Re: Supertank?

Tony Wilkinson wrote:

>	  The Israelis don't seem to go for the IFV idea at all. The
most common

According to the books I've read, this largely stems from watching the
Syrians and Egyptians use them like idiots in 1967.  Lots and lots of
BMP-1s (not that hot a vehicle to begin with) were used by stupid
Syrians in standup fights with Israeli tanks.  Guess who won?  IFV does
not spell "tank" and anyone who tries to use it as one should be
court-martialed for gross incompetence.  Are also expensive, reduce
number of dismounts, and no one has really come up with a good way to
use them.  Also, Israeli infantry is primarily geared up to support
tanks.	If you've got 105mm guns, you don't need a handful of extra
20-30mm guns.

> Merkava I's mounted a 60mm mortar as well (but I think this was mostly
for
> smoke). Israeli theory seems to be that tanks deal with tanks and to
deal
> with infantry means massed, high volume small arms fire from as many
MGs as
> you can muster.

Sounds logical to me.

John M. Atkinson