1/ A couple days ago @CovertCabal released his MT-LB count video, done in collaboration with me. I was celebrating my birthday AFK this weekend, but now it's time to make a thread about it.
2/ First of all, here are the current numbers: 
3/ So, first of all, you know that for the last 1,5-2 months MT-LBs have been my obsession. We were missing a lot of recent footage, but everything pointed to them being almost out of storage by now.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1783556507407151579
4/ Once we finally managed to get footage of them, thanks to @kromark from Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Covert himself and others, we did confirm our predictions.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1787571488825970798
5/ It's also good to know that, for the most part, my previous estimates based on shitty Sentinel footage were right.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1807815054483505351
6/ Anyway, a little context before getting to the actual analysis. As I said in the past, the MT-LB, while originally designed as an armored artillery tractor, has become the humble workhorse of the Russian army and logistics.
7/ It serves as the go-to armored box with tracks, kinda like the M113 in Western militaries. It can be an APC, and improvised SPG/MRLS, a logistics vehicle... In fact, they were mostly stored at just a small set of storage bases dedicated to logistics equipment, just like MT-LBus are also mostly stored at artillery facilities.
8/ It's no wonder then that it's so commonly emplyed by Russia, considering the huge prewar numbers they boasted. At least almost 3,000 in storage and a huge number in active service en 2022 (though I believe that, as usual, The Military Balance overestimated it before 2022).
9/ However, considering there's just 1,095 confirmed losses as of now by @WarSpotting, something is off. Why are so many more removed from storage then?
Graphic made by a good buddy from @projectowlosint:
Graphic made by a good buddy from @projectowlosint:
10/ When we look at prewar images of MT-LB depots, they looked on average far better preserved than most types of Russian armored vehicles in storage.
11/ So much that you could barely see any degraded or cannibalized MT-LB hull in storage before the war. So much so that the only graveyard of MT-LBs I've found was in the base of a Separate Engineer-Sapper Regiment based in Murmansk, uncovered by @waffentraeger.
12/ So what's with all the demothballed MT-LBs? A serious of factors, IMHO: 1) they are a polivalent vehicle as a I said, so it's not like BMPs that you only expect to use them for combat duties; 2) they appeared to have been mostly well-maintained and with an ample source of spare parts, so it's easier to replace armor losse with them than with, let's say, BMP-3s; 3) they're very common also in the civilian economy (such as firefighter and rescue vehicles in Siberia);
13/ 4) they weren't the most commonly exported Soviet armored vehicle, so not as big a demand for smuggled cannibalized components as with T-72s or BMPs, for example, 5) like I said, there were probably far less in active service before 2022 than it was assumed by Western sources; 6) finally, wear and tear take their toll, not just combat losses, even for a design as simple and reliable as the MT-LB.
14/ It's no surprise then that so many have been demothballed in Ukraine, a lot more than their already big rate of destruction.
15/ There's also the question of whether MT-LBs are still in production or are just refurbished and spare parts produced, but not whole hulls. There's contradictory sources on that.
https://x.com/RALee85/status/1102338082634956802
18/ Personally, I believe that if Russia was actually producing new hulls they wouldn't shy away from broadcasting it, as they tend to do to further the propaganda about the might Russian bear. But even if they are, production rate must be too small to be meaningful. Muromteplovoz Zavod, the plant in charge of MT-LBs, shows the same amount of cannibalized hulls around the main factory since the war started.
19/ With all that said, let's dive in the actual footage and numbers!
20/ First, my personal favourite, the 7021th (which I mistakenly called 7020th for a long time). Thanks to @kromark we got somewhat clear footage of this one, and we could confirm that numbers dropped from roughly 450 a year ago to 134 (probably less) in June 2024 (probably less):
21/ And I say probably less because I think these are actually tanks, but I rather be conservative with my count. Probably a lot of MT-LBs are also broken, considering previous images.
22/ Next, the 230th. This I already covered it some weeks ago. Just 52 (not 54!)left now:
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1802791975101280444
23/ The 4990th, I also talked about it. It was the biggest MT-LB depot by far, it got almost completely depleted pretty fast and now numbers barely changed. Probably because those that remain are cannibalized hulls. Footage donated by @kromark:
24/ The 187th saw an increase of MT-LBs once the war started, probably because it was used as a training base. Now it's almost empty, and not just of MT-LBs. Here too I'm quite sure those that I counted as MT-LBs are trucks, but once again I rather be conservative because I'm not 100% confident. Just 11(?) MT-LBs left now, again thanks to the footage by @kromark:
25/ At the 4989th the situation is the same. Again almost depleted, again not sure if I'm looking at trucks or MT-LBs. Again also many thanks to @kromark for his patronage of OSINTers. This one was already almost depleted by mid 2022 tho, so 19 MT-LBs left in the worst case scenario.
@kromark 26/ Thanks to @waffentraeger I noticed more MT-LB depots, like I said, but none of them were a groundbreaking discovery. Like the MT-LB depot near the 190th arsenal, which got from 90 vehicles to 0.
@kromark @waffentraeger 27/ Or the 82nd, which went from 139 to just 20 over a year ago.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1812074197994107314
28/ Unlike every other type of AFVs, which to a bigger or lesser degree leave behind rusted and broken hulls when the rest of them are pull out from storage, that's not the case with MT-LBs. Barely anything left behind. I can only think on the six MT-LBs stored at the Sevastopol depot, which were cannibalized, or the hulls at the 1295th that were already broken before the invasion started.
29/ So, what's left to say? Not much, really. I was very engaged recently in researching more in depth the stored MT-LB fleet and try to uncover the reasons as to why it went down so fast, but I think by now the reasons are pretty clear, as I wrote them down earlier in this thread.
@kromark @waffentraeger 30/ What I said a while ago stands even more now. MT-LBs are practically gone, and what's left isn't worth the effort of refurbishing it.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1808263542815986159
@kromark @waffentraeger 31/ We'll probably the stored ones drop a bit more this year, but the ones that remain by then in storage will probably stay there forever, too cannibalized and few in numbers to have any real importance.
@kromark @waffentraeger 32/ This MT-LB-related effort also helped to reinforce my ID abilities, both when it comes to Sentinel and other blurry but public footage, and also on individual IDs. Thanks to @Ath3neN0ctu4 for confirming that these are indeed Strelas as I suspected.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1811842307202908346
33/ I think the next big research will be about MT-LBus. If my predictions are proven right once again soon enough and indeed they have started to massively demothball them to compensate for the depletion of easy replenishments in the form of MT-LBs, then that will be noticed in the frontlines few months down the line.
34/ We'll be able to confirm this very soon.
https://x.com/Jonpy99/status/1806976937601999318
35/ All the minor bases and count changes are already in the spreadsheet, as usual. Coordinates are also there, so now you can check for yourselves even the minor bases Waffen found. docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d…
36/ Finally, big thanks to @CovertCabal for the collaboration, he was my original inspiration to start researching Russian stored equipment. Also big thanks to @kromark, check out his recent article in Radio Liberty: svoboda.org/a/na-poroge-is…
37/ And also many thanks to @waffentraeger for that titanic task of finding all the remaining storage facilities, @HighMarsed for crosschecking everything with me, @Ath3neN0ctu4, @AS_22im, @projectowlosint and many more! And AFV count video coming out this Saturday if all goes well!
@kromark Damn it, I forgot to put in here the newer picture.
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