New Type98/99 MBT thread

[plawolf]

Military camouflage, in that sense, only has a limited use nowadays. Unless you can hide it's heat signature, it's bound to be detected by any military fielding modern equipment. However, if you're in a rather low tech war, camo like that is still worth the effort.

Funny, I remember people saying something remarkably similar about the aircraft cannon, body armor and plenty of others.

The militaries around the world still evidently seem to think camos are a good investment since no-one has decided to paint their tanks or planes bright pink yet.

Modern thermal imagining equipment has useful lives just like anything else. It might not be limited to hundreds or low thousands of hours any more, but they do wear out after a certain number of hours of use. That is why no-one runs around with their thermal sights on all the time.

Even when you do have your thermal gear switched on, they only have a limited field of view, and if it is an active battlefield with large fires burning, you may well find your thermal gear rendered ineffective, in which case, you need to rely on the good old fashioned Mk 1 eyeball. There are plenty of other examples I could list, but I think I have made my point clear enough.

[IronsightSniper]

Funny, I remember people saying something remarkably similar about the aircraft cannon, body armor and plenty of others.

The militaries around the world still evidently seem to think camos are a good investment since no-one has decided to paint their tanks or planes bright pink yet.

Modern thermal imagining equipment has useful lives just like anything else. It might not be limited to hundreds or low thousands of hours any more, but they do wear out after a certain number of hours of use. That is why no-one runs around with their thermal sights on all the time.

Even when you do have your thermal gear switched on, they only have a limited field of view, and if it is an active battlefield with large fires burning, you may well find your thermal gear rendered ineffective, in which case, you need to rely on the good old fashioned Mk 1 eyeball. There are plenty of other examples I could list, but I think I have made my point clear enough.

You were saying?



While for the most part, in regards to thermal imaging, is true, that doesn't discount the entire range of reconnaissance a modern military utilizes. For the most part, if you're planning an armored assault, you don't just throw a tank brigade in one direction and tell them to search & destroy, you of course do some recon first, and nowadays, that's usually with drones like the Global Hawk, which would use it's thermal camera and a SAR (Side Aperture Radar) to locate and track tanks.

To counter this, of course, is a whole foray of modern tank camouflage techniques, such as thermal cloaks with a dual purpose to hide one's radar signature, and even a British system of some name that I can't remember that which transforms the tank into the thermal signature of something else. Again, not to say that painting your tank the color of it's surroundings and then adding forage to it won't be effective in some cases, but against a modern army, it's uses are limited.

[plawolf]

You were saying?



While for the most part, in regards to thermal imaging, is true, that doesn't discount the entire range of reconnaissance a modern military utilizes. For the most part, if you're planning an armored assault, you don't just throw a tank brigade in one direction and tell them to search & destroy, you of course do some recon first, and nowadays, that's usually with drones like the Global Hawk, which would use it's thermal camera and a SAR (Side Aperture Radar) to locate and track tanks.

To counter this, of course, is a whole foray of modern tank camouflage techniques, such as thermal cloaks with a dual purpose to hide one's radar signature, and even a British system of some name that I can't remember that which transforms the tank into the thermal signature of something else. Again, not to say that painting your tank the color of it's surroundings and then adding forage to it won't be effective in some cases, but against a modern army, it's uses are limited.

Arrh! My eyes!

Where did you find that picture?

Anyways, you make some good points, but I would just like to point out that all the advanced thermal cloaks and thermal signature scramblers are still camouflage. High tech camouflage, but still camouflage nonetheless.

Just as technology and means to defeat camouflage has advanced and evolved, so has the art of camouflage itself, and it is this more general term that I have been referring to, instead of merely camo paint.

Hell, with advances in modern technology and materials science, there are already IR and radar absorbent coatings that could have been applied along with the paint to greatly reduce a tank's IR and radar signature (they are just not employed because of cost, but if a real war breaks out between two evenly matched armies/nations, then the cost-benefit analysis may well shift decided in favor of applying such coatings to tanks and other armored vehicles); and there are metamaterials being developed that may one day be able to render something 'invisible' in the visual and IR spectrums.

My point is that camouflage is far from being dead or rendered ineffective by advancing science.

It's a perpetual arms race between detection and camouflage, just like most other fields.

[IronsightSniper]

Oh :v

I thought you were talking about the old methods of camouflage, agreed.

[challenge]

most tank today are painted with IR suppression paint.next step was radar suppression.
during the mid 90's french propose 'stealth" version of lelcrer. by far the most unique ,was adaptation of rectangular gun tube .

[TerraN_EmpirE]

the current next step is active IR signature control BAE and an Isreali Company recently produced a set of tiles that are fitted too the skin of a vehicle and can produce a specific set of IR images turning a Tank into a Car or a Hummer into a patch of shrubs. the after next step I think would be too enable visual modification of the same.

[A.Man]

These Are Not Tanks, But They Kill Tanks!

http://military.cntv.cn/program/jsjs...7/125107.shtml

[Lion]

These Are Not Tanks, But They Kill Tanks!

http://military.cntv.cn/program/jsjs...7/125107.shtml

They are obsoluted.. Can only fired when stop.. Aren't they sitting duck in modern armour warfare?

[Bltizo]

I didn't watch the full video, they did say they can only fire when stationary? That would be ridiculous.

Or are you just assuming that the video didn't show them firing on the move, that they're incapable of doing so? If the latter, then logic needs work lol...

--

trololol nvm sinodefence says the gun's apparently not stabilized (PTZ89) so can't fire on move, my bad.
But I wouldn't say it's obsolete on the modern battlefield. It's an anti tank gun, not a tank remember.

[IronsightSniper]

AT guns are rather obsolete in the modern battle field lol. Unless you're in a desperate situation where every man counts, then sure, give some a few AT guns, stabilized or not. But for any "professional" wars, they lack use, morso if they aren't stabilized.

[pendragon]

Yes, true ... but as the enemy tanks ares searching for movement, shapes, I.R. signature, radio transmissions, magnetic and acoustic signatures etc. they might once more become vulnerable to simple man operated/aimed weapons; in as more as the search would be done by automated systems (view vulnerability to relatively simple/cheap IED in iraq)!
Nothing as dangerous as a determined oponent defending his home, family or way of life!

[IronsightSniper]

Yes, true ... but as the enemy tanks ares searching for movement, shapes, I.R. signature, radio transmissions, magnetic and acoustic signatures etc. they might once more become vulnerable to simple man operated/aimed weapons; in as more as the search would be done by automated systems (view vulnerability to relatively simple/cheap IED in iraq)!
Nothing as dangerous as a determined oponent defending his home, family or way of life!

A modern tank's FLIR can see a man from several km away

[plawolf]

A modern tank's FLIR can see a man from several km away

Not if he has dug an old fashion trench/fox hole to wait in. Just a human head sticking out of the ground could very easily be missed or mistaken for a small animal, especially in an ambush scenario where the tank crews would not realize that there are hostiles nearby and would only be performing at most quick scans, if they decided to switch on their thermal sights at all.

If modern tech has all the godly powers their makers tries to portray them as having, Israel would never have suffered anything close to the losses it did fighting Hezballa.

Having the latest and greatest kit will no doubt be a massive tactical advantage, but it doesn't make you invulnerable by any stretch of the imagination.

[pendragon]

yes indeed,
a simple foxhole,
som heat dissipating cover,
if he's a regular even some IR shielding clothing ...

don't just believe what is noted by the producer, or your instructor (he just read the producers brochure) or even the top brass (which are paid by the producers). Check-out different sources, evaluate and make up your truth

[IronsightSniper]

Not if he has dug an old fashion trench/fox hole to wait in. Just a human head sticking out of the ground could very easily be missed or mistaken for a small animal, especially in an ambush scenario where the tank crews would not realize that there are hostiles nearby and would only be performing at most quick scans, if they decided to switch on their thermal sights at all.

If modern tech has all the godly powers their makers tries to portray them as having, Israel would never have suffered anything close to the losses it did fighting Hezballa.

Having the latest and greatest kit will no doubt be a massive tactical advantage, but it doesn't make you invulnerable by any stretch of the imagination.

A man cannot have only his head up to the sky at all times in a trench or a fox hole. From different angles, different parts of his body will be visible and radiate it's heat. Not to mention that standing up the whole time is probably not going to happen and the soldiers are probably going to be laying down or sitting down. Either way, trenches or foxholes would get bombed and arty'd out of the earth so that's a null point.

And Israel suffers casualties on the premise of deception of Hezbollah. There's a picture or two of a dump truck in Gaza where it looks like a dump truck, but it has 122 mm tubes below the dumper-thing, so that when it raises the dumper-thing to dump it's payload, it's rocket tubes reveal and allows it to fire rockets. Very discreet they are, and the only real way to counter such a thing is quarantine apparently! Just more examples of simple deception that can't be reprimanded without the harsh treatment that Israel imposes on the Palestinians.