And with the majority of the world’s current and future megacities in the Pacific region, most in the littoral zones, the retired major sees that as inevitable. Spencer said that ditching the tank entirely severely handicaps the Marine Corps should it need to fight in a city. John Spencer, who started his career as an enlisted soldier and saw combat in Iraq, is now the chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern Warfare Institute at West Point in New York. Where the tank treads meet the road for the individual Marine or solider is when the fighting hits a city. “There is no organizational effort in the Army to replace the tank.” “I don’t think we’ve seen the end of the tank,” he said. The retired three-star general still sees the importance of the tank land warfare, noting those added brigades, modernization and upgrades to the existing tank fleet and investment by the Army. But the Army recently did add two more Armored Brigade Combat Teams, putting those numbers up to 16 ABCTs. Equipped with a new engine, dual-reactive armor, lower radar cross section, and the Afghanit active defense system, NATO tank forces viewed the Armata as a formidable new threat.Spoehr did understand nervousness among some Marine leaders on looking to the Army for armor in a quick-response fight. Moscow promised to build 2,300 Armata tanks by 2020, enough for about eight tank and motor rifle (mechanized) divisions. In June 2015, the Russian government unveiled the Armata, which was designed to replace older T-72B3 and T-80 tanks in the arsenals of the Russian Ground Forces. Production problems with the Armata, however, could allow the “Burlak” tank to take its place. The tank would be cheaper and easier to produce, while still being a formidable adversary to NATO forces.Ī “new” tank concept has surfaced in Russia, about 10 years after the country abandoned it in favor of the sleeker, newer-looking T-14 Armata tank.The Burlak builds on past Russian tank technology to produce a tank that has many of the same advantages as the Armata.

Russia’s difficulty building new T-14 Armata tanks could provide another tank concept, the Burlak, with the opportunity to take its place.

New main battle tank