Bill Graveland, THE CANADIAN PRESS

Stumble Upon

del.icio.us

Digg

Facebook

Print

Email

1 Comment(s)

BAZAR - E PANJWAII, Afghanistan - After more than a year of rumbling across the bomb-scarred roads and dusty plains of southern Afghanistan, positive reviews are coming in on the 62-tonne Leopard 2 tanks used by the Canadian Forces.

Enlarge Photo

Canadian Leopard C2 Tanks conduct a road move on the camp at the Kandahar Airfield in Afghanistan. ©DND/For Editorial and Educational Use Only

The Canadian army borrowed 20 Leopard A6Ms from the Germans in the summer of 2007 to quickly replace its own nearly 30-year-old Leopard tanks which were not suited for use in Afghanistan.

The military has since completed a deal to buy an additional 100 surplus tanks from the Dutch, and will return the loaners once the newer tanks are delivered.

The Leopard 2 tanks offer more firepower, better landmine protection, longer range and better mobility.

"We're dealing with the best main battle tank in the world right now," said tank troop leader Capt. Tim Day, from the Lord Strathcona's Horse armoured regiment based in Edmonton.

"We've got more mobility due to the size. We've got less concerns of damage to the equipment. It's a big beast and can go where it wants to really," he added.

Although it's not ideal for a lot of the terrain in southern Afghanistan, the tank's size and power offer an intimidation factor in skirmishes with the Taliban.

In Kandahar province, insurgents have rarely targeted tanks with roadside bombs - the biggest threat facing Canadian troops.

Instead, the Taliban have more frequently used improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, against lighter armoured vehicles - troop-transport vehicles that are more vulnerable to such attacks.

"It's the demonstration of force that we can provide that is just talking without having to talk," explained Day, who operates out of a Canadian forward operating base in the Panjwaii district.

"We roll in with a big tank and it sends a pretty powerful message. We don't have to fire any shots, don't have to make any threats, just have to drive a tank into a village and the bad guys get the idea."

It also gives some added safety to those riding inside the tanks - called "superbeasts" by the Taliban. The extra armour better protects occupants in an explosion, Day said.

Cpl. Joel Ribert from Montreal spent three years driving the Leopard 1 and switched to the Leopard 2 on this tour of duty. He said the difference is like night and day.

"Driving it is awesome. Usually its about 18 hours in the tank a day when we are out there," he said.

"The Leopard 2 is like a car. The steering is smooth. It just follows the road."

But the Taliban have been building bigger and bigger IEDs over the past couple of years and that still poses the biggest risk.

"It's more of an infantry problem, so we try to be like the protection for the infantry," Ribert said.

"The IEDs? We've been lucky because we have good teams for EOD (explosive ordnance disposal) who try and find the IEDs, and locals are helping us as well."

The most glaring deficiency in the design of the Leopard 2 is lack of air conditioning - a key drawback in a country where high temperatures regularly reach well into the 40s Celsius and tank crews have suffered dehydration.

To avoid wilting in the extreme heat, the four crew members - pilot, gunner, loader and crew leader - wear cooling vests to circulate chilled water over their bodies.

"Both models (Leopard 1 and Leopard 2) have now been outfitted with a refrigeration unit so the crews will wear a chiller vest which gets plugged into a refrigeration unit which chills the water and flows through the vest. It makes a huge difference," Day said.