Whatismoo's Unclassified Soviet Army Field Guide, Part 2: Protected Mobility

Part Two of my field guide to the vehicles and equipment of the late Cold War Soviet Army! Notes and corrections under the break!

Note 2: I forgot (completely) the Romanian TAB-79! This is another Non-Soviet Warsaw Pact BRDM equivalent, this time created by taking the Romanian TAB-77 (a modified BTR-70 with a home grown turret) and shortening it to make something akin to a BRDM-2. Its recognition features are: TAB-77 turret (like a BTR/BRDM turret with a big circular sight on the port side), BTR-70 style chassis, and 4 wheel (2 per side in a 4x4 arrangement) layout. It is amphibious and armed with a 14.5x114 main gun and 7.62x54r coaxial MG in a high angle fire turret. I'll probably make a video of "vehicles I forgot in the main series" as an appendix after the post-soviet developments video.

Corrections:
23:19 - 23:57 -- the top vehicle is a TAB-77, distinguished by the big circular sight on the port side of the high angle of fire turret. The bottom is a BTR-70M, which has the turret, engine, and transmission of a BTR-80. This completely slipped past me in editing, so that's on me, but the slide is just to show general configuration of BTR-70.

The BTR-80A shown is actually a BTR-82A, which has a stabilizer, one less firing port on the right side, the newer IR illuminator, and note some BTR-80A have the front firing port for commander removed.

BMD-4 *was* adopted, but it's produced in such small numbers I thought it was a prototype/pilot run. According to IISS Military Balance 2020 they only have 60 in service

FUG APC doesn't have a BRDM turret, it's it's own turret but looks and performs like a BRDM turret.

BMP-1 appears not to have received the SACLOS SAGGER / AT-3c SAGGER-C/9M14P Malyutka-P.

The appearance of U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) visual information does not imply or constitute DoD endorsement.

If you're interested in high quality discourse about defense topics, why not try the Combined Defense discord! Link is in the sidebar of /r/militarygfys.

A non-comprehensive list of sources is as follows:

Various images are sourced from the US Department of Defense, Russian Ministry of Defense or other official publications.
Other sources are available upon request.

Images and video are used under fair use, for whatever that disclaimer is worth. I'm not making a dime off this and it's pretty patently educational.

[infinitemess]

This is very satisfying to watch, A+ VHS editing into Soviet AFV development

[grantnorthcott]

Your videos bring back memories of AFV recognition classes while serving in the Canadian armoured back in 1976. Good job!

[irongiant]

a small note on soviet infantry vehicle crewing practice, while all APC/IFVs have 3 crew seats (Driver, gunner, commander) the vehicles are only crewed by two people, with the commander seat going to the infantry squad or platoon commander/Sargent (Sargent stays mounted and commands platoon's vehicles) when dismounted the gunner/operator takes over.

[samgeorge]

Thank you for the series I have been waiting

[newoldstock_]

Excellent! Glad to see this one come together. I always get a kick out
of hearing about the development histories. Pity about the glitch at the
beginning, but it happens. We've just got too much 80s power
here!

[samuelspratt]

Great video, I feel like the humour is how you survived writing and editing this long of a video.

[cannonfodder]

After so long, its finally here. Yet another fantastic and informative video, love the touches of humor here and there as well.

Will be looking forward to Part 3

[wardogangsta]

Outstanding working and quality I hope to see a unclassified Field Guide for the US in the future

[commissarcactus]

These videos are really fun. I love seeing all of the odd variants that people might not realize exist. My one complaint is that the narration is slightly too quiet.

[robs]

You deserve a lot more subs! Love your content

[Star_Lancer]

Pretty good overview. I found only two minor issues - photo of romanian TAB-77 along with BTR-70, and photo of BTR-82A (identified by two detached snorkels) when you are talking about BTR-80A.

[mr.andrew]

Russian name ‘Russian word with unfortunate homophone in English that means bassoon’.

It took me a second to understand the meaning of this, but when I got it I was probably laughing more than I should

[abzalamangos]

Amazing video series. Such a shame there's no continuation;(

[MM]

Open-topped NBC recon truck.
"It's a bold move, Cotton! Let's see if it pays off!"

[joshuamartinez]

There were also some external differences missed regarding the MLI-84.

Such as it lacking the additional ribbed armor on the upper front plate. Instead opting out for a smooth surface

As well as utilizing an entirely different engine but I suppose the video mainly focuses on external differences

[spamuraigranatabru]

ASU-85 is my favourite soviet vehicle ever.
Might not surprise anyone the PT-76 is my favourite soviet tank.

[JustinCase-qszv]

Very enjoyable and humourous video. But how do I determine an engineering vehicle version, oh that's right, you might notice the crane.😂

[skau-yeong]

Despite spending a mad amount of time researching the MT-LB and MT-LBu, I never saw any mention of the GT-MU and didn't know NATO referred to the ARK-1 Rhys (or Zoopark-1??) counter battery radar as 'Rice Bag'! I totally dig the 80s infomercial soundtrack! PS Do you think Small Fred and Big Fred were porn star inspired names?

[aldraone-muyg]

Where the hell does an airborne recovery vehicle return damaged vehicles to?
Back on to the plane? XD

[matthewwaddington]

This is why NATO armies didn’t go ‘kookoo’ for amphibious vehicles.