01/22/2024 – Translated from Ukrainian via Google and OFP

The Ukrainian Defense Forces use a combination of Soviet and Western armored vehicles at the front. Defenders of Ukraine are coming up with different tactics to ensure that this military equipment successfully complement and strengthen each other during battles on the front line.

This is stated in the material published by Forbes. As the author of the material writes, the combination of Western and Soviet equipment in one battle became noticeable during the counter-offensive of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the summer of 2023.

Then, analysts noticed the use of German Leopard 2 tanks and American Bradley infantry fighting vehicles by Ukrainian troops next to Soviet T-64 and T-72 tanks. Now M-1 Abrams tanks, which Washington transferred to Ukraine, have appeared on the front line. As noted, the Ukrainian Armed Forces have a small amount of this equipment, but it has become very useful at the front.

Abrams tanks have the best sensor capabilities of all tanks in Ukrainian service. Therefore, the M1 Abrams should first of all be considered not so much as a tank, but as a sensor platform.

Thanks to the SADA-II thermal imaging system, this tank could operate in conjunction with Soviet-style main battle tanks, whose optics are less functional. The Abrams crew can detect targets at great distances and transmit their coordinates via radio to other Ukrainian crews.

“The Abrams has the best sensors of any Ukrainian tank. Thanks to the SADA-II thermal imaging system, the 69-ton, four-seat M-1 can detect targets up to five miles (8 km) away – further than all other main battle tanks in the 23-month war Russia versus Ukraine,” the article says.

In addition, there is a possibility that the American tanks and infantry fighting vehicles received by Ukraine are equipped with an on-board Blue Force Tracker system, which registers the location of friendly forces on a digital map.

“If the Ukrainian Abrams and Bradley can share situational awareness through their Blue Force network trackers, rather than through voice radio, they could become a better team than, say, Leopard 2 and Bradley,” the publication writes.

The combination of the Abrams with other combat vehicles also provides the team with excellent night fighting capabilities. The M-1, with high-quality thermal imaging sights, sees almost as well at night as during the day, at a range of several miles. But the Russian T-72B model 2022 has a rather primitive thermal imaging sight that operates at a distance of less than two kilometers.

As OBOZ.UA reported, during the four months of offensive operations near Avdiivka,  the losses of the Russians are already comparable to the losses of the USSR  in the war in Afghanistan. An officer of the 59th separate motorized infantry brigade named after. Yakov Handzyuk Sergei Tsekhotsky.

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