Turkey and Indonesia have signed an agreement to jointly develop and produce a medium-weight tank, Turkey’s Undersecretary for Defense Industries announced on May 7.The medium tank is back in the Pacific! China has one and now maybe Indonesia. Oh and don't be fooled...tanks were used in the jungles of that region during WW2, the Sino-Vietnam War and Vietnam by all sides.
The two countries signed an agreement for the design and manufacture of two prototype medium-weight tanks. The intellectual e Indonesia. rights will belong to both countries, the Undersecretary said in a statement.
The deal, which will be completed in 37 months, also included manufacturing one tank body to be used in mine tests.
Under the program, surveillance activities will be performed by an executive committee which will be established by the Ministry of National Defense of Indonesia and Turkey’s Undersecretariat for Defense Industries.
Turkish FNSS Defense Systems, the leading land combat systems company in Turkey, will provide job training to Indonesia’s state-owned PT Pindad for the medium-weight tank’s design and production.
The first prototype will be produced in Turkey with the participation of PT Pindand’s engineers and the second prototype will be produced in Indonesia by PT Pindad.
But finding an APS for the US Army and Marine Corps' global ground force is fraught with difficulties. Even if the US were to buy and deploy Israel's tested Trophy system, there are many additional considerations to be made.Has anyone noticed that defense issues are increasingly showing up in business publications? That military industrial complex is working overtime to suck the taxpayer dry!
The Marines, for instance, need an APS that can be deployed on boats and resist salt-water corrosion. The systems, with their advanced sensors needed to detect and destroy incoming threats in the blinding speed of real-time conflict, may interfere with each other or malfunction.
Because the systems need to operate in milliseconds, no human can deploy them. Therefore they need to be automated, and collateral damage is a real risk. APS uses a hail of shrapnel to thwart incoming rockets, filling the area outside the tank with explosions and flying debris that could potentially harm friendly troops.
Because of the US's high standards of protecting lives and property, public and private, they must come up with a satisfactory solution to these issues.
Meanwhile Russia claims to have developed the T-14 Armata, a truly next-generation tank fitted with a bigger gun, better armor, and APS all around.
While there is reason to doubt the overall capabilities of the T-14, antitank weapons systems are proven to be effective and in the hands of militias around the world.
For the US to retain its asymmetrical advantage in ground warfare, as it has done for decades, the issue of protecting armored vehicles must be addressed.
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| BVS10 Beowulf arriving at NGAUS. I wonder why BAE isn't pushing to sell these vehicles to civilian law enforcement and fire depts? They would be perfect in flood prone areas and great for mobility after tornadoes, hurricanes etc...when debris prevents other vehicles from getting to victims. Paint it fire red, orange, or any color but black, green or camo and sell it as an all terrain rescue vehicle. Really seems like a no brainer. |
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| M109A7 in Alaska. I really need to see what improvements were made to this vehicle. On a sidenote I wonder why they haven't trialed the long barrel they're talking about for the M777 for extended range. |
It's probably one of the best-known images of World War II, the enduring photograph that captures the last seconds of Leonard Siffleet's life.The whole article is here and definitely worth a read. Pictures like this aren't widely known by the American public and help put together the FULL story of the great war.
The photograph came to light after US troops discovered it on the body of a dead Japanese officer near Hollandia in 1944.
Featured in various newspapers and in Life magazine, it was thought to depict Flight Lieutenant Bill Newton, who had been captured in Salamaua, Papua New Guinea, and was beheaded on March 29, 1943. Even today, the soldier is still occasionally misidentified as Newton.
The soldier, who would become known because of the circumstances of his death, was actually Leonard George "Len" Siffleet.
He was born on January 14, 1916, at Gunnedah, New South Wales, Australia. Siffleet, who loved sports and adventure, moved in the late 1930s to Sydney to search for work. He tried to join the police forces but was rejected for having poor eyesight.
Nevertheless, in August 1940 Siffleet was still called up for military service, and he served in a searchlight unit at Richmond Air Force Base for three months before returning to civilian life. Not long after in September 1941, he enlisted in the Second Australian Imperial Force and joined the 1st Division Signals Company at Ingleburn.
Leonard Siffleet went on a signals course at Melbourne Technical College before he volunteered for special operations in September 1942. He was posted to the Z Special unit. In October 1943 he went to the Z Experimental Station in Cairs, where he would receive further training.
Siffleet was promoted to sergeant on May 5, 1943, and he was assigned as a radio operator in his unit. Not long after his promotion he was transferred to M Special Unit and was sent to Hollandia, Papa New Guinea, with his fellow soldiers.
In mid-September 1943, while part of a team led by a Sergeant Staverman, which included two Ambonese members of the Netherlands East Indies Forces, a Private Pattiwahl and aPrivate Reharin, Siffleet was underway to Aitape while traveling behind Japanese lines. At some point in October 1943, they were discovered by New Guinea natives and surrounded. Siffleet fired on some of the attackers before fleeing, but he was quickly caught along with his companions.
Hyundai Rotem is expecting to commence production of 600 6x6 KW1 and 8x8 wheeled armoured vehicles (WAVs) for the Republic of Korea Army (RoKA) from 2018 at a rate of about 100 vehicles each year, the company said. These will be designated K806 and K808 in RoKA service, respectively.Interesting. So the 6x6 will be used for rear echelon work and the 8x8 is for high intensity combat. That explains why they're building two different models.
Speaking to IHS Jane's at the DX Korea 2016 exhibition in Goyang city, South Korea, principal research engineer at Hyundai Rotem's research and development centre Shin Yong-Cheol said the company expects a firm order from the South Korean government by October, which will call for a batch of 16 low-rate initial production vehicles to be delivered to the RoKA for field trials scheduled to last till the end of 2017. Production will commence thereafter from 2018.
According to Shin, the order of 600 vehicles will comprise 100 K806 and 500 K808 platforms. These will be outfitted with a one-person protected weapon station armed with an M2 HB machine gun. IHS Jane's understands that there are no plans by the RoKA to equip the new vehicles with remote weapon stations to reduce acquisition costs, although Shin said the company is ready to supply these systems if requested.
Both the 16-tonne K806 and 20-tonne K808 share many of the same performance characteristics. According to the latest specifications supplied by Hyundai Rotem, the vehicles are powered by a 420 hp Hyundai Motor Company diesel engine that provides a maximum road speed of 100 km/h via a seven-speed automatic transmission. They are also operated by a two-person crew with accommodation for up to nine fully equipped troops.
However, Shin explained that the concept of operations for the vehicles is quite distinct, with the K806 aimed at performing rear echelon roles such as the defence of civilian and military facilities and logistics convoy protection while the K808 will conduct high-intensity combat operations alongside the service's K1A1 and K2 main battle tanks.
The memo from the Director, Operational Test & Evaluation makes very clear that the constant stream of positive pronouncements made by the Joint Program Office and Air Force generals have been false.and then this...
This latest DOT&E memorandum undermines one of the fundamental arguments in favor of the F-35 in the CAS role: that the F-35 will need to provide close air support in places with high levels of enemy air defenses, a mission that would require stealth capabilities. But the battles in which CAS is needed don’t generally take place in areas where there are high levels of enemy air defenses. The memo points out that close air support is normally conducted in low-air defense threat environments. This is a simple acknowledgement of the “close” in close air support. When close air support is discussed, it is important to consider the entire military system, both air and ground forces. These forces support each other mutually. By the time the ground troops who engage the enemy in close combat get involved, our military has already cleared out the heavy air defense. And the enemy ground troops will not be dragging around bulky, lightly armored, slow-to-move, hard-to-resupply “high threat” missile systems into the battle area because they will be too busy maneuvering and dodging bullets in the ground fight.This is a must read. For the first time I've seen a publication take apart the lies that surround the F-35 point by point.
Beyond that, the F-35’s ability to perform any CAS right now is extremely limited. As the DOT&E memorandum says clearly, “The F-35A in the Block 3i configuration has numerous limitations which make it less effective overall at CAS than most currently-fielded fighter aircraft like the F-15E, F-16, F-18 and A-10.”
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| A Polish fighting vehicle with the 6th Mechanized Company, 7th Mounted Rifles Battalion, moves forward while another provides security on the ridgeline during an advance-to-contact enhanced maneuver training exercsie at Hohenfels Training Area, Germany, on Sep. 2, 2016. The Polish soldiers were practicing how to maneuver their armored vehicles through the mountains and forests of Germany in anticipation of tough simulated fights during Combined Resolve VII. Combined Resolve VII is a 7th Army Training Command, U.S. Army Europe-directed exercise taking place at the Grafenwoehr and Hohenfels Training Areas, Aug. 8 to Sept. 15, 2016. The exercise is designed to train the Army's regionally allocated forces to the U.S. European Command. Combined Resolve VII includes more than 3,500 participants from 16 NATO and European partner nations. (Photo by U.S. Army Sgt. David L. Nye, 302nd MPAD) (Photo Credit: Sgt. David L. Nye, 302nd MPAD) |
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| The PLL-09 122-mm self-propelled howitzer system fires at a simulated target during the live-fire training conducted by a mechanized infantry regiment under the PLA Western Theater Command in the Pamir mountains in China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region on Sept. 9, 2016. The training aims to test the performance of the PLL-09 in plateau environment. (81.cn/ Wang Ning) |
Indonesia has taken delivery of 24 of the 61 Leopard 2 RI (Republic of Indonesia) main battle tanks (MBTs) ordered from Rheinmetall Defence in December 2012, sources told IHS Jane's on 8 September.Question. Will Indonesia end up with a more powerful tank force than Australia? It will matter on how you rank the tanks, but numerically they're about equal...or will be in March 2017.
The balance of 37 MBTs would be delivered in two tranches, concluding in March 2017, the sources added.
