The North PacificBoard

Mobility. Survivablity. Letahlity.

These three aspects of warfare are the hallmarks of any halfway decent armored fighting vehicle. To make such a fearsome weapon of war, all three of them must be properly accounted for. Ignore one of them too much and you end up with an overly vulnerable or ineffective vehicle. On the other hand, place too much emphasis on one of them and your vehicle becomes to complex, too unreliable or too expensive to actually be useful. After years of R and D, and a whole lot of international cooperation, East Supple Lund believes it has come up with the ulimate fighting vehicle: the MBT-69!

Developed during a time of great uncertainty, this tank was made for one express purpose: to combat the growing influence of rival alliances. From the rapidly expanding alliance of OSEAN, to the all present and ever menacing Warsaw Pact, ESL had many enemies abroad hungry for some sweet Supple clay. When the impulsive alliance known as FLOOF was founded, it sent off alarm bells all over ESL. Thus, a massive overhaul of the military was deemed necessary, and out of the many projects of that time came the MBT-69 tank.

Designed to successfully defeat hordes of enemy tanks, the MBT-69 was given the latest advancements in firepower, allowing it to engage multiple targets at long range while keeping itself safe from return fire. It was nimble enough to escape enemy counterattacks and get to where it was most needed. Of course, the tanks of Friently and the Hong kong empire never actually came to ESL, and instead, the tank found itself fighting an enemy much closer to home: fellow Supple Lundians.

After three civil disturbances, the Supple Defense Forces have become quite adept in the art of urban and guerilla warfare. Naturally, such lessons came at a high cost, and were paid for in their fair share of Supple blood. Many MBT-69s fell prey to anti-tank rockets and IEDs in the Nurth and West Supple regions, and it quickly became apparent that the tank was very much NOT designed for this type of warfare.

After the last Great Supple Civil War, ESL contracted the nation of North Armatas to make some improvements to the base model, including a redesigned hull and turret housing a new type of explosive reactive armor (ERA) that would be able to defeat any missiles headed its way. These improvements were quite successful, and the newly christened MBT-69/ESL found immediate export success among a number of nations such as The wellerman and Tierdza. One of the nations currently interested in buying the vehicle was the nation of Rising sakura, who had asked ESL to hold an exhibition to show off some of the features of the vehicle. ESL was happy to oblige and had split the event into three parts to showcase each aspect of the tank's fighting capability.

First was the mobility component.

A mockup of a ruined city had been erected on the demonstration field, complete with burned out buildings and large piles of rubbles strewn about the streets. The MBT-69 began the demonstration by showcasing its impressive top speed of 69 kilometers per hour, doing laps around the outskirts of the wrecked "city". It only took the tank around 15 seconds for it to reach its top speed, and it was able to maintain its breakneck pace even as it entered the city proper, its all-terrain capabilities making short work of the various obstacles that blocked the city streets. The tank was able to climb any slope it encountered, being able to defeat anything up to 60 degrees, and vertical obstacles were nary a problem, the tank easily capable of traversing anything up to 2 meters in height. One particularly noteworthy feature of the vehicle was its hydropneumatic suspension, allowing the vehicle to lower and raise itself on command. This feature, combined with the tank’s low height of 8 and a half feet and its fully retractable 20mm autocannon, allowed the tank to reach a total height of just over 6 and a half feet, allowing it excellent hull down firing position. The tank pulled alongside a piece of rubble and used its suspension to sink beneath it, leaving only the turret exposed. The demonstration ended with the tank fording a 13 foot deep ditch, filled with water. It had equipped on it specialized snorkel device allowing the tank to become completely waterproof, letting it pass through the water with ease.

Next on the agenda was the lethality portion of the exhibition.

For this portion, the 140mm armed MBT-69 was selected to show off its incredible firepower. Moving throughout the city’s ruins, the tank was set upon by a horde of radio-controlled drones, known as R.O.B units. These wheeled contraptions were surprisingly agile for their size and came at the tank from all different directions. Within seconds, the tank’s roof mounted 20mm autocannon was fully deployed, and alongside its coaxial 50 caliber machine gun, made short work of all the drones. As the tank continued on its way, it was “attacked” once again, this time from the air. A large number of DDS-Bassmouth drones and PB-Fireball helicopter drones descended onto the tank, buzzing around as they circled the vehicle. They fared little better than their ground-based counterparts and were promptly torn apart by airburst rounds and tracer ammunition.

But, all these were but a precursor to the main event: the firing of the 140mm cannon. After reaching the city outskirts, the tank began engaging targets from both stationary and mobile positions, its stabilizer and hydropnuematic suspension allowing the tank a high degree of accuracy. A number of different targets were blown to smithereens, ranging from tank silhouettes to anti-tank guns to mortar and missile positions. It didn’t matter how far the targets were, 500 to 5,000 meters made no difference to the tank’s advanced fire controls.

After a short rest for the tanker crews, it was time for the final portion of the exhibition: the survivability portion.

Both the 120mm and 140mm tanks were driven onto the field, facing one another from several thousand meters away. Once each tank was in position, the tank crews exited the vehicles and moved off the field as quickly as they could. Once all crew members were clear, another team of Supple soldiers came back on, armed with some sort of anti-tank missile launcher. They set up the device on the flank of the 120mm tank, took aim at it, and fired away! A loud *fwoosh* could be heard as the missile screamed toward its target, intent on disintegrating it at all costs. But just before the missile made contact, it suddenly exploded several feet away from the tank, preemptively detonating it before it could strike the tank. It had been intercepted by the BRUH-42 APS (Active Protection System). As the MBT-69 had been designed without an integrated APS, ESL had developed a modular “brick” of APS that could be integrated with the tank’s ERA. These bricks of APS were quite cheap to make, could be mounted onto any flat surface of the tank, and had lightning-fast reaction times, although it only held a single shot and had no IFF to speak of. Nonetheless, it was a highly effective system.

The Supple missile team adjusted their aim toward the other tank, and fired another missile at it. Once again, as the missile flew toward its target, it failed to make contact, though this time the missile instead spiraled out of control over the turret of the tank and plowed into the ground several dozen feet behind it. It had been intercepted by an infrared “dazzler” system mounted onto the top of the tank, allowing it to interfere with the missile’s guidance system. It was part of the tank’s 3 tiered defense system, a mix of both passive and active protection systems.

At this point, the missile team moved off the field, but the previous tanker crew returned to their tank. They drove the vehicle forward, rotated the turret and aim the powerful 120mm cannon toward the other Supple tank! Were they going to fire a their own equipment? As the barrel was lowered, the tank fire, and out the end came…a load of confetti! Thousands of pieces of green, blue and white paper fluttered throughout the wind, eliciting a smattering of laughter from the onlooking crowd. Oh, those quirky Supple Lundians!

*Then the tank fired a live round.

A large 120mm shell came hurtling though the air, smashing into the side of the 140mm tank’s turret. A massive explosion emanated from the zone of impact, the ERA exploding as the shell made contact. Once the smoke drifted away, it was clear that the ERA had detonated as designed, but the turret itself was completely unharmed! ESL claimed that the ERA developed by Armatas was equally effective against both HEAT and APFSDS rounds. Such a claim was hard to verify, as the round had been completely dissolved by the ERA armor. Nonetheless, it was a highly advanced and effective armor system.*

With that, the exhibition was over, and the two tanks were quickly taken in for maintenance and replacement of any missing ERA, and were soon back on the field for display. Along with the two tanks, the Supple Lundians also had out on display the SVBT-69A1, a heavy infantry fighting vehicle built on the chassis of the tank. It had a turret with a pair of 30mm autocannons, 4 missile tubes and a single 50 caliber machine gun instead of the main cannon, and could optionally take 2 hull mounted grenade machine guns. This example had extra hull armor and a bulldozer blade instead.

Thus, ESL hoped that they had sufficiently impressed their hosts, and that a contract would soon be forthcoming…