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About the so-called "infinite" tank potential of the Russian army.

As I cover the subject of tanks in the Russian army, I periodically encounter

the opinion that Russia's tank potential is practically infinite.

And it seems that this is not unreasonable.

For example, there is information in open sources about the number of tanks in storage in Russia.

Only these types of tanks in storage in Russia are more than 13 thousand! But there is a nuance.

The fact is that a tank that has been in storage for a long time, especially one that is kept in

conditions, to say the least, unsatisfactory, is not always possible to restore to the level

of combat capability. And Russia has far more such tanks than can be put back into service.

According to preliminary estimates, the potential to return the tanks from storage

through restoration of their serviceability is up to 2,900 tanks. The rest are scrap and donors.

But something else is much more interesting, namely that now there are videos with echelons

of T-54/55 tanks being taken out of storage in Khabarovsk Krai.

This raises the corresponding question - what is the purpose and reason behind this happening?e

If you have 2,900 tanks of different types, why would you take up plant resources and spend

man-hours restoring a tank that was accepted for service in 1946, when you could simply pull a T-72

or T-80 out of mothballs? Isn't it because the actual storage situation is much worse?

I'd say it's more like armor graveyards than proper storage conditions for the most part.

Furthermore, the problem extends beyond that. The fact is that the restoration timeframe for

T-72 and T-80 tanks is much more arduous than that of T-62 tanks (because of their

basic design) and T-90 tanks (primarily due to their relative modernity). Consequently,

it is faster to return the latter two to service than the fickle T-80s and the T-72s.

Thus Russia now has far fewer tanks which can be returned to

serviceability after withdrawal from storage. There is not enough resource

to restore the relatively modern tanks, hence the focus is on the older models.

And it is for this reason that the dusky "genius" of the Russian Military-industrial

complex has to pull out T-54 and T-55 tanks to make up for the lack of tanks in the

combat zone, because Russia's restoration capabilities are much worse than imagined.

In my line of work I have to look through a lot of information, including enemy propaganda resources.

Yet, they fail to mention that the Russian military had to withdraw from a number of

positions as the Ukrainians bombarded them with artillery fire so heavily that it was

no longer tenable to maintain positions on the Zaporizhzhia front due to the incurred losses.

They are silent about the fact that for several days there is a check on the readiness of combat

units, because the leadership is not confident that the defenses will not fall on the first day.

Why are they silent about the fact that the number of equipment and personnel

supply has significantly decreased several times compared to the winter?

Why the silence about the fact that instead of "offensive on Orikhiv or Hulyaipole"

they are already thinking "where to retreat: to Mariupol or to Crimea"?

They are silent about the buses that are already reserved for

evacuation in Genichesk, which borders Crimea.

Why not a word about the column of damaged equipment in Crimea,

which the enemy will not be able to restore before the counterattack by the AFU forces?

And in general, where are all the victory materials?

It seems that everything is quite sad for the propagandists in recent weeks.

There are a lot of questions, but for some reason I did not find any answers.

But I found another scare story about a nuclear strike if the Ukrainian counteroffensive moves

to Crimea. And even a version that these ancient T-55 tanks were created to fight in a nuclear war.

This will be what "red line" in the account,

which will pass the Ukrainian side ? And it will cross it, no doubt about it.