America is putting active protection on the tanks of three of our armored brigades, with other systems for Bradleys and Strykers. Strategypage looks at the systems and notes the origins:
Russia pioneered the development of these anti-missile systems. The first one, the Drozd, entered active service in 1983, mainly for defense against American ATGMs. These the Russians feared a great deal, as American troops had a lot of them, and the Russians knew these missiles (like TOW) worked.
Late in the Cold War, I recall that the objective for our heavy divisions was to have a thousand anti-tank weapons (tanks and heavy missiles, for the most part) each. On the narrow central front, the Russians had to launch a frontal assault on those "sponges" that would absorb and slaughter Soviet armor.
That works out to a hundred anti-tank weapons per battalion (9 battalions in 3 brigades plus an armored cavalry squadron).
With two tank companies and two mechanized infantry companies in missile-armed Bradleys per battalion, we have nearly 170 anti-tank weapons in three battalions in our armored brigade combat teams.
That doesn't count the ability of artillery to use precision rounds against armor, nor does it included anti-tank support from helicopters or Army drones.
But it still falls short of the 300 we should have with the old Cold War objective. And if tanks are more survivable with active protection and exotic passive armor, is even 300 anti-tank weapons per brigade enough?
Or is precision firepower delivered by aerial drones, fixed or rotary wing manned aircraft, and rocket or tube artillery going to provide the bulk of the anti-armor weapons that will blunt and stop an armored attack?
And how do our infantry brigades survive without the anti-tank capabilities of the Abrams and Bradleys that provide the bulk of anti-tank power in the armored brigades? Does the distant precision firepower make up for lightness? At least in firepower if not in survivability, of course.
Which makes it seem like heavy tanks and possibly heavy infantry fighting vehicles will be with us for a while longer.
I still just don't think that we can replace the heavy tank with a technologically advanced wonder tank (see page 28).
UPDATE: I made my case in "Look to Abrams Tanks to Support the Infantry," in the April 2018 edition of Army Magazine, for increasing the survivable tank-killing power of infantry brigades by attaching tank companies or battalions (or tank-mechanized infantry units) rather than searching for a new light "tank" to do the job. Now online.
