"In a Fight Between Abrams and T-90 Tanks, Victory ..." Topic

…Goes to the Better Crew.

"While the T-14 Armata might be Russia's latest and greatest tank, it still is not ready for service. In order to bolster the capabilities of the more conventional tank fleet while the Armata is being prepared, Russia continues to modernize its current "top-tier" tanks, such as the T-90.

Recently 40 T-90Ms, the latest variant of the T-90, were reported to be ready for delivery in the near future to combat units. Similar to the M-1A2 SEP v3, this is an upgrade kit that builds upon and improves the capabilities of the tank. It is unknown at this time whether the T-90Ms being delivered are kits being retrofitted to T-90s or T-90As. But how do these two souped-up tanks compare?

Unlike earlier generations of Russian tanks, the T-90M has practically every feature that modern Western tanks enjoy. While earlier tanks sometimes lacked an independent commander thermal sight, instead only having independent commander day and night sights, the T-90M mounts the PK-PAN independent commander sight. The gunner's sight is also thermal — the now-standard Sosna-U module…"
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Amicalement
Armand

The Abrams is superior, but the T-90 is what some people call the "80 percent solution at less than 50 percent of the cost":

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(smile)

Amicalement
Armand

IMO, the most important place where the T72 is superior is fuel economy. Active Protection systems are nice, but being able to run for more hours/miles is more important in a mobile attack or defense!

Abrams suck fuel fast enough to restart the world economy…

The Russians tried gas turbine engines with the T-80 but found them to be too complex and costly to maintain.

If the T-90 relative to the Abrams is the 80% solution at under 50% of the price, then the Abrams would be, what, the 125% solution at over twice the cost of the T-90?

I think, if the Russians were to ramp up production of their modern equipment to WW2 levels, create a mass standing army with the professional ethos of Western forces, and radically restructure their society and economy to support this…

…then they would be a threat.

But, as they're not going to do that, I think we can safely say that T-90s are not going to be facing off against Abrams variants for a long time. If ever.

T90s currently in use by Iraq and some in Syria. Egypt and Kuwait also looking to purchase them. Since Egypt , Kuwait and Iraq are already operating M1s both would be in the same armies. Very slight possibility of Iraq M1 vs Syrian T90 in areas being fought over.

I can see the appeal of buying T-90's. Like those Sprint commercials with the "Can you hear me now?" guy trying to get people to switch from Verizon where he asks "Would you pay double for only a 1% difference in network reliability?"

Not only are T-90's cheaper to buy, they're also cheaper to maintain.