dkhoo,
I can name u more than one conflict in a CBD type area. Start with Berlin, 1945, go to Seoul, Korean war, NVA in Saigon used armour in 1975, armour used extensively in Chechnya, most recently in Basra and Baghdad. U can stand off and blast the town, but sooner or later u still have to go in and occupy it. It will be just worse ala Stalingrad and Monte Cassino with rubble all over the place creating perfect ambush positions for the defenders.
What are u going to do, bypass JB? How? If you bypass them the defenders will hit you from behind. Okay, lets say u go into a so call "manageable provincial town", well u are so gung ho, go in with your 18 ton light tank than. The weapons they are going to use on u are still the same as in a CBD type area. I will take a real MBT every where.
All I know are the facts:
1) 16 US Army M1s were disabled in the last Iraq war. (not counting USMC M1s)
2) No crew man died, as no rounds penetrated. Only mobility kills
3) Many M1s were hit with everything from every RPGs, 125mm HEAT, 57mm cannon, etc. Most of them still running around in battle.
Challenger performance pretty much the same.
If your 18 ton light tank can perform as above than I will gladly get into one.
Originally posted by dkhoo:
Seriously, On The Way, name one conflict where there was extensive combat in a modern CBD type area, with 30+ storey buildings side-by-side for miles, like you describe. Stalingrad was hell, and it was not as built up as a run-of-the-mill HDB estate. The USMC was put through the meat grinder at Hue, Vietnam, and that town would not even be considered suburban in Singapore. The townships in the Occupied Territories are shanty towns in comparison to a modern city.
To be honest, no one has the slightest clue how to practically wage war in a modern BUA against a determined opponent. The FIBUA training we receive is already extremely good by the standard of any army in the world, it is just that the FIBUA mission is too big. I do not think any army would know its head from its ass if it were forced to FIBUA in Singapore or KL. It has never been done before. There is no precedent. Do you need a 3 to 1 attacking ratio? 10 to 1? 100 to 1? Nobody knows.
That is why the plan is to bypass these urban centres. Your 50 or even 70 ton MBT is not going to bash through these operational hellholes, On The Way. It will die like everything else. If we FIBUA, it will only be for smaller, more manageable provincial towns and villages. The only things entering a major BUAs from the SAF will be shells, bombs and propaganda leaflets. Anything else would be a crazy gamble.
Talk of capturing KL is just that, talk. If the Malaysians wanted to fight, it would be impossible with the resources of the SAF without blasting the city to the ground. At the best, the threat of overwhelming brutality would push them to the bargaining table, but it would not endear us to the rest of the world. Nightmare scenarios no matter how you cut it. That is the reality, and no wunderpanzer is going to change it.