HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Wingham Advance-Times, 1985-05-01, Page 15leisure, features and entertainment
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Crossroads Wednesday, May 1 , 1985
The Leopard and the
friiIiPAC by Marion 1. Duke
..This is the fifth in a series of articles
by Marion 1 Duke, editor of The Listo-
' wel Banner, who participated in,a Ca-
nadian CommunityNewspapers Asso-
ciation study tour of Canadian Forces
in Europe, NATO's military headquar-
ters at Mons, Belgium, and the Cana-
dian embassy in Bonn, Germany.
It's Day 4 of this tour and we are
ready for work — up early for breakfast
and loaded down with cameras and
notebooks. Given the pace since we ar-
rived, I'm amazed we look as alert as
we do.
All of us marvel at the resilience of
Rick James. While he's a trifle pale,
Mr. James is a 100 per cent compared
to the previous. day.
Mr. James and a couple of others, in-
stead of coming back to the hotel from
the Bacra Bar had decided to take in a
few mote joints.
Somewhere along the line, said Mr.
James, he was given a glass of "funny
tasting wine". in any event, the follow-
ing day which was spent on a leisurely
drive through the Black Forest area,
was anything but enjoyable for Mr.
• James.
He might have been interested in the
large farmhouses, The tilled areas of
steep slopes, the kind of pioneer village
near Triberg, the lumbering and the
souvenir shop with its cuckoo clocks,
but his stomach wasn't.
Recalling the day at breakfast, Mr.
James says, "I wasn't seeing the Black
Forest; I was making a tour of WCs."
He looks relieved to find he actually
enjoyed a second orange juice.
However, we've no time to doddle •
over breakfast, or to swapstories. The
bus is picking us up at 8 a.M. and we're
to spendthe day visiting units of the 4
CanadianMechanized $rigade, Group,
First we are to see something of the •
armour unit, The.Royal Canadian Dra-
goons, then the artillery., the lst Regi-
ment,, Royal Canadian Hdrse Artillery,
both atCFB Lahr.
At noon we are to depart for CFB
Baden-Soellingen, locatedabout 50 km
to the north. There we will visit the in-
fantry, the 2nd Princess Patricia's
Light Infantry.,,
We are no sooner tat the bus than our
escort officer, Capt. Philip Anido, tells
us there .has been a slight change in
plans.
Instead astaying another night at
Hotel zum Ldwen we will have to book
out at noon and go to another hotel
There has been some kind of mix-up.
A groan goes through the bus. I guess
everyone's room is in the same kind of
mess my own is. Thisis an inconven-
ience on a tightly scheduled day. Had .
we known, we could have packed last
night and booked out at breakfast.
Ah, well.
THE DRAGOONS
After clearing the guard at the gate,
we proceed through the base. Capt.
Anido points out the various kinds of
shelters.
"These," he says, "are personnel
shelters. They are all over the base, put
close to places of work."
Each personnel shelter, he says,
holds about 110 people and is equipped
with a supply of water, etc.
Some of the larger bunkers, which
look like big culverts, are built to with-
stand chemical warfare. The ammuni-
tion bunkers look like mounds of earth.
We then pass the "hardened shel-
ters" which protect the fighter aircraft.
Now they hold the CF -104 Starfighters
but will soon house the new CF -18s.
Capt Anido says in every 48-hour _,
period deployment is practiced. "They
start them up inside the shelter, do
their checks, and are gone."
Not far past the aircraft shelters is
"the hut where we get gassed". The
captain says members of the Forces go
through the training at least once a
year, wearing masks with fuller's
.earth. "Some people get quite sick."
We arrive at the briefing room at 8:35
a.m. Providing us with some back-
ground on the Dragoons is. Maj. Mike
Appleton.
It's an old unit. The Royal Canadian
Dragoons, Maj. Appleton says, seriied
in the Northwest Rebellion, in the Boer
War, the First and Second World Wars
and in Korea.
The Dragoons have the distinction, of
being the only unit in which three mem-
bers won the Victoria Cross in a 24-hour
period. That happened backlit July 1900
during the battle of Springbok.
The RoyalCanadian Dragoons have
been in Lahr since 1970. In 1978 the
decision was made to equip the two
squadrons with the German -made Leo-
pard 1 and Leopard 2 tanks.
•
1
Members of a Canadian Community Newspapers Association group
on a study tour of Canadian Forces in Europe and NATO get a close
look at the Leopard tank at CFB Lahr. From left are: Ev van Duuren of
Huntsville (back to camera), Richard Collicutt of Kentville, N.S.:
unidentified soldier, Allan Willis of Sterner, Alta. (crawling up on
tank); Sgt. Breckenreid- (standing beside antenna flag), Peter
Schierbuck of Fairview, Alta., talking to a member of the tank crew;
and on top, Lorne Eedy of St. Marys, and Richard James of
Bowmanvilie.
These British -made Centurion tanks are part of a display at CFB
Lahr, Germany. Today the Royal Canadian Dragoons of 4 Canadian
Mechanized Brigade Group are equipped with the German -made
Leopard tanks.
Sgt. Brepkenreld of the Royal Canadian Dragoons (centre) talks to Timothy Crump of Kindersley, Sask.,
and Lorne Eedy of St. Marys, Ont. before they are given a ride on a Leopard tank. The driver is located in
the right front of the tank (left in photo), beside the turret.
"I don't buy
there, but
think it's
around a
million each."
Maj. Appleton explains each tank
carries a crew of four, a commander, a
radio operator -loader, a gunner, and a
driver. There are four tanks in a troop
and four troops in a squadron. Then
squadron headquarters has three
tanks, for a total of 19 tanks in each
squadron.
The tank squadron back in Canada is
located at Gagetown, N.B.
The Dragoons also has a reconnais-
sance squadron, supplied with the 20 -
.year -old Lynx,equipped with a_.50 -cali-
bre machine gun and a 7.62 mm ma-
chine gun.
"They're our scouts" Maj. Appleton
says. "They find out what is happening
and tell the tanks what is going on."
We are now ready to go out and have
a look at a demonstration arranged for
our benefit. Before leaving the briefing
room, I ask the major how much a tank
costs.
"A good question," he replies. "I
don't buy them, but 1 think it's around a
million each."
Before heading out to see the tanks,
we are outfitted in olive-green cover-
alls. Mine are roomy, leaving lots of
space to get my notebook from an in-
•
side pocket, and to shelter my camera.
Ev Van Duuren of Huntsville, the big-
gest guy in ourgroupp has a bit of diffi-
culty though. "I think I'll be all right as.
long as I don't try to bend over tooter,"
he grins.
Outside I..get my first look at a Leo-
pard
tank. I don't know if it's the model
1 or 2. There are a number of them lined
up and my first impression is that they
aren't as big as I expected.
I've read where this tank weighs
about 43 metric tons, is somewhere
between eight and 9.5 metres long, de-
pending upon where the gun is located,
is something over three `metres wide
and about 2.5 metres high.
That information sounded massive,
By comparison, I think these are trim
fighting machines.
We are introduced to Sgt. Brecken-
reid. He's short, stocky and looks about
as eaay to push around as thetank he's
telling us about.
WEAPONS' SYSTEMS
The Leopard Mkt was developed in
the 1960s. It can hold 895 litres of fuel,
has a road range of 500 km and a maxi -
Mum speed of 65 kmh. Later I ask one
of the soldiers how often they get it up to
65.
"Not very often," he grins.
The tank is equipped with a 10 -cylin-
der, multi -fuel engine, rated at 818 bhp.
Complete engine replacement is pos-
sible in half an hour under field con-
ditions.
Sgt. Breckenreid says the squadron
commander has "lots of leeway as far
as shallow and deep fording is con-
cerned".Properly fitted with external
gear, the tank is capable'of deep -ford-
ing or submerged fording where river
banks are prepared for exit and entry.
That about exhausts my knowledge of
things mechanical. However, what
makes this machine the fighting force it
is, is its weapons system.
In preparation for this trip, I have
done considerable reading. At least one
thing has stuck in My mind. It was in an
article in The Atlantic Monthly on the
new.lsraelitank, the Merkava, which I
read just a day before leaving.
According to that article, if NATO
and Warsaw Pact forces ever fight a
conventional warin Europe, the victory
will go to the side with the best tank.
Given all the ballyhoo we've heard
about the importance of getting the best
'fighter aircraft for our Forces, and
whether we should have bought the F=16
instead of theF-18, I don't know quite
what to make of this statement regard-
ing the tank; but I'm determined to at
least wade through the stats on the Leo-
pard.
Besides, one ought to know what is
available these days for a million bucks
in tax dollars.
The Leopard weapons systems in-
clude a main armament, fume -
extracted 105 mm gun; a 7.62 co -axially
mounted machine gun, and a 7.62 mm
crew commander's machine gun. ,
In addition, the tank is fitted with two
banks of smoke grenade dischargers on
the turret to create local cover.
On -board ammunition is 59 rounds -for.
the main armament: and 4,000 rounds
for the 7.62 mm guns.
The main armament ammunition is
mean sounding stuff. It includes: ar-
mour piercing fin stabilized discarding
sabot (outer casing), known in military
jargon as APFSDS; armour piercing
discarding sabot (APDS) ; high explo-
sive squashhead (HESH) and high ex-
plosive plastic (HEP); high explosive
anti-tank (HEAT) and smoke.
The descriptions are awkward. They
are also accurate explanations of what
this kind of ammunition does.
The APFSDS is a Tong -range projec-
tile, capable of piercing the armour of
another tank and then splintering into
who knows how many particles.
The-HESHslams.against whatever it
hits, with the explosive setting off shock
waves to destroyinterior surfaces. The
HEAT projectile has its cone lined with
metal, usually copper. Upon impact,
the metal is gasified and forms a kind of
drill that pierces the opposineirmour.
Sgt. Breckenreid tells us the tank has
a maximum weapons range of from 600
to 7,800 metres, but is most effective be-
tween 600 and 4,000 metres.
For communications its two long-
range radios are good for 20 miles. We
are also told the Leopard can be sealed -
off against nuclear contamination on
the nuclear battlefield.
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