The discussion of one material prompted the Polish military to think a little about this topic. Well, or not slightly. To say that the Polish army is the coolest in Europe is, you know, strong. But it smacks of bison.
By the way, a nuance. Zubrovka vodka is not from the bison, if that. And from the grass Hieróchloe odoráta, or odoriferous odoriferous (aromatic). Tell me - what's the difference? And such. There is a difference between the bison and the bison. But first things first.
Thinking about which army is better (it is clear that in the US-Russia-China trio it is necessary to search), I realized that it is necessary to come up with a certain criterion for the assessment. And came up with.
The assessment criterion will be the Russian army. As an option, why not? Since we are still a pan-European scarecrow, barbarians and a threat comes from us, danger, and in general the end of the world from Russia will come, then what is there? Tolerate once in theory ...
So what do we have? We have an army of Russia, which suddenly, in a non-nuclear war, begins to move to the English Channel.
Why non-nuclear? It is clear that in the case of the nuclear one no one moves anywhere at all, everyone quietly cools down in the field.
Well, suddenly it happened, the warships of Switzerland attacked the corvette of Belarus, and Russia, suddenly flying off the coils, went to restore order in Europe. Non-nuclear way.
That is, strategically and tactically everything happens approximately as in the Great Patriotic War, only the priorities can not be set, whom we are liberating, and who we are just taking. Then we will understand, according to the results.
That is, all modern weapons are used, with the exception of tactical and strategic nuclear weapons. That is, we are going to cleanse Europe of tolerance and other busts of the democratic world. The usual methods. Tanks, Infantry fighting vehicles, armored personnel carriers, self-propelled guns, aircraft, helicopters, in general, everything. Yes, we can do without fleet, simply because all participants have nothing to brag about.
And who can contrast us?
The US Army, which really can, is not taken. It is necessary to speak about it especially, the Yankees are quite serious guys, and now we are laughing at the Europeans.
We immediately leave Ukraine aside, so much has been said about the neighbors, I just do not want to take the time away from the readers. The Armed Forces of Ukraine today are at war at the level of the First World War, without aviation, so for those who can, I do not hold them. Partisan action only.
Further we have the Baltic states.
Well, yes, it's funny.
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. BTR, BMP, a bit of artillery, mortars ... Ukraine-2. Also without aviation, a pair of leased L-39s doesn’t count. It’s completely frivolous, you can not even bother the army, enough of the Russian Guard.
Hungary. 22 thousand people, 30 tanks, armored personnel carriers, artillery, mortars. All that remains of the army of Hungary. All Soviet-made weapons are very new.
Romania. 77 thousand people. 200 tanks of own production based on the T-55 and 260 T-55. Artillery. Fifty helicopters (French, produced under license). Three dozen MiG-21s and 12 F-16s purchased at a sale in Portugal.
Czech Republic. 22 thousand people. 30 T-72 tanks, two hundred armored personnel carriers and armored vehicles. Artillery and anti-tank weapons - Soviet. True, there is aviation. 20 attack aircraft L-159A and 12 fighter Saab JAS 39C. Helicopters also remained from Soviet times.
Slovakia. 7 thousand people. 30 T-72 tanks. 250 Soviet-made IFVs. Anti-tank and air defense systems from the same times. Aviation is represented by 12 MiG-29s and old Soviet Mi-24s.
Poland. 120 thousand people. Tanks: 105 Leopard 2A5, 142 Leopard 2A4. 233 pieces of RT-91, 500 T-72M. Almost a thousand tanks. 1200 infantry fighting vehicles, 700 armored personnel carriers. Aviation: 36 F-16, 26 MiG-29. Soviet helicopters, Soviet air defense. S-125, "Circle". But there is.
Austria. 14 thousand people. 56 tanks "Leopard 2A4", 112 BMP "Ulan", 78 armored personnel carriers. There are 155 mm howitzers (30 units) and 120 mm mortars (70 units).
Germany. 60 thousand people. Tanks "Leopard 2" - 530 pcs. BMP "Marder" - 382 pcs. "Puma" - about 550. Armored personnel carrier "Fuchs" - about 2000 pcs. A decent amount of ATGM and air defense. With aviation, too, everything is better than with the Poles. Eurofighter Typhoon - 130 pcs, Panavia Tornado - 78, Eurocopter H145M helicopters (15 pcs).
Belgium. 32 thousand people. Belgian ground forces abandoned tanks altogether, the role of armored vehicles is played by the Piranha and Dingo armored vehicles with a total of more than 400 pieces. Aviation is represented by 60 F-16 units and 22 Agusta A109 helicopters. 34 units of F-35 were ordered.
Netherlands. 47 thousand people. They also abandoned caterpillar equipment, so the main force of the BTR “Boxer” ground forces (200+ units) and CV9035NL infantry fighting vehicles (150 units). Aviation is represented by F-16 assembly plants of Fokker (61 units), Apache helicopters (28 units) and NH90 NFH / TTH (18 units).
France. 225 thousand people. Leclerc tanks - 400 pcs., AMX-10 RC armored personnel carriers - 247 pcs., VBCI armored personnel carriers - 620 pcs., VAB armored personnel carriers - 2600 pcs. Everything is fine with self-propelled guns and artillery. Army aviation has more than 150 attack helicopters. The Air Force has 134 Mirages of all modifications and 100 Rafales.
Italy. 105 thousand people. 200 Ariete tanks, 120 Leopard 2 tanks, 300 Centaur tank destroyers, 264 infantry fighting vehicles and almost 2000 armored personnel carriers. 200 self-propelled guns. 60 attack helicopters "Mongoose". Aviation has 90 Eurofighter Typhoon, 70 AMX ACOL attack aircraft, 84 Panavia Tornado.
Switzerland. 100 thousand people. 134 tanks Pz-87, 180 BMP CV9030, 133 self-propelled guns M109. The Air Force includes 25 F / A-18C Hornet fighters, 41 F-5I Tiger II fighters and 25 Super Puma and Cougar helicopters.
Greece, Great Britain, Bulgaria and Spain should not be considered because of some distance from the theater of operations, and Albania, Montenegro, Macedonia, Luxembourg because of the size of their armies. For the former, a stereotube is needed to consider, for the latter, a microscope.
So, here is the situation: on one side of the scales, this is all, and on the other, the Russian army is almost a million (it’s clear that not all can be used right away), but there is some reserve in the form of the same National Guard, which can easily be plowed.
Well, almost 3500 tanks, more than 4000 infantry fighting vehicles, more than 4000 armored personnel carriers, almost 1000 MLRS, almost 2000 barrels of self-propelled and towed artillery, and then on the list. It’s worse with airplanes, but you can scrape together 500 pieces. And attack helicopters a couple of hundred. But with our air defense it’s just luxurious, you can see who else is flying and how.
And what conclusion immediately suggests itself?
For our woofers - the most pleasant. Indeed, having believed in the strength and power of NATO, that is, the American army, Europeans do not really spend too much on their ground forces. There are countries that openly demonstrate a desire to completely shift their security onto the shoulders of someone from the bloc, that is, the United States.
А зря.
The number of American soldiers in Europe is also steadily declining, and if the sources do not lie, now about 30-32 thousand people, not more.
Of course, you can transfer as many people as you like by sea and air to defend allies in the bloc. In the air, however, you don’t do much manure. By sea it is both more profitable and safer. But will those who decide to swim in the English Channel wait for this moment?
No, they will not do.
But on the way near the Russian columns, nobody really twitches. The microscope was set aside, the magnifier was set aside. We will really look at those who can "stand day and night hold out."
The fact that the Poles recruited people into the army and bribed the “Leopards” is something to rejoice for them. But the number of people is not an absolute indicator, for the Polish army is armed with frank Soviet (albeit modernized) scrap. 1000 tanks is, of course, a figure, but the quality is clearly not present. The half that T-72M. This is still the 1980th year.
Considering how the Poles do not like us ... Taking into account their ambition ... Moreover, “we beat you 100 years ago” ... Well, yes, they will last a couple of days. Still, we have the year 2020, not 1920, in our yard, we must understand. And they’re fighting not a thousand tanks, they are fighting the army in the aggregate. Taken together, the Polish army is as junk as all the armies of our former ATS allies. Armed with junk that Soviet, that German.
Yes, the army of the former police department is a heartbreaking sight, of course. On the one hand, everyone seems to have joined NATO, but almost everyone has official permission to complete the use of Soviet equipment, as there is no money for a new, NATO-style one.
For example, I’m terribly interested in where 1500 tanks went from Hungary, what didn’t we take out of there? Really drank everything?
Nevertheless, all these so-called (or ironically called) “armies” are nothing more than something, “for the parade”. Like in the Baltic states. That is, there is something to show at the parade, but to fight ...
The ground forces of Germany, Italy, France and Switzerland look much more solid. More precisely, I would have put it somewhat differently: France, Switzerland, Germany, Italy. But in any case, the Bundeswehr is not the same, and the Italians as fighters are still not the same. More precisely, they were never “those”.
On the whole, if you look at the map and the sheet with the numbers listed, it turns out that in the case of "if that", then in fact there will be almost a walk to the Franco-Swiss-German border. There is no one to resist there. There is simply no one.
Perhaps the Germans and French will be able to show something there, but there is no certainty, to be honest. If a Russian can go on such a trip because "purely for fun and in general these rainbow-colored ones got it," then I doubt that the Germans and French will demonstrate miracles of perseverance and professionalism.
Still, the armies we have today are for the most part not for war, but for peace ...
By and large, it is necessary to consider such a moment as the willingness to arrange such a ... Red Alert. Observed in our country allows us to conclude that we can do this without very much straining. Because tolerant Europeans are not former Iraqi officers from terrorist groups in Syria and the Muslim world team in the mountains of Chechnya.
It is much simpler.
Perhaps this is precisely why all (or almost all) in Europe, on the one hand, are reducing their armies and selling equipment somewhere, on the other hand, they are afraid or afraid.
And this is also correct and justified.
The result is a funny situation: the European armies are nothing of themselves, with rare exceptions. Although the technical equipment of the same Bundeswehr, although above all praise, they are fighting not only with technology. They are also fighting with people. With the Poles, on the contrary, people most likely have, there is no technology. Etc.
And all hope is only that the Russians will not go off the coils and decide to take a walk to the canal, or the Americans, who are supposed to protect their allies in the bloc.
Interestingly, much like this alignment like the Americans?
After all, these are completely different things: on the one hand, to establish a “democratic order” in Iran or Libya, on the other hand, to go on a clinch with the Russians.
In any case, in situation No. 2, the armies of European countries are clearly not helpers. No, like meat completely. But no more than that. So if suddenly we decide - there will be no one to stop, except for the USA. It all looks strange in Europe, to be honest. Why then such an army, it is completely incomprehensible.