Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!pacific.mps.ohio-state.edu!linac!att!cbnews!cbnews!military From: bcstec!shuksan!major@uunet.UU.NET (Mike Schmitt) Newsgroups: sci.military Subject: Re: TOW vs Saggers and RPG's in Iraq and Yom Kippur War Message-ID: <1991Jan12.012157.25115@cbnews.att.com> Date: 12 Jan 91 01:21:57 GMT References: <1991Jan10.025148.3218@cbnews.att.com> Sender: military@cbnews.att.com (William B. Thacker) Organization: The Boeing Co., MMST, Seattle, Wa. Lines: 39 Approved: military@att.att.com From: bcstec!shuksan!major@uunet.UU.NET (Mike Schmitt) > From: Marc Alexandrovich Volovic > I quite agree that the the Sagger and RPG equipped Egyptian forces > caused heavy losses to the Israeli tank forces. The reason is, as you have > stated, lack of infantry support. During the years from 67 to 73 the Israeli > Army, under the influence of General Tal, developed the "tank-heavy" doctrine. > The decided that the ancilary forces of the tank division are less important > than the tanks and that tanks "can do it alone." According to one Israeli Tank Battalion comander, Israeli tank forces were ordered to reach the battle at all speed - to halt the oncoming Egyptian forces. In so doing, their tanks quickly outran the old infantry-carrying half tracks - and met Egyptian anti-tank weaponry without infantry support (a big non-no). First, the Israeli tank forces quickly developed a "Sagger Overwatch" tactic - and secondly, the arrival of M113 APCs allowed the infantry to keep up with the tanks (many of the M113s came from U.S. POMCUS stocks stored in Europe). > The US has that experience, and its tank divisions have infantry > support, with independent and organic AT subunits. I doubt very much that > the Iraqis have Blazer or the newer Israeli designed fire attenuation systems > incorporated in the Russian tanks, and even if they do, they probably have > the subsystems on the better tank divisions (i.e. RepGuard). Traditionally, the Soviet "export" model of their tanks is less sophisticated than their "domestic" model - especially in fire control. So, the question is - what model Soviet tank do the Iraqi's use as their Main Battle Tank? T-64? T-72? T-80? And were these tanks manufactured in the Soviet Union (domestic model) or Czechoslovokia (export models)? Do they have any French AMX-series of tanks (eg AMX-30)? mts