It's not like air defense tech also stayed still from the 70's. Fighter tech moved hand-in-hand with anti-aircraft tech. It's kinda inevitable. Any advantage each side has will inevitably be countered by the other.

Back then the Phantoms and Skyhawks were state-of-the-art fighters and still they got shot down by the SAMs of their generation. So it's not outside possibility today's latest-generation fighters can still fall victim to the latest-generation SAMs.

Essentially they can go where tanks can go. Although it looks bulky, Paladin SPH are far lighter than most MBTs, at around 25 tons (PT-91 weigh in at 45 tons) and have lower ground pressure.

As a rule of thumb tracked vehicles fare better in offroad situations than wheeled ones and make better all-round combat vehicles.

This post has been edited by MilitaryMadness: Dec 7 2015, 08:36 PM

The difference in size between M1 Abrams and T-72 makes it obvious M1 will be far heavier. M1 probably around 1/4 bigger than T-72.

Is it really necessary for Russia to go to China for missile tech? I still have the impression Russia is king in all things related to ICBM.

Whatever is said about it, I'm somehow still not convinced an ICBM warhead from orbit has the necessary accuracy to hit a moving target.

Scorpion probably too costly for low-level COIN airstrikes. Usually these COIN strike planes types are converted prop-engined light planes.

While modified prop-engine COIN planes may be costly as a whole, they are not as costly individually as high-tech strike aircraft like Scorpion(Embraer Super Tucano typically only costs around $ 10-14 million USD per unit).

Good precision stand-off weapons and advanced electro-optical sensors can place them as far away from insurgent's AA guns as needed. As they are mostly being powered by piston or turboprop engines, they generate less IR signature compared with a plane with jet engines making it very difficult to aim with MANPADS.

Being slow also makes the IR signatures generated from friction be reduced dramatically. Powered by propellers also makes them far less noisy than jet engined planes.

Nonetheless, I think for this type of operation, armed UAV like Reaper are more suited.

I don't get why people are scared of heavy tanks in tropical environment. The tank's caterpillar tracks spread out its weight over a larger area. Instead of concentrating all of its weight on a few road tyres like a normal wheeled vehicle, a caterpillar track spread the vehicle's weight over a significantly larger surface area, lowering the ground pressure.

A 65+ ton M1 Abrams tank has a lower ground pressure (100 Psi) than an average 1 ton family car (190 Psi). The main problem tanks have on soft ground or off-road situations are the tracks themselves, which are made from hard metal that will do damage to driving surfaces by churning up the soft ground, but that is the inevitable effect of using tracks on soft ground, not due to the weight of the vehicles themselves. Even a 1 ton vehicle using a caterpillar track will do this type of damage, so the weight of a tank is irrelevant in this matter.

Most steel or concrete bridge can accommodate a 50-60 ton tank crossing quite well due to the fact the tank is constantly moving, so its weight doesn't remain in place for too long. As long as you don't stop, the bridge should do fine.

Although due to avoid overstressing the bridge structure, the crossing may involve only one tank crossing at a time, which can be tactically dangerous due to the bottleneck this may produce.

If no suitable bridge can be found you could either deploy an assault bridge or if the riverbanks are climbable just have the tanks swim it.

Laser targeting pod usually for shorter-range weapons with line-of-sight aiming like LGB or AT missiles. The usual weapons loadout for Tu-22M usually consists of long-range cruise or Anti-ship missiles. These weapons are semi-autonomous and don't require constant laser illumination which a laser targeting system provides.

So it would't surprise me if Tu-22M actually doesn't have any laser targeting system.

Broadly speaking, tropical countries make terrible tank country. Whatever areas isn't covered by jungles and plantations, are usually developed urban areas. There is't much open space for maneuver and too much area for ambushes.

Also, short of dumping Agent Orange over everything, there's too much jungle leaf cover for electro-optical equipment sensors to track anything from the air.