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Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 1:56:57 AM

RedArgo

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Anyone watching this show on Military Channel? It seems a lot like the Enterprise 360 and Patton 360 from History. Lots of CGI and interviews with veterans. So far, they've done Gulf War I, '73 Israel vs Syria and the battle of El Alemein (sp?), next week is the battle of the bulge.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 2:06:08 AM

2ndACR

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Never watched the GW1 show, I was there. Don't need to watch it. LOL

Eagle 2/2 all the way!!

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 8:32:55 AM

ilovestrategy

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This reminds me of a tank video game with vector graphics I used to play at the arcade in the 80s, and I cannot remember the name of it. I remember you had the view of the gunner. It had a name like Battle Zone or something like that. I miss Tail Gunner, that game rocked.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 9:39:51 AM

cantona2

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Gulf War great tank battle?!??! Air supremacy vs tanks = no tank battle!

I suppose Prokorovkha was the only great tank battle and recently I have seen some revisionist stuff claiming it wasn't

As to El Alamein, it was more an artillery and minefield, infantry battle as opposed to a great tank battle

Your thoughts?

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 1:54:37 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: RedArgo

Anyone watching this show on Military Channel? ...

I am and its graphics are not nearly as gratuitus as the HC's 360 shows.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 2:59:46 PM

bairdlander2

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cantona2

Gulf War great tank battle?!??! Air supremacy vs tanks = no tank battle!

Like shooting fish in a barrel.

< Message edited by bairdlander -- 1/23/2011 3:01:52 PM >

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 6:09:55 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: cantona2

Gulf War great tank battle?!??! Air supremacy vs tanks = no tank battle! ...

Actually it was the battle of 73 easting: Bradleys w/TOWs and M1 Abrams vs. stationary Soviet arm'd vehicles, and I don't recall that any "Warthogs" were involved.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 6:13:31 PM

bairdlander2

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Sounds like the biggest live fire exercise with human targets.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 6:27:44 PM

2ndACR

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Nope, no A10's. We actually fought (all of 2nd ACR) 3 brigades. 1 from Tawakana, 1 from Medina, 1 from Hamarabi divisions. Eagle 2/2 hit the stationary, but we also had Fox, Ghost and Hawk company engaged. Hawk tangled with a brigade that was fleeing the Brit's and 1st Cav and almost ran into our combat trains.

We lost a gunner in a Ghost troop Brad during the fight. Our M109 battery fired 2600 shells during the battle. Almost 12 hours long. Visibility sucked massively. Even with thermals. Towards the end of the battle we passed 1st Inf thru our lines during the battle at night. We then went into Corp reserve.

Our S2 recorded a broadcast from the radio that said "we have found, fixed and destroyed the 2nd ACR" and at that moment you can hear in the background our contact reports coming in.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 6:47:21 PM

Dennistoun

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Yeah, the episode about the Arab/Israeli battle sure fuelled a renewed thirst for that Flashpoint ME game that we've been waiting for...

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 6:47:23 PM

Perturabo

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

quote:

ORIGINAL: cantona2

Gulf War great tank battle?!??! Air supremacy vs tanks = no tank battle! ...

Actually it was the battle of 73 easting: Bradleys w/TOWs and M1 Abrams vs. stationary Soviet arm'd vehicles, and I don't recall that any "Warthogs" were involved.

I've read a study of that battle. It would be a pretty bloody battle for Americans if there weren't three factors involved:
1. The Iraqi didn't know how to dig in properly. They made sand berms instead of properly digging in their tanks. A properly dug tank "trench" should be deep enough to hide the whole tank with a part where tank can drive forward and show just a turret to fire at enemies.
Result: Americans could see the tanks and fire through sand berms.
2. A big part of Iraqi weren't in their tanks. They stayed outside from fear of air-strikes. A lot of tanks were destroyed without crew inside.
3. They didn't set up early warning posts that would warn them that Americans are coming and would allow them to get into tanks.

Apparently it's because the Middle East has a culture of treasuring knowledge for personal advantage and not passing it to subordinates.

< Message edited by Perturabo -- 1/23/2011 6:58:29 PM >

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 7:10:47 PM

2ndACR

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Well, not bloody at all really. We took a mission kill M1a1 (engine took a hit and part of the track gone, missing 2 road wheels) backed a captured T72 about 400 meters away and shot it from the side. Did not penetrate the armor. Spalling would have hurt the crew. The Iraqi's were using home made in Iraq ammo for the tanks, they lacked the punch of true Russian tank rounds. Plus the Iraqi tankers really did not know how to fight their vehicles.

2nd Day of ground war, we rolled thru a bunker complex (thought it was abandoned), stopped to prepare to do a fast sweep, when up pops an Iraqi soldier out of a bunker, he dove back in, and you could hear the shouting, seconds later, all kinds of weapons were being thrown out of bunkers all over the place. 275 or so prisoners. Our Saudi interpreter said they had a report of us being 30 miles away about 2 hours before we got there. They figured we would arrive the next day. Never thought we could move that fast. But my memory is foggy after all these years. The distance could have been further.

After 73 Easting, when ever we came upon Iraqi armor (or any vehicles for that matter) we would pop a round nearby, the Iraqi would stop, bail out, run about 300 meters and plop to the ground, then we would destroy the vehicle. They learned that being in the vehicle was certain death. I honestly cannot remember if we ever had any air support outside our own attack helicopter squadron and the Apache Battalion we had assigned to us. We rolled thru areas that had been B52 strikes on them, and there were craters everywhere, but alot of times we never could figure out what they were hitting.

But the Iraqi's were terrified of the A10 and Apache. Not to mention any of our M1a1's or Brads. I know it is not politically correct, but I hold all Arab/Middle east armies in extremely low regard. Except the Israel army. All the others, well, I do not fear them in the least, at all.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 10:23:30 PM

Fred98

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quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR
I know it is not politically correct, but I hold all Arab/Middle east armies in extremely low regard. Except the Israel army. All the others, well, I do not fear them in the least, at all.

Iran would be different. They last saw combat 20 years ago but the senior genersl would not have forgotton.

Saddam was a dictator and it showed in the performance of the individual soldier. Iran is not a dictatorship and the soldiers will perform that much better.

Their weapons are nearly as good as the US and the Iranians would use them wisely.
-

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 10:51:40 PM

bairdlander2

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USA will never attack an adversary that they think will give them a bloody nose.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/23/2011 10:56:25 PM

2ndACR

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Nope, Iran would be no different. I highly doubt any ME country would even try to combat the US in a straight up fight ala GW1. What we saw with GW2 and the melting away of the Iraqi army is what we will see there. But now, they would have to fight the most battle tested army on earth. We can now fight it out either way they want to go.

Iran fought a lot of the Iran-Iraq war with human wave attacks......those went away in Korea. We have this thing called DPICM that would make very short work of that tactic.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 12:23:47 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo

I've read a study of that battle. It would be a pretty bloody battle for Americans if there weren't three factors involved ...

An "if" to the 3rd power!

John Keegan predicted that although Iraq had held it's own during its war with Iran, no 3rd world army would pose a problem for a modern western army.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 2:21:06 PM

Perturabo

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo

I've read a study of that battle. It would be a pretty bloody battle for Americans if there weren't three factors involved ...

An "if" to the 3rd power!

Except that that the "if" was about basic mistakes made by the enemy. Armies of Arab states are really scary (not as opponents, but as a show of human capability for stupidity). Stuff like intelligence spying their own generals instead of enemies, not sharing military knowledge because personal gains from having skills that others don't have is more important than victory, etc. are a norm there.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

John Keegan predicted that although Iraq had held it's own during its war with Iran, no 3rd world army would pose a problem for a modern western army.

But did he predict that their refusal to give up would make wars with middle eastern countries very expensive?

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 2:50:14 PM

2ndACR

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Well, to go any further will dive into politics and that is not allowed. Because there is not a politically correct way to respond.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 4:35:30 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo

Except that that the "if" was about basic mistakes made by the enemy ...

The winner of a game of chess is the player who makes the next to last mistake, but coalition commanders advancing into Kuwait and Western Iraq soon realized that the enemy couldn't co-ordinate its forces above the battalion level.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo
But did he predict that their refusal to give up would make wars with middle eastern countries very expensive?

I believe we billed the Gulf states for our expenses encurred during ODS; in fact, Saudi was willing to give each and every US soldier deployed to their nation $100 US, but Bush said we weren't mercenaries.

However, many of us still have our gold encrusted KLMs.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 5:29:41 PM

Perturabo

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo

Except that that the "if" was about basic mistakes made by the enemy ...

The winner of a game of chess is the player who makes the next to last mistake, but coalition commanders advancing into Kuwait and Western Iraq soon realized that the enemy couldn't co-ordinate its forces above the battalion level.

What I have found bizarre was that it wasn't just a question of technology (and basically,in many books ODS was portrayed as purely war of technology - with stuff like stealth bombers, M1 Abrams tanks, etc. getting glorified and actual skill of US soldiers and horrible lack of skill of Iraqi soldiers being de-emphasised) but also a question of cultural flaws that make their military function completely irrationally.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Joe D.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo
But did he predict that their refusal to give up would make wars with middle eastern countries very expensive?

I believe we billed the Gulf states for our expenses encurred during ODS; in fact, Saudi was willing to give each and every US soldier deployed to their nation $100 US, but Bush said we weren't mercenaries.

However, many of us still have our gold encrusted KLMs.

KLMs? Also, I didn't mean the ODS. I meant the latter wars that actually involved a government change. It's almost like they threw all their cheap units at the coalition solely to make it spend more money on the war.

< Message edited by Perturabo -- 1/24/2011 5:46:08 PM >

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 8:52:50 PM

2ndACR

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Kuwaiti Liberation Medals......from the Saudi and Kuwaiti Govt's. Big gaudy things. LOL

Well, we were trained to fight the Russian Bear. My Regiment spent 200+ days of the year in the field. Border 30 days, back 2 weeks, Graf 30 days, back 2 weeks, Hoenfelds 30 days......repeat. We (VII Corps) actually wanted to leave our tanks and Brads painted forest green so that the Iraqi's knew they were fighting the 1st String. LOL

Current will be too close to politics so will leave it alone. But sort of hard to fight an enemy who doesn't "play" by the rules yet you are hampered by rules out the wazoo. Expensive was the dumb re-building. Go in, whip butt, leave. They will get the message sooner or later. I would have given it to the Kurds myself.

OOPS, I went and answered.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 9:42:54 PM

Fred98

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quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

Nope, Iran would be no different. I highly doubt any ME country would even try to combat the US in a straight up fight ala GW1.

Iran would not try to combat the US in a straight up fight ala GW1.

Instead Iran would do something clever.

I dont know what but it would be designed to counter the superior US men and the superior US weapons.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 9:56:24 PM

2ndACR

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They would fade away and hide like little girls behind civilians and launch attacks against our civilians here.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 10:01:54 PM

Fred98

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quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

They would fade away and hide like little girls behind civilians and launch attacks against our civilians here.

In which case you will hold you're fire.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 10:21:25 PM

2ndACR

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Hence the "hamstrung by rules" when they don't heed them. One reason why they should not receive any Geneva Convention protections. Remove the uniform in combat and you cease being a soldier protected and become a mad dog that needs to be put down.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 10:25:37 PM

Perturabo

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quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

But sort of hard to fight an enemy who doesn't "play" by the rules yet you are hampered by rules out the wazoo.

On the other hand, you aren't hampered by lack of training, weapons, tons of life-saving technology, etc. that was bought by the same public that wants you to follow the rules. I'm not sure if they'd bother to spend as much money on minimizing losses if they wouldn't have that life cult mentality.

The main problem with the enemy is that they don't value human life. It means that they can just sacrifice tens of thousands of their fighters and murder people left and right just to keep you spending money on guided munitions, repairing/replacing extremely expensive hardware, developing specialised weapon systems and staying there for years or even decades. It's basically like fighting against a computer gamer. I don't think it would be possible to influence them just by breaking the rules unless it would be something like wholesale genocide.

quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR

Expensive was the dumb re-building. Go in, whip butt, leave. They will get the message sooner or later. I would have given it to the Kurds myself.

I agree. I have accurately predicted that lots of bombings and suicide bombings would be the most probable reaction to occupation, no matter how noble are the reasons for it.

< Message edited by Perturabo -- 1/24/2011 10:32:32 PM >

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 10:30:36 PM

2ndACR

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A lot of the animosity we faced in the South was due to the 1st GW. Bush Sr had been calling for them to rise up and rebel all the time. When they did, we turned our backs on them while they got massacred almost in front of us. The culture over there says to hold a grudge. heck I had 1st Crusade stuff tossed at me while there. Of course they did not want to hear that the 1st Crusade was a retaliation of the Muslim invasion of Europe.

I am just hard core enough to get banned, so will leave the rest of this alone if I can. It is not nice so use imagination.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 11:06:03 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo
What I have found bizarre was that it wasn't just a question of technology ... but also a question of cultural flaws that make their military function completely irrationally.

That was the Soviet excuse: blame the iraqis and their islamic culture to explain away the relatively poor performance of Warsaw Pact armaments against that of the coalition during ODS.

Many of us didn't buy it then, and still don't accept it today.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo
But did he predict that their refusal to give up would make wars with middle eastern countries very expensive?

Keegen is a military historian and analyst, not a macro-economist.

quote:

ORIGINAL: Perturabo
KLMs? Also, I didn't mean the ODS. I meant the latter wars that actually involved a government change ...

Then you should have said so; The Mil Channel's "Greatest Tank Battles" depiction of the battle of 73 Easting was during Gulf War I under Schwarzkopf when GW Sr. was Cdr in Chief.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 11:20:00 PM

Joe D.

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quote:

ORIGINAL: 2ndACR
... One reason why they should not receive any Geneva Convention protections. Remove the uniform in combat and you cease being a soldier ...

Actually there are several Geneva Conventions; the document you refer to defines a soldier as wearing a recognizable uniform with visible rank insignia and weapon and who is responsible to superiors in an established chain of command, but I recall reading that later Conventions required participating nations to grant Geneva protection status even if these rules aren't followed, and supposedly the US signed-off on this as well.

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RE: Great Tank Battles - 1/24/2011 11:23:34 PM

2ndACR

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Would not surprise me at all that we would agree to this. But if IIRC, if the other party does not follow the conventions then the other warring party is not bound by them either. Not that we would ever be allowed to do that.

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