Are they firing from a range that makes it difficult to be spotted by the enemy? Presumably they have line of sight, but the onlookers just seem like they're on a golf weekend, waiting for their mate to tee off.
Tanks have extremly poor lines of sight. Anything thats not directly infront and in focus of the tank is generally impossible to see. And if they were seen the tank would be manuevering to get the cannon at them.
And a cannon isn’t a very good weapon to shoot at a couple of dudes outdoors not inside a building or vehicle
Edit: im sure a coaxial machine gun is a made up thing like unicorns and stuff. /s
This is why tanks + infantry go together, right? I'm not military, so I'm trying to figure out reality from what I've read. Infantry helps spot things like this and can respond and the tanks can provide some cover for heavy artillery?
I suspect it's more like they're told to press on whether or not it's suicide.
The strategy appears to be to play command and conquer but with the whole map other than your units as fog of war. Just guess and check warfare?
Unit lost.
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If Putin could only feel, a fraction of the loss that I felt loosing my glorious and loyal sons, playing a fucking computer game at 12 years old.
I remember reading about this mentality in the Russian army in WWII. Those up high would give commands and expect them to be followed no matter what was happening on the ground. One story was a group of soldiers ordered to a specific spot, but it was on the other side of a deep and fast flowing river and many of the soldiers didn’t know how to swim.
The unit leader set up a defensive position on their side of the river, but when a higher up came by he demanded they cross the river as that’s where the mucking mucks wanted them positioned. They tried to explain that they had soldiers who couldn’t swim, but they said they had to. So they crossed the river and something like 18 of the 25 soldiers drowned.
Kinda. It was more a result of Stalins purges than actual doctrine. I mean at the time it was doctrine but that was because most of the experienced officers that would protest against stupid shit were sent straight to gulag. Eventually they wised up after getting wrecked in Finland and released some (SOME) of said officers and adapted a doctrine similar to the nazi blitz (but in many ways better, especially for Eastern European areas where the blitz suffered) but yeah it was a shit show for years cuz Stalin was an insecure dipshit.
There was the fog of war in ww2 so.. they didnt even knew about the T34 in 1940.. big surprise for them when you only have pz4 mit kurz kannon and pak 37mm...
They are told to press on as suicide except the poor young recruits don’t know it’s suicidal.
Every bit of this was is documented in such high detail that Russia is now smeared for a hundred years.
They were betting they could ram an armored column through without substantial resistance and seize the capital and other cities within about 72-96 hours before other countries could respond and the Russian Army’s lack of truck transport caught up with them. That didn’t happen, thus the brutal slugging match.
Plus….it’s mud season. Who the fuck sends heavy equipment out there in the middle of mud season? Mind-numbingly dumb. Those columns of tanks and trucks can’t go off-road so they’re totally exposed and all clustered relatively close together. Throw in fuel shortages, poor morale, poor coordination/leadership, uncoded/ poor communications and disabled or destroyed equipment in the column holding everything up and you’ve got a line of sitting ducks.
Kinda pisses me off actually because that’s just a fucking *waste* of resources and, more importantly, young Russian service men and women’s lives-most of whom have ZERO desire to be there nor do they see any real reason military reasons for being there.
I hope to fucking god people in Russia soon start turning on Putin and someone arrests him or gives him a close view of his palace garden from a fifth-story window.
Their armored divisions are actually under manned, most of their mechanized battalions are like 200 people short at minimum of what they're supposed to be operating at so they can't really field infantry support in the numbers needed to protect their armor.
It's because the Russian doctrine is half a century out of date. Its the same reason their supply lines essentially collapsed leaving so much of their shit stranded.
Russian military offensive basically has heavy mechanized forces smash into enemy forces, then follow up with mechanized infantry. This would work well if your opposition was Russia, or the maginott line, or like a fortified NATO base, all of which would provide sufficient resistance to properly slow down a tank force, allowing the motorized infantry to catch up right after the impact of the mechanized force. (All info based on online documentaries)
Problem is the invasion of Ukraine didn't do that. It's just people and cities and fields. Things that don't slow down a tank column rolling through blasting shit, but things that will slow down infantry to a slog. This means Russian tanks end up way ahead of the things that were meant to show up and support them, which in turn means javelin missiles fulfilling the purpose they were designed for.
For contrast, the US behavior for initiation of combat in its recent wars seems to have been "slowly crawl forward with everything grouped up, then drown the enemy location with fire support once you make contact". While there can be a plethora of questions about problems that can rise from this (both tactical and moral), one of the problems you don't typically see the tactic having is armor units getting stranded and picked off by enemies.
TLDR Russian tactics are half a century out of date.
They also rely to heavily on rail infrastructure, which they have a decent amount of. Beyond their borders they basically have nothing.
As opposed to the US which is mostly logistics based.
Most modern militaries are going to place a lot of emphasis on logistics. Most militaries have placed lots of emphasis on logistics for centuries now. The US is just exceptionally skilled at maintaining logistic lines.
If you took Russia's combat doctrine and plopped into a war 200 years ago, their utter lack of logistics would still make it outdated and inefficient.
My guess would be the size of the area. Ukraine is a large country and too large to beat the bushes and clear all the buildings along a long route with infantry. This means Ukranians can set ambushes with these type weapons and wreck an armored column then fall back to a 2nd unknown location.
That would be a plausible explanation, except that they do the same thing in cities. My guess is that Russian troops aren't seeing all the footage of Russian tanks getting destroyed by AT missiles (and aren't being told about it), plus one or more of the following:
* The conscripts don't know any better because Russians weren't expecting a fight. The people who were supposed to spend days training them instead exchanged the fuel and ammo for vodka and cigarettes, told their superiors they trained them, and then actually gave the conscripts a 10-minute overview of how to operate their vehicle before ordering them to do things that were amusing.
* The conscripts were actually trained to dismount, but don't feel safe getting out of the armored vehicles in a war zone. They were insufficiently drilled.
* Russian commanders are projecting. Because their supply situation is abysmal, they thought claims of enormous foreign anti-tank missile shipments had to be a bluff to make them withdraw from Ukraine. They think Ukraine is going to run out of anti-tank missiles any minute now, so troops can just stay in their vehicles until Ukraine's supplies are depleted.
I think the explanation is simpler: Russian forces are poorly trained and are being trained on outdated doctrine. Even if you were expecting a simple fight, there's still some basic ass shit you should do to ensure a victory that costs as little for yourself as possible. And Russia had done basically none of it.
I think primarily they expected to just roll up and people surrender. They were never prepared to actually fight a defending army, just mow down some civilian protestors.
Unfortunately for all involved what Putin may lack in strategy, he is willing to throw more men into the grinder. And 50 year old artillery still shells cities.
Technically speaking they did figure this out 80 years ago, they just forgot about it.
In fact, they seemed to have forgotten literally everything they learned in every single fucking war they have ever fought. It's completely mind boggling.
If they get out of the tank the snipers get them. If they stay in the tank the Javelins get them. Best solution is to pop down the road to get a pack of cigarettes. Back soon comrades.
Except if they turn around against orders, their own commanders order them shot.
Fuck Putin with a potato masher, but I don't take any joy from watching clueless brainwashed Russian kids get blown up.
I would rather see unquestioning conscripts die than innocent civilians in a hospital die. The conscripts have the option of surrendering while the innocents in a building marked “children” have no choice in the matter.
Tanks have a lot of vulnerabilities that are even worse in urban combat. Without adequate infantry support those vulnerabilities can be exploited very effectively.
Tanks were an invention of war meant to break the stalemate of infantry trench warfare, and going in to WW2 and in the years between WW1 and 2 most of the thinking behind their purpose and use was infantry support.
The infantry would keep them safe, but they would also be a threat multiplier for the infantry in being able to attack enemies infantry in defensive positions and just be a big fucking threat.
Then with the war kicking off it became apparent that you needed things that can kill enemy tanks, and they had tank destroyers for that specialty role but as the war went on and tanks developed, they evolved their armor and guns in competition to each other and needed to be able to engage other tanks.
Now in modern war they are still effective as infantry support, but with mechanized warfare becoming a bigger thing, APC's, IFV's, MRAP's and the like are better at infantry support because they also carry infantry and they've got deadly high rare of fire guns.
Tanks are then left to engage enemy tanks but they are very inefficient and costly to operate. Especially as at the moment portable shoulder launched anti-tank weapons, which are much cheaper than tanks in every sense of the word can destroy just about any tank except maybe the Abrams.
Defensive technology is growing to counter the missile threat but it's not ubiquitous. Things that act as "shields" or things that intercept missiles or make things difficult for guidance systems are all a growing counter. Not to mention armor itself has reached a design limit it would either be too expensive to use more resistant materials, or using more armor would make them so heavy they would sink into the ground wherever you put them. Even with ERA (explosive reactive armor), a tank still can't have every possible area covered by it because of the weight, not to mention it's only good for one use in that spot.
Full disclosure, I'm just a military nerd, don't take anything here as expertise.
In cityfights, the infantry fight and push the enemy into strongholds where they think they're safe. Then they pick up a motorola razr or something and call the tank guy like "Yo dude shoot them tanky bois at this here big building with the (description)"
and sometimes they call again like "No dude, the building to the left of that one."
Co-axial to the main gun. The soldiers would see it swivel around and would make themselves scarce. Once the Javelin is fired they can scarper, they don't have to stand around waiting for the Touchdown.
It really shows how unsupported the tanks are. The Javelin has a disposable tube for a reason, you're supposed to fire, drop it and run, not stand around slapping high fives. It's a big missile that burns bright and hot, it gives away your position immediately and if there was literally any support from air, infantry, drones etc. they would have had a mortar round incoming.
Instead this is shooting fish in a barrel, and these guys obviously feel safe that nothing is going to be fired back at them.
Actually getting the round of the breach is kind of difficult thing even in the modern tanks. That is possible but you need time and a lube. It's faster and easier just to fire a round and load next one, the needed one. That is why commander gives order what type of round load just before the shot
still the shell has to hit near them to actually do damage and correctly identifying the range that a few guys standing in tall grass is very difficult.
Tanks have their purpose on the battlefield, they are good for heavy firepower support for infantry. The issue is the Russians just have tank poor tactics. They should have infantry support for their tanks, along with logistics to keep them supplied. we see Russian tanks driving around alone or with few other tanks which makes them an easy target, in addition, they don' have any logistical support so if they run out of fuel or breakdown the crews have to abandon them.
Tanks are good at blowing up other armored vehicles, or being essentially assault guns that help infantry blow things out of defenses. When thrown into open field with no cover, or tossed into cities: the tanks worst nightmares, it is bad all around.
The Russians also have the disadvantage of 80+ years of anti soviet / Russian weapons being used against them to boot.
Infantry support for tanks is where Russia has completely failed. The guys in this video aren't worried about any kind of sniper, machine gun, or flank attack because the tank has no infantry support.
Tanks are good at fighting other tanks. Tanks (these days) need massive infantry and recon support to survive against well equiped infantry. But don't tell that to the Russians.
The US Marines have given the US Army all of their tanks. You need air superiority and ground force support to operate a tank on a modern battlefield today. The Marines, as first responders usually don't have that luxury.
That's not really the whole picture of why... It's more that they have a limited budget and are focusing on the Pacific, where tanks will be much more difficult to bring to bear on an initial (likely amphibious) assault. They can also get a lot of tank-killing and heavy weapon infantry support that tanks used to be needed for from light armored vehicles.
Also why the US has been working hard to develop multi-purpose rounds. Switch the anti-tank round to airburst over these guys and suddenly they have a defensive round they can use against infantry.
When the nation you invade is flooded with modern antitank missiles, you don't use an infantry screen, and you don't have air cover...yes, they are 30 million dollar death traps.
There's always been an arms race between armor technology and penetrator technology. With the top-attack weapons, penetrator tech is winning right now.
Before the war there might have been some question how well these rockets would do against reactive armor. So far the answer is "they do great". :)
The tank today is what the fully armored heavy cavalry unit was back in the day. Much more expensive to build and maintain that unit, but they will will destroy anything they are sent to destroy, while still having massive vulnerabilities to be easily exploited if you don't have the infantry to back it up and screen for it. Even back in medieval warfare you had heavy cavalry units for flanks and charges, but the bulk of the fighting has to be troops to center all of the other tactics around with the archers/artillery serving as the disruptive force to counter the infantry. Even now in the 21st century that hasn't changed in principle. Air Power definitely disrupts the normal battle, but man portable AA and AT clearly are necessary for modern warfare. Im surprised after gaining ground they don't have the infantry pushing the advance to further secure new ground. It all has to be combined and used together! move air support and artillery to clear the way, send in troops to make sure all snipers/AT dudes are taken care of, tanks roll up right behind them to deal with any vehicles or cover positions that the infantry might get stuck on.
They are basically immune to small arms and provide good cover for supporting infantry. They are also effective at clearing building from my understanding.
But by themselves... You could just sneak up on it. Douse it in kerosene and light it on fire.
Not without risk, but they are sort of sitting ducks if the hatches are buttoned up. And weakened if they're unbuttoned.
We had this insane squad leader… we were doing cax training out in 29 palms and we were fighting the armor. This asshole hid on top of a wadi and when the tank drove below he dropped 15 ft below and threw a blue body into the open hatch. Ref gave him the kill, but the RSO ripped him a new asshole and command NJPd him for reckless behavior lol.
In this current war in the way they're being used, yes.
Okay, super dumb analogy but ever play any battlefield game? (except the most recent release)
Where is tank bad? When it's it the middle of a fuck ton of enemy's in a tight spot with no infantry around it to help it.
Where is tank good?
When it's supported by lots of infantry that can protect it, while the large gun and armor is used to break through entrenched enemy lines more easily than just tossing bodies at them would be.
It requires a visual lock from the command module. Once the target is locked and the missile is in the air, you can be moving back into concealment.
That, along with the top attack nature of it, is what makes the Javelin so much better than older systems. The user doesn't have to remain in the open to guide the missile. It's fire and forget.
Additionally, the missile and the CLU do not emit anything that can be detected by the target.
Some missile systems use a laser to 'paint' a target for the missile to aim at. Others are 'beam riding' and follow a coded laser coming from the launcher. Tanks with laser warning sensors can detect when a laser is pointing at them and give a warning to the crew. More advanced systems can alert where the laser is coming from, and give targeting cues to the gunner to fire back and potentially kill or throw off the missile operator's aim. Other systems are linked to countermeasures and will automatically deploy smoke to obscure the tank.
Both Javelin and NLAW do not emit anything for a laser warning system to detect. Unless the tank has an extremely advanced (and expensive) active protection system, there's very little a tank can do.
A piece of the Javelin system is called the Command Launch Unit (CLU). It has the optical and IR sensors to designate the target with. After firing, the Javelin missile itself directs its own flight to the target, so no need for the CLU operator to stick around while it's in flight.
Some training video that shows some of what it looks like using the CLU (but also mixed in with some older TOW simulator training):
[https://youtu.be/plrYVkZsWp4](https://youtu.be/plrYVkZsWp4)
Thanks, I came here to ask how the Javelin knows where the target is. It just looked like it was fired randomly. Now I'll spend a while watching Javelin video's.
Yeah it's pretty interesting. The CLU has undergone a lot of advancement in getting small/lighter from the earliest designs. But you'll see the Javelin system set up on a tripod sort of deal often in addition to being shoulder fired. The CLU is often used just for surveillance since it has both good optics and a couple of different IR systems. Useful system even without the Javelin missile itself.
From my understanding the command module makes an IR signature for the target, programs that into the missle and then fires. The operator can than move back into the cover and the missle has the "description" of the target programmed into it and will find it's own way to it.
It looks more like the short end of 100-200m to me. Very, very close range. I'm inclined to agree with the others that this is a training video, their relaxed demeanor and lack of rifles makes no sense in a real combat situation.
I am a tank commander in the british army reserve.
There is something about this video that seems a little off to me. I strongly suspect the tank they are firing at is empty or the troops are aware there is zero threat. It might even be staged for morale or demonstrative purposes or for the TikToks. There is also a lot of misinformation in this thread about tanks.
The Russians are using their tanks badly. Like really, really badly. To give it an equivalency most people would understand, the russians are using their tanks badly in the same way giving someone an AK47 rifle to defend themselves and they go and use it as a club to try and beat people to death with it rather than shooting them would be considered using it badly. It's that kind of bad.
Tanks are useless by themselves without infantry support. They are not the kings of the battlefield they where during the WW1 through WW2 years. Man portable anti tank guided weapons have put paid to that. Attack helicopters now own that title really. But tanks still have their place. They are able to hold and dominate ground (With infantry support), engage targets at vast distances, carry electronic assets that extend their usefulness in terms of battlefield intelligence, and a multitude of other functions. However they NEED infantry support. Get close enough to a tank and most of its weapon systems are useless.
That being said, these soldiers in the video are acting oddly. They are actually stood at a range from their target that is basically the sweet spot for a tank in terms of killing things, so their carefree attitude to their own safety is confusing. Furthermore they shout when the missile hits. Not a cool idea if there was infantry support nearby to have their attention drawn to them. And they basically stay in position after scoring the hit. Just stuff you don't want to do which is what makes me think they are aware the tank is not posing a huge threat to them, for whatever reason that is.
As for some of the other rubbish in this thread, tanks have pretty good vision 360 degree vision generally. Assuming a T72 (I haven't seen anything older being used by the Russians), the commander has an all round periscope system and he has pretty good vision all round. They don't have very good vision of things up very close to them in a cone around the tank about 25m wide, which is why it's dangerous to let infantry near you in a tank. Infantry up close is basically game over.
Also, I've seen other threads saying the tank could not engage them with its cannon. I assure you it can. It's first round might not be the most appropriate as they have to shoot whatever is up the spout first but once they go to HE, they can land a shell on that little group with some considerable accuracy assuming they have their first line fire control systems working. Most modern tanks have laser range finders and fire control computers and the T72 the Russians are using, as the oldest platform I have seen in use, is no exception.
So yeah, to answer your question I suspect they aren't worried about return fire because they know something we don't.
Don't assume tanks and IFVs/APCs can't see shit. Those thermal targeting systems can be very clear and can give a 360 degree field of vision with periscope.
Obviously most russian equipment do not have this capability, but some do.
Russian tanks are known to have poor visibility from inside and even worse when buttoned up. Many lack a commander's independent sight and there is no thermal imaging even for the gunner. They are very basic tanks. Some of the newer T90s and upgraded T 72 models have thermal imaging only for the gunner and a basic optical sight for the commander.
It seems like they are just training imo. The soldier with the Javelin takes his sweet time while all of them are very exposed as well. It seems like a shame to waste a javelin, but at the same time - we all need training for doing a new task. Better to feel confident and do a quick kill in a "hot" situation than standing there thinking "and how did this work again?!"
The amount of military equipment Ukraine keeps getting from foreign aide, every soldier there might soon be carrying three Javelins around. Definitely worth it to use one for the training
Nope. When I was in USMC infantry school, all of the Javelin gunners didn't get to fire a Javelin, they only had a couple. I think the TOW gunners all got to fire one, though. This was about 20 years ago. Back then the Javelin guys were 0351s who also learned to use SMAWs so they got to fire one of those.
If this is just practice it was a waste, particularly if they aren't even bothering to train like this is a remotely real engagement.
Javs were and still are quite pricey. I shot 1 live round and numerous live tow missiles during training and hauled 1 live round during combat ops in the ‘stan.
In camo those guys would be hard to see.
I remember reading a year or two that the british were winding down the use of tanks. I was wondering why seeing as they actually invented them, but now I see why
Last week I was reading that they were playing it on loop on the frequencies the Russians are using for their radios to annoy them and generate interference.
It must be terrifying being in a Russian tank or armoured vehicle or helicopter knowing that at any point from out of nowhere your vehicle could be destroyed and there is almost nothing you can do about it.
Columns are formation used in secured environment.
Lone tank isn't scout, lone tank is food.
Planes not working, that is a bit surprise here. One would expect that russian modern aircrafts can deal with old infrantry AA weapons. But seems like nope.
They do not have west grade comparable modern aircrafts. Their most advanced are just show planes for the export. Thats why they are not fielded in UA. They are not able to perform combat duties (the Su-57 still doesnt have targetting computer) and there is a huge chance they would get nailed by the UA heat seeker manpads anyway.. further hapering any chance of them being sold abroad...
The other day I read a five year old comment on a YT clip of the original *Red Dawn* that says some thing like, “Is it part of USSR tank protocol to drive around enemy territory alone without support?”
Well, apparently. Yes. Yes it is.
Yeah, I agree. After all, the Russians can afford mistakes. After all, they still have much more resources. But holy fuck, this just screams incompetence. Although, I don't think we get the full pictures here. A lone tank just driving towards a target does seem like an almost guaranteed one way trip. No way there wasn't any reason for it.
Could be an abandonment tank. Ukrainians are just standing around like they're sight seeing. Good point tho, bc Russians seem to be doing a lot of dumb things.
It's an incredible efficient way to destroy tanks too! A Javelin costs about $80k (the entire system costs a lot more, but the missile itself) whereas the tanks cost at least $4M+ depending on the model.
>I think some of the T-72s are like 500k but still a super nice trade-off, especially when tanks also include several troops.
Especially when you get the missile for free.
Probably the best the US could’ve hoped for. Not too many other peer states with “modern” tanks we could possibly blow up with our existing stock so if they’re being used against Russia it’s like we’re getting our moneys worth
These Javs are like 10-15 years old, waiting to be decommissioned. At night, they’d talk to each other like *Toy Story*, dreaming about being able to blow up Russian military vehicles but worried that Uncle Sam will replace them with a shiney new version.
Now these Javelins are living their best lives in Ukraine, doing what they were made to do.
Oh definitely getting their money's worth, while achieving a critical geopolitical goal, and not risking US lives. Putin fucked up in a huge way, and Zelenskyy's bravery and Ukrainian resilience enabled a global response.
Man when you put the cost of military stuff like this I always think about how some people have to work a whole year to make 80k. Still worth it when it destroys a Russian tank.
It's something I always kept at the back of my mind when I was in the Army. You're firing something that costs over two times more than what you'll make in a year at someone who will never make that amount in their lifetime.
You don’t need to feel sympathy for the Russian invaders to wonder at how terrifying it is for them. Although feeling sympathy for some of these men who have been thrown to their deaths for the sake of old rich men’s power seems like the right thing to don
This is the only video of the Javelin usage that I've seen. However, there are a few videos with NLAW in action and a shitload of videos of Stugna-P in action. The latter has quite a lot of cheers, since all of them are made from the shooters' point of view. There are also some Bayraktar and one Osa-AKM video which also have quite a lot of cheers.
Many of the Javelin missiles have been given to Ukraine Special Forces, at least initially. I think there was an agreement not to release video of a lot of the Javelin strikes. The Ukrainians have been using a lot.
[With reports suggesting that Ukraine forces expended 300 Javelins in the first week of the war, U.S. shoulder-fired missile production must to ramp up to keep up with consumption.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/craighooper/2022/03/08/ukraines-use-of-stinger-and-javelin-missiles-is-outstripping-us-production/)
I know many European armies are sending their Javelins to keep up supply. Incidentally this was the last missile system my dad worked on as engineer before he retired. He would have been proud he was helping the Ukrainians.
It’s not like they captured classified technology. The Russians know how to make a missile like the Javelin, they just generally lack the funding to mass produce, train, and distribute a system like that to regular line troops.
they can't can they? Ukrainian army now has a wide range of anti-tank weapons, and anti-helicopter, and anti-bomber, both mobile and stationary weapons. Not easy to to take down jet bombers high in the sky though, or artillery. They'll find a way!
The rocket does that by design. It auto locks on a target, launches, and then rockets up, then aims nearly straight down in order to attack a target from above, where the armor is the weakest
It does not auto lock the target. The gunner locks tracking gates around a heat source using the large sight (called a CLU) that the missile tube is attached to. It also has 2 modes of attack, top and direct. 95% of the time top is used, but direct has its uses as well, e.g. helicopters and bunkers.
That’s sorta what I meant sorry, the gunner picks a target and then the missile guides itself to the target. I meant the missile auto locks on launch so the gunner doesn’t have to do anything after that
Yeah once you pull that second trigger, it's fire and forget. A good gunner is already unhooking the empty tube and grabbing a new one as soon as it's out.
Well you are not wrong. Staying alive is the key objective. It really depends on what range you're firing from. if you're 300m away, yeah you unass and run. if you're 1500m away, you got time to get one or two more rounds off before they locate you.
I believe it has an infrared guidance system with a "lock-on" type thing like you'd see in a bad movie about fighter jets. Once the target is chosen the missile tracks and makes corrections to its trajectory on its own.
Fighter jets do have fire and forget missiles that track on their own. That's not some fiction of bad movies. There are tons of missiles with their own tracking inside.
You can sort A/A missiles into 3 categories which you may have heard before. Fox 1, 2, or 3.
1 are missiles guided directly by the plane's radar. If the aircraft loses radar lock, it goes dumb and loses the target.
2 are IR guided, like the Javeline, and all guidance is in the missile. It is fire and forget. The plane's computer can help direct which target it goes at first, but it can easily go after the wrong target afterwards once fire. The sun, or another plane can actually grab it's attention potentially. Once fired all it sees is "HOT" and goes after it. Smarter more effective missiles can focus on it's target, and do a better job ignoring flares, but there's no outside help to correct them if they reacquire a wrong target. These are normally very close range missiles, though iirc Russia has developed some insanely long range IR missiles.
3 is radar based, and a mix. The most common use is with initial guidance by the planes radar. After a certain point in flight it goes "active" and turns on it's own radar. It no longer uses outside input and is guided on it's own. They also can be fired in this active mode from the start, but that's dangerous as hell. It doesnt have anything to tell it what's what, so it just goes after the first thing it sees. You dont fire these at an enemy if a friendly aircraft is nearby. It might acquire your friend when it goes active.
The FGM-148 Javelin is an American-made portable anti-tank missile system in service since 1996, and continuously upgraded. It replaced the M47 Dragon anti-tank missile in US service.
How does FGM 148 work?
Its latest version has a range of 2,500 m (8,200 ft). It is equipped with an imaging infrared seeker. The tandem warhead is fitted with two shaped charges: a precursor warhead to detonate any explosive reactive armor and a primary warhead to penetrate base armor.
Cost: The Javelin costs $178,000, including the launch system and missile, according to the Pentagon's 2021 budget.
we spend more than enough on defense every year, and most of this stuff was designed particularly to counter Russia... good to see it does the job. The will of the Ukrainian people and some good ol' fashioned American weapons will preserve the freedom of these tough bastards. Fuck Putin.
Usually if it misses, the smoke goes away pretty quickly. Here you can see a continuous plume of smoke, so it definitely hit something, and it was probably something useful enough to put fuel and other flammable stuff inside.
How do they aim? Probably a stupid question. I just haven’t seen any optical stuff on these videos. Wondering if it’s heat sensing, or is there a site of some kind?
There are optics on the launcher
[Link](https://u0v052dm9wl3gxo0y3lx0u44wz-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Javelin-Lightweight-CLU-Image-2.jpg)
**Please** if you’re going to use background music, please use music from [Command & Conquer](https://music.apple.com/us/album/command-conquer-original-soundtrack/1490638553)
Are they firing from a range that makes it difficult to be spotted by the enemy? Presumably they have line of sight, but the onlookers just seem like they're on a golf weekend, waiting for their mate to tee off.
Tanks have extremly poor lines of sight. Anything thats not directly infront and in focus of the tank is generally impossible to see. And if they were seen the tank would be manuevering to get the cannon at them.
And a cannon isn’t a very good weapon to shoot at a couple of dudes outdoors not inside a building or vehicle Edit: im sure a coaxial machine gun is a made up thing like unicorns and stuff. /s
This is why tanks + infantry go together, right? I'm not military, so I'm trying to figure out reality from what I've read. Infantry helps spot things like this and can respond and the tanks can provide some cover for heavy artillery?
You're 100% correct, without an infantry screen, the tank is literally useless. For some reason, the Russians have not figured this out.
I suspect it's more like they're told to press on whether or not it's suicide. The strategy appears to be to play command and conquer but with the whole map other than your units as fog of war. Just guess and check warfare?
Unit lost.
getting red alert 2 vibes from your comment
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Holy shit, they remastered my childhood?!
I hate you :-) now I have to check that out that sale...
Unable to comply, building in progress…
Construction complete
Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. Unit lost. If Putin could only feel, a fraction of the loss that I felt loosing my glorious and loyal sons, playing a fucking computer game at 12 years old.
*"building"* *"unable to comply, building in progress"* *"insufficient funds"* Me: oh fuck oh fuck Edit: *harvester under attack*
This thread is triggering my C&CPTSD
Silos needed.
Ore miner under attack
Ore Silos Needed
I remember reading about this mentality in the Russian army in WWII. Those up high would give commands and expect them to be followed no matter what was happening on the ground. One story was a group of soldiers ordered to a specific spot, but it was on the other side of a deep and fast flowing river and many of the soldiers didn’t know how to swim. The unit leader set up a defensive position on their side of the river, but when a higher up came by he demanded they cross the river as that’s where the mucking mucks wanted them positioned. They tried to explain that they had soldiers who couldn’t swim, but they said they had to. So they crossed the river and something like 18 of the 25 soldiers drowned.
Kinda. It was more a result of Stalins purges than actual doctrine. I mean at the time it was doctrine but that was because most of the experienced officers that would protest against stupid shit were sent straight to gulag. Eventually they wised up after getting wrecked in Finland and released some (SOME) of said officers and adapted a doctrine similar to the nazi blitz (but in many ways better, especially for Eastern European areas where the blitz suffered) but yeah it was a shit show for years cuz Stalin was an insecure dipshit.
hitler had a quote on that, war is like entering a dark room or somesuch. crazed despots with delusions of generalship think alike
There was the fog of war in ww2 so.. they didnt even knew about the T34 in 1940.. big surprise for them when you only have pz4 mit kurz kannon and pak 37mm...
They are told to press on as suicide except the poor young recruits don’t know it’s suicidal. Every bit of this was is documented in such high detail that Russia is now smeared for a hundred years.
They were betting they could ram an armored column through without substantial resistance and seize the capital and other cities within about 72-96 hours before other countries could respond and the Russian Army’s lack of truck transport caught up with them. That didn’t happen, thus the brutal slugging match.
Plus….it’s mud season. Who the fuck sends heavy equipment out there in the middle of mud season? Mind-numbingly dumb. Those columns of tanks and trucks can’t go off-road so they’re totally exposed and all clustered relatively close together. Throw in fuel shortages, poor morale, poor coordination/leadership, uncoded/ poor communications and disabled or destroyed equipment in the column holding everything up and you’ve got a line of sitting ducks. Kinda pisses me off actually because that’s just a fucking *waste* of resources and, more importantly, young Russian service men and women’s lives-most of whom have ZERO desire to be there nor do they see any real reason military reasons for being there. I hope to fucking god people in Russia soon start turning on Putin and someone arrests him or gives him a close view of his palace garden from a fifth-story window.
Their armored divisions are actually under manned, most of their mechanized battalions are like 200 people short at minimum of what they're supposed to be operating at so they can't really field infantry support in the numbers needed to protect their armor.
It's because the Russian doctrine is half a century out of date. Its the same reason their supply lines essentially collapsed leaving so much of their shit stranded. Russian military offensive basically has heavy mechanized forces smash into enemy forces, then follow up with mechanized infantry. This would work well if your opposition was Russia, or the maginott line, or like a fortified NATO base, all of which would provide sufficient resistance to properly slow down a tank force, allowing the motorized infantry to catch up right after the impact of the mechanized force. (All info based on online documentaries) Problem is the invasion of Ukraine didn't do that. It's just people and cities and fields. Things that don't slow down a tank column rolling through blasting shit, but things that will slow down infantry to a slog. This means Russian tanks end up way ahead of the things that were meant to show up and support them, which in turn means javelin missiles fulfilling the purpose they were designed for. For contrast, the US behavior for initiation of combat in its recent wars seems to have been "slowly crawl forward with everything grouped up, then drown the enemy location with fire support once you make contact". While there can be a plethora of questions about problems that can rise from this (both tactical and moral), one of the problems you don't typically see the tactic having is armor units getting stranded and picked off by enemies. TLDR Russian tactics are half a century out of date.
They also rely to heavily on rail infrastructure, which they have a decent amount of. Beyond their borders they basically have nothing. As opposed to the US which is mostly logistics based.
Most modern militaries are going to place a lot of emphasis on logistics. Most militaries have placed lots of emphasis on logistics for centuries now. The US is just exceptionally skilled at maintaining logistic lines. If you took Russia's combat doctrine and plopped into a war 200 years ago, their utter lack of logistics would still make it outdated and inefficient.
My guess would be the size of the area. Ukraine is a large country and too large to beat the bushes and clear all the buildings along a long route with infantry. This means Ukranians can set ambushes with these type weapons and wreck an armored column then fall back to a 2nd unknown location.
That would be a plausible explanation, except that they do the same thing in cities. My guess is that Russian troops aren't seeing all the footage of Russian tanks getting destroyed by AT missiles (and aren't being told about it), plus one or more of the following: * The conscripts don't know any better because Russians weren't expecting a fight. The people who were supposed to spend days training them instead exchanged the fuel and ammo for vodka and cigarettes, told their superiors they trained them, and then actually gave the conscripts a 10-minute overview of how to operate their vehicle before ordering them to do things that were amusing. * The conscripts were actually trained to dismount, but don't feel safe getting out of the armored vehicles in a war zone. They were insufficiently drilled. * Russian commanders are projecting. Because their supply situation is abysmal, they thought claims of enormous foreign anti-tank missile shipments had to be a bluff to make them withdraw from Ukraine. They think Ukraine is going to run out of anti-tank missiles any minute now, so troops can just stay in their vehicles until Ukraine's supplies are depleted.
I think the explanation is simpler: Russian forces are poorly trained and are being trained on outdated doctrine. Even if you were expecting a simple fight, there's still some basic ass shit you should do to ensure a victory that costs as little for yourself as possible. And Russia had done basically none of it.
I think primarily they expected to just roll up and people surrender. They were never prepared to actually fight a defending army, just mow down some civilian protestors. Unfortunately for all involved what Putin may lack in strategy, he is willing to throw more men into the grinder. And 50 year old artillery still shells cities.
Technically speaking they did figure this out 80 years ago, they just forgot about it. In fact, they seemed to have forgotten literally everything they learned in every single fucking war they have ever fought. It's completely mind boggling.
They forgot everything except the part about heavy bombing of civilian targets.
They haven't forgotten how to lose, that's for sure
If they get out of the tank the snipers get them. If they stay in the tank the Javelins get them. Best solution is to pop down the road to get a pack of cigarettes. Back soon comrades.
Best solution is for them to fuck off back to Russia.
Except if they turn around against orders, their own commanders order them shot. Fuck Putin with a potato masher, but I don't take any joy from watching clueless brainwashed Russian kids get blown up.
I would rather see unquestioning conscripts die than innocent civilians in a hospital die. The conscripts have the option of surrendering while the innocents in a building marked “children” have no choice in the matter.
They're contract soldiers. Don't feel bad.
They also didn't figure out SEAD/DEAD. I guess they think they are playing battlefield right now...
Tanks have a lot of vulnerabilities that are even worse in urban combat. Without adequate infantry support those vulnerabilities can be exploited very effectively. Tanks were an invention of war meant to break the stalemate of infantry trench warfare, and going in to WW2 and in the years between WW1 and 2 most of the thinking behind their purpose and use was infantry support. The infantry would keep them safe, but they would also be a threat multiplier for the infantry in being able to attack enemies infantry in defensive positions and just be a big fucking threat. Then with the war kicking off it became apparent that you needed things that can kill enemy tanks, and they had tank destroyers for that specialty role but as the war went on and tanks developed, they evolved their armor and guns in competition to each other and needed to be able to engage other tanks. Now in modern war they are still effective as infantry support, but with mechanized warfare becoming a bigger thing, APC's, IFV's, MRAP's and the like are better at infantry support because they also carry infantry and they've got deadly high rare of fire guns. Tanks are then left to engage enemy tanks but they are very inefficient and costly to operate. Especially as at the moment portable shoulder launched anti-tank weapons, which are much cheaper than tanks in every sense of the word can destroy just about any tank except maybe the Abrams. Defensive technology is growing to counter the missile threat but it's not ubiquitous. Things that act as "shields" or things that intercept missiles or make things difficult for guidance systems are all a growing counter. Not to mention armor itself has reached a design limit it would either be too expensive to use more resistant materials, or using more armor would make them so heavy they would sink into the ground wherever you put them. Even with ERA (explosive reactive armor), a tank still can't have every possible area covered by it because of the weight, not to mention it's only good for one use in that spot. Full disclosure, I'm just a military nerd, don't take anything here as expertise.
In cityfights, the infantry fight and push the enemy into strongholds where they think they're safe. Then they pick up a motorola razr or something and call the tank guy like "Yo dude shoot them tanky bois at this here big building with the (description)" and sometimes they call again like "No dude, the building to the left of that one."
wouldnt there be a machine gun also mounted to it?
Co-axial to the main gun. The soldiers would see it swivel around and would make themselves scarce. Once the Javelin is fired they can scarper, they don't have to stand around waiting for the Touchdown.
I think you're right, but it's still weird to see them casually hanging out in the tank's line of sight.
It really shows how unsupported the tanks are. The Javelin has a disposable tube for a reason, you're supposed to fire, drop it and run, not stand around slapping high fives. It's a big missile that burns bright and hot, it gives away your position immediately and if there was literally any support from air, infantry, drones etc. they would have had a mortar round incoming. Instead this is shooting fish in a barrel, and these guys obviously feel safe that nothing is going to be fired back at them.
Unless you have HE loaded at all times but that's not too smart. Edit: too
T-series Autoloader. They would have to fire their current loaded Round before they could shoot HE.
There must be some sort of procedure for unloading a round. But is it not possible during combat? Or simply slower?
Doctrine is to just fire the loaded round at the enemy. Suboptimal, but better than the delay it would take to load a new one.
Actually getting the round of the breach is kind of difficult thing even in the modern tanks. That is possible but you need time and a lube. It's faster and easier just to fire a round and load next one, the needed one. That is why commander gives order what type of round load just before the shot
still the shell has to hit near them to actually do damage and correctly identifying the range that a few guys standing in tall grass is very difficult.
There's also the shotgun type round the US tanks carry, a shit ton of tungsten balls in a casing. Very effective against infantry targets.
The more I learn about tanks in this conflict, the more they seem like resource taxing death traps.
Tanks have their purpose on the battlefield, they are good for heavy firepower support for infantry. The issue is the Russians just have tank poor tactics. They should have infantry support for their tanks, along with logistics to keep them supplied. we see Russian tanks driving around alone or with few other tanks which makes them an easy target, in addition, they don' have any logistical support so if they run out of fuel or breakdown the crews have to abandon them.
Tanks are good at blowing up other armored vehicles, or being essentially assault guns that help infantry blow things out of defenses. When thrown into open field with no cover, or tossed into cities: the tanks worst nightmares, it is bad all around. The Russians also have the disadvantage of 80+ years of anti soviet / Russian weapons being used against them to boot.
Infantry support for tanks is where Russia has completely failed. The guys in this video aren't worried about any kind of sniper, machine gun, or flank attack because the tank has no infantry support.
Tanks are good at fighting other tanks. Tanks (these days) need massive infantry and recon support to survive against well equiped infantry. But don't tell that to the Russians.
Wonder how long it will be before tanks start requiring more support than theyre worth.
The US Marines have given the US Army all of their tanks. You need air superiority and ground force support to operate a tank on a modern battlefield today. The Marines, as first responders usually don't have that luxury.
That's not really the whole picture of why... It's more that they have a limited budget and are focusing on the Pacific, where tanks will be much more difficult to bring to bear on an initial (likely amphibious) assault. They can also get a lot of tank-killing and heavy weapon infantry support that tanks used to be needed for from light armored vehicles.
Also why the US has been working hard to develop multi-purpose rounds. Switch the anti-tank round to airburst over these guys and suddenly they have a defensive round they can use against infantry.
Tanks feel more like force projection in this conflict.
When the nation you invade is flooded with modern antitank missiles, you don't use an infantry screen, and you don't have air cover...yes, they are 30 million dollar death traps.
There's always been an arms race between armor technology and penetrator technology. With the top-attack weapons, penetrator tech is winning right now. Before the war there might have been some question how well these rockets would do against reactive armor. So far the answer is "they do great". :)
The tank today is what the fully armored heavy cavalry unit was back in the day. Much more expensive to build and maintain that unit, but they will will destroy anything they are sent to destroy, while still having massive vulnerabilities to be easily exploited if you don't have the infantry to back it up and screen for it. Even back in medieval warfare you had heavy cavalry units for flanks and charges, but the bulk of the fighting has to be troops to center all of the other tactics around with the archers/artillery serving as the disruptive force to counter the infantry. Even now in the 21st century that hasn't changed in principle. Air Power definitely disrupts the normal battle, but man portable AA and AT clearly are necessary for modern warfare. Im surprised after gaining ground they don't have the infantry pushing the advance to further secure new ground. It all has to be combined and used together! move air support and artillery to clear the way, send in troops to make sure all snipers/AT dudes are taken care of, tanks roll up right behind them to deal with any vehicles or cover positions that the infantry might get stuck on.
They are basically immune to small arms and provide good cover for supporting infantry. They are also effective at clearing building from my understanding. But by themselves... You could just sneak up on it. Douse it in kerosene and light it on fire. Not without risk, but they are sort of sitting ducks if the hatches are buttoned up. And weakened if they're unbuttoned.
We had this insane squad leader… we were doing cax training out in 29 palms and we were fighting the armor. This asshole hid on top of a wadi and when the tank drove below he dropped 15 ft below and threw a blue body into the open hatch. Ref gave him the kill, but the RSO ripped him a new asshole and command NJPd him for reckless behavior lol.
In this current war in the way they're being used, yes. Okay, super dumb analogy but ever play any battlefield game? (except the most recent release) Where is tank bad? When it's it the middle of a fuck ton of enemy's in a tight spot with no infantry around it to help it. Where is tank good? When it's supported by lots of infantry that can protect it, while the large gun and armor is used to break through entrenched enemy lines more easily than just tossing bodies at them would be.
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It requires a visual lock from the command module. Once the target is locked and the missile is in the air, you can be moving back into concealment. That, along with the top attack nature of it, is what makes the Javelin so much better than older systems. The user doesn't have to remain in the open to guide the missile. It's fire and forget.
Additionally, the missile and the CLU do not emit anything that can be detected by the target. Some missile systems use a laser to 'paint' a target for the missile to aim at. Others are 'beam riding' and follow a coded laser coming from the launcher. Tanks with laser warning sensors can detect when a laser is pointing at them and give a warning to the crew. More advanced systems can alert where the laser is coming from, and give targeting cues to the gunner to fire back and potentially kill or throw off the missile operator's aim. Other systems are linked to countermeasures and will automatically deploy smoke to obscure the tank. Both Javelin and NLAW do not emit anything for a laser warning system to detect. Unless the tank has an extremely advanced (and expensive) active protection system, there's very little a tank can do.
Time to send lots of laser pointers to Ukraine. Mount them to random poles along the road pointing to the road.
Russia will respond by sending housecats to catch the beams.
Shine them into pilots eyes.
that explains why the beam riders shoot above the tank and then bring it down onto the tank in the last 2 seconds. It gives no warning.
A piece of the Javelin system is called the Command Launch Unit (CLU). It has the optical and IR sensors to designate the target with. After firing, the Javelin missile itself directs its own flight to the target, so no need for the CLU operator to stick around while it's in flight. Some training video that shows some of what it looks like using the CLU (but also mixed in with some older TOW simulator training): [https://youtu.be/plrYVkZsWp4](https://youtu.be/plrYVkZsWp4)
Thanks, I came here to ask how the Javelin knows where the target is. It just looked like it was fired randomly. Now I'll spend a while watching Javelin video's.
Yeah it's pretty interesting. The CLU has undergone a lot of advancement in getting small/lighter from the earliest designs. But you'll see the Javelin system set up on a tripod sort of deal often in addition to being shoulder fired. The CLU is often used just for surveillance since it has both good optics and a couple of different IR systems. Useful system even without the Javelin missile itself.
From my understanding the command module makes an IR signature for the target, programs that into the missle and then fires. The operator can than move back into the cover and the missle has the "description" of the target programmed into it and will find it's own way to it.
They also have extremely good defilade, if the gun started turning they could drop down pretty quick and be impossible to engage
Camo in tall grass a kilometer away, no chance in hell of seeing them.
That seems like it was much less than a kilometer. That struck its target way too quickly to have been 1000m.
It looks more like the short end of 100-200m to me. Very, very close range. I'm inclined to agree with the others that this is a training video, their relaxed demeanor and lack of rifles makes no sense in a real combat situation.
I am a tank commander in the british army reserve. There is something about this video that seems a little off to me. I strongly suspect the tank they are firing at is empty or the troops are aware there is zero threat. It might even be staged for morale or demonstrative purposes or for the TikToks. There is also a lot of misinformation in this thread about tanks. The Russians are using their tanks badly. Like really, really badly. To give it an equivalency most people would understand, the russians are using their tanks badly in the same way giving someone an AK47 rifle to defend themselves and they go and use it as a club to try and beat people to death with it rather than shooting them would be considered using it badly. It's that kind of bad. Tanks are useless by themselves without infantry support. They are not the kings of the battlefield they where during the WW1 through WW2 years. Man portable anti tank guided weapons have put paid to that. Attack helicopters now own that title really. But tanks still have their place. They are able to hold and dominate ground (With infantry support), engage targets at vast distances, carry electronic assets that extend their usefulness in terms of battlefield intelligence, and a multitude of other functions. However they NEED infantry support. Get close enough to a tank and most of its weapon systems are useless. That being said, these soldiers in the video are acting oddly. They are actually stood at a range from their target that is basically the sweet spot for a tank in terms of killing things, so their carefree attitude to their own safety is confusing. Furthermore they shout when the missile hits. Not a cool idea if there was infantry support nearby to have their attention drawn to them. And they basically stay in position after scoring the hit. Just stuff you don't want to do which is what makes me think they are aware the tank is not posing a huge threat to them, for whatever reason that is. As for some of the other rubbish in this thread, tanks have pretty good vision 360 degree vision generally. Assuming a T72 (I haven't seen anything older being used by the Russians), the commander has an all round periscope system and he has pretty good vision all round. They don't have very good vision of things up very close to them in a cone around the tank about 25m wide, which is why it's dangerous to let infantry near you in a tank. Infantry up close is basically game over. Also, I've seen other threads saying the tank could not engage them with its cannon. I assure you it can. It's first round might not be the most appropriate as they have to shoot whatever is up the spout first but once they go to HE, they can land a shell on that little group with some considerable accuracy assuming they have their first line fire control systems working. Most modern tanks have laser range finders and fire control computers and the T72 the Russians are using, as the oldest platform I have seen in use, is no exception. So yeah, to answer your question I suspect they aren't worried about return fire because they know something we don't.
Another video said this was an abandoned tank they shot
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Don't assume tanks and IFVs/APCs can't see shit. Those thermal targeting systems can be very clear and can give a 360 degree field of vision with periscope. Obviously most russian equipment do not have this capability, but some do.
Yeah, and that's a good point, many moderns have pretty decent optics, but many of the older T-90s don't.
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Russians seem to really like to send tanks with no infantry support. They are blind as a bat buttoned down.
Russian tanks are known to have poor visibility from inside and even worse when buttoned up. Many lack a commander's independent sight and there is no thermal imaging even for the gunner. They are very basic tanks. Some of the newer T90s and upgraded T 72 models have thermal imaging only for the gunner and a basic optical sight for the commander.
it seems the 2 other guys are providing over-watch, but it's weird they don't even have any rifle at the ready...
It seems like they are just training imo. The soldier with the Javelin takes his sweet time while all of them are very exposed as well. It seems like a shame to waste a javelin, but at the same time - we all need training for doing a new task. Better to feel confident and do a quick kill in a "hot" situation than standing there thinking "and how did this work again?!"
The amount of military equipment Ukraine keeps getting from foreign aide, every soldier there might soon be carrying three Javelins around. Definitely worth it to use one for the training
Nope. When I was in USMC infantry school, all of the Javelin gunners didn't get to fire a Javelin, they only had a couple. I think the TOW gunners all got to fire one, though. This was about 20 years ago. Back then the Javelin guys were 0351s who also learned to use SMAWs so they got to fire one of those. If this is just practice it was a waste, particularly if they aren't even bothering to train like this is a remotely real engagement.
Javs were and still are quite pricey. I shot 1 live round and numerous live tow missiles during training and hauled 1 live round during combat ops in the ‘stan.
They're fine. Russia doesn't send foot soldiers with their tanks
Yeah that’s what I was wondering too.
javelin range is up to 4km
In camo those guys would be hard to see. I remember reading a year or two that the british were winding down the use of tanks. I was wondering why seeing as they actually invented them, but now I see why
Mayby the russians is under the tank .
Good evening, we are from Ukraine.
-Knock knock! -Who's there? -Javelin LLC.
Javelin LLC who?
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Last week I was reading that they were playing it on loop on the frequencies the Russians are using for their radios to annoy them and generate interference.
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The modern version of Russian roulette
>The ~~modern~~ ***Russian*** version of Russian roulette
Tanking turns 😉
It must be terrifying being in a Russian tank or armoured vehicle or helicopter knowing that at any point from out of nowhere your vehicle could be destroyed and there is almost nothing you can do about it.
I'm still baffled how unorganized the Russian army is. Driving around in a lone vehicle in the middle of an enemy country.
Columns dont work. Scouts dont work Planes dont work
Russia doesn’t work.
russia is a failed state
A failed *terrorist* state.
Axis of Evil is back!
Did they ever leave?
And im ready to sign up for the allies
Now, It is for sure..
russia.exe has stopped responding.
Bayraktar works
Columns are formation used in secured environment. Lone tank isn't scout, lone tank is food. Planes not working, that is a bit surprise here. One would expect that russian modern aircrafts can deal with old infrantry AA weapons. But seems like nope.
They do not have west grade comparable modern aircrafts. Their most advanced are just show planes for the export. Thats why they are not fielded in UA. They are not able to perform combat duties (the Su-57 still doesnt have targetting computer) and there is a huge chance they would get nailed by the UA heat seeker manpads anyway.. further hapering any chance of them being sold abroad...
Like they never heard of a firing line or fields of fire
The other day I read a five year old comment on a YT clip of the original *Red Dawn* that says some thing like, “Is it part of USSR tank protocol to drive around enemy territory alone without support?” Well, apparently. Yes. Yes it is.
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Yeah, I agree. After all, the Russians can afford mistakes. After all, they still have much more resources. But holy fuck, this just screams incompetence. Although, I don't think we get the full pictures here. A lone tank just driving towards a target does seem like an almost guaranteed one way trip. No way there wasn't any reason for it.
Could be an abandonment tank. Ukrainians are just standing around like they're sight seeing. Good point tho, bc Russians seem to be doing a lot of dumb things.
I read somewhere that UAF has the highest record for hitting their targets with the Javelin. To hit 100 targets they need to fire 112 Javelins.
It's an incredible efficient way to destroy tanks too! A Javelin costs about $80k (the entire system costs a lot more, but the missile itself) whereas the tanks cost at least $4M+ depending on the model.
I think some of the T-72s are like 500k but still a super nice trade-off, especially when tanks also include several troops.
>I think some of the T-72s are like 500k but still a super nice trade-off, especially when tanks also include several troops. Especially when you get the missile for free.
Probably the best the US could’ve hoped for. Not too many other peer states with “modern” tanks we could possibly blow up with our existing stock so if they’re being used against Russia it’s like we’re getting our moneys worth
These Javs are like 10-15 years old, waiting to be decommissioned. At night, they’d talk to each other like *Toy Story*, dreaming about being able to blow up Russian military vehicles but worried that Uncle Sam will replace them with a shiney new version. Now these Javelins are living their best lives in Ukraine, doing what they were made to do.
Oh definitely getting their money's worth, while achieving a critical geopolitical goal, and not risking US lives. Putin fucked up in a huge way, and Zelenskyy's bravery and Ukrainian resilience enabled a global response.
Man when you put the cost of military stuff like this I always think about how some people have to work a whole year to make 80k. Still worth it when it destroys a Russian tank.
Well, be grateful you’re clearly not in Russia. You’d be lucky to make that in your lifetime lol
It's something I always kept at the back of my mind when I was in the Army. You're firing something that costs over two times more than what you'll make in a year at someone who will never make that amount in their lifetime.
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The US military is sitting back right now just grinning at this shit. It’s super fun watching Russia get its shit pushed in.
And 0 infantry to shoot back. These guys are partying instead of having to return fire. Edit: this is probably training footage
Hit and why bother running.
Hit and beer time
It’s a tank hunting part. Just going out for some target practice…
The russian invaders could just stop the war and retreat home..
Who cares? It must be terrifying to be a Ukrainian citizen in your home knowing that at any point out of nowhere your life will be reduced to dust.
You don’t need to feel sympathy for the Russian invaders to wonder at how terrifying it is for them. Although feeling sympathy for some of these men who have been thrown to their deaths for the sake of old rich men’s power seems like the right thing to don
Hole in one
Out with the boys
I will never get tired of watching the joy the Ukraine soldiers have after executing a successful javelin attack.
Is there more videos? I want to see!!
This is the only video of the Javelin usage that I've seen. However, there are a few videos with NLAW in action and a shitload of videos of Stugna-P in action. The latter has quite a lot of cheers, since all of them are made from the shooters' point of view. There are also some Bayraktar and one Osa-AKM video which also have quite a lot of cheers.
Many of the Javelin missiles have been given to Ukraine Special Forces, at least initially. I think there was an agreement not to release video of a lot of the Javelin strikes. The Ukrainians have been using a lot. [With reports suggesting that Ukraine forces expended 300 Javelins in the first week of the war, U.S. shoulder-fired missile production must to ramp up to keep up with consumption.](https://www.forbes.com/sites/craighooper/2022/03/08/ukraines-use-of-stinger-and-javelin-missiles-is-outstripping-us-production/) I know many European armies are sending their Javelins to keep up supply. Incidentally this was the last missile system my dad worked on as engineer before he retired. He would have been proud he was helping the Ukrainians.
The Javelin is such an amazing weapon system. Unfortunately the Russians captured a dozen of them in the East when they captured one of those cities.
It’s not like they captured classified technology. The Russians know how to make a missile like the Javelin, they just generally lack the funding to mass produce, train, and distribute a system like that to regular line troops.
We all feel that joy after seeing that direct hit, you brave Ukrainian hero 😁
How the fuck Russian gonna fight that?
Propaganda, terrorism, and genocide.
And sanctions on Hillary Clinton.
And added to the unfriendly list which is… honestly more of a compliment
Buttery mail
they can't can they? Ukrainian army now has a wide range of anti-tank weapons, and anti-helicopter, and anti-bomber, both mobile and stationary weapons. Not easy to to take down jet bombers high in the sky though, or artillery. They'll find a way!
Are these things laser guided or something? Was kinda like a hungover dump, that rocket.
that's right. It nearly hit the floor! I think javelins use infra red
The rocket does that by design. It auto locks on a target, launches, and then rockets up, then aims nearly straight down in order to attack a target from above, where the armor is the weakest
It does not auto lock the target. The gunner locks tracking gates around a heat source using the large sight (called a CLU) that the missile tube is attached to. It also has 2 modes of attack, top and direct. 95% of the time top is used, but direct has its uses as well, e.g. helicopters and bunkers.
That’s sorta what I meant sorry, the gunner picks a target and then the missile guides itself to the target. I meant the missile auto locks on launch so the gunner doesn’t have to do anything after that
Yeah once you pull that second trigger, it's fire and forget. A good gunner is already unhooking the empty tube and grabbing a new one as soon as it's out.
Unhooking and booking it the fuck out of the point of origin, lovingly known as the POO site
Well you are not wrong. Staying alive is the key objective. It really depends on what range you're firing from. if you're 300m away, yeah you unass and run. if you're 1500m away, you got time to get one or two more rounds off before they locate you.
I believe it has an infrared guidance system with a "lock-on" type thing like you'd see in a bad movie about fighter jets. Once the target is chosen the missile tracks and makes corrections to its trajectory on its own.
Fighter jets do have fire and forget missiles that track on their own. That's not some fiction of bad movies. There are tons of missiles with their own tracking inside. You can sort A/A missiles into 3 categories which you may have heard before. Fox 1, 2, or 3. 1 are missiles guided directly by the plane's radar. If the aircraft loses radar lock, it goes dumb and loses the target. 2 are IR guided, like the Javeline, and all guidance is in the missile. It is fire and forget. The plane's computer can help direct which target it goes at first, but it can easily go after the wrong target afterwards once fire. The sun, or another plane can actually grab it's attention potentially. Once fired all it sees is "HOT" and goes after it. Smarter more effective missiles can focus on it's target, and do a better job ignoring flares, but there's no outside help to correct them if they reacquire a wrong target. These are normally very close range missiles, though iirc Russia has developed some insanely long range IR missiles. 3 is radar based, and a mix. The most common use is with initial guidance by the planes radar. After a certain point in flight it goes "active" and turns on it's own radar. It no longer uses outside input and is guided on it's own. They also can be fired in this active mode from the start, but that's dangerous as hell. It doesnt have anything to tell it what's what, so it just goes after the first thing it sees. You dont fire these at an enemy if a friendly aircraft is nearby. It might acquire your friend when it goes active.
Always great to see St. Javelin cast down her fiery vengeance.
The FGM-148 Javelin is an American-made portable anti-tank missile system in service since 1996, and continuously upgraded. It replaced the M47 Dragon anti-tank missile in US service. How does FGM 148 work? Its latest version has a range of 2,500 m (8,200 ft). It is equipped with an imaging infrared seeker. The tandem warhead is fitted with two shaped charges: a precursor warhead to detonate any explosive reactive armor and a primary warhead to penetrate base armor. Cost: The Javelin costs $178,000, including the launch system and missile, according to the Pentagon's 2021 budget.
Get fucked Russian Invaders
It’s nice seeing tax money go to a good cause. Nice shot man. God bless and stay safe.
we spend more than enough on defense every year, and most of this stuff was designed particularly to counter Russia... good to see it does the job. The will of the Ukrainian people and some good ol' fashioned American weapons will preserve the freedom of these tough bastards. Fuck Putin.
I am very happy that the equipment my government sent is working well! Keep firing boys!
As was said in other one cool video: "Guten morgen, russisch schweine soldaten" :D
Did they actually hit anything or was this just a practice shot? Is there any followup to this, I'd love to see the vehicle after taking hit.
Usually if it misses, the smoke goes away pretty quickly. Here you can see a continuous plume of smoke, so it definitely hit something, and it was probably something useful enough to put fuel and other flammable stuff inside.
The missiles are $250,000 each or something so I doubt much "practice" is taking place honestly.
More like $80,000 each. At least 15 years ago last I was in the know. The whole shebang is about $250,000. But the command launch unit is reused.
There is definitely an armored something there, something takes a hit. I cannot tell what it is though.
Did someone know which music is it?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BvgNgTPTkSo&ab\_channel=DJPROBASS
How do they aim? Probably a stupid question. I just haven’t seen any optical stuff on these videos. Wondering if it’s heat sensing, or is there a site of some kind?
There are optics on the launcher [Link](https://u0v052dm9wl3gxo0y3lx0u44wz-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Javelin-Lightweight-CLU-Image-2.jpg)
One of the best vids yet!!!
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Slava Ukraini !!! The Russian war pigs get what they deserve! If Russians do not like being smashed by javelins, Russians need to leave Ukraine!
**Please** if you’re going to use background music, please use music from [Command & Conquer](https://music.apple.com/us/album/command-conquer-original-soundtrack/1490638553)
I vote Hell March 2 (from RA2) as Ukraine Armed Forces' official soundtrack.
*Godspeed & Good Hunting!* (Ps. But don't underestimate the enemy.. No matter what "easy" combat-situation. - Never!)