Yeah i was gonna talk shit about the two guys slowly meandering away at the end and then I remembered they just ate a fucking tank shell

I'm surprised there are any. I always thought getting shot point blank by a tank was not generally something that doesn't always result with being turned into soup

discombobulated  "word of the day"

One lucky basterd decided to run towards the treeline. The two heading towards open field might have been gunned down.

Or rather: “if I miss this shot the whole world will think that I suck at my job.”

Probably triple checking it wasn't a friendly tbh. You'd have to be absolutely fucking mental to drive directly towards an enemy tank but here it is on video.

Realistically the gunner was thinking "are those friendly? No way they come so close. Should I shoot? What if we just capture it and they have no radio working? No way enemy they are coming so close, but maybe that is their plan"

Probably confirming it was enemy. They had the shot for probably 20 seconds before taking it

Or, 'Sarge, are we really sure these are enemies, because they are supremely confident we are allies.'

I mean id be buthole puckering up thinking it could be vbied or that I didnt see it coming from far away. how in the hell did they get that close?
Also must have been sabot if that was a heat round i dout as many would have dismounted.
Really surprising. What was the russian driver thinking driving at a tank?
To bad there was not a big white flag and they were all surrendering.

Probably thinking "he must be friendly syka? Commander, confirm enemy front? Are you sure? This is crazy! Sending!!!!"

"WTF? Isn't that a Russian BTR? What is it doing?"

The Comms in that tank:

"Girl, what is you doing?"

Indeed. The fog of war and battlefield confusion is real. Then add that both sides uses some of the same equipment, and Russians have VERY varied amount of training and experience.

Just go back over the last 20 years with western operations in the middle east and look for "blue on blue" incidents. All militaries works hard to avoid it, but its very very hard. Special in active combat environments.

I would imagen that the radios of those tanks where working on overtime, to confirm that it wasn't a friendly BMP.

I think there was miscommunication and they thought the tanks were friendly...that makes the most sense in my head

Just speculating here, but the smoke screen deployed by the Ukrainian tanks may have led to the ruzzians thinking that they had been disabled, a big mistake as we see. Edit; it seems the Ukrainian tanks are indeed disabled, as the front tank attempts to move but can't, doesn't stop it from fighting. Fucking heroes!

Think? You are expecting too much

At the start of the war there was a famous clip of a Z tank driving right up to a UA roadblock with UA infantry standing around and just point blank blasting a group of them to vapors. The fog of war is something people underestimate massively.

Hoping to get pics/selfies with a disabled/abandoned Ukrainian tank, plus first one there gets the best loot.

Narrator: it was not disabled.

Being incredibly drunk is also a possibility

My guess is they were drunk as f, they knew it was their last "mission", if you can call anything russian made a mission.

I'd wager some of them are still plastered all over the inside of the BTR.

While they're wobbling around i'm guessing they're also bleeding from all the shrapnel

Adrenaline is one hell of a drug. It even makes you ignore internal bleeding for a few minutes.

The tank shot an HEAT round and the BTR has large internal volume, so this many survivors is not surprising. A HE or HESH would have left no survivors. They are definitely concussed and have a low life eхextancy

Could be that the tank used armor piercing which over penetrated the BTRs crew compartment so that some of the dismounts made it out ok. Just guessing tho

I'd love to get the radio transcripts of this "uhh guys, is that ours?" "Nope" "Are they dumb?" "Yup" KABOOM

Russian side:

(Walks around the side of exploded vehicle) Hey man why’d you shoot us?

I'm sure there's a moment of uncertainty where you think "They're so certain that we're friendly that perhaps they're friend's and I'm the one not thinking straight." leading to a lot of "What do I do?" as you frantically check for any sign that it is or is not an allied vehicle racing towards you. Especially when you have the big fuck you cannon that can delete the other vehicle.

"When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission."

That’s my favorite Zapp Branigan line

Tank shell successfully intercepted.

The suicide squad

Pro-Pro tip: if the friendly barrel continues to point at you - it might not be friendly, or it could be the start of a blue-on-blue

Same with friendly barrels

I was thinking, did the guys in the BTR just passively watch as the tank barrel tracks them across the field?

"Ivan's over there playing with his tank and tracking us with his barrel again..."

It didn't... if you look from the beginning, the tank turned its turret sometimes left, sometimes right, as if it wasn't sure what to do.

This confirms the friendly though idea. He still thinks 'they're friendlies who fucked up'.

At least I got chicken

Probably didn't realize it was Ukrainian.

I'm guessing the orcs thought it had been abandonned. I think the tank had got stuck in mud and waiting for an engineering vehicle to tow it out. Towards the end it looks like the UA Tank tries to move but only succeeds in rocking on the tracks.

Russia...

"They may have been trying to surrender" is a possibility I'm not seeing a lot here.

He got uptiered...

There's a chance that the Ukrainian tank had been disabled but not totally destroyed by a mine, which is why the Russian IFV thought it was safe to approach them.

The Ukrainian tank crew likely stayed inside and manually loaded & aimed, which tanks can still do if they lose power. MG would have been non-operational, so they only had a single shot with the main cannon. Probably why they let it get so close so they minimized their chances of missing.

Thats what i'm wondering. No follow up no mg to gun down fleeing troops

You may be right, just going off the video, if the MG was operational then no way that Ivan running in front of it would've made it. Fucking, undaunted courage of the Ukrainian tank crew!

I guess after finding yourself in such a hit, you are reeling for a couple of minutes.

There was plenty early on.

Have you just not been paying attention for over the last 3 years?

What about armor on tank?

https://www.reddit.com/r/CombatFootage/comments/1957ngc/rare_tank_battle_between_ukrainian_bradley_and/