I will expand upon this elsewhere but for where I'm at between two projects right now I believe this article fits this thread for now. Though this article covers a lot of ground it does address the concerns of the USMC about the HIND and it's overall assessment to defeat it and the Soviet helicopter threat overall on the battlefield and thus addresses by default most of the issues brought up in this thread to include at least on the Soviet side how the USMC perceived how their pilots would operate based on their combat performance to date of this paper. It is an honest evaluation of the CORPS ability to fight in this environment. Sorry but, yes this will require some reading.
The HIND has been around a few years now and the USMC was just getting their AH-1W COBRA gunships. Ground support would soon follow with the LAV-AD that was designed to be a close air support system and HIND killer. HIND protection level at this time was 12.7mm all angle protection on the fuselage, 35mm protection around the cockpit and bullet proof cockpit glass. This from 1988...
http://www.globalsecurity.org/milita...t/1988/ZMD.htm
Regards,
Pat
Re: Helicopter armor
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