Tanks for Your Money, Suckers

The North Korean Army is holding winter exercises, and the Joongang Ilbo has the tank porn. This cream puff is a Soviet PT-76, or ChiCom clone of one. The PT-76 is no match for a main battle tank — it sacrifices armor protection in exchange for an amphibious capability, and its gun can’t penetrate the armor of any main battle tank.

Frankly, I can’t really see why the North Korean army is so fond of these lightly-armored amphibious tanks in a place that’s not especially thick with rivers, and where it’s widely expected that North Korea would have to attack when the rice paddies are all frozen. I still wouldn’t drive a PT-76 through a wet paddy, and you can’t climb Korea’s rocky hills with one. On the other hand, Korea is full of natural choke-points, which makes it great ambush country for infantry with RPG-2‘s or AT-4‘s. In fact, when I was in the Army, I recall being surprised to learn that you could drill your way into one of these with a .50 caliber machine gun. The North Koreans also make the PT-85, a slightly up-gunned, up-armored variant, but as you no doubt noticed, it has five road wheels, not six.

Love the message of peace and brotherly love on the sign, by the way:

In an indication that the North had directly targeted the South in its exercise, four of the photos showed signs bearing names of South Korean cities and highways. In one, a tank is seen passing a sign reading, “The Chungang Expressway, Chuncheon-Busan 374 km,” in reference to a highway that connects Gangwon province on the east coast and the Gyeongsang regions in the southeast.

I wonder where South Korea can go to claim a refund for all that money it wasted on the Sunshine Policy. Laugh all you want. Your tax dollars paid for it, too.