The pro-Russian separatists and their T-54

#451795974 / gettyimages.com

So I was derping around on Wikipedia, reading up on what kind of weapons and equipment the military of the self-proclaimed (and little recognized) Federal State of Novorossiya was using to fight against the Ukrainians. I noticed something interesting under the section about tanks: they've got a T-54. Now that itself isn't noteworthy because a lot of countries had them, thanks to the Soviet Union's foreign policies. What I did find amusing however was that they got the tank from a museum.

They've been erected new barricades on the streets of the city of a million people - and have even nicked a World War II tank from a local war museum.

The armed men arrived at Donetsk museum with heavy lifting gear, winched the Soviet era T-54 tank onto a flat-bed truck and drove it off. Squatting on top of the tank, one of them told a local online journalist: ‘‘We have got an engine to go in it. We have got some experts. We have to add the engine, ease the turret and it will be a working battle tank.’’

Well, necessity is the mother of invention, so I have to tip my hat to their improvisation. I wonder who these experts were and from which side of the border they hailed from? Actually, the separatists have a nice little armor corp, the bulk of which is made up of about 40 or more T-64s (apparently from Crimea after the Russians took over there), some T-72B1s, and a small number of other armored vehicles.

M36 Tank Destroyer

Via here, here, and here.

Tanking of you this holiday season

Centuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurioooooooooooooooooooooon!

(via Wikipedia)

Ceeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeen

(via Wikimedia)

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(via Wikimedia)

iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooon!

(via Wikimedia)

Tanks for the memories! (I'll just wait here for the pun police)

Tanks! Because why the hell not?

M103 heavy tank.

IS-3 heavy tank.

M551 Sheridan.

M60A3 Patton.

MBT-70.

Another WWII movie starring Brad Pitt, you say? Yes, please.

I wasn't aware of this until the other day, but Brad Pitt is starring in another World War II movie directed by David Ayer called Fury. It's about the crew of a M4 Sherman fighting against the Germans near the end of the European Theater of the war. Besides Pitt, the cast list is pretty impressive: Shia LaBeouf (the guy from the Transformers movies), Logan Lerman (Percy Jackson movies), Michael Peña (End of Watch, Gangster Squad, Shooter), Jason Isaacs (Lucius Malfoy in the Harry Potter movies and has done a couple of war movies such as Black Hawk Down and Wind Talkers), and Jon Bernthal from The Walking Dead.

The last WWII movie Brad Pitt did, The Inglorious Basterds, was pretty damn good, so there's hope that this one will at least be a good popcorn movie. I have this feeling that it probably won't be hugely accurate, but what war movie has ever been dead-on? Honestly, I don't care too much about strict accuracy in war movies. As long as a movie doesn't include anything absurd and blatantly inaccurate (aside from like comedies), I'll probably enjoy it.

On the other hand, Fury is only the fifth movie David Ayer has directed and the first war movie; all of this previous movies have been crime and cop dramas. He also wrote the script for U-751, which was based on the capture of that German u-boat and its Enigma Machine. Unfortunately, in the movie, he altered history by having an American submarine crew in place of the British crew who had actually captured the u-boat. He also wrote The Fast & The Furious, so take that as you will.

I guess we'll just have to wait until the first trailer comes out before we'll have any idea of whether it'll suck or not.

Paraguay still has M3 Stuart tanks

So, it all started with a post on The Wars of Pooch about a game of Flames of War involving New Zealanders in Italy against Germans. Well, the Kiwis were using three M3 Stuart Light Tanks and as is my want, I ended up on Wikipedia reading about the Stuarts. I already knew about them. Not a lot, but they weren't new to me. That's when I saw something that made me do a double take. Apparently, Paraguay's army still uses Stuarts and M4 Shermans. At first, I thought it was BS, since that bit of info had a [citation needed] tagged on at the end, so I looked up the article about the Paraguayan Army and that's when I facepalmed. They do indeed have twelve Stuarts (of which, only six still work) and three Shermans.

M3 Stuart Light Tank.

Holy crap. I know a lot of third and second world countries rely on older military vehicles, since they can't afford more up-to-date stuff, but Stuarts from World War II? Tanks from World War II? I did some checking and according to Wikipedia, a T-72 tank costs like one or two million dollars and their military budget is about $248 million. Maybe Paraguay can do a fundraiser on Kickstarter or IndieGoGo and raise money to buy tanks that aren't over sixty years old?

God, I hope they don't expect those things to actually hold up against an invasion. Paraguay, guys, be nice to your neighbors! Then again, I just read that they've only ever been in two wars, the last of which was the Chaco War in the 30s, so they should be okay.