They will be stripped down and likely A1 models.
The crews won’t be trained or marginally trained and these machines need folks specifically trained on their use.
Knowing how we do things, we’ll give the Ukrainians a 2 week crash course on how to operate them...
There is no logistics or maintenance in place for them. These are complex machines that require folks trained on how to maintain them and this is where the fact that the M1 is turbine powered is a disadvantage. It’s not a diesel where you can easily find folks that have some idea of what to do.
Turbines are generally speaking an advantage contrary to what some of the idiots out there “believe.” The turbine is quieter, MORE efficient under load, much lighter for comparable HP and Torque, does well in high and low temperatures (it don’t care if it’s 120F or -70F, it’ll start and run, easily. The turbine is a true multi-fuel, while the diesel is not (JP4, JP7, JP8, diesel, kerosene, auto pump gasoline any grade). (((BUT))) Diesel mechanics are available almost everywhere, and even some of the parts of many of these diesels can be found off the shelf in some cases, or many of your allies use the same MTU and can help out... but good luck with an AGT1500 where production ceased in the late 90s and many of the parts are re-manufactured, only available through us, and you can’t find a mechanic to work on it.
They only have a few of them (30) and those will somehow have to be integrated with a bunch of other tanks. That is a logistics nightmare, i.e. different track, road wheels, etc.
Ukraine hardly has trained in combined and joint operations with these machines, there is no doctrine. All they have is a BN’s worth.
The Leo2 and M1 going to Ukraine is more symbolic that functional.
For the Ukraine side, I see this analogous to German “Wunderwaffen” at the end of WWII. People put a lot of faith into these dreams when things aren’t going well for them. It’s a moral lifeline for a sinking man.
Expect to see pictures of M1’s with Russians dancing on top of them, maybe even not damaged from combat but simply mired in mud or broken down and not recoverable. Will we send M88A1 Herks too? It’s in reality a 70 ton machine and need a recovery vehicle able to handle that. Doubt it. The point is, a tank like this stand alone isn’t going to do much and in fact might end up like many German Tiger II tanks captured in near perfect condition by Allied troops in WWII simply because they broke down or got stuck somewhere.
But sure, if it makes them feel good.
We have 8,000 of them, so I guess 30 won’t be missed.
Thanks for the technical information.
Yep. I was originally commissioned as an Armor officer back in '91. The Armor Officer Basic course was 4-5 months long, and that was to teach lieutenants how to maintain and fight an Abrams platoon as well as some other basic core stuff that wasn't specifically related to tank warfare (i.e. M9 pistol qualification, UCMJ, etc.)
Of course, even after that 4-5 month course, it was assumed the graduate would be going to an active unit for continued OJT, with an established organizational level motor pool and a direct support shop for higher level maintenance.
31 tanks is a battalion by old soviet organizational doctrine. Not sure about now, but when I was in, a US Armor battalion had 58 tanks (4 companies with 14 tanks, and two tanks in the battalion HQ for the commander and S3). The soviet line battalions had IIRC, 3 companies of 10 + the battalion commander for 31.
And the Tiger IIs were in the hands of at least a few experienced crews ac nd mechs. The IIs did quite a lot of damage during The Bulge. About the onlyGI vehicles that could put them down were the M36 TDs with the 90mm gun. So these Abrams should put a hurt on the Russians as long as they’re active, but damage, fuel, ammo will make their stay a short one. Someyhong like the rxperience of the TigerIsin Tunisia in Dec 43 to May 43.