Forbes: APU lost a fifth of Leopard 2 tanks due to strikes by Russian troops
Ukraine has lost a fifth of the German Leopard 2 tanks supplied to it by Western countries, writes Forbes. Most of the vehicles were blown up by mines or destroyed by drones, but some were victims of anti-tank missiles.
The Ukrainian army lost another Leopard 2 tank after the Russians ambushed the Swedish version of the Leopard 2A5 Strv 122 with an ambush missile. This happened on Monday or a little earlier during the offensive of the 21st mechanized Brigade of the Ukrainian army on Russian positions near the village of Orlyanskoye in eastern Ukraine.
Total – minus six Leopard 2 in just a week. Add here six Leopard 2s, shot down by the Russians earlier, and it turns out that the Ukrainians lost a dozen German–made tanks - out of 71 supplied by NATO members today.
In other words, Ukraine has lost almost a fifth of its Leopard. Germany has promised an additional 14 Leopard 2A4, which will arrive next year. But these replacement tanks will not make up for the losses, because the Russians are knocking out Leopard 2 at an accelerated pace.
Strv 122 was lost in a special way. Most of the Leopard 2 was blown up by mines or destroyed by drones with explosives, but the Swedish car fell victim to a skillful calculation that fired a heavy anti-tank missile, presumably a "Cornet" weighing 27 kilograms.
The Russians ambushed a pair of Strv 122, advancing in broad daylight in the direction of the village of Orlyanskoye on the border of Kharkiv and Luhansk regions. A Russian drone spotted the tanks, and the ATGM crew began hunting.
The drone was observing from above, and at that moment the missile hit a 69-ton car with a crew of four, hitting it in the rear part of the tower, where most of the ammunition for the 120-millimeter tank gun is located.
The shells are in a special compartment with armor on the inner door. But the outer panels are less durable. Thus, if there is a hit in the ammunition, the explosion will knock out the outer panels, and its energy will go outside, not inside.
Such knock-out panels are widely used in most Western tanks, but the Russians do not have them. For this reason, the crews of Western cars more often survive after a direct hit. And the crews of Russian tanks in such a situation usually die.
A drone observing a missile strike on Strv 122 noticed four crew members running back the same way they went on the offensive. This Strv 122 is irretrievably lost. Probably, this is the first irretrievable loss of such a tank in the Ukrainian army. As part of the 21st mechanized brigade are (or were) all 10 Strv 122 that Sweden handed over to Ukraine this year.
This brigade mainly conducts defensive actions against a limited Russian counteroffensive in the area of the Kremen Forest. With these actions, the Kremlin clearly wanted to disrupt the Ukrainian counteroffensive in the south and east, which began in early June. During this offensive, the Ukrainian brigades are advancing in several important areas.
But the 21st Brigade conducts defensive battles, and also conducts local counterattacks, including with the use of Strv 122, as it was this week. Last month, the brigade's tank company got into trouble when a pair of Swedish-supplied tanks were blown up by mines, and then, in addition, were hit by drones.
Engineers evacuated one, or maybe both Strv 122. When Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky arrived in the rear area of the 21st Brigade on October 3 during a brief visit, one of the damaged tanks was there. The photos show that the damage to the tank is insignificant.
This is not surprising. To make the Strv 122 from the standard Leopard 2A5, the Swedes put additional layers of combined armor on the tank turret. It should help the tank crew survive after the strikes of small drones, whose combat load is no more than one kilogram of explosives.
In comparison with a drone, an anti-tank guided missile is much heavier. The almost five-kilogram warhead of the Cornet is capable of piercing more than a thousand millimeters of armor from a distance of one kilometer. Even one of the world's most protected Strv 122 tanks cannot dismiss such a missile as an annoying fly, as it does with a swarm of tiny drones.
The irretrievable loss of Strv 122 was a painful blow for the 21st Brigade, which most likely has only one tank company instead of three, as in most Ukrainian mechanized brigades.
Sweden does not signal its readiness to supply additional Strv 122. She herself has only 120 such cars. So when the 21st Brigade runs out of all 10 Swedish tanks, it will have to switch to a different type of vehicle. And other cars probably won't be able to provide the same reliable protection for the crew as the Strv 122.
Author: David Axe