As of: February 3, 2024, 6:33 a.m
By: Karsten Hinzmann
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The Challenger tank has difficulty making progress in the terrain.
Ukraine is therefore using it as a weapon in its fight with Russia - with success.
Robotyne – “Vehicle movement spotted,” a Russian voice croaks through the headphones.
“What kind of vehicle?” asks a second.
“I don’t know,” replies the first, “definitely huge and loud!” The Ukrainian radio operator listens with great pleasure to the intercepted conversation between two Russian reconnaissance officers.
One of the steel opponents of Vladimir Putin's troops is the British Challenger tank, which the Russians are talking about.
Great Britain was the first country to provide Ukraine with tangible support from its own resources in its defense against Russia.
The vehicle drums against their fortifications - the success of another counteroffensive depends on British exports.
The British “Challenger 2” are the first Western-designed main battle tanks to go into the Ukraine War.
Only Great Britain and Oman - the latter in very small numbers - use this model.
The British Army says it has around 230 remaining “Challenger 2s”.
Additional battle tanks may be in storage or the manufacturing companies may still have reserve units.
14 of them went to Ukraine.
The vehicle is idiosyncratic, and the British are now considering how they can continue to be combat-ready within the NATO alliance.
Undefeated in Iraq, on difficult terrain in Ukraine: The British Challenger 2 is starting to lame in Ukraine due to its overweight.
(Archive photo) © Imago
Britain delivers Challenger tanks to Ukraine
Britain boasted at the start of last year that it had never lost a Challenger 2 tank in combat, even though it was most recently used in Iraq.
They were previously used in military operations in Bosnia and Kosovo towards the end of the decade - but the Challenger still lacks an equal opponent.
The British government apparently wanted to put pressure on its NATO partners and especially Germany.
At the time of delivery, the federal government was still actively discussing the extent to which a tank was a defensive or offensive weapon.
Then-British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace told the House of Commons that he would “urge my German colleagues” to at least give Poland, Finland and other countries permission to re-export German-made Leopard 2s in the coming days.
Which is what happened.
The Challenger tank: a defensive weapon for the British even in the Ukrainian war
Wallace in the
Guardian
: “There is currently a debate in Germany about whether a tank is an offensive weapon or a defensive weapon.
Well, it depends on what you use it for.
If you're using it to defend your country, I would bet it's a defensive weapon system," Wallace told MPs.
The German historian Ralf Raths argues similarly: "Neither the American M1 Abrams, the French Leclerc or the British Challenger, nor the German Leopard are the hoped-for 'game changers' of the Ukrainian counteroffensive," says the director of the German Tank Museum in Munster.
According to Raths, the Challenger 2 is particularly suitable for cracking bunker systems, as he told the broadcaster
n-tv
.
“The old tubes of the Challenger 2 are perfect for crush-head ammunition,” explains the tank expert.
While armor-piercing kinetic bullets concentrate their energy into a small point and leave a small hole, Challenger 2 crush-head bullets can burst upon impact and cause extensive damage to the interior.
“This makes the Challenger 2 perfectly suited to taking out bunkers and buildings during a Ukrainian counteroffensive,” said Raths.
The British tank, which weighs more than 70 tons, is simply too heavy for our soil
Tank drivers of Ukraine about the Challenger tank
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They are currently being deployed near Robotyne, in the Zaporizhzhia region, in the south of Ukraine, as
Forbes
now reports: The Challenger 2s, 14 of which belong to the 82nd Brigade of the Ukrainian Air Assault Force, fire high-explosive projectiles from their 120-millimeter -Smoothbore guns and thus support the infantry.
This actually reverses the purpose of tanks: they achieve their combat value from the combination of firepower, protection and movement.
However, the Challenger is making slow progress in Ukraine - if at all.
Ukrainian tank drivers told Forbes
: “The British tank, which weighs more than 70 tons, is simply too heavy for our soil.” As Forbes continues, “Our soil” refers to the agricultural administrative unit of Zaporizhzhia in the south of Ukraine.
There the 82nd Brigade joined the Ukrainian counteroffensive last summer, just in time to reinforce Ukrainian gains in and around Robotyne, ten miles south of the previous front line.
Fierce fighting on the front lines of the Ukrainian War
The
Süddeutsche Zeitung
writes about this section of the front: “There are no trees left here, not a house, there are frozen corpses along the way.
On the way on the front line, where people fight and die for a few meters.” The Challengers are trying to give the trench warfare a little more legs again by trying to break up the Russian positions.
In this sense, the Challenger 2s appear more like mobile guns than actual tanks.
If at all, they make few, fast attacks, which is typical for tanks.
Their tank crews told
Forbes
that in Ukrainian-controlled areas they operated from forest edges and fought Russian-controlled forest edges about two miles away.
As a form of artillery, they attempted to blow up their fully concrete, dug-in positions.
According to information from the
Institute for the Study of War,
the Ukrainian army around Zaporizhzhia is trying to widen the lane through the three-tiered Russian defenses known as the “Surovikin Line”;
The aim remains to cut off Vladimir Putin's troops from their own supplies and to pave their own way to the Sea of Azov.
The 82nd Ukrainian Brigade: spearhead of the counteroffensive against Russia
At the end of last year, the Ukrainians managed to break through the main line of defense between Robotyne and Werbowe.
The goal was to enlarge the breach to such an extent that a mechanized advance with Western tanks would be possible.
We are continuing to work on this.
The 82nd Brigade is the main or even sole user of some of Ukraine's best foreign-supplied vehicles: the US-made Stryker wheeled combat vehicles, Marder infantry fighting vehicles from Germany and all 14 Challenger 2s provided by the UK had.
However, his future looks bleak.
The former lieutenant colonel of the British armored units and current security advisor Stuart Crawford had already spoken publicly about the Challenger in the
UK Defense Journal
several years ago and looked forward to its decommissioning in 2025 - the veterans were bothered by the armament or the typical British solo approach.
Unlike the other NATO tanks, the Challenger 2 fires a 120 mm rifled cannon.
The advantage over the otherwise used smoothbore weapons is a significantly longer firing range of around 9,000 meters compared to around 4,000 meters for the Leopard 2 A6.
The future: The British want to upgrade their tank fleet to be more NATO-compatible
However, this gun achieves a significantly lower muzzle velocity and therefore has difficulty penetrating the modern layered and reactive armor of enemy main battle tanks.
In addition, NATO ammunition does not fit.
For two and a half years, the German company Rheinmetall has been working on further developing the vehicle into the Challenger 3. By 2027, the new vehicle will be equipped with a 120 mm high-pressure smoothbore cannon that fires sub-caliber dart projectiles and programmable multi-purpose ammunition.
The cannon will then also have increased accuracy and penetration as well as the latest fire control technology - this will make the British main battle tank fleet more compatible with NATO units.
Crawford writes about the modernization of the British tank fleet after 2030: “Perhaps the United Kingdom will finally be able to swallow its national pride and choose the best option, regardless of the country of origin.” After all, NATO is already afraid of a modernized Russian force.
Nato Commander-in-Chief Christopher Cavoli has a bad outlook, as the
Hamburger Abendblatt
quotes him: Within five years of the end of the war, an aggressive Russia could not only bring its army up to date, but even expand it into a larger and more capable armed force.
This includes a modernization program with new technologies that the West has to worry about - “from the hypersonic glide weapon Avangard, which carries nuclear bombs to their target at several times the speed of sound and with an unpredictable course, to the nuclear-powered underwater drone Poseidon, which could trigger radioactive tsunamis.
The Ukrainian soldiers surrounding Robotyne swear by what the Challenger can do: scare;
or as the crew explains to Forbes: Firing at Russian fortifications nearly two miles away from positions on the edge of the forest is rarely as boring as it sounds.
Russian missiles, drones and artillery are a constant threat.” Enemy tanks stay at a distance.