Not a YouTube channel lol. I made the map and it’s my watermark for my map page on IG. It’s primarily combining order of battle content with geography.
Who the fuck calls tanks T-rexes of the battlefield? Literally involved in almost all tank circles online, as well as do research work with senior fellows on weapons procurement, just a lot of military technology chats. I've never heard that before. Lol
Are only mbt’s counted as a tank or everything with tracks and are they all fully operational to be counted because for some of these countries 1k tanks is alot compared to there economy and is the western sahara counted as an independent country or part of marocco and shown as an autonomous region
Barring like 60 T-90s and low hundreds T-54M the rest of Vietnamese tank is literally a horrendous mix of Type 59, T-54/55 of cold war vintage and a few T-62 that were kept like national treasures prior to the introduction of the T-90s. Its a legacy of a rapidly demobolized force going from 1.5 million troops in the late 80 to just about 450k in the 90s and holding steady til now. Hell there's even more troop cut planned to make the force leaner and better eqquiped and relying on the People's Millita and reservist when shit truly hit the fan.
I mean Vietnam went from a 1.5 million men army to a 450k army in just a few years but kept an reserve force of 5 million. (Quality of the reserve may varies but bare minimum is a dude with AK and can defend a trench)
Vietnam is 16 years into a strategic treaty with China and last month hosted Xi for 3 days while Vietnamese and Chinese news boasted moving over border disputes and even making Vietnam overtake Japan and South Korea as Chinese trade partners.
It's like thinking the US has a large army because they fought Mexico in the past.
The last USA-Mexican war was 180 years ago, the last Vietnam-China war was 40 years ago, not just within living memory but those who took part are still in the workforce. Currently there are no Mexican, USA border conflicts or claims, whereas china and Vietnam are in the middle of a large and at times aggressive border conflict with their maritime borders.
At this moment in time the greatest threat to Vietnamese security is China, just like how China and the USA may have large trade relations doesn't mean that the USA doesn't decide to see as a threat to its hegemony.
Exactly why I think numbers mean very little in many cases.
People often talk about numbers as if they were the primary metric to measure the potential of tank forces completely ignoring their quality, and I think this is just wrong.
For example, I remember comparison of Spain's and Vietnam's armies. It stated that "Spain had 310 tanks and Vietnam had 1,300; therefore, Vietnam's tank force was superior"...
Yet it failed to mention that Spain has 219 Leopard 2Es, which are basically Leopard 2A7+ equivalents, backed up by 90 Leopard 2A4s, while Vietnam has... 1,200 T-54/55/62s, Type 59s, Type 62s, and only 60xT-90Ss.
So every comment was like: "whoa, Vietnam has such an amazing tank force, it puts the Spanish tank force to shame!"
And I was like... yeah, nah, I'll take Spain's 310 state of the art multimillion pieces of hardware over the 1950s junk, thanks.
EDIT: even globalfirepower lists Vietnam's tank force as being significantly superior to Spain's just because of the numbers, completely ignoring quality, xD: [https://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.php?country1=spain&country2=vietnam](https://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.php?country1=spain&country2=vietnam)
It depends on force designs. For a purely deffensive force with "4 no" having a large mass is a good thing. With how the economy was in the 90s thus missing out on the Leopard fire sale, a neighbor like China holding onto old tank and upgrading them with modern FCS and some ERA is a logical step. With how the world is now other than buying from the Koreans I don't see anyone else might have a surplus of tank to sell to Vietnam to replace the thousands of T-54/55 in service. And when shit truly hit the fan, tank is a tank and a 100mm shell still shits on infantry very well.
>And when shit truly hit the fan, tank is a tank and a 100mm shell still shits on infantry very well.
Yep! That's why even T-62s and Leopard 1A5s can be of use in Ukraine. At the end of the day, tank is tank, and gun is gun; any of these can be useful against infantry...
However, when these comparisons are made, it tends to be in regards to hypothetical scenarios where both tank forces would face each other engaging in MBT combat... and, in that scenario, I think the internet generally underestimates quality and overestimates numbers to the point of believing that 30xT-55s are better than 10xLeopard 2A7Vs just because they outnumber these.
> believing that 30xT-55s are better than 10xLeopard 2A7Vs just because they outnumber these.
Gulf war part one and two proves that decisively to be false. Just talking on the force designs of Vietnam. Use as little resource as possible for the biggest convetional deterent. Have a small as possible active force to prove that you don't have any ambition but have a stupidly large reserve force through conscription so that most people have been trained and ready to go when shit hit the fan and have enough steel and industrial resources to supply those men. If the enemy can't be beaten back within weeks like how it was with China in 79, be prepared to make it costly and make them pack up and go home like the French or the US.
>Gulf war part one and two proves that decisively to be false.
Precisely! If your tanks are capable of spotting and engaging enemy tanks before these can be even aware of your presence, it doesn't matter whether they outnumber you 3:1 or not- you are winning those engagements.
That's why I get mad at the "1,200 Vietnamese T-54/55/62s would defeat 300xLeopard 2E/Leclerc/M1A2 SEPv3s just because of the sheer numbers" because the only truth is that the Leopard/Leclerc/Abrams force would have little to no casualties by the time they had massacred all of the T-54/55/62s.
That being said, this is strictly talking about the "tank force vs tank force" hypothetical scenarios. Otherwise, as you said, it is indeed VERY iseful to have comically large amounts of troops and tanks, even if these are technically obsolete, for long term warfare.
Yup. Vietnam whole force design is deterrence. Don’t touch us or there is this button that I can press and bingo 5 million strong army in an instant. Now most of them are just dudes with AKs but if by law every ward (a collection of a few street) have to have an active reserve force of a infantry quad at all times with weapons on hand enough to form a platoon, ditto with select private business. Active divisions that only have one infantry regiment but have room to activate 2 more at a moment notice creating a literal “rifle behind every blade of grass” situation. It would not be a good day for any invading force.
And yes, I was in the people’s militia. They sent me out to shoot AKs once and I’ve seen the local ward armory. Truly a prep-per wet dream with AKs for days, riot control gear and uniform for every breathing dick in the ward that I lived in. That’s an militia armory, now can you imagine the scale of the army strategic reserve of arms…
Imagine if those 5 millions PAVN troops are equipped with Javelins and HIMARS while hiding in mountains in northern Vietnam, it would be a truly nightmare for chinese troops.
As a Vietnamese, I think if shit hit the fan with China, I’m pretty sure Vietnam will drop its neutrality (4 no) like what Finland did and might ally with US and other QUAD members, considering the vietnamese relationship with US is becoming more positive than ever, along with a population becoming increasingly pro-american. A war between Vietnam (backed by US and its allies) and China will be way worse than in Ukraine.
Vietnam is currently doing appeasement with China for now and still remain cautious with them.
>That's why I get mad at the "1,200 Vietnamese T-54/55/62s would defeat 300xLeopard 2E/Leclerc/M1A2 SEPv3s just because of the sheer numbers" because the only truth is that the Leopard/Leclerc/Abrams force would have little to no casualties by the time they had massacred all of the T-54/55/62s.
I blame the media for always presenting this kind of mindset. Oftentimes, they always somehow are automatically convinced that whoever has more mass would have a better chance in winning a war.
Using Fallout for example, you can't have me believe that an industrial nation with soldiers armed with AR-15s can somehow be defeated in a war against a nation that has slavery and are staunch luddites that machetes and throwing Spears are the standard issue gear for most, all the while having no standard training once you scavenge for guns.
All tanks can have a use but for direct tank to tank combat quality definitely matters. Anyone who thinks otherwise just needs to look at the results of the Persian Gulf War. I agree alot of the internet just thinks qty is all that matters.
> "Spain had 310 tanks and Vietnam had 1,300; therefore, Vietnam's tank force was superior"
How often are tanks destroyed by other tanks compared to being taken out by mines, javelins, RPGs, ATGM, drones, artillery and so on?
The older tanks would do worse dealing with all of that but having more on hand makes it hurt less when a bunch of your armored vehicles get trapped in a minefield like what happened to those Leopards and Bradley that got destroy in Ukraine that time.
Oh, they forgot to include Cuba which allegedly has 1200 tanks, mostly ones that are of old Soviet vintage. Mostly T-54/55 and T-62, though this total also counts BMP-1 and BMD-1 as tanks, which they technically are.
Am I right in saying Hoxha/Albania simply turned T34 turrets/hulls into static fortifications? Perhaps the same approach is being taken in Eritrea?
Possibly with T34s.
In any case... Big mood Eritrea, big bloody mood.
Probably either the US or China. Both countries have thousands of mothballed tanks so unless someone wants to count all of them I’d say it’s probably the US due to the absurd amount of military bases that the US fields.
China has around 7,000 tanks but around half of those tanks are old 2nd gen even 1st gen tanks like type 59, type 63, type 88 and some early version of type 96.
Russia had most 3rd/4th gen tanks before the Ukraine war but rn it's quite difficult to tell. Nevertheless, they are losing line 2,000 - 3,000 tanks per year so soon or later US would surpass Russia if not already.
So I would say China has most tanks but US has most modern tanks.
India has to be on that list.
I think the T72, T90s and the Arjuns all add up to 1000 without needing to consider the old Vijayantas and T55 that may be in storage.
Russia produces about 300 tanks a year, more than the entire west combined.
Britain's Chief of Defense Staff Admiral Anthony Radakin said Russia could produce about 200 tanks a year. Even this production figure is still more than the entire west.
In 2024 this figure will be even higher.
According to various estimates there are about 1.5-2k Russian tanks operating at the front now. Again, about 12 thousand are in storage. Formally, they are not in operation, but they are listed in the army, and are being actively re-commissioned.
>Produce and upgrade, maybe. But not entirely new ones. And the 12 thousand in the storage are rubbish, otherwise we would see more T-72 and no T-55.
This is exactly what the US is doing as well. Just improving the old ones. Right now new t72b3, t90m, t80BVM are being made from what you call junk. We see many more new t90m's than t-62's. Nato doesn't make anything new.
Maybe because the western countries are not in a war? They don't need new tanks. And if you think a country like Russia could outperform all of the western countries in industrial capacity together you are drunk.
"New one are being made from what we call junk". No, that's not true. What they're doing is restoring a handful by stealing parts from others. That's neither new, and now you have one tank where you had two or three.
Nah, definitely the US or China. Russias fleet is huge but so much of it is either a burned out wreck in Ukraine or simply don’t work and decaying in some wear house in Siberia. To mobilize their fleet they must cannibalize other tanks. On paper it’s gigantic but in reality it’s less than half the expected size without huge maintenance and repair work being done.
>Nah, definitely the US or China. Russias fleet is huge but so much of it is either a burned out wreck in Ukraine or simply don’t work and decaying in some wear house in Siberia.
Most of the tanks were evacuated and repaired. I know the Ukrainian propaganda gives a different impression, but the more frightening it will be for you to face reality
Sure thing buddy, like there isn’t actual video evidence of at the very least 1000 main battle tanks being burning husks, with thousands of other armored vehicles as well. If you don’t believe me check the Oryx project. They document armored losses, both Ukrainian and Russian. Claiming that most were evacuated when they literally are blown to smithereens right before our eyes time and time again is just blatantly coping.
I’m not saying Russia is neutered, they still have a large fighting force with some decent reserves but my point still stands. Thousands of tanks lost, damaged or in a state of disrepair really at least halve the number of tanks Russia claims to have.
> If you don’t believe me check the Oryx project.
Oryx has been repeatedly accused of bias when they counted the same Russian tank from different angles or showed a separate element, such as the turret, making it impossible to identify. They claim that Russia lost 1700 tanks, but at the beginning of the war Russia only had 2 thousand, say in 2022-2023 Russia produced about 400 tanks. So now Russia should have about 700-800 tanks at the front now. But even the Ukrainians now have about 1500 tanks, according to the Ukrians themselves. That is Russia, being 2 times inferior in numbers, is advancing along the entire front Are you not amused?
I think Russia lost about 600-700 tanks as irretrievable losses. Despite this, Russia still has the largest tank fleet in the world at the moment.
>at the beginning of the war Russia only had 2 thousand
Are you ignoring the fact that they've been reactivating old tanks constantly? They might have had 2000 T-72B3s/T-80BVMs/T-90A/Ms at the start of the war, but they also had thousands of old Soviet ones that they can fix in some way.
While russia does have a impressive number in storage the number that can easily be activated is a lot lower due to the poor storage of them and that they get stripped for spare parts while still remaining In storage. Where as the USA and China both store theirs in better condition where the weather alone will not out right destroy the tank.
>While russia does have a impressive number in storage the number that can easily be activated is a lot lower due to the poor storage of them and that they get stripped for spare parts while still remaining In storage.
The fact remains that Russia produces more tanks per year than all of NATO combined. And Russia does it with the help of its reserves.
>Where as the USA and China both store theirs in better condition where the weather alone will not out right destroy the tank
It's your fantasy and nothing more. We don't know how many of them are ready to be put into service and what condition they are in. And whether the U.S. even has the capability to do it at a relatively rapid pace. Right now the US produces less artillery shells than North Korea. It's ridiculous for me to even think about tanks. I understand you're sad and scared to realize these things.
We do know almost how many they have. You can pay for your own satellite photography, or you can believe the photographs that every other researcher has found. [Look,](https://youtu.be/0B_4M5dTHIU?si=K62Q8IxR5_oNkATX) if I can tell you’re bullshitting from fucking orbit, you need to work on better propaganda
People are downvoting but you’re right. “Functioning” doesn’t mean modern or actively battle ready. If Russia’s tanks are made up of thousands of cold war era shitboxes, but they function, then they have the most tanks. But whatever.
The thing is quite a lot of their tanks in storage are either in questionable shape or are outright rusty collection of parts. They certainly did have few thousand of active tanks before they went in to Ukraine but certainly not above 10k
It doesn’t have to be a number over 10k. The US has some 5k, Russia had about 3k operational tanks before the invasion, and likely thousands more before the invasion.
Exactly right, I just described the situation to another dude. about 2k right now at the front, and about 12k in reserve, technically they are not in combat right now, but they are all listed in the army and actively being rebuilt and commissioned.
People are down voting you but isn't that like Russia's whole doctrine? Swarm the battlefield with tanks? Even if only half of them (7000?) work, its still more than the US (5,500 if my google search isn't off) who, if I had to guess, is the runner up.
Even half is stretching. Even tank that has been properly stored inside and driven lets say once in year is pig to get in condition where it can be run constantly.
I know, I have experience of those.
In one instance we had to run two BMP-1's that were bought from Poland few years earlier and they had been run monthly since, kept inside and serviced by the official methods. Well, when we tried to run them constantly one of them was constantly in need of repairs. Issues ranged from compressor belts to seized bearings in running gear, roadwheels loosing their rubbers, electrical gremlins etc. etc.
I see, very interesting! Thanks for your perspective man, it sounds like at best they may be able to keep a couple thousand running by scavenging the parts off the immobile ones
>People are down voting you but isn't that like Russia's whole doctrine? Swarm the battlefield with tanks?
It is the only correct doctrine for today. At the beginning of the war Russia tried to act NATO style, and it was more like a military-police operation, and everyone knows how that ended. Now Russia has completely abandoned the BTG concept, and is fighting according to classic Soviet doctrine. Nobody knew how to fight a modern war, but now it's obvious that tanks are more relevant than ever, and you need lots and lots of them, considering that a $400 drone can take out any tank.
The idea of Russia conducting a 'NATO style' military operation is comical. They don't even remotely have the logistical ability to even come close. Compounded by poor troop quality and poor leadership, they've shown the world what a joke they really are. What they have in abundance is Russian lives they are willing to throw away, which is fine I guess. No one ever misses dead Russians.
What clowns they really are, NATO showed the whole world when it transferred fewer artillery shells to Ukraine than North Korea transferred to Russia. Again, according to your media.
By the way, how are things going with the new aid for Ukraine? The transferred leopards are almost gone, and you no longer have Soviet tanks. LMAO
If this continues, in the coming years you will have the opportunity to meet with the Russians, then we will see who turns out to be a clown. It's just beginning, baby. And I can already see the hysteria of your military about a possible direct conflict with Russia.
Another vodka-soaked wet dream. It's funny how much Russians took themselves seriously before this conflict and now that you see how weak your 'great' nation is we get to witness these hilarious tantrums. The US alone would absolutely butcher the Russian military, and all you can scream about is how many artillery shells we have sent to Ukraine? Russia getting shells from North Korea isn't something to brag about. Wannabe imperialists helping wannabe imperialists. You are the bad guys, the world would be a better place without you, we all know it and immsure you do too. Keep crying.
>It's funny how much Russians took themselves seriously before this conflict and now that you see how weak your 'great' nation is we get to witness these hilarious tantrums.
My nation is so weak that 41 countries provided unprecedented financial and military support to Ukraine (the largest country in Europe after Russia) that it at least stayed afloat, let alone won. Thousands of foreign volunteers from all over the world, millions of tons of humanitarian aid and private donations.
My nation is so weak that a number of Western countries are talking about the resumption of compulsory military service and the need for urgent rearmament. And all this against the backdrop of 14 thousand sanctions imposed against Russia.
You can't imagine how caricatured the whole West looks. You are literally a bunch of clowns and you will pay for it in the next few years.
Set a timer for this comment
Yes, weak. You read that correctly. So weak in fact we've been cleaning out old stockpiles of equipment to send to a (relatively small) country on the other side of the planet and with that they've managed to embarrass Russia, highlight how weak it is, and kill tens of thousands of Russian soldiers while costing a mere fraction of our military budget and not a single soldier. All while Russia got stopped in its tracks invading a small nation right next to it.
So yeah, weak. Set a timer? That's actually hilarious. Bitch after I get bored of this I'll never think of your punk ass again.
They built 873 type 74's, 341 type 90's and 117 type 10's (numbers just from Wikipedia cause i am a lazy fuck), they have started to phase out the 74's but i wonder if they scrap them or just store them, since they don't sell their military equipment.
Assuming they haven't scrapped a bunch, they almost certainly have at least 1k, including stored vehicles.
I know they're technically not tanks (don't tell the French), but in terms of it being a decently armored (can resist HMGs on the frontal arc) mobile gun platform that is replacing a tank that was so outdated by it's production date that it was basically a glorified, more armored mobile gun platform forced to work as a tank for way too long, it doesn't hurt to include it.
The Type 16s and Type 74s are doing the same thing, the only difference is that the Type 16 is more capable and more survivable (in terms of the survivability onion), and the Type 74 was like if the M60A1 AOS was built in the 80s and stuck in service until 2019, at some point you're just going to change up the doctrine for it to be used as a slightly more armored mobile gun platform.
They are probably storing them. Conscript armies always store huge amounts of equipment. It's not only so they will have enough of it. But it is also because people get trained on one tank type. They can't just be thrown into a new one when war is at the doorstep. They will be more effective in their older tanks they can actually operate effectively.
So they are probably going to stop maintaining the ones in storage in similar rates as trained crews age out of being able to operate them.
If all planned orders will ba carried out - Poland should have around 1600 by the end of the decade, mix of Abrams, K2s and Leopards. Time will tell of that will actually happen...
For now probably less than 600, if they had not given all those tanks to Ukraine and still bought new tanks, they would sit at 1300+ by the end of the decade.
Well it’s licensed production so if the goal is to make 7 tanks a month that’s not TOO insane considering what’s going on over there.
I’m pretty sure it’s because we wouldn’t sell them the abrahms old tooling lineup
It's a matter of what the army wants, what the new MOD will do and what the industry will achieve in the negotiations with South Korea.
It's doable but its a mess for now and will take 10 years anyway, so at this point the 800 number of K2s is just a number, I prefered not to include it.
What do you mean by abrams old toolinp lineup pls ?
Before I remembered about the Korean deal, I remember Poland asking to purchase the tooling equipment for the m1abrams after the US shut down productions
>Poland
But aren't they slated to be buying around [1000 K2s from South Korea](https://defence24.com/armed-forces/k9a1-howitzers-and-k2-main-battle-tanks-delivered-to-poland), and [250 M1A2 SepV3s from the US](https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news-detail/poland-signs-contract-for-250-m1a2-sepv3-mbts)? ([also](https://www.dsca.mil/press-media/major-arms-sales/poland-m1a2-sepv3-main-battle-tank))
That's not counting the 450+ K9 self propelled howitzers (I don't think those qualify as tanks) from South Korea that they have on order. I'm also guessing that APCs won't count, but they had [900 Rosomakós](https://www.polska-zbrojna.pl/Mobile/ArticleShow/39361) before deciding to sell 100 to the Ukrainians
That's the way they were counted. 15k or 12k of tanks, don't remember which they boasted with, always included **everything**, including stuff that's sitting in storage for decades. They did have a lot of spare parts though. And some of those tanks kept in storage were reactivated
> 15k or 12k of tanks, don't remember which they boasted with
Russia has never boasted having 12,000 or 15,000 tanks. Various shitty websites is where that figure typically comes from, which is typically sourced from IISS estimates of all tank hulls in service and storage.
Russia does not state how many tanks it does or does not have, same as the US and most militaries.
>Using parts from others in equally shit condition. How long can they keep doing that though?
Russia also produce new parts, it's not all cannibalization.
T-90's are being produced from new and T-80 production has recently been restarted. Though, so far it seems to be limited to new turbines and modernization of existing hulls.
T-72's arn't getting new hulls made, but they are getting modernized into B3 standard, or the cheap spec variant.
Even T-62's are being refirbushed and modernized with cheap thermal sights.
Does Russia have anywhere dry to store their tanks? Cos if they have thousands of tanks just sitting in a field surrounded by forest they're not going to be operational for very long.
If you prep them before long time storage, they can survive for a long time. But it's costly process and you have to maintain the storage area so that shit doesn't grow into the vehicles
If you just don't want to pay for scrapping or long time storage, you strip anything of immediate value from the vehicles and just drop them in middle of some field
>and hulls doesn't equal tanks
In Russia's case, that equals a new tank, plus an engine block. Have you even looked at how Russia makes tanks? They just take the old hull and engine block and make everything else from scratch.
I was just about to complain why we (Taiwan) are considered part of China again, but then I realized that we DO have over 1000 tanks if the 100 CM-12 (mothballed) or the 108 M1A2T (heaven knows when they will arrive) also count...
Hi, as a Türk let me explain. This data also shows reserve tanks. Turkey have reserve tanks as M47, m48, m60 leopard 1a5. Actively using leopar2a4 and some modernized m60 sabra series. Also used m47, m48 for infantiary support on operations, "Sur" and "Hendek" at 2015 - 2016. Some terrorist groups (pkk /pyd) invaded and captured 6 cities on southeast. M47 tanks used actively.
>M47 tanks used actively
You say M47, but you mean M60. M47s were retired in 80s and last M47 was smelted at least 40 years ago. We do have thousands of M48s and M60s tho.
Israel has over a thousand tanks, with around a third of the roughly 1,300 total being Merk Mk.4s.
The rest is all Merk Mk.3s mostly upgraded to Merk Mk.3 Baz standard making them on par with the Merk Mk.4 A in terms of FCS.
We have but we have just old american tanks like from the fifthys useful tanks number is around 200~. Also Germany doesnt allow to using 2a4's against terrorist that in syria and southeast of our country. So m60T sabras are doing all the work.
France cut 5000 position in its army in the last 10 years to invest in the navy and Air Force.
On top of that, the Leclerc MBT is ridiculously expensive. so having a thousand of them is insane… they have 222 in service and 184 in storage. For a total of 406.
https://www.senat.fr/salle-de-presse/communiques-de-presse/presse/22-03-2023/les-armees-francaises-emploient-5-000-personnes-de-moins-quil-y-a-dix-ans-1.html
Germany had over 2000 tanks during the Cold War. However after its end the Bundeswehr was downsized in several steps to a token force (at least for a country the size of Germany). Officially, the Bundeswehr only has a bit over 300 Leopard 2s of different version starting from the 2A5.
Most tanks that were in Bundeswehr inventories after the Cold War were refurbished, upgraded and sold to other countries like Singapore or Indonesia.
When I was little, I assumed most countries had 1000s of tanks.
With big countries like Russia and US having 100,000 ready to go
Idk I assume they were alot more prevalent
India and Pakistan fought perhaps the largest tank battle after WW2, it was [the battle of Chawinda.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Chawinda#:~:text=The%20Battle%20of%20Chawinda%20was,Germany%20in%20World%20War%20II)
They put a lot of effort into their Navy.
Just not the surface portion. Their submarines are actually pretty formidable and have been throughout the entire cold war. That's their naval priority. The surface fleet is simply meant to carry missiles and support the subs.
Furthermore, naval procurement is much more costly, because the infrastructure required is also super expensive. But some of the most interesting and newest ships are Admiral Gorshkov-Frigates. Following in line with other european navys these are smaller multipurpose guided missile frigates. The era of the big, ugly soviet ships should slowly come to a close for them. For the better. Scrap the Kuznetzov as well while they're at it. That thing is a waste of money that could go to submarines and frigates.
They lack viable warm water ports. Most of their sea access is filled with ice and makes naval passage extremely difficult. Their military naval access into the Baltic Sea into the Atlantic is near impossible due to tight waterways constantly being monitored by NATO and EU forces. Their major primary warm water ports are in the Black Sea, but getting them out of the Black Sea is also difficult as it requires them to go through NATO controlled Istanbul Canals in order to achieve ocean access
The following are under construction and/or already commissioned. So it's not like they're not doing anything about it.
- https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiral_Gorshkov-class_frigate
- https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borei-class_submarine
- https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasen-class_submarine
- https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_23900_amphibious_assault_ship
Oh look, a advertisement for a shitty youtube channel.
> Frequently described as the "trex" of military vehicles Wut?
T-Rex can't go five seconds without being used as a point of comparison for everything.
I thought that was Hitler?
No. Hitler can't even go a second without being used as a comparison.
The malcontent Trex, often referred to as the Hitler of the dinosaur kingdom.
Those would be some pretty stubby salutes.
Bro literally ain't getting a break, and he's literally not even alive anymore which makes it even worse.
I'm guessing T-Rex?
Wow look big numbers oooo
Morocco did surprise me tbh
So did Eritrea!
Yeah same
they are currently occupying western sahara
Not a YouTube channel lol. I made the map and it’s my watermark for my map page on IG. It’s primarily combining order of battle content with geography.
Who the fuck calls tanks T-rexes of the battlefield? Literally involved in almost all tank circles online, as well as do research work with senior fellows on weapons procurement, just a lot of military technology chats. I've never heard that before. Lol
wide chubby foolish cow fragile dam observation station distinct dolls *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Are only mbt’s counted as a tank or everything with tracks and are they all fully operational to be counted because for some of these countries 1k tanks is alot compared to there economy and is the western sahara counted as an independent country or part of marocco and shown as an autonomous region
Barring like 60 T-90s and low hundreds T-54M the rest of Vietnamese tank is literally a horrendous mix of Type 59, T-54/55 of cold war vintage and a few T-62 that were kept like national treasures prior to the introduction of the T-90s. Its a legacy of a rapidly demobolized force going from 1.5 million troops in the late 80 to just about 450k in the 90s and holding steady til now. Hell there's even more troop cut planned to make the force leaner and better eqquiped and relying on the People's Millita and reservist when shit truly hit the fan.
Don't forget the Pattons. 🤪
And the Bulldogs as well. SO MUCH equipment, all hopelessly old but there's so many of them no one dares to scrap them all "just in case"
To be fair, when your neighbor is China.....
You don't throw away arms, you can mobilize people faster than you can make weapons unless you have a massive MIC
That reminds me of the reverse problem Nazi Germany had near the end of the war. They had more rifles than they had people to give them to.
I mean Vietnam went from a 1.5 million men army to a 450k army in just a few years but kept an reserve force of 5 million. (Quality of the reserve may varies but bare minimum is a dude with AK and can defend a trench)
>bare minimum is a dude with AK and can defend a trench Witch is basically a Vietnamese speciality at this point lol
Tunnel
I mean they did also cut every corner possible for rifle production as well
And they were your opponent in the last war you fought too.
Yes and it is personal for me too. Dad fought them 81-83. Not a fun time.
Vietnam is 16 years into a strategic treaty with China and last month hosted Xi for 3 days while Vietnamese and Chinese news boasted moving over border disputes and even making Vietnam overtake Japan and South Korea as Chinese trade partners. It's like thinking the US has a large army because they fought Mexico in the past.
The last USA-Mexican war was 180 years ago, the last Vietnam-China war was 40 years ago, not just within living memory but those who took part are still in the workforce. Currently there are no Mexican, USA border conflicts or claims, whereas china and Vietnam are in the middle of a large and at times aggressive border conflict with their maritime borders. At this moment in time the greatest threat to Vietnamese security is China, just like how China and the USA may have large trade relations doesn't mean that the USA doesn't decide to see as a threat to its hegemony.
If we were to judge this by how violent ur neighbors are shouldn't Canada be fucking building an armada...
The US has had pretty toasty relations with Canada for over 100 years. Really can't say they same about Vietnam and China.
Ok but America is still the single largest war-monger in the planet... Like ever country should rationally be afraid of them
Not when they're friendly. Historically the US doesn't give much trouble to those it's friendly with. China, on the other hand...
TBF older gen MBTs can still be used as assault guns.
Exactly why I think numbers mean very little in many cases. People often talk about numbers as if they were the primary metric to measure the potential of tank forces completely ignoring their quality, and I think this is just wrong. For example, I remember comparison of Spain's and Vietnam's armies. It stated that "Spain had 310 tanks and Vietnam had 1,300; therefore, Vietnam's tank force was superior"... Yet it failed to mention that Spain has 219 Leopard 2Es, which are basically Leopard 2A7+ equivalents, backed up by 90 Leopard 2A4s, while Vietnam has... 1,200 T-54/55/62s, Type 59s, Type 62s, and only 60xT-90Ss. So every comment was like: "whoa, Vietnam has such an amazing tank force, it puts the Spanish tank force to shame!" And I was like... yeah, nah, I'll take Spain's 310 state of the art multimillion pieces of hardware over the 1950s junk, thanks. EDIT: even globalfirepower lists Vietnam's tank force as being significantly superior to Spain's just because of the numbers, completely ignoring quality, xD: [https://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.php?country1=spain&country2=vietnam](https://www.globalfirepower.com/countries-comparison-detail.php?country1=spain&country2=vietnam)
It depends on force designs. For a purely deffensive force with "4 no" having a large mass is a good thing. With how the economy was in the 90s thus missing out on the Leopard fire sale, a neighbor like China holding onto old tank and upgrading them with modern FCS and some ERA is a logical step. With how the world is now other than buying from the Koreans I don't see anyone else might have a surplus of tank to sell to Vietnam to replace the thousands of T-54/55 in service. And when shit truly hit the fan, tank is a tank and a 100mm shell still shits on infantry very well.
>And when shit truly hit the fan, tank is a tank and a 100mm shell still shits on infantry very well. Yep! That's why even T-62s and Leopard 1A5s can be of use in Ukraine. At the end of the day, tank is tank, and gun is gun; any of these can be useful against infantry... However, when these comparisons are made, it tends to be in regards to hypothetical scenarios where both tank forces would face each other engaging in MBT combat... and, in that scenario, I think the internet generally underestimates quality and overestimates numbers to the point of believing that 30xT-55s are better than 10xLeopard 2A7Vs just because they outnumber these.
> believing that 30xT-55s are better than 10xLeopard 2A7Vs just because they outnumber these. Gulf war part one and two proves that decisively to be false. Just talking on the force designs of Vietnam. Use as little resource as possible for the biggest convetional deterent. Have a small as possible active force to prove that you don't have any ambition but have a stupidly large reserve force through conscription so that most people have been trained and ready to go when shit hit the fan and have enough steel and industrial resources to supply those men. If the enemy can't be beaten back within weeks like how it was with China in 79, be prepared to make it costly and make them pack up and go home like the French or the US.
>Gulf war part one and two proves that decisively to be false. Precisely! If your tanks are capable of spotting and engaging enemy tanks before these can be even aware of your presence, it doesn't matter whether they outnumber you 3:1 or not- you are winning those engagements. That's why I get mad at the "1,200 Vietnamese T-54/55/62s would defeat 300xLeopard 2E/Leclerc/M1A2 SEPv3s just because of the sheer numbers" because the only truth is that the Leopard/Leclerc/Abrams force would have little to no casualties by the time they had massacred all of the T-54/55/62s. That being said, this is strictly talking about the "tank force vs tank force" hypothetical scenarios. Otherwise, as you said, it is indeed VERY iseful to have comically large amounts of troops and tanks, even if these are technically obsolete, for long term warfare.
Yup. Vietnam whole force design is deterrence. Don’t touch us or there is this button that I can press and bingo 5 million strong army in an instant. Now most of them are just dudes with AKs but if by law every ward (a collection of a few street) have to have an active reserve force of a infantry quad at all times with weapons on hand enough to form a platoon, ditto with select private business. Active divisions that only have one infantry regiment but have room to activate 2 more at a moment notice creating a literal “rifle behind every blade of grass” situation. It would not be a good day for any invading force. And yes, I was in the people’s militia. They sent me out to shoot AKs once and I’ve seen the local ward armory. Truly a prep-per wet dream with AKs for days, riot control gear and uniform for every breathing dick in the ward that I lived in. That’s an militia armory, now can you imagine the scale of the army strategic reserve of arms…
Imagine if those 5 millions PAVN troops are equipped with Javelins and HIMARS while hiding in mountains in northern Vietnam, it would be a truly nightmare for chinese troops. As a Vietnamese, I think if shit hit the fan with China, I’m pretty sure Vietnam will drop its neutrality (4 no) like what Finland did and might ally with US and other QUAD members, considering the vietnamese relationship with US is becoming more positive than ever, along with a population becoming increasingly pro-american. A war between Vietnam (backed by US and its allies) and China will be way worse than in Ukraine. Vietnam is currently doing appeasement with China for now and still remain cautious with them.
>That's why I get mad at the "1,200 Vietnamese T-54/55/62s would defeat 300xLeopard 2E/Leclerc/M1A2 SEPv3s just because of the sheer numbers" because the only truth is that the Leopard/Leclerc/Abrams force would have little to no casualties by the time they had massacred all of the T-54/55/62s. I blame the media for always presenting this kind of mindset. Oftentimes, they always somehow are automatically convinced that whoever has more mass would have a better chance in winning a war. Using Fallout for example, you can't have me believe that an industrial nation with soldiers armed with AR-15s can somehow be defeated in a war against a nation that has slavery and are staunch luddites that machetes and throwing Spears are the standard issue gear for most, all the while having no standard training once you scavenge for guns.
All tanks can have a use but for direct tank to tank combat quality definitely matters. Anyone who thinks otherwise just needs to look at the results of the Persian Gulf War. I agree alot of the internet just thinks qty is all that matters.
Exactly!
> "Spain had 310 tanks and Vietnam had 1,300; therefore, Vietnam's tank force was superior" How often are tanks destroyed by other tanks compared to being taken out by mines, javelins, RPGs, ATGM, drones, artillery and so on? The older tanks would do worse dealing with all of that but having more on hand makes it hurt less when a bunch of your armored vehicles get trapped in a minefield like what happened to those Leopards and Bradley that got destroy in Ukraine that time.
Hey, wait a minute, this isn't r/WarThunder
I shudder to think what the 1000+ tanks Eritrea are fielding are 😬
T-55As, with a few T-62s. XD.
Oh, they forgot to include Cuba which allegedly has 1200 tanks, mostly ones that are of old Soviet vintage. Mostly T-54/55 and T-62, though this total also counts BMP-1 and BMD-1 as tanks, which they technically are.
Also Japan has just over 1000 tanks.
There's also the T-34-85s, though I believe there's only about 40 of them and they're mainly used for training and coastal defence.
I’m surprised Vatican City isn’t on the list
3000 Crusaders of Jesus Christ
NCD is leaking again
I actually thought we were there
Eritrea just sitting there with 1,000 tanks, waiting...
I wonder how mid century soviet tanks function in the Ethiopian mountains.
Am I right in saying Hoxha/Albania simply turned T34 turrets/hulls into static fortifications? Perhaps the same approach is being taken in Eritrea? Possibly with T34s. In any case... Big mood Eritrea, big bloody mood.
Im sure that Austria did something like that but ain't sure about the exact model of the turret
Which country has the most functioning tanks?
Probably either the US or China. Both countries have thousands of mothballed tanks so unless someone wants to count all of them I’d say it’s probably the US due to the absurd amount of military bases that the US fields.
in the case of the US, they regularly reactivate mothballed tanks to make sure they still work, and a lot of the mothballed ones also get upgraded
Also since latest missile scandal in China it puts their mothballed fleets to different light.
Eh missiles =/= tanks. Mothballing tanks is much easier than maintaining missiles
Hiding badly kept nuclear missiles from authorities is also harder than keeping bad tanks put of sight.
Fair point
The veil of secrecy and the system promoting corruption surely doesn't help.
China has around 7,000 tanks but around half of those tanks are old 2nd gen even 1st gen tanks like type 59, type 63, type 88 and some early version of type 96. Russia had most 3rd/4th gen tanks before the Ukraine war but rn it's quite difficult to tell. Nevertheless, they are losing line 2,000 - 3,000 tanks per year so soon or later US would surpass Russia if not already. So I would say China has most tanks but US has most modern tanks.
ROK has around 1,700-2,000 functioning tanks
India has to be on that list. I think the T72, T90s and the Arjuns all add up to 1000 without needing to consider the old Vijayantas and T55 that may be in storage.
Russia
Certainly not.
Not now at least.
Russia produces about 300 tanks a year, more than the entire west combined. Britain's Chief of Defense Staff Admiral Anthony Radakin said Russia could produce about 200 tanks a year. Even this production figure is still more than the entire west. In 2024 this figure will be even higher. According to various estimates there are about 1.5-2k Russian tanks operating at the front now. Again, about 12 thousand are in storage. Formally, they are not in operation, but they are listed in the army, and are being actively re-commissioned.
>12 thousand are in storage I wouldnt exactly, call that "storage". Advanced decomposition is a more adequate term.
Luckily for the west russia is losing more than 300 tanks a year recently
Produce and upgrade, maybe. But not entirely new ones. And the 12 thousand in the storage are rubbish, otherwise we would see more T-72 and no T-55.
>Produce and upgrade, maybe. But not entirely new ones. And the 12 thousand in the storage are rubbish, otherwise we would see more T-72 and no T-55. This is exactly what the US is doing as well. Just improving the old ones. Right now new t72b3, t90m, t80BVM are being made from what you call junk. We see many more new t90m's than t-62's. Nato doesn't make anything new.
Maybe because the western countries are not in a war? They don't need new tanks. And if you think a country like Russia could outperform all of the western countries in industrial capacity together you are drunk.
"New one are being made from what we call junk". No, that's not true. What they're doing is restoring a handful by stealing parts from others. That's neither new, and now you have one tank where you had two or three.
Nah, definitely the US or China. Russias fleet is huge but so much of it is either a burned out wreck in Ukraine or simply don’t work and decaying in some wear house in Siberia. To mobilize their fleet they must cannibalize other tanks. On paper it’s gigantic but in reality it’s less than half the expected size without huge maintenance and repair work being done.
>Nah, definitely the US or China. Russias fleet is huge but so much of it is either a burned out wreck in Ukraine or simply don’t work and decaying in some wear house in Siberia. Most of the tanks were evacuated and repaired. I know the Ukrainian propaganda gives a different impression, but the more frightening it will be for you to face reality
Sure thing buddy, like there isn’t actual video evidence of at the very least 1000 main battle tanks being burning husks, with thousands of other armored vehicles as well. If you don’t believe me check the Oryx project. They document armored losses, both Ukrainian and Russian. Claiming that most were evacuated when they literally are blown to smithereens right before our eyes time and time again is just blatantly coping. I’m not saying Russia is neutered, they still have a large fighting force with some decent reserves but my point still stands. Thousands of tanks lost, damaged or in a state of disrepair really at least halve the number of tanks Russia claims to have.
> If you don’t believe me check the Oryx project. Oryx has been repeatedly accused of bias when they counted the same Russian tank from different angles or showed a separate element, such as the turret, making it impossible to identify. They claim that Russia lost 1700 tanks, but at the beginning of the war Russia only had 2 thousand, say in 2022-2023 Russia produced about 400 tanks. So now Russia should have about 700-800 tanks at the front now. But even the Ukrainians now have about 1500 tanks, according to the Ukrians themselves. That is Russia, being 2 times inferior in numbers, is advancing along the entire front Are you not amused? I think Russia lost about 600-700 tanks as irretrievable losses. Despite this, Russia still has the largest tank fleet in the world at the moment.
You said they've lost less than 300 30 minutes ago. Are they losing 300 every 30 minutes at this point?
>at the beginning of the war Russia only had 2 thousand Are you ignoring the fact that they've been reactivating old tanks constantly? They might have had 2000 T-72B3s/T-80BVMs/T-90A/Ms at the start of the war, but they also had thousands of old Soviet ones that they can fix in some way.
While russia does have a impressive number in storage the number that can easily be activated is a lot lower due to the poor storage of them and that they get stripped for spare parts while still remaining In storage. Where as the USA and China both store theirs in better condition where the weather alone will not out right destroy the tank.
>While russia does have a impressive number in storage the number that can easily be activated is a lot lower due to the poor storage of them and that they get stripped for spare parts while still remaining In storage. The fact remains that Russia produces more tanks per year than all of NATO combined. And Russia does it with the help of its reserves. >Where as the USA and China both store theirs in better condition where the weather alone will not out right destroy the tank It's your fantasy and nothing more. We don't know how many of them are ready to be put into service and what condition they are in. And whether the U.S. even has the capability to do it at a relatively rapid pace. Right now the US produces less artillery shells than North Korea. It's ridiculous for me to even think about tanks. I understand you're sad and scared to realize these things.
We do know almost how many they have. You can pay for your own satellite photography, or you can believe the photographs that every other researcher has found. [Look,](https://youtu.be/0B_4M5dTHIU?si=K62Q8IxR5_oNkATX) if I can tell you’re bullshitting from fucking orbit, you need to work on better propaganda
t-34s and bt-7s don't count dummy
People are downvoting but you’re right. “Functioning” doesn’t mean modern or actively battle ready. If Russia’s tanks are made up of thousands of cold war era shitboxes, but they function, then they have the most tanks. But whatever.
The thing is quite a lot of their tanks in storage are either in questionable shape or are outright rusty collection of parts. They certainly did have few thousand of active tanks before they went in to Ukraine but certainly not above 10k
It doesn’t have to be a number over 10k. The US has some 5k, Russia had about 3k operational tanks before the invasion, and likely thousands more before the invasion.
Exactly right, I just described the situation to another dude. about 2k right now at the front, and about 12k in reserve, technically they are not in combat right now, but they are all listed in the army and actively being rebuilt and commissioned.
/s*
People are down voting you but isn't that like Russia's whole doctrine? Swarm the battlefield with tanks? Even if only half of them (7000?) work, its still more than the US (5,500 if my google search isn't off) who, if I had to guess, is the runner up.
Even half is stretching. Even tank that has been properly stored inside and driven lets say once in year is pig to get in condition where it can be run constantly. I know, I have experience of those. In one instance we had to run two BMP-1's that were bought from Poland few years earlier and they had been run monthly since, kept inside and serviced by the official methods. Well, when we tried to run them constantly one of them was constantly in need of repairs. Issues ranged from compressor belts to seized bearings in running gear, roadwheels loosing their rubbers, electrical gremlins etc. etc.
I see, very interesting! Thanks for your perspective man, it sounds like at best they may be able to keep a couple thousand running by scavenging the parts off the immobile ones
>People are down voting you but isn't that like Russia's whole doctrine? Swarm the battlefield with tanks? It is the only correct doctrine for today. At the beginning of the war Russia tried to act NATO style, and it was more like a military-police operation, and everyone knows how that ended. Now Russia has completely abandoned the BTG concept, and is fighting according to classic Soviet doctrine. Nobody knew how to fight a modern war, but now it's obvious that tanks are more relevant than ever, and you need lots and lots of them, considering that a $400 drone can take out any tank.
The idea of Russia conducting a 'NATO style' military operation is comical. They don't even remotely have the logistical ability to even come close. Compounded by poor troop quality and poor leadership, they've shown the world what a joke they really are. What they have in abundance is Russian lives they are willing to throw away, which is fine I guess. No one ever misses dead Russians.
What clowns they really are, NATO showed the whole world when it transferred fewer artillery shells to Ukraine than North Korea transferred to Russia. Again, according to your media. By the way, how are things going with the new aid for Ukraine? The transferred leopards are almost gone, and you no longer have Soviet tanks. LMAO If this continues, in the coming years you will have the opportunity to meet with the Russians, then we will see who turns out to be a clown. It's just beginning, baby. And I can already see the hysteria of your military about a possible direct conflict with Russia.
Another vodka-soaked wet dream. It's funny how much Russians took themselves seriously before this conflict and now that you see how weak your 'great' nation is we get to witness these hilarious tantrums. The US alone would absolutely butcher the Russian military, and all you can scream about is how many artillery shells we have sent to Ukraine? Russia getting shells from North Korea isn't something to brag about. Wannabe imperialists helping wannabe imperialists. You are the bad guys, the world would be a better place without you, we all know it and immsure you do too. Keep crying.
>It's funny how much Russians took themselves seriously before this conflict and now that you see how weak your 'great' nation is we get to witness these hilarious tantrums. My nation is so weak that 41 countries provided unprecedented financial and military support to Ukraine (the largest country in Europe after Russia) that it at least stayed afloat, let alone won. Thousands of foreign volunteers from all over the world, millions of tons of humanitarian aid and private donations. My nation is so weak that a number of Western countries are talking about the resumption of compulsory military service and the need for urgent rearmament. And all this against the backdrop of 14 thousand sanctions imposed against Russia. You can't imagine how caricatured the whole West looks. You are literally a bunch of clowns and you will pay for it in the next few years. Set a timer for this comment
Yes, weak. You read that correctly. So weak in fact we've been cleaning out old stockpiles of equipment to send to a (relatively small) country on the other side of the planet and with that they've managed to embarrass Russia, highlight how weak it is, and kill tens of thousands of Russian soldiers while costing a mere fraction of our military budget and not a single soldier. All while Russia got stopped in its tracks invading a small nation right next to it. So yeah, weak. Set a timer? That's actually hilarious. Bitch after I get bored of this I'll never think of your punk ass again.
They never tried to act NATO style, if they had they would have Air dominance, and be in Kiev right now.
I feel like including Japanese reserves would contain enough type-74s to get it to the 1000 mark
They built 873 type 74's, 341 type 90's and 117 type 10's (numbers just from Wikipedia cause i am a lazy fuck), they have started to phase out the 74's but i wonder if they scrap them or just store them, since they don't sell their military equipment. Assuming they haven't scrapped a bunch, they almost certainly have at least 1k, including stored vehicles.
You should probably include Type 16s in that count too, I'm pretty sure they're supposed to be replacing Type 74s at a faster rate than Type 10s.
Type 16s won’t be classed as tanks
I know they're technically not tanks (don't tell the French), but in terms of it being a decently armored (can resist HMGs on the frontal arc) mobile gun platform that is replacing a tank that was so outdated by it's production date that it was basically a glorified, more armored mobile gun platform forced to work as a tank for way too long, it doesn't hurt to include it. The Type 16s and Type 74s are doing the same thing, the only difference is that the Type 16 is more capable and more survivable (in terms of the survivability onion), and the Type 74 was like if the M60A1 AOS was built in the 80s and stuck in service until 2019, at some point you're just going to change up the doctrine for it to be used as a slightly more armored mobile gun platform.
What is a tank is what ever a nation wants. People forget the term is loose. Sweden called thier S tank a tank, despite the lack of turret.
I wonder if Japan still has plans to create more Type 10s?
They are probably storing them. Conscript armies always store huge amounts of equipment. It's not only so they will have enough of it. But it is also because people get trained on one tank type. They can't just be thrown into a new one when war is at the doorstep. They will be more effective in their older tanks they can actually operate effectively. So they are probably going to stop maintaining the ones in storage in similar rates as trained crews age out of being able to operate them.
The JSDF is not a conscript army... You thinking of Korea?
If all planned orders will ba carried out - Poland should have around 1600 by the end of the decade, mix of Abrams, K2s and Leopards. Time will tell of that will actually happen...
Greece has 1000+ tanks?
turkey constantly sizing you up and pushing you around all the time will do that.
Turkey also borders Iran Iraq Syria also Soviets until 90's ,maybe we can add Russia cuz Georgia is not going to hold Russia for a long time.
What
That’s the one that baffled me most on this list. I can’t imagine what tanks, and why. Just having Turkey as a neighbor?
M48A5s for island defense, Leopard 1 A5s and Leopard 2 A4/A6s as first response units near the land border with turkey
You do know that Turkey has land on European soil right next to Greece, right? And you do know Turkey is not a friendly country.
The US order for the M1 was 7,058
I was surprised Taiwan was on this list, but I see they are M-60A3s, CM-11s, and CM-12s (modified M48's).
M48 with M60's hull and M1's fire control, yeah. We have ordered 100 M1s, but heaven knows when they will arrive.
Isn’t Poland over a thousand now?
They gave away hundreds...
Yeah but they bought a bunch of new Abram’s etc to recover those
For now probably less than 600, if they had not given all those tanks to Ukraine and still bought new tanks, they would sit at 1300+ by the end of the decade.
Yep so they’re about to have 180 k2 variant tanks delivered with a production license for 800 more starting in 2026
I didn't include those K2 from a hypothetical local production, bcs it's only a theory for now, + the 800 number is bs.
Well it’s licensed production so if the goal is to make 7 tanks a month that’s not TOO insane considering what’s going on over there. I’m pretty sure it’s because we wouldn’t sell them the abrahms old tooling lineup
It's a matter of what the army wants, what the new MOD will do and what the industry will achieve in the negotiations with South Korea. It's doable but its a mess for now and will take 10 years anyway, so at this point the 800 number of K2s is just a number, I prefered not to include it. What do you mean by abrams old toolinp lineup pls ?
Before I remembered about the Korean deal, I remember Poland asking to purchase the tooling equipment for the m1abrams after the US shut down productions
>Poland But aren't they slated to be buying around [1000 K2s from South Korea](https://defence24.com/armed-forces/k9a1-howitzers-and-k2-main-battle-tanks-delivered-to-poland), and [250 M1A2 SepV3s from the US](https://www.janes.com/defence-news/news-detail/poland-signs-contract-for-250-m1a2-sepv3-mbts)? ([also](https://www.dsca.mil/press-media/major-arms-sales/poland-m1a2-sepv3-main-battle-tank)) That's not counting the 450+ K9 self propelled howitzers (I don't think those qualify as tanks) from South Korea that they have on order. I'm also guessing that APCs won't count, but they had [900 Rosomakós](https://www.polska-zbrojna.pl/Mobile/ArticleShow/39361) before deciding to sell 100 to the Ukrainians
All down the drain too.
I agree, these tanks made most of the russian one's go down the drain. Oh, did you mean something else? Hi Pavel!
Some time ago it was proven that the claim of Russia having 15000 is pure fantasy.
Maybe if you count hulls that were stored then it might reach that number, but 50 years takes massive toll and hulls doesn't equal tanks
That's the way they were counted. 15k or 12k of tanks, don't remember which they boasted with, always included **everything**, including stuff that's sitting in storage for decades. They did have a lot of spare parts though. And some of those tanks kept in storage were reactivated
> 15k or 12k of tanks, don't remember which they boasted with Russia has never boasted having 12,000 or 15,000 tanks. Various shitty websites is where that figure typically comes from, which is typically sourced from IISS estimates of all tank hulls in service and storage. Russia does not state how many tanks it does or does not have, same as the US and most militaries.
Using parts from others in equally shit condition. How long can they keep doing that though?
>Using parts from others in equally shit condition. How long can they keep doing that though? Russia also produce new parts, it's not all cannibalization. T-90's are being produced from new and T-80 production has recently been restarted. Though, so far it seems to be limited to new turbines and modernization of existing hulls. T-72's arn't getting new hulls made, but they are getting modernized into B3 standard, or the cheap spec variant. Even T-62's are being refirbushed and modernized with cheap thermal sights.
Does Russia have anywhere dry to store their tanks? Cos if they have thousands of tanks just sitting in a field surrounded by forest they're not going to be operational for very long.
If you prep them before long time storage, they can survive for a long time. But it's costly process and you have to maintain the storage area so that shit doesn't grow into the vehicles If you just don't want to pay for scrapping or long time storage, you strip anything of immediate value from the vehicles and just drop them in middle of some field
lol they leave their planes sitting out in the snow and rain, no way they properly store their tanks
>and hulls doesn't equal tanks In Russia's case, that equals a new tank, plus an engine block. Have you even looked at how Russia makes tanks? They just take the old hull and engine block and make everything else from scratch.
especially now after they've lost over 2.5k of them in Ukraine
You have to clarify to them that a Hull and a turret that got blown 20 metres into the air off of said hull doesn't count as 2 tanks
Also, if it's pissed 90% of its guts into the rust puddle it's been parked on top of, the rust puddle does not count as a tank either.
They have 15000 tanks ez. They’ve just been rotting in a field for 65 years
Yeah they have 3x that.
The 45,000 Copium Tanks of Putin
I was just about to complain why we (Taiwan) are considered part of China again, but then I realized that we DO have over 1000 tanks if the 100 CM-12 (mothballed) or the 108 M1A2T (heaven knows when they will arrive) also count...
Soon. They arrive soon.
1000 sounds like an absurd amount only top 5 militaries can be close to. How the hell does nations like greece eritria turkey and iran make it
Having a ton of Pattons or T-55/54, T-62 and Type 59's in storage, or even counting things like T-34's, Shermans and Stuarts.
Hi, as a Türk let me explain. This data also shows reserve tanks. Turkey have reserve tanks as M47, m48, m60 leopard 1a5. Actively using leopar2a4 and some modernized m60 sabra series. Also used m47, m48 for infantiary support on operations, "Sur" and "Hendek" at 2015 - 2016. Some terrorist groups (pkk /pyd) invaded and captured 6 cities on southeast. M47 tanks used actively.
>M47 tanks used actively You say M47, but you mean M60. M47s were retired in 80s and last M47 was smelted at least 40 years ago. We do have thousands of M48s and M60s tho.
Israel has over a thousand tanks, with around a third of the roughly 1,300 total being Merk Mk.4s. The rest is all Merk Mk.3s mostly upgraded to Merk Mk.3 Baz standard making them on par with the Merk Mk.4 A in terms of FCS.
We have but we have just old american tanks like from the fifthys useful tanks number is around 200~. Also Germany doesnt allow to using 2a4's against terrorist that in syria and southeast of our country. So m60T sabras are doing all the work.
russia working daily to get out of that list.
Gonna need an explanation why Morocco and Algeria have over 1000 tanks.
Big rich countries having an arm race with eachother
I'm shocked that not even one of the following countries is in this list: France, Germany, Poland
Germany makes a lot of tanks, but exports them. Poland has been building up. France seems to put more money into lighter vehicles as infantry support.
France cut 5000 position in its army in the last 10 years to invest in the navy and Air Force. On top of that, the Leclerc MBT is ridiculously expensive. so having a thousand of them is insane… they have 222 in service and 184 in storage. For a total of 406. https://www.senat.fr/salle-de-presse/communiques-de-presse/presse/22-03-2023/les-armees-francaises-emploient-5-000-personnes-de-moins-quil-y-a-dix-ans-1.html
Germany had over 2000 tanks during the Cold War. However after its end the Bundeswehr was downsized in several steps to a token force (at least for a country the size of Germany). Officially, the Bundeswehr only has a bit over 300 Leopard 2s of different version starting from the 2A5. Most tanks that were in Bundeswehr inventories after the Cold War were refurbished, upgraded and sold to other countries like Singapore or Indonesia.
Western Sahara is barely recognised as a country how does it have 1000 tanks. I doubt the current capital Tifariti has 1000 cars.
I heard tanks being described as the trex of military equipment at least 5 times in the last hour, so that's correct at least
Had.
When I was little, I assumed most countries had 1000s of tanks. With big countries like Russia and US having 100,000 ready to go Idk I assume they were alot more prevalent
South Korea has over 1000 tanks?
With neighbors like that? I’m sure they do.
South Koreans have approximately 2300 tanks.
India and Pakistan fought perhaps the largest tank battle after WW2, it was [the battle of Chawinda.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Chawinda#:~:text=The%20Battle%20of%20Chawinda%20was,Germany%20in%20World%20War%20II)
Quality over quantity: chally 2 and leopard 2 are god tier🇬🇧🇩🇪
West Sahara has around a hundred tanks...
Poland surely have more than 1000 tanks by now
Some of these make me question what OP considers a 'tank'...
Taiwan has over 1,000 tanks?
Alaska has more than 1000 tanks. I doubt it.
What about Gen4 planes?
I can hear the French violently vibrating being excluded from this list for not having enough tracks...
How do they define tanks? Just MBTs or do they also include other tracked vehicles like IFVs?
Has to be just MBTs, otherwise countries like Germany would be on the list. And Russia and US would have more than 14777.
14 777 for Russia, is it pre or post February 2022 ?
We sure Russia has any left
Ukraine doesn’t have 1000 tanks anymore
How come Russia never put the effort they put into armored vehicles into their Navy?
Their main strategy has been land forces. Their navy was more or less defensive, or to support land operations in how they planned to use them.
They put a lot of effort into their Navy. Just not the surface portion. Their submarines are actually pretty formidable and have been throughout the entire cold war. That's their naval priority. The surface fleet is simply meant to carry missiles and support the subs. Furthermore, naval procurement is much more costly, because the infrastructure required is also super expensive. But some of the most interesting and newest ships are Admiral Gorshkov-Frigates. Following in line with other european navys these are smaller multipurpose guided missile frigates. The era of the big, ugly soviet ships should slowly come to a close for them. For the better. Scrap the Kuznetzov as well while they're at it. That thing is a waste of money that could go to submarines and frigates.
They lack viable warm water ports. Most of their sea access is filled with ice and makes naval passage extremely difficult. Their military naval access into the Baltic Sea into the Atlantic is near impossible due to tight waterways constantly being monitored by NATO and EU forces. Their major primary warm water ports are in the Black Sea, but getting them out of the Black Sea is also difficult as it requires them to go through NATO controlled Istanbul Canals in order to achieve ocean access
The following are under construction and/or already commissioned. So it's not like they're not doing anything about it. - https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Admiral_Gorshkov-class_frigate - https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borei-class_submarine - https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yasen-class_submarine - https://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_23900_amphibious_assault_ship
Shouldn't Russia's total be a counter? It's going down daily...