Why Russia May Lose the War in Ukraine

Much of the Russian military strategy is focussed on the idea of applying overwhelming armoured force, with the T72 tank as the centrepiece. Here's why Russia's strategy is likely to fail.

Much of the Russian military strategy is focussed on the idea of applying overwhelming armoured force, with the T-72 tank as the centrepiece. As of this writing, Russia possesses approximately 12,000 front-line main battle tanks, many of which are the latest T72BM3 variant. It’s believed that as many as 2,480 of these tanks are currently deployed in Ukraine.

The T-72 is a very old tank design. Its genesis began in the late 1960s out of a desire to replace and improve upon existing Second World War-era T-34s and later T-54, T-55, T-62 and T-64 designs.

The designers of the T-72 had several goals in mind. First, they wanted a compact tank with a low height profile so it would be hard to see and hit. The compact size and low height necessitated the development of an automatic loader fed by a carousel situated just below the bottom of the turret basket. The loader functions first by moving a shell from the carousel and then ramming it into the breech of the main gun. The shell is followed by a bag charge that acts as a propellant for the shell.

As we have seen repeatedly in the first Gulf War of 1991 and now in Ukraine, this arrangement has proved catastrophic for the T72 tanks and their crews.

The reason for this is that anti-tank guided missile systems (ATGM) work by exploding the missile over the top of the turret of the tank where the armour is weakest.

The warhead then punctures the metal by causing a jet of molten metal to form, thus killing or severely injuring the crew members sitting inside the turret and destroying fire control systems and other crucial electronics. The hot metal ultimately makes its way to the ammunition carousel, which is located just under the turret basket.

The molten metal, together with the concussion of the explosion, causes the ammunition to explode and the associated propellant casings to burn furiously. The resulting conflagration is intense. It also results in catastophic destruction of the tank and more often than not, separation of the turret from the hull, a phenomenon that was seen frequently by American and British tank units during the First Gulf War when engaging Iraqi T-72 tank formations.

The low height profile of the T-72 has also meant that the main gun couldn't be depressed very far, with the end result that Russian tanks couldn't go into hull-down positions that would prevent major losses when engaging approaching enemy forces, or allow T-72 crews to ambush enemy forces in smaller, set-piece battles.

The designers also wanted a tank that could be quickly, cheaply and easily built in massive numbers. At the time the T-72 came into existence, Russian military doctrine held that overwhelming NATO defences with massive numbers of tanks was the way to win.

It was a philosophy that worked in countering German armoured columns during the Second World War, and Russian military planners saw no reason to change it, at least so long as NATO countries continued to prioritize social welfare spending over military procurement.

Given that the NATO countries then had few effective anti-tank weapons systems and had not yet begun building a corresponding number of more capable tanks, the Russian philosophy was likely to be prove successful. This disparity prompted the West to develop ATGM systems like the Milan and TOW in the early 1970s, with the idea that such systems could be fielded in the numbers required to counter the Russian threat until numerous advanced tanks like the US M1 Abrams, German Leopard 2, and the British Challenger 1 could be built.

For its part, Russia began building T-80 and T-90 tanks to compensate for some of the deficiencies of the T-72, most of which became painfully apparent in various wars and conflicts in the Middle East. However, these newer tanks were never built in the same numbers as the T-72 due to cost concerns and the economic collapse that Russia experienced in 1990 and caused the Soviet Union to cease to exist.

Hence, the Russians instead upgraded their far more numerous T-72's with better fire control systems, Explosive Reactive Armour (ERA) panels, slat panels and more specialized kinds of ammunition, including gun-launched ATGM's. ERA panels consist of armoured bricks of explosive that are mounted on the front of the hull and the sides and top of the turret. They work by causing incoming warheads to explode before they actually reach the main armour of a tank.

ERA and slat panels are largely stop-gap measures that counter some of the capabilities of ATGM systems. However, they have proven to be insufficient in the face of rapidly improving Western-made ATGM systems which now have, and have had for some time, the ability to defeat all of these countermeasures through the use of tandem warheads. Tandem warheads work by using a two-charge system: the first charge defeats any ERA panels or slat armour, thus clearing the way for the second charge which penetrates the armour.

Indeed, recent Russian attempts to protect the vulnerable tops of their tank turrets by installing screens of slat armour that function like an umbrella have proven insufficient against the devastating effects of tandem top-attack munitions.

The Russians have also been working on active protection systems for their tanks. Active protection systems (APS) work by launching explosive projectiles that defeat incoming missiles or shells well before they get close to the tank. Israel’s Trophy APS is an example of a system that is just beginning to be widely available. The APS systems that are being developed in Russia are still in the early stages of development and have not yet been installed on many tanks.

As things stand today, the Russians have not been able to afford to develop their most modern, state-of-the-art T-14 Armata tanks and field them in sufficient numbers to compensate for the extensive deficiencies in their armoured forces. Indeed, the gestation period for the T-14 has been long, difficult and fraught with serious problems. Sanctions imposed by Western countries over the Russian invasion of Ukraine could make further development of the T-14 well-nigh impossible.

Even then, it's believed that the T-14s would still be highly vulnerable to Javelin and other similar anti-tank weapons systems that use top-attack munitions. The crews of the T-14s might survive such encounters as the turret functions like a remote weapons system, while the crew compartment is a separate, more highly protected space, but the tank as a whole will be rendered combat ineffective.

An equally large and emerging threat to Russian tanks and armoured forces is coming in the form of small, remotely-piloted drones that are hard to see and counter. These small drones carry tiny bombs weighing less than 15 pounds. These bombs, if they land on the top of the turret or the engine deck, can totally destroy or immobilize a tank.

By comparison, Ukraine’s army has a large number of old T-72 main battle tanks along with the indigenously-developed T-84 Oplot, but they don’t need to deploy these tanks in any great numbers to win. The massive numbers of US-made Javelin and UK-made NLAW antiarmour systems flooding into Ukraine may well be enough to save the day, so much so that some wags are now prompted to say that Ukraine’s new patron saint is called ‘St. Javelin’.

Russia's historical choice to use stop-gap, cost-saving measures over innovation is one reason why it will likely lose the war in Ukraine, or win it only at a massive cost in tanks, armoured personnel carriers and the lives of its soldiers. The doctrines that would have served Russian forces well back in the middle phase of the Cold War no longer apply today.

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