Is heavy armor outdated on the modern battlefield?

SSG Ronald Williams — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 13:25:01 -0400

I am a former Tank Commander. The last of the heavy armor was moved from Europe about 2 years ago, now it is being moved back due to Russia's aggressive moves. Army command continues to tell Congress it does not want to continue production of heavy armor, but Congress continues to budget for it, most likely due to the economic impact on the cities where they are produced and upgraded. Does heavy armor have a place on the modern battlefield?

Response by SGT Richard H. made Apr 21 at 2015 1:29 PM

SGT Richard H. — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 13:29:44 -0400

I think it does still have a place. Desert Storm is a great example.

Response by SGT Bryon Sergent made Apr 21 at 2015 2:30 PM

SGT Bryon Sergent — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 14:30:33 -0400

Does the live that it would save? Get rid of the armor, roll in in the MRAPS, and the 1151's see how long they stand up to T-72's. That's one of the reasons they haven't pushed to hard, they know that the M1 Abrams will KICK THERE ASS!

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 2:55 PM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 14:55:59 -0400

Our ability to dominate the battlefield has pretty much forced our enemies to engage us via asymmetric warfare instead of traditional symmetric warfare. We need to maintain a balance between both forms of warfare, because our enemies will engage us wherever we are weakest.

Response by SGT Jeremiah B. made Apr 21 at 2015 3:07 PM

SGT Jeremiah B. — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 15:07:26 -0400

I'm horribly biased, but NEVER! The problem is that we stare too long at one kind of war and forget that there are others. Sure, the Abrams had limited utility in heavily populated Iraqi cities or the mountains of Afghanistan, but it has an important place in maintaining a decisive weapon against forces that will have to fight you in the open across large swathes of land. Not every enemy will be a tribal hiding in a cave or village. Even then, Marine tanks in the Stan were stunningly effective when they could be brought to bear...that asshole hiding in a wadi 700m away taking potshots at you suddenly found himself a lot more visible and a lot less safe.

Response by SFC Mark Merino made Apr 21 at 2015 3:07 PM

SFC Mark Merino — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 15:07:43 -0400

Heavy armor will never be obsolete. I love the Stryker, but wouldn't expect it to defeat the sheer numbers of T-80's, etc that can be thrown at them. The psychological effect they have is a huge multiplier as well.

Response by SSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 3:12 PM

SSgt Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 15:12:51 -0400

As long as small arms, RPGs, APCs and other armored units etc. exist, there will always be a need for heavy armor.

Response by SFC William Swartz Jr made Apr 21 at 2015 3:13 PM

SFC William Swartz Jr — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 15:13:36 -0400

No it is not!

Response by LTC John Shaw made Apr 21 at 2015 3:26 PM

LTC John Shaw — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 15:26:50 -0400

No, especially when you need to control territory. If we had even a few dozen M1A2 in Ukraine or near, Russia would not have the attitude they have now with Crimea and Ukraine.

Just because our last fight was COIN does not mean the next one will be.
We need heavy armor in Europe, Baltic states and Ukraine NOW.

Response by SFC Charles S. made Apr 21 at 2015 4:49 PM

SFC Charles S. — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 16:49:23 -0400

No, Heavy Armor is not outdated and If you have never watched the History Channel the Greatest Tank Battles, you have to see the Battle known as 73 Easting, Gulf War 1991. Tanks against Tanks are why we still have Tanks. Russia won't stop using tanks so, Mount up!

Response by SPC Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 4:50 PM

SPC Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 16:50:36 -0400

Which would I rather have giving me, the infantryman, supporting fires? a Stryker MGS or a M1A2?? I'll take the tank any day... especially because it means that some 25mm wil be there too from my Brad lol

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 5:04 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 17:04:22 -0400

It's not like they are still building them all you ever see now is old tanks with new gear and upgrades a few more batteries to power up the extra electronics and they slap a new name on like sepV2 which we are waiting till they come out with the sepV3 it should have a lot less problems

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 5:05 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 17:05:34 -0400

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 5:26 PM

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 17:26:27 -0400

Simply no.

Response by SFC Miguel Lopez made Apr 21 at 2015 5:35 PM

SFC Miguel Lopez — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 17:35:09 -0400

SSG Williams, thank you for your service. I'd rather call it reserved for future conflicts, the US Army Armor force has the latest technology in its vehicles to search, find, engage and destroy any adversary armor force, especially in a desert environment. As recent as OIF operations, however, employing them against Russia require a different strategy combined with other combat multipliers. But it's not outdated as other NATO countries that still operate M-60 series tanks, M-113s APC, Cobra helicopters, etc. Those are considered outdated however fitted with upgrades and updated technology. Good question though.

Response by COL Vincent Stoneking made Apr 21 at 2015 5:56 PM

COL Vincent Stoneking — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 17:56:29 -0400

Absolutely. Force on force is always going to be a requirement. Just because we haven't faced a peer conventional opponent doesn't mean we won't in the future. When that happens, we are going to have to re-learn a bunch of stuff that I, and many other Armor guys, have forgotten since 9/11.

Response by LCpl Mark Lefler made Apr 21 at 2015 6:02 PM

LCpl Mark Lefler — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 18:02:09 -0400

I'm not sure how 75 tons of death is outdated.

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Apr 21 at 2015 6:06 PM

MAJ Ken Landgren — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 18:06:47 -0400

Yes terrain dependent. They are good at destroying things and attack at a fast pace. If we have air superiority and the terrain is flat, we will have thousands of tanks pressing the attack.

Response by SFC Pete Meyer made Apr 21 at 2015 7:46 PM

SFC Pete Meyer — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 19:46:43 -0400

No!

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 21 at 2015 8:18 PM

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 20:18:12 -0400

I think those that say heavy armor is obsolete suffer from tunnel vision. They're basing their opinion solely upon the current conflicts. A tank is designed to rapidly seize territory and engage the enemy at stand-off range. They employ speed, shock, and tempo to their advantage to accomplish this. Urban environments significantly reduce the inherent advantages that armor brings to the table. COIN campaigns do as well, since restrained force is not a strong point of tanks either. Heavy Armor is admittedly not well suited to our current OEF campaign, nor was it particularly useful once Iraq transitioned to a counter-insurgency war.

However, basing our tactics and force structure upon the previous war has continued to be disastrous for the U.S. military. While an armor-centric force may not be the future, it is a capability we need to maintain. It's not unlike the vertical envelopment capabilities that airborne troops offer. They're not terribly useful in a COIN campaign either, but that doesn't mean we should drop the capability altogether. Nobody wants another Task Force Smith, where our unpreparedness and lack of equipment resulted in disaster.

Response by CPT Ahmed Faried made Apr 21 at 2015 10:05 PM

CPT Ahmed Faried — Tue, 21 Apr 2015 22:05:35 -0400

If our adversaries, near-peer or otherwise still have their tanks (and they do) then no, armor isn't outdated.

Response by SGT Robert Hawks made Apr 22 at 2015 2:39 AM

SGT Robert Hawks — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 02:39:30 -0400

Response by CSM Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 22 at 2015 8:13 AM

CSM Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 08:13:29 -0400

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 22 at 2015 10:25 AM

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 10:25:51 -0400

Your enemy always gets to choose the type of war you will fight. Tanks are outdated now simply because no one else has the capacity to fight them. As soon as the tanks are gone, there will be a immediate and urgent need for them.

We never fight the last war because we train for that war, we always fight the war we are not training for.

The reason we fought an insurgency in Iraq was because they were so easily defeated in the conventional invasion. It took them a while to figure out what worked and IEDs became prominent. Simply because they were effective. While an MRAP is a great tool for IED's it is near worthless in a conventional attack.
If we were to limit our conventional forces or scrap the tanks our enemies simply would adjust back to the conventional fight.

I do think an M551 Sheridan or modern version would have been very useful in Afghanistan.

They will become obsolete when a man portable anti-armor weapon becomes a feasibility, like the laser death ray in the movie Congo.

Response by LTC Paul Labrador made Apr 22 at 2015 12:26 PM

LTC Paul Labrador — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 12:26:30 -0400

Part of the issue with continuing production is that once theproduction line goes cold, it is next to impossible to restart it again. So is it better to keep the line open, churning out small numbers of tanks than to shut it down in the hopes that we won't need to produce more?

Response by SSgt Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 22 at 2015 1:01 PM

SSgt Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 13:01:29 -0400

As a former tank commander myself I can say that there will always be a place on the battlefield for armor. There is nothing badder and more of a force multiplier than am M1A2 rolling over a hill. Well unless it is an A-10 Warthog coming down out of the clouds for a strafing run.

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Apr 22 at 2015 2:00 PM

MAJ Ken Landgren — Wed, 22 Apr 2015 14:00:15 -0400

The army has around 8000-9000 tanks. Something like 29 miles of tanks. :)

Response by SGT Private RallyPoint Member made Apr 23 at 2015 3:44 PM

SGT Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 15:44:01 -0400

The only way I can see if armor will be outdated, is if JDAMs become a dime a dozen, fuel is cheaper that water and bomber become cheaper than a Kia.

Response by 1SG Michael Blount made May 6 at 2015 3:33 PM

1SG Michael Blount — Wed, 06 May 2015 15:33:49 -0400

Armor - when it absolutely, positively has to be destroyed.

Response by SFC Private RallyPoint Member made May 7 at 2015 4:58 AM

SFC Private RallyPoint Member — Thu, 07 May 2015 04:58:07 -0400

Heavy Armor will never be outdated. If you were to totally remove us from the battlefield and mothball our equipment then when the time comes (i.e. the Russia aggression) the training needed to address it will not be there. Allegedly the new tanks are going to be something that we will need to worry about, however it is not going to be something that we cannot beat due to the fact that a combination of our tanks and our training are something that are dominant. In addition we are adept at fighting in urban environments when we are called upon, while it is something that we are not as good at due to the constraints of the equipment, when you take a HKT, a Platoon of Bradleys and a Platoon of Tanks going through an Urban environment then there is nothing that we need to worry about. It is what we train for, it is what makes us the unstoppable force that we are. While we give the Grunts crap, the bottom line is this, the heavy mechanized units are something that the military MUST have, you give it up then you weaken the military to such a point that I am not sure even where to rank it. I am not talking about these little Strykers and MGS platforms either. I am talking about heavy armor. These are the platforms that need to be maintained in the arsenal because these are the platforms that when called upon are going to stop the heavy armor that comes against us.

Response by LTC Bink Romanick made Jul 1 at 2015 9:22 AM

LTC Bink Romanick — Wed, 01 Jul 2015 09:22:31 -0400

Absolutely not! The tank will always have a place in our army. The MGS can't possibly usurp the role of the tank on today's battlefields. This COIN doorkicker period will soon be over. I will admit that we will never see the numbers of tanks that we had in the Cold War but we will always be relevant.

Stay on the tank.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Jul 1 at 2015 9:48 AM

CPT Private RallyPoint Member — Wed, 01 Jul 2015 09:48:46 -0400

Now the tank itself as we know it today may become obsolete. But the concept of armored assets on the battlefield will never be outdated. I don't think tanks as we know them will always be there. I am sure in the future something may come to do the same mission. But the idea of just tanks itself not enough. We have to look at the concepts of warfare in which the tanks are being used also. If you send tanks against the US Army then you are making a very poor decision. I don't care if it is the Russians with their fancy tin can. Our control of the battle space and air and prevent enemy tanks from having really much of an impact.

Just as the infantry will never become obsolete or outdated. How we employ them and what they look like will change. But the concept of sending in ground forces will never change nor will the supporting assets.

Response by SPC Terry Newman made Jul 1 at 2015 2:57 PM

SPC Terry Newman — Wed, 01 Jul 2015 14:57:04 -0400

Armor will never be outdated unless no one has armor

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Jul 3 at 2015 7:46 PM

MAJ Ken Landgren — Fri, 03 Jul 2015 19:46:22 -0400

There will be times when we want want the lethality, speed, and armor of tanks to press the attack and destroy what it is in front.

Response by CPT Private RallyPoint Member made Jul 3 at 2015 7:50 PM

CPT Private RallyPoint Member — Fri, 03 Jul 2015 19:50:43 -0400

I absolutely agree with just about everyone else here: heavy armor is not outdated and very likely never will be. In a conventional fight, there is no asset capable of providing highly-mobile, lethal firepower at long range like a tank. When MG McMaster was still the MCoE commandant, he spoke to my BOLC class about the future of Armor. He had a few good points, one of which was, "The IBCT is nimble, which is one of it's strengths, but it lacks mobile protected firepower. I mean, elves are nimble, but you don't send one to kick someone's ass. That's what the ABCT is for." Even recent history bears that out. Look at the 2003 thunder runs that took BIAP and then Baghdad itself - perfect examples of how an audacious commander can use an armored formation to seize and hold territory from the enemy. The Marines used tanks in southern Afghanistan to great effect, as did the Germans and Canadians, and it goes without saying that Russians and Ukrainians are using tanks.

Also, since you brought up appropriations, the Army did not tell Congress it doesn't to continue production of tanks. It told Congress that it doesn't want to build any new M1A2s for the next several years because there's no need while they finish updating the entire Abrams fleet to the M1A2 SEP v2 variant. The reason GD (the company that builds the tanks) pushed Congress not to stop building new tanks, is that the cost of shutting down the plants that build new tanks and then reopening them in five years is more expensive than keeping them open with a small level of production.

Response by MAJ Private RallyPoint Member made Jul 4 at 2015 12:43 AM

MAJ Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 04 Jul 2015 00:43:04 -0400

Depends on the fight. But as long as the enemy has tanks, so will we...

Unless you've used them or seen them in combat. You have no idea.

Response by SSG Private RallyPoint Member made Aug 1 at 2015 10:06 PM

SSG Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 01 Aug 2015 22:06:19 -0400

I dont think heavy armor will ever go away. May not need them all the time, but its nice to know that they are around just in case we need them. Kinda like artillery

Response by SPC Christopher Perrien made Sep 12 at 2015 7:32 PM

SPC Christopher Perrien — Sat, 12 Sep 2015 19:32:02 -0400

F.O.G. missiles represent a grave danger to tanks. Tanks are going to need an integral anti-missile system one of these days.

Response by SSG Erick Diaz made Nov 15 at 2015 5:34 AM

SSG Erick Diaz — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 05:34:41 -0500

As long as the rest of the world has heavy armor, we must maintain tanks. You can't go to a gun fight with a knife.

Response by MAJ Ken Landgren made Nov 15 at 2015 1:31 PM

MAJ Ken Landgren — Sun, 15 Nov 2015 13:31:38 -0500

Heavy armor will lead the ground attack in conventional war. It's mission is to destroy, not defeat, but to destroy.

Response by SGM Ron Crump made Nov 26 at 2015 7:32 PM

SGM Ron Crump — Thu, 26 Nov 2015 19:32:29 -0500

Just like the Military, during a lull they always wonder if it is necessary, BUT let the defecation hit the occulating rotator and who do they call. I saw this during my 27 year career. Yes it is loud and impressive, but nothing makes a better statement than 70 tons of mean firepower. Sometimes you need a scalpel and sometimes a sledgehammer. Best to have both at the ready. BTW I love the picture. My wife used to call it "Your 70 ton girlfriend", cant say I disagree. Was a Tanker my entire career. Loved being a 1SG (then a OPS SGM) except for the fact I had to give up my TC position.

Response by LTC Private RallyPoint Member made Dec 26 at 2015 3:59 PM

LTC Private RallyPoint Member — Sat, 26 Dec 2015 15:59:59 -0500

It will never be out dated. The current fight doesn't require as much heavy armor. That doesn't mean another enemy will require us to use more of it. Tanks, Bradley Fighting Vehicles, and some version of them will be around for long time.

Response by MAJ Joe Bentley made Dec 7 at 2016 7:27 PM

MAJ Joe Bentley — Wed, 07 Dec 2016 19:27:05 -0500

Only if every vehicle involved in any operation or convoy can move fast!

Response by CPT Jacob Swartout made Feb 10 at 2017 12:26 PM

CPT Jacob Swartout — Fri, 10 Feb 2017 12:26:23 -0500

There will always be a need for heavy armor units on the battlefield.

Response by SPC Private RallyPoint Member made Dec 21 at 2018 2:27 AM

SPC Private RallyPoint Member — Fri, 21 Dec 2018 02:27:11 -0500

I ask myself the same question when SSGT, since I want to reclass to armor. I loved tanks since I was a kid, but we got all these drones, it makes me wonder when will armor become outdated. When will infantry and artillery become outdated? But of course, territory has to be held. That's the first I had to remind myself. I also had to remind myself the potential of armor in a war against Russia/N. Korea/China. And lastly... just look at that picture. That's the beautiful thing I have ever seen.

Response by SFC David Xanten made May 3 at 2020 1:07 PM

SFC David Xanten — Sun, 03 May 2020 13:07:09 -0400

Tanks have played a role in every conflict since WWI. We, the US Army have always, until the cold War, have had inferior Tanks and until the M1 Series Tanks were outgunned. There are currently upgrades that when applied to the M1A2's will make them even more lethal. That is a good thing.