Future Ready Combat Vehicle tender

[Willy2]

This photo is an excellent demonstration of the armor protection design of T-72/T-90 family. They are lower, shorter and lighter than western tanks like M1 or Leopard. But that comes at a cost of all-around armor protection. That is why Soviet/Russian designers concentrated the armor in a 60 degree cone towards the front. The turret front is very well armored with ERA and composites, but the sides and back are not. The sides are tapered toward the back so that they remain within the 60 degree cone. Hull ERAs is most dense in the upper glacis, and the front sides have 3 ERA modules attached to the skirt.

This is a very good tank for assaulting the enemy on open tank country, which is what was expected of the T-72 in western Europe. But the downside is, it's not very good on it's own when operating in urban environment, as demonstrated by the Syrian videos on youtube. An RPG-29 hit to the side hull from a destroyed building across the street will cook off the turret well mounted autoloader ammo, and fry the crew.

I would much prefer rolling into Lahore inside an Arjun MK2 equipped with TUSK kit.

But if our cold start is more like "blitzkrieg", then it's possible that we would more like to cutoff large paki cities before taking control , like fall of Dhaka , we need lighter tank to pass rivers and stream rolled through field even before we consider entering lewhore and sialkot .........
So possibly lighter tank like T-90 going to dominate our tank forces in future .

 

[binayak95]

But if our cold start is more like "blitzkrieg", then it's possible that we would more like to cutoff large paki cities before taking control , like fall of Dhaka , we need lighter tank to pass rivers and stream rolled through field even before we consider entering lewhore and sialkot .........
So possibly lighter tank like T-90 going to dominate our tank forces in future .

Quite feasible an idea. Perhaps. The IA's thinking is 80% lighter 50T tanks like the T-90 and the FRCV, with a few elite regiments of Arjun Mk-IIs... The Arjuns can take and dish out serious punishment, while the T-90s flank and spank.

Old school cavalry tactics. Shock heavy cavalry supported by light cavalry!

 

[sayareakd]

But if our cold start is more like "blitzkrieg", then it's possible that we would more like to cutoff large paki cities before taking control , like fall of Dhaka , we need lighter tank to pass rivers and stream rolled through field even before we consider entering lewhore and sialkot .........
So possibly lighter tank like T-90 going to dominate our tank forces in future .

T90s is upgrade over T72m they share 60% same parts. Rest new or drdo developed parts. Now problem is modern anti tank weapons could take out these tanks unless we employ smart tactics or else, Pak anti armor teams will take them out.

Lets not underestimate them and use proper armor on our tanks. Thats reason uncle has 70 tone tank, at least crew comes home safe.

Added later: good tank crew is second only to fighter pilots in training, therefore from light tanks every one is moving to heavy tanks like Arjun, Russia with T14 and Chinese tanks are example of added protection for crew.

 

[Vinod DX9]

Long ago I went through an article on Soviet open terrain tank warfare strategy. It simplified the thing with sime key points. In a war, T-64 will be at the front. Will take heat and will fire upon enemy, being believed T-64 frontal armour capable of taking direct fire from Western tank in short distance. Hence T-64 will work as both a shock absorber and front line assault weqpon. Whereas T-72s would strike from flank as they could be operated more easily. When T-64 and T-72 would finish best front line tanks of opponent , T-54/55 & T-62 would be mobilized to search and destroy any remaining.

We too can use it. Arjun Mk II can take out front line Paki tanks like Al Khalid II . T-90 Bhismas can take out as much as possible from flank. Any remaining will be taken out by Ajeyas or FRCV.

Now, FRCV should be better than Ajeyas. And can be even better than even T-90s too if chosen wisely.

However, none of them are good for urban warfare. In fact no tank can guarantee 100% protection in urban warfare . For that fast light tanks are much better choice as they can maneuver better than MBTs.

 

[Kshithij]

Long ago I went through an article on Soviet open terrain tank warfare strategy. It simplified the thing with sime key points. In a war, T-64 will be at the front. Will take heat and will fire upon enemy, being believed T-64 frontal armour capable of taking direct fire from Western tank in short distance. Hence T-64 will work as both a shock absorber and front line assault weqpon. Whereas T-72s would strike from flank as they could be operated more easily. When T-64 and T-72 would finish best front line tanks of opponent , T-54/55 & T-62 would be mobilized to search and destroy any remaining.

We too can use it. Arjun Mk II can take out front line Paki tanks like Al Khalid II . T-90 Bhismas can take out as much as possible from flank. Any remaining will be taken out by Ajeyas or FRCV.

Now, FRCV should be better than Ajeyas. And can be even better than even T-90s too if chosen wisely.

However, none of them are good for urban warfare. In fact no tank can guarantee 100% protection in urban warfare . For that fast light tanks are much better choice as they can maneuver better than MBTs.

Urban warfare means missiles, bombs and nukes. This is to be followed by 1 crore artillery shells to level everything.

 

[sayareakd]

Long ago I went through an article on Soviet open terrain tank warfare strategy. It simplified the thing with sime key points. In a war, T-64 will be at the front. Will take heat and will fire upon enemy, being believed T-64 frontal armour capable of taking direct fire from Western tank in short distance. Hence T-64 will work as both a shock absorber and front line assault weqpon. Whereas T-72s would strike from flank as they could be operated more easily. When T-64 and T-72 would finish best front line tanks of opponent , T-54/55 & T-62 would be mobilized to search and destroy any remaining.

We too can use it. Arjun Mk II can take out front line Paki tanks like Al Khalid II . T-90 Bhismas can take out as much as possible from flank. Any remaining will be taken out by Ajeyas or FRCV.

Now, FRCV should be better than Ajeyas. And can be even better than even T-90s too if chosen wisely.

However, none of them are good for urban warfare. In fact no tank can guarantee 100% protection in urban warfare . For that fast light tanks are much better choice as they can maneuver better than MBTs.

This is not what happen in modern warfare.

We should use CBU 100 against their armor, decimated their formations, then spread out forces, in such a way that using tactical nukes will be useless.

Thats when they will panic. BTW nag and helina will make tank battles things of past.

 

[Vorschlaghammer]

Armored tactics in urban warzone and plains are very different.

First, Without a total war situation, nukes and carpet bombing/shelling is not feasible. Look at Syrian war, Russia has been relying on localized arty support and point air strikes mostly. You can't bombard a city for a week with a billion shells or drop millions of tons of ordnance from air. That was WW2 and Vietnam when political goals were more blunt and straightforward. The typical destroyed city will have rubble all around, which is the ideal terrain for 1-2 man sniper and RPG teams. It's impossible to stop the infiltration of these irregulars. Taking a city will be hands down costly in all aspects for the attacker. The ideal street clearing operation is to be done with infantry working together with modern "Heavy" Tanks and IFVs. The heavy armor is needed to protect against RPG teams. The IFVs will need to pin any contact with Autocannon, AGL, and Co-ax fire, then the Tank will need to put HE rounds in to flatten it. Infantry will need to do room clearing for each building. The whole situation is a headache. Happened in Stalingrad, Hue City, and Aleppo.

In the plains speed is more important than all-over protection when you can maintain the tempo of the operation.
This is a video about the overall Wehrmacht Panzer tactics during it's initial successful years.

Point to be noted is that, this was an era when towed Anti Tank guns were the primary threats for the Panzers, today in a proper war, against a proper enemy, attacking Tanks will face flanking ATGM teams, Pillboxes, hull down enemy tanks, and SADARM rains from above.

But ultimately it all depends on too many variables like your established armored doctrine, mid level command aggressiveness, acceptable casualty rate, average crew training, terrain, enemy assessment and many more, so these are ultimately speculations technically. Unless you have passed out of the Armored Corps college, as lay men we can only speculate. In my ideal Utopian vision of IA I would have prefered if they kept Arjun as the heavy hitter who can shrug off punishment, then a multipurpose medium platform like the K2 which could be used as MBT, heavy IFV, SP Arty hull, and a light tank and light tracked IFV for the north, and finally rebuild the retired T72s as tank support vehicles like the BMPT. But we all know we neither have the $600b budget nor a clarity of vision in the top brass.

 

[tharun]

==========================================

T-Rex tank to be made by ukraine...........

 

[shuvo@y2k10]

This is a proposed tank based on hulls of old t-72 to counter the Armata T-14 of Russia. It seems it is a private venture and not a Ukrainian government sanctioned project till now. It is in design phase right now.

 

[Vinod DX9]

In 2012, @p2prada wrote (on a MRCA type competetion for tanks)
" Someone mentioned something about an open tender like MRCA. No one will provide us with the kind of ToT that will help us make even 50% of thetank at home let alone the 85% that we achieved with T-90...."

In FRCV RFI we hoping for same....

 

[Flame Thrower]

T-Rex tank to be made by ukraine...........

Russia will be upset.

This action will be seen as indirect financial assistance to Keiv govt.

Bad choice @tharun bhai.

 

[Kshithij]

Ukraine is incompetent. It just has Russian technology due to Soviet legacy

 

[tharun]

Russia will be upset.

This action will be seen as indirect financial assistance to Keiv govt.

Bad choice @tharun bhai.

We are not buying it.
It was just a image for representation of the circular autoloader.

 

[bhramos]

Indian program of the perspective tank FRCV

24 months after the Indian Army issued an RFI request for the Future Ready Combat Vehicle (FRCV) project, it had to reconsider its excessively high requirements and send a second request for a less ambitious, but to the more accessible family of heavy armored vehicles, says Tom Waldwin, an expert at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), in his article "India's not-quite-ready Future Ready Combat Vehicle."

The first Request for Information (RFI) of June 2015 was replaced by a document issued in 2017, which amended the program for the alleged replacement of about 2,000 Indian Army T-72M1 tanks by 1,770 units of FRCV advanced technology. So, of the 11 FRCV modifications proposed in 2015, there are five. In particular, the wheeled cannon armored vehicle ("Wheeled version") disappeared from the list, while ambitions for the light tank were preserved ("Light Tank"). The 2017 document also identifies a basic self-propelled platform for other weapons ("Self-propelled base platform for other arms").

It is unclear what the Indian army means by "light tank". The creation of a more compact and light version of the machine chosen to meet the requirements of the main tank, even if this would be achievable, would complicate the development process and inevitably increase costs. It is more likely that in this role a machine developed within the framework of a separate program Future Infantry Combat Vehicle (FICV) aimed at replacing Indian BMP-2 will be used.

In accordance with the updated RFI, the combat weight of the basic platform of the main tank (Baseline MBT Platform) should be from 42.5 to 58 tons - the same range as that of the armed tank T-72M1. This "most important" characteristic is due to the country's geography and infrastructure. Despite the fact that India is open to proposals for tanks with a crew of 4 people and a 120-mm cannon, many years of experience with the use of the T-72M1 and T-90S tanks with three crew members and 125mm guns can lead the country to choose a more customary option .

The Indian army is looking for a foreign company to supply the "proven Armored Fighting Vehicle", and then plans to cooperate with a local Indian enterprise that will manufacture. The announced requirements seem to limit the choice to offers from South Korea, Japan and Russia. However, all of them will create certain difficulties.

The South Korean tank K2 was ordered by the South Korean armed forces in two batches of 100 units each, but has not yet been exported. The first batch, equipped with German engines, was commissioned in 2014. The second batch with the engines of the Korean company Doosan DST, stopped at the testing stage due to problems in the power plant. The Japanese tank of type 10 was also not exported. To date, a small amount of these type 10 tanks with an average cost of $ 11 million per unit was ordered by the Self-Defense Forces of Japan.

T-90MS is the most modern modification of the Russian T-90 tank. Since the mid-2000s, India has been licensed to produce its earlier version of the T-90S, more than 1,000 units are in service with the country. However, Russian-Indian cooperation in this direction was not simple, errors on both sides led to delays and increased costs. If India decided to continue the purchase of T-90 tanks, it would be logical to continue production at the state-owned Heavy Vehicles Factory in Avadi.

The choice of T-90MS within the framework of the FRCV program would mean that the Indian army opts for a homogeneous T-90 park, instead of a mixed version. At the end of 2016, the Defense Acquisition Council of India (DAC) approved the purchase of another 464 T-90 tanks, which were designated in the Indian press as T-90MS. If this is true information, one might assume that the Indian Army is considering this project apart from the FRCV program, which makes the T-90MS victory unlikely.

Although the T-14 "Armata" can not be called "proven", since he still has to enter the arsenal of the Russian Army, the demands made by the Indian side make him a serious candidate. Despite the fact that the introduction of a partner into the Armata program will become a complicating factor for Moscow, the division of production costs and the maintenance of the order are likely to be welcomed.

The FRCV program is important not only in terms of the replacement of T-72 tanks, but also in connection with the Indian Army's refusal from the corresponding project of the Organization for Defense Research and Development (DRDO). The Indian project of the main tank Arjun Mk I, whose history dates back to the 1970s, was faced with many years of delays and excess costs, until in 2009, after the construction of 122 out of 124 custom-made tanks, production was not curtailed. Since then, DRDO has been working on its improved version of Arjun Mk II. Despite the fact that the DAC approved the purchase of 118 Arjun Mk II tanks in 2014, as of the end of 2017 the contract has not yet been signed. Part of this is due to the resistance of the Indian army due to the heavy weight of the tank, which is reportedly 68.6 tons. In fact, the army and DRDO are competing, trying to convince politicians of the country,

https://bmpd.livejournal.com/3021432.html

 

[darshan978]

this is from 43 parliamentary defense committee report


Futuristic Infantry Combat Vehicle (FICV) : It will replace existing
BMP-II. OFB has gone ahead with the development of this ‘Complex
High Technology’ item after Integrated Project Management Team/
MoD conveyed that OFB to start Design & Development of FICV. OFB
had participated in the EOI (Expression of Interest) issued by MoD for
selecting Design Agency(s).
Preliminary design has been completed. Development of sub-systems
will be completed within a year and 1st prototype for internal evaluation
is scheduled to be manufactured by December, 2019.
Various varieties of its ammunition (i.e. 30mm Ammunition) are already
manufactured by Ordnance Factories. OFB is further developing 30mm
FSAPDS and 30mm PFFC ammunition to enhance the role of the
weapon platform.

 

[ezsasa]

this is from 43 parliamentary defense committee report


Futuristic Infantry Combat Vehicle (FICV) : It will replace existing
BMP-II. OFB has gone ahead with the development of this ‘Complex
High Technology’ item after Integrated Project Management Team/
MoD conveyed that OFB to start Design & Development of FICV. OFB
had participated in the EOI (Expression of Interest) issued by MoD for
selecting Design Agency(s).
Preliminary design has been completed. Development of sub-systems
will be completed within a year and 1st prototype for internal evaluation
is scheduled to be manufactured by December, 2019.
Various varieties of its ammunition (i.e. 30mm Ammunition) are already
manufactured by Ordnance Factories. OFB is further developing 30mm
FSAPDS and 30mm PFFC ammunition to enhance the role of the
weapon platform.

30mm
FSAPDS
This should be interesting, never heard of it before.

 

[Adioz]

this is from 43 parliamentary defense committee report


Futuristic Infantry Combat Vehicle (FICV) : It will replace existing
BMP-II. OFB has gone ahead with the development of this ‘Complex
High Technology’ item after Integrated Project Management Team/
MoD conveyed that OFB to start Design & Development of FICV. OFB
had participated in the EOI (Expression of Interest) issued by MoD for
selecting Design Agency(s).
Preliminary design has been completed. Development of sub-systems
will be completed within a year and 1st prototype for internal evaluation
is scheduled to be manufactured by December, 2019.
Various varieties of its ammunition (i.e. 30mm Ammunition) are already
manufactured by Ordnance Factories. OFB is further developing 30mm
FSAPDS and 30mm PFFC ammunition to enhance the role of the
weapon platform.

FICV ≠ FRCV

BTW what happened to TATA FICV?

 

[darshan978]

FICV ≠ FRCV

BTW what happened to TATA FICV?

very confusing

 

[Aghore_King]

I think ofb ficv will be a bmp 2 copy with some modern systems....

 

[Kshithij]

FICV ≠ FRCV

BTW what happened to TATA FICV?

What is the difference between FRCV and FICV? I thought they were the same. This is new information