[Zhang Fei]

He was struck by how ‘new’ and ‘unused’ the Saudi UCOFT was. Back at home, the UCOFT is literally scheduled 24 hours a day...and I remember getting up to go do 3:00 a.m. shifts in it. In other words, we used the heck out of it. Like a video game, it had progressively harder levels, and a new tank commander/gunner combination would have to reach a certain level together, before the army spent money on training with real rounds.

This being a more or less a video game, they don't even have the excuse that they lack the fuel and ammo budget to conduct the necessary training.

[lacrew]

“This being a more or less a video game, they don’t even have the excuse that they lack the fuel and ammo budget to conduct the necessary training.”

Exactly...the whole point of the UCOFT is to train on the cheap. The UCOFT is not fun at all, though...was quite a ‘chore’. So it looked like the Saudis quickly lost interest.