PLA Next Generation Main Battle Tank
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IIRC, all tanks have been relocated to Hokkaido and armored units on Honshu have been replaced with wheeled assault guns. Japan lacks the necessary rail infrastucture (narrow gauge tracks being one issue) to transport tanks unlike many other nations. Weight restrictions on bridges and tank transport trucks also pose logistical challenges that are circumvented with wheeled assault guns which can take advantage of existing road infrastructure.
Even Hokkaido isn't totally flat. But you are correct. It seems like the Type 10 is only deployed in Hokkaido. I thought otherwise.
Semantics. In the modern era, there are heavy mbts and light mbts. It is this distinction discussed in my post.
By the last sentence, are you implying a full scale American attack on China? Other than that, no way to send large quantities of modern quality combined arms units.
This is not within the scope of discussion, but China's strategy then would be based on hitting the logistics centers of the attackers and striking their ships, not engaging in maneuver warfare inside China with massive invader armor columns.
Although even in that scenario, having a light (Russian level) weight tank with low profile and high protection, helps picking off isolated enemy attack formations and also assist China's own breakthroughs in eventual amphibious counterattacks on US bases.
A T99A is as heavy as the Japanese Type 90 and with even more weight/per crew member than all but the heaviest nato tanks, it is not a light weight tank by any means nor has really much to do with Russia's lightweight, more offensive oriented tanks at all.
TerraN_EmpirE
Tyrant King
Bogus it is a term used improperly.
“Heavy tank” is a historical classification for a tank. It’s not a term that should be thrown around off hand. They traded mobility for heavy armor and a really big gun. By the 1950s however it was more or less defunct as improvements in suspension, engines and firepower meant that “medium” tanks became universal tanks.
Also remember we live in the era of ERA and modular armor systems so an MBT can be one weight at its base then moved up significantly. Challenger 2 is a prime example here. Its base weight is 64 tonnes. But full armor load it with everything and it’s pushing 75 tonnes.
Even an MBT as heavy as Challanger 2 can move as fast as a modern “light tank” and have similar capabilities of terrain crossing. The speed and firepower of an M1A2 MBT as well as its ability to cross country is actually on par if not superior to lighter vehicles of the same class in many cases. The only realistic exception being in strategic mobility. Bridges, Air and Amphibious transport. Yet even then it’s still not quite accurate as most of the users of those lighter tanks tend to have issues in those regards due to lack of repair or equipment.
The light classification is also obsolete. As it was a classification of a tank intended to serve for scouting. In the modern era the IFV absorbed that role. Today’s “light tanks” are assault guns really.
Farther When we talk about Abrams or Booker or US Vehicles something people forget is Metric vs Imperial. American Vehicles are generally listed in Imperial or Short tons where European and Asian vehicles are normally in Metric tons. The latest Abrams is actually closer to 66 metric tonnes.
Where the first generation Abrams was the same weight as K2 or Type 90.
M10 Booker is actually the same weight as the Chinese Type 15 of the same role. Also weight doesn’t mean protection. Lots of things on a vehicle can generate weight. For example the Mtu883 power pack on most European tanks as well as Turkish Altay and Korean K2 is twice the weight of the Abrams ATG 1500. Because of the dramatic changes of tank design over the last decades many tanks have excess weight in the form of obsolete mechanical parts or components like copper wire that you be lighter weight fiber optic cables today.
No I am pointing to actual buys and shipments to Taiwan! The M1A2T is part of Taiwanese procurement. They have over a hundred on order. F16V is on delivery, Taiwan is modernizing its indigenous military equipment and ordering missiles and drones. Though if China pushed the issue strategic ambiguity is getting thinner with the U.S. leadership saying we will assist more than it won’t.
It’s designed around the same kind of automatic loader, angles of depression and elevation. Although heavier then Russian tanks it’s not that different in design features and is dramatically different from the Japanese Type 90 or Korean K2 which have similar weights.
The line of Offensive vs Defensive tanks really is subjective.
Iraq had over a 100 T72s too. Unsupported tanks get rekt, especially in not that large numbers.
If US moves enough forces against China to matter, it will be taken as a full scale invasion and lead to direct war.
Otherwise, US simply isn't covertly gonna sneak in enough weapons to fight the overwhelming home advantage the PLA has in air and artillery, which means M1A2s on the ground are essentially blind armored pillboxes. Easy to destroy through combined arms.
The new lighter mbts are suitable for quickly being brought to help counterattacks and achieve break through, ideal for situations such as the above scenario.
Also wtf are you talking about on the last paragraph? So although being in different weight classes, having a completely different chassis, gun, drivetrain etc, having the same caliber and loader location (not even mechanism) makes them "not much different" from Russian tanks? By that logic, every single 120mm tank or every single hand loaded tank are "not much different". PLA have really different service requirements from what the USSR had, their tanks are as radically different as Leclerc are from Challenger 2... What kind of lazy bogus logic is it to lump apart 2 unrelated designs because both countries happened to be eastern bloc, even ignoring the fact that all of the T99s were built during a time China had worse relations with USSR than with US... I have no words.
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TerraN_EmpirE
Tyrant King
Which we see again and again in Syria and Ukraine. No argument. But that’s not what we were arguing about.
Again i was talking about Taiwanese military forces. Strategic ambiguity is the question of If China moves forces to take Taiwan in an Invasion. Which the U.S. has made an unclear line on its actual policy but statements from administration imply would result in a war between the two. Hence why they try to not play the game.
However you seem unaware that Taiwan has a military. That Abrams is slated to enter that military before this tank concept gets into production.
That’s just what any MBT could do assuming it’s supported and properly equipped.
Most modern MBT chassis are either Torsion Bar or Hydropneumatic. Type 99 is the former of them. Weight doesn’t really matter that much unless you are dealing with terrain that forces a question on it. Because just about all modern MBT have speed and ground pressure in the same range. The only differences are going to be acceleration, and reverse speed. The Type 99 Was designed around the same Caliber of gun and automatic loader aspects that place it in a position of where and how it’s used as a weapon.
Tank is tank!
MBT performs the same functions no matter the country. The differences between them are reflective of the differences in technology and doctrines of the armies that use them but overall they live in the same performance envelopes of automotive and kinetics. Whereas you see more differences in defensive systems and sensors/ communications.
And when Type 99 was built the USSR was a ghost. The 99 refers to the first appearance by calendar Year which was 1999 a full 8 years after the dissolution of the USSR. Unless I missed some name change from the Kremlin between last night and now.
It was designed at a time when relations between the Peoples Republic of China, the Russian Federation and United States of America were generally amicable but overall nebulous.
Found this by chance, a Canadian startup doing hybrid diesel electric trucks are visiting a Chinese supplier
At 6:40 in the video they briefly show a battery made for a tank.
We should perhaps not take the Tank part as gospel since many people with no military interest calls every armored vehicle they see a Tank.
At 6:40 in the video they briefly show a battery made for a tank.