Finnish is buying new mbt's

[Tymi 0]

Finnish army is buying 100 Leopard 2 tanks. Finally we have some state of art MBT's.

[Tymi 0]

And i ment Finnish ARMY is buying new MBT's

Its quite embarassing to fu*k up your first thread.

[Flugel 0]

HEh cool! Sounds something for that EXCELLENT LOOKING Finish army mod to be implemented in

[Guest SC Jolly]

Erhmm.. does Norway still use the old.. I think it was Leopard? I heard it SUCKED, more or less.

[S_Z 0]

Norway’s  most modern tank is Leopard 2A4...according to this site: http://www.royhaaland.net/index.html

Sweden have a great MBT…Leopard 2A5 improved S(strv122)  

More info about the Swedish ARMY can be found here: http://www.wendel.se/rswa/index.htm  …if someone is interested  

[4ntifa 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tymi @ Feb. 23 2002,02:05)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Finnish army is buying 100 Leopard 2 tanks. Finally we have some state of art MBT's.<span id='postcolor'>

How much taxes are you paying? I'm quite fückin' pissed to see my tax money wasted like that! Raise nurses' and teachers' salary ferfockssake, or anything, something useful. I don't want to see my money wasted by some retarded gun freaks.

/meh is totally pissed.

Not to mention the NATO aspect. This is clearly another step to smuggle Finland to NATO. I'm extreeeeeemely pissed indeed.

[Sandman 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (4ntifa @ Feb. 24 2002,08:32)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Not to mention the NATO aspect. This is clearly another step to smuggle Finland to NATO. I'm extreeeeeemely pissed indeed.<span id='postcolor'>

Tell me....how did you figure that one out?!? I really want to now....

[GrimCalavera 0]

Sad they will not be on use when I'm in the army, 2003 summer. If I'd be a tanker they'd give me old T-72's... so I guess I'll go for infantry instead. By the way model of those Leo's will be 2A4... might be upgraded, they plan to field them on 2005.

[4ntifa 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Sandman @ Feb. 24 2002,10:15)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (4ntifa @ Feb. 24 2002,08:32)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Not to mention the NATO aspect. This is clearly another step to smuggle Finland to NATO. I'm extreeeeeemely pissed indeed.<span id='postcolor'>

Tell me....how did you figure that one out?!? I really want to now....<span id='postcolor'>

I guess you haven't been paying attention to Finnish politics? Step by step, the Finnish army is being more and more "NATO-compliant" and there is a purpose. Finland will eventually join NATO. The citizens won't be asked. A politician (Jan-Erik Enestam, IIRC) recently said that "there is no need to let the citizens vote".

[Blake 0]

It's about goddamn time the army brass admits that those ex-DDR T-72M1 tanks are NOT 'quality armor bought with the price of scrap metal' like they claimed back in 1995.

Instead, they're indeed scrap metal with with a scrap metal price tag

(If you call ca. 50.000 Euros/each cheap)

Sweden made a wise decision buying mixed bag of quality surplus West-German made Leopard 2 A1's back then, and afterwards upgrading them to A5 standard. They also got still cheap and useful BMP-1 APCs from ex-East Germany. From an armor magazine I read they got also Mt-LB tracked APCs for ridiculous 6.000 SEKs a piece (1000 Euros)! So they certainly made more reasonable choises than Finland in their defence purchases.

I hope Finnish Defence Forces succesfully skip the parliamentary hassle on new tank purchases as they faced fierce resistance from some MPs when Attack/Escort helicopters were hot topic a while ago. Good timing for those tanks since parliament is currently engaged in a debate about new nuclear powerplant so tanks may have a chance of 'slipping through'

[R. Gerschwarzenge 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (4ntifa @ Feb. 24 2002,09:32)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">How much taxes are you paying?<span id='postcolor'>

Too much.

[christophercles 0]

*CRIES* Australia still uses modified leopard 1ns

[Oligo 1]

Maybe Finland will join NATO. And maybe we'll finally get to participate in some wars. It really sucks that our government doesn't send troops to shooting wars, not even volunteer troops. Kind of removes the point from being in the army, I mean, soldiers are meant to make war, right?

[Wobble 1]

I mean, soldiers are meant to make war, right?

ambitious assholes make wars.. soldiers fight them

[Oligo 1]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Wobble @ Feb. 25 2002,10:32)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">ambitious assholes make wars.. soldiers fight them<span id='postcolor'>

Yeah, thanks for pointing out my inadequacy in your native language.

Soldiers go to the pointless wars and die. Sounds a lot better than working the job you hate (so you can buy shit you don't need) until they stuff you into a retirement home and feed you through tubes till you rot away.

Man, people always whine that life is too short, but I'm whining that life is too long.

[R. Gerschwarzenge 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Oligo @ Feb. 25 2002,11:24)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">It really sucks that our government doesn't send troops to shooting wars, not even volunteer troops.<span id='postcolor'>

This is a joke, right?

[Oligo 1]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (R. Gerschwarzenge @ Feb. 25 2002,12:03)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Oligo @ Feb. 25 2002,11:24)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">It really sucks that our government doesn't send troops to shooting wars, not even volunteer troops.<span id='postcolor'>

This is a joke, right?  <span id='postcolor'>

Not a joke, man. I'm pretty sure every country has a bunch of men who would like to go and fight in wars, whatever the cause.

For a country, sending these people to wars has two benefits:

a) The young men vent their energy on war rather than venting it against the social structure of their own country

b) The armed services of the country get officers who have actually been under fire

[R. Gerschwarzenge 0]

Now that I come to think of it I have nothing against some nutcases to go shoot and be shot at if they want to.

[Oligo 1]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (R. Gerschwarzenge @ Feb. 25 2002,12:24)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Now that I come to think of it I have nothing against some nutcases to go shoot and be shot at if they want to.  <span id='postcolor'>

Exactly my point.

[Blake 0]

No government is preventing frustrated individuals from going abroad to fight as mercenaries. But by doing that those individuals are not representing their fatherland, just their personal beliefs and motivations.

It would be politically unwise to officially send young men to foreign countries to fight and gain combat experience.

Today's wars are mostly civil wars raging in third world countries so the combat experience gained from such fighting may be hard to implement on much more organized modern defence forces.

[Assault (CAN) 1]

Blake, good point, my words exactly

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Australia still uses modified leopard 1ns<span id='postcolor'>

LOL, I feel your pain. We (Canada) use about 110 modified Leopard 1's. They don't even have turbine engines (I think) but they are decent though. Our current model is the C1E1 (the 5th major upgraded version).

On Sunday (24th) I witnessed a Canadian Army firepower demonstration, it featured 4 Cougar AVGP's, 4 LAVIII's, 1 M-113 APC w/ TOW missle launcher, and 4 Leopard MBTs. And every single small arm that Canada has in its inventory on strength.

I am very happy that I was there to see our armoured vehicles flex some muscle, it was VERY cool. Those Leopards were something else, very impressive, very loud, very deadly. It was especially neat when the whole platoon of them were firing random shots at targets +2k away.

I also saw the Carl Gustav and the M-72 SRAAW-L (LAW) fired. (I have fired the inert ones before but never with a live warhead.) Very cool aswell, OFP does not even come close to simulating these weapons but OFP still does it better than any other sim out there right now.

Wow,

Tyler

[Oligo 1]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Blake @ Feb. 25 2002,15:27)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">No government is preventing frustrated individuals from going abroad to fight as mercenaries. But by doing that those individuals are not representing their fatherland, just their personal beliefs and motivations.

It would be politically unwise to officially send young men to foreign countries to fight and gain combat experience.

Today's wars are mostly civil wars raging in third world countries so the combat experience gained from such fighting may be hard to implement on much more organized modern defence forces.<span id='postcolor'>

Merccing is actually more or less banned. They can even sue you to frigging international court.

Anyway at least yanks and brits send their people to fight all the time.

[christophercles 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Oligo @ Feb. 26 2002,16:28)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Merccing is actually more or less banned. They can even sue you to frigging international court.

Anyway at least yanks and brits send their people to fight all the time.<span id='postcolor'>

They dont always send the right people.

Also, on the topic of the leopards, I once went to an "open day" at the base where my uncle used to work in the leopards. We where observing what we thought was a rifle firing demonstration over the top a lake, but there was a guy on a nearby pier fishing. Later on, after they finished firing, 3 or four guys in yowie (ghillie i guess to everyone else) suits popped up, previously unoticed by anyone, followed by a leopard 1, rolling out of the lake, that was previously having its snorkel supported by the guys fishing line. It was very impressive indeed.

[Blake 0]

I wouldn't want to be in Leo 1 or any tank when it's under water, with only snorkel bringing the air into vehicle

It seems Leopard 2 was uncontested choice for the Finnish Army but I would have liked to see some competition with different armor manufacturers, Sweden ran exhaustive tank trial in mid-90s with T-80, LecLerc, Leopard 2 and M1 tanks being tested meticulously. Leo 2 ended up as the winner, LecLerc didn't perform so well even though french manufacturer gave bottle of fine cognac with the vehicle

No info how M1 performed against Leo 2 though, perhaps there was no considerable difference other than the price tag.

But I wonder if US was trying in any way market it's surplus M1A1 + upgrade packages to Finland...Leopard 2 A4s are surplus vehicles of German Bundeswehr, but it's certain that US also has surplus M1A1s on sale since more of them have been manufactured than Leo 2s?

[S_Z 0]

According to this the M1A2 and Leopard 2A5 was equally good but the Leo didnt cost as much. It doesnt say anything about any T-80 being in the trial though...