As a tankie stationed in Germany in the mid 80's this is very familiar, we never doubted that we could take the three enemy tanks we needed to to allow the re enforcements coming from the UK and US to push forwards but most of us knew we probably wouldn't see the end of the war. A grim outlook I guess but we were realistic.
I was in Berlin with 2 Para 77/8. We knew we were just a tripwire force and were dead men walking. I never rated the Russian war machine apart from its numbers. I reckon when the Russian armour came across the Centurions and latterly, the Chieftains, you lads would have ate them up and spit them out. When I finally came eye to eye in Iraq with the t54/5/62/BTR/BMP etc etc, I saw whats a load of shite their stuff was. Ours was not to reason why etc etc.
@@peterstubbs5934 Maybe we would have while eating egg banjos and drinking Herforder Pils ;) Our head PTI was always a sergeant from the parras, I have no idea why but he liked to beast us as often as possible, some of the guys even went over to 2 Para, splitters
The USA is known to have aggressor units for training purposes. There were many opportunities to get some captured soviet equipment from Israel and maybe Iran.
I was a young 🇬🇧 ‘courier’ in the late 80’s. We were regularly followed by KGB, who didn’t hide themselves. The Russian’s & East Germany were convinced NATO would invade them, just as we were.
It was always a concern for me right from my teenage years, but I always wondered how powerful the Warsaw Pact forces really were. Stories occasionally floated around of their troops not being paid properly and equipment being inferior, not wanting to be there etc. Nevertheless it was a huge force facing us, and of course either side had nuclear weapons to fall back on if things went badly. Once I happened to ask another kids' dad (who had been in the army) about the balance of power in West Germany and he that in his opinion the Soviets could be held off for only a few days. Worrying stuff, I wonder how their army that attacked Ukraine compares with what they had then....
@@rob5944 All this guessing what would be meaningless, only the fight can show who is stronger. We were also told that you would not be able to stand three days in front of the russian army, but the reality turned out to be quite different. I like your approach in the West that you always think you have it bad, self-confidence always leads to failure.
When you say 'them', you mean the commisars and officers who actually supported the ddr/polish regimes, the soldiers werent into the propaganda and the majority would have laid down their weapons or disbanded, mutineed, i read an article published by a german university on polls of ex-ddr and polish soldiers done in the 90s. After 40 years of propaganda the general population just didnt buy the bullshit . The russians on the other hand were a different kettle of fish like we see in the current war.
Its not really a threat anymore, its clear as day that russia's military, and politcal/military leadership would be completely destroyed. Their military is trash, their gear is trash, and their leadership are also trash, who make incredibly stupid decisions. NATO would be inside the Kremlin within a few weeks
@@宋教仁-b4ilol so please do explain why Ukraine has gone through 10 rounds of mobilisation whereas Russia has only done 1 and is still capturing territory
This takes me back! I remember as a BAOR soldier serving as an NCO with 2RGJ we would often do TEWT’s (Tactical Exercise Without Troops) where frequently we (officers and Nco’s) would walk our deployment areas and go through various scenarios and our reactions to them - sometimes with umpires, sometimes without - which we would then use as part of our training regime. It’s only since the fall of the Warsaw Pact and the collapse of the Soviet Union where information has been made available, that I realise what a real predicament we would be in if it had kicked off. If anyone has a genuine interest in what ‘could’ have happened, there is a vast resource available in the form of declassified documents as well as many books dealing with fact and fiction. Had I known then what I know now at 64 y.o., I wouldn’t have been so cocky………
@@teamidris when my Godson joined the Anglians and became a mortar man, he was using exactly the same gear as I was using in the 80’s! He enlisted in 2005! 😂 He was gobsmacked when I ran him through his fire control and bedding in orders…….
Do you have any suggestions regarding declassified documents or other books? The Cold War 1970s-80s has become my latest focal point regarding historical research.
….the books by Harvey Black are also well worth the read. Harvey served in the intelligence corps during the Cold War and his experiences form the backbone of his novels which cover the Cold War turning hot. I had some fascinating online conversations with him a few years ago, and was given some first had insight into what was going on behind the scenes as well as info that would have cast a different light on our ability if they had been open knowledge. For example: I didn’t know until 2012 that the soviets had spetnaz units whose sole task was to be parachuted into West German garrison towns once “we” had deployed and to capture any remaining family units to use as a “bargaining” chip. I have no idea what I would have thought knowing my wife and son were captured by Soviet troops…….It doesn’t bare thinking about….
Remember watching this as a young trooper in 4rtr and then as a cold war warrior from 1983 to 1991 taking part in many many exercises from driver through to commander to practice the actual mechanics of warding off the soviet threat. That's when BAOR was a force to be reckoned with.
@@humphrey4976 as confident as one could be, well trained, decent enough kit given the technology of the time and all aspects of the threat had been exercised to death either on Soltau training area or BATUS and regular gunnery camps at Hohne meant every crew member knew the part they played and battlegroup training meant all other arms worked well together as well. Everyone knew we were there to slow the soviet threat unless the big red button was pushed and then it was over no matter what. Cest la vie eh.
@@stuc734 as a concerned teenager I thought our main hope was that you guys would end up convincing those conscripts that it'd be a better idea to ditch their gear and go back home, seriously. I knew we were probably a superior force, but my worry was by how much...
@@rob5944 Rob, yup I think we all hoped that the Warsaw pact troops would turn tail and head for home, however they were probably more scared of their own commanders and political commisars etc than of us imoh.
I don't know what's worse, being a Soviet vanguard commander sending untold amounts of men against a single wall or being a British rifleman told to glue yourself into place against those countless men hurtling toward your wall.
@@9261-k6l If you live in Russia, incase you didn't know- 70% of russian military history told to russian citizens is a lie. The only thing they want you to think is that Russia was great and is amazing. and won world war 2 themselves. They tell you the west lies about history and is ungrateful. Единственное, что они хотят, чтобы вы думали, что Россия была великой и удивительной. и сами выиграли 2 мировую войну. Они говорят вам, что Запад лжет об истории и неблагодарен.
As a one time infantry soldier ,deployed to stop the soviet juggernaut back in the seventies and early eighties,we all knew if it ever came to a shooting war,we'd not last much more than 48hours....plenty of gallows humour 😂
My platoon played 'enemy' for a sniper course in the late 80s. We were given Bulgarian AK47s and RPGs for weapon accuracy I.e for would be snipers to report on equipment we were carrying. I'm guessing a lot of this stuff came from Arab-Iraeli unpleasantness.
Reminds me of the Dad's Army episode where they are leaning how to destroy a German tank and Private Walker pipes up and asks "and what's the tank doing while we are doing all this...?😂
I was stationed in BAOR in the 70,s. The British army was mainly a delaying force to ensure the families and civies reached the coast and ferries to take them BACK to the UK. Your life was measured in hours and days so although this vid shows us holding the enemy up and we had a very well trained and equipped army then l, other tactics would have been Used to stop them. Natural geography stood as the best defence for instance the river Weser which they needed to cross, that’s where main battles would have been fought before allowing the soviet forces en masse to filter into natural passes between hills and mountains. That’s when the main butchering would have been done but they had far superior numbers of tanks and Infantry available so eventually their armies would get through but very heavily depleted just through sheer weight of numbers. But one point it doesn’t show is which tank/bmp you would single out for the first and most legal targeting. That was the political commissar one which flew a certain standard. There are or where approx 20 different ruskie dialects so in the height of battle only one voice could speak to them all to be certain to be understood.. so take him out first and the ruskie tank battalion would hopefully fall into chaos without any clear orders they all understood. We had faith in our eqpt, not our Officers who where mostly hooray Henry’s but we knew that in a these sorts of battles it was every man for himself as we knew we would be in a very target rich environment lol… You where very aware of the threats etc but you couldn’t let it stop you living your life and West Germany was a great posting then.. just don’t attack on a Friday night.. most of us where out chasing girls and getting drunk lol
There are not 20 different "Russian dialects." By 1970 in the Red Army it would be unusual for someone to even understand a nonstandard Russian dialect, let alone speak it exclusively in preference to Moscow speech. There were a relatively few large ethno-national groups in the USSR where penetration rate of Russian language was low, such as the Uzbeks, but they were not mixed in willy-nilly with Russian speakers. Politruks were mostly just supernumeraries. If we're being completely honest about it, the source of these weird mistaken ideas about "Russians" with their "dialects" who would fall into racialized chaos and be easily handled as soon as the thin veneer of commisardom was removed is pretty straightforwardly just Naziism. Like I am not one of these hysterical pro-Russians who says NATO is all Nazis, but the historical fact is the Western Cold War-era understanding of how to fight the Red Army was overly and unfortunately influenced by a lot of Nazi nonsense.
@@tiivc That’s what we where told and what we would have done.. it wouldn’t have mattered really anyway because we would have taken out every Russian tank on the battlefield but been overrun through sheer weight of numbers
The “national minority” cliques undoubtedly were a thing in the soviet army, as well as non-russian-speaking conscripts. However, they were sent to very rear echelon forces such as construction troops (строительные войска), and were unlikely to be spearheading an invasion. Thus said, priority targeting of any combat vehicle with banners or extra antennas was absolutely justified - knocking out enemy command and communication vehicles is quite helpful to sowing chaos and enhancing uncertainty.
@@davidcorbett62 My old man was in the BAOR during the 70s too and told me the same growing up, Russians spoke so many dialects they'd have to use whistles to communicate etc. Total guff as we know now of course but an amusing thought
My grandfather was a civil servant (an accountant, really). His job, eventually, was to audit the accounts of the entire BAOR. He was given by the government of whenever it was (late 50s I guess) the acting rank of a full Colonel so that he could - I suppose - open pretty much any file he needed to see. When I was a young lad of 11 or 12, some years after he had retired, he told me some stories about his adventures. Some of the stories he told me about some of the nefarious activities he uncovered belong in a book - or a movie! Mostly it was petty pilfering and the usual low-level corruption, but he also discovered (I think in the 1960s, so probably Centurion!) tanks (not a tank, but tanks) were vanishing into thin air. They existed on the books, but, upon his inspection, "no longer in what one could call 'physical reality'" (his words). What happened to those tanks is a mystery to this day. He never found out where they went, or how they could possibly have fallen off the back of a tank transporter. But "clerical error" rather "tanks stolen and sold to hostile nations" sounded much better in the report, according to essentially everyone, so that's what he wrote. I remember that he just sucked on his pipe and laughed about the lunacy, which seemed to appeal to his wonderful sense of humour. He died not that long after, in 1982. I still miss him; I just wish there'd been more time. And still wonder what the hell happened to those tanks.
*"Though the minefield takes it's toll, the Soviet tanks continue to press forward. The attack is finally stopped by a barrage of tins of cheese 'possessed' and packets of biscuits brown- for the use of. This distracts the Soviet peasant infantry, who debus from their BMP's and BTR 60's- in order to enjoy a tasty feast. This proves disastrous for the Sov's, as the 'sneaky' Brits brass the infantry up with concentrated GPMG SF fire, shattering the momentum of the attack and breaking the will of the enemy to press home the attack. Ivan is sent packing and the Brits crack a celebratory brew on!"*
Oh God - the labels on stuff... Trousers, waterproof, water, for the protection from. Spade, 1x, handle, wooden, for the operation of. Biscuits, brown, teeth, shattering, job security, dentists, for the purpose of.
Ah yes. I remember it well. Your skills honed to perfection - and your life measured in hours from first contact. And ex-regular, I trained and trained with 2 Yorks (the 'old ones') as a section commander. Hard work.
This film assumes the soviets to be a worthy foe who've drilled and trained for this moment and should be underestimated or taken likely. It's the perfect training film.
Dad was in BAOR Berlin garrison and were stationed with him. Soviets and DDR were always practicing invading. I thank NATO and US for deterring the brutal military dictatorship from invading
How does an Army practice invading in a city? The west was more worked up about it than the Commies were. Non-stop exercises to deployment areas, border patrols etc. During the eight years served in Germany we never saw a Soviet patrol of the IGB nor any sign of exercises near it.
Liverpool markets mate.... can buy anything there, no questions asked! They were still teaching this crap on 2001 when I was on my crew commanders course in Warminster....😂
Interestingly enough, this video is very relevant to the current war in Ukraine and a potential future NATO-Russia war, as all Russian and most Ukrainian officers either started their careers in the Soviet Union or were taught by former Soviet officers in cadet school, thus almost this exact way of conducting an attack is the basis of their craft.
Massed armoured attacks with aerial support seems to be a challenge for both sides, the latest Ukrainian offensive appears to be backing up the original experience of the Russians. Almost as if we are back to a first world war scenario where tactics have not kept pace with the technological advances made (WW I machine guns, rapid fire artillery = Ukraine ATGM's, SAMS etc).
I like near the beginning how the tank and the APC just casually and effortlessly run over several chunks of split firewood that would completely destroy the axles, tires and suspension on my little corolla.
Remember the "Active Edges" getting woke up at early hours of the morning to deploy to war time locations of course we never knew they were going to happen but our kit just happened to be ready to put on
Great source material. I used this in playing the Soviets in Combat Mission Cold War. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Soviet tactics are much easier for dilettantes like me to implement!
There could have been an interesting confrontation against BAOR and Nationale Volksarmee alias "Red Wehrmacht". In WW2 Wehrmacht, even formed by conscripts, was more than a match for British Army that was fully professional with officers coming from Eaton and other élite universities and it is conceivable that NVA had maintained the same efficient training
If only the British of the day could have seen how impoverished the average east bloc comrade was. There was never going to be a war. They were too feeble.
Christ i wonder how much effort is needed to build those overhead protection dugouts. All that backbreaking work , to then survive a combined arms attack !
I was out in Germany in them years, and our battalion was written off because being infantry we would have been the first ones in, and thankfully it didn't happen although we had a couple of close calls.
@MikeGuardiaAuthor I just bought "Foxbat Tales" and will check out all your other work. I was in the RA, medically retiring after 11 years in 2014. When I was a CC at JBLM, I had the privilege of meeting COL Bruce Crandall. I look forward to jumping in to your works on LTG Hal Moore. Thank you for the things you do to preserve the sacrifices of our sacred few. --Alex
"You may also have been attacked from the air, which could include fire support helicopters........" Got any more 'good news' you cheerful bastard?! lol
Ah, SSVC, that takes me back together with active edge. I've always wondered why all our callouts were at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning in winter, if the Russians had attacked us midday in August we would have been fucked. As for SSVC they were bandits ripping off squaddies for years. In NI they would "rent" soldiers TV's, music centres (it was a thing then), etc to cover their time in the province. Then not only charge rental but a 17% insurance premium payable with every rental payment. No surprise that SSVC was incorporated into the NAAFI who continue to this day to rip off the soldiers.
A lot of Russian eqpt was captured by the Israeli army and handed over to NATO. I was guard commander of 3 Russian tanks for a few days.. not to guard against the Russians trying to take them back but the countless Mojo,s who worked cleaning the camp etc who at least 50% where ruskie spies. It was thought they would try and destroy them. Like now the tanks where if low quality
Keep in mind their spy network were in many ways superior at the time. Even the BRIXMIS were photographed as they themselves tried to gather intel in East Germany and they weren't aware until ~40 years later.
MBT crewman, Chieftain & Chally 1 BAOR 1985 - 1992. We were under the impression our life expectancy was 6.5 minutes against Soviet Armor. I don't think any of us (certainly not I) gave a shit. 😆😆😆
Not to wade in here late asking odd questions. But can't help myself. Lol The Challenger 1 MK2/3 you'd of been serving with. You have any idea of the armour protection levels? Seen some declassified stuff from our national archives people have shared online showing various figures of 435mm turret, 325mm on the front hull. And others saying higher figures of 500mm on both the turret & front hull. Curious due to some game systems using such (legally) known stats on kit of various nations to make certain games these days. Was kind of surprised to see the Challenger 1 being noted as only having around 435mm turret armour in some of the mentions. Given the T72 variants with ERA could reach the high 500mm figure in protection against fin rounds. Etc
So history does repeat itself when enough people forget their history and forget to look ahead, prepare and distance themselves to autocratic leaders (Russia) etc. That said, Europe has still not learned from the history of WW2 and the Cold War (Germany especially). Instead Europe tried to trade with Putin's regime and even grew dependant of the gas and oil unaware of his sinister plans: To regain the lost territory from the USSR era. I believe Medvedev put it directly, when mentioning that Ukraine should be wiped off the map. Imagine if that happened to GB. China is also one which the West trades eagerly with even to this day.
I was 1 year old but I do remember years later watching the falklands war and learning about it in school also WW1 & 2 and how the Brits and Americans stuck together through thick and thin. Also learning about the Cuban missile crisis and what DEFCON meant and article 5 of the NATO treaty. None of our kids post 2000s are taught this anymore. They don’t understand why us Gen X are so proud of our country and are patriots because they have never been taught what they would lose if WW3 broke out.
its chilling how after 2 world wars,numerous conflicts and so on national armed forces still made videos like this predicting tactics from the other side
Interesting watching this footage some 30 years later and sat here thinking that the Russians of today's army probably wouldn't get that far when seeing how poorly they are doing in Ukraine!
More Army dreamers. This nonsense would have ended after 12 hours as we all died - everyone in Europe - died in a flash. I doubt the sirens woud have ever sounded.
This was absolutely brilliant and brought back a lot of memories. This was just how we were trained although some things were glossed over. I was an A1 Chieftain tank crewman which meant I could do all trades on there but if I could I would prefer to be the driver. So having watched the video the Russians could have thrown as much smoke at me as they liked as it made no difference. I could still see the Russians but now they could not see me as they didn't have the sights that could see through smoke. Secondly using Sabot we were normally one shot kills. In a hull down position any Russian tank or vehicle poking its nose out would have been terminated immediately, the kit we had on Chieftains at that time were awesome. We would have an infantry unit assigned to us or we to them, and we would defend them to the hilt as we needed them as much as they needed us and together we were a bloody good fighting team. We were told the Russians had hardly any radios and did all their communication through flags which we now know was true so again we had a big advantage. As we have seen with regards to the Ukraine invasion, only a General has the means to think for himself and all ranks below do not. As it is now it was the same then which is a massive disadvantage. We all know how corrupt Russia is and I do not doubt it was much the same then, so it makes me wonder how much their vehicles were serviced at that time. I know we were always servicing our vehicles as our lives depended on it. Again a well made awesome video of the time.
Quote: '' I could still see the Russians but now they could not see me as they didn't have the sights that could see through smoke''. You don't know much about IR do you? ''Using sabot Chieftain was capable of a one shot kill''. Is that why the only time Chieftain won the Canadian Army Trophy was 1970? (search for this on Google). You've been listening to too much hearsay. Why don't you search for this information before you sound off and make a fool of yourself. Quote from the internet. ''The R-123 radio was widely used in Soviet and Warsaw Pact tanks and armoured vehicles like T-55 tanks, BMP-1, OT-64, MT-LB, BRDM-2. They were even used on many soft-skin vehicles like Gaz 69 and UAZ 469''. --------------- There is corruption in every country, the last US general election was the biggest scam of the 21st century. The west sees itself as being white and everything Russia does is bad. Typical anti-Russia phobia and ignorance.
@@I_Have_The_Most_Japanese_Music Huh? You can't be serious. Do you honestly believe people are daft enough to drink hydraulic fluid? It's poisonous! Tall story! One thing I remember well from 20 years in the military, there was so much bullshit people actually believed most of it.
I think the issue with Russian maintenance today is that the vehicles which were supposed to be used until the 80s have been neglected and ignored for decades until now, because we still see those same vehicles doing fine in the service of NATO countries such as Poland
@@Slaktrax A single Google search gave me: "Years ago I read an obviously ghost-written autobiography of a Soviet pilot who defected and flew a then-latest Mig from eastern USSR to Japan. The book discussed life in the Soviet Union. One of the things he discussed was grain alcohol. He said it was used as a coolant for electrical components in the the airplanes. I don't know how that would work. But he said the ground crews would steal the stockpiles of alcohol - imagine that - and that often the planes were grounded because there was no coolant available." "Sounds like something [drinking brake fluid] a collegue of mine, Ret. Colonel Art Alphin, described tank crews under his command drinking, probably mixed according to needs/flavor. " "'Jar a brake fluid, handful of raisins, set out in the sun for a few days to ferment. Filtered through some old stale bread, pretty good kick'...taken from the movie "The Beast". Great movie about Soviet tank crew in Afganistan separated from their column during their stint in the '80's." "I've heard similar stories from some of my Russian friends. Vadim was a motor pool Sgt in Afghanistan back in the 80's. They hadn't gotten their vodka ration for a few weeks but heard if you strain brake fluid through black bread you could drink it. He spent nearly a month in the hospital...'damn near killed me!' he said. Making a long story short. He was out of the army 3 months later and lives in the US now. Alcohol was used as anti freeze in their vehicles and it was known to cause toxicity an blindness. They knew guys who would drink it but they never messed with that stuff. They would never have enough for their vehicles they said. Yuri, a BMP driver, said it was pretty wide spread." "air brake systems use alcohol in winter time for drying air in pipes...my Father brought alcohol from his big public bus in 70-80es." "Being assigned to the ground crew on a MiG-25 interceptor, for example, was a good gig. The supersonic fighter was nicknamed gastronom - delicatessen - because its nose-mounted radar and generator were cooled by more than 200 liters of water/methanol mix." "Russian internet users still share the stories of unspeakable substances that alcoholics once consumed. 'They drank methylated spirits, eau de cologne, different lotions. As if that’s not enough, everyone became a chemistry master and they somehow managed to create spirits from car brake fluid, ‘BF’ glue, polish, tooth-powder, and so on,' Vladimir Bukovsky, a dissident who fled the USSR to the U.S., wrote in his memoirs To Build a Castle. Technically, the job of getting alcohol from such substances was hard. For instance, those trying to extract it from brake fluid “froze it out.” In winter, they took a hollow metal pole, left it in the cold for a night, and then poured brake fluid through it - believing that all the additives would freeze to the rail with only spirits left. This wasn’t an exact science." "True but they perfected the practice. In the invasion of Hungary, many tanks broke down because the Russians drank the fluid." "
I hope all the WARNO players out there are watching this. But seriously though, mad respect for the lads who would have had to face this Soviet Onslaught, if it ever came to it.
@@denarte6986 kind of Ironic in hindsight if you think about it, Ukrainians where a major part of the Soviet Union and would have been a part of some of the key breakthrough units if WW3 went hot in the 80s.
I was stationed in then West Germany from December 1988 to February 1991 US ARMY 1st Infantry Division 1st Battalion 16th Infantry Regiment Panzer Kaserene. Got there thinking they had Bradley's boy was I disappointed to see M-113's instead, but we transitioned to Bradley's mid 1989. Can't believe 42 years ago I was supposed to defend Lower West Germany from a Soviet attack. Thank goodness that never came to fruit. Good times though and would love to go back in time too those 2 years if could. Where did time go.
I met the USA Football (Soccer) world cup squad at Pisa in Italy in 1990. Then I watched them play the Czechs in Florence (Firenze). So, they were in uniform, I wasn't.
It may be a "silly" question, but Had You as United states army infantry better consideration for Red Army or for Nationale Volksarmee? It has been said that East Germans were not improvised and that they made war seriously
The Brits Chieftain was such a cool looking tank. At least it was for an 11 year old(in 83) American kid. I still have the plastic model one I built as a kid on my bookshelf.
There is another one showing a British combat team, Chieftain and FV432 doing an attack. I've searched for years to try and find it again, only ever saw it on vhs tape. Certainly high quality training aids
@@ozanareyiz7773 dont be silly... Germany is democratic .. and regularly it chooses its current geopolitical course via that democratic process. if you think differently , then stand on a soap box and try to convince germans..
![Yailin La Mas Viral, @kreizyk.official - Dale 2 (Remix) [Video Oficial]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/JaYHBzgqz94/mqdefault.jpg)
As a tankie stationed in Germany in the mid 80's this is very familiar, we never doubted that we could take the three enemy tanks we needed to to allow the re enforcements coming from the UK and US to push forwards but most of us knew we probably wouldn't see the end of the war. A grim outlook I guess but we were realistic.
I was in Berlin with 2 Para 77/8. We knew we were just a tripwire force and were dead men walking. I never rated the Russian war machine apart from its numbers. I reckon when the Russian armour came across the Centurions and latterly, the Chieftains, you lads would have ate them up and spit them out. When I finally came eye to eye in Iraq with the t54/5/62/BTR/BMP etc etc, I saw whats a load of shite their stuff was. Ours was not to reason why etc etc.
@@peterstubbs5934 Maybe we would have while eating egg banjos and drinking Herforder Pils ;) Our head PTI was always a sergeant from the parras, I have no idea why but he liked to beast us as often as possible, some of the guys even went over to 2 Para, splitters
@Phil Staples that almost sounds like an AI generated response featuring lots of BAOR terms. Yellow handbags, Ivan, Fulda Gap, Korn, Crash Out etc.😊
@@Surv1ve_Thrive Well Nick you know the terms so you were probably there, BOAR was a meme of itself during it's own NAFI break.
@@philstaples8122 🇬🇧👍 🇩🇪🍻💣🪖🌭💨🌞 👜
Nice of the Soviets to cooperate in the making of this film.
😂
The USA is known to have aggressor units for training purposes. There were many opportunities to get some captured soviet equipment from Israel and maybe Iran.
@@charlesc.9012 So called "Redfor, OPFOR" and "Red CellS"
The Soviets wouldn’t have freely given the footage or cooperate in making films like this with Western countries. lol
Footage of actual Soviet battle training is most likely from the 70s.
I was a young 🇬🇧 ‘courier’ in the late 80’s. We were regularly followed by KGB, who didn’t hide themselves. The Russian’s & East Germany were convinced NATO would invade them, just as we were.
It was always a concern for me right from my teenage years, but I always wondered how powerful the Warsaw Pact forces really were. Stories occasionally floated around of their troops not being paid properly and equipment being inferior, not wanting to be there etc. Nevertheless it was a huge force facing us, and of course either side had nuclear weapons to fall back on if things went badly. Once I happened to ask another kids' dad (who had been in the army) about the balance of power in West Germany and he that in his opinion the Soviets could be held off for only a few days. Worrying stuff, I wonder how their army that attacked Ukraine compares with what they had then....
@@rob5944 the top NATO brass didn't think they could defeat it
@@rob5944 All this guessing what would be meaningless, only the fight can show who is stronger. We were also told that you would not be able to stand three days in front of the russian army, but the reality turned out to be quite different. I like your approach in the West that you always think you have it bad, self-confidence always leads to failure.
When you say 'them', you mean the commisars and officers who actually supported the ddr/polish regimes, the soldiers werent into the propaganda and the majority would have laid down their weapons or disbanded, mutineed, i read an article published by a german university on polls of ex-ddr and polish soldiers done in the 90s. After 40 years of propaganda the general population just didnt buy the bullshit . The russians on the other hand were a different kettle of fish like we see in the current war.
@@olivere5497 that's what I hoped they might do in the event of an invasion, however the Russians may not of such a different kettle of fish anyway.
Who would of thought when this was made, this threat would disappear in Europe 7 years later. Then suddenly become very real 40 years later.
От советской армии сейчас 2% и вся российская техника это остатки российской .нового нет.
Its not really a threat anymore, its clear as day that russia's military, and politcal/military leadership would be completely destroyed. Their military is trash, their gear is trash, and their leadership are also trash, who make incredibly stupid decisions. NATO would be inside the Kremlin within a few weeks
Who would of thought they would be using the same tanks.
What threat? They can't defeat the ukrainians and will probably just get stomped by the Poles if they tried.
@@宋教仁-b4ilol so please do explain why Ukraine has gone through 10 rounds of mobilisation whereas Russia has only done 1 and is still capturing territory
This takes me back! I remember as a BAOR soldier serving as an NCO with 2RGJ we would often do TEWT’s (Tactical Exercise Without Troops) where frequently we (officers and Nco’s) would walk our deployment areas and go through various scenarios and our reactions to them - sometimes with umpires, sometimes without - which we would then use as part of our training regime.
It’s only since the fall of the Warsaw Pact and the collapse of the Soviet Union where information has been made available, that I realise what a real predicament we would be in if it had kicked off.
If anyone has a genuine interest in what ‘could’ have happened, there is a vast resource available in the form of declassified documents as well as many books dealing with fact and fiction. Had I known then what I know now at 64 y.o., I wouldn’t have been so cocky………
Being cocky was the only thing keeping you there :D what surprised me was same tactics being used in 2022 and 2023 :o
@@teamidris when my Godson joined the Anglians and became a mortar man, he was using exactly the same gear as I was using in the 80’s! He enlisted in 2005! 😂 He was gobsmacked when I ran him through his fire control and bedding in orders…….
"here is a vast resource available in the form of declassified documents " - any handy links or pointers? Cheers
Do you have any suggestions regarding declassified documents or other books? The Cold War 1970s-80s has become my latest focal point regarding historical research.
….the books by Harvey Black are also well worth the read. Harvey served in the intelligence corps during the Cold War and his experiences form the backbone of his novels which cover the Cold War turning hot. I had some fascinating online conversations with him a few years ago, and was given some first had insight into what was going on behind the scenes as well as info that would have cast a different light on our ability if they had been open knowledge. For example: I didn’t know until 2012 that the soviets had spetnaz units whose sole task was to be parachuted into West German garrison towns once “we” had deployed and to capture any remaining family units to use as a “bargaining” chip. I have no idea what I would have thought knowing my wife and son were captured by Soviet troops…….It doesn’t bare thinking about….
Remember watching this as a young trooper in 4rtr and then as a cold war warrior from 1983 to 1991 taking part in many many exercises from driver through to commander to practice the actual mechanics of warding off the soviet threat. That's when BAOR was a force to be reckoned with.
Did it make you feel confident? Sounded pretty overwhelming to me.
@@humphrey4976 as confident as one could be, well trained, decent enough kit given the technology of the time and all aspects of the threat had been exercised to death either on Soltau training area or BATUS and regular gunnery camps at Hohne meant every crew member knew the part they played and battlegroup training meant all other arms worked well together as well. Everyone knew we were there to slow the soviet threat unless the big red button was pushed and then it was over no matter what. Cest la vie eh.
@@stuc734 thanks for the insight. Glad it never happened.
@@stuc734 as a concerned teenager I thought our main hope was that you guys would end up convincing those conscripts that it'd be a better idea to ditch their gear and go back home, seriously. I knew we were probably a superior force, but my worry was by how much...
@@rob5944 Rob, yup I think we all hoped that the Warsaw pact troops would turn tail and head for home, however they were probably more scared of their own commanders and political commisars etc than of us imoh.
I don't know what's worse, being a Soviet vanguard commander sending untold amounts of men against a single wall or being a British rifleman told to glue yourself into place against those countless men hurtling toward your wall.
Это миф. В второй мировой войне РККА потеряла 12 миллионов а Вермахт 15 . Союзники убили только 20% Вермахта.
@@9261-k6l
If you live in Russia, incase you didn't know-
70% of russian military history told to russian citizens is a lie.
The only thing they want you to think is that Russia was great and is amazing. and won world war 2 themselves.
They tell you the west lies about history and is ungrateful.
Единственное, что они хотят, чтобы вы думали, что Россия была великой и удивительной. и сами выиграли 2 мировую войну.
Они говорят вам, что Запад лжет об истории и неблагодарен.
As a one time infantry soldier ,deployed to stop the soviet juggernaut back in the seventies and early eighties,we all knew if it ever came to a shooting war,we'd not last much more than 48hours....plenty of gallows humour 😂
@@martinblunden4689 48? Try 10. But them men must have had balls of steel.
@@martinblunden4689 Certainly a rough task. Your job was to hold on and slow them down as much as possible until REFORGER could kick in fully, right?
Surprisingly well done Video. They sure seem to have had a lot of Soviet Equipment available.
@Jockbigcox probably, yes.
@Jockbigcox It makes sense, because there's nothing too modern which was being used at the time such as T-72, BMP-2 or BTR-70
The Americans had unit that went around giving demos and a look around Soviet equipment, if I remember rightly they were called Red Star.
My platoon played 'enemy' for a sniper course in the late 80s. We were given Bulgarian AK47s and RPGs for weapon accuracy I.e for would be snipers to report on equipment we were carrying. I'm guessing a lot of this stuff came from Arab-Iraeli unpleasantness.
This is a Soviet made propaganda film smuggled to the West. Footage is most likely from the 70s.
Reminds me of the Dad's Army episode where they are leaning how to destroy a German tank and Private Walker pipes up and asks "and what's the tank doing while we are doing all this...?😂
We were taught most Soviet attacks would start with a massive chemical attack then several simaltaneous armoured thrusts, not a pleasant thought!
I was stationed in BAOR in the 70,s. The British army was mainly a delaying force to ensure the families and civies reached the coast and ferries to take them BACK to the UK. Your life was measured in hours and days so although this vid shows us holding the enemy up and we had a very well trained and equipped army then l, other tactics would have been Used to stop them. Natural geography stood as the best defence for instance the river Weser which they needed to cross, that’s where main battles would have been fought before allowing the soviet forces en masse to filter into natural passes between hills and mountains. That’s when the main butchering would have been done but they had far superior numbers of tanks and Infantry available so eventually their armies would get through but very heavily depleted just through sheer weight of numbers. But one point it doesn’t show is which tank/bmp you would single out for the first and most legal targeting. That was the political commissar one which flew a certain standard. There are or where approx 20 different ruskie dialects so in the height of battle only one voice could speak to them all to be certain to be understood.. so take him out first and the ruskie tank battalion would hopefully fall into chaos without any clear orders they all understood. We had faith in our eqpt, not our Officers who where mostly hooray Henry’s but we knew that in a these sorts of battles it was every man for himself as we knew we would be in a very target rich environment lol… You where very aware of the threats etc but you couldn’t let it stop you living your life and West Germany was a great posting then.. just don’t attack on a Friday night.. most of us where out chasing girls and getting drunk lol
There are not 20 different "Russian dialects." By 1970 in the Red Army it would be unusual for someone to even understand a nonstandard Russian dialect, let alone speak it exclusively in preference to Moscow speech. There were a relatively few large ethno-national groups in the USSR where penetration rate of Russian language was low, such as the Uzbeks, but they were not mixed in willy-nilly with Russian speakers.
Politruks were mostly just supernumeraries. If we're being completely honest about it, the source of these weird mistaken ideas about "Russians" with their "dialects" who would fall into racialized chaos and be easily handled as soon as the thin veneer of commisardom was removed is pretty straightforwardly just Naziism. Like I am not one of these hysterical pro-Russians who says NATO is all Nazis, but the historical fact is the Western Cold War-era understanding of how to fight the Red Army was overly and unfortunately influenced by a lot of Nazi nonsense.
@@tiivc That’s what we where told and what we would have done.. it wouldn’t have mattered really anyway because we would have taken out every Russian tank on the battlefield but been overrun through sheer weight of numbers
The “national minority” cliques undoubtedly were a thing in the soviet army, as well as non-russian-speaking conscripts. However, they were sent to very rear echelon forces such as construction troops (строительные войска), and were unlikely to be spearheading an invasion.
Thus said, priority targeting of any combat vehicle with banners or extra antennas was absolutely justified - knocking out enemy command and communication vehicles is quite helpful to sowing chaos and enhancing uncertainty.
@@davidcorbett62 My old man was in the BAOR during the 70s too and told me the same growing up, Russians spoke so many dialects they'd have to use whistles to communicate etc. Total guff as we know now of course but an amusing thought
‘All Officers are Hooray Henry’s’. YAWN. Same old crap.
Superb film it was shown for the first time to me that year!!✊️💥
My grandfather was a civil servant (an accountant, really). His job, eventually, was to audit the accounts of the entire BAOR. He was given by the government of whenever it was (late 50s I guess) the acting rank of a full Colonel so that he could - I suppose - open pretty much any file he needed to see. When I was a young lad of 11 or 12, some years after he had retired, he told me some stories about his adventures. Some of the stories he told me about some of the nefarious activities he uncovered belong in a book - or a movie! Mostly it was petty pilfering and the usual low-level corruption, but he also discovered (I think in the 1960s, so probably Centurion!) tanks (not a tank, but tanks) were vanishing into thin air. They existed on the books, but, upon his inspection, "no longer in what one could call 'physical reality'" (his words). What happened to those tanks is a mystery to this day. He never found out where they went, or how they could possibly have fallen off the back of a tank transporter. But "clerical error" rather "tanks stolen and sold to hostile nations" sounded much better in the report, according to essentially everyone, so that's what he wrote. I remember that he just sucked on his pipe and laughed about the lunacy, which seemed to appeal to his wonderful sense of humour.
He died not that long after, in 1982. I still miss him; I just wish there'd been more time. And still wonder what the hell happened to those tanks.
Probably went to Israel or South Africa as an off the books (literally) arms export and I wouldn’t be surprised if it was the Foreign Office’s doing.
This British army looks better kitted out than today’s
🤣🤣🤣
And larger
*"Though the minefield takes it's toll, the Soviet tanks continue to press forward. The attack is finally stopped by a barrage of tins of cheese 'possessed' and packets of biscuits brown- for the use of. This distracts the Soviet peasant infantry, who debus from their BMP's and BTR 60's- in order to enjoy a tasty feast. This proves disastrous for the Sov's, as the 'sneaky' Brits brass the infantry up with concentrated GPMG SF fire, shattering the momentum of the attack and breaking the will of the enemy to press home the attack. Ivan is sent packing and the Brits crack a celebratory brew on!"*
This is the most British thing I have ever heard
@@matthewjones39"biscuits, brown" were truly lethal. God knows what they put in them!
Oh God - the labels on stuff...
Trousers, waterproof, water, for the protection from.
Spade, 1x, handle, wooden, for the operation of.
Biscuits, brown, teeth, shattering, job security, dentists, for the purpose of.
Ah yes. I remember it well. Your skills honed to perfection - and your life measured in hours from first contact. And ex-regular, I trained and trained with 2 Yorks (the 'old ones') as a section commander. Hard work.
Which company?
@@grahamprice3230 D (Green Howards) Coy based in Scarborough with Whitby & Filey Detachments. I was with Whitby at the time.
Remember you .I was CSM and later RQMS Coulby Newham Middlesbrough .Milan platoon etc etc.
“Although overhead cover will prevent any casualties” 😅
Yeah I thought that was a bit overly optimistic.
I want part 2!
Freaking cool
This film assumes the soviets to be a worthy foe who've drilled and trained for this moment and should be underestimated or taken likely. It's the perfect training film.
Its strange seeing the SSVC logo after so long.
Dad was in BAOR Berlin garrison and were stationed with him. Soviets and DDR were always practicing invading. I thank NATO and US for deterring the brutal military dictatorship from invading
Thank the Nukes.
How does an Army practice invading in a city? The west was more worked up about it than the Commies were. Non-stop exercises to deployment areas, border patrols etc. During the eight years served in Germany we never saw a Soviet patrol of the IGB nor any sign of exercises near it.
Brings back memories of the Cold War era...
Training videos always know exactly what enemy will do and everything on own side will function perfectly...
WOW, another gem from the back of my mind
Like most of you watching this i remember watching this as a sprog
Any idea who played the "Soviet" forces for the video? Mostly I'm curious how they got all that hardware during the height of the Cold War.......
could have been captured stuff bought from Israel perhaps? I can't explain the uniform and arms though. Maybe seized shipments heading to Africa.
Liverpool markets mate.... can buy anything there, no questions asked!
They were still teaching this crap on 2001 when I was on my crew commanders course in Warminster....😂
@@johnhughes8016 Did you enjoy Warminster? It's a ghost town now.
South Africa Israel Vietnam etc plenty about
@@reubendobbs8011 Yeah of course, once you all mentioned it it made perfect sense. Thanks.
This is much better than any Hollywood war movie
Interestingly enough, this video is very relevant to the current war in Ukraine and a potential future NATO-Russia war, as all Russian and most Ukrainian officers either started their careers in the Soviet Union or were taught by former Soviet officers in cadet school, thus almost this exact way of conducting an attack is the basis of their craft.
Massed armoured attacks with aerial support seems to be a challenge for both sides, the latest Ukrainian offensive appears to be backing up the original experience of the Russians. Almost as if we are back to a first world war scenario where tactics have not kept pace with the technological advances made (WW I machine guns, rapid fire artillery = Ukraine ATGM's, SAMS etc).
I like near the beginning how the tank and the APC just casually and effortlessly run over several chunks of split firewood that would completely destroy the axles, tires and suspension on my little corolla.
simply fascinating, 40 years later how much has changed with N Laws and Javelins and copious amounts of drones!!!
Lancet and TOS 1A have some nice replies to you
I remember the one about comms security.
Where the Soviets new everything we were doing.
Watched that as part of my gunner sigs training.
Remember the "Active Edges" getting woke up at early hours of the morning to deploy to war time locations of course we never knew they were going to happen but our kit just happened to be ready to put on
I was stationed in West Germany I remmeber watching this..
Great source material. I used this in playing the Soviets in Combat Mission Cold War. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Soviet tactics are much easier for dilettantes like me to implement!
Wow this video is as old as me :D still relevant too!
"You're seeing almost all of his military knowledge now."
:derp charge:
There could have been an interesting confrontation against BAOR and Nationale Volksarmee alias "Red Wehrmacht". In WW2 Wehrmacht, even formed by conscripts, was more than a match for British Army that was fully professional with officers coming from Eaton and other élite universities and it is conceivable that NVA had maintained the same efficient training
Did that wire a few times..in tne 70s..I was Recce platoon..
I wonder how the training video looks nowadays. The battlefield and tactics must have changed very much.
If only the British of the day could have seen how impoverished the average east bloc comrade was. There was never going to be a war. They were too feeble.
8:34 he says "the demolitions are blown". Not mentioning that it is, in many locations, a frugging underground nuke!
Was stationed in west Germany 1982 as danish support for the British 7 armored brigade , we were real soldiers 🤗
Christ i wonder how much effort is needed to build those overhead protection dugouts. All that backbreaking work , to then survive a combined arms attack !
Like a live action version of Red Storm Rising 😃
This is fascinating.
You may find yourself covered in a red colored jelly-like substance, this was your mate, Dave.
I was out in Germany in them years, and our battalion was written off because being infantry we would have been the first ones in, and thankfully it didn't happen although we had a couple of close calls.
Ah, the Sid Sausage Video Club, fond memories !
Mike, if that's your real name, you are a bad-ass!
Yep, that's my real name. And thanks!
I second the motion that you are a badass Mike.
thanks amigo 😎 👍
@MikeGuardiaAuthor I just bought "Foxbat Tales" and will check out all your other work. I was in the RA, medically retiring after 11 years in 2014. When I was a CC at JBLM, I had the privilege of meeting COL Bruce Crandall. I look forward to jumping in to your works on LTG Hal Moore.
Thank you for the things you do to preserve the sacrifices of our sacred few.
--Alex
"You may also have been attacked from the air, which could include fire support helicopters........" Got any more 'good news' you cheerful bastard?! lol
well nothing has changed i guess
I wonder what the training videos by the opposition were like?
Where were these BTRs sourced from?
Ah, SSVC, that takes me back together with active edge. I've always wondered why all our callouts were at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning in winter, if the Russians had attacked us midday in August we would have been fucked.
As for SSVC they were bandits ripping off squaddies for years. In NI they would "rent" soldiers TV's, music centres (it was a thing then), etc to cover their time in the province. Then not only charge rental but a 17% insurance premium payable with every rental payment.
No surprise that SSVC was incorporated into the NAAFI who continue to this day to rip off the soldiers.
It looks like Russian doctrine has not changed, the meat grinder doctrine!!
Fun fact for the civilians, one of the Russian types of chemicals was a "incapasitating agent" one type was apparently LSD.
brings back memories...jt
18:43 "Under current Soviet military doctrine, that's all he needs to know"
Well it's been proven now that they never improved upon this
no even need to improve anything to smash weaklings.
@@kirilld6206 they should clearly change it then
@@kirilld6206 2nd best army in the world (?) to the second best army in Ukraine.....................
@@justwhenyouthought6119 english-speaking countries shouldn't be speaking of war. They are just simple traders and pirates.
@@justwhenyouthought6119the best army in Ukraine are kinda busy with their failed summer offensive.
I'm pretty sure I was never shown any kind of video like this until I got out in 2019. Do we even make them still?
What is the name of the abandoned town in the video
Does anyone where they sourced the Soviet gear from?
A lot of Russian eqpt was captured by the Israeli army and handed over to NATO. I was guard commander of 3 Russian tanks for a few days.. not to guard against the Russians trying to take them back but the countless Mojo,s who worked cleaning the camp etc who at least 50% where ruskie spies. It was thought they would try and destroy them. Like now the tanks where if low quality
I like the T'Cheftainsky at 15:37
Where was our air support???????
Are you quite sure we're in the "free world?"
This (in retrospect) turned out to be "Theoretical Wank", as proved by Ukraine's Militia.
It's strange to look back now and see we actually believed the Soviets posed a genuine threat.
Keep in mind their spy network were in many ways superior at the time. Even the BRIXMIS were photographed as they themselves tried to gather intel in East Germany and they weren't aware until ~40 years later.
Because they did.
4:57 that brit accented russian
sterling effort people
So where were the Cobra or Lynx gunships fitted with TOW missiles? Minigun would have made hamburger out of troops in the open.
MBT crewman, Chieftain & Chally 1 BAOR 1985 - 1992. We were under the impression our life expectancy was 6.5 minutes against Soviet Armor. I don't think any of us (certainly not I) gave a shit. 😆😆😆
Not to wade in here late asking odd questions. But can't help myself. Lol
The Challenger 1 MK2/3 you'd of been serving with. You have any idea of the armour protection levels?
Seen some declassified stuff from our national archives people have shared online showing various figures of 435mm turret, 325mm on the front hull.
And others saying higher figures of 500mm on both the turret & front hull.
Curious due to some game systems using such (legally) known stats on kit of various nations to make certain games these days.
Was kind of surprised to see the Challenger 1 being noted as only having around 435mm turret armour in some of the mentions.
Given the T72 variants with ERA could reach the high 500mm figure in protection against fin rounds. Etc
@@BroadHobbyProjects No idea mate.
So history does repeat itself when enough people forget their history and forget to look ahead, prepare and distance themselves to autocratic leaders (Russia) etc. That said, Europe has still not learned from the history of WW2 and the Cold War (Germany especially). Instead Europe tried to trade with Putin's regime and even grew dependant of the gas and oil unaware of his sinister plans: To regain the lost territory from the USSR era. I believe Medvedev put it directly, when mentioning that Ukraine should be wiped off the map. Imagine if that happened to GB. China is also one which the West trades eagerly with even to this day.
He should have said ‘but ultimately it won’t matter who wins, as the loser would then nuke the battlefield’
I was 1 year old but I do remember years later watching the falklands war and learning about it in school also WW1 & 2 and how the Brits and Americans stuck together through thick and thin. Also learning about the Cuban missile crisis and what DEFCON meant and article 5 of the NATO treaty. None of our kids post 2000s are taught this anymore. They don’t understand why us Gen X are so proud of our country and are patriots because they have never been taught what they would lose if WW3 broke out.
And the army was 3 times the size back then.
Memories.
Who would have thought that in Ukraine they would not applied this sound doctrine.
This all before drones became commonplace
its chilling how after 2 world wars,numerous conflicts and so on national armed forces still made videos like this predicting tactics from the other side
NOTHING MUCH HAS CHANGED FROM THIS FILM TOO TODAY'S RUSSIANS FIELD CRAFT 😮 .
They couldn’t field any of this anymore, there’s hardly an army left.
This shows the disgraceful lack of health and safety in combat.
Yes, combat is quite dreadful.
I love these old vids. B4 all the woke BS
Seems like the Russians were very well organised and equipped at that time unlike know...
I wonder what caused the downfall of their military?
"Erreeeeeeeeeeeeee"
I miss the Cold War.😢
Interesting watching this footage some 30 years later and sat here thinking that the Russians of today's army probably wouldn't get that far when seeing how poorly they are doing in Ukraine!
Soviet troops - for the sake of speed - would move in clumns. Or stand in columns. To eventually perish. 39 years ahead. Slava Ukraini! 🇺🇦🇺🇸🇵🇱🇬🇧🇩🇪
More Army dreamers. This nonsense would have ended after 12 hours as we all died - everyone in Europe - died in a flash. I doubt the sirens woud have ever sounded.
modern british army could not defeat an 80's soviet army
Only cause of numbers thats why NATO exist
Yeah yeah...the Soviets are portrayed like idiots...pull the other one 😅
Btr 60 PA no roof.BTR 60 PB Roof plus turret with DSHK 14.5 or 12.7.Troops dismount over side 3m drop to ground.on PA.
Is it probe, " a probe sir, its an avalanche ' where are my tanks my air support, "calm down capt stranski you're not alone! "I AM ALONE,I AM ALONE !!
Nice video, unfortunately there's no mention of me defending the NAAFI pie machine, armed only with a clasp knife and 200 JPS.
Haha! Quality comment mate! :)
Ahhhhh JPS…….I was a B&H man myself……..
You had a KNIFE!!!!
@@Ubique2927 He must have been one of those hard core specialists.
I got a tear in my eye you hero you, I would be beside denying them bastards the milk machine, no cold pinters for you Ivan 😮
This was absolutely brilliant and brought back a lot of memories. This was just how we were trained although some things were glossed over.
I was an A1 Chieftain tank crewman which meant I could do all trades on there but if I could I would prefer to be the driver.
So having watched the video the Russians could have thrown as much smoke at me as they liked as it made no difference. I could still see the Russians but now they could not see me as they didn't have the sights that could see through smoke. Secondly using Sabot we were normally one shot kills. In a hull down position any Russian tank or vehicle poking its nose out would have been terminated immediately, the kit we had on Chieftains at that time were awesome.
We would have an infantry unit assigned to us or we to them, and we would defend them to the hilt as we needed them as much as they needed us and together we were a bloody good fighting team.
We were told the Russians had hardly any radios and did all their communication through flags which we now know was true so again we had a big advantage.
As we have seen with regards to the Ukraine invasion, only a General has the means to think for himself and all ranks below do not.
As it is now it was the same then which is a massive disadvantage.
We all know how corrupt Russia is and I do not doubt it was much the same then, so it makes me wonder how much their vehicles were serviced at that time. I know we were always servicing our vehicles as our lives depended on it.
Again a well made awesome video of the time.
Quote: '' I could still see the Russians but now they could not see me as they didn't have the sights that could see through smoke''. You don't know much about IR do you?
''Using sabot Chieftain was capable of a one shot kill''. Is that why the only time Chieftain won the Canadian Army Trophy was 1970? (search for this on Google).
You've been listening to too much hearsay. Why don't you search for this information before you sound off and make a fool of yourself. Quote from the internet. ''The R-123 radio was widely used in Soviet and Warsaw Pact tanks and armoured vehicles like T-55 tanks, BMP-1, OT-64, MT-LB, BRDM-2. They were even used on many soft-skin vehicles like Gaz 69 and UAZ 469''.
---------------
There is corruption in every country, the last US general election was the biggest scam of the 21st century. The west sees itself as being white and everything Russia does is bad. Typical anti-Russia phobia and ignorance.
Warsaw Pact "maintenance" actually degraded the condition of the equipment; soldiers drinking hydraulic fluid, e.g.
@@I_Have_The_Most_Japanese_Music Huh? You can't be serious. Do you honestly believe people are daft enough to drink hydraulic fluid? It's poisonous! Tall story! One thing I remember well from 20 years in the military, there was so much bullshit people actually believed most of it.
I think the issue with Russian maintenance today is that the vehicles which were supposed to be used until the 80s have been neglected and ignored for decades until now, because we still see those same vehicles doing fine in the service of NATO countries such as Poland
@@Slaktrax A single Google search gave me:
"Years ago I read an obviously ghost-written autobiography of a Soviet pilot who defected and flew a then-latest Mig from eastern USSR to Japan. The book discussed life in the Soviet Union. One of the things he discussed was grain alcohol. He said it was used as a coolant for electrical components in the the airplanes. I don't know how that would work. But he said the ground crews would steal the stockpiles of alcohol - imagine that - and that often the planes were grounded because there was no coolant available."
"Sounds like something [drinking brake fluid] a collegue of mine, Ret. Colonel Art Alphin, described tank crews under his command drinking, probably mixed according to needs/flavor. "
"'Jar a brake fluid, handful of raisins, set out in the sun for a few days to ferment. Filtered through some old stale bread, pretty good kick'...taken from the movie "The Beast". Great movie about Soviet tank crew in Afganistan separated from their column during their stint in the '80's."
"I've heard similar stories from some of my Russian friends. Vadim was a motor pool Sgt in Afghanistan back in the 80's. They hadn't gotten their vodka ration for a few weeks but heard if you strain brake fluid through black bread you could drink it. He spent nearly a month in the hospital...'damn near killed me!' he said. Making a long story short. He was out of the army 3 months later and lives in the US now. Alcohol was used as anti freeze in their vehicles and it was known to cause toxicity an blindness. They knew guys who would drink it but they never messed with that stuff. They would never have enough for their vehicles they said. Yuri, a BMP driver, said it was pretty wide spread."
"air brake systems use alcohol in winter time for drying air in pipes...my Father brought alcohol from his big public bus in 70-80es."
"Being assigned to the ground crew on a MiG-25 interceptor, for example, was a good gig. The supersonic fighter was nicknamed gastronom - delicatessen - because its nose-mounted radar and generator were cooled by more than 200 liters of water/methanol mix."
"Russian internet users still share the stories of unspeakable substances that alcoholics once consumed. 'They drank methylated spirits, eau de cologne, different lotions. As if that’s not enough, everyone became a chemistry master and they somehow managed to create spirits from car brake fluid, ‘BF’ glue, polish, tooth-powder, and so on,' Vladimir Bukovsky, a dissident who fled the USSR to the U.S., wrote in his memoirs To Build a Castle.
Technically, the job of getting alcohol from such substances was hard. For instance, those trying to extract it from brake fluid “froze it out.” In winter, they took a hollow metal pole, left it in the cold for a night, and then poured brake fluid through it - believing that all the additives would freeze to the rail with only spirits left. This wasn’t an exact science."
"True but they perfected the practice. In the invasion of Hungary, many tanks broke down because the Russians drank the fluid."
"
I hope all the WARNO players out there are watching this. But seriously though, mad respect for the lads who would have had to face this Soviet Onslaught, if it ever came to it.
And for the lads in Ukraine who are stepping to do it for all the west
@@denarte6986 kind of Ironic in hindsight if you think about it, Ukrainians where a major part of the Soviet Union and would have been a part of some of the key breakthrough units if WW3 went hot in the 80s.
@@RomanHistoryFan476ADyea but that’s all in the past
@@ch-53esuperstallion76 True but I do enjoy the irony of it.
@@RomanHistoryFan476AD yea i suppose
I was stationed in then West Germany from December 1988 to February 1991 US ARMY 1st Infantry Division 1st Battalion 16th Infantry Regiment Panzer Kaserene. Got there thinking they had Bradley's boy was I disappointed to see M-113's instead, but we transitioned to Bradley's mid 1989. Can't believe 42 years ago I was supposed to defend Lower West Germany from a Soviet attack. Thank goodness that never came to fruit. Good times though and would love to go back in time too those 2 years if could. Where did time go.
I ETSed in 87 from A 1/16 Inf.
@@robertanderson1272 I was in Bravo Company.
I met the USA Football (Soccer) world cup squad at Pisa in Italy in 1990. Then I watched them play the Czechs in Florence (Firenze). So, they were in uniform, I wasn't.
It flew out the window I guess
It may be a "silly" question, but Had You as United states army infantry better consideration for Red Army or for Nationale Volksarmee? It has been said that East Germans were not improvised and that they made war seriously
The Brits Chieftain was such a cool looking tank. At least it was for an 11 year old(in 83) American kid. I still have the plastic model one I built as a kid on my bookshelf.
BAOR’s job was to fight a delaying action until the apocalypse happened
There is another one showing a British combat team, Chieftain and FV432 doing an attack. I've searched for years to try and find it again, only ever saw it on vhs tape. Certainly high quality training aids
I'm no expert but was quite impressed.
I'm sure I've seen that on here.
ruclips.net/video/b9zSIyt-JDg/видео.html
This one? ruclips.net/video/3zo5f6l-ZP4/видео.html (Part 1); ruclips.net/video/pDAQV4fMaUk/видео.html (Part 2)
@@phippsdl Thats it, Thank you so much. That brings back my instructing days
great respect to the brits from germany! thankful for having you as an ally by our side.
What are you, a NATO troll? You have no allies. You have been occupied ;D
@@ozanareyiz7773 dont be silly... Germany is democratic .. and regularly it chooses its current geopolitical course via that democratic process. if you think differently , then stand on a soap box and try to convince germans..
@@joecater894 Keep editing. And don't be fool. Democracy died in the West decades ago. Including The US.
@@ozanareyiz7773this trolling is weak
No Russians were hurt making this Film