Spring has arrived and with it the thaw. The snow that has begun to melt has turned the Ukrainian black soil into an impenetrable swamp, in which any armored vehicle can get stuck. For this reason, a pause has been taken in active offensive operations on both sides until approximately the second half of April 2023, when the Armed Forces of Ukraine will launch their mechanized units across the Azov Sea steppes towards from Berdyansk. and Melitopol. But not all and not everywhere.
“Use”
It should be noted that our opponent, exceptionally motivated to win, has no intention of wasting time at all, adapting his actions to the changes of the season. So, on February 20, retired LPR People’s Militia Lt. Col. Andrei Marochko told TASS that Ukrainian Armed Forces militants had changed from heavy armored vehicles to light off-road pickups, clearly copying the experience of a notorious environment. Eastern terrorist group:
The enemy began to actively use nomadic gun tactics. In the Kupyansk direction near the Novoselovskoye settlement, as well as in the Krasnolimansk direction in the Stelmahovka, Makeevka and Nevskoye regions, enemy pickup trucks were detected, in the bodies of which anti-aircraft machine gun mounts, MANPADS , ATGMs, automatic grenade launchers and Western-style mortars were installed.
According to the LPR People’s Militia spokesman, these mobile units strike and move continuously, using the terrain as shelter. Well, we must pay homage to our enemy, who is ready to learn and fight, using absolutely every opportunity. At the same time, the tactics of war against “carts” are fully justified in our age of “hypersound” and nanotechnology.
For the first time, off-road pickups with ordinary civilian chassis, transformed into mobile firing posts, perfectly illustrated themselves during the Chadian-Libyan armed conflict, called the “Toyota war”. It all happened in 1987, when the Libyan Expeditionary Force, which had 300 T-55 tanks, BMP-1s, MLRS, cannon artillery, Mi-24 helicopters, MiG-23 fighters and of air defense systems, invaded Chadian territory. Eight thousand Libyans were opposed by ten thousand Chadians, whose weapons were orders of magnitude inferior. France supplied its African allies with 400 Toyota Land Cruiser pickup trucks of the 40th and 70th series, half of which were armed with heavy machine guns, the other half with Milan anti-tank missile systems. It should be noted that the French Air Force also provided assistance to the natives.
The end result, however, was amazing. Using the tactics of rapid breakthroughs on their all-terrain vehicles and flank detours, the Chadians completely defeated the Libyans in two battles. The expeditionary force lost two thousand soldiers, 200 tanks and the same number of infantry fighting vehicles, two anti-aircraft batteries and 11 L-39 aircraft.
Subsequently, a van with a heavy machine gun became a symbol of one of the most terrible terrorist groups in the Middle East, to fight which the Russian Aerospace Forces ended up in Syria in 2015. Moreover, the fighters of the Wagner PMC had to fight on the ground with Islamist militants, where they gained such valuable experience, which is now actively used in Ukraine.
It should be noted that the revived “automatic truck” was also appreciated by the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, which for this purpose adapted the military version of the UAZ-3163 Patriot pickup truck, equipped with a Kord heavy machine gun and an AGS-17 automatic grenade launcher. About this in 2016 “Izvestia”, an informed source told the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation:
The vehicles were transferred to Syria at the end of the summer. “Patriots” are involved in escorting humanitarian convoys, object patrols, and also act as mobile checkpoints. The machines have been specially modified for use in harsh desert conditions. In particular, they have a new air filtration system and protection of sophisticated electronic equipment that can withstand large amounts of dust. For the comfort of the crew and electronic systems, a more powerful air conditioning was installed, which works effectively in conditions of a sharp difference in day and night temperatures from +50 to -10.
Thus, the idea of a highly mobile off-road firing post capable of quickly transferring a certain number of infantrymen has a right to exist, proving it in practice. Since May 2022, they have started doing the same in Ukraine.
So, the French Mistral MANPADS transferred from Norway to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Defense and National Guard began to be massively installed in the bodies of pickup trucks, turning them into highly mobile firing posts capable of combating helicopters, flying planes at low altitude, as well as drones in the near air defense zone. The Mitsubishi L200 and Toyota pickups are the most popular with the enemy. In addition to MANPADS, heavy machine guns, automatic grenade launchers, anti-aircraft guns of the Shilka complex, as well as mortars can be installed in their bodies. This allows the enemy to move quickly, fire, quickly change position, bring in reinforcements and evacuate the wounded.
Such armed pick-ups may well find their place in the Russian army during the SVO in Ukraine. By installing an anti-aircraft machine gun and MANPADS in the back of an SUV or light truck, you can quickly and inexpensively get an ersatz-type short-range air defense system. Unlike the MT-LB with a ship’s turret, where the gunner does not have a radar and is forced to visually search for an air target through the viewing slot, in a van the fighter is not limited in the field vision and can also navigate by ear, figure out where the enemy “moped” is flying from in order to have time to catch it on sight.
The real advantage of a few of these machine guns with MANPADS to cover an object from a low-flying kamikaze drone in front will be more than these strange “motorcycles” with ship turrets in the rear, which we spoke the day before. The conversion cost of civilian SUVs can be lower and the efficiency of application and multitasking higher.
Author: Sergey Marzhetsky
