The permanent scandal shaking the Russian defense industry and the Russian military department in connection with the procurement of new armored vehicles reached its climax after the statement by the Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces Alexander Postnikov about the obsolescence of the samples offered by our industry. After that, the search for a common language became inevitable. How successful it will be and where are the roots of the current critical situation in the domestic tank building?
There is no sadder story in the world …
Problems with the fleet of domestic main battle tanks did not arise yesterday - the fundamental shortcomings of the T-72, from which the T-90 actually traces its pedigree, were understood by specialists even before the collapse of the Soviet Union, and work on the creation of a new generation MBT began already in the 80s … Part of the flaws - an outdated engine (the development of the legendary V-2, which was on the BT-7M, T-34 and KV tanks), transmission, lag in the capabilities of sighting equipment and avionics could be eliminated "with little blood": by developing new units. However, a number of vices, namely, poor survival of the crew in case of armor penetration, tightness inside the vehicle, entailing increased fatigue of tankers, and other features determined by the layout and size of the "seventy-second", required drastic measures. It was necessary to design a new tank, with a different approach to its layout and other weight and size restrictions.
It was impossible to get a new MBT from the defense industry in the 90s - the death of the Soviet superpower buried these plans, like many other projects, but the study of the operating experience and combat use of existing vehicles, their advantages and disadvantages continued. The actions of our troops in Afghanistan and Chechnya, the Iran-Iraq war and the campaigns in the Persian Gulf provided a wealth of valuable information.
By the end of the 90s, it became clear that Soviet tanks intended for "throwing to the English Channel" in the event of World War III were not very good in conditions of local conflicts. At the same time, it was the fundamental layout flaws that came to the fore - the low survival rate of the crew and its increased fatigue due to the dense layout of the vehicle.
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Since 2015, a new main tank will appear in the Armed Forces with fundamentally new tactical and technical"
characteristics"
In addition, in the face of a catastrophic reduction in military spending, one more flaw turned out to be very significant: Soviet tanks, in comparison with Western peers, had the worst modernization potential. A radical increase in technical characteristics, as in the modernization of the M1 Abrams to the M1A1 and M1A2 variants or in the creation of the later modifications of the Leopard 2 - 2A5, 2A6 and 2A7, required much more effort for domestic vehicles.
These shortcomings were exacerbated by the huge "species diversity" of the Russian tank fleet inherited from the USSR. Tens of thousands of tanks of various types, which are in storage bases with no hope of ever getting into service, have hung dead on the RF Ministry of Defense.
… Than a story about the Central Committee
The Russian Federation owed these reserves to the specifics of the Soviet defense industry management system. The "industrial lobby", whose influence grew all the years after the victorious end of the Great Patriotic War and reached its peak after Dmitry Ustinov took the post of Defense Minister, actually pushed the military away from decision-making in the field of weapons production.
The consequence of this approach was the variety of platforms in service - by 1991, the Soviet army simultaneously operated the T-54/55, T-62, T-64, T-72, T-80. At the same time, the variants of each model multiplied: for example, there was an Omsk T-80U with a gas turbine engine and a Kharkov T-80UD with an opposed diesel engine. Many veterans of the defense industry recall this time with nostalgia, extolling the importance of having several independent directions for the development of military equipment. The military, especially those who had to send three types of tanks incompatible in terms of spare parts to the exercises in parts of the same division, react to these memories mostly not too politely, and, as usual, no one asked the opinions of the financiers.
With all this presence, something had to be done. The T-72 was chosen as the main platform of the Russian army. This step was predetermined by the higher cost of the Omsk T-80U gas turbine unit and the increased requirements of this tank to the qualifications of the personnel. And in the conditions of the economic catastrophe of the first half of the 90s, the Ural car was gaining additional points.
The decision in her favor did not mean the immediate removal of the T-80 from service - these tanks remain in service now, but the development of the platform has practically stopped. Another loser was the "object 187", also created on the basis of the T-72 and, in the opinion of a number of experts, significantly superior to the "object 188" - the future T-90. The reasons for choosing "Object 188" are still not known exactly, but the main reason is the price of the car.
The T-90 went into production in 1993. True, the word "series" will probably be too loud: in the first years of production (1993-1995), the Russian army received no more than 120 vehicles, after which the production of the "ninetieth" for its own Ground Forces stalled for nine years. In the subsequent period, the "military" part of the UVZ survived by exporting tanks, primarily to India.
Too expensive and complicated
A lot has already been said about the "object 195", aka T-95, but the main moments of this story should still be refreshed in memory. Work on a fundamentally new tank for the Russian Armed Forces resumed in the early 2000s, almost at the same time that purchases of the T-90 began again.
The T-95 is equipped with an uninhabited turret, and the crew of the vehicle is housed in an armored capsule, separated from the turret and automatic loader. This arrangement was supposed to dramatically increase the survivability of the crew in the event of armor penetration, eliminating one of the main drawbacks of Soviet tanks.
Collage by Andrey Sedykh
Firepower also increased due to the installation of a 152-mm gun. The mass of the tank, according to information released by the media, exceeded 60 tons, which required the creation of an appropriate engine.
Taking into account the time, the requirements for the MBT equipment were formulated, which in modern conditions should interact with other units on the battlefield, receiving and transmitting information in real time. The tank's security and firepower make it a natural "center" of the battle formation, which determined the high demands for communication and control systems and, of course, for the qualifications of the crew.
The characteristics and cost of the T-95 ultimately influenced its fate - in the current conditions, the implementation of this project has become an impossible task for the Russian industry, and the price of the machine turned out to be prohibitive. A promising tank was to be created anew, taking into account the state of the domestic defense industry and the capabilities of the country's economy. It will be discussed below.
Passion for the T-90
Meanwhile, starting in 2004, the T-90 again went into series for the Russian Armed Forces. At first, they received one at a time, and then, since 2007, two battalion sets each year. There was also an upgrade of old vehicles by overhaul with elements of modernization of T-72 tanks, which were assigned the T-72BA index.
Around 2007, the Defense Ministry's claims to the T-90 were first made public for the first time. First of all, the military was not satisfied with the growing price of the car and the preservation of the previously mentioned shortcomings of the tank. Manufacturers, for their part, attributed the increase in cost to low-volume production, higher prices for raw materials and components. However, if the second factor really took place, then the first was designed to mislead the public: only the volume of production of the T-90 for export in 2001–2011 approached 900 vehicles, and taking into account the internal order, it amounted to about 1300 units, and we can talk about small series here at least incorrect. Over the past 10 years, the T-90 has been the largest production main battle tank in the world.
Some of the T-90's shortcomings were eliminated: a new welded turret (inherited from Object 187) significantly increased the vehicle's security, and French thermal imagers significantly increased the tank's ability to detect targets on the battlefield. At the same time, there were still claims to communication and control systems, to the capabilities of dynamic protection, and finally, to the overall quality of MBT production. In part, these shortcomings were also recognized by the management of Uralvagonzavod, which expressed complaints about the components received from subcontractors, which had a serious negative impact on the state of the final product.
Nevertheless, the increase in the price of the T-90 and the preservation of the appearance of the vehicle as a whole led to the fact that in 2010 the Russian Ministry of Defense decided to refuse to purchase this tank in its current form. The scandal that had previously smoldered on the pages of the press broke out no worse than the forest fires that engulfed Russia that hot summer. Gasoline was added to the fire by the fact that it was not only the T-90 that became the subject of the dispute: the military made serious claims to almost the entire line of equipment and weapons of the Ground Forces. From the camp of industry representatives, Anatoly Serdyukov's subordinates were accused of almost maliciously undermining the country's defense capability and of total incompetence. In turn, the heads of the military department argued that the defense industry was wasting the appropriations allocated to it without benefit, while, as part of a new approach to equipping the army, they declared their readiness to purchase foreign weapons.
The apotheosis of the scandal was the above-mentioned demarche of the Commander-in-Chief of the Ground Forces, who said that modern Russian tanks are inferior in their capabilities to the machines of NATO countries, and often China, being, in addition, unjustifiably expensive. The statement made at a meeting of the Federation Council in the heat of the controversy was not intended for the press, but got into the press and the flames soared to the skies.
News about "Armata"
At the end of April, a round table was held in Moscow with the participation of representatives of the defense industry and military experts who discussed the situation with the T-90. Among other speeches, the greatest interest was aroused by the words of Lieutenant General Yuri Kovalenko, former first deputy head of the Main Armored Directorate of the Russian Ministry of Defense. He confirmed the fact of the creation in the Russian Federation of a new main battle tank under the code "Armata", representing the adaptation of the latest developments in this area to the capabilities of the Russian industry.
"Since 2015, the Armed Forces will have a new main tank with fundamentally new tactical and technical characteristics, with a new automatic ammunition supply, with the placement of the crew in an armored capsule, with the removal of ammunition from the fighting compartment," General Kovalenko said. Among other innovations, he noted the increased capacity of the automatic loader, which will contain not 22, but 32 shells for various purposes.
As an intermediate solution, the industry offers the T-90AM tank, which is to be demonstrated at an exhibition in Nizhny Tagil this summer. The next modification of the T-90 will receive, as expected, a new turret with ammunition removed outside the fighting compartment, which will significantly increase the survivability of the vehicle. The tight layout of the tank, low ergonomics, insufficient elevation / depression angles of the gun will, apparently, be corrected with the adoption of the "Armata".
Why army MBT?
Does it make sense to invest in the development of the T-90 and other machines? This question is regularly asked not only by ordinary people, but also by some representatives of the expert community, who claim that today the importance of tanks has come to naught. However, despite regular attempts to "bury" MBT, and even armored combat vehicles as a class, the importance of this technology is only growing.
“The experience of recent military conflicts has clearly demonstrated that tanks retain the position of the backbone of any significant army and play in many ways a decisive role on the battlefield. Moreover, in connection with the development of the "mine war" and the improvement of anti-tank weapons, there is now a kind of "renaissance of armor," says Ruslan Pukhov, director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies. - Today we can talk about the beginning of a new stage in the development of heavy BTT, associated with the advancement of security requirements, achieved by the development of both constructive protection and passive and active protection systems. At the same time, a significant place is occupied by the adaptation of the design of tanks to operations in urbanized zones, as a result of which requirements arose for providing all-round protection, specific development of observation and fire control systems, equipping with auxiliary weapons, etc."
Commenting on the words of the expert, we can add that the reduction in the MBT fleet in all countries of the world has only increased the requirements for the capabilities of each individual machine, the value of which has increased dramatically. Under these conditions, thousands of "tank hordes" in warehouses in Siberian forests or Arizona sands are of less and less importance. An increasingly important role is played by the ability to create a modern machine that is able to operate on the battlefield and equally effectively perform tasks in conditions of both a local conflict and a major war. The new modification of the T-90 will be demonstrated this summer, and the Armata in the coming years. Soon we will receive an answer to the question whether Russia will be able to create such a machine on its own.
