Infantry mortars on armored vehicles: a whim or a vital necessity?

They say smart people learn from other people's mistakes, and fools learn from their own. The wise use the experience of both for their own benefit. But what to do with those who do not want to learn?

It has been noted that one of the features of the domestic audience is polarity and categorical judgments, where there is no room for compromise. We either have hysterics in the spirit of “everything is lost” and “where are the shells,” or an arrogant demand for the highest standards, so that everything is in order. If there is a war, then it should be network-centric; if there is an offensive, then only with tank wedges supported by aviation, reconnaissance and attack aircraft, long-range self-propelled guns, and so on. But why doesn’t everything look quite like that in reality?



The author was prompted to write this publication by becoming familiar with, so to speak, the discussion under previous, where some thoughts were expressed on possible ways to improve Russian tanks, taking into account the realities of the Northern Military District. Quite deliberately, absolutely fantastic options, such as the development of wedge-shaped tanks, were left out of the picture, as quite well-known near-military experts seriously talk about. The proposals were made quite specific, but for some reason they caused an inappropriate reaction. Having neither the opportunity nor the desire to chew on each reader’s thoughts separately in the comments, I would like to explain in more detail the most “controversial” points.

First of all, regarding the equipping of tanks with a howubized 152 mm caliber gun, which causes a mixed reaction among the respectable audience, from approval to unmotivated aggression. There is nothing new in this proposal; everything was invented long ago within the framework of the Black Eagle project. The tank was developed on the basis of the T-80U, and it was designed to be able to install a 152 mm gun. Another thing is that the “Black Eagle” series never went into production, but the military-industrial complex seemed to be planning to start producing the T-80 again, so this platform, if the customer wishes, could be finalized and brought to mind. The question is, is such a tank needed on the battlefield?

As a counter-argument, they quite rightly point out, by the way, that one must fight wisely: self-propelled guns perform their tasks, tanks do theirs, aircraft do theirs, etc. But what are we seeing in reality for the second year in a row? For some reason, tanks act as ersatz self-propelled guns, radio communications in the troops at the grassroots level are built on civilian stations made in China, and drones of the same Chinese production or with Chinese components are used for reconnaissance and target designation. At the same time, our enemy, represented by the collective West, is objectively superior technologically, and this is a fact.

In the personal opinion of the author of these lines, the modern version of the “Black Eagle”, which is a transitional link between the main battle tank and the self-propelled gun, can turn out to be a very effective “workhorse” due to the presence of serious armor for protection against fragments in counter-battery combat and a large-caliber gun. At the same time, of course, no one is proposing to abandon the T-72/T-90 as an MBT. But whether this is really necessary at the front, let the professionals in the Russian Ministry of Defense and the military-industrial complex decide.

Let's move on. A proposal to standardly equip Russian tanks with reconnaissance quadcopters and additional weapons in the form of mortars caused a somewhat incomprehensible reaction. Let's look at this in a little more detail. Why would significant losses in armored vehicles be suffered at the first stage of the SVO?

There were several reasons. Firstly, at that time there was an acute shortage of aerial reconnaissance assets. Secondly, despite the presence of tanks, infantry fighting vehicles and armored personnel carriers in the Russian troops, there was an acute shortage of trained infantry to cover it. Thirdly, our armored vehicles did not have secure radio communications for coordinating actions with their own infantry, and the enemy could listen to radio communications via analog communications. As a result, the “amusing” Ukrainian Teroborona, armed with modern American Javelin-type ATGMs and anti-tank grenade launchers, was able to ambush and destroy our columns, knocking out machinery along with the crews.

Now both sides are essentially marking time; progress forward, at best, is measured in kilometers. But what will happen if you have to go on a large-scale offensive with deep breakthroughs, and not only in the steppes of Donbass and the Azov region, but also in the North-East of Ukraine, through the forests?

In this case, having a tank commander with a standard reconnaissance quadcopter UAV, or better yet a couple, will, to put it mildly, not be amiss, increasing his awareness of what is happening around him. It may also be useful to have additional armament on the armored vehicle in the form of a mortar.

Here it is worth making a short digression and recalling the IDF’s experience from the 1973 war. Then the real threat to Israeli armored vehicles became light mobile fighter squads armed with RPGs, mounted grenade launchers and recoilless rifles. A year later, in Tel Aviv, it was decided to equip tanks and other armored vehicles with 60-mm infantry mortars, the tasks of which were to quickly fire fragmentation and smoke mines at areas where enemy tank destroyers were seen or could be located. Optionally, the mortar can be used at night for illumination with special lighting mines.

On Merkava-1 tanks, a 60-mm mortar was placed outside the turret, on the right, and the tank commander fired from it, leaning out of the hatch. Subsequent generations of "Chariots" implemented the ability to fire from a protected armored space. Ammunition includes 60 mines - 36 fragmentation, 12 smoke and 12 lighting. The C02 breech-loading mortar (Under Armored Vehicles Turret) has a firing range of up to 4000 m and a rate of fire of up to 6 rounds per minute.

During the first Lebanon War in 1982, mortars were widely used to shell suspicious groves and greenery, and illumination mines significantly increased the effectiveness of night vision devices, which worked on the principle of amplifying starlight. You can see how this looks in practice in the video.


It remains to ask the question whether a standard reconnaissance quadcopter and an additional mortar mounted on a turret would be useful to our tank crews in conditions of trench warfare and a theoretical large-scale offensive to great depths, and to answer it honestly.