Abrams destroyed by friendly, not Iraqi, fire

gf0012-aust

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By Sean D. Naylor, Army Times staff writer


Friendly fire knocked out at least one — and possibly two — Abrams tanks in an attack originally attributed to Iraqi forces.
That conclusion can be drawn from an informed read of a briefing prepared by Lt. Col. Bob Lovett, the product manager for the M-1A2 Abrams tanks. The briefing makes no reference to friendly fire, but finds disabling damage caused by ammunition used by U.S. Army Bradley fighting vehicles.

Despite the damage to the tanks, no crew members were injured.

Lovett spent the war in Iraq with 3rd Infantry Division’s (Mechanized) division support command, monitoring the performance of Abrams tanks.

He prepared the briefing, titled “Abrams Tank Systems — Lessons Learned, Operation Iraqi Freedom, 2003,†at the request of Chief of Armor Maj. Gen. Terry Tucker. Army Times obtained a copy of the briefing, which Lovett said in a May 30 interview should have been renamed “Observations,†since official “Lessons Learned†from the Iraq war have yet to be compiled.

The briefing includes a page that explains what happened to one of two tanks from B Troop, 3rd Squadron, 7th Cavalry Regiment that were knocked out in a night battle outside Najaf. The briefing gives the date as March 26, but the battle in which the two tanks were hit occurred the night of March 24-25.

In the immediate aftermath of the battle, crewmen in the two tanks said they thought they had been hit by Iraqi fire by some sort of truck-mounted cannon. If true, this would have meant they were the first two Abrams tanks ever knocked out by enemy fire, and Army Times reported this.

But it is now certain that the rounds that hit at least one of the B Troop Abrams were fired by a Bradley fighting vehicle’s 25 mm main gun. The tank in the photographs, according to the slide, was “disabled from 25 mm penetration of [the] engine compartment.†Four photographs show the rear of the tank punctured by about a half dozen nickel-sized holes. An accompanying diagram indicates the tank was hit in the rear by eight 25 mm rounds.

Another slide in the briefing refers to “documented instances where 25 mm AP-DU [armor-piercing depleted uranium] and above ammunition disabled a tank from the rear.â€

Lovett said he was limited in what he could say about the incident because it was still under investigation. But he confirmed that the reference to vehicles disabled by 25 mm depleted uranium ammunition referred to the Najaf incident. And he also confirmed that the Bradley’s Bushmaster main gun is the only weapon that fires that sort of round.

Maj. Mike Birmingham, the 3rd Infantry Division spokesman, said in a May 30 e-mail that the division had just completed an investigation into what he described as “a friendly fire incident … from around an Najaf involving the Cav.†However, he said he would be unable to provide details on the results of the investigation so shortly before press time.

Other highlights of the Abrams briefing include:

• There was no reported case of any Iraqi antitank guided missiles being fired at any Army vehicle. Lovett said this surprised him, because the Iraqi military was presumed to have substantial supplies of Soviet-era antitank missiles.

• The Abrams’ turret ammunition blast doors worked as designed. In the Najaf incident, the 25 mm rounds hit the Abrams’ “ready rack†of 120 mm main gun ammunition in the turret, igniting some main gun rounds. But the blast doors contained the explosion and the crew survived unscathed except for fume inhalation.

• One 3rd Infantry Division lieutenant had a lucky escape when he was shot by an Iraqi fighter while poking his head out of his Abrams turret. The Kalashnikov’s 7.62 mm round did not penetrate the lieutenant’s combat vehicle crewman helmet. The incident demonstrated the stopping power of the helmet.

• If a tank has to be destroyed to prevent it from falling into enemy hands, commanders need to have a plan ahead of time on how to do this and train their crews to execute it. In one case, U.S. forces used a thermite grenade, a 120 mm sabot round fired by another tank, and two Maverick missiles to destroy an abandoned Abrams. The resultant destruction penetrated the secret armor package at the front of the tank, therefore exposing it to possible compromise.

• Because relatively few Iraqi armored vehicles came out to fight, Abrams crews used very little of their sabot ammunition. Instead, the main gun rounds of choice were the high-explosive antitank (HEAT) and multi-purpose antitank (MPAT) rounds, which despite their names are mainly used to attack unarmored vehicles and buildings.

• Iraqis hid in fighting positions until U.S. tanks were too close to engage them with their main guns. As a result, “machine guns ended up being [the] weapon of choice in numerous engagements,†the briefing states.

• There was an unexpectedly high failure rate of Abrams’ road arms and assemblies, which form part of the tank’s suspension system, Lovett said.

• Logistics were a challenge. Units that deployed with the most spare parts fared best, but the pace of the drive to Baghdad meant spare parts were not pushed forward until the Iraqi capital had been secured.


(Article from Army Times)
 

Winter

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An unfortunate possible blue-on-blue incident. But a Bradley against an Abrams and winning? A 25mm chaingun neutralising possibly a pair of Abrams? Not that the Abrams were reacting, but I didn't know a Bushmaster could get past the M1s Chobham armour (?)

Has the investigation been concluded since last year? Any different outome?
 

Awang se

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If this is the case, The insurgent will win because the coalition is shooting each others.this explained how the insurgent can sit with ease in fallujah.
 

gf0012-aust

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A lot of this doesn't make sense. eg I know of a US Master Gunner who was responsible for leading the drive into Bagdhad. He's a career officer, and as a Master Gunner has been responsible for some of the design and development work on the Abrams. He also trains other gunners to qualify.

In his own personal experience (and recorded on film), his tank survived 20 RPG7 attacks and was not immobilised. He also took 2 direct hits from a brace of T-72's.

He was able to return fire and chew 2 x T72's at point blank range and continue on and further destroy 5 BMP's. All of it is on film as they were recording the "run" as they were leading the assault.

So, it was a controlled tank killing exercise and he won it convincingly (and at point blank range)

I find it hard to see that a chain gunned bradley could/would do this, in light of his experiences, so I suspect that there are bits missing here.
 

Winter

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Awang se said:
If this is the case, The insurgent will win because the coalition is shooting each others.this explained how the insurgent can sit with ease in fallujah.
This is essentially an isolated incident that took place during the war over a year ago. I wouldn't believe it to be that widespread an occurence. Particularly among vehicular combat too, where IFF tools and other measures are deployed to prevent this scenario from taking place.

It would take a lot of friendly fire incidents to seriously hamper Coalition operations, and that just isn't happening.

What makes you think the insurgents aren't suffering just as bad a problem? I do not believe they equip themselves with IFF transponders. :roll
 

Red aRRow

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If true, this would have meant they were the first two Abrams tanks ever knocked out by enemy fire, and Army Times reported this.
What the hell. The report just lost credibility after I read this stupid line. Go check in DefenceTalk gallery where there are pictures of Abrams destroyed by Iraqi fire during the initial assault of Baghdad.

Just a usual propaganda piece from Army Times.

I think U.S. DoD releases these report in order to psychologically intimidate potential enemies into thinking that M1s are invincible.
 

tatra

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gf0012 said:
I find it hard to see that a chain gunned bradley could/would do this, in light of his experiences, so I suspect that there are bits missing here.
Well, it clearly says the M1's were hit in the rear of the hull and turret. That's not were you normally find the most armor. Chobham and DU-armor would be at the turret front and glacis. Witness the angles from which russian tanks tended to get clobbered in Chechnya.

Don't underestimate the penetration power of modern 25-30mm weapens firing apfsds rounds. e.g. a10 warthog's gun, 30mm raden, 25mm oerlikon kbd, 25mm chaingun. The Swedish CV90 uses 40mm cannon only (without ATGW backup as on Bradley) to deal with armored foe.

Interesting also, because I thought I saw a thread around here somewhere speculating on the use of anti-materiel rifle on that M1 with that got his by some mysterious Iraqi round. I don't know of anti-matieriel rifles of more than 20mm and I bet that under the right conditions even these could mission-kill an M1
 

gf0012-aust

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tatra, can't remember if i raised it here or on one of the armour boards, but i have flagged the issue that it might have been a RAUFOSS derived round.
 

Gremlin29

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There isn't anything that remarkable about the 25mm rounds from the Brad penetrating the rear of the Abrams.

Shamayel, they are referring to ballistic destruction and IIRC the M1's in question were destroyed via explosives/landmines.

GF, is your friend a commissioned officer (Captain, Major, Colonel) or an NCO (Sergeant, Staff Sergeant, Sergeant Major etc) ? The reason I ask is I've never heard of a commissioned officer gunner in the US Army and I've never heard of a commissioned officer gunnery instructor. Not impossible (nothing in the military is) but highly highly unusual. :)

Finally, guys the Army Times is definately not an objective news source, duh!! While Americans enjoy freedom of speach, members of the armed forces do not. The only things totally believable are the promotions and board listings.

Anyway, I don't think the article comes off as if they are trying to make the M1 invulnerable, everyone in the service knows that's not true. They do know however that it is quite capable of squaring off with any other armor threat they would conceivably come up against now or in the predictable future.
 

gf0012-aust

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Gremlin, my bad edit, he's a career soldier, not an officer. He speared the column leading into Bagdhad in the first round of GW1, and has been involved in M1A1 development issues as a legacy of that involvement.

He's quite open in his assessments, he believes that the Chally2 has the most powerful main gun and better armour package, and considers the Leo2-A6 to be more powerful in a lot of areas than the M1 - just not in combat. As an aside he rates the Leclerc quite low (with the Japanese T-98 ahead of it)
 

Gremlin29

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Roger that GF. Wasn't trying to call you out on the carpet mate, just curious. :) I was just wondering if it was a cultural thing, some countries do in fact consider their NCO's part of their "officer corps". Any chance your friend was with the 1st ID during GW1?
 

gf0012-aust

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Gremlin29 said:
Roger that GF. Wasn't trying to call you out on the carpet mate, just curious. :) I was just wondering if it was a cultural thing, some countries do in fact consider their NCO's part of their "officer corps". Any chance your friend was with the 1st ID during GW1?
No worries. No, he was part of the 24th.

I think some NCO's think that they are officers (and not necessarily gentlemen) as well... ;)
 

tatra

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gf0012 said:
tatra, can't remember if i raised it here or on one of the armour boards, but i have flagged the issue that it might have been a RAUFOSS derived round.
Interesting suggestion.
 

Awang se

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What leads to the shooting by the way. Is it misID or misfire? I find missID to be fairly hard to believe since they didn't expect the insurgent to have an armoured vehicles.
 

Wooki

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And?

The M1A1 and M1A2 have serious issues regarding rear armor, but GDLS is attempting to address them.

What I would like to know is the Merkava 4 just as vulnerable in the rear armor department?
 

Pursuit Curve

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gf0012-aust said:
A lot of this doesn't make sense. eg I know of a US Master Gunner who was responsible for leading the drive into Bagdhad. He's a career officer, and as a Master Gunner has been responsible for some of the design and development work on the Abrams. He also trains other gunners to qualify.

In his own personal experience (and recorded on film), his tank survived 20 RPG7 attacks and was not immobilised. He also took 2 direct hits from a brace of T-72's.

He was able to return fire and chew 2 x T72's at point blank range and continue on and further destroy 5 BMP's. All of it is on film as they were recording the "run" as they were leading the assault.

So, it was a controlled tank killing exercise and he won it convincingly (and at point blank range)

I find it hard to see that a chain gunned bradley could/would do this, in light of his experiences, so I suspect that there are bits missing here.
Do not forget that the disabling rounds came from the rear of the tank, there is as far as I know not the same level of armour protection in the quarter, so it is not inconcievable that the 25mm depleted uranium round could do the damage. As it was pointed out in the article you posted regarding the destruction of disabled abrams, it took quite an effort to destroy the abrams from the front.

Your article reminded me of a surprising finding of how .50 calibre rounds from straffing P47 thunderbolts destroyed Tiger Tanks in Normandy, 1944. It was found that if a fighter bomber could strafe a Tiger on a paved or cobble stoned road, ricocheted .50 rounds would bounce up and hit the thin armour of the tigers belly, effectively penetrating the bottom armour and killing the tank. I cannot remember the source but I think it was from an Air Power International special on the P47.
 

Pursuit Curve

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Wooki said:
And?

The M1A1 and M1A2 have serious issues regarding rear armor, but GDLS is attempting to address them.

What I would like to know is the Merkava 4 just as vulnerable in the rear armor department?
Its not the Merkava rear that is vulnerable, it seems to have one nasty shot trap between the mantlet for the main gun and the upper decking.
 

Wooki

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What looks like a shot trap on modern tanks is not designed to deflect a high velocity penetrator.

But what if you turned around and fired a low velocity projectile at it? Now that would be interesting. A HESH round might bounce and splat for spectacular effect.
 
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