Free Republic

Ukraine has sidelined U.S.-provided Abrams M1A1 battle tanks for now in its fight against Russia, in part because Russian drone warfare has made it too difficult for them to operate without detection or coming under attack, two U.S. military officials told The Associated Press. The U.S. agreed to send 31 Abrams to Ukraine in January 2023 after an aggressive monthslong campaign by Kyiv arguing that the tanks, which cost about $10 million apiece, were vital to its ability to breach Russian lines. But the battlefield has changed substantially since then, notably by the ubiquitous use of Russian surveillance drones and...

Footage showed numerous destroyed tanks, vehicles as well as multiple Russian casualties dispersed in a field. Ukraine has wiped out on of Russia's biggest tank charges since the start of the war, destroying 12 tanks in one day. Footage showed 48 Russian tanks and other vehicles coming under attack from Ukrainian drones, missiles and artillery. It shows the convoy of Russian tanks and armoured vehicles moving in the east of Ukraine alongside soldiers. Kyiv's forces then struck the convoy as it moved down a single road, taking out 12 tanks and eight armoured vehicles as well as several Russian personnel....

By a long shot, the enduring image of a NATO-standard modern main battle tank in the Russo-Ukraine War is a video of a stopped vehicle getting hammered by cheap FPV drones, before it gets set on fire and burns down to a six-million-dollar hulk. Combat video posted by the 79th Air Assault Brigade on Tuesday, reportedly from the eastern Avdiivka sector, was typical, showing a stationary US-made M1A2 Abrams tank hit with a detonation in the back of the turret, probably by a Russian FPV drone. Three crew hurl themselves from the main battle tank (MBT) as ammunition stored in...

British tanks are designed for military trade shows but not for the battlefield? According to this Sun report the biggest ‘challenge’ for the ‘Challenger’ tank are ordinary puddles by Ukrainian standards. “It keeps getting stuck.” Excellent video.

Soldiers of the 47th Mechanized Brigade showed the combat use of their M1A1 SA Abrams tanks in the Avdiivka direction. And while Russian invaders are trying to understand where Abrams tanks are, tankers of the 47th Mechanized Brigade have been “dismantling” Russian invaders and their equipment for molecules for more than a month,” the Brigade said. In the video, there is shown the presence of ARAT ERA protection on combat vehicles. As Militarnyi previously reported in January the SA tanks of Armed Forces of Ukraine had been equipped with an Abrams Reactive Armor (ARAT-1) protection.

A new viral video shows the crew of a Russian T-90M Breakthrough tank getting a first-hand lesson in the devastating firepower of the Bradley Fighting Vehicle’s Bushmaster M242 25mm automatic cannon. The War Zone reached out to highly-experienced armor experts to explain exactly what we are seeing in the intense combat footage and how the Bradley was able to take on Russia's most capable frontline tank.

NATO has a huge problem that will take decades to overcome. Put most simply, the armor vehicles NATO has won’t survive in a firefight with the Russians, notwithstanding the fact that Russian armor is far from the best. Russia has demonstrated in Ukraine that in conventional warfare it can knock out some of NATOs best tanks and decimate Western armored fighting vehicles like the US Bradley and the German Marder. NATO does not have enough tanks, does not have sound logistics to support them, and faces significant problems coming up against modern Russian ground forces. The Leopard tank has performed...

I thought today I would related a real story of a real American soldier. A truly great soldier, an Army Tanker who served in combat in WW2 for 81 straight days. Let’s ponder that for a moment. Most of us can’t imagine 1 day in combat. I served for 100 hours in combat in 1991, just 4 days or so. This guy was in the fight, every day, for 81 days. This is insane. None of us today knows what this means. Here’s his story. He is, by the way, considered the American Tank Ace of Aces. Many of you...

It seems the Ukrainian armed forces have lost their first Challenger 2 tank. A video that circulated online on Monday depicts what appears to be one of the 82nd Air Assault Brigade’s ex-British Challengers 2 in flames on a roadside outside Robotyne, in southern Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Oblast. The apparent first loss of a 69-ton, four-person Challenger 2, out of 14 that the United Kingdom pledged to the Ukrainian war effort back in January, comes just days after the Ukrainian defense ministry highlighted the tank in a video interview with an 82nd Brigade trooper.

Threads, the new “Twitter killer” app rolled out by Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, has surpassed 100 million users in less than a week while Elon Musk’s micro-blogging site has seen traffic “tanking,” according to a tech executive. The initial burst of success for Threads has fueled a war of words between Musk and Zuckerberg. The Twitter boss referred to his tech rival as a “cuck” and challenged him to a “d–k measuring contest” over the weekend. Not only have users been signing up to Threads through their Instagram accounts, but they have also been posting prolifically. Since the system went...

The service is returning to its roots as an island-hopping tornado to face off against Russia and China. The U.S. Marine Corps is in the process of reinventing itself to deal with future threats . . . and future budgets. The service is concentrating on island and littoral missions, and going lighter and more mobile as a result. The plan, Force Design 2030, aims to make the Corps an indispensable tool in America’s toolbox. The U.S. Marine Corps is undergoing its biggest reorganization in decades, slimming down and chopping weapon systems, such as tanks and howitzers, in an effort to...

In remarks at a fundraiser in California where he was boasting of his valor in the shooting down of a Chinese spy balloon, President Biden called China's President Xi Jinping a "dictator for being upset that I thwarted his espionage gambit. Given the economic difficulties his country is having he should not be provoking me." Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning called Biden's remarks "extremely absurd and irresponsible. All nations collect intelligence on their adversaries. The United States is no respecter of the privacy of other nations. The scope of their spying is global. It even includes spying on its...

While the scale of Ukrainian battlefield losses of Western-built tanks claimed by invading Russia will obviously be taken with a pinch of salt, Kyiv is nevertheless asking Germany to send more armour east. Leopard 2 tanks are worth “its weight in gold for the decisive offensive” and Germany should ship more of them to the front lines, so says former ambassador to Germany now working to drum up deliveries of equipment from abroad Andrij Melnyk. He said, per Germany’s Tagespiegel: “The Ukrainian army most urgently needs many more Western battle tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and other armoured vehicles”. Counteroffensive: Western...

Ukraine is ramping up for its highly anticipated spring offensive, powered by a huge arsenal of tanks and other weapons being delivered by Western allies, along with newly organized brigades. “The frontline is priority number one. We are also actively preparing new brigades and units that will show themselves at the front,” President Volodymyr Zelensky said in a video address. “Everyone in Ukraine must understand that the main task of the state is the de-occupation of our territories, the return of our lands and our people from Russian captivity.”

The United States is ready to begin training Ukraine forces on how to use and maintain donated Abrams tanks as it continues to fast track efforts to get them onto the battlefield against Russia, U.S. officials said Friday. According to officials cited by AP, 31 main battle tanks will arrive at Grafenwoehr Training Area in Germany early in May and the troops will begin 10 weeks of training soon after. The heavy armor will not be the examples given to Ukraine as it fights against Russia’s invasion. Instead, another 31 M1A1 battle tanks are being refurbished in the U.S. and...

Thanks to a shipping label on the barrel of the main gun of a Russian T-90A tank that wound up at a Louisiana truck stop, we now have an idea where it came from and where it may have been headed before the truck hauling it broke down Tuesday night, leaving it sitting at Peto's Travel Center and Casino. You can read our original story on the mysterious tank in question here. The shipping label, photographs of which were shared with us by Louisiana resident John Phelps, shows it was sent from an organization called the “multinational assessment field team”...

Work on overhauling T-64 tanks has started at the Polish arms plant Bumar-Labędy as part of the agreement between the Polish arms concern Polska Grupa Zbrojeniowa (PGZ) and Ukroboronprom [Ukraine’s Defence Industry – ed.]. Cooperation in the maintenance of T-72 and PT-91 tanks, which were transferred to Ukraine by Poland, is also planned in the long term. The possibility of joint work on the maintenance of Leopard 2 tanks, which were transferred to Ukraine by the international coalition, is also being considered.

No country in the world had more of tanks than Russia. But after a year of all-out war in Ukraine, analysts believe Putin may have lost up to two thirds of his tanks in the largest obliteration of Russian armour since World War Two. This is the story of how the world’s largest tank army was decimated on the killing fields of Ukraine, and what it means for the future of the war. Video @ the link.

Ukrainian tank destroys Russian trenches after surviving near miss. A Ukrainian tank is seen destroying Russian trenches after it nearly missed getting hit by a Russian anti tank missile on the frontline. Ukrainian soldiers later appear and successfully capture the tactical point.

The 18 Leopard 2 battle tanks pledged by Germany to support Ukraine in its war against Russia have arrived in Ukraine, the German Defence Ministry said on Monday. Germany agreed in January to supply the tanks, regarded as among the best in the West's arsenal, overcoming misgivings about sending heavy weaponry that Kyiv says is crucial to defeat Russia's invasion but Moscow casts as a dangerous provocation. "I'm sure that they can make a decisive contribution on the front," German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius said in a tweet. Besides the 18 tanks, 40 German Marder infantry fighting vehicles, and two...