The Ukranian BMT-72 - Insanity.

[Suhiir]

MarkSheppard said:
They wanted a tank which can drive from East Germany to France, despite being knocked out and having their crews killed 3-4 times; a lot of minor hits can kill a lot of the crew, without significantly impairing the tank's mobility or firepower; allowing it to be repaired and put back into action once more after hosing out the dead crew.

OK, learned my new thing for the day.
While I knew the Soviets weren't as concerned with casulties as the NATO nations I didn't realize they went so far as actually planning for their equipment to survive the crew.

[badger45]

They weren't, it's kind of urban legend. Soviet construction schools, whether on tanks, aircraft or submarines (e.g.) were always concerned about the crew in a normal way, AFAIK there is no proof to say nonsense like "crew matters less than engine". Engine forward is not found on any major soviet tank as well as on any US, British, French or German tank.

[AMX]

PlasmaKrab said:
Or reverse, go at it like with the Achzarit, put the troop compartment and exit ramp on the front.

Actually, the Achzarit doesn't have a front ramp - it has a rear exit, connected to the crew compartment by a narrow passage along the engine.

[PlasmaKrab]

Actually, the Achzarit doesn't have a front ramp - it has a rear exit, connected to the crew compartment by a narrow passage along the engine.

OK, my bad, it doesn't. Then are Israeli engineer APCs used to ram building walls for quick assault bakc first? I have heard of this practice being used in some rare cases for assaulting buildings under fire.

[Marcello]

"They weren't, it's kind of urban legend. Soviet construction schools, whether on tanks, aircraft or submarines (e.g.) were always concerned about the crew in a normal way, AFAIK there is no proof to say nonsense like "crew matters less than engine"."

Exactly. They did toy with the front engine idea:
http://www.morozov.com.ua/images/p78-2l.jpg
http://www.morozov.com.ua/images/p87-1l.jpg

Neverthless they rejected it, probably for the same reasons everybody else except the israelis rejected it.

[pdoktar]

That thing is so ugly its good they rejected it. An extremely ugly armored vehicle. (And for us tank junkies, they are meant to be pretty.)

[Marcello]

The second vehicle actually looks quite good IMHO.