Missiles vs Tank Guns: Why Guns are better!
Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGM) instead of a regular tank gun? There were some projects like the M551 Sheridan and M60A2 that replaced the regular tank gun. Meanwhile the Soviets went for a regular tank gun that could also fire ATGMs, what are the benefits and drawbacks of missiles? Why didn't they prevail? How do missiles like the TOW, AT-3 Sagger, NLAW, Javelin and others compare to tank guns in capabilities, complexity, range and other factors?
Disclaimer: I was invited by the Panzermuseum Munster in 2019 & 2020.
English Channel of the Panzermuseum: / germantankmuseum
German Channel of the Panzermuseum: / daspanzermuseum
Cover Design by vonKickass. Modified screenshot from War Thunder.
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» SOURCES «
Ogorkiewicz, Richard M.: Tanks: 100 Years of Evolution. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2015.
Ogorkiewicz, Richard M.: Technology of Tanks I. Jane’s Information Group: Coulsdon, Surrey, UK, 1991.
Ogorkiewicz, Richard M.: Technology of Tanks II. Jane’s Information Group: Coulsdon, Surrey, UK, 1991.
Zaloga, Steven J.: T-62 Main Battle Tank, 1965-2005. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2009.
Zaloga, Steven J.: T-80 Standard Tank: The Soviet Army’s Last Armored Champion. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2009.
Zaloga, Steven J.: T-90 Standard Tank: The First Tank of the New Russia. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2018.
Zaloga, Steve: T-64 Battle Tank: The Cold War’s most Secret Tank. Osprey Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2015.
Hilmes, Rolf: Meilensteine der Panzerentwicklung Panzerkonzepte und Baugruppentechnologie. Motorbuch Verlag: Stuttgart, Germany, 2020.
Moran, Nicholas: A Visit to the US Army Heavy Weapons Leaders' Course, 2021 • A Visit to the US Army...
tanks-encyclopedia.com/coldwa...
• Inside the Chieftain's...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HOT_(mi...)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-ta...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS.11
#ATGM,#MissilesVsGuns,#TankGuns
Your choice of icon to illustrate the “top attack” made me laugh hard enough to spit my drink. Well played!
Agreed. The subsonic icon was also awesome :)
Thank you, I spent quite some extra time to make it.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized Your time was well spent. ^^
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized As a Javelin Gunner, I appreciated the Top Attack icon. 🤣👍
@@tyree9055 did anyone made this an unofficial symbol of the Javelin units yet?
It is worth noting some more recent developments. Though not accepted for service yet, the XM111 is a guided conventionally launched projectile fired from the 120mm cannon. It comes in two variants, one with a KE penetrator, the other with a shaped charge. It was designed for both line of sight and indirect fire, testing gained a hit at over 8.5km. (The M1 normally isn't expected to engage much over 4km). Something else worth noting is that you can put a missile on anything, but if you want a proper accurate tank gun, you need something heavy enough to mount it, and hopefully tough enough to take what comes back the other way. So pretty much for a tank gun's firepower, you need a tank, but for a missile's firepower, you can use anything-but-a-tank.
? XM111 was cancelled more than a decade ago.
@@kylesenior Which is why it has not entered service! But it is an example of extant technology which combines the capability of a missile with the speed and ease of a conventional round. The issue is that there seems to be no need for it, not that it doesn't seem to work, which is an interesting addition to the arguments in this video.
Is a source allowed to argue with the video? And what were u more deadly with a tow or 120mm
I thought that was for anti-heli work anyway.
This sounds like a redo of the old SADARM round that was going to make armour weak at the knees back in the 70s. Never really went into service.
Good video! A couple of other factors to consider: Missiles tend to be more fragile than tank rounds. Rounds can stand more bouncing around and mis-handling in armored vehicles than can missiles. Missles tend to be bulkier than tank rounds (particularly while in their shipping containers) thus potentially limiting the shooting capacity in tanks.
Solid rocket motors turning into bombs from being mishandled is scary
Javelin is a prime example. Even in its carry container with special shock absorbing rings around it the soldier can easily make it inoperable if he simply stumbles and bumps the container against the ground or say a tree. That's not going to happen with a HEAT or APFSDS tank shell.
@@tommihommi1 which happened to the Dutch army during operations in Yugoslavia. The field commander upon receiving his Dragon missiles found that the propellant charges on ALL of them were cracked, rendering the missiles more dangerous to his own troops than to Serbian tanks and APCs. The same was true for most of his LAW rockets and even his mortar shells. This left the Dutch batallion in Yugoslavia without any anti-armour capability at all and inevitably led to the failure of their mission . The culprit was poor maintenance and storage under incorrect conditions in the Dutch war supply warehouses, while never publicly stated I guess the entire Dutch munitions stockpile was probably similarly affected.
I also love the content but I think it needs some music
I'm on the other side of this. The gun itself is a better weapon. The problem is there big and need transport, so you make them mobile. But you want them protected, so they weigh a lot with armour, so the mobile platform grows giant and all the gadgets and equipment on the tank and training the crew is super $$$ . the problem is no matter how tough you make it, the other side will build a handheld missile 1 50 year old guy like me can fire smoking a cigarette destroying the tank after 30 minutes playing the video game version for training. Tanks also are more vulnerable to be destroyed from the air more then ever with drones. Rommell knew in ww2 planes had made large formations impossible unless you owned the skies. Artillery, the oldest take destroyer since ww1, is so accurate, 1 or 2 guns can do some real damage to tank formations as we have seen some video coming from Ukraine. Israel had problems with the first wire guilded missiles in the Sinai. Bazooka and panzerfoust had several upgrades in ww2 and proved deadly thats how quickly war changes.
Also I think that tank guns are there for the higher versatility; tanks often shoot at structures/buildings in infantry support, and here the ability to shoot HE is very important.
>structures/buildings i.e. ukrainian hospitals and apartment buildings
Shooting guided ATGM at a big statistic target is such a waste of money is the biggest reason i think.
Why can’t you use an HE missile for the same thing?
@@Rokaize Missiles are kind of expensive to just shoot them at buildings all the time.
@@Rokaize A tank shell can cost from a few hundred dollars, or the local equivalent, to a few thousand, maybe even into the low tens of thousands for a DU round (uranium is a very hard metal, and thus an absolute sod to work with, as well as needing considerable additional safety measures), and can reach out to maybe 3 or 4 miles, although you're unlikely to hit anything other than a large stationary target at the far end of that range. An NLAW might make 1 mile under ideal circumstances, and costs £20,000. A Javelin has a similar max range to the tank shell, but costs about £200,000
Presumably missiles are also more vulnerable to active defence systems too due to their slower speed and relative complexity/fragility
That is just with the commonly-available rocket motor tech, there is some newer rocket motors that would vastly improve missile speed, the problem is _mass production_ and that's the real problem with mil-tech.
Active defence does not makes the tank impervious to a missile
@@darugdawg2453 I think It does, very few missiles are capable of jamming the APS detection to get a direct hit. APS is overpowered as hell, Trophy APS even stops Javelins. There are probably blind spots in the rear or you could fire an RPG from a very high position down into the tanks roof but it would need to be very close for that. About US army testing Trophy: ...the U.S Army has reported similar success in tests. “I tried to kill the Abrams tank with ATGM 48 times and failed, despite the fact that some of them were supersonic,” said US Army Col. Glenn Dean.
@@darugdawg2453 as with anything in the realm of modern industrial warfare not being impervious is irrelevant. Everything is about probabilities & cost. Active defense lowers effective hit probability & that's all that matters. Sure you can always go with higher speeds, better guidence, better tech, but that has an added cost too. Anything that reduces the probability of a fast & speedy kill while increasing the cost of achieving a given hit probability is a problem.
Not against the slower, more fragile HEAT rounds
Important to keep in mind as well that MBTs are not only designed to fight other tanks, but also support infantry or other vehicles. That may require the use of HE or smoke rounds. Missile systems to deliver those ammunitions would take too much room to be any useful.
yes, that's why it is so bad idea for politicians to tell army what they need to buy or where they are "best" used. You get tank barrel launched missiles or even worse ATGM Carriers liek IT-1, or Gallipoli campaign ... or as with any other war, Ukraine.
I think he didn't bring it up because all of his example (M551,M60A2,T-64,T-90) already pack powerful punch against infantry. So only the AT capability are used instead. Remember that he is talking about gun-launched ATGM and not ATGM in general.
But couldn't the shells designed to destroy tanks simply be replaced by ATGMs and then leave a supply of HE and Smoke shells?
@@PhilipDK5800 Usually the have different dimensions, also APDSFS is much cheaper than missile 10 fold or more. Missile is much more finicky. They need to be checked more often for defect, especially on rocket engine part. etc. Since currently they give no advantage to tank, while having many disadvantages, no not really
@@klonik79 Makes sense! :)
I wasn't an assaultman [Javelin] or a TOW gunner in the US Marines, but my buddies who were said they were trained to [ideally] trigger two additional smoke/demo explosions when firing so a tank crew had to choose among the 3 choices
You mean to obscure their position with two other smoke clouds, that could be launch points? Or to protect the missile?
@@willtaylor9309 probably obscure position of launch point, but if the enemy tank has APS system, the Javelin will be neutralized and the approximate position of launch will be shown to the crew. But the only armies I know that use APS on their tanks and are capable of neutralizing Javelins are US and Israel's army. (they use the same Trophy APS system)
@@Welterino note that a lot of US abrams tanks aren't even equipped with trophy APS systems.
@@willtaylor9309 yes to obscure position. I think they were using Dragons at the time in addition to TOWs, a very slow going ATGM that was wire guided iirc
@@Archeangelous Yeah, tactics for Dragon and TOW were much different than modern NLAW and Javelins.
8:10 "Top-Attack ATGMs" This quality analysis is why I watch this channel.
I think they also wanted to mount anti-tank missiles on other types of armored vehicles that could not support big guns, like the Bradley. Missiles do not have that huge recoil.
Yeah.
@@MilitaryHistoryVisualized You can mount a missile on a rowboat, or an anti tank canoe. You cant swim a gun across a river. A tank round is likely better against more things than a missile though. A heat round is cheaper to shoot at a bunker or building. You can fire smoke rounds or flairs from a gun, though I am not sure anyone does. Its also far cheaper to train with real ammunition on a gun than with a missile.
@@scottmccullough8030 I am also surprised that folks forget one of the biggest factors in weapon choice Ammunition and logistics. I can print tank shells in their thousands. But anti tank missiles need to be carefully assembled and checked, with delicate electronics that can render the weapon utterly useless. And most missile weapons are larger than tank shells, and when attacking we note there were problems for the KV tanks from world war 2 due to having small ammunition stowage capacity! Modern ammo remains large and limited, if you sacrifice yet more ammunition for a bigger missile you will need to retreat to a ammo truck after even less time fighting on a battlefield!
You can use a recoiless gun to handle recoil, but weight would still be a issue
@@user-pq4by2rq9y you do note that recoilless weapons require a mechanism to discharge sufficient propellant to balance out the kinetic energy of the shell being fired? So they usually have worse back blast than missile weapons? And are poorly suited to confined spaces, like inside a turret. I wonder just how big a blank Shell you might need to balance out a HVAP type round.
Khrushchev was a big fan of missiles and rockets - see the Cuban Missile Crisis & the Space Race. Many Soviet rocket designers were Ukrainian (Khrushchev lived in Donbas as a child and governed Ukraine prior to WWII) and familiar to him. It was also a way he could take leadership of military matters within the Soviet Union, like Stalin but with a more progressive, modern approach (these opinions are stated in his autobiography)
"Khrushchev was a big fan of missiles and rockets - see the Cuban Missile Crisis" You mean the Soviet response to the US putting missiles in Turkey? The ones that were quietly removed in agreement with the Soviets taking out the missiles in Cuba?
@@princeofcupspoc9073 That is what few Americans were aware of at the time, US missiles in Turkey. Their existence was not disclosed until years later. The entire Cuban Missile Crisis was the result of a misstep by JFK. He had campaigned on a missile gap. In reality, the missile gap was 17:1 in favor of the U.S. McNamara told him this upon the start of the new administration. Rather than admit error, JFK ordered the construction of 500 more ICBMs. This convinced Khrushchev that the Americans were going for first strike capability, which realistically they already had. JFK himself knew nothing about the US missiles in Turkey until told by his advisors of their existence.
Khrushcev did such a great job in Cuba, they gave him a retirement dacha, and let him bask in the glory they heaped on him....right?
@@scottkrater2131 He got a nice big garden to grow things in. A better retirement deal than Malenkov or Kaganovich I think
@@MsZeeZed and that's the truth.
Another point to consider is that the line of sight might no always be clear. An APFSDS will go through a bush or a small wall without deviating or loosing too much penetration, while a missile will probably get deviated by the bush and stopped by the wall
Missiles can go over the obstacle, though. I don't think it's practical quite yet, but I doubt there will be much longer before guided missiles are increasingly the obvious choice.
Missile can deal with bushes. Not wall. Also you will not risk shooting AP throught a wall cause you don't know what's behind.
@@m0nkEz The advantage of conventional high velocity projectile is the low time between fire and impact. And there is no realistic way to intercept them, passive or active system. Yes, it is possible with missile, but size of missile required to reach the same velocity would be stuff like losat, very big and limited in carrying capacity.
@@jintsuubest9331 I think you very much would put an AP round through a wall if you suspected an enemy tank was behind it.
@@jintsuubest9331 There were tank kills in WWII from shooting right through buildings at one another. So I don't think that'll stop anyone from firing through your house at the enemy vehicle on the other side of it. Only some bureaucratic ass-kisser might be stopped by such a philosophy, but not anyone experience in warfare.
Love the Soviet Womble reference for "Fire and Forget".
15:40 a wild SovietWomble appears! How did his pictogram made it into this video?!
I was like is there a reference I'm missing, cause I've watched most of his KZhead stuff more than one and I couldn't think of anything?
@@JakeInaitor5000 Me neither... might be just a funny coincidence. I don't get it either and I would consider myself well versed in the womble madness.
it's a recurring joke in MHV. not often, but womble's icon is usually attributed to generally wonky things.
Ah thx, I was really wondering how he endet up there :D I like it !
Interesting video. However, I would like to point out that one of the main reasons to use a gun-fired ATGM is to compensate for the fact that Soviet-type tanks have a much lower silhouette and so do their guns. Overall they have a narrower range for elevation and depression. ATGMs don't care. They'll climb or dive where you guide them. This means, for example, they can be fired from the top of a hill at targets downhill where cannons wouldn't have a firing solution. For this same reason, they can be fired at helicopters with a greater chance of success than tank shells would. (In theory.) Still, I find that most of the points in the video concerning the advantages and disadvantages of ATGMs vs shells are valid, I would like to put a little caveat on the travel time difference. In a tank vs tank scenario, even if there is a 1000 m/s difference. The humans operating the target vehicle will still, most likely, be unable to make their 50+ tons vehicle "dodge" the missile in time even if they are aware it is coming. Furthermore. You can correct the trajectory of an ATGM, you can't correct a shell in flight. In conclusion, the question 'Are missiles better than shells?' is just as relevant as the question: 'Is a sledgehammer better than a screwdriver?' Think of that what you will.
Agreed regarding physically dodging the missile. However, if they spot the incoming missile in time, it does increase their chance to pop smoke and disappear from the view.
This is not completely true, soviet gun launched atgms are laser beam riding and they require the main sight to aim at the target, gen 1 atgms like the malyutka can do that but not russian barrel launched ones
Excellent point. Never thought of this.
@@Ropetor are the later generation barrel launched atgms like Svir/Invar/Refleks-M exclusively tied to the main barrel sight? I would’ve thought they would’ve added the ability for the commander to guide it in.
@@fenriders7008 All russian tanks in service except t14 and t90M don't have a citv. They use the same unstabilized night vision sight from with from 1978. Commander in t72/t80 is almost blind with minimal hunter killer capability, the commander can override the traverse and point the gun to a target but the targeting needs to be done by the gunner, he has a monitor that allows him to watch trough the gunner sight and he has his own controls but no CITV Russian tanks mostly use the sosna-u gen 2 thermal sight with a laser rangefinder attached to it, they also have a sight called duplet as a secondary sight but it uses the same laser rangefinder as the main sight. Russian gun launch atgms are all laser beam riding and the only sight capable of emitting is the main sosna-u or pmn-t wich is another thermal seen in use by the T-80BVM
Excellent video as always Bernard! Was a pleasure to review the script and help out.
Thanks again!
Logistics is always the one point that gets missed any time someone comes up with a shiny thing... The very minor point that you may have missed is "how many rounds can you carry?" and once you fire those rounds/missiles off, how easy/hard is it to resupply? Missiles come in their own shipping containers which are extremely bulky, where as a pallet of tank rounds is a heavy but easy cargo unit.. Re-loading a tank with it's basic fire allotment is a well practiced routine for your tank crew... but a re-supply of a vehicle of replacement missiles is a much more complicated thing... Overall, the logistical support for the weapon system really makes it a not very good choice for an tank.
Yeah, something the navies forgets even more, considering VLS systems generally can only be reloaded at specialized ports
this long ago TOW/DRAGON repair tech loved this video. Just as an aside, a design flaw in the Dragon trainer made it very unlikely that any one live firing for the first time would get a hit. The simulator had a weight that shifted when the training blank was fired BUT it did NOT leave the training launcher, thus the weight on the gunner's shoulder never changed. So first live round fired the gunner would tend to rise as the 10 kilos of missile left his shoulder, often causing the missile to drop-if not bounce on it's flight path. I watched as EVERY DRagon round fired by a Ranger company did exactly that at Yakima firing center. Every shot missed the target train-even after a Master Sgt opted to jump on the trains engine to control the throttle.
My favorite parts of this video were the "Top-Attack ATGMs" (8:11) and the note that anti-tank missiles are still Subsonic (10:56).
Thank you for a nicely thorough but concise summation of this topic. Always enjoy your videos.
I mean, there were dedicated missile carriers like the Pereh in use and ATGMs are in frequent use as secondary armament for IFVs like the Bradley or Puma that simply don't have the space and carrying capacity for a full-blown 120 mm cannon.
I think the point stands that if your vehicle has the capabiity of carrying a gun you take that over Missiles.
@@brain_tonic True. Come to think of it there are vehicles like the M1128 and the Rooikat that have something akin to a MBT cannon mounted on a wheeled platform.
Great video as always, thanks.
Great topic! I've wondered about this for a long time.
8:10 You made my day. Highly anticipating the deployment of anti-tank battalions based on the bouncing-plumber tactic!
Great episode!
Well done and thank you!
Thank you for the excellent overview and content, very much worth the view.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Another thing we have to take into account is the types of countermeasures available against missiles vs. tank gun rounds. There are several types of active protection systems against ATGMs that can shoot down incoming missiles with something like an automated shotgun (e.g. Trophy, Arena), or use electronic warfare to interfere with the missile guidance. And this is in addition to various types of reactive armor. On the other hand, once a kinetic round leaves the tank gun, there is little you can do about it. Shotguns, smokescreens, and electronic baffles have no effect whatsoever on an incoming APFSDS round.
Very informative video, thank you! Did not expect the Mario/Womble icons. Well played, those got me good.
Glad you enjoyed!
Another superb presentation.
Many thanks!
Those tell tale exhaust trails, acceleration for shoot and scoot, munition size too. As usual, an interesting and well researched piece. Fire and forget weapons such as javelin and brimstone offer an interesting weapon for other vehicles. The long range Brimstone can hit 450 m/s. Moran's figure for TOW seems about right to me
Reminds me of the old "Sagger" drills back in the late 80s and early 90s. If you see a puff of smoke, the driver drives in a random zigzag pattern while the gunner fires in and around the puff of smoke. You done need to kill the sacred operator, just make him flinch and jerk the missile off course.
not so useful anymore, NLAW, Javelin, etc are fire and forget. NLAW procedure is to track target for 3secs and fire, it tries to predict where the vehicle will be in 5 secs. (it only has a 800m range, which is pretty short to be on the receiving end of a 125mm HE shell).
Forgot about those, but was 40 years ago
@@orbitalair2103 I believe the NLAW is not guided per se. It simply predicts a path based on prior movement. In theory, if a driver sees the launch, eratic maneuvers may evade the NLAW.
@@demonprinces17 It is still effective if the missile is not a guided fire and forget missile. The US TOW is still command controlled. Same for some Russian AT missiles. Many of them are beam riding.
1:40 I think a big reason why the US doesn't peruse gun launched Anti-Tank missiles anymore was the debacle that was the Shillelagh system soured them to the idea.
Odd, considering that the system showed the potential, just held back by technologies of the time.
+@@jamesharding3459+ It suffered from So Many problems that the Pentagon just chose to retire the platforms early than bother improving them after they Finally got a mediocre level of effectiveness that took Decades to achieve. Them trying to use caseless ammo for the gun rounds probably didn't help along with how in early models firing a shell would break the missile guidance components.
@@cnlbenmc True. But those were engineering problems, not inherent to the concept.
This guy is GREAT!!! His facts are impressive - numerous, on point, and INTERESTING!!! Thank you for your encyclopedic presentations!!!!
Thanks, that was really interesting.
while games can just come ever so close to reality, I have a clear preference for stabilized guns or at longer ganges even unstabilized gun systems over ATGMs because I always kinda feel betayed if i launch an ATGM, the enemy tank stops, laser range finds me and shoots/kills me and then dodges the missile... - quote from a War Thunder veteran, circa 2022, digitalised :D
i do absolutly agree, exept if im in the Wiesel 1A2, then no one sees me in the first place, that little thing is a wild Wiesel!
In real life there's a slightly longer delay on the target tank shooting back and dodging, because only its commander or maybe gunner spots the missile first, and then he has to deliver the order to gtfo to the driver, and try to maybe guide the gunner to aim back at were the missile came from. Source: I did my millitary service as a CV9030 gunner
Its a game bud. Relax )
Brit ATGM carrier like striker and swingfire Allan also launch while hidden like the Wiesel, just with much worse missiles.
@Napalmratte also, give us more naval content dude! Keep up the great work, love the channel.
A thing to consider is also that vehicle mounted missiles are often mounted on the side or top of a tank, making them hard to reload and easy to damage. While light artilery fire could not take out the main gun, it can make external missile launchers inoperable
That subsonic icon is great
Has any army ever considered a gun-launched surface-to-air missile ? It would certainly be a very useful self-defense capability for tank formations, especially against attack helicopters. Also, love the Soviet Womble reference.
The LAHAT mentioned at the end of the video should also be able to deal with helis, I considered adding that line, but didn't.
@@Laotzu.Goldbug That was one of the advantages of the Soviet missile systems. Their missiles were much faster than the TOWs coming back the other way, and at long range, their accuracy simply couldn't guarantee a hit on a target. Of course, you'd need to hope you had a missile in the tube at the time.
...At the typical range from which an armoured vehicle would engage aircraft would a guided SAM have a significant advantage over, say, a proximity fuse round? (IIRC the M1 Abrams is capable of firing such ammo) Legitimate question, as a non-expert I am intrigued
Small quibble: you should have specified, in the tittle and in the beginning, that this video relates to guns vs missiles as _tank armament_ . Otherwise, a viewer comes in thinking it's an overall comparison.
8:05 the mario symbol for the top attack of Javellin was a really nice touch.
i love all the little icons,,< devil in the details,subsonic>
another factor to consider is equipment such as hard kill anti APS and missile dazzlers, which along with ERA are much more useful against shaped charges than AP rounds.
I love the little memes you put in your videos.
Informative, thanks. Luv the icons, inc. Super Mario attacks and unicorns are hybrids.
Glad you like them!
Quite interesting!
I have no idea why im not subscribed to you anymore but i just found you again
Vee-hikill! Love it, B’s accent is a delight to my ears.
Very good Thank You .
One has to appreciate the kind of gamechanger hollow charges were. During WW1 and most of WW2, AT warfare was "Fire a really hard projectile really, really fast". Speed was the one property for deciding if you made a kill. Shaped/Hollow charges do not need speed for killing. That is what makes them man portable and easily added to IFVs. Of course you can also put a S/H charge into a tank gun round. ATGMs not fired from the barrel are propably best left as secondary weapon for those vehicles that can bot fire modern AT rounds.
Also interesting is that tank-fired antitank rounds have largely reverted back to firing something hard and fast at the enemy instead of shaped charges lol
@@gimmethegepgun I think that was due to ERA developments getting too good. But right now ERA is pivoting towards AFDPS defeating too.
My shot at it: You can't shoot an ATGM in 2 seconds and you can't shoot 10 ATGMs in a minute.
Not with that attitude you can’t
Great video as always man! But I have to ask, what the hell is the visual for "Modern Fire & Forget" (at 15:35) trying to symbolize and/or conjure in my mind? haha It didn't even help when I fired up the bubler... well, it didn't help me figure out what the image was anyway haha =)
Thanks!
Thank you!
Shillelagh is pronounced "Shil-ay-lee". Throwing that in there before The Chieftain has a hernia ;)
Thank you for getting there first. My emotional support missile also thanks you.
I cant say exactly why but I feel like guns are more accurate, less proned to errors, more simple, cheaper, less fancy. More of a "boom, problem solved". Edit: in more accurate I ment close range, because they are faster, you can hit a target almost instantly. A missile uually needs some time to gain speed.
ya, thanks to fancy stabilizers, range finders and ballistic computers
And don't fail because some debree or branches were in the way
if I am having a normal gun. with a AT shell and discovers a enemy truck. I can allways fire. what I got and load a HE. it´s not like I am going to fire of something that is more expensive then the truck I am shooting at. I am kind of shure my commanders wouldn´t like if I use the firecontrol system to clear the breach from a rather expensive and rare missile.
@@alexxu3004 it's not like those tech aren't already commonplace by the 70s. A fancy FCS will always be more cost effective than throwing a sophisticated system onto the enemy everytime you fire
@@piscessoedroen ya, and ATGMs are common since 1950s too, long before any reliable high penetration apfsds came to world. also you overestimate how much missiles cost, a typical cold war era tank launched missile cost only about $5000-20000, and your modern day tank rounds cost 4000-10000 per shot anyway not including the cost of the high pressure gun barrel itself. You would think missile is more complicated but it's pretty much just a rocket-powered RC drone with explosives, on the other hand tank apfsds are super hardened material with high requirement of dimensional accuracy. cost is never the issue here.
Going into the video I'm going to say the one thing: Cost! People are talking alot now about the Javelin vs cold war tanks, completely forgetting that Javelins are 120,000 USD each and against tanks 2x older than the soldiers fighting.
I have always wondered about barrel erosion from the rocket propellant. In the Soviet system does the rocket have a small kick out charge like an infantry weapon or does it go full bore no pun intended with the main propulsion out the barrel? What if any residue might be left in the barrel? Is there any issue with increased barrel wear or pitting of metal?
As I understand it has a small kick charge that is just like the gun round propellant, just smaller, enough to get the round out of the tube, then the flight motor starts up. So theres no real difference in barrel or gun wear. Russian engineers and designers are generally pretty thoughtful about such things.
I am not knowledgeable about this so take my words with a grain of salt. But I would imagine the stresses of a rocket and a smoothbore cannon round would be comparable in overall "wear" but very different in terms of how. The cannon obviously would involve extremley high chamber pressures and velocities. In other words an extremley brief but intense impulse. The rocket would involve much lower pressure but much higher heat and much more propellant/residue left in the barrel which could be damaging. I'd certainly like to hear an engineer/knowledgable person's take
@@0sm1um76 Well going from orbitalair said you would use same principles of firing the round to make missiles leave the gun then missile would ignite its engines. So that would mean it would be no different then firing regular round.
@@0sm1um76 I used to make rocket motors. All tube launched missiles use small kick charges. Watch the javelin and nlaw videos closely at launch.
Soviet system barrel-fire missle do have a kick out charge, similar system like Israel LAHAT also have kick out charge
Two additional points, if I can. 1. A gun is more flexible. As soon as I pull the trigger I can traverse onto a new target as the round is "fire and forget" whereas most ATGMs require a beam rider or optical tracking (i.e. keep the gun pointing at the first tgt until you hit/miss). With the gun, you can shoot at targets at 12 O'clock, then 9 O'clock then 3 O'clock (esp. if the tank has CITV or similar Hunter/Killer equipment), while the missile is still looking at the 12 O'clock target. 2. The gun can fire many different natures (types) of ammunition (anti armour [Kinetic or Chemical], smoke, HE, Canister or similar anti personnel rounds, ...). Having only an ATGM forces you to shoot at say a truck with an ATGM rather than say HE.
While I can't say anything about gun-launched ATGM missiles, but - for example - the RPG-7 shoulder-launcher can use several types of HEAT (normal and tandem), fragmentation and thermobaric ammunition. The reason why tanks don't carry multiple types of gun-launched missiles is that their gun-ammunition is already good enough for the task. As for shooting at trucks, Russian tanks usually have a heavy machine gun (12.7mm, similar to the US .50 caliber).
@@CalinCETERAS I was using a truck tgt as an example. Ideally you would use coax on transport. But there is no "smoke" ATGM, nor a Cannister ATGM, etc. This is one reason why the "ATGM only" (note only) option wasn't adopted.
I must strongly object to higher complexity require more training per default. Starting out with the GrG m/48 (Carl-Gustaf), it takes months of training to become proficient and reliably hit a moving target. First generation of missiles took weeks to learn how to effectively guide the missile to the desired impact point. Learning how to use Rb 56 Bill could be done in a week, while learning how to use a Javelin can be done in a couple of days. (Note that this does not include the tactical skills necessary, as to which firing positions to select, concealment and so forth). Another aspect not brought up is that after WWII, the main focus in gun munitions was HEAT, which has a much lower velocity making them far more difficult to correctly lead on moving targets at longer ranges. This trend was not changed until the 1970's with the long rod penetrators. These projectiles did not see the sharp decline in armour penetration over range as the previous kinetic penetrators had, and thus removed the need for chemical penetrators for long range engagements.
I'm curious whether there are any partially steerable gun rounds in development, like the ones proposed for sniper rifles. Basically tiny actuators on the tail that can slightly steer a round after it has been fired.
Possibly the best image to use mario for javelin top attacking atgm
Good points.
First: Brilliant Icon for Top Attack :) As well as for Subsonic :) With the Russian invasion of Ukraine I recently thought about this very question. Always interesting to see different nations come to differenty conculsions for differenty reasons. Thanks for the very well researched video. Good that you got some proper Video of the Panzerjägers together before the rearrangament. One point that I think you didnt make that will likely degrade the viability of ATGMS against the top of the line MBTs, will be or already is in some cases, the addition of a hard kill system like Trophy. As far as I could find out, those systems cant currently intercept APFSDS arrows and that should give the tank gun a comparative advantage for some time. Until the pendulume swings again.
I love this channel
Very good job.
Excellent video, as usual. Thank you for this analysis. There is nothing more fearsome and morale-boosting than to hear your own MBTs firing off high velocity 120 mm main gun rounds. Missiles are also a necessity to a well-rounded armed force do have their place too. This is especially being demonstrated against so-called well-protetced and ERA-clad Russian MBTs falling victim to infantry teams armed with Javelin, RPG, NLAW, and even Molotov cocktails. This is not one system that takes all types of questions, it is finding the balance and proper application of weapons and tactics to win a conflict.
Neat...so now let's cover tube artillery missiles...like the copperhead which I totally forgot about for ages until this video. 😁
About the propability to hit with a tank gun: In the 90s a Leopard 2A4 crew was supposed to hit and kill enemy tanks up to 3000m with the first shot, at least that was the training requirement/goal. Also, a tank gun is rather easy to use. Advanced targeting systems make that easier, not more difficult. The gunner keeps the sight on the target, uses the laser for the distance, maybe has to hold an extra button if the target is moving, then uses the trigger. To avoid detection by enemy laser detectors and thus warn the enemy, the gunner can laser the ground next to the enemy tanks. While laserguided missiles operators have to keep a laser on the enemy the whole time, or at least for every course correction during flight. (not sure how technology progressed there) Id use a tank gun anytime unless you got a ATGM for ranges, say 4km+, where the enemy tank cant reliably shoot back at you.
I wouldn't be surprised to see any future MBT development include a tandem or top-attack option for ammo in addition to more conventional ammo like APFSDS and Multipurpose rounds. The development of APS and soft kill systems might further complicate the choice and the logistics/requisition of ammo. Weapons like the Starstreak and Fin-Guided ammo are also irons in the fire, worthy of consideration.
I think you forgot a quite important con to ATGMs - soft/hard kill active protection systems (APSs) systems (Shtora, Arena, Trophy, Zaslon, so on).
We are inching closer to hard kill systems that can engage other projectiles as well. Right now hard kill systems are close to meaningless, though, since there's no widespread adoption of them, and personally, I think these systems will be reliably engaging tank rounds long before even a quarter of the modern tanks out there will have them.
9:30 teasing me with that kpz 70 in the corner and useing the leo 2a4 as an example ignoring the gun launcher equipped vehicle that would have been a great example like the prior soviet main battle tanks
There's also that hollow (shaped) charge the penetration is dependent on the diameter of the warhead. That's why the 152 mm Shillelagh (love hearing a German try to pronounce a Gaelic word Shil- lay- lee), not one for the 105mm L1 was the missile chosen.
Tanks need to have a gun for fast shooting and ammunition capacity (and cost). And once you have to have a gun, then why complicate things in the tank when a different vehicle can carry the ATGMs? The missile vehicles can fire overwatch from longer ranges out of range of enemy tanks and thus don't need as heavy of armor. They basically act as attached tank destroyers. As a bonus they can carry infantry.
Basically, why have a tank that has ATGMs in place of a gun when you can either have IFVs with ATGM launchers or another lightly armored transport vehicle with one sitting a bit off in the back.
I thank you sir, using Mario as the symbol for top attack missiles.😂 pure genius. “It’s a me Mario!!” Tank go boom!
How yall doing bro long day at work need something to focus my adhd on
Great Video as always :) I'm not Irish but with St. Patrick's day upcoming, Shillelagh is pronounced "Schelela" for german speakers like us ;) Gaelic pronounciation makes no sense to me but competent people actually speaking the lingos told me it is perfectly logical ;)
My Dad, born in Waterford, pronounced it Shi-Lay-Lee.
Video idea - drones. I believe they were beginning development in WWII, if you include Fritz X as a drone (theres some very similar US kamikaze anti-tank drones today that operate in a very similar way but are launched like a mortar).
Very good video
Did you use the T-90A from War Thunder as the cover image lol
Could you theorize the effectiveness US experimental kinetic missiles compared to regular tank guns and conventional ATGM's that were discussed in this video?
For a gun system the muzzle velocity is not the velocity at the target which can be 1000 meters away in which velocity at that point will lower due to air resistance. A missile, depending on design, may have propulsion up to the target & more velocity there, again depending on the design.
Is there a noticeable difference between missiles and tank guns in term of value against soft targets?
That's a thing: Although some of the most advanced missiles have fire-and-forget systems, the target adquiring still needs line-of-sight. However, there isn't any technological reason to not be able to adquire the target indirectly, via a small drone, for example. I'm not talking about the drone launching the missile. I'm talking about a small drone that can adquire the target, send the info to the missile so the operator can safely launch it from behind a hill or something.
You need secure coms then, and that's hard. Opens the door for EW interference.
I wonder what software you use to make the presentation?
In the words of TF2 heavy, “Some people think they can outsmart me. Maybe, maybe. I've yet to meet one that can outsmart bullet.”
Something that hasn't been discussed here is that conservation of momentum dictates that a missile system delivering the same momentum (weight x speed) of ordnance on target will always weigh more than an equivalent load of tank shells, which biases logistics in favour of tank shells. Guns and rockets both work by conservation of momentum - the forward momentum of the projectile / rocket is matched by the rearward momentum of whatever materials it pushes off, called the reaction mass. In the rocket's case, it carries all the reaction mass it needs for forward flight on-board, which it then pushes off by burning them in its motor and ejecting it out the back as exhaust. It needs to carry enough of this reaction mass to provide enough momentum to reach the target, which of course makes it very heavy, especially since some of that reaction mass is used to push the remaining unburnt reaction mass forward along with the missile body. For a tank shell, the tank shell reacts against the propellant gas, which reacts against the gun breech, which reacts against the tank, which reacts against the Earth itself. So in a very real sense a tank shell cheats by dumping all of its reaction momentum into the Earth, which it (and the tank / truck / ship / C17 carrying it) doesn't need to carry around, making tank shells in general much lighter than an equivalent momentum missile.
Generally I think main battles tanks are going the way of the Dodo. Besides guided anti tank missiles there are also howitzers ie the PzH 2000 and ARCHER which can fire munitions like SMArt155 and Bofors BONUS from 38km away. These rounds break up near the target and each contains 2 independent self-guided submunitions designed to destroy tanks. Both can fire these quite rapidly ie 8-12 rounds per minute continuously.
The "e" in the standart Latin transcription of the Cyrillic letters is pronounced "o" (sometimes "jo"). Hence "Krushchev" is spoken "Crushtshow" - wich is actually correct.
Very interesting. Didn't naval armament go through the same gun vs missile choice and came out on the opposite side? From what I understand guns are just a backup armament on a warship and the main workhorse is the missile, right? So what were the factors that made the difference?
Range. Whatever the theoretical range of a tank gun, it's pretty rare to be able to engage a target at more than a mile, maybe 2, even in a desert, because there are places to hide. There's no cover on the open ocean, so it is entirely realistic to expect to be able to detect and localise a target at hundreds of miles
Radars and BVR engagement. Also non-overlapping use cases. Both gun and missile armament of ships are tailored to beyond visual range engagement nowadays, the UK 4.5 inch will fire 17 miles (3 miles is visual range at sea level). But a missile will fire closer to 200 miles. It's not even a comparison, missiles have capabilities that naval guns simply don't have, so you have one or the other, or both depending on your need. At maximum gun range you have to factor in thing like the curvature and spin of the earth to your aiming calculations.
@@talltroll7092 And even within gun range by the end of WWII you had ships able to range out to 39 km (over 42,000 yards) at which point the time of flight is about 90 seconds, and that plus the little variations in pointing, velocity, shell, etc. all multiplying over that time/range meant you're unlikely to hit another ship without firing off a ton of shells hoping to get lucky or some kind of course correction or guidance on the shell (which wouldn't be developed until long after anti-ship missiles) So you could be within (extreme) gun range of the enemy and your slow anti-ship missile is still reasonably likely to make the first hit.
A ship uses a missile to kill a $100 million dollar aircraft or $1 billion ship. A tank might use its gun to suppress infantry. Conscripts even. Also modern ships are basically unarmored because ship based missiles (which are huge) make armor a waste of tonnage. And as others have pointed out- not-tanks tend to use missiles. Armor is basically what defines a tank. Also the range issue. Even a smart missile has trouble killing a target it can't see when launched. All naval radar outranges an 18" gun. And remember the gun on the Zumwalt? The point was supposed to be cost. Then the round became as complex as a missile. It really was a gun launched missile. Railguns only matter if stealth or active defenses let you get in gun range. Although if they can shoot down ship killers they are again more armor than missile replacement. Also shore bombardment. But then you're kind of doing a tank's job. Of course if ATGMs get light and powerful enough (or javelins) people have long hypothesized the could make tanks and attack helicopters obsolete. But I think modern tanks are designed to operate with infantry. So the armor is as much for not-tanks as opposing tanks. I like others points. Tanks carry guns. Other things carry missiles. But then let's talk about artillery... which interestingly are guns. But in NATO combined arms if it's outside of tank gun range the tank can help something else kill it. Either missiles or aircraft or artillery. But note the marines have now ditched tanks. And thus tank guns. Make of that what you will.
@@doomedwit1010 On the point of shore bombardment, ships usally tend to have cruise missiles exactly for that purpose. Look at the invasion of Iraq for an example.
With the American Army thinking of replacing the gun with missles didn't stop with tanks. The US Navy and Airforce thought the samething with the F4 Phantom had no gun and used missiles instead. Until it was realised the aircraft had to have a gun. One other thing more rounds could be carried on a tank.
There is a constant strive to make armor more effective against both chemical and kinetic penetrators. In general ERA has only in recent years seen a focus on better protecting from kinetic penetrators. There have also been significant developments towards jamming different kinds of missile tracking systems which in cases of laser warning receivers also offer a heads about a gun targeting system. Active protection systems are also being installed on several vehicles from many nations and they also mostly protect against missiles. On the other hand missiles like the TOW offer effective ranges in excess of 4 km where current anti tank guns are of very limited use.
very good video
I wonder if a swarm of consumer grade quadcopters with a shape charge on its bottom that you just disperse in the possible movement area of expected enemy tanks is effective. You could have them lay in wait and have maybe some operator that can target a tank and then activate the nearest drone that will then kamikaze itself to the tank. You would get something like a mine field with actively homing mines.
Enemy would just avoid the area entirely. While area denial is a valid combat tactic, there are better way of doing that. Including but not limited to just spread some mine on ground. Also consumer quadcopter has too little payload for this to be truely effective.
Im curious why Soviet Womble avatar was used for Fire and Forget at 15:35 lol
Missiles are bulky which is why most vehicles carry them outside the vehicle. Hard to protect the crew from cook offs and round count is very low. They are also much more expensive per shot. When you’re at the front of the line you may have a lot of potential targets and many of these are lower value targets that can be dealt with quicker and just as effectively with a gun with less risk to the crew and less need for resupply of ammo.
Das ist ein very gut video.
I think a solution would be fire-and-forget missiles. Coupled with an auto-loader you could maybe be able to engage several ground and air targets simultaneously.
8:18 "... decreased substantially if i am not mistaken." 1. APFSDS can bounce too, a point, which let tank armor geting more and more sloped on the expected main shielding (tank front), so 0:0 2. composite armor would need a much lower weight if it had only to provied blow of space for a shaped charge, it also has to act as a deformable energy destroyer against APFSDS, so 0:0 3. reactive armor disturb both ammo type by unbalancing their flight, shown result on shaped charges is more imposing because the shrapnels additionally trigger the pressure reacting charge load, since APFSDS has no triggerable load it simply spins against the tank armor with drastically reduced penetration impact. Important is that the reactiv armor (iron fist,.... too) hits the projectile from a side. so 0:0 4. APFSDS could have a similar result, but that requires a second hit on the same point, which is theoretical an idea, but far out of range aslong even the most precise gun in load manually, so 0:1 5. Also rear and side armor are much thinner and easier to penetrate, but since APFSDS can not be fired with high balistic curve in a normal tank and does not fly in a curve or full turn, its out, so 0:2 6. normal shells are far less expensive to produce, than a guided missile which destroys the whole expensive guiding componates at the moment it hits too. unmanagable in a longer war, for raw material importing countries (for example Germany), so 1:2 Also with one additional point to count, shell 1 : 2 missile , looks not that bad for the technical solution of a guided missile 😉 P.S. using guide missiles also means a change in fighting tactic, since contrary to a gun, not the one who see the target fires, the one with the harder to counterstrike position fires the guided missile
I am curious about super sonic missiles than could be fired from say a ship say a frigate size or similar large platform and use satellite image guidance.
fire and forget is Soviet womble? XD Love the vid though, always so grundlig :)
barrel launched ATGMs are a good idea I think, additional options at longer ranges, able to target helicopter (in some cases) and a tank is generally a safer place for the operator