Mountain Cat light amphibious ATV

[tphuang]

It's still the fact that those mountain cats likely can't even stand up to small arms fire, to land a decent sized force would make a ton of noise via helicopters, you're better off just using conventional APC/IFVs in that scenario. Although the ability for such a compact vehicle to participate in sophisticated network centric operations is nothing to scruff at either.

I'd see this as more of a technology demonstration rather than actual tactics in that case.

At this point, this is a concept they are selling. However, you are wrong about the first part. The latest helicopters have extremely quiet engines and won't be heard unless they are right over top of you. They can certainly land troops and ShanMao at night time somewhere in Taiwan and not be detected (assuming they've already bombed it for a couple of weeks). They cannot use APC/IFVs because only ShanMao is designed to fit in the bellies of Z-8L and Mi-17s. With UCAV help other the top, I think they and UCAVs can help clear out the guarding force next to port or beach front ahead of an actual landing operation.

You have to imagine that by this point, defenders would be out of fuel and electricity, so it wouldn't be facing an armored vehicles.

 

[tphuang]

I love it, PLA is taking over the world with this cut little thing.

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[Heliox]

It's still the fact that those mountain cats likely can't even stand up to small arms fire, to land a decent sized force would make a ton of noise via helicopters, you're better off just using conventional APC/IFVs in that scenario. Although the ability for such a compact vehicle to participate in sophisticated network centric operations is nothing to scruff at either.

I'd see this as more of a technology demonstration rather than actual tactics in that case.

Air assaults are for opening up new flanks that your conventional forces can't reach or to go in behind the lines to act as blocking forces to encircle the point of the assault or prevent resupply of the point of assault.

Heliborne assaults are by their very nature noisy. Airborne assaults (para) are by their nature very visible. Their main advantage isn't that the enemy can't hear you coming - it's that the speed of the assault means they struggle to react to where you are attacking.

You land somewhere where the enemy isn't, you quickly transit the landing force to where you need them to be and then you dig in and wait for your main force to link up while fulfilling your mission objectives.

True, APCs > ATVs but sometimes you can't do Y-20s cos lack of air superiority or whatever so you make do with mini-ATVs and helos.

For that, mini-ATVs can be awesome. It allows heavy stuff to be part of the light infantry element without slowing down the "light" - eg. defense stores and hvy crew served weapons - stuff that goes boom instead of bang is very heavy and painful to hump. If you have enough wheels, it gives the light infantry even scarier mobility, from 4kmph to 40+ kmph is seriously doctrine changing. Light and unarmoured that ATVs may be, they are operating in a rear area where toyota truck style "technical" rush can still be very profitable.

Also, given the terrain that is represented in the pictures, artillery is the bane of landed legs forces and wheels give them the ability to quickly displace out of arty impact zones. You don't want to do a hot LZ so you also do need to move them landed troops and that barren terrain with long LoS and nowhere to hide means troops need to cover distances either quickly or invisibly ... you let me know how you intend to do either.

Horses for courses. Mini-ATVs aren't a universal panacea but they can be very useful in the right circumstance.

 

[Heliox]

At this point, this is a concept they are selling. However, you are wrong about the first part. The latest helicopters have extremely quiet engines and won't be heard unless they are right over top of you. They can certainly land troops and ShanMao at night time somewhere in Taiwan and not be detected (assuming they've already bombed it for a couple of weeks). They cannot use APC/IFVs because only ShanMao is designed to fit in the bellies of Z-8L and Mi-17s. With UCAV help other the top, I think they and UCAVs can help clear out the guarding force next to port or beach front ahead of an actual landing operation.

You have to imagine that by this point, defenders would be out of fuel and electricity, so it wouldn't be facing an armored vehicles.

Then we're talking of Cdo raids rather than conventional air assaults.

If we're relying on stealth to move from LZ to beach-head or port-head then you're going off-roads. Couple of things;
i) Taiwan terrain, off roads, is not very wheeled friendly. You might be better sticking to roads but using local vehicles (if you can drop a Shanmao, you can BYO fuel)
ii) Taiwan is quite populated all throughout and it'd be very difficult to move into the coastal zone without being detected** unless you're a small unit w/o vehicles or moving in plain sight using local wheels.
(** you're at the mercy of the civilian populations willingness to report or not report you to the local garrison)

If you're intending to fight your way to the beach/port then no point talking about going in quiet.

 

[tphuang]

Then we're talking of Cdo raids rather than conventional air assaults.

If we're relying on stealth to move from LZ to beach-head or port-head then you're going off-roads. Couple of things;
i) Taiwan terrain, off roads, is not very wheeled friendly. You might be better sticking to roads but using local vehicles (if you can drop a Shanmao, you can BYO fuel)
ii) Taiwan is quite populated all throughout and it'd be very difficult to move into the coastal zone without being detected** unless you're a small unit w/o vehicles or moving in plain sight using local wheels.
(** you're at the mercy of the civilian populations willingness to report or not report you to the local garrison)

If you're intending to fight your way to the beach/port then no point talking about going in quiet.

Lol, there will be no electricity, no gas and all dark at night time. Command centers will be all knocked out. There won't be working phones. Who is going to report them and who to?

And shanmao is great in off road terrains. That's why they are shan mao, not just regular mao.

 

[LCR34]

Lol, there will be no electricity, no gas and all dark at night time. Command centers will be all knocked out. There won't be working phones. Who is going to report them and who to?

And shanmao is great in off road terrains. That's why they are shan mao, not just regular mao.

I do have reservations about mountain cat and gyrocopters, I think for something that draws enemy fire they offer little to no protection. I know SAS and US SOC do use buggy in desert operations and im not fond of that either.
That's it if you place it in the context of all out war. In some mountainous area, yeah you could use it to carry ammo to hard to reach places.

 

[Heliox]

Let me start off by stating that this is what I trained for and have ground experience in.

I spent 15 years (2.5 active and the rest reserves) in a formation that specialises in amphib and heliborne ops. I was mainly doing Terminal Guidance (not quite TAG but similar) so I spent a lot of time doing small unit ops linking the bigger formations, often in the "opfor" rear area.

The above doesn't mean I'm right and you're not ... though I do struggle to wrap my head around your, to me, rather cavalier take on the above. I suppose there is always more than one way to skin a cat so I welcome your explanation of your POV.

Meantime, here's mine ...

Lol, there will be no electricity, no gas and all dark at night time. Command centers will be all knocked out. There won't be working phones. Who is going to report them and who to?

I come from Singapore. It is no secret that our planning and training is an unstated focus on a conflict with Malaysia (even if just simply by virtue of it being the only "land" border we have).

Malaysia has a Volunteer Corp or Home Guard of almost 3 million members (less than 1% armed). Whatever their peacetime and other duties are, the one duty of theirs that is pertinent to this discussion and that my unit specifically takes into account is their role in wartime - which is to act as eyes and ears for the military in their rear area.

(remember the Taiwanese rich guy who wanted to privately fund training of 3million volunteers? people poo-poohed on that cos they approach it from the POV of trained and armed resistance but ... as a civilian ISR network?)

I can assure you that even if there is no electricity and fuel, ground level ISR provided by these volunteers is a factor you need to take into account. Do not for a moment think that their SOP does not take into account loss of modern comms. In this case, their intel may not be instant but it will still remain a present threat and you should never, never discount the ability of a patriot on a bicycle and his ability to bring grief, in the form of a military response onto you. (or a goatherd calling the local garrison onto a scud hunting patrol, but I digress)

I am also not debating the PLA's ability to achieve total, as in literally 100%, destruction of electricity, fuel and C3 except to state that one never gameplans success to be contingent on the above. You plan on the enemy having all of the above and then attempt to degrade them to increase chance of mission success. A plan reliant on total loss of fuel and C3 will be so totally screwed by even a single digit percentile retention of the above. The actual effect on the ground may be the same at the end but the direction of approach and mindset is vastly different.

And shanmao is great in off road terrains. That's why they are shan mao, not just regular mao.

It's also an open secret that the Singapore Armed Forces actually conducts training exercises in Taiwan. I have 3x2weeks of experience extensively walking the hinterlands of Southern Taiwan on military opex, the exact kind of areas you have any chance of an unobserved, helo insertion into.

And once on the ground in the hinterland, this is the kind of terrain your mini-ATV has to account for ...


Yes, we don't go through the forest 24/7 but even if take backroads/firetrails, we have to be ready to melt 15m+ into the treeline with any hint of oncoming. I don't quite see any ATV getting deep enough (or quietly enough) into that to be unnoticed.


and sometimes, like sometimes-too-often, you have to crossgrain the elevation #justbecause (eg, we have to bypass the village on that spur but still continue on the metal road) and it can get like this. Don't quite see any vehicles getting up/down the last slope. ...


Again, this is from the perspective of a small unit, behind lines, striving to remain unobserved which like I said, I spent quite a bit of time doing, even in Taiwan. The above pics are all internet sourced pics of Taiwan. I can't exactly use my own pics taken during OPEX but #trustmebro, it's similar. My observation is that outside of the heavily settled coastal region, the interior of Taiwan gets very hilly, very undergrown, very fast. Shanmao may be a mountain cat but it'll definitely struggle a fair bit to go where the legs are going.

Time and place for everything mate, time and place.

 

[by78]

It's still the fact that those mountain cats likely can't even stand up to small arms fire, to land a decent sized force would make a ton of noise via helicopters, you're better off just using conventional APC/IFVs in that scenario. Although the ability for such a compact vehicle to participate in sophisticated network centric operations is nothing to scruff at either.

I'd see this as more of a technology demonstration rather than actual tactics in that case.

They are armored against small arms fire. They don't have to be dropped by helicopters close to enemies. These ATVs can cover long distances on their own, so why would they be dropped off within earshot of adversaries?

I see these as great for counter terror operations in certain parts of central Asia. Terrains there are favorable and transports can land unseen and unheard on unprepared runways that lie miles and miles away from a terrorist camp or outpost. A few companies of light infantry can then move swiftly on these armored ATVs to close in on the terrorists.

 

[tankphobia]

Let me start off by stating that this is what I trained for and have ground experience in.

I spent 15 years (2.5 active and the rest reserves) in a formation that specialises in amphib and heliborne ops. I was mainly doing Terminal Guidance (not quite TAG but similar) so I spent a lot of time doing small unit ops linking the bigger formations, often in the "opfor" rear area.

The above doesn't mean I'm right and you're not ... though I do struggle to wrap my head around your, to me, rather cavalier take on the above. I suppose there is always more than one way to skin a cat so I welcome your explanation of your POV.

Meantime, here's mine ...



I come from Singapore. It is no secret that our planning and training is an unstated focus on a conflict with Malaysia (even if just simply by virtue of it being the only "land" border we have).

Malaysia has a Volunteer Corp or Home Guard of almost 3 million members (less than 1% armed). Whatever their peacetime and other duties are, the one duty of theirs that is pertinent to this discussion and that my unit specifically takes into account is their role in wartime - which is to act as eyes and ears for the military in their rear area.

(remember the Taiwanese rich guy who wanted to privately fund training of 3million volunteers? people poo-poohed on that cos they approach it from the POV of trained and armed resistance but ... as a civilian ISR network?)

I can assure you that even if there is no electricity and fuel, ground level ISR provided by these volunteers is a factor you need to take into account. Do not for a moment think that their SOP does not take into account loss of modern comms. In this case, their intel may not be instant but it will still remain a present threat and you should never, never discount the ability of a patriot on a bicycle and his ability to bring grief, in the form of a military response onto you. (or a goatherd calling the local garrison onto a scud hunting patrol, but I digress)

I am also not debating the PLA's ability to achieve total, as in literally 100%, destruction of electricity, fuel and C3 except to state that one never gameplans success to be contingent on the above. You plan on the enemy having all of the above and then attempt to degrade them to increase chance of mission success. A plan reliant on total loss of fuel and C3 will be so totally screwed by even a single digit percentile retention of the above. The actual effect on the ground may be the same at the end but the direction of approach and mindset is vastly different.



It's also an open secret that the Singapore Armed Forces actually conducts training exercises in Taiwan. I have 3x2weeks of experience extensively walking the hinterlands of Southern Taiwan on military opex, the exact kind of areas you have any chance of an unobserved, helo insertion into.

And once on the ground in the hinterland, this is the kind of terrain your mini-ATV has to account for ...
View attachment 101411

Yes, we don't go through the forest 24/7 but even if take backroads/firetrails, we have to be ready to melt 15m+ into the treeline with any hint of oncoming. I don't quite see any ATV getting deep enough (or quietly enough) into that to be unnoticed.
View attachment 101412

and sometimes, like sometimes-too-often, you have to crossgrain the elevation #justbecause (eg, we have to bypass the village on that spur but still continue on the metal road) and it can get like this. Don't quite see any vehicles getting up/down the last slope. ...
View attachment 101413

Again, this is from the perspective of a small unit, behind lines, striving to remain unobserved which like I said, I spent quite a bit of time doing, even in Taiwan. The above pics are all internet sourced pics of Taiwan. I can't exactly use my own pics taken during OPEX but #trustmebro, it's similar. My observation is that outside of the heavily settled coastal region, the interior of Taiwan gets very hilly, very undergrown, very fast. Shanmao may be a mountain cat but it'll definitely struggle a fair bit to go where the legs are going.

Time and place for everything mate, time and place.

I think another factor that can't be discounted in a helicopter insertion scenario is the proliferation of manpads. We've already seen the heavy loss of helicopter in Ukraine due to man pads to the point that helicopter assaults were only seen at the very beginning of the war, I don't see how this will be different in Taiwan unless you conduct all ops at night which is very ill advised seeing the terrain images you're posting.

 

[by78]

Let me start off by stating that this is what I trained for and have ground experience in.

I spent 15 years (2.5 active and the rest reserves) in a formation that specialises in amphib and heliborne ops. I was mainly doing Terminal Guidance (not quite TAG but similar) so I spent a lot of time doing small unit ops linking the bigger formations, often in the "opfor" rear area.

The above doesn't mean I'm right and you're not ... though I do struggle to wrap my head around your, to me, rather cavalier take on the above. I suppose there is always more than one way to skin a cat so I welcome your explanation of your POV.

Meantime, here's mine ...



I come from Singapore. It is no secret that our planning and training is an unstated focus on a conflict with Malaysia (even if just simply by virtue of it being the only "land" border we have).

Malaysia has a Volunteer Corp or Home Guard of almost 3 million members (less than 1% armed). Whatever their peacetime and other duties are, the one duty of theirs that is pertinent to this discussion and that my unit specifically takes into account is their role in wartime - which is to act as eyes and ears for the military in their rear area.

(remember the Taiwanese rich guy who wanted to privately fund training of 3million volunteers? people poo-poohed on that cos they approach it from the POV of trained and armed resistance but ... as a civilian ISR network?)

I can assure you that even if there is no electricity and fuel, ground level ISR provided by these volunteers is a factor you need to take into account. Do not for a moment think that their SOP does not take into account loss of modern comms. In this case, their intel may not be instant but it will still remain a present threat and you should never, never discount the ability of a patriot on a bicycle and his ability to bring grief, in the form of a military response onto you. (or a goatherd calling the local garrison onto a scud hunting patrol, but I digress)

I am also not debating the PLA's ability to achieve total, as in literally 100%, destruction of electricity, fuel and C3 except to state that one never gameplans success to be contingent on the above. You plan on the enemy having all of the above and then attempt to degrade them to increase chance of mission success. A plan reliant on total loss of fuel and C3 will be so totally screwed by even a single digit percentile retention of the above. The actual effect on the ground may be the same at the end but the direction of approach and mindset is vastly different.



It's also an open secret that the Singapore Armed Forces actually conducts training exercises in Taiwan. I have 3x2weeks of experience extensively walking the hinterlands of Southern Taiwan on military opex, the exact kind of areas you have any chance of an unobserved, helo insertion into.

And once on the ground in the hinterland, this is the kind of terrain your mini-ATV has to account for ...
View attachment 101411

Yes, we don't go through the forest 24/7 but even if take backroads/firetrails, we have to be ready to melt 15m+ into the treeline with any hint of oncoming. I don't quite see any ATV getting deep enough (or quietly enough) into that to be unnoticed.
View attachment 101412

and sometimes, like sometimes-too-often, you have to crossgrain the elevation #justbecause (eg, we have to bypass the village on that spur but still continue on the metal road) and it can get like this. Don't quite see any vehicles getting up/down the last slope. ...
View attachment 101413

Again, this is from the perspective of a small unit, behind lines, striving to remain unobserved which like I said, I spent quite a bit of time doing, even in Taiwan. The above pics are all internet sourced pics of Taiwan. I can't exactly use my own pics taken during OPEX but #trustmebro, it's similar. My observation is that outside of the heavily settled coastal region, the interior of Taiwan gets very hilly, very undergrown, very fast. Shanmao may be a mountain cat but it'll definitely struggle a fair bit to go where the legs are going.

Time and place for everything mate, time and place.

I've never seen the Mountain Cats depicted as operating in sub-tropical or densely wooded environments. All promo videos I have seen so far invariably depict flat, arid tundra or desert environments, which leads me to believe they are intended for central Asia, not some southeast Asian jungle.