This is the first of a two-parter on the development of Singapore's armoured fighting vehicles. I've often been quizzed on the state of development of our armour, and this post is also to serve as a summary of personal observations on the trends of local AFV development. This first bit will cover the changes over the years, with the second looking at some constants - for better or for worse!
I won't attempt to make a forecast (those often go wrong!), but will make an attempt at illuminating the Singaporean army's current thinking about AFVs and how it relates to global trends and technological development.
I won't attempt to make a forecast (those often go wrong!), but will make an attempt at illuminating the Singaporean army's current thinking about AFVs and how it relates to global trends and technological development.
First and foremost, there's been a focus away from AFVs providing their own swimming capability. Nearly all AFVs operated by the SAF were able to float across rivers and streams, given preparation. However, if you visit an Armour unit today you will find less emphasis on getting across streams on one's own steam and instead more emphasis on working with the Engineers and covering them while they conduct bridging works. Tactical experimentation seems to have come firmly on throwing a bridge across that can serve as a proper logistics link, rather than taking time and effort to ready vehicles for fording.
Effort has been made towards urban survivability. Terrex is one vehicle that seems intended for fighting in towns and other built-up areas. The remote weapons station looks to be able to elevate to high angles to engage targets at all levels, and the counter-sniper sound system may be put to good use (although as any movie-maker will tell you, acoustics in a city is terribly wonky). "Armour doesn't fight urban", was once the refrain. This has changed, and it's perhaps handy that the barrier between green and black beret is blurring. May well spark a rethink of the whole organization.
The answer to the question: "How will we see out of the tank?" has also changed. The vast majority of Singaporean armour still operates under "Vietnam war rules", with vehicle commanders and infantry poking out of hatches to provide vision. In the closed terrain where the SAF trains (and presumably will operate), this makes a modicum of sense. However, time has marched on, with CITV (commander's independent thermal viewer) sights and other innovations such has external-mounted cameras going some way to enable vision under armour. For example, many Western MBTs like the Abrams and Challenger with independent commanders' sights allow the tank commander to search for targets, with the gunner controlling the turret. If the commander wants to direct fire, he can hit a button to orient the turret to the commander's field of view. This has found its way into the SAF vocabulary under the term "hunter-killer": the commander hunts, then the gunner kills. Frankly, this is a long overdue development, and this blog wholeheartedly welcomes it, despite my personal understanding of how dicey it is moving AFVs about even with many pairs of eyes sticking out.
The utility of cameras to watch one's sectors is still limited - a single camera watching an arc doesn't do a good job portraying depth of field, for one, and may require some sort of binocular package. This is ultimately an engineering question, however, and solutions will likely emerge as more and more nations work with hatches closed. Keeping heads in the vehicle will do more than ensure safety - having half the section hanging out the back of APCs does tend to restrict the field of fire of the main turret armament. While they make up for it somewhat by shooting their own guns out the back, constraining the turret to only firing forward is a bit of a waste.
Our SHORAD vehicles have also had a new lease of life - from RBS 70s mounted on the rather geriatric wheeled V-200, we've gone to Iglas mounted on tracked M113s. With a simple air-search radar, I might add. Air defence is sadly not my strong point, so I hope very much that the V-200 is gone. Since the practice seems to be the Army passing its surplus to requirements AFVs to the Air Force, a Bionix-mounted system might be next. (It's a shame that the RSAF's field defence squadrons no longer have light armour - but it seems the V-200s were much unloved, for some reason.)
Another quieter development is proofing against mines and the increasingly catch-all term IED. One lesser-known issue with mines is that even if armour protection isn't breached the shockwave can be transmitted via AFV seats and surfaces to send the occupants banging about. Certain AFVs that the SAF has have not swopped in their normal, more comfortable seats for harnesses suspended from vehicle roofs, which are intended to be immune from this effect. One hopes that other steps have been taken as well.
The answer to the question: "How will we see out of the tank?" has also changed. The vast majority of Singaporean armour still operates under "Vietnam war rules", with vehicle commanders and infantry poking out of hatches to provide vision. In the closed terrain where the SAF trains (and presumably will operate), this makes a modicum of sense. However, time has marched on, with CITV (commander's independent thermal viewer) sights and other innovations such has external-mounted cameras going some way to enable vision under armour. For example, many Western MBTs like the Abrams and Challenger with independent commanders' sights allow the tank commander to search for targets, with the gunner controlling the turret. If the commander wants to direct fire, he can hit a button to orient the turret to the commander's field of view. This has found its way into the SAF vocabulary under the term "hunter-killer": the commander hunts, then the gunner kills. Frankly, this is a long overdue development, and this blog wholeheartedly welcomes it, despite my personal understanding of how dicey it is moving AFVs about even with many pairs of eyes sticking out.
The utility of cameras to watch one's sectors is still limited - a single camera watching an arc doesn't do a good job portraying depth of field, for one, and may require some sort of binocular package. This is ultimately an engineering question, however, and solutions will likely emerge as more and more nations work with hatches closed. Keeping heads in the vehicle will do more than ensure safety - having half the section hanging out the back of APCs does tend to restrict the field of fire of the main turret armament. While they make up for it somewhat by shooting their own guns out the back, constraining the turret to only firing forward is a bit of a waste.
Our SHORAD vehicles have also had a new lease of life - from RBS 70s mounted on the rather geriatric wheeled V-200, we've gone to Iglas mounted on tracked M113s. With a simple air-search radar, I might add. Air defence is sadly not my strong point, so I hope very much that the V-200 is gone. Since the practice seems to be the Army passing its surplus to requirements AFVs to the Air Force, a Bionix-mounted system might be next. (It's a shame that the RSAF's field defence squadrons no longer have light armour - but it seems the V-200s were much unloved, for some reason.)
Another quieter development is proofing against mines and the increasingly catch-all term IED. One lesser-known issue with mines is that even if armour protection isn't breached the shockwave can be transmitted via AFV seats and surfaces to send the occupants banging about. Certain AFVs that the SAF has have not swopped in their normal, more comfortable seats for harnesses suspended from vehicle roofs, which are intended to be immune from this effect. One hopes that other steps have been taken as well.
The SAF is having another go at battlefield networking in the combat arms. The earlier versions of the Battlefield Management System (BMS) fielded with the Armour formation were, to not put too fine a point on it, were pretty disappointing. Another try is being had with the Infantry formation. The "Advanced Combat Man System" (ACMS) is one such attempt, but the Terrex AFVs come with onboard computing and supposedly have a version of the BMS. Time will tell if the technology is mature.
We don't have any more tank riders, for sure!
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