We got any tankers or armored authorities on here? Reading the news blurbs, FedEx or somebody is delivering some Abrams to the Ukes in the next few days. How long to train crews and support people? Is the Abrams as bad a fuel hog as advertised? ( lot of armchair criticism of a main battle tank that has to parked half the time waiting for fuel trucks to catch up ) Is it too heavy, too big, too thirsty, too wide for European roads and bridges? Will it make any difference when it's fielded?
Training a functional crew doesn't take very long. Training a very good crew takes considerably longer. Kind of like the difference between a brand new equipment operator and a guy who has been doing the job a couple of years. Then you need to learn to work with other armor.
The Abrams is a massive fuel hog it burns a ton of fuel even sitting still. It is very maintenance intensive and it's pretty heavy I was told the M1's in our motor pool were around 70 tons combat loaded (late 90's time frame). On the other hand it's got pretty good to very good crew protection depending on the version.
Honestly I doubt that it will be the wonder weapon that wins the war.
