Marsh

It's more about the three missing tankers that went with this vehicle.  Reportedly, the tank arrived in the Soviet Union still containing human remains, personal belongings and documents belonging to the tank's crew.  Russia denies this was the case saying no human remains or crew items were in the vehicle when they received it.  I would assume that even if it were true, such objects would have been removed from the vehicle before it was put on display so I'm not really sure what the Israelis hope to gain from it.  Still, Israel has been asking for this vehicle for a long time, it makes sense for the Russians to return it as a diplomatic gesture.  

As Walter has said. It's more to do with the missing crewmen than the tank. It's the same MIA thing common to most Western societies. The families still think the crew may be alive and/or want some form of closure. 

 

Two Magachs were captured. Three crew members were not accounted for. There are grainy clips of film from 1982 showing one of the Magachs being driven through the streets of Damascus, with three apparently alive, but wounded, crew members being exhibited on the outside of the vehicle. The Syrian authorities since then have blankly denied any knowledge of the fate of the crew members. The Israelis want to ascertain if it was the same vehicle being driven through Damascus and if it is the vehicle belonging to the missing soldiers.

 

It won't bring the crewmen back, but might fill in some of the missing jigsaw pieces.

 

cheers

Marsh

You are welcome Collimatrix . Just to expand on my answer, I forgot to mention that I have seen a number of old fashioned looking Soviet light trucks, each mounting Swatter AT-2 ATGMs, which were captured from Egypt in 1967.(One of the advantages of being an old git, is that you have lived long enough to have seen a lot. My problem nowadays, is remembering it)!

Both the Israelis and Egyptians had a handful of vehicle mounted ATGMs in 1967.  Cobras and S11s as far as I remember for the IDF. I do not know of any actually being fired. There was neither the doctrine nor numbers for either side to employ the missiles with any effect.

 

Sagger was not a great surprise to the IDF in 1973. They had encountered it in small amounts during the War of Attrition between 1968 and the Yom Kippur war. What was a huge surprise was the numbers of ATGMs used in company with an apparently endless supply of RPGs. That and the greatly improved level of training and determination offered by the Arab forces.

 

Cheers

Marsh

Hmm, the new Jordanian APC looks much less advanced than their previous offering, the Temsah, which also was Centurion based but didn't go into service.

Hi LoooSeR,

In post 293, the black and white photo of the Nagmachon and Nakpadon next to each other, is one of mine. The correct name is Nakpadon.

The Base where the machines were photographed was in Galilee. It was built to train infantry and armour to work in tandem against an asymmetric opponent. A LOT of input in the Base design was from ex Russian and Soviet combat veterans, you might be interested to know.

Magach-6B (?)

Hi. Its the Magach 6 Batash.

Bloody hell. Someone is for the high jump. .......

Hey LoooSeR , that's one of my photos! I took it at the Namer's first Firepower trial. The Namer, in the photo, is one of the first three pre-production prototypes.

Cheers

Marsh

P.S.

My Avatar is me standing in front of the very same machine

I always called it the coif.

As well as the ball and chains, have a look at the ribs which make up the kit stowage pannier on tthe rear of Merkavas. They are made of ballistic steel and are designed to crush the fuze mechanisms of some mode RPGs. In other words, bar armour, long before it became popular on Western AFVs.

I like it.  The gun on that think actually looks like a real 105mm.  I wonder of those tanks were originally Israeli Tiran 5's which Israel gave to their Lebanese allies, the South Lebanon Army militia.  That would be rather ironic.

Hi Walter,

 

It is in fact one of the Tiran's provided to Israel's Lebanese allies. As far as I am aware it was equipped with the original 100mm gun.

cheers

Marsh

I would like to point out I am talking about the 1970s. I am an old git in my 60s, but even I don't date back to the 1600s. Feels like it sometimes mind .......

Vanagandr, a lot of people in the UK at the time, including me, thought the Icelanders were within their rights. Even the RN respected the Icelandic Coast Guard and thought the British government was being stupid.

It is a pity that the fishermen of the U.K. couldn't have been incorporated within a new sensible fishing agreement, but that is the fault of governments, not the men from the fishing ports.

Hi People,

 

Richard Ogorkiewicz's new and rather excellent book, 100 years: evolution of the tank, is currently going dirt cheap (99p) on UK Amazon as a Kindle book. 

 

Sorry, I don't know the situation in North America or Europe, you will need to check your local Amazon.

 

cheers

Marsh

I saw them for the first time in October 1973. Three damaged and abandoned tanks on the Golan on the way to the outskirts of Kunetra. They looked sleek and formidable with the 115mm gun

Pretty sure that's a Sabra, not a Magach-7.  I think all the Israeli variants ditched the tumor-cupola well before they put applique ERA and such on.  The stupid thing was getting their commanders killed.

Hi Collimatrix,

 

You are spot on. It is a Sabra as configured for Turkish service. Heaven knows why they wanted to keep the wretched cupola.

 

As I understand it, the Israelis did look into a further modernisation of their M60s to incorporate new applique armour and the 120mm gun. Although it resembled the version of the Sabra produced for Turkey,, it was not identical. In any case they decided to retire the M48s and M60s and focus on Merk 3s and Merk 4s for their active tank fleet.

Have you had much opportunity to meet some of the other authors specializing in armor history?

Hi Walter. I sent you a PM

Thanks Lads, I think  ,,,,      

 

Walter, I have written stuff for Jane's Defence Weekly, Jane's Intelligence Review, IDR etc. I have written for something like 40-50 different journals, both popular and professional, not only on military technology but also on infectious diseases amongst other topics. Had four books published, co-authored a fifth and have contributed several chapters to books.

Hi Walter. The photos on the dust jacket were chosen by the publisher. I requested that they use one of the photos I had taken, for the main one on the dust jacket. In fact I specified a photo of a Challenger 1 in an over-watch position which I took on Salisbury Plain. When I got my author's copy of the book, it was as you see. The photo of the Merkava 3 is mine as is the photo on the bottom right. The publisher chose the Merkava picture as it was "dynamic rather than static.". At first I was annoyed, then over time the dust jacket grew on me. Brassey's was the most problematic publisher I ever worked for. Jane's publishing was OK as was Osprey. Jochen Vollert at Tankograd was a pleasure to work for.

Cheers

Marsh

Looking at it again - it now reminds me Merkava 3BdD and Merk 4 turret sides armor.

Yes, but which generation? I am well out of the loop nowadays, but I know of at least four generations of armour modules that I have climbed over. Remember, with fully modular armour arrays on the Merkava, they are changed at much more frequent intervals than most other modern MBTs. Given the IDF's somewhat limited resources, the modules are changed in small batches, but the technology of the modules is cutting edge; ahead of most to be honest.

The equivalent? Yes . . . 

The ready rack in the merkava, as I understand it, is sealed and behind blow-off panels.  It's a rotary setup, and the loader takes the rounds out of it from the same place every time.  I think the loader can even dial a particular type of round:

 

This video shows it at 2:18

 

 

I'm sure Marsh can clarify/correct.

Marsh is currently being very careful and cautious before he says anything about the Merk or Namer. I don't want to cross the line into OPSEC issues. 

http://www.yadlashiryon.com/show_item.asp?levelId=64565&itemId=8053&itemType=0

 

Merkava SIman 2-based APC will be called "Ofek" / "Horizon". Well, it is cheap as no modifications to frontal part of the hull are needed.

 

Hi,

It looks like the current version,  as shown, of Ofek will be used as casualty evacuation vehicles and by combat engineers rather than infantry. It is quite possible that the vehicle might be reworked further to make it more suitable as a heavy APC to supplement the Namer and Achzarit.

 

Cheers

Marsh

Hi Walter,

 

Only one M48/M60 was ever converted. It was a competitor to the Centurion based Nakpadon LIC carrier. The Centurion was used as the suspension was easier to repair after damage from mines and the fact that the M60 continued in use as an MBT in the IDF, beyond the timeline of the Centurion. Thus fewer were available for conversion into carriers.

 

Surprisingly, despite Kangaroo RAM carriers, the IDF never used the Sherman as an infantry carrier.

 

Cheers

Marsh

Looks like new heavy APC is tested in Israel.

Merkava Siman 2 chassis, turret removed, some kind of superstructure with cage armor and lots of antennas (jammers?) installed. 

Hi LoooSeR,

 

Have you seen the article contained in the link below?

 

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4717422,00.html

 

Cheers

Marsh

 

 

"Are you at liberty to elaborate more on this?  I am very curious about the origins of Blazer; it seems to have been developed very rapidly."

 

Hi Collimatrix,

 

I first met Manfred Held, the progenitor of ERA, at least in its initial fielded form, Blazer, at an AFV symposium run by SMi held in London in January 2004. He is not of course a Norwegian who once worked for Rafael,  but a German academic specialising in ballistics.

 

If I remember a conversation around a dinner table correctly, He came up for the idea for ERA when given permission to examine some of the hundreds of T-54s and T-55s the IDF had captured in 1967. He paid particular emphasis to those vehicles that had been damaged. To his surprise, he noted that in certain cases, where propellant for individual isolated shells had cooked off and hadn't caused a general catastrophic explosion, the force of the propellant had disrupted the efficacy of a penetrating shaped charge jet. Held then worked on methodologies for harnessing this phenomena and came up with the idea of ERA sandwiches and drive plates within steel boxes.

 

Although Held patented his ideas in 1970, he could not generate interest in his ideas in Western Europe. however, he returned to Israel in 1974, again to examine the hulls of knocked out or damaged T-55s and T-62s. He explained his ideas to the IDF who arranged an experiment using primitive ERA boxes. A very convincing and successful demonstration of the efficacy of ERA was held, I know the exact date for this, it was on the 16th May 1974, where the prototype ERA boxes defeated both Sagger and RPG warheads.  After that demonstration, Rafael was given the task of rapidly developing applique ERA boxes which could be fitted to the IDF's increasingly obsolescent Centurion and M48 tanks. The rest you know. 

 

cheers

Marsh