Wednesday, June 04, 2014

Ukraine switches to Dozor APCs. Dropping BTR-4E.



via Voice of Russia
Turchynov reviewed on Wednesday heavy armored and special vehicles at the Chuguyev firing range in the eastern Kharkov region, which will be used by the Ukrainian army, including during Kiev’s punitive operation in the country’s east, the acting president’s press office reported.
The armor was also inspected by Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov and commanders of the battalions involved in Kiev’s so-called "anti-terrorist operation" in the country’s east.
"The small armored personnel carrier Dozor is three times cheaper than the BTR-4E APC and has proved its efficiency in field conditions. Today this vehicle is awaited in the National Guard," the press office quoted Turchynov as saying.
Military experts say it will take several months to put the Dozor APC into serial production. Poland earlier purchased a license from Ukraine to make these combat vehicles operational in the Polish army.
Turchynov, Avakov and battalion commanders are expected to visit the headquarters of Kiev’s military operation near the town of Slavyansk in the eastern Donetsk region on Wednesday, Interfax reports.
The President of Ukraine is touring defense manufacturing facilities and announces that instead of their premier vehicle, the BTR-4E, they're switching to the cheaper DOZOR.

They're dealing with an insurgency/civil war and they're scrimping on defense?

Their economy must be worse than I thought.


18 comments :

  1. sol,

    I dont think it's about saving money, it's about quantity, if's ita a third of the price, you can get 3 times the amount.

    The old russian doctorine of, "quantity, has quality, of it's own", plus there economy, is going down the tubes, so, if they only buy 2 instead of 3, they save money too boot.

    ReplyDelete
  2. "National Guard" is a bit of loaded term. I wonder whether the Russians put that in or Ukrainians actually said it?

    You would thought they would have used their dollars to buy American..... ;)

    A nice pic' of a BTR-4 swimming,

    http://media.defenseindustrydaily.com/images/LAND_BTR-4_Swimming_lg.jpg

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh another fantasy "news" from Russia.

    Poland did not buy nor license or any Dozor-B vehicle. The Lacenaire Limited Сo. coop with Polish private company Mista to product Dozor-B as Oncilla. They show it in MSPO 2013, but that's the end. Polish Army did not show interest with that vehicle and there is no plans to buy any type of that combat vehicle in near future.

    http://www.armyrecognition.com/mspo_2013_show_daily_news_coverage_report/oncilla_a_new_lightweight_multi-purpose_dual-axis_armored_vehicle_at_mspo_2013.html

    ReplyDelete
  4. BTR-4 you are seeing are leftovers from an Iraqi order that Iraq refused to take as the vehicles had cracks in armor plate (something about being welded in subzero temps )http://andrei-bt.livejournal.com/259205.html

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That type of cracks are nothing new in BTR series, those vehicles or rather most of old soviet designs (even with new paint job) always had problems with quality. Looks like arms company's in Ukraine try to maintain this "tradition".

      Delete
    2. You are wrong, Shas. Those cracks in the armor plates were a result of a disturbance of the production technology during welding works.

      Delete
    3. 1Modeus I'm wrong saying that they are a quality problem because they are... problem with quality of welding? :D

      Delete
    4. Shas, you have said about the soviet vehicles quality, yes, there had been problems as any production can have problems, however in this case the cracks were not caused by technology problems in general, that was simply someone's negligence.

      Delete
  5. The Ukraine economy has been and is a basket case, it is becoming steadily worse and it will be the US/EU's responsibility to subsidize the Ukraine economy at a higher level than Russia has been doing.

    Losing the Russian market for defense goods from Ukraine's old Soviet-era plants wouldn't be compensated by the West. So we're talking hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies to sustain a further broken Ukraine economy, while Russia sits by and watches. Russia has no choice because his US/EU opponents are so much stronger, militarily and financially, than Russia.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You have an odd definition of winning. The Russians sit by while the Germans and the US throw billions down the drain. Militarily stronger? Yes, but where is the military threat apart from nukes? Financially stronger? The Federal Reserve is only keeping things going by printing dollars. While the large emerging economies are starting to trade in currencies other than the dollar. We need to hope whoever comes into the White House next is a steadier hand and puts US domestic concerns first. When your political head of state dodges domestic troubles for the world stage you know he hasn't got a clue what to do. I bet China is just waiting to push the Philippines and Vietnamese off some rocks in the South China sea. Winning you say? Doesn't look like it from here.

      Delete
  6. Cracks are nothing new on Armored vehicles with no subframe as armor has to also carry drivetrain loads ,in General Dynamics Pandur ,Slovenian army had to reinforce Pandur 6X6 hulls as they were cracking in use.
    But on BTR4 these were from manufacturing not stress of use.

    ReplyDelete
  7. One could argue that an insurgency would require MRAP type vehicles rather than an APC with autocannon. I think that's probably the rationale

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. MRAP type vehicle is good only for one threat ,roadside bomb in everything else its second or even third rate and it can't be compared to a 8x8 AFV .

      Delete
  8. With the way the attrition rates are mountig for the ukrainians it does not matter what vehicle they produce in the short term.
    Yesterday they lost two Mi-24 attack helicopters, rumors are they lost three and TWO Su-25 attack jets, tensions are rising after a su-25 fired unguded S-8 rockets at the public administration building in Lugansk.
    If this continues thru the next months or so they might suffer significant losses in combat aviation.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yesterday? Do you have any link to the info of that, can't find any.

      For now, they lost two Mi-24 one in air and one on ground. Two or three transport choopers, probably Mi-8. No info about any plane lost (rumors are still the rumors) and attack of Su-25 on administration building is highly doubted, from pic it's look like inside of building detonation and scale of damage is way to small for S-8 warhead. I saw the power of them on training grounds, damage would be a loot bigger.

      Delete
    2. rusvesna.su/news/1401905298

      For now its just a claim by the seperatist. We shall see in the coming days if they show some shotdown Su-25s, remeber however if they fell outside seperatist controlled territory, they wont show them.
      Also we shall see if the ukrainians are really using heavy artillery near Slaviansk.

      Delete
    3. They like it or not, but number of equipment casualties of Ukrainian forces is pretty clear. To many different journalists, TV cameras, cell phones there to hide that info. Lost of attack planes would be a really good news ( good in meaning for media, you know "bad news are good news" ) that I think we would have in every media on the world.

      But as you said, we shall see in the future what is what and who was who.

      Delete
    4. Oh, for fuck sakes. It was a Su-25 that attacked the administration building.

      http://tomgiuretis.com/2014/06/an-assessment-of-the-june-2-luhansk-administration-building-attacks/



      Even the OSCE refutes Ukraine's absurd story that the Luhansk airstrike was caused by the rebels themselves, and confirms it was, like everyone with a brain should have known*, a Ukrainian air strike.

      *The notion that the tiny warhead of a single MANPADS could somehow create a series of large explosions is so comical it beggars belief. That Kiev's absurd lie was promulgated at all is a sad testament to the ignorance of reporters and people like you that actually believe this.

      S-8 warhead's are more then big enough to do this damge.

























      Delete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.