One weapon becomes a force-multiplier for scattered Ukrainians against the wall of steel Russian mechanized invasion. Can the fire & forget Javelin missile repel the aggressor, force a massive re-think of military doctrine…and literally save lives?
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29 replies on “Game-Changing Javelin: Fire & Forget Force-Multiplier Missile Rains Hell on Russian Tanks”
In the West and Israel, there are already defenses against Javelin and similar missiles. You need to look at the “Trophy” system. What the Javelin does is obsolete the tanks that don’t have it.
Similarly, the MPADs have limited range. Low flying aircraft are vulnerable, but the higher flying aircraft are not. It doesn’t stop enemy airpower or replace more powerful anti air batteries, it just limits low flying aircraft.
We’ve had doctrines around this for decades in the US military and train to work around those problems.
Basically, the Russians are invading with obsolete equipment and obsolete tactics against a more modern, essentially guerilla force. This is not a Battleship level moment.
When I was studying to be an infantry officer, we learned numerous ways of destroying enemy armor (tanks and the like). By the time we were done, we all swore that no one could get us into a tank. However, we then learned about tanks. My first time inside a turret was an eye opener. With no prior experience, I destroyed targets quickly and efficiently. My point of view quickly changed (and so did my classmates). The more important lesson we learned was the value of joint operations. Infantry, artillery, and armor mutually supporting one another, covering for each others’ weaknesses. Fortunately, the Russians never seemed to learn this lesson. For example, they sent tanks into Budapest during the Hungarian Revolution expecting the citizens to capitulate at the sight and sound of these armored behemoths only to discover 14 year old children darting from alleyways to destroy their armor with improvised explosives. Infantry armed with Javelins, for as effective as they are, are vulnerable to infantrymen screening the tanks. Hopefully, the Russians will never get it…
Its the rasputitsa, spring mud season, in Ukraine hence the Russian inability to go cross country. Everything gets bogged. It will dry out by May. While the Russians are stuck the Ukrainians are not and that implies that the Ukrainians have some new mobility aid that no one knows about. What ever it is, it leaves no tracks and must be very cheap and easy to use. The mud would stop small trucks, horses and snowmobiles. Most hovercraft designs can’t handle slopes. Everyone’s is stumped.
Its getting worse for the Russians. Its dropping to -20 (-4 Fahrenheit) and the Russian are out of food and fuel. In some places they have fire wood. The Ukrainians seem to have mobility in the mud and pre placed supplies including smokeless heat and cooking systems. We are going to see significant Russian forces freeze to death as the Germans did.
In one video we see a Ukrainian unit with 6 different types of antitank weapons including east German Panzerfaust 3, Nlaw, Javelin, RPG, And two that military’s experts could not name. They also had a heavy machine gun, an east German MPAD and a laser targeting sight for the drones ATGM’s. And these were the reserves in that particular fight.
The Ukrainians are using the Javelin to spook the Russians into hunting infantry in the tree line 2 miles away while the Stugna-P is making most of the kills at a range of 3 miles. The Stugna-P has the same functionality but better stealth when set up. It also serves as a long range sensor platform and is not as temperature sensitive. It’s a tripod system but can be controlled via a wire data line from 50 yards. The tripod can also collapse to drop the thing into a hole after firing. Perfect for ambush. A decoy Stugna-P can be made with sticks, cloth and two boxes. https://uk.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A1%D1%82%D1%83%D0%B3%D0%BD%D0%B0-%D0%9F
The major threat to tanks has been other tanks. Since the majority of tank guns are used at relatively short range, the impacts are usually in the front, sides, or rear.
This means that the main armour is placed in these areas.
If the likes of the Javelin become more common, the solution will be relatively simple; more armour on the top of the tank, APC, or other armoured vehicle.
There are indications that the Russians did not actually hit and kill more than 10% of the Ukrainian air forces and larger anti air assets or radars. https://twitter.com/lostweapons/status/962228582595493888 These are made by a Czech company. For the cost of one radar you can buy 20 decoys. For the cost of one fighter you can buy 500 fighter decoys. The Ukrainians are making a continuous use of decoys to negate Russian air recon aircraft.
Let’s hope those missiles were built in the boomerang company. Zelensky is scum.
Your falling for some really obvious Russian propaganda.
This is a three way fight. Zelenskyy beat the Globalists and the Nazi’s at the last election and the Pro-Russian faction boycotted the election.
Zelenskyy (73 %) Poroshenko/ Tymoshenko (24%), the Nazi’s (>2%) Zelenskyy removed the pro Neo-Nazi politicians and government officials. He could not remove the Azov brigade without a civil war. He charged some of the Biden associated oligarchs. He supported Trump in both of the impeachment attempts.
Zelenskyy’s army has fought well but not recklessly. As some claim. Most of the population that would evacuate have been evacuate. Those now trapped and cut off probably expected the Russians to win quickly and did not care who ran the country.
Yes he’s made woke jokes and performed in drag. So has almost every other comedian in the world.
I suspect Putin planned this war in 2019 with the expectation that Poroshenko or Tymoshenko would win. Zelenskyy won so Putin waited, expecting the NAZI’s to eliminate him, and in that time the tires deteriorated on his trucks and the troops trained for the war were replaced with new green conscripts, Someone cracked the Russian codes and crypto systems, etc. Putin does not seem to grasp real-history or logistics. Like Trump Putin is anti-communist and anti-globalist but his methods are not just.
Trump sarcastically praised Putin at Cpac because, I suspect, Trump knew Zelenskyy had a lot of well tested anti-tank systems; Mobility in the mud; a lot of decoys and road runways for his fighters; and that Putin had a technology and maintenance problem.
I smell a rat. Any “revolution in military affairs” must proceed incrementally with constant testing in the field, of weapon systems and strategies/tactics to use them, and our military-industrial complex and the cabal in DC are all too willing to outsource such testing to ongoing world-wide conflicts by instigating and perpetually funding them. It seems the cabal has been itching for a confrontation with Russia for decades and found willing combatants in the Ukrainians, this time to test these weapons against an overpowering WWII-style, mechanized, armored wermacht. This isn’t about preserving democracy, it’s about getting someone to try out this new gun. I applaud the development of potentially disruptive, defensive systems. I’m ashamed of a government willing to get someone else to test it……and lie about it.
Something you missed that is a critical component to all this is networking and coms. Your Javelin crews have to be where the tanks are and in sufficient numbers to take all the tanks out. That means gathering and distributing information about the enemy to all your own troops fast enough for them to react. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Ukrainians weren’t making innovative use of messaging apps and other types of social media to coordinate their defense. They appear to be more agile than the Ruskies.
It almost seems with the technological advances, we are going back to infantry vs infantry. Starship Troopers, anyone?
Good point, stipulating that the book was far, far better than the movie.
And it is not even very close. Thought the movie was awful.
The movie was awful, and all of the sequels were worse. It’s amazing what one will watch when one can’t sleep in the middle of the night. Those were a few hours that I regrettably can never get back.
I thought Starship Troopers too.
In the history of game changing weapons systems, remember the English long bow. It’s been a while since I read about it, but I believe that it ended the 100-years war.
I don’t know that I’d say the longbow actually ended the 100 years war but it was certainly a deciding factor. The last battle of the 100 years war (Battle of Castillon) was the first decisive application of artillery in European history. Artillery not archery was the deciding factor in that battle. So I’d say that artillery actually ended the 100 years war but that might be quibbling.
The longbow was replaced by firearms and artillery shortly thereafter and became obsolete.
The lesson of the longbow is still a valuable one to this day. The longbow was nearly universally wielded by the yeomanry, the common citizen. These armed citizens applied the longbow to very decisive effect many times during the 100 years war. The armed citizen, armed with the very best weapon available to them in that day. It was the medieval equivalent of an AR-15 pattern rifle and took considerable training and skill to use.
The reason that the longbow could even be applied to battle situations was that English law required every man to be armed with one “capable of putting a broadcloth arrow a hands breadth through a 4 inch oak door at 100 paces” and bow practice was mandatory.
The armed citizen has a long and noble tradition of effectiveness in the defense of a homeland. Something the Brits seem to have forgotten and we dare not.
Incidentally, I own a yew longbow of 100 lbs. draw weight. It’s a bear to string and shoot and I’m no small person. The English warbow had a draw weight of 50% more or greater than my bow.
You make a good point about the yeoman/citizen soldier. Here’s a couple of interesting stories about the longbow that underline your point.
The great chronicler of the 100 Years War, Jean Froissart, once asked an English knight how the longbowmen were trained. The knight laughed and replied. “Well, you start with his grandfather…”
It surprises many folk that the last time the British Army carried out official tests to look at the potential re-adoption (or at least partial re-adoption) of the longbow was in 1797! The longbow had a better effective range, was more accurate, had good stopping power, better rate of fire, easily reusable ammo, and was generally a better weapon than the smooth bore musket. The crucial disadvantage was that to be effective it needed to be in the hands of a strong, fit individual who had trained with it for years. A musket could be put in the hands of a 19 year old from the slums of London or a Yorkshire farm and he would be as proficient with it as was necessary in a few weeks.
The war bow and guns coexisted on the battlefield for longer than is often realised. The first chap to be killed by very early ancestor of the musket died in the 1300s, while in Henry VIII’s time, the English armies that took Thérouanne and Tournai from France and heavily defeated an invading Scots army at Flodden in 1513, still had plenty of very effective longbowmen.
You might find the videos Tod has on his channel interesting. He got some people together, one of which was a longbow crafter and user and tested arrow types against plate armor. He has also done a lot of historical looks at usage of bows, development suchlike.
https://www.youtube.com/c/TodsWorkshop1
I replied to Davey
I see that, I’ve watched some of Tod’s videos and enjoyed them all. I’m a bit of an anachronistic weapons fan just as a hobby. Or in case of a Zombie Apocalypse. 😉
While the details change much remains the same.
The Japanese Admiral Yamamoto is often cited as saying “You cannot invade mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass.”
Turns out Yamamoto probably never said any such thing but the principle is still true.
Today you cannot invade a nation well equipped with man portable armor and air defenses because there’s a Javelin or Stinger behind every blade of grass.
Same stuff, different day.
“You cannot invade mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind each blade of grass.”
Wasn’t that basically the theme of the original Red Dawn.
Yes, it was. Wolverines!
I first saw that movie in the theater with my Dad and his wife. I never referred to her as anything but “Dad’s wife”, she wanted to be called my “stepmother” to give her some sort of weird authority over me but she’s the same age as I am and I already had a Mom so … You get the picture.
As we walked out of the theater she stopped and said one of the only things that ever endeared her to me in any way. It was —
“Seeing that movie makes me glad I know people like you two.”
Am I the only one who strats laughing like Beavis & Buttheaad every time I hear the phrase “Man Pad”?
“Hey Beavis, they’re now making Maxi-pads just for you. Huh huh, huh huh”!
“Shut up, Buttheaed!”
LOL