Russia’s armed forces have removed obsolete tanks and armored vehicles from long-term military storage for a number of reasons, not just the most obvious, to use them in attacks, military analysts at the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) noted in their article. The latest assessment of the conflict in Ukraine.

ISW notes that the dispatch to the front of some T-54/55 tanks produced in the second half of the 1940s and 50s, the information that appeared the day before, will be aimed at compensating for significant losses in part of the armored forces of Russia.

Oryx, an independent site that tracks casualties on both sides of the war in Ukraine, estimates that Russian forces have so far lost at least 57 T-90 tanks, 448 T-80 tanks, 1,025 T-72 tanks, and 53 T-64 tanks. models and 73 T-62.

“The losses of Russian armored vehicles currently limit the ability of the Russian Armed Forces to conduct effective mechanized maneuvers in its stalled offensive operations in Ukraine,” ISW notes.

Russia needs tanks with cheap spare parts

American military analysts note that the use of T-54/55 tanks could be aimed at filling losses and strengthening the offensive actions of the Russian army.

But they also say the tanks can also perform a defensive role, being deployed in anticipation of a mechanized counteroffensive by Ukrainian forces.

“The Russian armed forces can also decide to deploy these tanks, because the components for repairing T-54/55 tanks are available in large quantities and are much cheaper. The Soviet Union produced tens of thousands of T-54/55 tanks after World War II,” the ISW assessment states.

At the same time, it is emphasized that the T-54/55 tanks do not benefit from the protection offered by the armor of more modern combat vehicles.

Russian tankers brought to the front, victims of “fossils”.

“Russian forces are likely to suffer more casualties using these old tanks in Ukraine. Deploying low-quality equipment to restore Russia’s ability to conduct mechanized maneuvers may lead to further degradation of Russian personnel in Ukraine,” military analysts explain.

They remind that the destruction of a tank often means the loss of its entire crew, whose training can last for months.

“It is not clear how effective these tanks will be against Ukrainian armored vehicles. Instead, they are extremely vulnerable to the many anti-tank systems that Ukraine has at its disposal, and not all of them are expensive,” ISW added.

American military analysts attribute this to the fact that some observers of the war have begun to say that Ukrainian forces will eventually use the expensive anti-tank systems they received from the West to destroy outdated combat vehicles and at a lower cost.

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