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Sturgeon's House

Britons are in trouble


Mighty_Zuk

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1. An admission that there had been mixed drivers on Ajax as a delivery programme.
2. These had been an issue on Ajax.
3. Delays on Ajax had had a morale impact on units due to see it as their core equipment.
4. There had likely been attempts to push it into service, regardless.
5. It turned out to be unrealistic to deliver to units a piece of equipment that still had issues.
6. AM Knighton seems to be saying, when he says, "when we better understand", that this is a relatively on-going issue (hearing was scant days ago).
7. If PS has to "write a letter" to the PAC about this, this is not a mundane issue.
8. AM says that any such letter will be, "a revised assessment of the programme - meaning that current assessment is no longer valid.
 

 

 

 

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UK to reassess Ajax programme
 

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UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) procurement chiefs are reassessing the GBP5.3 billion (USD6.7 billion) Ajax programme after the first batch of production standard armoured fighting vehicles (AFVs) was found not to be ready for delivery.


https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news-detail/29cf9003-fcc5-4c72-af61-e7a41a7aa603

The rumour is that the Spanish built vehicles have shocking quality control (including hull welds) resulting in the Welsh facility having to disassemble, fix, reassemble and then re-validate each unit.
Santa Bárbara recently had problems with the Piranha V-based Dragon 8x8 and a Spanish defence magazine says the VCZAP Castor (ASCOD-Pizarro engineering variant) prototype is overweight and delayed.

Despite this Desider Magazine reports that the first 2 rebuilt Ares have been accepted for service:

Success as AJAX completes acceptance testing
 

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Progress with AJAX testing has continued despite the challenging circumstances brought by COVID-19. The first two Ares platforms that will provide reconnaissance support have recently passed general acceptance testing and will shortly be delivered to the Household Cavalry Regiment.


https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/889347/June-desider-online.pdf

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  • 2 weeks later...
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Ed Francis has recently started a fantastic Youtube channel going over British vehicle design and development called Armoured Archives. He has plenty of unseen gems in his videos, including this bad boy:

 

EAVAkgo.png

 

I'll let his work speak for itself: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCIgjPAYn253oyWLsYgiHDw

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It is because there was this realisation that the programme was not ambitious enough. It needed a smoothbore gun. It needed the ability to put a missile down that barrel to overmatch Armata, as you rightly describe. It needed its protection levels to be significantly enhanced.


https://committees.parliament.uk/oralevidence/652/pdf/

Army apparently wants CR2 to fire gun-launched ATGM and have significantly enhanced protection.

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I thought that GLATGM started to go out of fashion with the rise of APS systems and advance with the ballistic computers and ammo. Sure they still bring a capability which is useful (not sure if against T-14 though) but is that worth of the investment and the development effort? 

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38 minutes ago, BaronTibere said:

Ignoring the problem of APS the LAHAT is designed for top attack is it not? Theoretically an Armata can be hull down with no exposed crew meaning some form of top attack would be required to hit the crew compartment.

 

But top attack missile would hit most likely the unmanned turret instead of the crew compartment (even if we completely ignore the countermeasures T-14 posses). 

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3 hours ago, BaronTibere said:

Ignoring the problem of APS the LAHAT is designed for top attack is it not? Theoretically an Armata can be hull down with no exposed crew meaning some form of top attack would be required to hit the crew compartment.

 

afaik LAHAT is just a bog standard 105mm ATGM

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I don´t understand how they believe that Lahat is gonna give them overmatch vs the T-14. Lahat may have a very good maximum range (8km) and top attack but its not fire and forget and the missile is fairly slow, meaning that the tank has to be exposed to enemy fire during a long time. If the gunner loses visual on the target, the missile is useless.
How its going to go in a theoretical scenario? Cr2 spots an advancing T-14 at about 5km and fires Lahat. T-14 APS detects the missile and the point of origin, Cr2 turret is then spotted by the gunner. T-14 loads Sokol, locks the target and fires. T-14 deploys smoke and countermeasures and reverses to cover while Sokol flies on his own and hits the Cr2.

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Lahat can be detected only when target is illuminated by laser (at the end of the flight). And effectiveness of Armata's APS is questionable. It looks like old Soviet Drozd APS, and we don't know if it can be effective against top attack missiles.

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I've seen it mentioned that "missile" could simply mean a tank round projectile.
In English a missile is "an object which is forcibly propelled at a target, either by hand or from a mechanical weapon".

However the CR2 Streetfighter concept with Brimstone launcher shows the Army is interested in under-heavy-armour ATGM ability.

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32 minutes ago, VPZ said:

Lahat can be detected only when target is illuminated by laser (at the end of the flight). And effectiveness of Armata's APS is questionable. It looks like old Soviet Drozd APS, and we don't know if it can be effective against top attack missiles.

I didn't mean a hardkill interception. Just by popping smoke the missile is useless.

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Moreover you have to try really hard to find a spot where you have a 5 km line of sight in Europe. That's possible basically only in deserts or if the enemy is completely stupid. 

 

1 hour ago, VPZ said:

And effectiveness of Armata's APS is questionable. It looks like old Soviet Drozd APS, and we don't know if it can be effective against top attack missiles.

 

The Drozd-like APS rockets are not meant for top attack missile defence. On the turret there are 24 smaller vertical launcher tubes likely intended for that (aside of another 24 rotating smoke grenade launchers). What they atually launch is another question. 

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