Leopard 2 vs T-14: Armata: Russian narratives in Japan media

The euphoria in the Russian media regarding the results of Ramstein-8 (about the results of which we wrote here) lasted only a few days. When it became clear that Ukraine would receive more than 100 state-of-the-art tanks from NATO countries, the methodology of Kremlin propagandists also changed. From now on, the official version is as follows: the Russian T-14 is in many ways more effective than the German main battle tank Leopard 2*.

*Ukraine will get around 80 Leopard 2 main battle tanks and close to 180 Leopard 1 tanks from many countries from Germany to Spain and Portugal. 

 

Russian «super tank»: invincible only in the media

In order not to look completely pathetic, the Russian mass media decided to refer to an article in the Japanese edition of Traffic News, which as an expert involved a design engineer from the T-14 development group of the Uralvagonzavod enterprise. That is, the publication refers to the words of a person who banally praises his brainchild.

Now about the characteristics. The publication writes that Leopard 2 is significantly inferior to T-14 only in terms of «Run», «Attack», and «Defense». Japanese journalists are so delighted with the T-14 tank that they compare its electronic equipment to a spaceship. At the same time, the authors of the article, trying to imitate objectivity, point out that the T-14 is currently not in mass production and can only affect the situation at the front in the future. However, Russian journalists do not translate this part of the article.

 

Make wishes come true

We decided to ask about T-14 the military expert. Ruslan Forostyak clarify the situation. The specialist’s answer:

«I have seen a lot of similar propaganda articles trying to convince the whole world that Russia has some advantages in the military industry. Specifically, this Armata (T-14) has been created for 10 years and is still at the stage of research operation. What I want to pay attention to: their main modernization of the tank fleet, in particular the T-72, was due to imported components. For example, there were French optics and night vision devices. It is not clear why there were not the latest ones, as promised to be installed on the T-14».

Regarding the comparison with Leopard 2, the expert notes ironically:

«At the level of the magazine «Yuny Technik». Example: The article mentioned that the Armata would have a system that would nullify attempts to destroy this T-14 with NATO strike systems. But I know that experiments have shown that this system can destroy only portable unguided RPGs, any attack from above is not available for it. The same Javelin hits similar targets.»

A well-known Russian political figure, deputy of the State Duma of the 2nd convocation, Konstantin Borovoi, who was forced by the current Russian government to leave his homeland due to opposition activities, notes:

«Putin’s regime is not capable of creating anything, it can only engage in propaganda, steal and persecute those who speak about it. I am not a military expert, but I understand how propaganda works. To support imposed myths, it must be total. They have been taking Kyiv in 3 days for a year, but they continue to talk about state-of-the-art military developments.»

 

Conclusions

It is obvious that Russia uses similar articles, including those in the foreign press, for propaganda purposes. On the one hand, this is necessary to curb protest sentiments in the middle of the country, on the other hand, it is a signal to Ukraine’s Western partners about the futility of supplying weapons to our defense forces. If in the first case, it works so far, then the second point is completely ineffective for Russian propaganda. The process is not going as fast as we would like, but according to the results of the 8 meetings in the Ramstein format, Ukraine received practically everything, except for long-range missiles and modern aviation. But this question has also moved from a dead point.

 

Kostyantyn Grechany