NATO armored vehicles supplied to Ukraine are being destroyed by the Russian Army at a rapid rate across the locations of the fighting.
The NATO armored vehicles supplied to the Ukrainian armed forces have rather thin armor and limited firepower, so it is not difficult to understand why they have suffered so much damage on the battlefield.
Currently, every day there is information about the destruction of armored vehicles that are being aided by NATO in Ukraine. Most of the damage was recorded with armored personnel carriers, mine-resistant armored vehicles, and Humvee multi-purpose armored vehicles.
For example, the defeat or capture of armored vehicles of the M113 family, including the special Dutch-made YPR-765 version, is regularly reported by the Russian Army.
According to comments, these obsolete armored vehicles have relatively weak protection and low firepower. Without aid from the Ukrainian armed forces, the vehicles that have been withdrawn from service in many countries will most likely be sent for dismantling or used at training grounds as targets.
The supply of armor by NATO to the Ukrainian armed forces has solved the problem of the overabundance of special vehicles capable of protecting soldiers from landmines, which becomes unnecessary when maintaining large numbers after the war. war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
One workaround was that the US gave friendly militias in the Middle East their International MaxxPros, but it turned out to be more suitable for patrolling on fine asphalt roads. In Ukraine, they are often stuck in the mud.
Recently, it is known that the Ukrainian armed forces have lost the first British-aided Mastiff heavy armored vehicle, which is a version of the Cougar mine-resistant armor developed by the US.
The Mastiff’s weight is 25,000 kg with a capacity of 12 soldiers with fully equipped weapons. The car is integrated with a diesel engine with a capacity of 330 hp. The maximum speed on the highway is not more than 90 km / h, the fuel range is about 950 km.
Various types of machine guns, including 12.7 mm heavy machine guns, as well as 40 mm automatic grenade launchers can be used as weapons when the manufacturer has made positions available to help soldiers easily. easy integration.
Along with the Mastiff, Wolfhound armored trucks have been deployed on Ukrainian soil, they are capable of transporting up to 6 tons of cargo, but similar to armored personnel carriers, this type of truck, although not on the front lines, but also significant damage.
In the future, it is not excluded that NATO allies will also provide Kyiv with more surplus infantry fighting vehicles or main battle tanks, such as the Marder or the Leopard 2A4.
Although these types of tanks have much better protection, it is certainly not enough to survive the blow from Russia’s extremely powerful anti-tank missiles.
The modern battlefield has shown that the role of tanks and armor is increasingly blurred when confronting drones or self-propelled combat robots on the ground.
With what happened in the hot land of Ukraine, many military experts once again made the assessment, that the period of being “king of the battlefield” of tanks and armored vehicles is about to end.
