it's not T-62 levels of cheap and ease of manufacture, the tank it was meant to replace
The T-72 was meant to replace the T-54, not the T-62. The T-64 and T-80 were the T-62 replacements. At lesat as far as I am aware, btut I'm sure that
@ZTZ-99A or
@DNNS-2 would know better.
It got scope and feature creeped and ended up as the generic tank of the modern age.
No, it received multiple upgrade packages throughout it's lifespan, most of which were the result of necessity within the Soviet and later Russian industrial complex since its replacements weren't enough of an upgrade to justify them since the Soviet and later Russian economy straight up couldn't handle it. The fact that it is "the generic tank of the modern age" simply means that it serves as the gold standard against which all other tanks are compared, much like the Sherman of WWII or the T-54 that the T-72 replaced.
The 3kmph reverse speed is shit
No one will disagree with you on this, this is a known weakness of the design although given Soviet doctrine in the sixties and early seventies it's largely a non-factor in the design and has only become a problem with non-Soviet countries which possess different doctrines from the Soviets and later on when the Soviets transitioned more fully into Citadel Defense rather than First Strike and Deep Battle.
For a sliver of Finland they got, they took immense fucking casualties to guys with skis and hand me downs
Which still isn't a loss. An inch or a mile, winning is winning.
Do you understand what the term phyric means?
Do you? Neither the Winter War nor the Continuation War were pyrrhic victories for the Soviets. Had there been a third round the Finns would have ceased to exist assuming Stalin followed the Continuation War playbook.
The actual weakness of the Soviet model is an excessive reliance on the commander having to handle everything, and not trusting or developing proper NCOs who can be relied on to find whatever solution has to be solved. Then again, they did develop a lot of aids and standard procedures for the commanders to use if they are in situation X or Y. As for Deep Battle, I do think it's still a very solid basis for a large military to use.
For a great example of what the Soviets could do when they did eventually get everything sorted out, you can look at their invasion of Manchuria in 1945, where they for once got to actually have real prep time and had the necessary experience from the fight against Germany to sort out all the bugs of their military model.
Yeah, it took a few years for them to get their shit together for various reasons, same as anyone who's just formed an entirely new nation, but once they had their shit together they were a force to be reckoned with and I honestly believe that up until the mid seventies or so they would have had the clear edge on NATO in any sort of hot conflict. The Red Army was not a push over even with its clear doctrinal limitations. Deep Battle was prototyped against the Japs in Manchuria and then matured against the Germans, it was a proven system that
worked.
So the Vietnam pullout part 2: Soviet edition.
The Soviets in Afghanistan had multiple parallels to the Americans in Vietnam although they were
far more successful in their goals.
So you're saying they got a fraction of what they wanted at a immense cost. Yeah thats not great.
Due in large part to the fact that hey accepted peace terms from the Finns and chose not to squash them flat like they could have. Which the Soviets didn't want anyways for numerous reasons that have been gone over in other posts here, but needless to say Finland was an unmitigated success for the Soviets and the anti-Soviet narrative of it is pure propaganda.
Also the Soviets are dead, so objectively, they did suck, they don't exist
Rome, the Ottomans, the Mongols, the British Empire, Alexander the Great, Oda Nobunaga, and numerous uncountable others also all suck by this metric.
Yeah the reverse speed is terrible, but I wouldn't go as far as to call it a pile of shit, especially for the time. It was very well armed, and armoured.
It still is even by modern standards. It's on the lower end of the tank threat scale but it's still undeniably a tank and requires anti-tank assets to effectively combat while remaining a viable anti-tank asset itself.
