The T-72, which weighs almost 42,000 pounds, is a “military beast” that instills fear in every enemy. Provided well used. ‘A formidable weapon system’ is what the Russian tank is called by Major General Bd Harm de Jonge, who for years held various commander positions with two tank battalions of the Dutch army.
De Jonge: ‘But just like any other modern weapon system, the T-72 is also a vulnerable weapon. Especially if you deploy it so unprotected, without infantrymen around for protection, as the Russians have been doing in Ukraine for weeks now. You can tell by the countless T-72s that have been destroyed.’
But according to experts, there is another reason why hundreds of Russian tanks have been shot to pieces in Ukraine in just two months: the ammunition storage. Unlike the Western tanks that had to fight the T-72, dozens of shells in the Russian tanks are not stored separately, but are located with the three-man crew in the gun turret. With all its consequences.
Tank turned into coffin
If the T-72 is hit by an American Javelin missile, there is a good chance that a chain reaction will start and all 40 shells will explode. The massive explosion then sends the gun turret into the air and transforms the T-72, once the most modern in the Soviet Union, into a coffin for the crew.
The numerous Russian tanks found in Ukraine with blown-off turrets indicate that this nightmare scenario has played out in many T-72s. It is not clear how many tanks the Russians lost in 64 days of war. According to British estimates, the count stood at 530 until Monday. The Ukrainian army says it has taken out more than 800 tanks with the thousands of Javelins and other Western anti-tank weapons it received after the outbreak of the war.
De Jonge ‘definitely’ sees the ‘design flaw’ of the T-72 as one of the reasons why the Russians lost so many tanks. The vulnerability came to light as early as 1990, during the Gulf War, when the Americans easily destroyed the Iraqi T-72s with their Abrams tanks. However, the Russians did not care about this and did not adapt the T-72. The heavy Iraqi losses, so was the attitude among the generals, would never befall the mighty Russian army.
Storage in bunker
‘Every tank has certain vulnerabilities,’ says De Jonge, who served with the 43rd Tank Battalion and the 11th Tank Battalion in Oirschot. ‘Where the armor is less, you can hit the tank well. A fired anti-tank weapon can penetrate the tank, but it does not have to be fatal. But because all the ammunition from the T-72 is stored in the turret, everything explodes immediately if the tank is hit.’
De Jonge argues that this would never have happened with Western tanks, such as the German Leopard that the Netherlands had and the Abrams. These two tanks were the most modern Western tanks during the Cold War and were seen as the answer to the enormous tank supremacy of the Soviet Union.
De Jonge: ‘The Leopard and the Abrams have an extra security system due to a different storage of the ammunition. In these tanks the ammunition is stored in a separate room. Every time a grenade is removed from this bunker, the door is automatically closed.’
‘Made mistakes made’
The former officer, who also held senior NATO positions in Bosnia and Afghanistan, says the Russians also suffered heavy losses due to the ‘completely wrong deployment’ of their tank arsenal.
‘They use it in a stupid way, too vulnerable’, argues De Jonge. “We see the tank as a unique weapon system that you have to work with artillery, infantry and the air force. Don’t let the enemy come near your tanks. But the Russians don’t get that fight. They have made great doctrinal mistakes. Incomprehensible.’
De Jonge: ‘The Russians use the tank as a consumable. They just send tanks forward, with no infantry around for protection. They don’t disperse their tanks and provide security. Then you make the tank really, and completely unnecessarily, vulnerable. They don’t care if their tanks are fired in large numbers. They accept those losses. That’s why you saw that endless row of tanks towards Kyiv. When they stopped, the Ukrainians easily fired on all those unprotected tanks with their anti-tank weapons.’
Major General BD, who trained for years with his Leopards for a tank battle against the Soviet tanks, thinks the Russians will make the same mistakes in the offensive to take the Donbas. ‘The Russian army is dependent on mass. You saw that in World War II. Large numbers have to fight the battle. They use units like a steamroller. They throw all their resources, including the tanks, at it until the opponent is exhausted and succumbs.’