Canadian Armed Forces: 55,000 and holding steady

[Sea Skimmer]

If you want to look at a military "leech", look at Israel. We're not the ones demanding billions of dollars a year in advanced military hardware and more in economic aid. We may have a small military, but we take care of it ourselves.

Every dollar for military support given to Isreal must be used to buy American weapons and equipment, same for what Egypt gets.

The longer the production run, the cheeper a weapon system is.
So not only do American industrys get quite a bit of cash, but the US military also pays less for things. The net loss to the US is somewhat if not compleatly reduced by this.

Think about the logic of what you're saying: "we send them billions of dollars of stuff, but we bought it from ourselves, so we really didn't lose much money". Do you realize how closely that resembles an Amway sales pitch?

Sorry, but it doesn't work. It's still money out the door. All of those people working in US industry to build these weapons are being paid with TAX DOLLARS which came out of citizens' pockets, and the fruits of their labour are being shipped off to another country without getting anything in return. There's no mitigation. When the government spends money, it takes out of the economy to put back in; it's a zero-sum game. If the products of this expenditure are sent outside the country, it's a net-loss game. Sorry, but that's the math.

And let's not even talk about the interest-free loans the US gives Israel on top of all this ...

No, the biggest military "leech" on the US is unquestionably Israel. Not only do they demand enormous amounts of aid and military hardware, but their inability to work out some kind of compromise with the Palestinians (sorry, but despite what the Israel-apologists have to say, it takes two to tangle, and neither side has made a genuine effort at peace) creates an ENORMOUS headache for US foreign policy. To classify Canada as a big drain on America's military interests (particularly from O'Leary, who's a big Israel-supporter) is simply laughable; it's like taking a magnifying glass to a spot of rust on your bumper and not noticing that the doors have been smashed in.

Care to point out where I specified Canada as a bigger Leach? Notice how I snipped everything, which even mentioned Canada in favor of addressing the single point, which I gave a damn about, mainly US military aid to Israel and the world and the actual loss suffered from this.

Never said Israel wasn't the biggest leech. Though Egypt came very close in the late 70s. My point was simply that the lose is considrabuly less then what the raw numbers would point to.

Anyway if I had to name a bigger leech it would be France and Germany. Under NATO they spent considerably less proportional to there GDP's then the USA for decades, forcing the US to spent more on conventional forces to protect them.

And then when the mid and late 90's operations where launched in the Balkans the US had to carry the load, despite the close proximity of European combat units that could have done the job on there own with ease. Those operations alone cost more then Israel gets in a decade combine.

[Darth Wong]

Care to point out where I specified Canada as a bigger Leach? Notice how I snipped everything, which even mentioned Canada in favor of addressing the single point, which I gave a damn about, mainly US military aid to Israel and the world and the actual loss suffered from this.

Sorry, I assumed that based on the thread subject.

Never said Israel wasn't the biggest leech. Though Egypt came very close in the late 70s. My point was simply that the lose is considrabuly less then what the raw numbers would point to.

You said it might "somewhat if not completely" reduce the loss. I might buy "somewhat", but "completely" is just silly (see Amway comment and explanation regarding government zero-sum game).

Anyway if I had to name a bigger leech it would be France and Germany. Under NATO they spent considerably less proportional to there GDP's then the USA for decades, forcing the US to spent more on conventional forces to protect them.

Yeah, throughout the Cold War that's where America spent all of its efforts. Canada was not a worry for them except for the risk of Soviet missiles coming from the North, and we helped the US build NORAD for that reason.

And then when the mid and late 90's operations where launched in the Balkans the US had to carry the load, despite the close proximity of European combat units that could have done the job on there own with ease. Those operations alone cost more then Israel gets in a decade combine.

Tell that to the guy who thought 2nd or 3rd world nations could cross half a world and invade Canada if not for US protection

[Sea Skimmer]

Care to point out where I specified Canada as a bigger Leach? Notice how I snipped everything, which even mentioned Canada in favor of addressing the single point, which I gave a damn about, mainly US military aid to Israel and the world and the actual loss suffered from this.

Sorry, I assumed that based on the thread subject.

No probulume, I tend to do that a lot.

Never said Israel wasn't the biggest leech. Though Egypt came very close in the late 70s. My point was simply that the lose is considrabuly less then what the raw numbers would point to.

You said it might somewhat or completely reduce the loss. I might buy "somewhat", but "completely" is just silly (see Amway comment and explanation)..

Yeah, I was thinking I should have changed that from the start. The only nation about which you could say repays its military aid is Venezuela. And that’s because they generally ignore OPEC and pump extra oil to send to the US whenever prices rise.

Anyway if I had to name a bigger leech it would be France and Germany. Under NATO they spent considerably less proportional to there GDP's then the USA for decades, forcing the US to spent more on conventional forces to protect them.

Yeah, throughout the Cold War that's where America spent all of its efforts. Canada was not a worry for them except for the risk of Soviet missiles coming from the North, and we helped the US build NORAD for that reason..

Yup, IIRC Canada paid for all the installations on its soil and even contributed towards the US based command and control hubs, which linked the radars to the deterrent and defense forces.

Would have been interesting to see what would have happened if Kennedy didn’t cancel all those ABM missiles in favor of an army which could be sent to die in Vietnam. Would Canada have become a nuclear power to enjoy there protection or remained venerable to missile attack? The cost would have been pretty high but the returns great.

And then when the mid and late 90's operations where launched in the Balkans the US had to carry the load, despite the close proximity of European combat units that could have done the job on there own with ease. Those operations alone cost more then Israel gets in a decade combine.

Tell that to the guy who thought 2nd or 3rd world nations could cross half a world and invade Canada if not for US protection [/quote]

Second world is not an impossbility.

We'll if we remove the US forces from the equation , the Soviets could do it.
They can move a small Mech division and four paratrooper divisions to Canada from about 1983 through 1991, in one lift using combat assest.

Canadian ground forces would be totally out classed, especially since follow on forces could be brought in quickly on using civilian LASH barge ships and normal freighters.

The RCN would sink some lesser ships, but I think I'll take the cruisers Kirov and Slava over anything, or everything combine, the RCN could field. Course all those pesky Hornets could be a problem for the landing, but thats what Tu-22M is for, blast the bases and the short legged Hornts are not much of a threat.
Now If the rest of NATO is still active, that’s not a possible scenario.

However for any other nation but the US, it would never be possible.

The Chinese could try building a bridge, they attempted this once to capture some lesser Islands the ROC had in the mid 50's, but that was only over three miles in sheltered waters.

[Darth Wong]

Second world is not an impossbility. We'll if we remove the US forces from the equation , the Soviets could do it.

The Soviets were considered a second world nation? I guess I never thought of it that way (although I don't think that's what the original poster meant; I suspect he was thinking of places like Iraq).

[MKSheppard]

I have an old cartoon here somewheres....showing a US Soldier
holding a barbell labelled "NATO DEFENSE - 300,000 lbs" while
a guy labelled "European Allies" says "I'll Carry the Bar", leaving
the US soldier to carry 95% of the weight......

I'll scan it tomorrow for your enjoyment.

I just wish that our allies would at least put SOME additional funding
into their militaries, so that we could sit back at least once in a while
instead of having to bear the burden in virutally every military action
involving Europe......witness the war over Kosovo....we had to pull
90% of the bombing runs, even though it was right in Europe's
backyard....[/i]

[Sea Skimmer]

Second world is not an impossbility. We'll if we remove the US forces from the equation , the Soviets could do it.

The Soviets were considered a second world nation? I guess I never thought of it that way (although I don't think that's what the original poster meant; I suspect he was thinking of places like Iraq).

I thought it went First World: Western Europe, America, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and a few other modern capitalist democracies, Second world: USSR and the Warsaw Pact, sometimes China, basically the bastions of "modern" devloped Communisium. The Third world was everyone else.


Unless Iraq/Iran/generic evil nation, devolpes some form of TA syle Tank hovercraft, builds 1500 of them along with an anti physics device which gives 900% engine effeciency and drives across the Artic ice, I dont think Canada has much to worry about in terms of invasion.

Same for most everyone else except the UK, France, germany and Japan. Those nations could build up sufficent forces if they wanted to. Heck the UK could have had 4 60K strike carriers for much of the Cold war if they matched US spending. Damn 1966 defence White paper..

[Crown]

I just wish that our allies would at least put SOME additional funding into their militaries, <snip>

Well I remember once reading, that when the American ambassador/consulate/secratary of state, or something similar was being showed a tour through Germany military installations, he was shown an advanced fighter (it was either a mock up, or a prototype, although if I would have to guess what exactly it was I would say mockup 100%). The second he saw it, he turned around to his German tour guides, and told them to cancel the program immediatley (it was using US funds). It was.

What was the project? Nothing less then a stealth fighter. Now I am not talking about F-22 type, I am talking about F-117. It looked nothing like the F-117, except it was all faceted. Now this before the F-117 had been 'revealed' to the public. I mean the Germans hadn't done much more than designed the faceted outside, no avionics and engines etc.

What does this proove? Well nothing much, but what I am trying to say is that yes, the US spends a disportianate amount on it's military compared to it's allies, however by doing so they have a defacto veto power over them.

[Crown]

I guess I should actually try and describe it a little so that I don't recieve the Unfounded Claim of the Decade Award (TM). Imagine the basic shape of an F-4 Phantom. Now, imagine that the nose was all faceted, as was the fuselage and that's what the mockup looked like. Man I really have to find that book! I think it was something like Modern Fighter, Modern Jet/Warriors or Fighters of the 21st Century. Pretty vague ehh?

[victorhadin]

Throughout the cold war many Western European nations could have stood to spend more, admittedly, but the idea of 'the US protecting Europe' is a bit dodgy when you actually look at the amount of ground troops stationed in Germany and neighbouring countries. -The US contributed surprisingly little on the ground in Germany throughout the cold war. Britain had more troops in germany, France more and Germany itself, despite defence cutbacks, had built a very large and capable army with more tanks than France and Britain (possibly Italy too; not too sure of that) combined. Even today, Germany fields a serious amount of battletanks and armoured units.

Now the US, being as it was free of the threat of a Soviet armoured invasion, was far more free to build carriers and a staggering airforce for power-projection worldwide.

The issue of the Balkans is an embarassment but is more to do with politics and a lack of leadership than defence spending. Western Europe could easily have fielded the forces necessary to accomplish the goal in the Balkans; the problem was that we spent the entire time bickering. There are 15 nations in the EU and reaching single agreements tends towards being difficult over issues like the Balkans. What the US provided when it did step in was leadership and an end to the bickering between nations. It's all very well to say it was 'in our back yard' but many of us didn't see it that way. Western Europe is geographically smaller than the United States but far more diverse and segregated; only the nations right next to the Balkan crisis really saw it as being 'in their back yards'.

For now there are some moves towards getting rid of the leadership problem with the European Rapid Reaction Force concept. France and Britain will be crucial to forming it, and although Jacques Chirac is a keen proponent, Tony Blair currently seems more focused on taking his orders from Washington rather than hopping over to France to sort it out and get Germany off it's arse to form the ERRF as a viable organisation.


To summarise, you may say 'we have been protecting you' but to say that is bloody cheeky and in some areas more than a bit hypocritical.

[Knife]

Your going to say that because Germeny built a couple hundred tanks that America didn't made it fiscally possible for us to build aircraft carriers and other large force projections.
And the Balkans are more the EU's backyard than ours, and it still took our intervention to atleast attempt to deal with that situation. And do not play that diverse and segregated thing, are they the European Union or not? If not why the name, if so then its your backyard.
Undoubtedly some will be insulted, but I am not tring to insult individual nations or people, but I don't like revisionist history and to say that the US hasn't carried the load for the western world in defence is just that.

[Admiral Piett]

Actually the german army towards the end of the cold war had 1800 Leopard 2 + hundreds of Leopard 1, tank destroyers etc.

[Knife]

Ok, but I think I still have a point.

[Sea Skimmer]

Throughout the cold war many Western European nations could have stood to spend more, admittedly, but the idea of 'the US protecting Europe' is a bit dodgy when you actually look at the amount of ground troops stationed in Germany and neighbouring countries. -The US contributed surprisingly little on the ground in Germany throughout the cold war. Britain had more troops in germany, France more and Germany itself, despite defence cutbacks, had built a very large and capable army with more tanks than France and Britain (possibly Italy too; not too sure of that) combined. Even today, Germany fields a serious amount of battletanks and armoured units.

Now the US, being as it was free of the threat of a Soviet armoured invasion, was far more free to build carriers and a staggering airforce for power-projection worldwide.

The issue of the Balkans is an embarassment but is more to do with politics and a lack of leadership than defence spending. Western Europe could easily have fielded the forces necessary to accomplish the goal in the Balkans; the problem was that we spent the entire time bickering. There are 15 nations in the EU and reaching single agreements tends towards being difficult over issues like the Balkans. What the US provided when it did step in was leadership and an end to the bickering between nations. It's all very well to say it was 'in our back yard' but many of us didn't see it that way. Western Europe is geographically smaller than the United States but far more diverse and segregated; only the nations right next to the Balkan crisis really saw it as being 'in their back yards'.

For now there are some moves towards getting rid of the leadership problem with the European Rapid Reaction Force concept. France and Britain will be crucial to forming it, and although Jacques Chirac is a keen proponent, Tony Blair currently seems more focused on taking his orders from Washington rather than hopping over to France to sort it out and get Germany off it's arse to form the ERRF as a viable organisation.


To summarise, you may say 'we have been protecting you' but to say that is bloody cheeky and in some areas more than a bit hypocritical.

Your entire argument is flawed, No conventional ground troops=no protection. In fact its US Army Nuclear forces=only worthwhile protection.

Throughout the 1950's, 60's and early 70's any war in Europe would be Nuclear. There was no question about this. That is why instead of packing in near useless ground troops; the US had only enough to ensure that any attack on the NATO central front would be an attack on the United States.

Tactical aircraft and Theater missiles, along with Corps Artillery, all for delivering said Nuclear weapons, where quite plentiful. And of course the US triad would be available to blast the USSR back 200 years should things escalate. Of course that would bring a counter strike against the US.

The US theater forces had more nuclear firepower then the combine French and British deterrent force. It was this, which kept Europe safe. The Russians could litterly shrug off all of Europe's nukes. Really any strike of under 1000 weapons would be ineffective.

However with the presence of swarms of effective, and expensive US theater forces, they couldn't steamroller Europe and bided there time, waiting for a weakness that would never come.

By the mid to late 1970's the Russians had finished building up their nuclear arsenal to keep place with the mammoth American investments in the 1950's. At that point they began ramping up conventional forces. The idea being to overrun said nuclear forces before they could be used, that&#8217;s why the Russians where so edger to see the BGM-109 and Pershing II die, they could not be overrun.

That is why conventional forces where not present, anything bigger then a combined arms company was a just a target. Once the Soviets began to builds for the overrun scenario, America spent tens billions building up entire heavy corps with all new equipment to hold the line and protect the theater forces, and keep the Russians out of Germany.

The US could have simply pulled back the theater forces, and accepted the loss of Germany in a hail of thermonuclear weaponry from both sides, but instead it took the more expensive option of holding the line and keeping the battle away from Germany's centers of population.

[Oberleutnant]

I don't mean to nitpick, but the exact number of Leopard 2s that saw service in the Bundeswehr before the year 1992 might be as high as 2125 tanks. In either case the number of West German armour is very respectable.

Source: (a shameless plug)
http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?t=718

About the military capabilities of the European Union: Yes, it is far from good, but it has greatly improved since the Kosovo conflict. In December 1999 at the Helsinki summit, EU decided to create a common European crisis management force for operations within 4000 kilometer radius from Brussels. It is supposed to be combat ready by the year 2005, I believe. This will reduce the dependency from USA in military operations.

[IRG CommandoJoe]

A very disturbing fact was that throughout the entire Cold War, Russia could have invaded Europe at will, and very easily. We had nothing to stop Russia. Their tank echelons invading would spread out over great distances to avoid being destroyed by tactical nukes, and then when they got close enough to the enemy lines so that tac nukes would hit both friends and enemies, they would close up and attack. The East had 19,000 tanks outnumbering the 8,000 tanks in the West. The best tank the U.S. had was the M-60. They were horrible pieces of junk that couldn't withstand anything the Russians had to offer. We're damned lucky that we lasted the entire Cold War with those POS tanks.

[IRG CommandoJoe]

Actually, I should add that until tanks like the Leopard were employed by the Europeans, Europe would have been overrun.

[Admiral Piett]

Actually, I should add that until tanks like the Leopard were employed by the Europeans, Europe would have been overrun.

What leopard,1 or 2?

[Azeron]

the main tank employed by the russians in the european theatre was the T-72, and late version of the T 50 series. These tanks are and were horrible tanks in every respect. 19,000 pieces of crap that die out after 16 hours of operation are worthless. russian hardware and guidence systems till are a joke in the t-92 series, and are only slightly better in the t-80 series.

russian at the height of its might only had 150,000 troops in the entire union that could be consider proffessinal combat soilders. the rest only held a AK-47 during thier swearing in ceremony and were hauled off to dig ditches and roads. The only good things they had in their army was the AK assualt rifles, and the RPG-7s.

these ametuers would have been slaughtered at the first outbreak of war, as the tactical nukes took out the cream of thier forces. The rest would be no better than untrained miltia. thats why nations around the world who are facing conflict are rushing to buy american. why, cause it works.

sure the soviet union looked impressive on paper, but they were only a paper force that got slaughtered by a third world nation (Afganistan). You might want to cry vietnam, but we never lost a battle, let alone a major one. We weren;t forced to leave out of military neccessity. we wiped out th viet kong. it was only after we signed the peace treaty, and after senator ted kennedy cut aid to the south a year later did the south finnally fall, as it was runing out of bullets and gas to fight with. (otherwise it was kicking the crap out of the north's army)

[Sea Skimmer]

A very disturbing fact was that throughout the entire Cold War, Russia could have invaded Europe at will, and very easily. We had nothing to stop Russia. Their tank echelons invading would spread out over great distances to avoid being destroyed by tactical nukes, and then when they got close enough to the enemy lines so that tac nukes would hit both friends and enemies, they would close up and attack. The East had 19,000 tanks outnumbering the 8,000 tanks in the West. The best tank the U.S. had was the M-60. They were horrible pieces of junk that couldn't withstand anything the Russians had to offer. We're damned lucky that we lasted the entire Cold War with those POS tanks.

Which is why they're where several thousand TAC nukes on hand. The Russians could spread out a fair bit, but they'd still suffer massively from nuclear strikes, especially M113 teams with Davy Crockets hitting everything bigger then a recon platoon.

As for the effectiveness of the M60, keep in mind armor was really just going to be used as a screen to locate and fix Soviet forces for the 15 or so minutes it takes to nuke them. And through 1975 over 80% of Soviet armor was T-55's with some T-62's.

M60's proved highly effective against both in 1973 and the Iran Iraq war. Actually the M60's 105mm also proved quite effective against T-72's in 1982 and the Iran Iraq war as well. The rare T-64 was another story, but it was still good enough for killing those.

The biggest period of risk was around 1975-1982, in that timeframe the Russians could have steamrolled into the West with convetionla forces and only a full strategic strike would have stopped them. However after that the conventional balanced swung well into the West's favor, and any war would be with theater and tactical nuclear weapons from the start once again.

Such a war would rapidly go stratigic and thats that.

[Oberleutnant]

the main tank employed by the russians in the european theatre was the T-72, and late version of the T 50 series. These tanks are and were horrible tanks in every respect. 19,000 pieces of crap that die out after 16 hours of operation are worthless. russian hardware and guidence systems till are a joke in the t-92 series, and are only slightly better in the t-80 series.

T-72 never saw large scale use in the Red Army or its modern Russian counterpart, and its export versions were significantly worse than those used by the Soviets themselves. The best Soviet MBT at the time was the T-64 which was deployed by their frontline units. The bulk of the rest of the Red Army comprised mainly of T-62s and T-55s.

While T-72 does have several design faults and suffers from the typical Russian design philosophy, it was by no means a bad tank when it was introduced in the early seventies. One of its worst problems is the lack of decent night equipment.

The 125mm gun, however, could easily destroy its 70's era western counterparts, depending on the ammunition and the distance. During the Gulf War, the Iraqis used piss poor alluminium ammunition that could not put a scratch on anything.

If maintained well, a T-72 can easily work longer than 16 hours. It also performs admirably even at very cold temperatures.

russian at the height of its might only had 150,000 troops in the entire union that could be consider proffessinal combat soilders. the rest only held a AK-47 during thier swearing in ceremony and were hauled off to dig ditches and roads. The only good things they had in their army was the AK assualt rifles, and the RPG-7s.

While I don't know if your figures are true, I wouldn't underestimate a typical Russian/Soviet conscript. They have typically fought bravely and diligently, but their commanding officers have often been extremely stupid with their tactics.

these ametuers would have been slaughtered at the first outbreak of war, as the tactical nukes took out the cream of thier forces. The rest would be no better than untrained miltia.

Let me ask you this: what force on Earth would've prevented the Soviets from using their own tactical nukes against NATO forces? That's exactly one of the main things for what their special forces, who arguably could be considered one of the best in the world back then, trained to do.

thats why nations around the world who are facing conflict are rushing to buy american. why, cause it works.

What does this American military hardware shopping frenzy has to do with your two earlier sentences? Yet again we also see unsupported claims about American equipment selling better than anything else in the world.

sure the soviet union looked impressive on paper, but they were only a paper force that got slaughtered by a third world nation (Afganistan). You might want to cry vietnam, but we never lost a battle, let alone a major one. We weren;t forced to leave out of military neccessity. we wiped out th viet kong. it was only after we signed the peace treaty, and after senator ted kennedy cut aid to the south a year later did the south finnally fall, as it was runing out of bullets and gas to fight with. (otherwise it was kicking the crap out of the north's army)

Damn, I hate to admit this, but I mostly agree with you on this last part, though the Soviets' perfomance in Afganistan doesn't neccessarily mean that the same would've happened in Europe.

[Sea Skimmer]

thats why nations around the world who are facing conflict are rushing to buy american. why, cause it works.

What does this American military hardware shopping frenzy has to do with your two earlier sentences? Yet again we also see unsupported claims about American equipment selling better than anything else in the world.

Oberleutnant, on this at least. Azeron is correct. America currently is the world's largest arms exporter and has been for some. I can dig up the exact numbers for if you'd like. IIRC Russia with fifth, right after Israel.

Intrestingly France controls 60% of the world SAM export market, and its all Minstrals!

[Oberleutnant]

Okay, I believe you, though it would be nice to see the exact numbers. Thanks in advance! It'd be interesting to see how large part of those sales go to countries which USA is also giving military assitance such as the Philippines, Taiwan or Israel. It puts other countries in an unfair position, but what exactly is fair in world politics and business?

[Doomriser]

Darth Paul, I am tring not to insult the Canadian military and my gratatude goes out to those who serve my country and those who help my country. My beef is with a political view held by the leadership of your goverment, that they can thumb their nose at us while enjoying the benifits of our mutual defence treaties.
And please tell me your not comfortable with only 55 thousand people comprising your military, as one talking head on TV said, thats about the amount of people in the NYC police.

It's not our fault that New York needs the manpower equivalent of the Canadian army to fight crime. Maybe it's U.S. leadership you should be attacking, not Canadian.

[IRG CommandoJoe]

This is from King of the "Killing Zone," by Orr Kelly:

"The first warning is the rumble of diesel engines and the clatter of tracks. As the predawn mist lifts, Soviet tanks by the hundreds and then the thousands emerge, each with its distnctive rounded turret looking like nothing so much as an inverted frying pan, with a cannon in place of the handle. Overhead, waves of bombers and fighter-bombers roar westward, hugging the ground to avoid radar coverage.

The Americans on guard at Observation Post Alpha, halfway between the former twin villages of Rasdorf, in West Germany, and Geisa, in East Germany, barely have time to sound a shrill alarm before their tower is blown away by a high-explosion shell. The first crew to move its M-60 tank toward the enemy is hit by a heavy projectile fired at a speed of a mile a second from a big Soviet tank gun. The shell cracks through the four and a half inches of the American's frontal armor, decapitates the loader, fills the turret with fragments of metal, and passes out through the rear. As the tank commander and gunner scramble to escape from their damage tank, ruptured tubes spray them with burning "cherry juice," the red oil used int he hydraulic system. Only the driver, riding deep in the hull of the tank, escapes serious injury.

A second M-60 pops up into view, catches an approaching tank in its sights, and fires its 105 mm gun, but the hit is a glancing blow. The shell bounces off the superbly shaped turret of the advancing Russian. The tank shudders, hesitates, and then resumes its course, swinging its gun around for the kill.

Quickly the American tanks and armored vehicles, all obviously pinpointed for attack before the battle began, are picked off-some by rockets, others by the heavy shells from the big Russian tank guns.

Other American crews, riding in unarmored jeeps, form a hasty defense and begind firing their TOW missiles. The TOW (the acronym for "tube-launched, optically tracked, wire-guided") is new to the battlefield, having just been tested in action by the United States for the first time at Kontum in South Vietnam. Ironically, the target destroyed in that first wartime firing was a captured Korean War-era American Bulldog tank. With the TOW, the operator fires the antitank rocket and then sends guidance messages through a wire that trails out behind the projectile, tracking the target as it tries to dodge out of the way. He must remain exposed to enemy fire for about sixteen seconds, until the missile reaches the target. Most of the crews have never fired their new weapon in practice because of the expense. A few of them have never even seen one fired.

Still, some of the TOWs find their targets. First one of the attacking tanks and then another burst into flames. In their tiny, claustrophobic turrets, the little Russians (only men between five feet and five feet four inches tall are assigned as tankers) are surrounded by ammunition and fuel. When a Russian tank is hit, there is fire, explosion, and death. But the Americans face what is euphemistically known as a target-rich environment. There are far more tanks than there are missiles to destroy them. Many of the Americans are killed by machine-gun bullets. Others fight on until they are squashed by the enemy tanks.

The nightmare ends with the Soviets beyond the Rhine, in firm control of the heartland of Europe. The factories and laboratories of West Germany, the Netherlands, and Denmark are theirs, barely damaged in the brief war.

If such a superblitzkrieg seemed farfetched, the worried soldiers had only to look back four years. In 1968 Soviet and Warsaw Pact forces were engaged in their annual fall maneuvers. Then, during the night of August 19-20, they imposed radio silence to deceive Western intelligence and crossed the Czech border. By the time the NATO allies realized what had happened, the Soviet tanks were in Prague.

The Americans on the border would have been even more worried if they had known as much about the Soviet tank force as is now known. They would have easily recognized the old T-54 and T-55 series tanks with their 100 mm gun and the newer T-62. When the T-62 first made its appearance in the early 1960s, it caused a stir in the West. Most of its features were familiar. But it had a new 116 mm smoothbore gun, different from and more powerful than anything in the West, a frightening hint of things to come.

By 1972, there was another and much more worrisome weapon in the Soviet arsenal: the T-64. Developed during the early 1960s, it went into serial production later in that decade, but Western intelligence didn't know that until much later. It would have come as a total surprise, truly a secret weapon. This is a tank worth a careful look."

It goes on to describe the T-64, but we already know it was far superior to the M-60, so lets skip that part.

"The military is often accused of exaggerating the quality of Soviet equipment, especially at budget time. But there is a powerful force in the other direction as well. If a potential enemy has better equipment, officers hesitate to give their soldiers a candid appraisal for fear they will be reluctant to fight. This was very much a factor in comparing the M-60 with the newer-and far more numerous-Soviet tanks.

Even though intelligence reports were giving an ominous, if often confusing and always incomplete, account of these new Soviet tanks, the U.S. Army pretended, at least publicly, that its own tank was as good or better. The fact was that the Soviets had, as one general later put it, "turned inside us." They had manage to field a tank that, despite its shortcomings, was ahead of anything in the West. American tankers were right in thinking that if war came, they would almost certainly lose-and lose quickly. While armor officers and senior nocoms were becoming almost fanatic in their desire for a new tank, it was not until 1972 that a just retired senior armor officer said bluntly to public what they had been discussing among themselves.

When General James H. Polk commanded the U.S. Army in Europe in the late 1960s, he praised the Army's fighting ability. But once in civilian clothes, he wrote an anrgy article describing the Amry's main battle tank as "the tired, old, second-rate M-60 series." Even after a modernization program, then under way, Polk wrote, the reworked tank "will not be the best tank on teh European battlefield by any stretch of the imagination." The article appeared in June 1972, only five months after the editors of Armor had featured "The Death of the Tank." It ran first in Army, the magazine of the Association of the U.S. Army and outlet for semiofficial Army policy, and was reprinted the following month in Armor."

I believe that pretty much sums up what would have happened and just how badly we would have lost had the Russians invaded.

[RadiO]

Ha! Israel is nothing to Japan! It doesn't even feild a respectable military. Essentially it's a military protectorate of America. So while America spent it's money in protecting Japan after WWII, Japan built the worlds second largest economy! Man I love that country!

No respectable military? That'll be Japan's large navy with its 30-odd modern warships, and the big air force with hundreds of F-15s and F-2s?