Friday, March 24, 2006

New Chinese Tank - M-1 killer

More recently it has been revealed that China is developing a new MBT, which is understood to be armed with a 152 mm gun fed by an automatic loader. The weapon would be coupled to an advanced day/thermal sighting system that will allow moving targets to be engaged with a high first-round hit probability while the vehicle is stationary or moving.

At least one source has indicated that Russia has supplied some of the technology for the new Chinese MBT project, in order to earn valuable foreign currency to fund some of its own tank development programmes. This is understood to apply mainly to the main armament and the diesel power pack.


From Jane's.

Now let's see if it's any more real than the semi mythical Russian T-95. I'd be delighted if either were true from a techno military geek PoV. From an American PoV I might be a little alarmed.

It seems that the Chinese are not embracing the same idea that the US is that light forces will rule them all through tech. Now, the Chinese have been - historically - slower to adapt to tech trends and take longer in their development times than the US (oy!), but it's entirely possible that they are rejecting the idea outright. Which, in and of itself, is very interesting. Either that portends that either the Chinese have no need to fight anything where they won't have a logistical base that's very strong (the US Army's strategy up to date), or that they think that the Medium Brigade idea that the US Army is following is a mistake and that Heavy Forces will always munch the lights if they are on the same tech level. They might also be taking away lessons from watching the Iraq confrontation as well that are different than the US is.

We shall see which it is.

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