 tanks of high effort (costs) to 14 tanks of less effort (costs), you do it wrong. You need to keep in mind that the saved expenses can be used to afford something else as well./2

You may look at the whole fleet. The budget for 14 expensive tanks may suffice t afford 17 less well-protected, lighter tanks. So you might compare 14 tanks vs. 17 and it would be a fair comparison. /3

Another way is to look at 14 tanks vs. 14 less expensive tanks PLUS additional anti-tank weapons (for infantry or dedicated AT teams). Now suddenly looking at tanks in terms of tan duel 1vs1 or 4vs4 looks foolish, right?/4

And then there are the different kinds of tank "kills".
Mobility kill = tank cannot move any more (usually = a track is broken)
Firepower kill = it cannot shoot or aim any more (with its main gun)/5

Mission kill: A mobility or firepower kill is a mission kill; the tank (crew) cannot continue its mission.

A mobility kill is almost as good as a total destruction, as the sitting target can often be destroyed easily with artillery or other means./6

A firepower kill is also devastating. A ruined main gun barrel can hardly be replaced; there are no big stocks of spare barrels. They would need to be taken from wrecks that did not burn out.
An unmanned turret can be ruined even by a 90 or 105 mm HESH round./7

All the exposed sensors, RCWS, APS could be taken out by 12.7 mm AP bullets even, partially even by infantry rifle bullets. These items are very expensive, again there won't be big stocks of spare parts. You would need to salvage spare parts from wrecks that did not burn out. /8

So adding protection against MBT guns for the crew does very little tactically. Maybe their morale gets a little better. The tank as a whole won't become significantly more survivable by it. /9

Now don't think about open steppes or desert, think about Europe with lines of sight shorter than 2 km. Tank kills will usually happen without the defeated tank crew first seeing their killer. Surprise is powerful. A surprise MBT shot almost surely to mission kill a target./10

So what's the point of giving the tank crew that extra armour? It's all about their survivability. Seems good to give that to them, right?
But what if the tank runs out of fuel because of that extra weight?/11

Fuel consumption is approx. proportional to tank weight with a given propulsion technology.
The extra weight also reduces soft soil mobility, which may also get the tank and crew killed becuase they become more predictable. /12

"Ugh! Armor thicker! Ugh!" is not a full appraisal of the survivability of either tank or tank crew. /13

And let's go full circle, back to opportunity costs: Why spend much on extra survivability of the few per cent men in harms' way that are tank crews? What about spending that extra money on saving other lives?/14

Does any heavy MBT proponent offer a full analysis that no such alternative (thousands may be thinkable) is actually more cost-efficient at saving soldiers' lives than adding protection against tank guns to MBTs?/15

Finally, there's difference in a MBT vs MBT duel regarding having medium or heavy armour as long as both you and them can penetrate about all-round. /16

An enemy tank crew cannot have superiority in terms of firepower and protection over a medium tank as long as the medium tank can penetrate their tank./17

The obsession with tank protection is a weird peacetime and civilians phenomenon. Wartime tank crews favoured the firepower to defeat the hostile tanks and the mobility to go almost anywhere highly over having armour that stops hostile shells. Immunity is an illusion anyway. /18

The military bureaucracy, civilian engineers and peacetime folks pay much attention to protection. But tanks don't need near-invulnerability to be effective. Firepower, mobility and protection against most threats is enough to excel./19

The German tanks that overran Poland in 1939, France in 1940, and rushed to Moscow in 1941 were easily penetrated by almost all artillery pieces and by all anti-tank guns and tank guns they did encounter./20

They only had about 15...50 mm armour plates. The penetration of the ubiquitous light field guns , by howitzers, almost all tank guns and by anti-tank guns of that time was better than 60 mm RHA./21

Those German tanks defeated French and Soviet tank forces in pitched battles that had thicker armour and sometimes even better guns./22

The 'magic' of armoured spearheads isn't in some invulnerability, it's in surprise, shock, working together, combined arms, offroad mobility, concentrated firepower, determination, good navigation and in making use of prior reconnaissance./23

Finally, anyone who still wants MBTs to be hardened against MBT gun threats should look at the tank destruction reports from Ukraine. How many MBTs were killed by MBTs without element of surprise (I remember an example of shots from 5 o'clock at short range)? /24

Those who want more resources to be spent on something carry the burden of evidence. They need to make a strong case for spending more, putting more effort in - not those who say we can make do with less./25

So in the end, I close by repeating my opinion that we should not protect MBTs against MBT threats any more. Particularly the German tank design obsession with stopping APFSDS in frontal about 60° is nonsense.
Let's choose better soft soil mobility & lower costs instead. /done

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