How Long Does It Take to Train an Abrams Crew and Who Will Be Manning Them in Ukraine?
17:46 GMT 28.09.2023 (Updated: 18:40 GMT 28.09.2023)
© AFP 2023 / Vano Shlamov
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President Zelensky confirmed Monday that the first Abrams had arrived in Ukraine, expressing “gratitude” to Kiev’s US “allies” for fulfilling their promise…nearly four months after the start of Ukraine’s disastrous counteroffensive. What problems will the tanks run into in Ukraine? Will they even be operated by Ukrainian troops? Sputnik explores.
The delivery of the first batch of American-made M1 Abrams to Ukraine has been met with a flurry of expert opinion on just what impact the tanks will have on the battlefield, with military experts from both Russia and Western countries pointing to numerous problems with the armored juggernauts, from their weight, size and complexity, to the ubiquitous threat of Russian drones, airpower, artillery and tanks.
Speaking to French media this week, former Leclerc battalion commander Yann Boivin pointed to the Abrams’ finicky nature, emphasizing that the tanks could quickly turn into 70-ton armored coffins if not maintained properly and in a timely fashion. “The real drawback of the American tank is the high level of maintenance and logistics required. Servicing turbine engines requires a far better trained personnel than servicing diesel ones,” the French officer warned. Issues with seals in ammunition chambers, and their vulnerability to enemy fire, are two more major problems, Boivin said.
General Mark Hertling, a decorated Gulf and Iraq War veteran and former commander of United States Army Europe, warned that if the Abrams’ engines are used improperly, the tanks could simply explode.
Ukraine’s 31 Abrams have been modified and downgraded from the ones operated by the US Army, refurbished and rebuilt from the ground up, with their secrecy-laden Chobham composite ceramic, steel, and depleted uranium-laced armor swapped out, presumably due to fears that Russia might capture the tanks and drag them back behind Russian lines to hand them over to military engineers. Russian social media is already flooded with videos and photos of trophy Leopards, Bradleys, and other advanced Western military hardware seized by the Russian military, so the probability of Abrams falling into Russian hands is not insignificant – if they’re ever deployed on the battlefield, that is.
Light Speed Training ‘From the Realm of Fantasy’
Training is another problem, with US media reporting this week that NATO countries’ crash course approach to instructing Ukrainian servicemen to operate alliance equipment has led to poor maintenance, a higher-than-expected incidence of breakdowns, and malfunctioning of heavy weapons’ onboard systems.
About 200 Ukrainian tankers are reported to have received 10-12 weeks of training to operate and repair Abrams, far below the 22 weeks the US Army takes to train a crewman, and the up to 34 weeks to teach a maintenance operator to repair the complex tanks. In the US military, becoming an Abrams repairman requires applicants to score within the top 99th percentile of the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) test, or the top 88th percentile of the Mechanical Maintenance and 92nd percentile of the General Technical test. Whether and how these issues have been addressed for Ukraine’s tankmen is unclear.
Screenshot of US Army website listing requirements for the position of M1 Abrams Tank System Maintainer.
© Photo : US Army
“It’s supposed to be eight months of training, but they want to do it in 12 weeks – three months. This is something out of the realm of fantasy,” Viktor Litovkin, a retired Russian Army colonel and veteran military observer specializing in tanks, told Sputnik, when asked just how realistic it is to train an Abrams tanker in such a short time frame.
“Even the best, quickest-training troops cannot master this tank in three months, because they have never seen anything like it before,” Litovkin emphasized, pointing to Ukrainian tank crews’ decades-long experience with Soviet-era armor, whose design school and operations philosophy differs vastly from NATO’s.
“A good tankman knows his machine from top to bottom, he has to know it through and through,” the observer said. “How long has it been since you’ve seen a Ukrainian tank driver who knows engineering and military terminology-specialized English? I can’t imagine that there are many such people in the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Translation is not just a matter of inconvenience, but of perception – everything inside the tanks is in English, including instructions and manuals. So the language barrier is quite significant.”
Could Ukraine’s Abrams Be Manned by Western Mercs or NATO Troops?
Pointing out that the Ukrainian servicemen the US has trained to operate Ukraine’s Abrams could easily be killed in future battles, Litovkin said it remains an “open question” about who could replace them.
“It’s very likely that these tanks will be operated by Western mercenaries,” Litovkin believes. “Not necessarily from the US, but from any other country where these tanks are used, from Poland for example.”
Moreover, the precedent already exists. Late last week, Russian forces reported that they had destroyed a German-supplied Leopard tank in Zaporozhye manned by an entirely German-speaking crew, with the tank’s mechanic emphasizing that he was “not a mercenary but a Bundeswehr serviceman.”
Maintenance Nightmare
The same goes for maintenance, Litovkin said, pointing out that Abrams is a “very capricious” tank, with its turbine engine guzzling jet fuel, and the piece of armor afflicted by special technical problems.
“Where is Ukraine going to get jet fuel? This tank has to be cleaned regularly because it has very capricious filters, with dirt accumulating in them in the fall and winter months. Not to mention that this tank is massive, weighing over 70 tons. That’s a weight Ukraine’s bridges may not be able to handle. What’s more, they can get stuck in the mud and clay” making up much “of Ukrainian territory, especially in the fall. Our tanks are twenty tons lighter.”
And as the tanks break down, or get stuck, they could instantly find themselves targets for Russian troops armed with man-portable anti-tank weapons, mortars, artillery, and kamikaze drones, Litovkin said. “Therefore I don’t think that the Abrams will play any major role in modern warfare,” with the Americans likely to “once again damage their own reputation,” just like the British did by sending their "unbeatable" Challengers.
If the Abrams are ultimately used by Ukrainians, and not by Western mercs or troops, the only thing accomplished by sending them to Ukraine will be to put Ukrainian soldiers’ lives in danger, the observer summed up.
