sino-terminator in development?
Chinese infantry fighting vehicles
- Thread starter Broccoli
- Start date
In that case I'm really curious as to what's the caliber of the ZBD100's main gun
To be honest, I have serious doubts about the practicality of the Terminator. Compared with infantry fighting vehicles, the Terminator’s main advantage lies in its ability to continuously suppress enemy soft targets and lightly armored vehicles, but this advantage does not seem particularly important. What matters more are better sensors and a higher level of information integration.
Then I thought again: perhaps the Terminator’s real advantage is its ability to better protect other members of the Type 100 armored vehicle family that are equipped with vulnerable sensors. Enemy soft targets and lightly armored vehicles may be able to easily damage exposed sensors, so suppressing these targets could indirectly enhance the system’s situational awareness.
Then I thought again: perhaps the Terminator’s real advantage is its ability to better protect other members of the Type 100 armored vehicle family that are equipped with vulnerable sensors. Enemy soft targets and lightly armored vehicles may be able to easily damage exposed sensors, so suppressing these targets could indirectly enhance the system’s situational awareness.
Terminator mostly is a special case vehicle that Russians needed in Chechnya, they wanted a tank level armored vehicle that had a high angle of fire meaning 45 degree elevation to hit enemy fire positions, especially AT teams while in a urban setting.
Cause BMP-2 couldn't do the job.
So they wanted a tank with an AA gun on top of it , so when the convoy drives though a main road in a city , they have a quick respones option suppres infantry in elevated positions.
But that job now days is given to drones , also it can be solved by better combat info sharing though other assets, so I doubt is is for ground support role.
My guess is that the twin 30mm is for anti-air and anti muniation role that a tank compaion need now, they are just too much guided munation equivlents that you might run into, and sensor platforms with thermal sight that can see your ass glowing in from a KM away that evey platton need an air cover bubble of at least 2KM .
You might be right; it has some kind of radar integrated with it's RWS. Although if it's more anti-air focused I'd expect atleast a small dedicated search radar or EO ball.
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I do wonder how far PLA will take this platform, will it be similar to the FCS or will it be more limited in scope? If they do intend on mass adopting the Type 100 chassis, I think the most likely variant to appear after these would possibly be a SPG based on this chassis similar to the XM1203 and a true IFV variant, some other ones might be recon, command and SPAA. Recovery vehicle is also a possibility but IMO the heavier Type 99A chassis with wider tracks might prove more advantageous over the lighter Type 100 chassis.
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It just looks like a bit of a generic unmanned turret with APS mounts to me. I wouldn't definitively relate it to Type 100.
Pay attention to "happy duck faces"(sensor blocks). While they can indeed proliferate, as of yet this was exclusively a type 100 feature, lacking for instance on newest airborne vehicles(with whom it appears to share ATGM pack).
Another interesting detail is RCWS on top(hard to say with certainty, but it looks exactly like tank RCWS and not like radar on type 100 fire support vehicle). This pretty much rules out "heavy SPAAG" and indeed turns it into sort of Terminator.
Interesting detail is presense of turret basket - i.e. it's less likely to be alternative turret for type 100 fsv, and more likely to go into the tank.
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I am aware of those sensor blocks, and it is indeed my point that those elements at this stage shouldn't be viewed as exclusive to Type 100 family.
I expect elements of the Type 100 family to proliferate among other ground vehicle concepts in time; the airborne vehicles themselves are somewhat unique for the "new generation" of AFVs given their weight class.
OTOH the risks of associating this thing with Type 100 family (which by extension implies adoption by PLA), without corroborating indicators, may just end up creating more problems for us in future.