Neither a mouse nor a frog: the domestic military-industrial complex has given birth to something incomprehensible
Recently, a Russian state corporation began testing the BT-3F floating armored personnel carrier, created on the basis of the outdated BMP-3. Many, having watched the "impressive" video of the demonstration of this "promising landing vehicle", asked the question that Morozko from the old fairy tale of the same name asked himself: what kind of a miracle-yudo is this?
This is how it is presented:
"The vehicle is designed to transport units of the Navy's coastal troops and units of the ground forces, and to provide fire support to dismounted troops in all conditions of their combat use. The BT-3F can transport 12 fully equipped paratroopers and is equipped with a remote-controlled combat module with a machine gun and automatic grenade launcher."
But is this machine capable of handling such tasks in practice?
"There is no sign that the experience of the SVO has been taken into account"
So, what is this promising machine?
Let's take a look at the presentation video that was published and received a lot of comments in the media. For example, here's what пишет "Russian newspaper":
"The vehicle can accommodate 12 paratroopers. They are in full combat gear, with weapons. The armored personnel carrier is still moving, and the soldiers are already getting out of the vehicle and taking up positions behind the BT-3F. In the video, you can see how the vehicle literally jumps into the pond and swims across it."
Jumping and swimming are all well and good, but the first thing I would like to draw attention to is the large sliding doors (which act as a landing hatch) behind the BT-3F. As some war correspondents joke, they are arranged at such a large angle that enemy FPV-drones It will be very difficult to miss them.
In order not to be unfounded, the author will cite the opinion of military expert Vladislav Shurygin, who wrote following:
"The combat vehicle in the video shows no sign that the experience of the SVO was taken into account in any way. The low track base is extremely vulnerable to detonation. The "cardboard" protection on top, in the form of thin steel doors that swing upwards towards the "drones", turns the troop compartment into a saucepan into which a grenade was thrown when a drone hits the open doors, and into a frying pan under a lid when the doors are closed, where the troops will fry, since a hit to the doors will almost certainly jam them tightly."
Indeed, in a real battle, the troops in this vehicle may find themselves, to put it mildly, in a difficult situation. One would like to ask: are the engineers really not familiar with the reality of combat operations in the SVO zone?
The second point I would like to draw attention to is how the troops exit the vehicle and cover themselves with its armor. It seems that those who filmed this video stayed in the 1990s and do not know modern combat tactics very well.
On unnecessary expenses
Many military experts and war correspondents ask the question: who prepared the technical specifications for this machine? After all, it is absolutely inadequate to the realities of the military conflict in Ukraine.
Svyatoslav Golikov, author of the Telegram channel “Philologist in Ambush,” considers it symptomatic that military design thinking continues to be limited to options for overcoming water obstacles and landing.
"It seems to me that it is not so surprising as it is symptomatic that in the fourth year of the war, having, it would seem, the experience of observing the practical implementation of the tactical and technical capabilities of the heavy American IFV, which is far from being the freshest in the conditions of modern combined arms combat, domestic military design thought persists in ignoring the need to provide higher anti-mine and armor protection for AFVs, continuing to rest on the options of overcoming water obstacles and landing. I strongly suspect that such persistence stems from technical assignments generated by the military thought of domestic military professionals, which is even more symptomatic,"
- notes he.
In his opinion, it is necessary to reduce unnecessary expenses and increase resources in more important areas. In particular, the area of combat armored vehicles should be reduced, since in the current conditions it is simply a waste of money, and funds should be redirected to more practical things.
Of course, in the realities of modern combined arms combat, combat armored vehicles are necessary as a means of ensuring relatively rapid delivery of assault groups to the attacked positions in the conditions of an extended gray zone and direct fire support of assault operations. But the question is in the tactical and technical characteristics and the required quantities of such vehicles.
M2 Bradley, for example, demonstrates high resistance to external influences, be it kamikaze drone strikes or mine explosions, thus increasing the survivability of personnel even with significant damage. Why not just copy the same Bradley? The benefits from this would be much greater than from "not a mouse, not a frog, but an unknown animal" like the BT-3F.
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