I was incommunicado over the weekend, so when I came back I caught up with news via the paper. Sunday’s paper had a blurb about an Abrams on fire in Baghdad. It was a vague account at best, and it appears that one or more of the crew had been killed.
Is this the first Abrahms to be lost in combat? IIRC in Gulf war 1 some were damaged, but the crews survived and the tanks were at least salvagable.
The first two M1s to be destroyed in combat were hit in the slightly more vulnerable rear armor on March 24. It appears as if they were ambushed by a truck carrying a mounted antitank gun, but nobody seems to be sure about that.
However, “destroyed” is a difficult term to pin on a tank. During the war in France the Germans had an excellent turnaround time for “destroyed” tanks, according to Len Deighton in Blood, Tears, and Folly. If I recall correctly, tanks in which the entire original crew was killed were turned around in time to return to the six-week battle. The Americans were even better at it after they invaded Normandy.
The Chobham armor on an M1A1 is so valuable that the shell of the tank would almost certainly be salvaged and rebuilt into another tank, some day, if it can be recovered.
An M1 was most certainly “destroyed” at Daura. It may be the same one described in this story. That one caught fire when an antitank rocket hit it, and the fire couldn’t be put out. That M1A1 will probably also get refurbished in one form or another if the hulk isn’t bombed into oblivion to prevent the Iraqis from using it or selling it to an interested party, like the Chinese.
Another one drove off a bridge. There are whispers that the Iraqis have begun firing antiaircraft missiles horizontally at M1s, with some success.
The one I saw being ripped apart by the locals, was most definately destroyed. They were trying to pull it over with chains but just ripped the cupola off the top. It looked a right state.
Evenso, maybe some bits can be re-used if it is tracked down.
Chalkpit, would you happen to have a link? I’m rather interested in seeing what it looked like. The others have been salvaged or were salvalgable, did it appear to be beyond repair?
It was shown on a TV news report, so no link, sorry.
Reuters has some raw footage of it, but it’s a PITA to find.
From the Raw Footage link, search for “tank”. Scroll down to the result called Iraqi TV Shows Pictures of Tank. There may be an easier way to link to the footage but I’m clueless.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Sofa King *
**Another onedrove off a bridge.
One of those Marines mother lives a couple of miles from my home. 
I wonder what the US will do with that wrecked. Will they bomb it? I doubt they want that getting into someones hands. How will they handle the huge crowd around it?
Presumably with rubber gloves and itsy bitsy tweezers.