" It is a great time to be an armoured crewman"

Those tanks are 1970's vintage, but they will no doubt work just fine on the Taliban.

Still, I hope they have lots of parts handy.

Phantom..they are just fine..they are upgraded versions,and have very little 70's era gear left in them...we always brought lots of spares,anywhere we went..that's par for the couse..

The Taliban won't like that 120mm main gun i will wager..nasty piece of kit...

Those poor soldiers put at deaths doorstep.

Nice to see Canadian warriors ready for battle. Makes me proud!
enough

Phantom re:the 120 mm main gun. It would be one of those "pricless moments" to have a picture of a taliban terrorist's mug when he gets a load of 120mm justice.

Doesn't the Leo have a 105mm gun, not 120mm?

Sorry boys and girls, hate to rain on your parade about the Leo.
The main gun was not upgraded during it's last round of upgrades. The main tube is the original L7A5 105 mm rifled British designed gun, using vastly improved ammunition and fire control system.

This is from DND's web site:
The Army's upgraded Leopard C2 is all about firepower! The tank is armed with a 105-mm gun that works with a computerized fire control system, thermal 'night vision', and a laser range-finder. The Leopard's 830 horsepower engine and the ability to drive in almost any terrain definitely make it the ultimate off-road vehicle!

Semantics, I know but to us "zipper heads" it's important.

The Leopard C2 is armed with the 105mm L7 gun, not (unfortunately) a 120mm.

The 105 still gives plenty of bang for the buck though.

Recognized a lot of names from the article, give 'em shit boys!

Damit Glen beat me to it. At least I know I'm not the only Zip here. :-)

This airforce zommie wishes all the Strats well....give em hell and give no quarter!

Video of the steel beasts in Afghanistan

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rab8cxw1YfM

Jeez..as a former Leo crewman..!!! yes 105mm..

still packs a punch!

Then again, i first trained in a Centurion..perhaps i have a brain wasting disease,i'm so old!

If a taliban got a load of 120mm shell, there'd be no mug to get a picture of. No head. No body...

Now if the bloody Dutch general would just let us use the things...

As far as the Leopard not having a 120mm gun, remember the 120mm was an upgrade to ensure kills on modern Soviet T-80 armour.
The 105mm should still handily deal with mud-brick pillboxes and Toyota pick-ups... ;)

Come to think of it, is a Japanese SUV even hard enough to contact-detonate the round? Hmmm...
(enquiring Sailors want to know!)

As much as I love to slag the zipperheads, I hope they have fun with their toys for the first time in how long??

Sorry Mad Mike. I have to bust your cherry (bubble). The T-80 is nothing other than an up-engined T-72 with an auto-loading system that doesn't eat it's gunner's arm, a turbine engine in a attempt to mimic the USA's M-1 and a sh-t load of reactive armor (explosive brick's) to counter the American TOW / British HOT missile and any man portable shoulder fired shaped charge round developed during the 90's. One only has to study the combat record of the T-72 in the first and second Gulf Wars to see how abysmally it preformed without reactive amour and how the very limited amount of tanks that where retrofitted with reactive amour in the Republican Guard during the second GW, to see how bad the base design (T-62/64) actually is. It's a great tank for the crew men under 5'4" have no left arm and wish to swarm your enemy with many targets. (GUNNER HESH TANK ON, FIRE)
With that said, 105 mm round development has not remained stagnate and the current rounds our troops use are "state of the art" and more than capable of doing the job in most if not all of the situations the Strat,s will encounter. Check out the above mentioned YouTube shorts and check out the combat loads they are loading before moving off. Most of the base design/ballistics are based on the practical knowledge the Israelis gained the hard way.

I am a retired Air Force pigeon. How many bunks does the Leopard have and where does the Tank Attendant heat the meals?

Hey, all you brown jobs ......... I'm kidding and I wish you all the best because I truly believe you are the best - - the very best.

Glen:
Thanks for the edumacation, I'm not familiar with your stuff. (being Navy)
Cheers!

Its nice to see some truly heavy armor over there for our boys.

Recent conflict in Iraq, and not so recent fighting taking place in and around Israel have shown the modern MBT to be a very effective weapon against an insurgent enemy, even in the much dreaded "urban environment" that so terrified the arm chair generals before Operation Iraqi Freedom.

Now Glen..don't bust mad Mikes cherry..he might have to work in the morning!!:)

How old would you say some of that ammunition is that they are feeding into the Leopard?

no quarter to the taliban whatsoever.

in fact I wouldnt give a quarter 2 bits for their chances either.

Junker, why risk the MBT's in built up areas when you've got LAV's to do the job? The MBT's will mostly be useful for outlying areas and small villages. And don't downplay the threat of an urban environment. If our enemy were halfway competent, we'd be taking massive casualties trying to fight them in cities. No matter how good our capabilities get, it's still the worst type of environment to fight in.

The reason we sent the Leo over is for direct fire support(DFS). We are not doing much fighting in a what we consider an urban environment, i.e. concrete cities, but more in small villages that the bad guys runs to after engaging us. The Leo gives us the DFS capability to engage trenches and bunkers and also affords us the option to make our own entry ways into the compounds that most of the villages consist of that the LAV III couldn't do. No fault of the LAV just wasn't designed or meant to plow throw walls that are two feet thick and have baked in the sun for a long long time. Anyway back to the Sandbox next week. Post from there

Are you guys going over there? Good luck and good hunting.

Time too kick ass and take names! Hmmm.....Forget the names there all Mohammed anyway.

Hope your treads rip'em a new one!

Alex,

For a look at how MBTs actually can perform in MOUT situations, go here: http://avengerredsix.blogspot.com/2004/12/red-8-on-my-left-flank.html

That's Captain Neil Prakash's blog, who has been decorated (Silver Star) for his actions in Baquba and Fallujah #2(Nov 2004) in his M1A2 Abrams Tank.

He blogged about his experiences in 2004 in Iraq in a series of posts starting in Dec 2004 and continuing on into the spring of 2005 until he rotated out to Germany. Written reports, photos, and video. The video from Fallujah is pretty amazing. The story about how he earned his Silver Star is also pretty amazing.

I'm with CERDIP. Although Urban terrain is the most dangerous environment for a tank it is also the most dangerous for everyone else. The US has used the M1 in cities throughout OIF and they have done well. Just because the Tank was not purposely designed for MOUT doesn't mean it shouldn't be used.

Alex, why just use LAVs in cities when you can use both?